Final trial results confirm Ebola vaccine provides high protection against disease

Explanation: This news release discusses the results of a World Health Organization-led study of an experimental Ebola vaccine manufactured by Merck, Sharpe & Dohme. The study tested the effectiveness of the vaccine (currently referred to as rVSV-ZEBOV) among individuals who had come in contact with people diagnosed with Ebola within three weeks prior to the diagnosis, including contacts of those contacts, using a “ring vaccination” approach similar to that used to fight smallpox in the mid- to late 20th century. Among the 5,837 individuals who were vaccinated immediately after assignment to the study, none developed Ebola 10 days or more after being enrolled. In comparison, there were 23 Ebola cases identified 10 days or more in the group of 4,507 assigned to either a delayed vaccination (16 cases) or no vaccination (7 cases). The release delivers a good description of harms, is written in a balanced and non-sensational tone, and provides an overview of next steps for the vaccine. The release would have been improved with some reference to cost and the other Ebola vaccines under development by major pharmaceutical competitors. Health organizations worldwide have been scrambling to develop an effective vaccine against Ebola since the 2013-2016 Ebola outbreak in West Africa which killed more than 11,300 people. Merck received “Breakthrough Therapy Designation” status in 2016 from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and “PRIME” status from the European Medicines Agency for this closely watched vaccine. The “breakthrough” and PRIME status speeds up the review process for the vaccine once it is submitted to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and/or the European Medicines Agency for approval.

The news release provides no information about how much the vaccine is likely to cost. Cost is especially important in the developing world where it is most likely to be used and in large quantities. The news release explains that, among participants vaccinated immediately, no Ebola cases were identified 10 days or more after vaccination, compared to 23 cases among individuals assigned to the delayed vaccination group. The data also suggested that the vaccine reduced Ebola risks for unvaccinated individuals within the contact rings of those who were vaccinated, but the news release notes that the study was not designed to test this so-called “herd immunity” effect, so it will require further research to confirm that vaccinating some individuals reduces the likelihood of their contacts developing Ebola. The release could have explained more clearly that the virus has a 10 day incubation period during which the virus can develop in the patient and not be affected by the vaccine as the body won’t have time to develop immunity. But the fact that the two groups (vaccinated and delayed vaccination) had equal numbers during the 0 to 10 day period helps to confirm that the two groups were equal in their exposure to the virus and risk of developing Ebola. The news release also accurately quantifies the harms associated with this vaccine, noting that more than half of those vaccinated reported mild side effects, including short-term headaches, fatigue and muscle pain. The release also identified two serious negative reactions (a high fever and an allergic reaction) associated with the vaccination and a flu-like illness that might have been a result of the vaccine. This is a particularly strong point of the release in that many releases on drug/vaccine studies don’t quantify the adverse event rates very clearly or completely. The news release notes that the trials involved 5,837 people who received the vaccine and 6,004 who did not. The fact that no patients in the vaccination group developed Ebola suggests that the vaccine does indeed have some effect. The statistical significance in the two groups for all patients was p = 0.01, suggesting that the result was unlikely to have occurred by chance alone. On the other hand, the fact that the study was stopped early does raise the possibility that a longer lasting study would have found a smaller difference between the two groups as this is typically found in studies stopped early for effect. Ebola is certainly a serious disease, given the high fatality rates when outbreaks occur. The news release acknowledges this but does not use sensational language or otherwise overplay the risks Ebola poses. The news release identifies the funding sources for the study, which included WHO and a number of government agencies from Canada, the United Kingdom, Norway, along with the international organizations the Wellcome Trust and Médecins Sans Frontières. The news release also identifies the organizations with which the study’s research team members were associated, although it does not give any indication of the extent to which research team members or their organizations receive additional funding from Merck, which obviously stands to gain the most if the vaccine proves effective and is recommended for use by the World Health Organization. The news release also briefly summarizes a study of a different Ebola vaccine candidate being developed by a Chinese organization. This study, also published in the same issue of The Lancet, was much smaller, involving only 500 participants, and suggested that the effectiveness of this vaccine declined during the first six months after the initial injection. To be even more thorough, the release might have acknowledged that still other vaccines are under development by GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson and at least one other pharmaceutical company. The news release provides fairly detailed information about the next steps in the vaccine approval process, noting that Merck has committed to submitting the vaccine for regulatory approval by the end of 2017 and that the company has committed to making 300,000 doses available should an outbreak occur before approval is gained. It also notes that if an outbreak occurred before the vaccine is approved, it could be used, with informed consent of those vaccinated, through a “compassionate use” program. The news release notes that no other Ebola vaccine is currently available, briefly summarizes results of a trial of an alternative vaccine and notes that the study findings being described “add weight to early trial results” published previously on the same vaccine. The Lancet news release eschews sensational language in reference to either Ebola or the vaccine. However, the statement that there was a dramatic effect (0 deaths vs 23 deaths) suggests that this is a super vaccine and perhaps too good to be true.


Under President George W. Bush, the U.S. had "52 months of ... uninterrupted job creation" and "revenues were at an all-time high in 2007.

Explanation: Gillespie touts Bush record on taxes, job creation

National, Economy, History, Taxes, Ed Gillespie,

On the July 11, 2010, edition of NBC's Meet the Press, Republican strategist Ed Gillespie sought to contrast favorably economic performance under President George W. Bush to that under President Barack Obama. Gillespie -- a former top aide to Bush -- said "the fact is, under the Bush tax cuts, we did have 52 months of ... uninterrupted job creation, longest in the history of the country, and revenues were at an all-time high in 2007. The problem wasn't lack of revenue. The problem still remains today too much federal spending, and this administration's not addressing that." We thought it would be worth checking two of Gillespie's claims. • Did Bush preside over 52 months of uninterrupted job creation? Close, but not quite. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the economy added more jobs than it lost during 50 out of 52 months between September 2003 and December 2007. The economy lost jobs over two months during that stretch -- between June 2007 and July 2007 (20,000 jobs) and between July 2007 and August 2007 (71,000). That falls slightly short of being "uninterrupted." Gillespie would have been correct if he'd said that jobs grew for 46 consecutive months. We might add that over the course of Bush's presidency -- a total of 96 months -- the economy created 1.08 million jobs. That may sound like a lot, but compared to every other post-World War II president prior to Obama, it's the lowest average annual percentage increase in jobs created. (See our calculations here.) That said, Obama's figures are worse than any of his postwar predecessors'. The economy has shed between 2.4 million and 3.1 million jobs during the 18 months he's been in office, depending on whether you start counting with the January 2009 figures or the February 2009 figures. • Were revenues at an all-time high in 2007? Strictly speaking, yes. According to the Urban Institute-Brookings Institution Tax Policy Center, total federal tax receipts hit $2.57 trillion in 2007, before declining in 2008 and 2009, when the current recession was under way. (Tax revenues almost always sink during a recession.) The 2007 level was the highest recorded since 1934, when statistics were first collected. So on that score, Gillespie's right. But using this particular statistic neglects a key factor -- the size of the economy as a whole. Though recessions and expansions produce volatility in tax collections, as do changes in tax policy, one would expect that a bigger economy would generally produce greater tax revenues than a smaller one. And indeed, in the 57 tax years between 1951 and 2007, tax collections grew 49 times on a year-to-year basis -- a consistent trend despite frequent changes in tax rates and periodic recessions. You can easily factor out the size of the U.S. economy if you divide revenue by gross domestic product, or GDP. The Tax Policy Center has also calculated these numbers. In 2007, tax revenues represented 18.5 percent of GDP. That's high by historical standards but hardly a record. It only ties for 16th place going back to 1934, and within the 14-year stretch between 1996 and 2009 it only rises to 7th place. So if Gillespie's point is that Bush's tax cuts led to record revenues, they did -- for 2007 at least -- but that was a record aided by a the largest, non-recession economy in American history. Ultimately, Gillespie two comments are generally accurate, but they would have benefited from some additional historical context. We realize that this is not always possible during a fast-paced television show, so on balance.


Pelosi offers Medicare negotiation plan to curb drug prices.

Explanation: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, trying to seize the agenda on a top consumer issue, announced an ambitious prescription drug plan Thursday that would allow Medicare to negotiate prices for seniors and younger people.

