There is a demonstrable link between marijuana legalization and an increase in violent crime.

Explanation: Conjecture aside, no credible data exists that supports a significant association between increased violent crime and marijuana legalization. Furthermore, studies suggest that — so far — violent crime decreases in states with legalized medical marijuana. Until new research credibly suggests otherwise, the claim that a demonstrable link between the two exists will remain classified as false.

On 27 February 2017, United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions suggested that there is a link between legalized marijuana and violence, and that his conversations with Nebraska Attorney General Douglas Peterson — a long-time legalization opponent — helped bring this issue to his attention. As reported by Huffington Post: “I don’t think America is going to be a better place when people of all ages, and particularly young people, are smoking pot,” Sessions said to reporters Monday at the Department of Justice. “I believe it’s an unhealthy practice, and current levels of THC in marijuana are very high compared to what they were a few years ago, and we’re seeing real violence around that.” Sessions said he had a meeting on Monday with the attorney general of Nebraska, who is very concerned about marijuana flowing in from Colorado, which legalized weed in 2012. “Experts are telling me there’s more violence around marijuana than one would think and there’s big money involved,” he said. […] “You can’t sue somebody for drug debt; the only way to get your money is through strong-arm tactics, and violence tends to follow that,” Sessions said. These comments offer two claims that require investigation. First is the specific information that Sessions attributes to Nebraska attorney general Peterson regarding “more violence around marijuana than one would think” as a result of legalization in neighboring Colorado. The second is that there exists a broad association between marijuana legalization and violent crime. Both claims lack credible data to support these assertions. Peterson has already attempted unsuccessfully (along with then Oklahoma Attorney General and now EPA commissioner Scott Pruitt) to seek permission from the United States Supreme Court to sue the state of Colorado over alleged increases to crime. It is likely that the matters highlighted by this case are what Sessions is referencing. On 18 December 2014, Oklahoma and Nebraska filed a motion for permission from the Supreme Court to sue the state of Colorado over damages they alleged to have suffered after their legalization of recreational marijuana, as reported by SCOTUSBlog.com at the time: Two of Colorado’s neighboring states, arguing that the legalization of marijuana for Coloradans is causing crime problems across state borders, asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to allow them to file a lawsuit directly before the Justices. If the suit goes forward, Nebraska and Oklahoma’s filing said, the Court should rule that the commercial part of the Colorado scheme is unconstitutional and could no longer be enforced. Under the Constitution, states with legal complaints against other states have a right to sue them in the Supreme Court without first going through a lower court, but they need the Justices’ permission to do so. Nebraska and Oklahoma chose that route, their filing said, because no other court can protect neighboring states from the impact of Colorado’s marijuana marketing law and rules. This filing alleges a number of damages suffered by the two neighboring states, which are best summarized in the written congressional testimony provided by Nebraska Attorney General Peterson to the United States Senate Caucus On International Narcotics Control on 5 April 2016, after his state’s attempt to sue Colorado was halted by the Supreme Court: The diversion of marijuana into my state has been fierce. I have learned from consulting with law enforcement officials in Nebraska’s largest urban areas that significant amounts of Colorado marijuana have been diverted into our state. As lower quality marijuana has been displaced by high-potency products from Colorado, the street price has spiked. This, in turn, has contributed to an increase in drug trade-related violence, which law enforcement ascribes to higher prices and increased currency flows. […] In addition to marijuana being shipped out of Colorado by mail and commercial carrier, Nebraska residents involved in the drug trade are increasingly traveling to Colorado, making large purchases, and returning to arbitrage the higher prices available on the black market at home. Of the above claims, the only statement backed up by corroborating evidence (as opposed to the more general “consultation with law enforcement officials”) in either this document or any of the prior court filings is that marijuana from Colorado is entering Nebraska in higher numbers since legalization. No publicly available empirical evidence has been introduced to demonstrate that this Colorado marijuana has led to any increase in drug-trade related violence in Nebraska. In terms of violent crime in general, Peterson’s testimony did introduce one document, written by the federal drug enforcement task force known as the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Program, which reported on the law enforcement ramifications of recreational marijuana legalization within Colorado. Peterson used this document to imply (but not demonstrate) such issues could carry over (or already have) into Nebraska: I have attached the executive summary of the September 2015 report by the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Program on the impact of Colorado’s marijuana legalization. The data contained in this report – gleaned from a broad and diverse array of federal, state, and local agencies – paints a grim picture of the results of Colorado’s scheme […] Though this document does raise concerns about about a variety of issues, including unexpected challenges to law enforcement,  drugged driving, increased potency of marijuana, and marijuana related hospital visits within Colorado (though these data come with caveats as well), the entirety of data related to the relationship between violent crime and legalization in that edition of the report, as well as the most recent report, is contained below: From 2014 to 2015 [in all of Colorado]: Property crime increased 6.2 percent Violent crime increased 6.7 percent All crime increased 6.2 percent   From 2014 to 2015 [In Denver]: Crimes against persons increased 7.5 percent Crimes against property increased 6 percent Crimes against society increased 15.6 percent All other offenses decreased 5.7 percent All Denver crimes increased 4.1 percent   From 2013 to 2014 [In Denver]: Crimes against persons increased 15.1 percent Crimes against property decreased 3 percent Crimes against society increased 23 percent All other offenses increased 41 percent While the statistics are not in dispute, the numbers offer no avenue to test causation — they are merely observations of year-to-year changes in crime rates. In the latest edition of this report, the task force makes this point explicitly (and in all caps) in a disclaimer: NOTE: SOME OF THE DATA REPORTED IN THIS SECTION IS BECAUSE THERE HAVE BEEN SO MANY INQUIRIES ON THE PARTICULAR SUBJECT, SUCH AS CRIME AND SUICIDES. THIS IS NOT TO INFER THAT THE DATA IS DUE TO THE LEGALIZATION OF MARIJUANA. In terms of published evidence, this report from Colorado is all that Nebraska (or Oklahoma) has officially cited in defense of the claim that marijuana legalization will lead (or has led) to an increase in violent crime in their state(s). Even if proper data existed, the adoption of recreational marijuana in Colorado is likely too recent to provide enough data to demonstrate anything statistically significant. That means that the best data the public can rely on in terms of an association between liberalization of marijuana laws and violent crime comes from states which have legalized medical marijuana and have a significant marketplace for medical dispensaries. The most thorough investigation of that relationship is a 26 March 2014 study published in the journal PLOS One. That study investigated changes to crime rates in states before and after policies legalizing medical marijuana, concluding: Results did not indicate a crime exacerbating effect of MML on any of the Part I offenses. Alternatively, state MML may be correlated with a reduction in homicide and assault rates, net of other covariates. […] These findings run counter to arguments suggesting the legalization of marijuana for medical purposes poses a danger to public health in terms of exposure to violent crime and property crimes. In fact, this same study tested the very premise Sessions proposed in his statements to reporters (that the high amounts of money involved in the marijuana industry will attract further violent or property crime): Interestingly, robbery and burglary rates were unaffected by medicinal marijuana legislation, which runs counter to the claim that dispensaries and grow houses lead to an increase in victimization due to the opportunity structures linked to the amount of drugs and cash that are present. This large-scale study echoes the findings of more preliminary or limited research, as well. Results from an investigation between medical marijuana legislation and violent crime was presented at the 2015 Fall Research Conference of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management. This study utilized state-level crime reports from 1994 to 2012 to test for an association between medical marijuana legalization and different forms of violent and nonviolent crime. They reported: Preliminary results suggest MMLs lead to a significant decrease in arrest rates for violent crimes among both juveniles and adults. Initial estimates also point to a reduction in arrest rates for property crime, which is likely driven by a decrease in burglary and theft arrests among juveniles. Adults living in states with MMLs experience a significant decline in drug abuse violation arrests. Potential mechanisms to explain the decline in arrest rates include increased security at dispensaries and homes, the decreased level of alcohol consumption that accompanies the implementation of MMLs, and the role of law enforcement. Another study, published on 13 January 2016 in the Journal of Drug Issues, compiled data from 11 states in the Western United States to “test hypotheses about potential effects on rates of violent and property crime”. These researchers concluded: There is no evidence of negative spillover effects from medical marijuana laws (MMLs) on violent or property crime. Instead, we find significant drops in rates of violent crime associated with state MMLs. Ultimately, the inherent weakness in the arguments attempting to make connections between marijuana legalization and violent crime is even betrayed by Peterson’s own congressional testimony, where he implores congress to “envision” the trouble that could potentially come: With law enforcement in Colorado now confronting a “wave of illicit marijuana cultivation” on public lands, it is not difficult to envision linkages between a relaxed overall enforcement environment within Colorado and emboldened drug gangs increasing their production activities on public lands. Historically, “envisioning” terrible things coming from marijuana (without demonstrating the reality of those things) has been a big part of campaigns against ending federal marijuana prohibition. Harry Anslinger, the first Commissioner of the U.S. Federal Bureau of Narcotics and the driving force behind marijuana prohibition in the 1930s, wrote a July 1937 editorial for The American Magazine that echoed similar speculative fears: How many murders, suicides, robberies, criminal assaults, holdups, burglaries and deeds of maniacal insanity it causes each year, especially among the young, can only be conjectured…


A forthcoming Russian reality show called "Game2: Winter" will permit contestants to commit crimes, including rape and murder.

Explanation: At the time of the reports’ circulation in mid-December 2016, material relating to Game2: Winter consisted of a small Facebook page and interviews with its creator. Despite multiple misleading headlines, the waiver described by news outlets explicitly stated that contestants on the show would be obliged to “obey the laws of the Russian Federation.”

