👋 Grüezi!*
Welcome to Tuesday, where the death toll rises to 41 after Russian strikes on Kyiv’s main children's hospital, former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is accused of embezzling $1.2 million worth of jewelry, and it’s bull run week in Pamplona. Meanwhile, for investigative news agency Agência Pública, Augusta Lunardi reports on the difficulty for Brazilian trans women to access hormone therapy, and how some are forced to self-medicate, even using animal hormones.
[*Swiss German]
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🗞️ FRONT PAGE
“Putin, message to Europe,” Italian daily La Stampa dedicates its front page to the Russian missile attack on Ukraine which targeted the country’s biggest children’s hospital. The newspaper compiles three articles on what the international community unanimously condemned.
🌎 7 THINGS TO KNOW RIGHT NOW
• Death toll rises in Ukraine, NATO summit begins. The toll across Ukraine has risen to at least 41 killed after Russia shelled the main children's hospital in Kyiv and other targets in cities across the country with a missile in broad daylight on Monday. U.S. President Joe Biden has condemned the attacks and vowed to strengthen Kyiv’s air defenses ahead of the NATO summit starting in Washington on Tuesday. For Biden, the summit will be seen as a public test if he is capable of carrying on his reelection bid, as a growing number of Democrats are urging him to pull out of the race to defeat Donald Trump.
• Israeli forces step up military offensive in Gaza. Israeli forces killed at least 18 Palestinians on the second day of a stepped-up military offensive in Gaza on Tuesday, jeopardizing possible ceasefire talks. Qatari and Egyptian mediators, backed by the United States, have accelerated their efforts this week to seal a ceasefire deal aimed at ending the Gaza war and releasing Israeli hostages in return for Palestinians prisoners jailed in Israel. Follow Worldcrunch’s international coverage of the war in Gaza here.
• Bolsonaro embezzled undeclared jewelry, Brazil's police say. Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro has been accused of embezzling roughly $1.2 million worth of jewelry during his time in office, including a diamond-encrusted Rolex and Patek Philippe watches. Bolsonaro was indicted last week on charges of embezzlement, asset laundering and criminal association in connection with the luxury jewelry from Saudi Arabia.
• Storm Beryl kills three in Texas. Tropical Storm Beryl brought strong winds and torrential rain to southeast Texas on Monday, killing at least three people, flooding highways, closing oil ports, canceling more than 1,300 flights and knocking out power to more than 2.7 million homes and businesses. The U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said conditions could create tornadoes in Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas.
• Russian court jails two theater figures. A Russian playwright and a theater director have been found guilty of “justifying terrorism” by a military court in Moscow. Director Yevgenia Berkovich and playwright Svetlana Petrichuk were sentenced to six years each for the production of their play The Brave Falcon Finist. Inspired by true events, the play tells the story of Russian women who traveled to Syria during the country's civil war to marry members of the Islamic State group. Human rights groups say the pair were targeted because of their opposition to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Read more about Russia and culture in this article, translated from Ukrainian by Worldcrunch.
• Rugby players arrested in Argentina over sexual assault allegations. Two France international rugby players have been arrested in Argentina following allegations of sexual assault. Oscar Jegou, 21, and Hugo Auradou, 20, were detained in Buenos Aires on Monday and will be transported to Mendoza, where local reports claim the crime allegedly took place against a woman. The French national team is currently on a tour of South America.
• Singapore approves insects as food. Singapore’s state food agency (SFA) has approved 16 species of edible insects for sale and consumption in the country. Insects approved by the SFA include locusts, grasshoppers, mealworms and several species of beetle. And, if you must, we offer this piece from the Worldcrunch vault, about a French startup looking to conquer the world of “insect meat.”
#️⃣ BY THE NUMBERS
52 years
Fifty-two years and 39 Italian governments after it was envisioned, Milan’s Brera Modern museum will finally be inaugurated, with an official opening set up on Dec. 7. The completion of this project faced delays after delays, most recently the discovery of asbestos. The new museum, linked to the Brera Painting Gallery will house more than 100 contemporary art works that had mostly been relegated to storage.
📰 STORY OF THE DAY
Without access to hormone therapy, Brazilian trans women turn to risky veterinary medicine
Brazil's public health system has offered free access to the transsexualization process since 2008. But difficulties in accessing hormone therapy, transphobia among public health officials and the high cost of private care are pushing some trans women to self-medicate, even with animal hormones — with dangerous side effects, reports Augusta Lunardi investigative news agency Agência Pública.
💉 In dozens of Facebook groups about hormone therapy, trans men and women exchange information. There are several messages about estradiol cypionate, or ECP as the substance is more commonly called. Exclusively for veterinary use in Brazil, ECP is a hormonal agent used to correct anestrus (absence of heat) in cows, mares, sows and sheep. In humans, its use can cause liver damage, increase the risk of liver cancer and lead to thrombosis, heart attacks and strokes.
🏥 Agência Pública spoke with trans women who currently use or have used ECP in their hormonal transition processes. They said that difficulties in accessing hormone therapy through Brazil's publicly-funded Unified Health System (SUS) and the high cost of obtaining private care pushes them to self-medicate. In the case of ECP, the main attractions are the low cost of the drug, ease of access and, above all, the promise of supposedly faster results.
🩺 Ana Vitória Saraiva de Azevedo Pontes began her hormonal transition at the age of 19, while studying law at the Federal Rural University of the Semi-Árido (Ufersa) in Mossoró, Rio Grande do Norte. She says that the specialist refused to see her and carry out the blood tests needed to start the hormonalization process. "The doctor didn't even look me in the eye. That really hurt me. That doctor's transphobia definitely pushed me towards self-medication," she said.
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📹 THIS HAPPENED VIDEO — TODAY IN HISTORY, IN ONE ICONIC PHOTO
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📣 VERBATIM
“It is a […] devastating blow to peace efforts to see the leader of the world’s largest democracy hug the world’s most bloody criminal in Moscow on such a day.”
— In a message posted on X/Twitter, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky shared his outrage over India President Narendra Modi’s visit to Vladimir Putin in Moscow the very same day a Russian missile destroyed Kyiv’s Okhmatdyt children’s hospital. Modi did not address the strikes while speaking to the Indian diaspora in Moscow on Tuesday, but instead praised relations between the two countries and the opening of two new consulates in the Russian cities of Yekaterinburg and Kazan to “facilitate travel and business.”
👉 MORE FROM WORLDCRUNCH
• The Far Right Defeat In France Isn't Stopping Viktor Orban's Big Plans To Weaken Europe — FRANCE INTER
• Secret Abortion In The Arab World: A Lebanese Woman Shares Her Story — DARAJ
• The Pious, Political And Musical Twists Of Egypt's "Islamic Bands" — AL-MANASSA
✍️ Newsletter by Emma Albright and Laure Gautherin
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