Seniors, AP Top News, Health care industry, Health, General News, Politics, Business, Inflation, Medicare, Prices, Prescription drugs, Nancy Pelosi

The proposal would direct Medicare to bargain over as many as 250, but no fewer than 25, of the costliest drugs. Insulin is on the list. Drugmakers that refuse to negotiate could face steep penalties. Companies that raise prices beyond inflation would have to pay rebates to Medicare. The plan would limit copays for seniors covered by Medicare’s “Part D” prescription drug program to $2,000. Medicare-negotiated prices would be available to other buyers, such as employer health plans. It’s shaping up as a high-stakes gamble for all sides in Washington. Polls show that high drug prices have Americans worried, and regardless of party affiliation, they want Congress to act. As a candidate, President Donald Trump called for Medicare negotiations but later seemed to drop the idea. Pelosi, D-Calif., said her goal is a deal that Trump can sign onto and that could pass the GOP-controlled Senate. “We don’t want a political issue at the polls,” Pelosi said at a news conference. “We want a solution in Congress, and we want it now.” Weighing in on Twitter, Trump said, “Let’s get it done in a bipartisan way!” Unlike other Republicans, he refrained from criticizing Pelosi’s bill and said “it’s great” to see her out with a plan. But he said he preferred a bipartisan Senate bill being pushed by Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley. In the Senate, Republican John Cornyn of Texas said Pelosi’s proposal “has absolutely no chance —zero, zip, nada” of passing. Some House Republicans quickly dismissed it as “socialism.” The 2003 law that created Medicare’s prescription drug benefit barred the program from negotiating prices, a restriction Democrats have long opposed. Most Republicans say they believe price negotiations are best left to private players such as insurance companies. The industry group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America said Pelosi’s plan was “radical” and would usher in an era of government price-setting that would “blow up” the current system, stifling innovation. But health insurers called the plan “bold reform” and hospitals said it takes “significant strides toward reducing out-of-control drug prices.” Public Citizen, a consumer group on the political left, said the bill didn’t go far enough because it left intact drugmakers’ monopoly on new medicines. A leading House progressive, Texas Democrat Lloyd Doggett, agreed that more is required. “This new bill was promoted as a way to sway President Trump and a reluctant Republican Senate,” said Doggett. “I await their embrace.” While the legislation leans left politically it also incorporates ideas from the Trump administration and from Republican and Democratic senators — a signal Pelosi wants a deal. Pelosi’s proposal would: — authorize Medicare to negotiate prices for up to 250 drugs with the greatest total cost to society. That includes pharmacy drugs under the Part D prescription benefit, and Part B medications dispensed in doctors’ offices, such as many cancer drugs. Medicare would negotiate for as many drugs as possible on a list refreshed annually, but no fewer than 25. The maximum price would be determined using a blend of international prices, similar to a more limited proposal from the administration. Drug companies that balk at making a deal would face penalties that start at 65% of sales for the drug at issue, and escalate if they hold out. — require drugmakers to pay rebates to Medicare if they raise prices beyond the increase in inflation. That idea resembles the plan from Sens. Grassley and Ron Wyden, D-Ore. Their proposal has cleared a key committee, with Trump’s support. But many Senate Republicans oppose inflation rebates, and it’s unclear what Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., plans to do next. — limit what seniors pay out of pocket for their medications to $2,000 a year. Currently, Medicare’s pharmacy benefit has no cap on copays, and the advent of drugs costing hundreds of thousands of dollars a year has left some seniors saddled with bills that rival a mortgage payment. An out-of-pocket limit is part of the Grassley-Wyden bill and is backed by the administration. For now, criticism of the industry — from Trump and lawmakers of both parties — appears to be having an effect on prices. The Commerce Department’s inflation index for prescription drug prices has declined in seven of the past eight months, which is highly unusual. That index includes lower-cost generic drugs. For brand-name drugs, a recent Associated Press analysis shows prices are still going up on average, but at a slower pace. Costly brand-name drugs that translate to steep copays are the top concern for consumers. The AP analysis found that in the first seven months of 2019, drugmakers raised list prices for brand name medicines by a median, or midpoint, of 5%. That’s a slowdown. Prices were going up 9% or 10% over those months the prior four years. Still, there were 37 price increases for every decrease in the first seven months of 2019. ___ Associated Press writer Alan Fram contributed to this report.


Wu-Tang's GZA is a scientist, educated in quantum physics, who has lectured at MIT and Harvard.

Explanation: Has Wu-Tang’s GZA Lectured on Quantum Physics at Harvard?

In February 2019, a #BlackHistoryMonth post on Facebook asserted that the Wu-Tang Clan’s GZA (also known as The Genius) is a scientist, has lectured at Harvard, and is educated in quantum physics:Above two photographs of GZA, text stated:People you didn’t know were scientists:GZA of Wutang Clan is educated in quantum physics & has given lectures at MIT & Harvard.The post was tagged “Day #6 #Ihadnoclue #sciencenerd and #blackhistory. No citations were provided about GZA’s science credentials, but the post was shared tens of thousands of times.In April 2012, Rolling Stone published an item titled “GZA Talks Lectures, Science and ‘Dark Matter,'” which began:Wu-Tang Clan rapper GZA has been known as the Genius since the early days of his career – but in recent months, the name has been particularly apt, as he has spent much of his free time chatting with scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and giving lectures at Harvard and New York University. The emcee also recently completed work on Dark Matter, a new album inspired in part by his interest in quantum physics, which will hit stores later this year.In response to a question about GZA’s passion for dark matter, he said:I’ve been interested in [quantum physics] for years. I mean, if you think about it, if you go back to Legend of the Liquid Sword – I put that out in 2002. I had a song on there, a verse where I say:Why U-N-I-verse run like clock works forever?Words pulled together, sudden change in the weatherThe nature and the scale of events don’t make senseA story with no warnin’ you’re drawn in, environmentsGravity that’s gone mad, clouds of dust and debrisMoving at colossal speeds, they crush an emceeSince this rap region is heavily packed with starsInternal mirror in the telescope, noticed the CzarFrom far away, they blink as the lightnin’ strolledGreat distance of space between precise globesHowever, the interview stopped short of characterizing GZA as a scientist (implying formal education in the sciences) rather than a well-informed physics enthusiast and autodidact.The meme also suggested that GZA “gave lectures” at Harvard and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, implying that the artist taught classes on branches of science like physics. It’s true that GZA appeared at Harvard in November 2011 as a guest lecturer, but the lecture involved was outside classes and open to the public; further, its content was more about GZA’s work and interests (including, but not limited to, physics):…GZA is planning on hitting up Harvard University as a guest lecturer.The Genius will speak at a lecture hosted by the Harvard Black Men’s Forum in Science Center D on Thursday, December 1st at 5 p.m. The chat, open to the public, will focus on the Wu-Tang Clan and his creative process, and will be followed by a Q&A session.Rolling Stone concurrently reported:Wu-Tang Clan rapper GZA/The Genius is set to give a lecture about his music career and lyrical craft at Harvard’s Black Men’s Forum on December 1st [2011].The Harvard Crimson covered GZA’s visit in December 2011, reporting that the artist spoke primarily about life and hip hop:“This is the first time for me. I should be learning from you all,” GZA said. “I’m actually shaking right now, crazy,” he added with a laugh.As he took the stage, a lecture hall full of fans greeted him with shouts of the trademark Wu-Tang phrase, “Peace.”[…]GZA closed his lecture with some advice for those that had turned out.“Live a life full of humility, gratitude, intellectual curiosity, and never stop learning.”GZA similarly visited MIT in 2015 to discuss hip-hop and science. GZA’s appearance was part of an “ongoing speaker series featuring hip-hop artists”:The Boston Globe reports that Gary Grice, who goes by the stage name “GZA,” will speak with students at the Cambridge university about his latest album and how art and outer space collide. […]GZA isn’t new to the school’s campus. The original Wu-Tang member last visited MIT in 2012 to talk to students about chess, freestyle rapping and the music that influenced his life.The meme also said that GZA was “educated in quantum physics.” In May 2012, the Wall Street Journal described GZA as foregoing formal education and later developing an interest in quantum physics:On an early May afternoon in the offices of Neil deGrasse Tyson, the director of the Hayden Planetarium, a model of Saturn caught the eye of a 45-year-old high-school dropout, and a lyric was born.“I thought, this is probably the longest spinning record in the world,” said GZA, the hip-hop artist and founding member of the Wu-Tang Clan, referring to the ring system surrounding the planet. About a week later, the words crystallized and he offered them over a vegetarian lunch on the Upper West Side.“God put the needle on the disc of Saturn / The record he played revealed blueprints and patterns,” he rapped in his signature rhythmic baritone, offering a taste from his forthcoming album, “Dark Matter,” an exploration of the cosmos filtered through the mind of a rapper known among his peers as “the Genius.”Informed by meetings with top physicists and cosmologists at MIT and Cornell University, “Dark Matter” is intended to be the first in a series of albums that GZA—born Gary Grice in Brooklyn in 1966—will put out in the next few years, several of which are designed to get a wide audience hooked on science. […]For GZA, a major challenge is convincing skeptics for whom hip-hop and an academic subject like physics seem incompatible.“It’s gonna sound so boring to most people,” the rapper said. “There have been times when I’ve been told, ‘Oh, you’re doing an album about physics? I hope it’s not boring.’ They don’t get the idea. Because rappers are so one-dimensional, so narrow-minded, it comes off corny.”Still, he believes that “Dark Matter” will tap into the innate curiosity of listeners—even those with no outward interest in science.The article reiterated that GZA’s formal education ended early, but that he worked with scientists to develop an album about physics:Despite have left school in the 10th grade, GZA nurtured his affection for science as he developed his skills as a lyricist.“There were certain things that grabbed my interest, such as photosynthesis, such as us living off plants and plants living off us,” he said. “You look at everything in that light—so if I’m looking at ice cubes, I might start thinking about absolute zero, or Fahrenheit and Celsius. There’s so much that can make me think about science.”In November 2012, GZA joined forces with scientists to promote scientific literacy in New York City:They are an unlikely team of educational reformers.Christopher Emdin is a Columbia University professor who likes to declaim Newton’s laws in rhyme. GZA is a member of the Wu-Tang Clan who left school in 10th grade. When the two men met this summer, at a radio show hosted by Neil deGrasse Tyson, the director of the Hayden Planetarium, they started talking about science and education — particularly, why science classrooms were failing to engage many African-American and Latino students, who together make up 70 percent of New York City’s student body. Only 4 percent of African-American seniors nationally were proficient in sciences, compared with 27 percent of whites, according to the 2009 National Assessment of Educational Progress.GZA, 46, who was born Gary Grice, had just finished an extraordinary round of meetings with physicists at Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, culling ideas for a coming solo album about the cosmos. Dr. Emdin, 34, an assistant professor of science education at Teachers College, was a lifelong hip-hop fan. They discovered a shared interest in merging their two worlds: GZA by bringing science into hip-hop; Dr. Emdin by bringing hip-hop into the science classroom.Next month, the two men, along with the popular hip-hop lyrics Web site Rap Genius, will announce a pilot project to use hip-hop to teach science in 10 New York City public schools. The pilot is small, but its architects’ goals are not modest. Dr. Emdin, who has written a book called “Urban Science Education for the Hip-Hop Generation,” hopes to change the way city teachers relate to minority students, drawing not just on hip-hop’s rhymes, but also on its social practices and values.The meme tells a partially accurate story about GZA’s passion for science, but leaves out a stronger underlying truth. The Wu-Tang rapper is indeed passionate about science, and while he hasn’t taught at Harvard or MIT, he did appear at several well-known universities (those among them) to speak about his life and interest in science. During that time, GZA worked with science advocates to develop initiatives drawing young hip-hop fans to promote scientific literacy, and has consistently expressed a deep interest in and love for science education.