Entertainment, game2: winter, misleading, murder

On 15 December 2016, multiple web sites reported that a new Russian reality show called Game 2: Winter would allow rape and murder while contestants were participating in Siberia:  Readers who spotted the article floating around on social media often missed a less visible, slightly contradictory sub-heading that said:  Contestants sign waiver acknowledging they may not survive nine-month Siberian wilderness challenge, and if crimes are committed, [contestants] will be arrested[.] The article described the waiver, but reiterated that all crimes committed in the course of the show were prosecutable: “Each contestant gives consent that they could be maimed, even killed,” reads an advert. “2000 cameras, 900 hectares and 30 lives. Everything is allowed. Fighting, alcohol, murder, rape, smoking, anything.” Contestants will each sign a waiver acknowledging that they might be raped or killed but the rules also state that police are free to arrest anyone who commits a crime on the show. “You must understand that the police will come and take you away,” the rules state. “We are on the territory of Russia, and obey the laws of the Russian Federation.” Deadline provided further details about the show, which was purportedly in production as of December 2016: Envisioned as an online series to begin on July 1 next year and run through April 1, 2018 it will be screened 24/7 around the world. It’s the brainchild of entrepreneur Yevgeny Pyatkovsky who created and is financing the show. Per reports, he is investing 1B rubles ($16.2M) in the series which will air in English, French, German, Spanish, Chinese and Arabic. The official ad for the show says “Each contestant gives consent that they could be maimed, even killed. 2000 cameras, 900 hectares and 30 lives.” The rules say “Everything is allowed. Fighting, alcohol, murder, rape, smoking, anything.” In an interview last month, Pyatkovsky said all potential contestants sign waivers, acknowledging that they could be raped or killed. As of November 18, he said there were already 32 people who had signed up, including one American. A few days later, the list of applicants had reached 60. The Siberian Times‘s coverage of the planned Russian reality show cited a 1 July 2017 start date for pre-filming activity, and was the likely source of inaccurate rumors: The contest called ‘Game2: Winter’ is the brainchild of Novosibirsk entrepreneur Yevgeny Pyatkovsky, who said: ‘We will refuse any claim of participants even if they were to be killed or raped. ‘We will have nothing to do with this. This will be spelt out in a document to be signed by the participant before the start of the show.’ He said: ‘There have been no reality TV projects before that stay on air 24/7. ‘Probably all of you have watched the Lost TV series, but surviving in a tropical climate is quite different from trying to stay alive in the Siberian taiga – boreal forest – at minus 40 degrees Celsius.


Explanation: The goal of the study was to show that the colon lining had decreased levels of inflammatory markers. Although this was accomplished in this very small and short study, it remains unclear whether this has any importance in the complex pathways that lead to colonic polyps and ultimately, malignancies. Look at how the headline – which starts the story – and the final sentence – conflict:  HEADLINE:  Ginger Supplements Might Ease Inflammation Linked to Colon Cancer FINAL SENTENCE: “It’s much too early to tell whether ginger has anti-cancer properties.”   Americans are overwhelmed by a tsunami of health care news every day. Why was it vital that they receive this extremely preliminary information now? Can the flood of health care news – including from such tiny, early studies – simply confuse and turn off readers? We think so. News decision-makers may say “Our readers have an unsatiable appetite for health news.”  But where is the evidence that they want this kind of medical minutiae? Reporting on results with

The story says that a month’s supply of ginger supplements typically runs about $10 – $30. What does a decrease in inflammation level of 28% mean? No context is given for the scope of this effect. Barely satisfactory. The story only says that previous animal research showed ginger “isn’t potentially toxic to the stomach like aspirin.” What about in people? The story states that the National Library of Medicine that ginger is “likely safe…although some people may develop side effects. Yes, there were caveats, such as: But our grade is unsatisfactory because the validity of the research isn’t questioned. How valid were the inflammation level measurements taken in the study? What does a 28% decline in inflammation level mean? 28% of what? From what to what? What percentage is significant? We don’t even know whether these levels of inflammation (recall that the volunteers were healthy) are linked in any way to colon cancer development. There is no evidence given that the kind of inflammation measured in study participants’ intestines is at all related to colon cancer. Yet the headline reads: “Ginger Supplements Might Ease Inflammation Linked to Colon Cancer” Is all stomach inflammation so linked? Readers may think that inflammation itself is worrisome, when in fact inflammatory markers are always present to varying degrees. One independent source was quoted. No context was given about any other research in the field of the inflammation – colon cancer link. Is this the only research in the field? The relevant comparison may be the relative reduction in colorectal cancer risk (or inflammatory markers) with aspirin, the most common anti-inflammatory product most people are exposed to. The story says ginger is found in supplements and in many foods. The availability of ginger supplements is implied elsewhere in the story. The story at least gives this context: “Previous research in animals has suggested that ginger can reduce inflammation but isn’t potentially toxic to the stomach like aspirin, Zick noted. And scientists have linked chronic inflammation in the gut to colon cancer, suggesting that easing this inflammation could reduce the risk of the disease.” There’s no evidence that the story relied solely on a news release.


Cyclone death toll above 750; fighting disease new challenge.

Explanation: Cyclone Idai’s death toll has risen above 750 in the three southern African countries hit 10 days ago by the storm, as workers restore electricity, water and try to prevent outbreak of cholera, authorities said Sunday.

Africa, AP Top News, International News, Floods, Storms, Environment, Southern Africa, Mozambique, Cholera, Malawi

In Mozambique the number of dead has risen to 446 while there are 259 dead in Zimbabwe and at least 56 dead in Malawi for a three-nation total of 761. All numbers for deaths are still preliminary, warned Mozambique’s Environment Minister Celso Correia. As flood waters recede and more bodies are discovered, the final death toll in Mozambique alone could be above the early estimate of 1,000 made by the country’s president a few days after the cyclone hit, said aid workers. Nearly 110,000 people are now in camps more than a week after Cyclone Idai hit, said Correia, the government’s emergency coordinator. As efforts to rescue people trapped by the floods wind down, aid workers across the vast region are bracing for the spread of disease. “We’ll have cholera for sure,” Correia said at a press briefing, saying a center to respond to cholera has been set up in Beira though no cases have yet been confirmed. Beira is working to return basic services, he said. Electricity has been restored to water pumping and treatment stations by the government water agency, so Beira and the nearby city of Dondo are getting clean water, he said. Electricity has been restored to part of Beira and the port and railway line have re-opened, he said. Repairs and bypasses are being built to the main road, EN6, which links Beira to the rest of Mozambique and the road should open Monday, said Correia. The restored road connection will allow larger deliveries of food, medicines and other essential supplies to be to be brought to Beira and to flooded areas like Nhamatanda, west of the city. “People are already going,” the environment minister said of the newly accessible road. Malaria is another looming health problem that the minister said was “unavoidable” because large expanses of standing water encourage the spread of malaria-carrying mosquitoes. Asked about his country’s current corruption scandal and whether the diversion of money has hurt the rescue efforts, Correia bristled, saying the government’s focus now is on saving lives. “We are doing everything to fight corruption,” he said. “It’s systematic, up to the top,” he said of the anti-graft drive. Two large field hospitals and water purification systems were on the way, joining a wide-ranging effort that includes drones to scout out areas in need across the landscape of central Mozambique, said Sebastian Rhodes Stampa, deputy director of the U.N. Humanitarian operation. The scale of the devastation is “extraordinary” not only because of the cyclone and flooding but because the land had already had been saturated by earlier rains, he said. A huge number of aid assets are now in Mozambique, Stampa said: “No government in the world can respond alone in these circumstances.”


Here in Florida, I’ve slashed government by 10 percent. That's $7 billion.

Explanation: Gov. Charlie Crist says he has reduced the size of state government

With conservative Marco Rubio nipping at his heels in the race for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist is trying to pump up his conservative credentials. In a new radio advertisement for his campaign, he says, "Here in Florida, I’ve slashed government by 10 percent. That’s $7 billion." It’s a statement Crist has also made on the campaign trail, and at a Hillsborough County Republican Party fundraiser earlier this month. It’s true that Florida’s budget has dropped by 10 percent, or about $7 billion, since Crist was elected governor in November 2006. The budget passed by the Legislature and approved by then-Gov. Jeb Bush in May 2006 came in at $73.9 billion. This year’s spending plan tops out at $66.5 billion. But can Crist, as his radio ad claims, really take credit for the cuts? In 2007, Crist did veto $459 million from the state budget, setting a state record with his veto pen. But the Florida Constitution requires that state lawmakers prepare a balanced budget, which is built around revenue generated by sales taxes, corporate taxes, other taxes and fees, and federal appropriations. And since 2007, that revenue has declined significantly as the nationwide recession has taken hold. State budget documents show that in the 2006-2007 fiscal year, $31.7 billion was available in the general revenue fund. This year, the fund had only $21.9 billion. (In fiscal year 2007, the fund had $28 billion, and in 2008, it had $24.3 billion.) With revenue down and a constitutional requirement for a balanced budget, Crist had to either cut spending or raise taxes. "This is not a concerted effort on the part of our governor and Legislature to cut the budget," said Dominic M. Calabro, president and CEO of Florida TaxWatch. "It is because of the worst economy Florida has had since the Great Depression." Crist has defended the budget-cut claim by saying that in other states, taxes were increased to cover shortfalls. While Crist didn’t push for tax increases to make up the entire shortfall, he did approve fee and tax increases this year — on everything from fishing licenses to initial vehicle registrations to cigarettes — that total $2.2 billion. So while it is true that state government has shrunk by 10 percent since Crist’s election, it had little to do with him, and a lot to do with the shrinking economy. For those reasons, we give Crist’s statement a Barely True.


Every dropout costs us $72,000 for the life of that person.

