The images are searing: a Russian man, ordinary-looking designer eyewear fittingly fixed on his face, approaching women in Accra’s malls, on its beaches, along its streets.

The women smile, engage, trust. They have no way of knowing that the glasses are recording. They have no way of knowing that the man, Yaytseslav Trahov, is allegedly not seeking connection, but content to sell.

This case, now the subject of an international extradition request and a firestorm of advocacy by organizations like Leading Ladies Africa, exposes two deeply uncomfortable realities that converged to enable the alleged violation of dozens of African women.

The first is a technology that has outpaced the law. The second is a social poison centuries old: the lingering colonial mentality that can grant a foreigner, particularly a white foreigner, an automatic presumption of trust.

The Technology of Deception

At a purely technical level, Trahov’s alleged method reveals a critical regulatory gap. The tool of choice was not a bulky camera or an obvious recording device. It was a pair of smart glasses—fashionable, unremarkable, and equipped with the capacity to record everything with no red lights, no tell-tale clicks, no outward sign of surveillance.

This is not science fiction. It is consumer technology, readily available and deliberately designed for seamless integration into daily life. But as the Trahov case demonstrates, the same features that make smart glasses convenient—discretion, ease of use, high-quality capture—make them devastatingly effective weapons in the hands of a predator.

The technology facilitates mass violation precisely because it is designed for deception. And while the devices have evolved at the speed of innovation, the legal frameworks governing their use, and the prosecution of those who misuse them, lag dangerously behind.

The Camouflage of Colonialism

But the smart glasses alone would not have been enough. For the technology to work, Trahov needed access. He needed women to trust him enough to enter hotel rooms. And it is here that the case confronts African societies with a more uncomfortable truth.

The campaign against Trahov alleges that he deliberately weaponized his identity.

His whiteness, in a continent still grappling with the psychological residue of colonialism, became a credential. It positioned him, in the eyes of some, as more desirable, more worldly, more trustworthy than a local might have been perceived.

This is not to blame the women who were allegedly violated. It is to name the system Trahov is accused of exploiting. Colonial mentalities did not vanish with independence. They persist in subtle hierarchies of desire, in assumptions about who is safe and who is suspect, in the reflexive credibility granted to the foreigner. Trahov, if all the allegations are true, studied this landscape and used it as camouflage. He knew that his passport and his skin colour could function as a master key.

The Deadly Intersection

When these two elements combine—the technological capacity to record without consent and the social capacity to approach without suspicion—the result is a uniquely potent form of predation. The smart glasses provide the means of violation. The colonial mentality provides the access.

This is the “deadly intersection of technology, privilege, and misogyny” that advocates describe. It is not an accident. It is a deliberate convergence of tools and attitudes that Trahov allegedly exploited to turn women’s bodies into products and their trauma into revenue, selling explicit footage on paid Telegram channels to a global audience of strangers.

Ghana Acts, But the Gaps Remain

Ghana has responded with commendable force. Technology Minister Sam George has activated Interpol resources, summoned the Russian ambassador, and made clear that Trahov will be pursued under the Cybersecurity Act 2020, which carries a penalty of up to 25 years for non-consensual sharing of intimate images. The government has stated it will request extradition and, if necessary, try him in absentia.

But prosecution, however vigorous, cannot undo the violation. It cannot scrub the internet of images now circulating forever. It cannot fully address the deeper questions this case raises about how African societies value and protect their women.

The Reckoning Ahead

The Trahov case is therefore not merely a criminal matter. It is a mirror held up to the continent and the world. It asks whether technology companies will design products with consent and safety in mind, or continue to prioritize seamless functionality over the potential for abuse. It asks whether African nations will coordinate their responses, or leave individual countries like Ghana to fight alone. And it asks whether African societies will confront the lingering colonial attitudes that can make a foreign predator less visible, more trusted, and therefore more dangerous.

For the women whose lives are now permanently altered—whose Google results are poisoned, whose intimate moments are currency for strangers—these are not academic questions. They are the daily reality of living with footage they never consented to, circulating forever.

And Trahov? He sits in Russia, beyond reach, protected by a state that rarely extradites its citizens. His technology served him. His privilege served him. The question now is whether justice, finally, will find a way to serve the women he left behind.