Indonesia green group calls for probe into death of activist.

Explanation: Indonesia’s biggest environmental group on Thursday called for an independent investigation into the death of one of its activists after pointing out suspicious circumstances and saying his work could have made him a target.

Golfrid Siregar, an activist with the Indonesian Forum for the Environment (Walhi), was discovered by a pedicab driver lying unconscious on the side of a road in the city of Medan on Sumatra island last Thursday, police said. He was brought to hospital but died three days later, police said. Police initially said it appeared to be a traffic accident, but on Thursday Medan’s chief detective, Eko Hartanto, said three men, including the pedicab driver, had become suspects for stealing the victim’s belongings, state news agency Antara reported. “We have also done a reenactment of the crime scene to find what exactly caused his death,” the news agency cited Hartanto as saying. Walhi said in a statement this week that Siregar suffered injuries to his head that appeared to come from a blunt object but there were no wounds on other parts of his body. His bag, laptop, wallet and phone were missing, it said. In a joint news conference in Jakarta on Thursday, Amnesty International Indonesia researcher Papang Hidayat said there should be an independent investigation “because the victim had raised cases on environmental and human rights crimes against local people, whose network of perpetrators don’t only involve corporations but also the state apparatus”. Human rights lawyer Muhamad Isnur also questioned why Siregar’s motorbike had not be stolen if his death resulted from  a robbery. Police detective Hartanto and a North Sumatra police spokesman did not respond to requests for comment. Siregar had been involved in various projects in recent years, including helping fishermen in a lawsuit against a sand miner and assisting residents in a fight against forest encroachment, said Walhi’s head of advocacy, Zenzi Suhadi. According to Suhadi, his latest and most high-profile case was representing Walhi in its legal challenge to stop the construction of a $1.5 billion China-funded hydro dam, which some experts had warned would destroy the habitat of orangutans. North Sumatra Hydro Energy (NSHE), which owns the dam project, said by text message: “We are requesting all parties not to speculate and connect PT NSHE directly or indirectly to the death of Golfrid Siregar ... until the results of a police investigation come out”.


A viral social media post in January 2020 represented an authentic, accurate "health bulletin" about the new coronavirus outbreak from an official public health authority.

Explanation: Neither the printed email nor the viral Facebook message were official statements produced by any public health authority. The alert was apt to spread widely online precisely because it did not include any details about its supposed source, aside from mentioning a “Ministry of Health” in an unspecified country or region.

In January 2020 we received multiple inquiries from readers about an alert that was shared widely on Facebook and Twitter, purporting to be an “emergency notification” from an unspecified “Ministry of Health” about an ongoing outbreak of a new coronavirus. Broadly speaking, the warning appeared in two forms. The most commonly shared was a text post that typically read as follows: *Urgent: Health Bulletin to the Public * *Ministry of health’s emergency notification to the public that the Coronavirus outbreak this time is very very serious & fatal. There’s no cure once you are infected. * *Its spreading from China to various countries* *Prevention method is to keep your throat moist, do not let your throat dry up. Thus do not hold your thirst because once your membrane in your throat is dried, the virus will invade into your body within 10 mins. * *Drink 50-80cc warm water, 30-50cc for kids, according to age. * *Everytime u feel your throat is dry, do not wait, keep water in hand. * *Do not drink plenty at one time as it doesn’t help, instead continue to keep throat moist. * *Till end of March 2020, do not go to crowded places, wear mask as needed especially in train or public transportation* *Avoid fried or spicy food and load up vitamin C.* *The symptoms/ description are* *1.repeated high fever* *2.prolonged coughing after fever* *3.Children are prone* *4.Adults usually feel uneasy,*headache and mainly respiratory related* *5: highly contagious*  The message was typically followed up with an exhortation to share its warnings, such as, “Please forward to help others.” One version of the viral alert even concluded by pleading with readers, “Please share if you care for human life.”  The second principal form in which the message appeared was as a photograph of a printed email, dated Jan. 28, 2020, and purporting to have been sent by “NWLLAB.” It contained many of the same key components — it purported to come from an unspecified “MOH” (Ministry of Health), and its main recommendation to the public was again to “keep your throat moist” by drinking water. It read as follows: Pls tell ur families, relatives and friends MOH Health Bulletin to the Public: The Upper Respiratory Infection affecting China at present is quite serious. The virus causing it is very potent and is resistant to existing antibiotics. (virus is not bacterial infection hence cannot be treated by antibiotics). The prevention method now is to keep your throat moist, do not let your throat dry up. Thus do not hold your thirst because once your membrane in your throat is dried, the virus will invade into your body within 10 mins. Drink 50-80cc warm water, 30-50cc for kids, according to age. Everytime [sic] you feel your throat is dry, do not wait, keep water in hand. Do not drink plenty at one time as it does not help; instead, continue to keep throat moist. Till end of March, do not go to crowded places, wear mask as needed especially in train or public transportation. Avoid fried or spicy food and load up vitamin C.  The symptoms/description are: 1. Repeated high fever. 2. Prolonged coughing after fever. 3. Children are more prone. 4. Adults usually feel uneasy, headache and mainly respiratory related illness. This illness is highly contagious. Let’s continue to pray and wait for further notice about the infection. Please share.


Officials release edited coronavirus reopening guidance.

Explanation: U.S. health officials on Thursday released some of their long-delayed guidance that schools, businesses and other organizations can use as states reopen from coronavirus shutdowns.

AP Top News, Religion, Understanding the Outbreak, Health, General News, Business, Virus Outbreak, U.S. News

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted six one-page “decision tool” documents that use traffic signs and other graphics to tell organizations what they should consider before reopening. The tools are for schools, workplaces, camps, childcare centers, mass transit systems, and bars and restaurants. The CDC originally also authored a document for churches and other religious facilities, but that wasn’t posted Thursday. The agency declined to say why. Early versions of the documents included detailed information for churches wanting to restart in-person services, with suggestions including maintaining distance between parishioners and limiting the size of gatherings. The faith-related guidance was taken out after the White House raised concerns about the recommended restrictions, according to government emails obtained by The Associated Press and a person inside the agency who didn’t have permission to talk with reporters and spoke on condition of anonymity. On Thursday, a Trump administration official also speaking on condition of anonymity said there were concerns about the propriety of the government making specific dictates to places of worship. And Roger Severino, director of the Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Health and Human Services, said “protections against religious discrimination aren’t suspended during an emergency. This means the federal government cannot single out religious conduct as somehow being more dangerous or worthy of scrutiny than comparable secular behavior.” President Donald Trump has championed religious freedom as a way to connect with conservative evangelical voters and has shown eagerness for in-person religious services to restart. He consulted interfaith leaders last month for suggestions on how to reopen and said on a recent Fox News town hall that “we have to get our people back to churches, and we’re going to start doing it soon.” The CDC drafted the reopening guidance more than a month ago and it was initially shelved by the administration, the AP  reported last week. The agency also had prepared even more extensive guidance — about 57 pages of it — that has not been posted. That longer document, which the AP obtained, would give different organizations specifics about how to reopen while still limiting spread of the virus, including by spacing workers or students 6 feet apart and closing break rooms and cafeterias to limit gatherings. Many of the suggestions already appear on federal websites but they haven’t been presented as reopening advice. Some health experts and politicians have been pushing for the CDC to release as much guidance as possible to help businesses and organizations decide how to proceed. “They want to be able to tell their own employees the guidance of the federal government,” Dr. Tom Inglesby, director of the Center for Health Security at Johns Hopkins University, said at a congressional hearing Wednesday. “They want to be able to tell their customers, ‘We’ve done everything that’s been asked of us.’”  The guidance relates to another document released by the Trump administration on April 17. That phased-in reopening plan broadly outlines how to move away from stay-at-home orders, school closures and other measures designed to stop the spread of the new coronavirus that has caused more than 1.3 million reported U.S. illnesses and more than 80,000 deaths. U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat, on Wednesday offered a resolution — blocked by Republicans — to encourage release of all the documents. “America needs and must have the candid guidance of our best scientists unfiltered, unedited, uncensored by president Trump or his political minions. The CDC report on reopening the country is an important piece of that guidance,” Schumer said. The decision tools have been undergoing review by different federal officials, and they’ve been edited from earlier versions. For example, an earlier draft of the one-page document on camps obtained by the AP asked organizers if their program would limit attendance to people who live nearby. If the answer was no, the camp was advised not to reopen. That local attendance limitation was dropped and was not in the version posted Thursday. And in that document and others, language has been dropped that asked if the organization is in a community that is still requiring significant disease mitigation. If the answer was yes, the organization was advised not to reopen. Many of the changes provide more wiggle room than what was in the initial versions. For example, in the document for people who run child care centers, the older version obtained by the AP stated that CDC recommended “checking for signs and symptoms of children and staff.” The new guidelines add “as feasible” to the end. Similar new language about feasibility appears in sections about promoting healthy hygiene such as hand washing and employees wearing cloth masks. ___ Dearen reported from Gainesville, Florida. AP reporters Mary Clare Jalonick, Zeke Miller and Elana Schor contributed to this report.