Explanation: Education chairman says each high school dropout costs Rhode Island $72,000 over a lifetime

Rhode Island, Economy, Education, Taxes, Robert Flanders,

With Rhode Island facing a budget crisis, officials are desperate to find ways to generate more revenue or save money. During a Dec. 17, 2010, budget summit, Robert G. Flanders Jr., chairman of the Rhode Island Board of Regents for Elementary and Secondary Education, said bringing down the state's high school dropout rate could be the key because a well-educated work force would attract new business. In addition, he said, there could be a direct monetary benefit to government as well. "The biggest thing I think we can do at the state level to promote savings is to do a better job of keeping kids in school and not having them turn out to be dropouts because the dropout problem -- it's not unique to Rhode Island of course -- but every dropout costs us $72,000 for the life of that person, whereas any person who has a college degree is generating hundreds of thousands of dollars for the state," he said. "The most expensive tuition we pay is the tuition to send kids to the training school or the ACI [Adult Correction Institutions], and those are disproportionately populated with people who have no education or who have dropped out and have no skills to get jobs." Does each dropout really cost the state $72,000 over a lifetime? We're always curious where the numbers like these come from, so we decided to go to the source. Flanders' office directed us to an April 2009 report from Northeastern University's Center for Labor Market Studies prepared for the Board of Governors for Higher Education, The Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce and the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Rhode Island. To find out how much high school dropouts cost the state, the authors used data gathered for the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey to make several estimates. One was their average earnings from age 18 to 64 in 2007 dollars. That number turns out to be $827,438. Then they estimated how much a typical dropout pays during that period in federal, state and local taxes, including property and sales taxes. Finally, they subtracted how much the typical dropout is expected to receive in unemployment compensation, disability, food stamps, Medicaid, workers' compensation and other social welfare programs, or how much would be spent to keep them in prison, using national incarceration statistics. It turns out that, by their reckoning, an average high school dropout costs society $440,214 from age 18 to 64. That's offset by the $367,867 he or she pays in taxes. Thus, a dropout's lifetime cost is $72,347, which is where Flanders' $72,000 number comes from. Looked at another way, the money you save by converting one dropout to one high school graduate is even higher. According to the methods used in the study, graduates have a lifetime income of $1,206,250, pay $532,922 in taxes, and consume $216,217 in services. Instead of being a $72,347 drain to the government, they add $316,705 to state, local, city and town coffers. So the average net benefit to the tax rolls of preventing one dropout is $389,052 over a lifetime. In theory. One problem with Flanders' comment is that he was talking about the impact of dropouts on the state, while the study looked at all taxes -- state, federal and local. State taxes make up about one quarter of a person's tax burden, according to estimates from The Tax Foundation, a respected business-backed tax policy group. Suddenly the $389,052 in tax benefit accrued by preventing one dropout and helping them graduate drops to about $100,000 over a lifetime. That's $2,100 per year. Meanwhile, we found other sources of information that made us wonder about the estimates. If you do the math, you discover that, according to the study, dropouts and high school graduates pay 44 percent of their lifetime earnings in taxes. But The Tax Foundation, which gives an annual estimate of how much Americans pay in taxes, reports that state, federal and local taxes amount to 27 percent of income, a much smaller ratio. Also, in 2005, Cecilia Rouse, a professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, made her own estimate of the lifetime difference in income between dropouts and high school graduates. She pegged it at $260,000, much smaller than estimate of $378,812 found in the study cited by Flanders. In her study, Rouse noted that the dollar amount varies significantly depending on how the economy behaves. The lifetime estimate could be as low as $121,000 or as high as $294,000. Rouse, who now works at the White House as a member of the Council of Economic Advisers, said such estimates include all sorts of assumptions that can quickly turn out to be outdated. "There's a lot of variation in this," she said. "These numbers are, at best, illustrative and are meant to make a point, and I don't encourage anybody to . . . say, 'That's the number.'" Christy Huebner Caridi, director of the Marist College Bureau of Economic Research in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., expressed concern that the Harrington study "didn't pick up indirect costs such as the need for increased police and private security because there's an increased criminal element" with more dropouts. "There are many factors they couldn't take into consideration in a study like this," she said. We asked Paul Harrington, the chief author of the study cited by Flanders, who is now at Drexel University in Philadelphia, about some of the discrepancies. He said one reason for the variation is that other reports exclude people who have no earnings; even though they have no income, they do end up paying some types of taxes such as sales tax. "Because there are many more zero earners among dropouts, this will bring down their average per capita lifetime earnings estimates proportionately more than it will lower their average lifetime tax burden, given that they do pay some taxes," he warned. "Our findings are consistent with other reports once we exclude zero earners from the analysis." He also noted, correctly, that the Rouse study looked at employee payroll taxes, state income and federal income taxes, not sales and other types of taxes. So that's another reason why the analysis would come up with different numbers. "I think we're using some of the best data out there for research purposes," he said. "I think these are probably pretty solid numbers." There's no disagreement that dropping out of high school is harmful, both for the individual and society. Dropouts tend to make less money, get in trouble with the law more often, require more social services and end up with more health problems. But the $72,000 figure strikes us as another example of experts making assumptions and doing calculations that produce numbers that sound precise, yet may only be rough approximations of the truth. In the end, while experts may calculate the cost of dropouts in different ways, they all agree that turning would-be dropouts into high school graduates is beneficial to the economy. But Flanders cited the $72,000 figure with a degree of certainty that is undeserved. And he did not make it clear that the figure includes lost tax revenue to the federal government, not just the state. As a result, the Truth-O-Meter grades his assertion as .


Muslim nurses now have the "option of participating in medical operations without washing their hands.

Q: Are Muslim nurses excused from washing their hands before medical procedures in Britain? A: No. That is an old misrepresentation that has been circulating online since 2010. A false story that started in Britain eight years ago has immigrated to America.In 2010, the website for the far-right British National Party claimed that the country’s National Health Service had changed its hygiene rules to allow Muslim nurses to skip washing their hands before seeing patients. It wasn’t true, but the claim had an appeal that allowed it to re-emerge several times over the years — including in 2013, 2014 and 2016. In March, it showed up on a website called hardcoreUSAnews.com.That recent version concludes: “So it’s true. Sharia law is actually hazardous to your health. Wonder if it would be possible to get a Surgeon General’s warning slapped on every Koran sold in the U.S.?”That story was posted on Facebook page called World Against Terrorism, which has more than 35,000 followers. Some Facebook users flagged the story as potentially false. It is.The original claim from the British National Party was posted shortly after the United Kingdom’s Department of Health updated its recommendations on uniforms for health care workers in March 2010.The original story said, in part: “female Muslim staff will now be exempt from the rule that all personnel be scrubbed and bare below the elbow.” That is a complete misrepresentation of what the amended recommendations from the department actually advised.After convening a group of Islamic scholars, chaplains, health policy makers, and infection prevention experts, the department recommended that uniforms can include long sleeves when the worker is not directly caring for patients and workers can use disposable forearm covers when they are also using gloves. The covers, with elastic at the elbow and wrist, are to be treated the same as gloves. In all instances, the guidance states, “Strict procedures for washing hands and wrists must still be observed.”That clear requirement for hand washing is made at least twice in the document.Still, hardcoreUSAnews.com wrote in its recent story: “Muslim nurses in the UK have now been granted the option of participating in medical operations without washing their hands.”That’s just not accurate.Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk false stories flagged by readers on the social media network.“Islamic Colonisation of Britain Continues: NHS Relaxes Hygiene Measure to Accommodate Muslim Staff but Bans Crucifix.” BNP.org.uk. 11 Apr 2010.“U.K Hospitals: Muslim Surgical Nurses, Actually All Muslim Nurses, No Longer Required To Wash Their Hands….” theconservativetreehouse.com. 29 Apr 2013.“Muslim Nurses Refuse To Wash Hands Before Operations, Say It ‘Compromises Religious Beliefs.” jewsnews.co.il. 20 Oct 2014.“Muslim Nurses refuse to wash hands in UK Hospitals according to Sharia Law.” terrornewsnetwork.com. 9 May 2016.“MUSLIM NURSES REFUSE TO WASH HANDS BEFORE OPERATIONS, THE REASON WHY IS INSANE.” hardcoreUSAnews.com. 12 Mar 2018.Department of Health. “Uniforms and workwear: Guidance on uniform and workwear policies for NHS employers.” NationalArchives.gov.uk. Mar 2010.


After initially agreeing with Republicans on an amount for Zika funding, "Democrats derailed it.