This article by Jordan Miller of the Arizona State University explains the consequences of the U.S. officially leaving the World Health Organization in January 2026, detailing how the withdrawal will weaken global disease surveillance, reduce American influence in international health policy, and hinder the country’s own ability to prepare for health threats like the annual flu.

Jordan Miller, Arizona State University

The U.S. departure from the World Health Organization became official in late January 2026, according to the Trump administration – a year after President Donald Trump signed an executive order on inauguration day of his second term declaring that he was doing so. He first stated his intention to do so during his first term in 2020, early in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The U.S. severing its ties with the WHO will cause ripple effects that linger for years to come, with widespread implications for public health. The Conversation asked Jordan Miller, a public health professor at Arizona State University, to explain what the U.S. departure means in the short and long term.

Why is the US leaving the WHO?

The Trump administration says it’s unfair that the U.S. contributes more than other nations and cites this as the main reason for leaving. The White House’s official announcement gives the example of China, which – despite having a population three times the size of the U.S. – contributes 90% less than the U.S. does to the WHO.

The Trump administration has also claimed that the WHO’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic was botched and that it lacked accountability and transparency.

The WHO has pushed back on these claims, defending its pandemic response, which recommended masking and physical distancing.

The U.S. does provide a disproportionate amount of funding to the WHO. In 2023, for example, U.S. contributions almost tripled that of the European Commission’s and were roughly 50% more than the second highest donor, Germany. But health experts point out that preventing and responding quickly to public health challenges is far less expensive than dealing with those problems once they’ve taken root and spread.

However, the withdrawal process is complicated, despite the U.S. assertion that it is final. Most countries do not have the ability to withdraw, as that is the way the original agreement to join the WHO was designed. But the U.S. inserted a clause into its agreement with the WHO when it agreed to join, stipulating that the U.S. would have the ability to withdraw, as long as it provided a one-year notice and paid all remaining dues. Though the U.S. gave its notice when Trump took office a year ago, it still owes the WHO about US$260 million in fees for 2024-25. There are complicated questions of international law that remain. https://www.youtube.com/embed/uacD-03S28E?wmode=transparent&start=0 The U.S. has been a dominant force in the WHO, and its absence will have direct and lasting impacts on health systems in the U.S. and other countries.

What does US withdrawal from the WHO mean in the short term?

In short, the U.S. withdrawal weakens public health abroad and at home. The WHO’s priorities include stopping the spread of infectious diseases, stemming antimicrobial resistance, mitigating natural disasters, providing medication and health services to those who need it, and even preventing chronic diseases. Some public health challenges, such as infectious diseases, have to be approached at scale because experience shows that coordination across borders is important for success.

The U.S. has been the largest single funder of the WHO, with contributions in the hundreds of millions of dollars annually over the past decade, so its withdrawal will have immediate operational impacts, limiting the WHO’s ability to continue established programs.

As a result of losing such a significant share of its funding, the WHO announced in a recent memo to staff that it plans to cut roughly 2,300 jobs – a quarter of its workforce – by summer 2026. It also plans to downsize 10 of its divisions to four.

In addition to a long history of funding, U.S. experts have worked closely with the WHO to address public health challenges. Successes stemming from this partnership include effectively responding to several Ebola outbreaks, addressing mpox around the world and the Marburg virus outbreak in Rwanda and Ethiopia. Both the Marburg and Ebola viruses have a 50% fatality rate, on average, so containing these diseases before they reached pandemic-level spread was critically important.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America issued a statement in January 2026 describing the move as “a shortsighted and misguided abandonment of our global health commitments,” noting that “global cooperation and communication are critical to keep our own citizens protected because germs do not respect borders.”

What are the longer-term impacts of US withdrawal?

By withdrawing from the WHO, the U.S. will no longer participate in the organization’s Global Influenza Surveillance and Response System, which has been in operation since 1952. This will seriously compromise the U.S.’s ability to plan and manufacture vaccines to match the predicted flu strains for each coming year.

Annual flu vaccines for the U.S. and globally are developed a year in advance using data that is collected around the world and then analyzed by an international team of experts to predict which strains are likely to be most widespread in the next year. The WHO convenes expert panels twice per year and then makes recommendations on which flu strains to include in each year’s vaccine manufacturing formulation.