Ted Cruz Says Democrats are embracing “abortion up until the moment of birth and even, horrifically, after that.”

Explanation: Cruz's statement is based on an inaccurate characterization of a bill considered in Virginia's House of Delegates, which would have changed requirements needed before doctors could perform an aboriton during the third-trimester of pregnancy. In Virginia, abortions are allowed at this late point if three physicians certify that a continued pregnancy is likely to result in the death of the woman. The author of the bill, which was unsuccessful, said her proposed changes would not allow an abortion to be performed on a woman during a live birth. Any attempt at aborting or killing an infant after birth is illegal.

In the latest push from Republicans to advance a federal ban on abortion after 20 weeks and a requirement for doctors to treat infants born after an attempted abortion, U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, spoke in favor of the efforts from the Senate floor. In his remarks, Cruz urged his Democratic colleagues to support these kinds of "common sense propositions," a departure from the party’s "extreme" position on abortion. Neither bill — versions of which GOP lawmakers have attempted to pass several times over multiple years — was approved. "We’ve seen far too many Democrats embrace extreme positions on abortion: abortion up until the moment of birth and even, horrifically, after that," Cruz said, before highlighting a radio interview Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam gave in 2019 about a bill in the Virginia House of Delegates regulating third-trimester abortions. "This bill was allowing a mother in labor, in the process of delivering a child, this bill would allow a doctor to kill that child instead of delivering that child in the midst of labor," Cruz said. "The idea of killing a child while the mother is in labor instead of delivering the infant is horrifying beyond words." Cruz’s claim that Democrats support abortion up until birth and "even, horrifically, after that," is inaccurate, as is his characterization of the Virginia proposal (which was unsuccessful). Trump claims This isn’t the first time a Republican leader has used an inaccurate description of the Virginia bill to advance legislation to require care for infants "born alive" after attempted abortions. When Senate Republicans attempted to pass a version of the Born-Alive Survivors Protection Act in February 2019, President Donald Trump offered two inaccurate claims on this front. Speaking at a rally in El Paso, he said that Northam "stated that he would even allow a newborn baby to come out into the world ... then talk to the mother and talk to the father and then execute the baby." We rated this claim . In a tweet sent days later, Trump said: "The Democrat position on abortion is now so extreme that they don’t mind executing babies AFTER birth." We rated that claim . To be clear: killing an infant after birth is illegal, and people on both sides of the abortion debate agree that this act should be illegal. Under federal law, the definitions of a person, human being, child and individual all include infants "born alive at any stage of development." Virginia legislation This characterization of Democrats as supporters of allowing abortions during and after a live birth surfaced in early 2019, when a subcommittee of the Virginia House of Delegates considered a bill aimed at loosening the state’s abortion laws. In Virginia, a woman can choose to obtain an abortion through the end of the second trimester of pregnancy, up to 28 weeks from her last menstrual period. After that point, abortions are legal if they happen in a hospital and three physicians certify that "the continuation of the pregnancy is likely to result in the death of the woman or substantially and irremediably impair the mental or physical health of the woman." The law also requires physicians to make "measures for life support for the product of such abortion" available if there is "any clearly visible evidence of viability" after an attempted abortion. The bill Virginia lawmakers considered in 2019 proposed multiple changes to state laws addressing abortion, including the provision regulating the procedure in the third trimester. The proposal would have lowered the number of physicians required to authorize a third-trimester abortion from three to one and remove the "substantial and irremediable" threshold in the law. At the time of the debate, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reported that there were two confirmed third-trimester abortions performed in Virginia since 2000. Republican lawmakers questioned the bill’s sponsor on the scope of the proposal, asking whether the measure would allow a woman who is dilating to get a abortion. "My bill would allow that," said Democratic lawmaker Kathy Tran. "Yes." Her response sparked intense backlash from anti-abortion advocates and footage of her remark circulated quickly on social media. But days later, Tran said she misspoke: "I should have said: ‘Clearly, no, because infanticide is not allowed in Virginia, and what would have happened in that moment would be a live birth.’" A spokeswoman for Cruz pointed to the language of Tran’s bill and said it clearly allows abortion up until the moment of birth, but Tran’s bill only changed the requirements in place before a doctor can perform a third-trimester abortion. It did not change the law as it relates to when such an abortion could take place. As the law stands, abortion is legal in the third trimester only in cases where three physicians certify that the mother’s life is in danger. Virginia law prohibits "partial birth infanticide," the killing of an infant who has "been born alive, but who has not been completely extracted or expelled from its mother." Northam’s comments In a radio interview two days after the debate, Northam discussed the legislation and offered a confusing comment about third-trimester abortions: "It’s done in cases where there may be severe deformities. There may be a fetus that’s nonviable. So, in this particular example, if a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen. The infant would be delivered. The infant would be kept comfortable. The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired, and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother." A number of anti-abortion advocates accused the Democratic governor of approving the killing of infants. Northam rejected this characterization of his remarks and a spokesperson said the comments were about options for care available to women with a nonviable pregnancy or in the case of a severe fetal abnormality. This can include issues like anencephaly, when an infant is born without parts of the brain and skull, and limb-body wall complex, when an infant's organs have developed outside of its body. In these cases, where there is "little or no prospect" of an infant surviving after birth, families might opt for perinatal palliative care, or comfort care — prioritizing comfort while allowing an infant to die naturally without exercising full resuscitation efforts. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists describes this care as existing on a spectrum of care, "which includes pregnancy termination (abortion) and full neonatal resuscitation and treatment." Cruz’s spokeswoman pointed to this care as an example of a doctor completing an abortion by denying medical care. This type of care is rare — a study of deaths at children’s hospitals found that while neonates represented 41% of all deaths, perinatal palliative care was only utilized in 2% of cases — and does not meet the definition of abortion. Harvard Medical School defines abortion as "the removal of pregnancy tissue, products of conception or the fetus and placenta (afterbirth) from the uterus." Our Ruling Cruz said Democrats support "abortion up until the moment of birth and even, horrifically, after that." Cruz’s remark hinged on an inaccurate characterization of legislation considered in Virginia’s House of Delegates in 2019 and comments made by the state’s Democratic governor at the same time. State law in Virginia allows doctors to perform abortions up until the moment of birth, but only in cases when three physicians certify that a continued pregnancy is likely to result in the death of the woman. The author of the bill clarified earlier remarks to say it would not allow an abortion to be performed on a woman during a live birth. PolitiFact has rated multiple statements making similar claims about Democrats supporting the execution of children .


Nebraska state officials say prison conditions have improved.

Explanation: Nebraska state officials are pushing back against allegations that prisoners aren’t receiving proper health care and mental health treatment due to deliberate indifference by the corrections department.

Access to health care, Prisons, Nebraska Attorney Generals Office, Lawsuits, Health, Nebraska

The Nebraska attorney general’s office argued in a court filing Tuesday that the Department of Correctional Services provides excellent access to health care and has invested millions in new facilities and employees in recent years. The filing came in response to inmates represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Nebraska, which filed a lawsuit in 2017. The inmates are now asking a judge to grant them class-action status, which state officials oppose. Assistant Nebraska Attorney General Ryan Post says the prison system still has problems to overcome, but those challenges aren’t constitutional violations.