Explanation: Ryan said Democrats blocked the Zika funding bill after agreeing on the dollar amount. That part is accurate, but the main reason Democrats gave for their action was the Republican addition of language that barred a Planned Parenthood affiliate in Puerto Rico from receiving government funds. Democrats could have chosen to accept that provision and passed the bill. On the other hand, Republicans could have chosen not to add it during the conference committee. It took two to tango. https://www

Abortion, National, Public Health, Paul Ryan,

The latest poster child for gridlock in Washington is congress’ inability to pass a Zika funding bill. Florida has home-grown cases and has started aerial spraying. Meanwhile, a $1.1 billion aid package sits on ice. House Speaker Paul Ryan put the blame squarely on the shoulders of Democrats. In an USA Today op-ed, Ryan said his side compromised plenty to move the bill forward. The Senate passed a bill that called for $1.1 billion, all in "new" money, that is, not pulled from existing funds. The House wanted much less. When the two sides got together to resolve the differences, the House came up to the $1.1 billion mark and paid for it with a mix of new and existing money. "Unfortunately, when this plan went to the Senate for a vote, Democrats derailed it," Ryan wrote. "This was despite months of calling for action, and even voting in favor of that exact funding level just weeks prior. They blocked our plan not once, but twice — a blatant ploy in an election year. Because of their actions, this funding is in limbo." Ryan has the sequence of events right, but he leaves out one part. When House and Senate negotiators got together in their conference committee, Republicans added a clause to block any money going to an affiliate of Planned Parenthood in Puerto Rico. On the Senate floor in June, Florida Democrat Bill Nelson argued that this would limit access "to birth control services needed to help curb the spread of the virus and prevent terrible birth defects." He said the House measure was not "a serious solution." Without Democratic support, the bill never made it to a straight up or down vote. We previously fact-checked Nelson’s claim that the Planned Parenthood ban would limit access to care. Here’s a map of the clinics that would get money under the bill. While this shows a few areas without a clinic, it turns out the Planned Parenthood affiliate doesn’t fill any of those gaps. A public health researcher told us that Planned Parenthood reaches younger and poorer women, but on balance. There would be some reduction in access, but not based on where women live. In theory, they could find care elsewhere in their community. So where does that leave us with Ryan’s claim? He is correct that Senate Democrats agreed to a $1.1 billion plan. But the bill they approved did not have the Planned Parenthood funding ban. To that extent, the bill they rejected was a different bill. Those differences were anti-abortion measures inserted by House Republicans. There were other changes, but the Planned Parenthood element was the one mentioned most often. Our ruling Ryan said Democrats blocked the Zika funding bill after agreeing on the dollar amount. That part is accurate, but the main reason Democrats gave for their action was the Republican addition of language that barred a Planned Parenthood affiliate in Puerto Rico from receiving government funds. Democrats could have chosen to accept that provision and passed the bill. On the other hand, Republicans could have chosen not to add it during the conference committee. It took two to tango.


U.S. 'gag rule' linked to 40% jump in abortions in parts of Africa.

Explanation: A decades-old U.S. government policy reinstated by President Donald Trump in 2017 that restricts international aid to NGOs that support abortion is linked to a 40% rise in abortions in some parts of sub-Saharan African, a study showed on Thursday.

The “Mexico City Policy”, also known as the “global gag rule”, also led to more pregnancies and lower contraceptive use among women in African countries reliant on U.S. foreign aid, the study in the Lancet Global Health journal showed. The policy prevents U.S. federal funding from being used overseas to support any organization that performs or provides counseling on abortion. Successive U.S. administrations have flip-flopped between rescinding and reinstating it along partisan lines since it was created by the Republican administration of Ronald Reagan in 1984. “Our findings suggest how a U.S. policy that aims to restrict federal funding for abortion services can lead, unintentionally, to more – and probably riskier – abortions in poor countries,” said Nina Brooks, a researcher at Stanford University who co-led the work. The researchers urged the United States, as the world’s biggest donor of development assistance, to recognize the health of mothers as “a global priority”, and warned that the Mexico City Policy’s knock-on effects could add to maternal death rates. The study looked at induced abortion, contraception use and pregnancy rates between 1995 and 2014. It used data from 26 sub-Saharan African countries over two U.S. policy transitions - from Bill Clinton to George W. Bush, then from Bush to Barack Obama - and compared rates in countries exposed to a greater or lesser extent to the policy due to reliance on aid. The researchers used what they called a “difference-in-difference” method to identify any changes - in other words they analyzed whether the difference between rates or abortion, pregnancy and contraceptive use in high-exposure countries versus low-exposure countries were significantly greater when the policy was in place than when it was not. Results showed a significant 40% increase in abortion rates in exposed countries when the policy was active, as well as a 13.5% relative drop in the use of modern contraceptives, and a 12% rise in rates of pregnancy. Stanford University’s Eran Bendavid, who co-led the study, said its findings had probably captured only a partial view of the policy’s harm to maternal health, since knock-on effects of risky abortions were not measured. “Because abortions are an important cause of maternal mortality, the increase in abortion uptake might also increase maternal deaths — and possibly disproportionately given that abortions under the policy could be less safe,” he said.


Explanation: St. Petersburg Republican says he sometimes bucked GOP during 2011 legislative session

Members of the Suncoast Tiger Bay Club are known for asking tough, pointed and sometimes over-the-top questions of the politicians who speak at their regular luncheon meeting. The May 13, 2011, event -- which was broadcast on WEDU's "Florida This Week" program -- was no exception. We'll cut to the chase. A questioner asked first-term state Rep. Jeff Brandes, a Republican representing District 52 in Pinellas County, if he was a fraud. "When you ran for office, if I recall correctly, you said, 'Now when I get elected, I'm gonna really take that Legislature to the woodshed,' " a man named Thomas Dunn said to Brandes. "But when you got elected, somehow you lost your backbone and you became a lackey if not a lapdog for the speaker. So my question is, when you ran for office, were you a fraud?" Brandes, who ran a campaign commercial vowing to take Tallahassee "to the woodshed," sat back in his chair and chuckled. "That's an interesting question," he started in response. "If you'll go back and watch that commercial, and read it line by line, what you'll see what I said is, for those that want to increase taxes or increase government regulation, we're going to take them to the woodshed. That was the exact line. I know and understand everybody wants me to take everybody to the woodshed, and sometimes it's probably appropriate." He continued: "The reality is, I think I stood up on a number of issues against the speaker and against the governor. I've gotten a phone call from the Governor's Office saying why don't you think welfare recipients should be drug-tested. I believe it's a violation of people's privacy to do that. And I stood up and did that (voted against that). So I think you'll find I have a lot of votes where I was the voice in the Legislature against something. Sometimes I was the only 'no' vote on the entire board. That takes a little bit of courage. So to say I have no courage, no backbone, is, I think, a little disingenuous." Brandes repeatedly used the woodshed imagery during the campaign because he used to be in the lumber business -- his family once owned Cox Lumber. He said in the television ad that "high taxes and over-regulation have got to stop so jobs can return. If Tallahassee gets in the way, we're taking them to the woodshed." And at his election night victory party after defeating incumbent state Rep. Bill Heller, he signed blocks of wood. Some Democrats, and apparently Dunn, took the line to mean that Brandes would take Tallahassee to the woodshed on every issue. While that may be a stretch, Brandes did defend his record as being an independent voice in the Legislature in his response. So we decided to check his record from the 2011 legislative session. Turns out, there are examples where Brandes bucked the Republican leadership, and even the entire Florida House of Representatives. Brandes was the lone person in the Legislature to vote against HB 949, a bill that added some licensing requirements for pest control businesses. The bill passed the House 116-1 and the Senate 38-0. Brandes' legislative aide, Nick Hansen, said Brandes voted against the bill because it included additional regulations. Brandes also was the lone "no" vote on SB 650, which allows a mobile home park homeowners association a chance to buy its park outright if the owner is considering changing its land use. The bill passed the House 114-1 and the Senate 39-0. And he opposed the majority of Republicans on several other issues:  HB 88: Brandes was one of two Republicans to oppose a bill that put restrictions on the amount of severance pay public employees can receive. The bill passed both chambers. SB 330: Brandes was one of four members of the Legislature and the only Republican to vote against a bill that makes it an election code violation for candidates to falsely say they served in the U.S. military. (Brandes is a former officer in the U.S. Army Reserves who served in the most recent Iraq war.) The bill passed both chambers. HB 661: Brandes was one of four Republicans to oppose a bill that would cap damages in wrongful death cases at nursing homes at $250,000. The bill passed the House but failed in the Senate. An amendment to HB 733: Brandes was the only Republican to join Democrats in supporting an amendment that would have lengthened an August sales tax holiday. (Two other Republicans initially voted with Brandes, but later changed their vote.) The bill did not pass. And as he said at Tiger Bay, Brandes was one of two House Republicans to vote against HB 353, which requires cash welfare recipients to first pass a drug test. Brandes spoke on the House floor that the measure violated people's privacy rights. The bill passed both chambers. Now, Brandes didn't always buck his own party. In fact, he was in lockstep on most of its highest priorities. He voted for GOP bills that prohibit public employees unions from collecting dues through automatic payroll deductions (which ultimately failed), restrict or limit abortions (passed), loosen the state's growth management laws (passed), change election law (passed), and to ask voters to approve a constitutional amendment creating two Supreme Courts (failed). He also voted for the budget. But in this fact-check, we're judging his words. Brandes said: "I think you'll find I have a lot of votes where I was the voice in the Legislature against something. Sometimes I was the only 'no' vote on the entire board." Measuring "a lot" can be subjective, but Brandes is right that on two occasions he was the only "no" vote in the Legislature. In other cases, he bucked his party and stood with Democrats. We don't know if that adds up to taking them to the woodshed or not. But we do know it makes his statement .


Trial Shows Cystic Fibrosis Drug Helped Ease Breathing

Explanation: Our main critique is the lack of any independent medical voice in this story. With the exception of an analyst, all quoted sources bet on this horse to win. Perhaps the analyst did, as well. When results are only available in a press release, it’s even more critical to get assessment from clearly independent sources. This kind of informal peer review would’ve strengthened the story’s authority substantially. This story is important for a couple of reasons. New CF treatments are needed. Desperately. The announcement of positive results for a new mode of therapy is sure to cause great excitement among patients, providers, and investors. This blog on the health care business does a solid job of describing the study from a business perspective, covering the core features of its design, results, and some interesting context, such as the drug’s 20-year journey. It takes a bit of background in research to pick up on the study’s limitations, but they’re here, too. The cystic fibrosis gene was identified in 1989 and with the identification came the hope that a the mutation could in some way be manipulated or new treatments identified. VX-770 is a step in that direction. It remains to be seen if the drug will make it to market.

It discusses the drug’s costs, which are expected to be substantial. Given the relatively small population that the drug might be of benefit to, price considerations are important. The story briefly notes both aspects. We liked the early caveat that VX-770 is designed for use in only 4% of people with CF, or 1200 Americans. It summarizes the alternative treatments for CF. It would’ve been interesting to note what other therapies subjects in this study received.


