News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Decades-Old Graph Problem Yields to Amateur Mathematician by Mediterraneo10 on Tuesday April 17, 2018 @08:37PM (#16863663)
There are a lot of charities handing out mosquito nets in a driveby fashion. There are not many charities working closely enough with local communities to ensure that those mosquito nets will actually be used, and they won’t be turned into fishing nets instead. If you donate to malaria prevention, make sure it’s a truly hands-on charity.
Re:Decades-Old Graph Problem Yields to Amateur Mathematician by iak8god on Tuesday April 17, 2018 @08:43PM (#16863695)
Thank you for the information. I have no connection to the charity I linked (except I think I may have given them $50 once), and I don't know which charities, if any, are effective at preventing malaria. Maybe they should be giving out fishing nets as well. It's telling that for the communities receiving these nets, they see starvation as a more immediate threat.

Anyway, my point is just that if you're looking to make optimal use of money to save or improve human lives, there are many things that should be higher priorities than stopping people dying "of old age" in the West.

Re:Decades-Old Graph Problem Yields to Amateur Mathematician by billhendricksjr on Wednesday April 18, 2018 @08:29AM (#16866789)
Clean water is an exponentially larger problem than any single disease. From Flint, MI to Malawi, no one is going to listen to any aid worker about anything else if they’re dying due to lack of clean drinking water.

https://www.charitywater.org/global-water-crisis/