• New study: Poverty has decreased more than we thought, as has inequality – including within countries. Warp News.
• Real wages of low-wage workers grew 12.1% between 2019 and 2023. Economic Policy Institute.
• Each of the past four generations of Americans (Millennials, Generation X, Baby Boomers, and Silent Generation) was better off than the previous one. SSRN.
• In Cambodia over the last two decades, the mortality rate from tuberculosis has dropped by 45 percent, saving an estimated 400,000 lives. The Star.
• Toxic chemical releases have declined 21% in 10 years in USA. Clean Technica.
• Scientists say they have successfully eliminated HIV from infected cells, using Nobel Prize-winning Crispr gene-editing technology. BBC.
• Surgeons transplant pig kidney into a patient, a medical milestone. New York Times.

For more good news, check out Fix the News and The Progress Network.

• For the first time on record, the number of children worldwide who died before their 5th birthday has dipped below 5 million. In 2022, 4.9 million young children died – that’s fewer than half the number who died in 2000. NPR.
• In the United States, there was a 13% decline in murder last year (the largest one-year decline ever recorded), 6% decline in violent crime, (likely the lowest rate since the late 1960s), and a 4% decline in property crime. Jeff-alytics.
• Germany’s emissions fell by record 10.1% in 2023. Euronews.
• Brazil installed about 17 gigawatts of solar last year, roughly equal to its entire solar market in 2021. These catapulted Brazil to the world’s third largest solar market in 2023, after China and the US. BloombergNEF.
• Woman given a new 3D-printed windpipe in a world-first. BBC.

For more good news, check out Fix the News and The Progress Network.

• India eliminates extreme poverty. Brookings.
• Breast cancer death rate dropped 58 percent over the past 44 years in the U.S. The Washington Post.
• After near extinction, the saltwater crocodile has achieved a full recovery in Australia. Science Direct.
• The Florida Golden Aster removed from the endangered list. US Fish and Wildlife Service.
• In Pakistan mangroves expanded nearly threefold between 1986 and 2020. Mongabay.
• Since 2016, 2.5 million plants and 880,000 trees have been planted in 30 corridors in Medellín, reducing pollution and bringing temperatures down by 2°C in a city of 2.5 million people. Reasons to be Cheerful.
• 1 in 5 new car sales globally were EVs in 2023. Electrek.
• In 2023, solar represented over half of the electricity added to the United States grid. Latitude Media.
• Spain has so much solar that electricity costs are almost free. Bloomberg.
• Due to a new breakthrough, life expectancy for those with cystic fibrosis has risen from 35 to 82. The Atlantic.
• In Nepal, the maternal mortality rate has declined from 536 per 100,000 live births in 1996 to 151 by 2021. Nepali Times.
• Nearly half the electricity produced in the Netherlands is now renewable. CBS.

For more good news, check out Fix the News and The Progress Network.

• $1 billion donation will provide free tuition at a Bronx medical school. The New York Times.
• Italy, home of the mafia, now one of Europe’s safest countries. Yahoo News.
• The Biden-Harris Administration has approved student debt cancellation for nearly 3.9 million Americans totaling almost $138 billion in relief. US Department of Education.
• Slovenia has seen cases of cervical cancer drop by almost half over the last 20 years, with the number of deaths from the disease also falling. WHO.
• Nepal’s Terai Arc Landscape initiative restored 66,800 hectares of forest and significantly increased the Bengal tiger population in the region. Mongabay.
• How Finland halved its suicide rate. The Guardian.
• Electric car sales hit record with over 1 million sold in January. Warp News.

For more good news, check out Future Crunch and The Progress Network.

• How Finland conquered homelessness. Spiegel.
• Critically endangered parrot bounces back in huge conservation victory. Science Alert.
• Mapping the world’s corals reveals more reefs than previously known. Bloomberg.
• Greece becomes first Orthodox Christian country to legalize same-sex marriage. The Guardian.
• In the half-century before the covid-19 pandemic, the black unemployment rate was on average twice as high as the white one. At the end of last year the black unemployment rate was only 1.5% higher than the white one, the narrowest gap on record. The Economist.
• Polio eradication is within reach. Our World in Data.
• Cambodia on track to eradicate malaria by 2025. Khmer Times.

For more good news, check out Future Crunch and The Progress Network.

• The United States has cut heart disease death rates by 70% since 1950 and stroke death rates by nearly a third since 1998. American Heart Association (PDF link).
• The poverty rate in Cambodia has declined from 36.7 percent in 2014 to 16.6 percent in 2022 and the number of poor people was halved from 5.6 million to 2.8 million. Khmer Times.
• Millennials have a real median household income that is 18 percent higher than that of the previous generation at the same age. Federal Reserve (PDF link).
• 95,000 Mauritanians supplied with clean drinking water thanks to decentralized cooperation. Afrik21.
• Agricultural growth key to accelerated poverty reduction in Bangladesh. The Financial Express.
• The Dominican Republic miracle: a fifth of the country regreened in 10 years. El Pais.
• European bison are no longer considered to be endangered. BBC.
• China’s carbon emissions are set to decline years earlier than expected. The Wall Street Journal.
• South Australia reached a record average of 82 per cent renewables in the December quarter. Renew Economy.
• In a first, a prosthetic limb can sense temperature like a living hand. Smithsonian.

For more good news, check out Future Crunch and The Progress Network.