Disaster

Russia has shut down four McDonald’s restaurants in Moscow for sanitary violations after a consumer watchdog filed a suit demanding certain burgers and milkshakes be banned on the grounds the fat, protein, carbohydrates and calories they contain “deviate widely from technical norms”. “Violations have been found that put the quality and safety of food products in doubt for the whole McDonald’s chain,” said Anna Popova, Russia’s head sanitary inspector.

Flint, Michigan has declared a state of emergency after officials discovered that children had dangerous levels of lead in their blood.  Flint Mayor Karen Weaver declared that state of emergency on Monday night, saying “the City of Flint has experienced a Manmade disaster.” Washingtonpost.com reports: The mayor — elected after her predecessor, Dayne Walling, experienced fallout from his administration’s handling of the water problems — said in the statement that she was seeking support from the federal government to deal with the “irreversible” effects of lead exposure on the city’s childre

In addition to its now traditional credit-funded boom-bubble-bust cycle which rotates from asset to asset, and is then promptly recycled courtesy of the nearly $35 trillion in various financial system "assets", another staple of the "new" Chinese economy are smog alerts following every burst in economic strength driven by "old economy" manufacturing.

A red alert for air pollution has been issued in the Chinese capital for the first time this year as choking smog is expected to cover the city and surrounding areas in north China during the next five days. The red alert, the highest in the color-coded warning system, will come into force at 08:00 p.m. local time on Friday. Private cars will be ordered off the road, with an odd-even number plate system in force, according to a notice posted on the official website of the Beijing municipal government.

As reported earlier, in an attempt to demonstrate how advanced (and safe) Uber's "self-driving" technology is, the company rolled out a trial of its self-driving Volvo XC90 cars in San Francisco, the second city it has done so after Pittsburgh. However, in a surprising twist, Uber did not obtain a preapproval from the California DMV, perhaps in an attempt to avoid making a public disclosure of any potential infractions its cars might got into.