Fish Oil Pills During Pregnancy Might Mean Stronger, Healthier Kids

Explanation: This HealthDay story describes a study published in the British Medical Journal that looked at whether pregnant women who took fish oil supplements in their third trimester produced healthier children based on their growth statistics and body mass index, compared to mothers who did not. The study was a high-quality randomized controlled trial of the effects of fish oil during pregnancy on asthma in children, which looked at effects on body mass index as a secondary outcome measure. The story included multiple independent sources to provide perspective, and it included a few key details about the study. While it provided the scope of the benefit of taking fish oil, it could have gone a step further to explain if those measured benefits really mean much for children’s health. There is great interest in understanding the effects of interventions during pregnancy on the health of the offspring, but such studies are difficult to conduct, since assessing outcomes that occur years following the pregnancy can be a challenge. Although the effects of fish oil supplements on children’s growth was not the primary intention of this trial, the results do suggest that mothers who take the supplements during their last trimester have children whose body mass index and body measurements for up to six years of age are better than the children of mothers who didn’t take the supplements. If a simple supplement can actually lead to that kind of improvement in children’s that would be an important finding for public health.

This story doesn’t mention the costs of the fish oil supplements it appears to support. However, the cost of such supplements is reasonable and the period in which they’re recommended is short — the last trimester of pregnancy — making cost a lesser concern than in some cases. The story explains the benefit this way:  “At age 6, children whose mothers took fish oil supplements while pregnant had a 395 grams higher total mass, 281 grams higher lean mass and 10 grams higher bone mineral content than children whose mothers who took olive oil during pregnancy, the findings showed.” This is sufficient, but the story could have provided some context on whether these numbers are clinically meaningful. Is 395 grams (less than a pound) a big deal? What about 10 grams more bone mineral content? Is that change big enough to reduce fractures, for example? The story didn’t discuss any risks of taking fish oil. But these include belching, bad breath, heartburn, nausea, loose stools, rash, and nosebleeds. For pregnant women who have to be vigilant about even seemingly harmless side effects (nausea can be a serious symptom in the third trimester, for example), these details are important. The story points out that this study used both an experimental and control group to test their hypothesis about fish oil supplements, and mentioned the large number of participants who took part — 736 pregnant women. It also included some of the study’s limitations and explained that growth wasn’t the primary measurement researchers were following, it was actually development of asthma. No disease mongering here. The story provides comments from independent sources unaffiliated with the research. We did not detect any conflicts of interest that should have been disclosed. Since there is little existing research in this area, the inclusion of another alternative would be difficult. Fish oil supplements are readily available. The story made very brief mention of other research in this area. Past trials of fish oil supplements during pregnancy or breast feeding, using different designs, doses, and follow up periods, have shown mixed results. The story would have been strengthened by some context, including findings of other studies and what is known of a possible mechanism for an effect of fish oil on growth of offspring. The story doesn’t appear to rely on a news release.


Three border agents in San Diego "were very badly hurt through getting hit with rocks and stones.”

Explanation: After a group of migrants tried to breach the U.S. border at Tijuana, Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan said there were no “reported serious injuries on either side of the border.” But President Donald Trump told reporters the same day that “three Border Patrol people yesterday were very badly hurt through getting hit with rocks and stones.”

After a group of migrants tried to breach the U.S. border at Tijuana, with some throwing rocks and border agents responding with tear gas, Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan said there were no “reported serious injuries on either side of the border.” But President Donald Trump told reporters the same day that “three Border Patrol people yesterday were very badly hurt through getting hit with rocks and stones.”We asked the White House and the Department of Homeland Security about the president’s claim, but we have not received a response.The conflict occurred at the San Ysidro Port of Entry, the major border crossing between Tijuana and San Diego. There are more than 5,600 Central American migrants, who had traveled in caravans through Mexico, housed in a Tijuana sports complex, according to the director of Mexico’s Social Development Secretariat, CNN reports. Tijuana Mayor Juan Manuel Gastelum has declared a humanitarian crisis.On Nov. 25, when planned protests in Mexico reached the border, some migrants attempted to cross into the U.S. at the port of entry and then tried to enter through fencing along the border, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The port of entry was closed temporarily and the incident involved “over 1,000 individuals who sought to enter the U.S. unlawfully in large groups,” McAleenan, the CBP commissioner, said. McAleenan told reporters on Nov. 26 that some of those individuals threw rocks or other projectiles at U.S. border personnel but that no one was seriously hurt. “Four agents were hit with rocks, but were wearing protective gear and did not suffer serious injuries,” he said. A White House blog post repeated McAleenan’s statement.Video and images showed tear gas being used to disperse the crowds. In a statement posted on Facebook, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said, “I want to thank those officers and agents in San Ysidro who, under tremendous strain, used professionalism and restraint to ensure that no one was injured as they were attacked themselves.”The president, however, contradicted McAleenan’s and Nielsen’s statements. In answering reporters’ questions after a roundtable event in Mississippi on Nov. 26, Trump said that “we had tremendous violence — three Border Patrol people yesterday were very badly hurt through getting hit with rocks and stones.”We’ll update this story if we receive any further information about the president’s claim from the administration.Trump also claimed that there are “over 500 people that are serious criminals and gang members” among the migrants in the caravan. Similarly, Nielsen said in her statement: “[A]t this point we have confirmed that there are over 600 convicted criminals traveling with the caravan flow. This includes individuals known to law enforcement for assault, battery, drug crimes, burglary, rape, child abuse and more.”But there is no evidence to support either claim.We asked the White House and DHS for more information on those figures, including how the administration has identified those convicted criminals and whether the crimes were committed in the U.S. or other countries. We have not received a response.Trump also repeated a claim he has made before, saying, “We’re building big parts of the wall.” He said the breach on Sunday was “in one area where the wall wasn’t quite built yet; it wasn’t completed. But the areas that have been completed have been very, very strong.” As we’ve explained before, Congress has approved funding for some new fencing, but it’s far less than the wall Trump had touted during the presidential campaign.The $1.6 billion in approved funding in the fiscal 2018 omnibus spending bill includes money to replace 14 miles of existing 8- to 10-foot high fencing in San Diego with 18- to 30-foot high bollard-style fences, according to CBP. But that’s not the kind of concrete wall Trump described during the campaign, and the funding is a fraction of the $25 billion the president requested.


Clusters of illness linked to CBD vapes share 2nd connection.

Explanation: Some of the people rushing to emergency rooms thought the CBD vape they inhaled would help like a gentle medicine. Others puffed it for fun.

Synthetic marijuana, AP Top News, Health, General News, Entertainment, Marijuana, Business, Science, Salt Lake City, U.S. News, Europe

What the vapors delivered instead was a jolt of synthetic marijuana, and with it an intense high of hallucinations and even seizures. More than 50 people around Salt Lake City had been poisoned by the time the outbreak ended early last year, most by a vape called Yolo! — the acronym for “you only live once.” In recent months, hundreds of vape users have developed mysterious lung illnesses, and more than 30 have died. Yolo was different. Users knew immediately something was wrong. Who was responsible for Yolo? Public health officials and criminal investigators couldn’t figure that out. Just as it seemed to appear from nowhere, Yolo faded away with little trace. As part of an investigation into the illegal spiking of CBD vapes that are not supposed to have any psychoactive effect at all, The Associated Press sought to understand the story behind Yolo. The trail led to a Southern California beach town and an entrepreneur whose vaping habit prompted a career change that took her from Hollywood parties to federal court in Manhattan. When Janell Thompson moved from Utah to the San Diego area in 2010, the roommate she found online also vaped. Thompson had a background in financial services and the two decided to turn their shared interest into a business, founding an e-cigarette company called Hookahzz. There were early successes. Thompson and her partner handed out Hookahzz products at an Emmy Awards pre-party, and their CBD vapes were included in Oscar nominee gift bags in 2014. In a video shot at a trade show, an industry insider described the two women as “the divas of CBD.” Indeed, Hookahzz was among the first companies to sell vapes that delivered CBD, as the cannabis extract cannabidiol is known. Now a popular ingredient in products from skin creams to gummy bears, cannabidiol was at that time little known and illegal in some states. The partners started other brands that offered CBD capsules and edibles, as well as products for pets. Part of Thompson’s pitch was that CBD helped treat her dog’s tumors. By autumn 2017, Thompson and her partner formed another company, Mathco Health Corporation. Within a few months, Yolo spiked with synthetic marijuana — commonly known as K2 or spice — began appearing on store shelves around Salt Lake City. Synthetic marijuana is manmade and can be manufactured for a fraction of the price of CBD, which is typically extracted from industrial hemp that must be farmed. Samples tested at Utah labs showed Yolo contained a synthetic marijuana blamed for at least 11 deaths in Europe — and no CBD at all. Authorities believed that some people sought out Yolo because they wanted to get high, while others unwittingly ingested a dangerous drug. What authorities didn’t understand was its source. Investigators with Utah’s State Bureau of Investigation visited vape stores that sold Yolo, but nobody would talk. The packaging provided no contact information. By May 2018, the case was cold. But it was not dead. That summer, a former Mathco bookkeeper who was preparing to file a workplace retaliation complaint began collecting evidence of what she viewed as bad business practices. During her research, Tatianna Gustafson saw online pictures showing that Yolo was the main culprit in the Utah poisonings, according to the complaint she filed against Mathco with California’s Department of Industrial Relations. Gustafson wrote that while at Mathco she was concerned about how Yolo was produced, that it was excluded from Mathco’s promotional material and that the “labels had no ingredients or contact listing.” Justin Davis, another former Mathco employee, told AP that “the profit margins were larger” for Yolo than other products. Gustafson’s complaint asserted that Mathco or JK Wholesale, another of the companies that Thompson and her partner incorporated, mixed and distributed Yolo. Financial records in the complaint show Thompson’s initials as the main salesperson for Yolo transactions, including with a company in Utah. The records also show Yolo was sold in at least six other states, including to an address in South Carolina where a college student said he vaped a cartridge that sent him into a coma. The former bookkeeper also tipped the Utah Poison Control Center about who she believed was behind Yolo, according to her complaint. Barbara Crouch, the poison center’s executive director, recalled getting a tip in late 2018 and passing it along to the State Bureau of Investigation. SBI agent Christopher Elsholz talked to the tipster, who told him she believed the company she had worked for distributed Yolo. Elsholz said the company was in California and therefore out of his jurisdiction, so he passed the tip to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. The DEA offered to help but took no law enforcement action, spokeswoman Mary Brandenberger said. Spiked CBD is a low priority for an agency dealing with bigger problems such as the opioid epidemic, which has killed tens of thousands of people. In the end, it wasn’t the synthetic marijuana compound in Yolo from Utah that caught up with Thompson. It was another kind of synthetic added to different brands. By the time of the Utah poisonings, vapes labeled as Black Magic and Black Diamond had sickened more than 40 people in North Carolina, including high school students and military service members. Investigators were able to connect Thompson to that outbreak in part based on a guilty plea from the distributor of the spiked vapes, who said a woman that authorities identified as Thompson supplied the liquid that went into them. Prosecutors also linked her to dealers charged in New York, where she pleaded guilty last month to conspiracy to distribute synthetic marijuana and a money laundering charge. The only brand federal prosecutors cited was Yolo. U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman called Thompson a “drug trafficker” who used JK Wholesale to distribute “massive quantities” of synthetic marijuana as far back as 2014. She faces up to 40 years in prison. Reached by phone the week before she pleaded guilty, Thompson declined to discuss Yolo and then hung up. In a subsequent text message, Thompson said not to call her and referred questions to her lawyer, who did not respond to requests for comment. While Yolo was Thompson’s project and she was the exclusive salesperson, her business partner and former roommate was involved in its production, according to the workplace retaliation complaint. Thompson’s business partner and former roommate, Katarina Maloney, distanced herself from Thompson and Yolo during an August interview at Mathco’s headquarters in Carlsbad, California. Maloney has not been charged in the federal investigation. “To tell you the truth, that was my business partner,” Maloney said of Yolo. She said Thompson was no longer her partner and she didn’t want to discuss it. In a follow-up email, Maloney asserted the Yolo in Utah “was not purchased from us,” without elaborating. “Mathco Health Corporation or any of its subsidiary companies do not engage in the manufacture or sale of illegal products,” she wrote. “When products leave our facility, they are 100% compliant with all laws.” Maloney also said all products are lab tested. She did not respond to requests for Yolo lab results. ___ This version corrects the name of the agency that received the tip, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, not U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.