While manufacturers will likely still be able to obtain information regarding the WHO’s conclusions, the U.S. will not contribute data in the same way, and American experts will no longer have a role in the process of data analysis. This could lead to problematic differences between WHO recommendations and those coming from U.S. authorities.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that each year in the U.S. millions of people get the flu, hundreds of thousands of Americans are hospitalized and tens of thousands die as a result of influenza. Diminishing the country’s ability to prepare in advance through flu shots will likely mean more hospitalizations and more deaths as a result of the flu.

This is just one example of many of how the U.S.’s departure will affect the country’s readiness to respond to disease threats.

Additionally, the reputational damage done by the U.S. departure cannot be overstated. The U.S. has developed its position as an international leader in public health over many decades as the largest developer and implementer of global health programs.

I believe surrendering this position will diminish the United States’ ability to influence public health strategies internationally, and that is important because global health affects health in the U.S. It will also make it harder to shape a multinational response in the event of another public health crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic.

Public health and policy experts predict that China will use this opportunity to strengthen its position and its global influence, stepping into the power vacuum the U.S. creates by withdrawing. China has pledged an additional US$500 million in support of the WHO over the next five years.

As a member of the WHO, the United States has had ready access to a vast amount of data collected by the WHO and its members. While most data the WHO obtains is ultimately made available to the public, member nations have greater access to detailed information about collection methods and gain access sooner, as new threats are emerging.

Delays in access to data could hamstring the country’s ability to respond in the event of the next infectious disease outbreak.

Could the US return under a new president?

In short, yes. The WHO has clearly signaled its desire to continue to engage with the U.S., saying it “regrets the U.S. decision to withdraw” and hopes the U.S. will reconsider its decision to leave.

In the meantime, individual states have the opportunity to participate. In late January, California announced it will join the WHO’s Global Outbreak Alert & Response Network, which is open to a broader array of participants than just WHO member nations. California was also a founding member of the West Coast Health Alliance, which now includes 14 U.S. states that have agreed to work together to address public health challenges.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has also launched an initiative designed to improve public health infrastructure and build trust. He enlisted national public health leaders for this effort, including former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention leaders Susan Monarez and Deb Houry, as well as Katelyn Jetelina, who became well known as Your Local Epidemiologist during the COVID-19 pandemic.

I think we will continue to see innovative efforts like these emerging, as political and public health leaders work to fill the vacuum being created by the Trump administration’s disinvestment in public health.

Jordan Miller, Teaching Professor of Public Health, Arizona State University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

In a world that too often equates formal education with destiny, Mary Wanjiku’s story shatters every excuse we tell ourselves about what is possible.

Born in rural Kenya, Mary lost nearly a decade of schooling due to poverty, family responsibilities, and the sheer absence of opportunity that still defines far too many childhoods across Africa. Most people would have accepted that as the end of the road. Mary did not.

She returned to education in her late teens, fought through every obstacle, and — against every statistical prediction — earned a PhD in a STEM field. Today she is a published scientist, mentor, and living proof that talent and determination can outrun even the harshest structural barriers.

Her journey is not just inspiring; it is a quiet indictment of the systems that continue to waste human potential. Globally, millions of girls still miss out on secondary education because of fees, child marriage, household duties, or distance to schools. In sub-Saharan Africa, the numbers are stark: UNESCO estimates that more than 30 million girls of secondary-school age are out of school. Each one is a Mary who never got the second chance.

Yet Mary’s story also proves the other side of the equation: when even one girl is given the opportunity to return, to persist, to excel — the ripple effect is enormous. She is not just a scientist; she is a role model for thousands of girls who now see a PhD as something that can belong to someone who looks like them, speaks like them, started from where they started.

The phrase she chose to summarise her path — “Science is beautiful” — is more than a personal motto. It is a radical declaration in contexts where science has historically been presented as elite, male, urban, expensive. Mary insists that beauty lives in discovery, in problem-solving, in the quiet joy of understanding the world — and that this beauty belongs to everyone, especially those who have been told it does not.

Her achievement should force governments, donors, NGOs, and communities to ask harder questions:

• Why do we still tolerate school drop-out rates that rob entire generations?
• Why are second-chance programmes underfunded and undervalued?
• Why do we celebrate individual miracles instead of building systems that make them ordinary?

Mary Wanjiku did not succeed despite her circumstances. She succeeded because somewhere, somehow, a door cracked open — and she ran through it with everything she had.

That door needs to be torn wide open for millions more.

Because science truly is beautiful — and it should never again be reserved for those who were lucky enough to never lose their place at the table.