The U.N.’s atomic energy chief has warned Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that the perilous situation at Europe’s largest nuclear plant “isn’t getting any better." The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant has lost several of its power transmission cables during the war with Russia, and on multiple occasions has had to switch to emergency diesel generators to power its essential cooling systems to prevent a meltdown. International Atomic Energy Agency Director-General Rafael Grossi met with Zelenskyy on Monday as relentless fighting in the area puts the Russian-held plant at risk of a disaster. Grossi said the situation at the plant remains tense because of the heavy military presence around it and a recent blackout that recently hit the facility.

Utah has become the first state to sign into law legislation that attempts to limit teenagers’ access to social media apps. Republican Gov. Spencer Cox signed a pair of measures Thursday requiring parental consent before kids can sign up for sites like TikTok and Instagram. The two bills Cox signed into law also prohibit kids under 18 from using social media between the hours of 10:30 p.m. and 6:30 a.m. They also require age verification for anyone who wants to use social media in the state and seek to prevent tech companies from luring kids to their apps using addictive features. Other states, such as Arkansas, Texas, Ohio and Louisiana have similar bills in the works.

Humanity still has a chance, close to the last one, to prevent the worst of climate change’s future harms, a top United Nations panel of scientists said Monday. But doing so requires quickly slashing carbon pollution and fossil fuel use, 60% by 2035, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said. The United Nations chief said it more bluntly, calling for an end to new fossil fuel exploration and rich countries quitting coal, oil and gas use by 2040. This is likely the last warning the IPCC will be able to make about the 1.5 mark because their next set of reports will likely come after Earth has either breached the mark or locked into exceeding it soon, several scientists, including report authors, said.

U.S. health advisers are backing the continued use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 pill Paxlovid, saying it remains an important option for adults at high risk of severe illness. The panel of Food and Drug Administration experts agreed Thursday that the drug is safe and effective for preventing severe COVID-19 in adults with health risks. The medication has been used by millions of Americans since the FDA  granted it emergency use authorization more than two years ago. Pfizer is asking the FDA to grant the drug full approval to remain on the market. The agency is expected to make a decision by May.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has ordered a number of improvements in access to mental health care to try to reduce suicides in the military. But he is holding off on endorsing more controversial recommendations to restrict gun and ammunition purchases by young troops, sending them to another panel for study. The orders issued Thursday reflect increasing concerns about suicides in the military, despite more than a decade of programs and other efforts to prevent them and spur greater intervention by commanders, friends and family members. But Austin's omission of any gun safety and control measures underscore the likelihood that they would face staunch resistance, particularly in Congress, where such legislation has struggled in recent years.

A new “good neighbor” rule issued by the Environmental Protection Agency will restrict smokestack emissions from power plants and other industrial sources that burden downwind areas with smog-causing pollution they can’t control. Nearly two dozen states will have to cut harmful industrial emissions of nitrogen oxide and other pollutants to improve air quality for millions of people living in downwind communities. EPA says the final rule, which was issued Wednesday, will save thousands of lives, keep tens of thousands of people out of the hospital and prevent millions of asthma attacks. But the National Mining Association blasted the rule as part of an ongoing effort by the EPA to force coal-fired power plants to close.

Scientists are studying hundreds of dogs at the Chernobyl disaster site that have managed to survive in extremely harsh conditions. They hope that examining the animals' genetics will give them insight into how humans can live in the most brutal of environments. They published their initial study on Friday in the journal Science Advances. They say the work sets the stage for future studies that can answer questions such as: What types of genetic changes help dogs and other mammals survive? And what might hurt their survival chances?

The House has voted unanimously to declassify U.S. intelligence information about the origins of COVID-19. The 419-0 vote Friday was a sweeping show of bipartisan support near the third anniversary of the start of the deadly pandemic. It was final approval of the bill, sending it to President Joe Biden’s desk to be signed into law. Debate was brief and to the point: Americans have questions about how the deadly virus started and what can be done to prevent future outbreaks. Congressman Michael Turner says the American public “deserves answers to every aspect” of the pandemic. The World Health Organization declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic on March 11, 2020.

ANNAPOLIS — The Maryland House voted Friday for a measure that would create a legal framework and tax structure to enable recreational marijua…

Two Americans are back on U.S. soil after surviving a deadly abduction in Mexico. They were brought to a Texas hospital for treatment on Tuesday. Two other Americans were killed. Irving Barrios, Tamaulipas state’s top prosecutor, confirmed the two surviving Americans were turned over to U.S. authorities at the international bridge to Brownsville, Texas. The Brownsville Herald reported the two were then taken to Valley Regional Medical Center with an FBI escort. A relative of one of the victims said Monday that the four had traveled together from the Carolinas so one of them could get a tummy tuck surgery.

Iran’s president has ordered authorities to investigate a series of incidents in which noxious fumes have sickened students at girls' schools, which some officials suspect are attacks targeting women’s education. Hundreds of girls at around 30 schools have been sickened since November, with some winding up in hospital beds. Wednesday's presidential order comes after officials initially dismissed the incidents, only acknowledging the scope of the crisis in recent days. Unlike neighboring Afghanistan, Iran has no history of religious extremists targeting girls’ education. Women and girls continued attending school even at the height of the 1979 Islamic Revolution that toppled Iran’s Western-backed monarchy.

U.S. intelligence agencies say they cannot link a foreign adversary to any of the incidents associated with so-called “Havana syndrome,” the hundreds of cases of brain injuries and other symptoms reported by American personnel around the world.  The findings released Wednesday by U.S. intelligence officials cast doubt on the longstanding suspicions by many people who reported cases that Russia or another country may have been running a global campaign to harass or attack Americans using some form of directed energy. Instead, officials say, there is more evidence that foreign countries were not involved.

Federal health advisers have narrowly backed an experimental vaccine from Pfizer that could become the first shot to protect older adults against the respiratory illness known as RSV. A panel of Food and Drug Administration advisers voted 7-4 in favor of the shot's safety and effectiveness for people 60 and older. The recommendation is non-binding and the FDA will make its own decision on the vaccine. For most healthy people, RSV is a cold-like nuisance. But the virus can be dangerous for young children and the elderly. Pfizer and GlaxoSmithKline are each seeking FDA approval for two new vaccines to protect older Americans from infections.