David Farrar: 66 good news stories

Future Crunch reports on 66 good news stories that you probably never heard of, as legacy media focuses on doom and gloom. They include:A record number of countries eliminated diseases this year

• US reported cancer death rates have fallen by a third in the last three decades

• Two malaria vaccines are about to be released

• Exclusive breastfeeding has increased from 38% to 48% globally in the last decade

• Age-standardised drowning mortality rates falling by 57.4% in the last three decades.

• World's solar capacity has doubled in the last 18 months, and that solar is now the fastest-growing energy technology in history

• Just two years ago, one in 25 cars sold globally was an electric vehicle. This year it will be one in five, and by 2025, one in two

• Discovery of huge new deposits of lithium in the United States and phosphate in Norway, a plunge in lithium and cobalt prices as new mines and processing plants solved shortages sooner than expected

• india, which has lifted hundreds of millions of people out poverty in the last two decades, and Indonesia, which has reduced its share of people living on less than $3.20 a day from 61% in 2002 to 16% in 2022

• Over the past three decades, global suicide rates have fallen by more than a third

• unicef reported that there are 50 million more girls in school today than there were in 2015

• Between 2000 and 2022, 2.1 billion people have gained access to safe drinking water

• India, home to the highest number of teenage brides, reported that the proportion of all girls married before the age of 18 has fallen from 46% to 23% in the last 15 years

• The UN High Seas Treaty is the first international agreement on ocean protection since 1982, providing for the common governance of half the Earth's surface, and paving the way for conservation on the high seas, with the aim of protecting at least 30% of the planet by 2030. Only about 1% of the high seas is currently protected.

• Brazil's deforestation rate fell by over 50%, the largest single year decline since records began

• Japanese scientists discovered a plastic-eating bacteria that could help solve global waste

What we can do with science is amazing,

David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders.