The US FDA’s proposed rule on laboratory-developed tests: Impacts on clinical laboratory testing

Latin America refers to the regions in the Americas where Romance languages—derived from Latin, such as Spanish, Portuguese, and French—are predominantly spoken. The term is commonly used to describe South America (excluding Suriname, Guyana and the Falkland islands), Central America, Mexico, and most of the islands in the Caribbean. In a narrower sense, it often refers specifically to Spanish America, but it may also include Brazil (Portuguese-speaking America). The term is broader than Hispanic America, which exclusively refers to Spanish-speaking nations, but narrower than Ibero-America, which includes all countries in the Americas with Spanish and Portuguese heritage, and occasionally European countries like Spain and Portugal.

The term Latin America was first introduced in 1856 at a Paris conference titled Initiative of America: Idea for a Federal Congress of the Republics (Iniciativa de la América. Idea de un Congreso Federal de las Repúblicas). Chilean politician Francisco Bilbao coined the term to unify countries with shared cultural and linguistic heritage. It gained further prominence during the 1860s under the rule of Napoleon III, whose government sought to justify France's intervention in the Second Mexican Empire. Napoleon III extended the term to include French-speaking territories in the Americas, such as French Canada, Haiti, French Louisiana, French Guiana, and the French Antillean Creole Caribbean islands (e.g., Martinique, Guadeloupe, Saint Lucia, and Dominica). This broader conceptualization aligned with France’s geopolitical ambitions to categorize these regions alongside the predominantly Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking countries of the Americas. (Full article...)

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Map of Central America with Costa Rica highlighted
Map of Central America with Costa Rica highlighted

Costa Rica is administratively divided into seven provinces which are subdivided into 84 cantons, and these are further subdivided into districts. Cantons are the only administrative division in Costa Rica that possess local government in the form of municipalities. Each municipality has its own mayor and several representatives, all of them chosen via municipal elections every four years.

The original 14 cantons were established in 1848, and the number has risen gradually by the division of existing cantons. Law no. 4366 of 19 August 1969, which outlines the creation of administrative divisions of Costa Rica, states that new cantons may only be created if they have at least one percent of the republic's total population, which was 5,044,197 as of the latest estimate (2022). The newest canton, Puerto Jiménez, was created on June 21, 2022, from the canton of Golfito. (Full article...)

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Sign reading "Education is not for sale" during a Chilean student protest in June 2011

The 2011–2013 Chilean protests – known as the Chilean Winter (in particular reference to the massive protests of August 2011) or the Chilean Education Conflict (as labelled in Chilean media) – were a series of student-led protests across Chile, demanding a new framework for education in the country, including more direct state participation in secondary education and an end to the existence of profit in higher education. Currently in Chile, only 45% of high school students study in traditional public schools and most universities are also private. No new public universities have been built since the end of the Chilean transition to democracy in 1990, even though the number of university students has increased.

Beyond the specific demands regarding education, there is a feeling that the protests reflect a "deep discontent" among some parts of society with Chile's high level of inequality. Protests have included massive non-violent marches, but also a considerable amount of violence on the part of a side of protestors as well as riot police. (Full article...)

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Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Credit: Luis Argerich

Skyline of the City of Buenos Aires, capital and largest city in Argentina, and the most visited city in South America. This picture shows specifically the district of Puerto Madero.

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Hands at the Cuevas de las Manos upon Río Pinturas, near the town of Perito Moreno in Santa Cruz Province, Argentina
Hands at the Cuevas de las Manos upon Río Pinturas, near the town of Perito Moreno in Santa Cruz Province, Argentina
Cueva de las Manos (Spanish for Cave of Hands) is a cave or a series of caves located in the province of Santa Cruz, Argentina, 163 km (101 mi) south of the town of Perito Moreno. It is famous for (and gets its name from) the paintings of hands. The art in the cave dates from 13,000 to 9,000 years ago.Several waves of people occupied the cave, and early artwork has been carbon-dated to ca. 9300 BP (about 7300 BC). The age of the paintings was calculated from the remains of bone-made pipes used for spraying the paint on the wall of the cave to create silhouettes of hands. The site was last inhabited around 700 AD, possibly by ancestors of the Tehuelche people. It was entered on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1991.

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