If the new coronavirus gets into your mouth, drinking water or other liquids will wash them down through the oesophagus. Once they’re in the stomach, the acid will kill the virus. If you don't drink enough water more regularly, the virus can enter your windpipes and into the lungs. If you have a runny nose and sputum, you have a common cold, not Covid-19. These are the symptoms for the common cold, but they don’t rule out Covid-19. Coronavirus pneumonia is a dry cough with no runny nose. Some Covid-19 patients do get pneumonia, and one of the symptoms is a dry cough. A runny nose doesn’t rule out Covid-19. This new virus is not heat-resistant and will be killed by a temperature of just 26/27 degrees. It hates the Sun. There’s no evidence for this. There’s evidence that similar viruses transmit less well in the heat, but many countries with reported Covid-19 cases are experiencing temperatures higher than this. If someone with the new coronavirus sneezes, it travels about 10 feet before it drops to the ground and is no longer airborne. How far the droplets spread from a sneeze depends on environmental factors, but it is likely to be several metres. If it drops on a metal surface it will live for at least 12 hours - so if you come into contact with any metal surface - wash your hands as soon as you can with a bacterial soap. We don’t know how long the virus survives on surfaces yet—it may be between hours and days. On fabric it can survive for 6-12 hours. normal laundry detergent will kill it. There’s no evidence yet that the virus can survive in clothing and be transmitted this way. Any soiled clothing should be thoroughly washed. Drinking warm water is effective for all viruses. Try not to drink liquids with ice. There’s no evidence that the temperature of liquids consumed can either protect you from or cure diseases caused by viruses. Wash your hands frequently as the virus can only live on your hands for 5-10 minutes. We don’t know how long the virus can last on the skin, especially not down to the minute. But you should regularly wash your hands. You should also gargle as a prevention. A simple solution of salt in warm water will suffice. There’s no evidence that this works as a preventative or a cure for the virus. The symptoms of Covid-19 are a sore throat lasting 3 or 4 days. The virus then blends into nasal fluid, enters the trachea and then the lungs causing pneumonia. With pneumonia comes high fever and difficulty breathing. The nasal congestion feels like you're drowning This is a roughly accurate description of the most common symptoms, although not everyone with Covid-19 gets pneumonia, and the symptoms may not come in this exact order or at these times. The NHS does not mention nasal congestion that ‘feels like drowning’ as a specific symptom for Covid-19. Claim 1 of 12


President Donald Trump “immediately discontinued” an aid program to Central America.

Explanation: The second of a two-part debate offered a new crop of spin.

childhood poverty, climate change, employment, health care, Illegal immigration, Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, universal background checks,