HIV in America: Studies zero in on trouble spots.

Explanation: U.S. health experts are turning to sophisticated computer mapping technology and electronic medical records to identify pockets of Americans most at risk of HIV infection.

In one study, presented on Tuesday at 2011 National HIV Prevention Conference in Atlanta, researchers at the Cleveland Department of Public Health saw big improvements in rates of HIV testing when they added reminders to patients’ electronic health records about the need for routine testing. In another, officials in the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health used disease mapping technology to identify HIV-infected patients not getting adequate treatment — increasing the risk of transmission. Dr. Jonathan Mermin, director of the division of HIV/AIDS Prevention at the Centers for Disease and Prevention, which sponsored the conference, said the studies, and others like it, will help as the agency implements the National HIV/AIDS Strategy introduced by the White House last summer. That plan aims to focus resources where HIV is most heavily concentrated — among gay and bisexual men of all races, blacks and Hispanics. Currently, about 1.2 million people in the United States are infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, and about one out of five people who are infected do not know it. And rates are much higher among high-risk individuals, according to data from a CDC study of 21 cities presented at the meeting by CDC’s Dr. Alexandra Oster. Oster’s team found that HIV continues to severely impact three groups at high risk of infection — men who have sex with men, injection drug users and poor heterosexuals. The study, which included data on nearly 30,000 individuals, found 19 percent of men who have sex with men were infected with HIV, 9 percent of injection drug users were infected, and 2 percent of heterosexuals in low-socioeconomic groups were infected. That compares with infection rates of just 0.47 percent in the overall U.S. population. Among those who were infected, nearly half did not know they were HIV positive. To help remind doctors of the need for testing, Dr. Ann Avery of the Cleveland Department of Public Health studied the impact of adding reminders to the electronic medical record system used at MetroHealth, a Cleveland-based hospital system that provides care to patients regardless of insurance status. When they started the study, only 4 percent of patients aged 13 to 64 were screened for HIV from 2008 to 2009. To increase routine HIV testing, last July MetroHealth added an HIV testing prompt to the electronic medical records system reminding doctors to screen all patients aged 13 to 64 if they had not been previously tested. Within six months of the changes, HIV testing in the hospital’s outpatient clinics rose dramatically, increasing by nearly two-thirds. The effort was especially effective at increasing testing among men, with first-time testing rising from 2.9 percent of those tested to 6.1 percent. Separately, a team led by Dr. Jennifer Sayles, director of Office of AIDS Programs and Policy for Los Angeles County used disease mapping software to track HIV infection and treatment rates among the county’s more than 10 million residents. Sayles studied treatment coverage among more than 12,000 HIV-infected individuals whose care was paid for through the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program, which provides HIV-related services to those who do cannot afford their care. Overall, 90 percent of patients reported getting antiretroviral drugs to keep the virus under control. But a cross-check of postal codes showed significant variation in treatment by neighborhood. Where patients lived also played a role in how well their infection was controlled. In general, blacks, people under 24, recent substance abusers, recent prisoners and the poor were more likely to have poorly controlled disease. Sayles said the study will be used to help target resources to those who need it most.


Inmate awaiting mental health treatment dies in Aspen jail.

Explanation: Authorities are investigating the suicide of a jail inmate in Aspen awaiting mental health treatment.

Health, General News, Aspen, Mental health

The Pitkin County Sheriff’s Office says 64-year-old Jillian White was found unconscious and unresponsive in her cell Sunday and deputies weren’t able to revive her. Sheriff Joe DiSalvo told The Aspen Times Tuesday that she used an extension cord used by a previous inmate to plug in an oxgenator that shouldn’t have been left there. White had a history of theft and drunken driving allegations. She was arrested in August for allegedly stealing from neighbors and was recently found incompetent to stand trial. Prosecutors say that her lawyer told the court Friday that she had found a private mental health facility for White to be sent to instead of the state hospital and requested that she be transferred there. ___ Information from: The Aspen Times, http://www.aspentimes.com/


Sanofi to cut U.S. insulin costs for some patients to $99 per month.

Explanation: Sanofi SA said on Wednesday it will cut the cost of its insulin products to $99 per month for uninsured patients and others who pay cash for it in the United States, as the French drugmaker contends with intense criticism over the high price of the life-sustaining diabetes medication.

Sanofi announced the plan hours before one of its executives was set to testify before a congressional committee on the rising prices of insulin. Executives from the other leading insulin producers - Eli Lilly & Co and Novo Nordisk A/S - will also testify. The cost of insulin for treating type 1 diabetes in the United States has nearly doubled over a five-year period, leading some patients to put their own health at risk by rationing the medication. Under its plan, Sanofi said people with diabetes in the United States can buy up to 10 boxes of insulin pens or vials with a valid prescription for $99 per month, beginning in June. The price of other manufacturers’ leading insulin products is $178 to $300 per vial and $235 to $563 per pack of pens, according to Sanofi. The move is an expansion of Sanofi’s “Insulin Valyou Savings Program” launched last year and represents a significant savings for patients already enrolled who had been paying $99 for each vial of insulin and $149 for each pack of insulin pens. “When you hear us say in our testimony in the hearing tomorrow that it is heartbreaking and no one should have to go without insulin, we mean it,” Michelle Carnahan, Head of North America primary care at Sanofi, said in an interview on Tuesday. Sanofi is not the first company to cut insulin prices in response to intensifying criticism from patients and politicians. Last month, Eli Lilly announced plans to sell a half price, authorized generic version of its popular Humalog insulin injection. The list price for Lilly’s authorized generic, to be sold only in the United States, will be $137.35 per vial. Patients with high out-of-pocket insulin costs can participate in the Sanofi program regardless of their income level, Sanofi said. Under current regulations, it can not offer the plan to patients insured under the government’s Medicare or  Medicaid programs or similar federal and state health programs. In terms of profitability, Sanofi said it believes the pricing program is sustainable for the long term. The company’s diabetes business brought in about 2.2 billion euros ($2.5 billion) in U.S. sales last year. Since Sanofi launched its “Insulins Valyou Savings Program” last April around 12,000 patients have utilized the program, saving about $10 million, the company said.


Stanford team finds blood test to help identify Alzheimer’s disease

Explanation: This was a story about a method described in a recently published letter to the journal Nature Medicine for the early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease. While providing some details of the results outlined in the letter, the story failed to provide context to help readers understand the risks and benefits that might be associated with the kind of test described. The story failed to mention that if the test were to be demonstrated to have utility for early identification of Alzheimer’s disease, its initial greatest benefit would probably come from identifying individuals who might then participate in clinical trials to develop treatments for improved management of the condition. The story did a good job in:   providing actual numbers (e.g., test was positive for Alzheimer’s disease in 38 out of 42 patients….) and % accuracy rate  using a lot of cautionary phrases (e.g., "preliminary studies") and has specific caution that will be at least 2 years before available (after further testing) and "…all technologies a long way from being available in clinics". However, the story doesn’t give much discussion about the specific limitations of this study. For example, this case-control type of patient selection almost always overestimates test accuracy. So it’s likely to perform worse in real world populations. The story also didn’t comment on the fact that the publication in the journal Nature Medicine was actually a letter – which is curious and almost demands comment. Although methods are published, why was it not published as an original article about original research? As a letter, was it peer-reviewed? The same as original articles? When a news story discusses the potential of a new test for Alzheimer’s disease – a topic of great public interest – questioning the quality of the evidence is a key issue.

