Amid mounting concerns over the risk of nuclear war, North Korea has been quietly amassing the infrastructure needed to create bioweapons as well. From building factories equipped to manufacture microbes "by the ton" and laboratories capable of genetically modifying…
Can scientific and medical collaborations succeed where political negotiations have failed? Some South Korean researchers believe so. In a cohort study called NORNS, the researchers are measuring the physical and mental health of more than 1,100 North Korean refugees and…
A media campaign to quit smoking, as well as pressure from wives, daughters, mothers and girlfriends appears to be paying off in North Korea, where an estimated 54 percent of adult males smoke. The ratio of male smokers in 2013 was down 8 percent when compared with 2009…
If you haven’t heard much about family planning and sex in North Korea, well, neither have many North Koreans. Ji-Min Kang, who defected to South Korea, describes growing up in a “black hole” of information: zero sex education. “Sex is a form of hedonism that people aren’t…
North Korea claimed that it successfully tested a hydrogen bomb last night, and US and South Korean scientists confirmed seismic activity in the country’s northeast. If true, it would mark a major step toward North Korea’s goal to build a warhead capable of reaching the…