The second group of 10 Democratic presidential candidates made false and misleading claims about immigration, gun control legislation and the environment, and repeated familiar talking points on taxes, health care and poverty.Night two of the primary election debates, on June 27, was again hosted by NBC, MSNBC and Telemundo.Former Vice President Joe Biden falsely claimed President Trump “immediately discontinued” an aid program to Central America, and implied that’s the cause of surging immigration across the U.S.-Mexico border.In fact, the Obama-era aid program was reduced only about 23 percent during Trump’s first two years, while illegal border crossings surged to more than triple the levels than before the Obama aid program commenced. Trump has already relented on a recent threat to cut off the aid entirely.Biden: I’m the guy that got a bipartisan agreement … to spend $740 million to deal with the [border] problem, and that was to go to the root cause of why people are leaving in the first place. It was working.We saw, as you know, a net decrease in the number of children who were coming. The crisis was abated. And along came this president, and he said — he immediately discontinued that.Biden was referring to the “U.S. Strategy for Engagement in Central America,” which began under Obama in fiscal year 2016 at a level of $750 million, according to a June 12 report by the Congressional Research Service, an arm of the Library of Congress. (See Table 5, page 13. )Appropriations for the program had already decreased to just under $685 million by fiscal year 2017, which began Oct. 1, 2016, before Trump was elected and nearly four months before he took office.From there, appropriations fell further to an estimated $527.6 million in the current fiscal year, according to the CRS report. That’s a reduction of just under 23 percent.Trump’s budget request for fiscal 2020, which begins Oct. 1, calls for a further cut to $445 million — which would represent a cumulative reduction in annual appropriation levels of 35 percent since the last fiscal year that began under Obama.In March, however, Trump told reporters, “I’ve ended payments to Guatemala, to Honduras, and to El Salvador. No money goes there anymore.” He directed the State Department to withhold appropriated aid funds. But that was a response to — not a cause of — the renewed surge in immigration.At the time Trump spoke, March apprehensions of immigrants illegally attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border were surging to 92,840, more than triple the level of March 2015, prior to the aid program to which Biden referred. Far from being “abated,” the “crisis” of which Biden spoke had come back with a vengeance.Trump has since relented on his threat. On June 18 — after widespread criticism — his administration said it would go ahead with $432 million in projects and grants that had been previously approved — out of the $615 million in aid that Trump had ordered to be frozen. Two candidates, former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper and Sen. Bernie Sanders, mentioned time frames in their discussions of climate change that could use some additional context. Hickenlooper, who studied to be a geologist, and is a two-term former governor of Colorado, said in response to a question about climate change, “I share the sense of urgency. I’m a scientist, so I recognize that we’re within 10 or 12 years of actually, you know, suffering irreversible damage.”Sanders later said, “The scientists tell us we are 12 years before there is irreparable damage to this planet.”The 12-year figure is frequently mentioned by the press and politicians, and is extrapolated from a 2018 special report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which found that global warming “is likely to reach 1.5°C between 2030 and 2052 if it continues to increase at the current rate.” The world has already warmed about 1 degree Celsius.The report also concluded that to stave off warming beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels — and avoid the many climate change effects — the world would have to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 45% from 2010 levels by 2030 and be net-zero by 2050.In 2018, that statement was taken by many to mean there were only 12 years left to do something about climate change. But many scientists have since come forward to say that’s the wrong way of thinking about it.Myles Allen, an author of the IPCC report and the leader of the ECI Climate Research Programme at the University of Oxford, explained in a Conversation story he wrote in April that the IPCC’s timing is only a best estimate.“Please stop saying something globally bad is going to happen in 2030,” he wrote. “Bad stuff is already happening and every half a degree of warming matters, but the IPCC does not draw a ‘planetary boundary’ at 1.5°C beyond which lie climate dragons.”Kristie L. Ebi, director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at the University of Washington in Seattle, told the AP, “This has been a persistent source of confusion,” adding, “The report never said we only have 12 years left.”And Kate Marvel, a NASA climate scientist, told Axios in January, “12 years isn’t a deadline, and climate change isn’t a cliff we fall off — it’s a slope we slide down.” She added, “We don’t have 12 years to prevent climate change — we have no time. It’s already here. And even under a business-as-usual scenario, the world isn’t going to end in exactly twelve years.”Sanders repeated the same misleading claim about the Republican tax law that he and other Democrats have recited since the law passed at the end of 2017.Sanders said during the debate, “83% of your tax benefits go to the 1%.”But that won’t be true until 2027, when most of the individual income tax changes will have expired.We’ve written about this claim before — when Sanders said it during a CNN town hall and when Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said it shortly after the law passed.Sen. Kamala Harris also partly echoed the claim during the debate, saying that she would repeal the “tax bill that benefits the top 1% and the biggest corporations in this country.”Most of the individual income tax provisions expire after 2025, which will shift most of the tax benefits to the top 1%. An analysis by the Tax Policy Center found that the top 1% of income earners would get 20.5% of the tax cut benefits in 2018. That percentage would go up to 25.3% in 2025 and then jump to 82.8% in 2027.Before the law was passed, Republicans said that they expected a future Congress to extend the individual income tax cuts, instead of allowing taxes for many to increase. They structured the law that way so they could pass their tax bill through budget reconciliation, a process requiring only a majority vote in the Senate, which meant that Republican lawmakers could not add more than $1.5 trillion to the deficit over 10 years. Also, they couldn’t have a bill that added to the deficit beyond that 10-year window.So, while it will be true that 83% of the tax cut benefits will go to the top 1% of income earners in 2027 if Congress doesn’t act before then, it is misleading to give that statistic without context.Pushing back against President Trump’s claims that the economy is doing great, Sen. Kamala Harris said, “Well yeah, people in America are working — they’re working two and three jobs.” The percentage of American workers who hold multiple jobs is virtually unchanged from when Trump took office, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.Harris: I’m meeting people who are working two and three jobs — you know this president walks around talking about and flouting his great economy right — my great economy, my great economy … You ask him how are you measuring the greatness of this economy of yours? And they point to the jobless numbers and the unemployment numbers. Well yeah people in America are working — they’re working two and three jobs.According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were 7,855,000 people who held multiple jobs in May, or 5 percent of all those who are employed. That percentage has remained virtually unchanged during Trump’s presidency — it was 4.9 percent in January 2017 when he took office. In fact, the percentage of the employed working multiple jobs has hovered around 5 percent since late 2009, and it’s lower than the roughly 6 percent of workers who held multiple jobs during the late 1990s.Looking deeper into the 7,855,000 who held multiple jobs in May, the majority — 4.4 million — were people with full-time jobs who had a secondary part-time job, according to a BLS news release (See Table A-18). Another nearly 2 million had two part-time jobs, and about 325,000 held two full-time jobs.We looked into a similar claim last July when then-congressional candidate Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wrongly claimed that the low U.S. unemployment rate was “because everyone has two jobs.” The number of people holding more than one job has no bearing on the unemployment rate.In one of the most contentious moments of the debate, Harris confronted Biden on two race-related issues: Biden’s past opposition to school busing and his recent comments about working with “some civility” in the 1970s with two segregationist southern Democrats, Sens. James Eastland of Mississippi and Herman Talmadge of Georgia.Harris, who is black, accurately noted that Biden “worked with them to oppose busing,” and told the story of her own school integration experience as an elementary student. As we have written, Berkeley public schools in California began busing students to fully integrate the school district in 1968, and Harris began attending Thousands Oaks Elementary School in 1970.Biden, who was first elected to the Senate in 1972, accused Harris of “a mischaracterization of my position across the board.” In telling her personal story, Harris left out a key detail: It was the local school district’s decision to integrate its schools.The former vice president said he opposed busing “ordered by the Department of Education,” or what critics called “forced busing,” in the 1970s. “You would have been able to go to school the same exact way because it was a local decision made by your city council,” Biden said. In fact, Harris was attending an integrated school before Biden even joined the Senate.But Harris did not mischaracterize Biden’s comments about Eastland and Talmadge, so she did not mischaracterize his position “across the board.”Harris said “it was hurtful to hear you talk about the reputations of two United States senators who built their reputations and career on the segregation of race in this country.” Biden responded by saying, “I did not praise racists.” Harris didn’t say he did. She said he talked about their reputations, and Biden did say that he was able to work with them in a civil way to get things done in the Senate, despite their political and personal differences.At a June 18 fundraiser in New York, Biden described Talmadge as “one of the meanest guys I ever knew,” and said Eastland referred to him as “son” instead of senator, which he took as a sign of disrespect.But, in comparison to the current political climate in Washington, Biden went on to say: “At least there was some civility. We got things done. We didn’t agree on much of anything. We got things done. We got it finished. But today, you look at the other side and you’re the enemy. Not the opposition, the enemy. We don’t talk to each other anymore.”Rep. Eric Swalwell, trying to distinguish himself from the other candidates on gun issues, said he was “the only person on stage who has voted and passed background checks.”That’s clearly false. Biden, for example, was in the Senate in 1993 and voted for the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, which became law. It requires federally licensed firearms dealers to conduct background checks on most gun transfers to prospective buyers.Swalwell’s campaign explained that the California congressman meant he “was the only person on stage who has voted for and passed universal background checks.”That’s true, but still misleading.Swalwell did vote for the Bipartisan Background Checks Act that passed the Democratic-controlled House by a vote of 240-190 in February. The legislation, according to the Congressional Research Service, expands background check requirements by prohibiting a firearm transfer between unlicensed individuals “unless a licensed gun dealer, manufacturer, or importer first takes possession of the firearm to conduct a background check.”However, four other people on the debate stage — Sanders, Harris, Sen. Michael Bennet and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand — are all co-sponsors of the Background Check Expansion Act, which would “expand federal background checks to all gun sales,” according to lawmakers who reintroduced the bill in January. (Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker, who were in the previous night’s debate, are also co-sponsors. )But because the Senate is currently controlled by Republicans, that bill has virtually no chance at passing in the chamber.After being asked about his concerns about “embracing socialism,” Hickenlooper misrepresented the Green New Deal, objecting to a provision in the legislation that doesn’t exist. “I admire the sense of urgency and how important it is to do climate change — I’m a scientist,” he said, “but we can’t promise every American a government job.”The Green New Deal, which we’ve written about before, is a nonbinding resolution that aims to tackle climate change while ensuring job security, health care and protecting vulnerable communities.The Green New Deal doesn’t promise every American a position in the government. Instead, it guarantees “a job with a family-sustaining wage, adequate family and medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security to all people of the United States.”The resolution was introduced into both chambers of Congress in February, and is most closely associated with New York freshman congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. In March, the resolution did not advance in the Senate, after nearly all Democrats voted “present.”Sanders claimed that Trump tried to “throw 32 million people off their health care that they have,” a figure that includes people who would choose to no longer purchase insurance if Congress repealed the Affordable Care Act without replacing it. As we’ve written before, it’s misleading to say 32 million would all be thrown off.Trump supported a partial repeal-and-replace bill in the Republican-backed American Health Care Act, which wasn’t expected to have as big of an impact on the uninsured. But he also backed an immediate repeal of the ACA, with a replacement at a “later date.”In 2017 the Congressional Budget Office estimated the Obamacare Repeal Reconciliation Act of 2017, a bill that would fit that description,  would increase the number of uninsured by 32 million people over 10 years. But not all of them would be thrown off their insurance. CBO said: “In the nongroup market, some people would choose not to have insurance partly because they choose to be covered by insurance under current law to avoid paying the penalty.”The ACA imposed a tax penalty, known as the mandate, on those without health insurance, but the Republican tax law repealed that penalty as of Jan. 1 of this year. It’s worth noting that in May 2018, the CBO revised downward its estimate of the impact of repealing the mandate.In his closing statement, Sanders said he suspects “people all over the country who are watching this debate are saying these are good people, they have great ideas, but how come nothing really changes?”He then posed several questions, including, “How come we have the highest rate of childhood poverty?”That’s an unchanging — and false — Sanders claim. We debunked it twice during his 2016 presidential run.A 2017 report by the United Nations Children’s Fund, or UNICEF, did note that the United States is above average when it comes to the “relative child poverty” rate — which “shows the proportion of each nation’s children living in a household where disposable income is less than 60% of the national median.”But the report did not indicate the U.S. had the “highest” rate. The country ranked No. 7 out of 41 rich countries, behind Romania, Israel, Turkey and others.The U.S. Census Bureau pegged the 2017 poverty rate for those under age 18 at 17.5 percent (see Table 3), which is the lowest it’s been since 2006.The bureau also calculates the Supplemental Poverty Measure, which accounts for government programs that assist low-income families and are not considered in the official poverty measure. The SPM rate for children in 2017 was 15.6 percent.Update, July 3: We amended our story to note that Sen. Kamala Harris began attending Thousand Oaks Elementary School, a public school in Berkeley, California, in 1970, according to her campaign. We previously reported, based on information from her Senate office, that she began there in 1969.Meyer, Peter J. “U.S. Strategy for Engagement in Central America: Policy Issues for Congress.” Congressional Research Service. 12 Jun 2019.Brennan, Margaret and Grace Segers. “Trump directs State Department to cut off aid to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.” CBS News. 30 Mar 2019.U.S. Customs and Border Protection. “Southwest Border Migration FY 2019.” Undated website accessed 28 Jun 2019.Lee, Matthew. “US restores some aid to El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala.” The Associated Press. 18 Jun 2019.Smith, Allan and Doha Madani. “Biden doubles down on segregationist comments, says critics like Cory Booker ‘should apologize’ to him.” NBC News. 19 Jun 2019.Spencer, Saranac Hale. “Sen. Harris Didn’t ‘Lie’ About Integration.” FactCheck.org. 13 Jul 2018.U.S. Congress. “Joseph Robinette Jr.” Biographical Directory of the U.S. Congress. Undated. Accessed 28 Jun 2019.Sokol, Jason. “How a Young Joe Biden Turned Liberals Against Integration.” Politico Magazine. 4 Aug 2015.Bobic, Igor. “Democrats Slam Joe Biden Over Comments Invoking Segregationist Senators.” HuffPost. 19 Jun 2019.Congressional Budget Office. Cost Estimate: H.R. 1628 Obamacare Repeal Reconciliation Act of 2017. 19 Jul 2017.Congressional Budget Office. Federal Subsidies for Health Insurance Coverage for People Under Age 65: 2018 to 2028. May 2018.U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Multiple Jobholders. Retrieved from FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis on 28 Jun 2019.U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Multiple Jobholders as a Percent of Employed. Retrieved from FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis on 28 Jun 2019.Bureau of Labor Statistics. News release: The Employment Situation — May 2019. 7 Jun 2019.Berman, Corey and Farley, Robert. “Ocasio-Cortez Wrong on Cause of Low Unemployment.” FactCheck.org. 18 Jul 2018.UNICEF. “Innocenti Report Card 14 Children in the Developed World.” Jun 2017.U.S. Census Bureau. “Income and Poverty in the United States: 2017.” 12 Sep 2018.U.S. Census Bureau. “Historical Poverty Tables: People and Families – 1959 to 2017.” Accessed 28 Jun 2019.U.S. Census Bureau. “The Supplemental Poverty Measure: 2017.” 12 Sep 2018.U.S House. “H.Res.109, Recognizing the duty of the Federal Government to create a Green New Deal.” (as introduced 7 Feb 2019).Davis, Susan. “Senate Blocks Green New Deal, But Climate Change Emerges As Key 2020 Issue.” NPR. 26 Mar 2019.McDonald, Jessica. “The Facts on the ‘Green New Deal’.” FactCheck.org. 15 Feb 2019.Freedman, Andrew. “Climate scientists refute 12-year deadline to curb global warming.” Axios. 22 Jan 2019.Allen, Myles. “Why protesters should be wary of ‘12 years to climate breakdown’ rhetoric.” The Conversation. 18 Apr 2019.Woodward, Calvin et. al. “AP FACT CHECK: O’Rourke on climate, Trump on ‘no collusion’.” Associated Press. 16 Mar 2019.IPCC, 2018: Summary for Policymakers. Global warming of 1.5°C. An IPCC Special Report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty. World Meteorological Organization, Geneva, Switzerland.