Potential costs not addressed. However, this is not a commercially available test or even available in most research labs so costs are very difficult to predict. But a story like this also could have touched on the whole issue of the downstream costs associated with testing everyone who forgets someone’s name or where they put their car keys – could be enormous – and the costs of providing what are now relatively ineffective current drug treaments. The story was really not clear about the benefits to be gained by early identification of pending Alzheimer’s disease. Although one expert was quoted as saying that he was a "proponent of knowing what is ahead" and the value in doing so while people can still "speak for themselves", it is not clear from this story what one would do with advance knowledge that one was going to develop Alzheimer’s disease.Not everyone is a proponent of knowing what is ahead, especially given uncertainty about effective treatment. Although the story did acknowledge that there are very few medical treatments for patients once they are diagnosed with Alzheimers’s, it failed to address the burden of such knowledge for the patient and the patient’s family. There could be insurance ramifications, there should likely be a consulting component to go hand in hand with the test, and there is the possibility of false positive results. The story did not do an adequate job of addressing the potential harms of this test. Mixed views on this criterion. The story did a good job in: However, the story doesn’t give much discussion about the specific limitations of this study. For example, this case-control type of patient selection almost always overestimates test accuracy. So it’s likely to perform worse in real world populations. The story also didn’t comment on the fact that the publication in the journal Nature Medicine was actually a letter – which is curious and almost demands comment. Although methods are published, why was it not published as an original article about original research? As a letter, was it peer-reviewed? The same as original articles? What’s missing is just as important as what was included, and for that reason. Although the story used some dramatic wording, it balanced the drama with hard, objective data on annual mortality rates due to Alzheimers and gave overall prevalence. The story included quotes from two individuals with expertise in the field but no direct connection with the publication discussed or the company which has been established to market the test. The story made reference to several other tests which are currently being explored for use in detecting Alzheimer’s disease. While it did mention MRI, the story did not mention current approaches to diagnosis (i.e. eliminating other possible diagnoses). Although the story used words like "proves" and "promising", it also included estimates for the time needed for further testing that made it clear that this was not something that was currently available. This was a story reporting on the development of a method for identifying individuals who will go on to devlop Alzheimer’s disease. It was accurate in the portrayal of the novelty of the approach. Does not appear to rely exclusively on a press release.


New Breast Reconstruction Technique Provides Better Outcomes, Less Discomfort for Women Recovering From Breast Cancer

Explanation: It’s hard to ignore a news release that claims a reconstructive breast surgery technique is “innovative” and “has the potential to be a ‘game-changer,'” as does this one from The Valley Hospital in Ridgewood, New Jersey. The release focuses on the outcome of one 43-year-old woman who received the hospital system’s first attempt at the surgery and is quoted extensively in the release. The procedure in question is available to some women who get a mastectomy following diagnosis, yet want an implant to recreate the appearance of their breast or breasts. After the breast tissue is removed, a balloon-like sac is temporarily placed in the void left behind and gradually filled with fluid. This prepares the skin and muscles nearby for a permanent implant, which is typically inserted a couple of months later for “an excellent aesthetic outcome.” This all sounds wonderful, but our review team (which includes a breast surgeon) thought the release was nearly devoid of crucial context. It doesn’t adequately discuss costs, risks, evidence, or alternatives, and it doesn’t make clear how this procedure differs from similar, more common implant techniques. It also trumpets the outcome of one woman, whose experience with the procedure — while extremely positive — may not hold true for many women who elect to have mastectomies. At best, this release is an incomplete advertisement. Electing to have breast surgery is often an extraordinarily difficult decision: Every patient’s cancer, her risks, and her needs are different. And while it’s nice to have options for reconstructive breast surgery — a topic that’s important to women affected by breast cancer — the advantages or disadvantages of one procedure over another seems to become less clear as more techniques become available. That’s why it’s increasingly important for medical institutions that promote the latest-and-greatest cosmetic procedure make clear its place in a cornucopia of alternatives, and adequately discuss the risks of surgeries that may have little or no bearing on survival or other critical outcomes.

Breast cancer,industry/commercial news releases

No dollar signs here. However, not including a mastectomy (anywhere from $15,000 to $55,000 or more), tissue-expander breast surgeries typically cost about $40,000 per breast. But if there are any complications, those costs can skyrocket due to additional surgeries and other medical costs. The benefits are described — “diminished post-operative pain, quicker recovery time, improved mobility, and an excellent aesthetic outcome” — but not quantified, neither alone nor in comparison to other options. How much is pain reduced by this procedure? How much faster is the recovery time? How much better can women get around? What constitutes “excellent” when it comes to the look of a reconstructed breast? We aren’t told. Even if the release had quantified the results or made a comparison to other techniques, this is a report of one procedure in one patient. It is not possible to make general statements about the benefits of a procedure when only one procedure has been performed. As a 2013 New York Times Well blog post highlights, about one-in-four nipple-sparing surgeries (promoted by this release) lead to dead tissue “in the areola or in nearby skin” — and additional surgeries to remove that dead tissue. The risks or necessity of mastectomy and reconstructive breast surgery aren’t mentioned, either. Mastectomies (as compared to lumpectomies or avoiding surgery altogether) may not lead to better outcomes for many women. Also, implants can leak, cause infections, and lead to other complications. We’re also not told how radiation and chemotherapy — two extremely common treatments in conjunction with breast cancer surgeries — affect results. The one saving grace of this release is its last word, which makes a case for approaching each woman’s diagnosis and treatment on an individual basis. Throughout the release, we get an earful about cause-and-effect relationship: If you do get tissue expander before, then you’ll heal faster, suffer less, and look better. But all we get is a vague mention to “ongoing research.” What and where are these studies? At the very least, how are outcomes measured? Who is this procedure appropriate or inappropriate for? The lack of key details that support the release’s claims is a major oversight. This is a procedure not commonly performed, and more study is needed to identify best candidates for the procedure as well as to evaluate the complications and long term results. Descriptions of pain and long recovery periods are found in this release. But that seems essential to the nature of this procedure, which aims to reduce these and other problems. The Valley Breast Center is listed at the end of the release. But due to the overwhelmingly positive comments from the patient who received the procedure, it would have helped to make clear whether or not she was compensated in any form by the hospital system. Options for reconstructive breast surgeries are as numerous as they are nuanced, depending on the needs of the patient. However, none of them — one-stage implant surgeries, muscle flap surgeries, etc. — get even a passing mention. In the context of this procedure, it would have been helpful to clear up the alternatives, including the more-common procedure of getting an implant beneath the chest muscle (where it’s less likely to cause complications). It should always be stressed that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to breast cancer reconstruction. Factors taken into account include the patient’s constitution, other medical problems, location of the cancer in the breast, type of cancer, need for preoperative or postoperative chemotherapy, need for radiation therapy, and patient preferences for cosmetic outcome. In addition, extensive discussion needs to be held regarding the potential complications of each reconstructive approach. We’re told The Valley Hospital performed this surgery, and — by implication of going through the effort of issuing a news release — we have to assume the hospital plans to perform this surgery again for patients who qualify. However, that isn’t made clear. This is definitely not a new technique. However it needs to be stressed that there are very good reasons why it is not commonly performed, and this release does not discuss any of them. The novelty is essentially lost in this release — the most we’re told is that this is a “variation of a standard technique.” Almost all tissue-expanding breast surgeries place a balloon-like sac beneath chest muscles and on top of the ribs, where they’re better held in place (and less likely to protrude through surgical cuts). The procedure described here places the implant on top of the chest muscles — right below the skin. Breast surgeons typically avoid this because the breast skin alone might not be able to support a saline-filled sac after an aggressive surgery, even if filed gradually over weeks. And as much as this release tries to make the procedure seem new, it’s not; it just appears to be new within this particular corner of New Jersey. Hyped terms like “innovative” and phrases such as “has the potential to be a ‘game-changer'” are found throughout this release — and there’s almost nothing to back them up.


Theophilus Van Kannel, who developed the revolving door, did so because of an aversion to holding open doors for women and other acts of chivalry.

Explanation: I just wanted to confirm that yes, the piece was in fact a humor piece, and that yes the chivalry aspect of the story was a total fabrication…When I wrote the piece I assumed that the absurdity of the idea would be self-evident, and even hedged by including the disclaimer which [you quoted]. Alas, that old chestnut about assumptions proved its inherent wisdom yet again.

