Todd K. Cowan, MD, a Family Physician with Texas Health Family Care

Click here for more articles by Kormedi.com. Sharing french fries with a friend can sometimes lead to a familiar moment: You take a bite, then plunge the same fry back into the communal ketchup. It may seem harmless, particularly among close friends. Children and teenagers sometimes jokingly call sharing food this way an "indirect kiss." As it turns out, the joke may have a little science behind it. Bacteria from the mouth can indeed make their way into a shared sauce when someone takes a bite and dips the food again, a practice known as "double dipping." But how many double dips would it take to transfer roughly as many bacteria as a 10-second kiss? The answer, based on a playful comparison of findings from separate studies, is around 800,000. Double dipping can transfer oral bacteria Researchers at Clemson University in the United States examined how much bacteria could be transferred when a person bites into food and then dips it back into a shared sauce. Their findings were published in the Journal of Food Safety. The experiment confirmed that bacteria from the mouth can enter the sauce

When a shark estimated at around two meters in length — believed to be a bronze whaler or dusky shark — drifted unannounced into the harbor off Busan’s North Port, it transformed almost overnight from a surprise guest into a viral mascot for Korea’s second-largest city. Now, municipal officials are stepping in to ensure that the unlikely local celebrity remains a public asset rather than a corporate cash cow. The city government said Friday that it will file trademark applications this month for "Bukangi," the affectionate moniker bestowed upon the shark currently frequenting the North Port Waterfront Park. The decision comes after officials discovered five unauthorized trademark applications filed by a private individual on Sept. 21. The private claims seek exclusive commercial rights over the name in both Korean and English, alongside design graphics covering roughly 40 product categories, including keychains, plush toys and apparel. While trademark filings do not grant automatic rights under Korean law, city administrators warned that a private registration could severely res

A special counsel team on Friday sought an 18-month prison term for Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon in a political funds case over opinion polls conducted in the lead-up to the 2021 mayoral by-election. Special counsel Min Joong-ki's team made the request at the Seoul High Court after a lower court fined Oh 10 million won ($7,400) for violating the Political Funds Act, putting him at risk of losing his mayoral post. Under the law, elected officials are stripped of their seats if they receive a finalized fine of 1 million won or heavier punishment for accepting illegal political funds. Oh was indicted on charges of having a supporter pay 33 million won for opinion poll results he received on 10 occasions from self-proclaimed power broker Myung Tae-kyun ahead of the by-election in April 2021. The lower court partially recognized the charges, ruling that Oh had asked Myung for opinion polls on five occasions and his supporter paid a total of 21 million won. "Defendant Oh Se-hoon is a prominent politician who, more than anyone else, is in a position to follow the Political Funds Act," Min's team said,

A court of appeals on Friday upheld a lower court's ruling in favor of Steve Yoo, a Korean American singer, in his third lawsuit seeking to overturn the Korean government's decision to deny him an entry visa after he renounced his Korean citizenship, allegedly to evade mandatory military service. The Seoul High Court ruled that the decision by the Korean Consulate General in Los Angeles to deny Yoo an entry visa must be revoked, upholding a ruling by the Seoul Administrative Court in August last year. The high court did not provide a specific explanation for its ruling. The case is an appeal of Yoo's third lawsuit against the LA consulate general after it denied his visa application. Yoo, 48, also known by his Korean name Yoo Seung-jun, has been barred from entering Korea after he became a U.S. citizen and renounced his Korean citizenship in 2002, with the alleged goal of dodging his military duty. Yoo first filed a lawsuit in 2015 after the LA consulate general refused to issue him a visa. In 2020, Yoo won a Supreme Court ruling that the visa refusal was procedurally flawed. After the to

Zheng Yongnian is a political scientist in China and a government adviser. His academic work is mainly about contemporary China, particularly politics, the country’s transformation and its external relations. SCMP Plus readers get early access to articles in the Open Questions series. Many have offered a lukewarm assessment of the Xi-Trump summit in Washington, citing the lack of a breakthrough. What is your take? There are two primary views right now. One is nihilism, which holds that China and...

A small Singaporean research team has beaten scientists in China and the United States to build the world’s most accurate atomic clock. The clock, built with a single ion of a rare earth metal element known as lutetium, is so precise that it would lose one second every 260 billion years – nearly 20 times the age of our universe. It is about four times as accurate as the previous record holder, a calcium-ion clock developed by a Chinese Academy of Sciences team in Wuhan, and also surpasses an...

Hong Kong socialite Abby Choi Tin-fung died of head injuries after being hit with a hammer during a car journey she believed was to pick up her daughter from school, a court has heard. Prosecutors on Friday detailed how three of Choi’s former relatives rented a remote village house and went on a shopping spree to acquire items they needed before allegedly killing the 28-year-old and disposing of her body on February 21, 2023. Choi’s ex-husband Alex Kwong Kong-chi, 31, his father Kwong Kau, 68,...

Deputy commissioner Cheryl Scanlon joined the service in 1986 as a 19-year-old.

Yusuf Zahab was only 12 when his family took him to Syria, and is now in prison in Iraq with about 12 other Australians, where they face the death penalty.

A man who paid to watch children being sexually abused online in overseas live shows for years has been jailed for almost two decades, police say.

Investor confidence remains shaky as inflation, interest rates and a challenging earnings environment loom.

China has set a five-year goal for the expansion of intelligent computing capacity to drive artificial intelligence (AI) that calls for a more than fourfold increase on what was in place at the end of June this year. To reach the 2030 target while being blocked by the United States from importing the most advanced Western-made AI chips will require innovation, adaptation and the application and coordination of vast resources. Judging by the 177 per cent increase in capacity achieved in the year...