Nearly all ships operated by U.S.-headquartered cruise lines are registered in foreign countries.

Explanation: Aside from the majority revenue generated by U.S. passengers, cruise lines are independent of the U.S. economy. Even though nearly 75 percent of passengers are U.S. citizens, “cruise line corporations and their ships are not traditionally American-owned or registered …” (Tomlinson, 2007)

As the COVID-19 coronavirus disease pandemic of March 2020 threatened to shut down businesses across America for an extended period of time, the U.S. government faced the difficult task of deciding which industries should be provided economic assistance to keep them afloat for the duration. Public sentiment in some quarters was strongly against government bailouts for businesses such as airlines and cruise companies, on the grounds that over the last several years many of the major operators had spent billions of dollars in profits buying up their own stock rather than paying down their debts. In USA Today, John M. Griffin and James M. Griffin wrote: Start with the airlines. Rather than using their profits from the past five years to pay off debts and save for a rainy day, the big four — American, United, Delta and Southwest — instead grew their combined liabilities to $166 billion, all while spending $39 billion on share repurchases. That number, which is only from the big four, is almost 80% of what they’re asking for now from U.S. taxpayers. Similarly, the three largest Cruise companies — Carnival, Norwegian, and Royal Caribbean — have liabilities of $47.5 billion and engaged in share repurchases of $8 billion. Had these companies paid down liabilities instead of using stock repurchases to bid up their stock prices, they would have been far better prepared to weather this emergency. Of course, higher share prices made their stock options more valuable. This allowed top airlines executives to pay themselves $666 million in compensation over the five-year period. The top cruise executives managed to haul in $448 million. Now, taxpayers are unwillingly being called upon to bail out their profligate behavior. A widely circulated meme on social media offered another reason why cruise lines were supposedly unworthy of government bailouts — because although they might be headquartered in the U.S., their ships were foreign-flagged in order to put them out of reach of U.S. law:  That nearly every major cruise line registers their ships somewhere outside the U.S. is hardly a disputable point. As a 2011 news report noted, only a single major cruise ship at the time was U.S.-flagged: [O]nly one major cruise ship — NCL America’s Pride of America — is registered in the United States, according to data from CyberCruises.com. Most of the big boats fly Bahamian flags, but other popular registries include Panama, Bermuda, Italy, Malta and the Netherlands. In fact, according to Cruise Lines International Association, 90% of commercial vessels calling on U.S. ports fly foreign flags. The three cruise lines called out by name in the meme — Disney, Celebrity, and Carnival — do indeed engage in this practice. It’s not difficult to verify that Disney cruise ships are registered in the Bahamas, Celebrity ships in Malta, and Carnival ships in Panama. Of course, the cruise industry and their critics offer differing reasons for why cruise ships are flagged in countries other than the U.S., with the former asserting that: CLIA [Cruise Lines International Association] maintains there are reasons for such policies: “There are many factors that determine where a cruise ship — or for that matter, any maritime vessel — is flagged. Those determinations are made by individual cruise lines and other ship operators based on varying factors including the capabilities of the flag to deliver the services needed; representation and reputation of the flag in the international shipping community; the performance of the flag state, which dictates how a ship is prioritized by port states; the pool of seafarers able to meet the needs of the flag; and the flag’s fees/charges and taxes,” the association said by e-mail. This can be viewed as a robust free-market debate. Some maintain burdensome U.S. regulations have forced cruise operators to plant their flags elsewhere, while others say these corporations are seeking to attract American dollars while skirting American safety and consumer protection laws. On the other hand, an academic paper by Caitlin E. Burke of the University of Florida about “Legal Issues Relevant to Cruise Ships” made no bones of observing that reflagging of ships had long been used as a means of avoiding U.S. federal taxes, labor and safety laws, environmental laws, lawsuits, criminal investigations, and other regulations:


Rihanna's Instagram message to followers to throw away the Snapchat app caused the company's share value to fall by hundreds of millions of dollars in one day.

Explanation: What's true: Snap, Inc. did lose a lot of value immediately after Rihanna told people to get rid of the app. What's false: The extent of the loss attributable to her statements is impossible to quantify.

Technology, domestic violence, rihanna, snapchat

The singer Chris Brown’s violent physical abuse of his one-time girlfriend, fellow singer and pop star Rihanna, was one of the most high-profile episodes of domestic violence in recent years, and one which raised awareness about the nature and consequences of that crime throughout the world. That made it particularly shocking to many observers when the social networking app Snapchat hosted a mobile game commercial which made light of Rihanna’s abuse at the hands of Brown. The advertisement for the game Would You Rather? invited viewers to choose to “Slap Rihanna” or “Punch Chris Brown.” Is it just me, or is this ad that popped up on my Snapchat extremely tone deaf? Like what were they thinking with this? pic.twitter.com/7kP9RHcgNG — Royce Mann (@TheRoyceMann) March 12, 2018  According to National Public Radio, the company behind Snapchat apologized and removed the commercial from circulation by 12 March 2018, but screengrabs of it had already begun to spread. On 15 March, Rihanna herself criticized the app for hosting the commercial in an Instagram post that has since been deleted: …I’m just trying to figure out what the point was with this mess! I’d love to call it ignorance, but I know you ain’t that dumb! You spent money to animate something that would intentionally bring shame to DV [domestic violence] victims and made a joke of it!!! This isn’t about my personal feelings, cause I don’t have much of them…but all the women, children and men that have been victims of DV in the past and especially the ones who haven’t made it out yet…you let us down! Shame on you. The star then appeared to encourage her 61 million Instagram followers to delete the Snapchat app, urging: “Throw the whole app-oligy away.” If she tells me to delete snapchat I’ll do it @rihanna pic.twitter.com/yUW1UOzNc2 — Nicollette Williams (@nicollettemw) March 15, 2018  Rihanna’s critical intervention appears to have been an event that sparked a selloff of shares in Snap, Inc. the company behind the app, prompting a whole ecosystem of viral social media posts and news articles in response. On 15 March 2018, the company’s share value dropped by 3.64 percent, the equivalent of roughly $754 million. While not unprecedented (it was only the 26th-biggest one-day percentage drop in value in the last year), this was a significant decline. Since March 2017, the average (median) one-day percentage loss in Snapchat’s market value has been -0.34 percent, so the devaluation seen on 15 March was substantial. On a day where there was no other major bad news for Snapchat, the evidence is very strong that Rihanna’s message to “throw away” the app (delivered instantly to 61 million people), as well as the ensuing media coverage, at the very least made a significant contribution to the nearly $800 million one-day loss.


Coronavirus forces U.S. churches to offer Easter Sunday services unlike any before.

Explanation: U.S. church leaders peppered their Easter homilies with references to the coronavirus on Sunday, in masses held online, on television and even in parking lots to people sheltering in cars to maintain social distancing during the pandemic.

For the world’s largest Christian population, the coronavirus pandemic has meant observing an Easter Sunday unlike any Americans have lived through before. “Today as we hear the Easter bells as a call to solidarity among all the members of our community in the face of the pandemic, we might respond to witness to the power of the Resurrection, the power of love that is stronger than death, and faith in a provident God who can always bring good out of evil,” Boston’s Cardinal Sean O’Malley said in his homily on BostonCatholic.org. Governors and health authorities across the United States have broadly asked residents to avoid gathering in large numbers, leading to the closure of schools, businesses and churches. The COVID-19 respiratory disease caused by the novel coronavirus has claimed more than 21,300 lives across the United States and infected more than 525,000 people. Major U.S. religious institutions, including Roman Catholic dioceses and Protestant churches, have found alternatives to safely celebrate the holiest day on the Christian calendar. In Easley, South Carolina, the 2,200 members of the Rock Springs Baptist Church were among the many U.S. churchgoers who turned to technology and the airwaves for help. Reverend Jim Cawthon, 46, said he expected hundreds to spend Easter services in their cars in his megachurch’s parking lot, watching the proceedings on big outdoor screens and listening to its broadcast over local radio. More will likely watch online, which Cawthon said should be easier as the church recently upgraded its video and internet systems. “Just prior to this all going crazy, we were already set  up,” Cawthon said. “It’s all about the cross and celebrating Easter even in a pandemic.”  Some older adults in retirement communities celebrated Holy Week by playing music and video broadcasts of services. Some communities held contests, asking residents, for instance, to decorate golf carts for Easter and leave them parked outside for judging, instead of holding annual golf cart Easter parades. Curtis James, a youth pastor at the Tate Springs Baptist Church in Arlington, Texas, dreamed up the idea of holding a safe Easter egg hunt for children with the online videogame Minecraft. Other churches have joined in as the plan garnered national attention. The Home Moravian Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, has held a sunrise Easter service for almost 250 years, weathering even the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, as well as the two World Wars. But for the pandemic, the service was canceled. It was to be replaced by an online and locally broadcast service with just a preacher and few choir and band members providing music. A handful of churches have bucked social distancing rules aimed at slowing the disease’s spread and planned to go ahead with in-person services on Sunday, with some pastors predicting divine protection from the disease. Most Catholic dioceses across the United States shut down all such live services, however. Archbishop Jose Gomez of the Los Angeles diocese wrote to priests and parishioners across the nation online to hold steadfast. “Future generations will look back on this as the long Lent of 2020, a time when disease and death suddenly darkened the whole earth,” Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles diocese wrote to priests and parishioners across the nation online. “This Holy Week will be different. Our churches may be closed but Christ is not quarantined and his Gospel is not in chains.”  In Columbus, Georgia, the St. Anne Catholic Church found a unique way to fill up its pews for Easter Sunday. More than 650 members of the 1,500-strong congregation sent in “selfie” photos of themselves that the priests taped to the pews, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. “Now we look out and see faces,” pastor Robert Schlageter told the newspaper.