Since the middle of the last century, revolving doors have been a quietly ubiquitous feature of modern cities around the world. But do they have their origins in one man’s neurotic attitude toward holding doors open for women? The most often-cited example of this legend is a 2013 article in Slate by Roman Mars, of the design podcast 99% Invisible. The story goes like this: Theophilus Van Kannel hated chivalry. There was nothing he despised more than trying to walk in or out of a building, and locking horns with other men in a game of “oh you first, I insist.” But most of all, Theophilus Van Kannel hated opening doors for women. He set about inventing his way out of social phobia. In the accompanying podcast episode, Mars warned: “Keep in mind that with all these origin stories, when they sound a little too much like stories, they’re probably not completely true.”  David McCall, writing in the Australian Design Review four years later, also traced the invention to Van Kannel’s purported misogyny: The story goes that he invented the revolving door because he simply hated holding doors open for people, especially women. It has also been reported that Kannel [sic] was a man without a family. These two facts may not be unrelated. The earliest version of the story that we could find was a 2008 post by Jaime Morrison on the art and design blog The Nonist, which went into considerable detail about the origins of Van Kannel’s aversion to chivalry, tracing it back to a public spanking from his mother and attributing his invention to his wife’s insistence that he hold open doors for her at all times. It seems that when Van Kennel [sic] was a boy, still in the care of his mother but just on the cusp of cultural manhood, he found the lingering rules of chivalry rather bothersome. In particular he refused to accept that he was expected to open the door for women and allow them to cross the threshold before him. A silly sort of quirk to our minds, certainly, but it was taken seriously enough by his mother that after numerous warnings and threats she eventually felt compelled to take action. Van Kennel [sic] family histories have it that at some point in his twelfth year she administered a savage bare-bottomed spanking, during a salon in the family’s drawing room, in full and explicit view of 37 local mothers and daughters. …Had this been the only episode the world may have never had a revolving door to shuffle through. As it so happens, however, Theophilus Van Kennel [sic] married a woman who, though beautiful and slyly clever, had an odd and stubborn quirk of her own. Young Abigail Van Kennel, it seems, refused to pass from one room of their apartments to another without the assistance of Theophilus. That blog post contains the tongue-in-cheek disclaimer that “…All untruths are, I assure you, my own. I’ll leave it to you to sort out which is which”; and cites just one source, an essay by the MIT professor James Buzard — which makes no mention of Van Kannel’s now-legendary misogyny. Indeed, despite extensive archival research, we did not find any evidence to back up the persistent rumor that Theophilus Van Kannel invented and refined the revolving door because of a neurotic aversion to holding doors open for women and others. In fact, we found several pieces of evidence which severely undermine the credibility of this claim. In July 1882, an H. Bockhacker received a patent in Berlin for a “Thür ohne Luftzug” (“draftless door”) whose design is essentially that of a revolving door. Six years later, on 7 August 1888, Theophilus Van Kannel of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania received Patent #387,571 for his “Storm Door Structure.” In his patent application, Van Kannel wrote: It will be evident that a storm door structure of the character described possesses numerous advantages over a hinged-door structure of the usual character, for, as the door fits snugly in the casing, it is perfectly noiseless in its operation and effectually prevents the entrance of wind, snow, rain, or dust either when it is closed or when persons are passing through it. Moreover, the door cannot be blown open by the wind, as the pressure is equal on both sides of the center of motion. Van Kannel subsequently patented several refinements and improvements to the revolving door, founded the Van Kannel Revolving Door Company, and died in New York City on Christmas Eve, 1919, at the age of 78. He was born in a log cabin in Coshocton County, Ohio, on 21 October 1841, to Swiss immigrant parents. Throughout his life, he was a prolific inventor. A 1988 publication of his autobiography and journal, housed in the Library of Congress, lists 49 patents, but the book’s editor writes that Van Kannel might have actually put his name to “about 75” of them. Over the years, Theophilus invented a cherry stoner, cider mill, water hydrant, shipping tag, gas machine check-valve, a sewing machine, an “apparatus for scalding vegetable or fruit,” and many more. He was also the inventor and owner of the Witching Waves ride at a Coney Island amusement park. He married Amanda Clayton, of Chester, Illinois and in November 1867 the couple had a daughter named Lulu. This refutes David McCall’s suggestion that Van Kannel’s alleged misogyny was due to the fact that he did not have a family. He did. The fact that Van Kannel’s wife was named Amanda also severely undermines The Nonist’s colorful stories about his wife “Abigail,” who “refused to pass from one room of their apartments to another.” In fact, Theophilus Van Kannel’s two-volume, almost 500-page autobiography and journal does not contain any evidence of any neurosis relating to women, nor any social phobias of any kind. What it does reveal is a multi-talented young man, somewhat sober and straight-laced, who struggled for many years with debt and an artificial leg, but enjoyed a fairly healthy social life, combined with a consistent dedication to his work. He wrote frequently to his mother, regularly visited his sister and her family, and spoke lovingly about his female relatives. (His journal entry on 30 January 1864 reads: “Letter from my sister requesting me to write an obituary for her husband. Sent $5 to mother.”) Another entry suggests Van Kannel understood and honored the Victorian norms of chivalry, without any reservations. 28 September 1861 (aged 19): …I received permission to buy some window blinds for the schoolhouse. While in the post office a very old lady came in to send off a letter, but she had no money to pay for the stamp. She asked the postmaster, Mr Bowman, to credit her, but he refused. I then bought ten cents’ worth of stamps and sent her letter. She was a stranger to me… As he grew into his 20s, Van Kannel’s journal shows him courting young women in Cincinnati, Ohio, all the while following the rules of chivalry and decorum. 26 February 1863 (aged 21): We all went to the church again this evening to practice our parts for the exhibition, and all showed great improvement. For the first time I mustered up enough courage to ask a young lady for her company home, and she very readily accepted. Nothing in his journal suggests the kind of “social phobia” or misogyny involved in the many stories told about him 150 years later. He attended church every Sunday, taught children, attended school with men and women, was an active member of debating societies, met friends for dinner and drinks (although he disliked drunkenness), and occasionally escorted young women home or to the theater. His interests and inventions were eclectic. By 1867 he was already developing a type of door spring, and so it’s not at all surprising that he would turn his mind to the innovation that eventually became the revolving door. Swinging doors let in drafts, making it difficult to control the temperature of a building, especially one with heavy footfall like a bank or train station. It is in keeping with the pattern of Van Kannel’s professional life that he would have identified this problem, and attempted to solve it using his gift for engineering. His invention of the revolving door does not require a psychological motivation. Nor were we able to find one, despite reading hundreds of pages of archival material and the journal of Theophilus Van Kannel himself. We looked at several news and feature articles about Van Kannel, some dating to the early 20th century. Not one mentioned Van Kannel’s now-mythical misogyny or aversion to chivalry — until The Nonist post, the veracity of which is extremely questionable. We contacted the 99% Invisible podcast, but we did not receive a reply by publication time. In October 2018, we received an email from Jaime Morrison, creator of the Nonist blog and author of the 2008 article about Theophilus Van Kannel and the invention of the revolving door. Morrison told us that he had written about Van Kannel’s now-legendary misogyny as no more than a joke which he was disappointed to find had been taken seriously by others:


U.S. President Donald Trump golfed several times and held a number of rallies after learning about the threat of the coronavirus.

Explanation: To sum up: The above-displayed tweet accurately lists the dates when Trump either golfed or held a political rally in the days after the CDC issued its first alert about the coronavirus. While some of these events took place as the impeachment process was underway (between Dec. 19, 2019 and Feb. 5, 2020), many of these rallies and golf outings took place after the trial was over.

U.S. President Donald Trump and the federal government have been widely criticized for what detractors described as their slow response to the COVID-19 coronavirus disease pandemic. As of this writing, the U.S. is still facing shortages of critical medical supplies such as masks and personal protective equipment (PPE). On March 31, 2020, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell argued that the government might have been too distracted by impeachment proceedings to focus on the impending pandemic. McConnell told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt that the outbreak “came up while we were tied down on the impeachment trial. And I think it diverted the attention of the government, because everything every day was all about impeachment.”  Shortly after McConnell made these remarks, a number of op-eds were published refuting this claim. Trump even responded, saying, “I don’t think I would have done any better had I not been impeached.” On social media, people started sharing a list that supposedly showed all the times Trump had golfed or held rallies after being warned about an impending pandemic, arguing that if Trump had time for leisure activities and political rallies during his impeachment, then he had time to deal with disaster response:   The timeline in this tweet is generally correct. Trump was officially impeached on Dec. 19, 2019. It’s not clear exactly when Trump was first alerted about the possibility of a pandemic. The Washington Post reported that U.S. Intelligence officials were warning the president about the potential scale of the coronavirus outbreak as early as January. While we don’t know a specific date, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued its first alert for U.S. clinicians to be “on the look-out for patients with respiratory symptoms and a history of travel to Wuhan, China” on Jan. 8, 2020. About a month after that on Feb. 5, Trump’s impeachment trial ended when the Senate voted not to convict. Before, during, and after the impeachment trial — and after the CDC issued its first warnings — Trump held political rallies and attended several golf outings. As stated in the above-displayed tweet, Trump visited a golf course on Jan. 18 and 19, Feb. 1 and 15, and March 7 and 8. All of these golf outings took place at Trump International Golf Course in West Palm Beach, Florida. Trump also hosted rallies on Jan. 9 (Ohio), 14 (Wisconsin), 28 (New Jersey) 30 (Iowa), and on Feb. 10 (New Hampshire), 19 (Arizona), 20 (Colorado), 21 (Nevada), and 28 (South Carolina). At his rally in South Carolina on Feb. 28, Trump spoke to the audience about the new coronavirus, accusing Democrats of “politicizing” the virus and claiming the U.S. was “totally prepared.” Fox News reported: Speaking at the North Charleston Coliseum for more than an hour, Trump dismissed the complaints from Democrats about his handling of the virus as “their new hoax” and insisted “we are totally prepared.” He also mocked the party for its chaotic efforts to count the votes earlier this month in Iowa’s caucuses. “Now the Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus,” Trump said, adding: “They can’t even count their votes.” Speaking at length about the virus, Trump said it “starts in China, bleeds its way into various countries around the world, doesn’t spread widely at all in the United States because of the early actions” of his administration. But still, Trump argued, the Democrats are claiming that “it’s Donald Trump’s fault.”