Drug may delay high blood pressure in some

Explanation: This article discusses a recent New England Journal of Medicine article on a randomized, controlled, double-blinded trial of candesartan, an Angiotensin II Receptor Blocker (ARB), to prevent hypertension in prehypertensive patients. Candesartan works by blocking the action of a substance in the body that causes blood vessels to tighten. As a result, candesartan relaxes blood vessels and this lowers blood pressure. There is evidence of disease mongering in this story: The classification of “prehypertension” (systolic 130-139 mm Hg and 85-89 mm Hg diastolic) is still debatable by some medical experts, and whether prehypertension alone is a strong predictor of future heart disease is also debatable. Blood pressure increases as a natural part of aging, so whether prehypertension or mild hypertension should be viewed as a condition or disease and treated with costly medication needs further study. Hypertension is only one of several risk factors that contributes to heart disease. A prehypertensive or mildly hypertensive person with low risk factors and a healthy lifestyle may not benefit from drug treatment as much as someone with greater risk of heart disease and an unhealthy behaviors, such as a poor diet, lack of exercise and smoking. The story does mention lifestyle modifications, such as diet and exercise, as a “cornerstone of controlling blood pressure,” however, comparison is only anecdotal and there is no mention of studies examining the effect of lifestyle modification on prehypertension or hypertension. The story mentions limiting salt and water as part of lifestyle modification. A reduced sodium diet may help control hypertension, but reducing water will not help most people decrease blood pressure. There is not much quantitative information on the risk reduction from taking an ARB to prevent hypertension. There was some modest protective benefit in the treatment group at 4 years (absolute reduction 9.8%), though the story says those who took the drug for 2 years and then a placebo for an additional 2 years “matched the placebo group”. There is no discussion of the side effects of this anti-hypertensive drug, nor is there discussion of long-term safety of taking this medication for many years as a means of prevention. The most common side effects of ARBs are cough, elevated potassium levels, low blood pressure, dizziness, headache, drowsiness, diarrhea, abnormal taste sensation (metallic or salty taste), and rash. In this study, gastrointestinal problems, dizziness and headaches were more common in the treatment group, though in most cases, the difference was small. This class of drugs are typically more expensive than other anti-hypertensive medications, but there is no mention of the cost of taking this medication daily for prevention of hypertension. Also, there is no comparison of ARB treatment with less costly anti-hypertensive medications such a diuretics, or a cost comparison with lifestyle modification. Lastly, the story appropriately notes that the makers of the candesartan sponsored and help design the study. What is not mentioned is that the lead author also serves as a consultant to the drug company and has other grant support from AstraZeneca, the makers of the drug.

No mention of the cost of these Angiotensin II Receptor Blocker drugs. They are typically more expensive than other anti-hypertensive medications, but there is no mention of the cost of taking this medication daily for prevention of hypertension. Also, there is no comparison of ARB treatment with less costly anti-hypertensive medications such a diuretics, or a cost comparison with lifestyle modification. The story gives some basic quantification of the benefits of treatment, but no relative or absolute risk reduction was provided, though they are available in the journal article. Benefits were oversimplified. No mention of side effects of the drug. The most common side effects of ARBs are cough, elevated potassium levels, low blood pressure, dizziness, headache, drowsiness, diarrhea, abnormal taste sensation (metallic or salty taste), and rash. In this study, gastrointestinal problems, dizziness and headaches were more common in the treatment group, though in most cases, the difference was small. There were no mention of the question of long-term safety of being on these medications for years as prevention. There is mention of the study design, but no mention that it was double-blinded. There was still some modest protective benefit in the treatment group at 4 years (absolute reduction 9.8%), though the story said that “they matched the placebo group”. This story represents a classic case of disease mongering. The classification of “prehypertension” (systolic 130-139 mm Hg and 85-89 mm Hg diastolic) is still debatable by some medical experts, and whether prehypertension alone is a strong predictor of future heart disease is also debatable. Blood pressure increases as a natural part of aging, so whether prehypertension or mild hypertension should be viewed as a condition or disease and treated with costly medication needs further study. Hypertension is only one of several risk factors that contributes to heart disease. A prehypertensive or mildly hypertensive person with low risk factors and a healthy lifestyle may not benefit from pharmaceutical treatment as much as someone with greater risk of heart disease and unhealthy behaviors such as a poor diet, lack of exercise and smoking. There is no discussion of the controversies surrounding these issues. The story mentions that makers of the anti-hypertensive medication sponsored and help design the study. The lead author also serves as a consultant to the drug company and has other grant support from the makers of the drug, which was not disclosed. Nonetheless, we give this a satisfactory score. Advantages/disadvantages of lifestyle and medication not adequately covered. The story mentions lifestyle modifications, such as diet and exercise, as a “cornerstone of controlling blood pressure”, however, comparison is only anecdotal and no mention of studies on the effect of lifestyle modification for reducing prehypertensive or hypertensive blood pressure. The story mentions limiting salt and water. A reduced sodium diet may help manage hypertension, but reducing water will not help most people decrease blood pressure. Treatment of prehypertention to prevent hypertension is currently only being studied in clinical trials such as the one described in this article. The story describes a trial of anti-hypertensive therapy with candesartan, an Angiotensin II Receptor Blocker (ARB), to prevent hypertension in prehypertensive people. But it offers no information about whether this is a new drug. No evidence this is from a press release. There are sources cited other than study authors.


A list of chemicals, written as if they were ingredients on a food label, accurately depicts the chemical composition of a banana.

Explanation: In sum, this graphic accurately depicts the chemicals that comprise a banana, using a variety of tactics to make that completely natural food appear to be full of “chemicals” — something originally created by a high school chemistry teacher as part of a lesson on chemophobia.

Photographs of various fruits accompanied by long lists of chemicals crafted in the style of ingredients labels have been a fixture on the internet since at least 2013, when they were created by James Kennedy, a high school chemistry teacher in Melbourne, Australia. His take on the banana is especially popular: This graphic is an accurate representation of the chemical constituents of your average banana, information that can be verified with the USDA Agricultural Research Database, which compiles studies into the nutritional and chemical content of various food items. Part of what Kennedy was trying to convey with his illustration was that even completely natural foods, when described scientifically, can sound unnatural and potentially unhealthy, as reported in the New York Times:  As a high-school chemistry teacher, I made these posters for my students as a visual introduction to our organic chemistry course. I want to erode the fear that many people have of ‘chemicals’, and demonstrate that nature evolves compounds, mechanisms and structures far more complicated and unpredictable than anything we can produce in the lab. This poster series breaks down all the major ingredients in popular natural foods — using E-numbers and IUPAC names instead of common names where they exist. Anthocynanins, for example, which are said to give blueberries their “superfood” status, are also known as E163. If these ingredients are considered hierarchically, the banana sounds much more simple. Like all fruit, it contains water, sugars, starch, fiber, amino acids, fatty acids, minerals (i.e., ash), and chemicals that impart their coloring. Myriad names can be ascribed to the various different chemicals that fit these groups, and Kennedy used a variety of different nomenclatural methods to make that point. The most common grouping of chemicals in the banana are sugars, and in this case the sugars are predominantly glucose and fructose, with lesser amounts of sucrose and maltose. After starch, a polysaccharide chemical found in abundance in plants, the next listed set of chemicals is fiber, another common group of carbohydrate chemicals. Kennedy represented the fiber as a group of chemicals listed by their “E numbers”, which are codes assigned to substances permitted as food additives within the European Union. In reality, all of these chemicals are either cellulose (the most common chemical in plants) or various breakdown products of cellulose: After the fiber, Kennedy listed amino acids, a group of simple chemicals ubiquitous to life on this planet. All the chemicals listed are present in bananas, according to the USDA. Fatty acids, the next group of chemicals, are similarly ubiquitous in nature, and all of those chemicals listed above are also found in bananas. Likewise, ash is another way of referring to the mineral content of a food item, and in this case Kennedy used a variety of different chemical-naming conventions to obscure the fact that each of them is commonly known by other names: Similarly, the coloring agents — all of which are natural — might be better recognized by different names: The remaining chemicals may sound intimidating, but they too are natural. E1510 is another name for ethanol, which forms naturally as fruit ferments. The final “natural ripening agent,” ethylene gas, might sound downright nefarious but actually represents a neat intersection of plant and food science. In nature, the gas is a plant hormone associated with aging that triggers the ripening process. In the food industry, the gas is used on industrial scales to ripen a variety of fruits and vegetables all at once.