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6784
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Madagascar’s plague deaths up to 124, island nation says.
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Authorities in Madagascar say the death toll from a plague outbreak has reached 124 people as the disease for the first time affects the Indian Ocean island’s two biggest cities.
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true
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Health, Madagascar, Plague, Indian Ocean
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The nation’s disaster risk management office says 1,192 cases have been identified. More than two-thirds of cases are of the more virulent pneumonic form. The office says less than 30 percent of people who have had contact with plague patients can be traced, making it more difficult to control the spread of the disease. Plague is endemic in Madagascar. This year’s outbreak is unusual because it has reached the nation’s two largest cities, Antananarivo and Toamasina.
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114
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Climate change protests snarl up central London, 135 arrested.
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Climate change protesters blocked traffic across London’s government district of Westminster on Monday as they launched two weeks of peaceful civil disobedience to call for urgent action to curb carbon emissions.
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true
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Environment
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Police said they had arrested 135 activists from the Extinction Rebellion group by 1130 GMT. The group expects 10,000 people will come to the capital from across Britain to join the two-week protest, which is part of a coordinated international movement. There were similar climate protests on Monday in Berlin, Vienna, Amsterdam, Madrid and other cities around the world. Large crowds of protesters blocked some of Westminster’s largest and busiest roads, bridges and squares, carrying banners with slogans such as “Climate change denies our children a future unless we act now”. Banging drums and chanting, they took over the tourist hotspot of Trafalgar Square and marched down the Mall, the broad tree-lined avenue that leads to Buckingham Palace. Some activists glued or chained themselves to cars parked in the middle of roads or to street lamps, making it hard for police officers to detain them. “We’re here because the government is not doing enough on the climate emergency,” said protester Lizzy Mansfield. “We only get one planet and so we’re here to try and defend it.” Extinction Rebellion rose to prominence in April when it disrupted traffic in central London for 11 days. More than 1,000 activists were arrested, of whom 850 were prosecuted for various public disorder offences. So far, 250 have been convicted. The Metropolitan Police has adopted more proactive tactics this time. Police chiefs said last week they would mobilise thousands of officers to handle the protests and that anyone who broke the law, even as part of non-violent civil disobedience, would be arrested. On Saturday, officers used a battering ram to enter a building in south London where the activists had been storing materials to use during the two-week protest. Eight people were arrested during the raid. Extinction Rebellion said the police response showed that British authorities considered the group a significant movement. Early on Monday, a group of activists locked themselves to a mock nuclear missile outside the Ministry of Defence, calling on the government to redirect funds spent on Britain’s Trident nuclear deterrent towards policies to combat climate change. “Climate not Trident” read a banner by the fake missile. Richard Dyer, a retired doctor from Scotland who was taking part in the street protests, said he regarded it as an extension of his medical career because climate change was the biggest threat yet to public health. “People in the environmental movement and climate scientists have been trying to persuade the public and government to take serious action and nothing has happened,” he said. “We want to use any way we can to make people and governments sit up and notice.”
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8393
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China reports 27 new coronavirus cases, death toll at 4,632 after data revisions.
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China’s National Health Commission reported 27 new confirmed coronavirus cases on April 17, up from 26 the day earlier, according to data published on Saturday.
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true
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Health News
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Of that figure, 17 cases were imported via individuals arriving overseas, up from 15 the previous day. Newly discovered asymptomatic cases were at 54, down from 66 a day earlier. Three of the new cases were imported, according to the health ministry. The total number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the country reached 82,719, an increase of 300 from the number reported the day prior. The sharp uptake follows revisions in case reporting that the NHC announced on Friday. The ministry placed the total death toll from the virus at 4,632 as of April 17, a number it originally reported on Friday when it publicly announced the revised figures. The new death toll marks an increase of over 1,000.
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22267
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"Florida Chamber of Commerce Says unions ""take away"" hard-earned money of teachers, firefighters and police officers to play politics."
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Chamber takes up 'paycheck protection' proposal in campaign-style ad
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false
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Unions, Florida, Florida Chamber of Commerce,
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"The Florida Chamber of Commerce says it is coming to the defense of teachers, police officers and firefighters with a new ad supporting legislation that would prohibit government unions from collecting dues through automated payroll deductions. The problem is, no teachers, police officers or firefighters are publicly saying thanks. Quite the opposite, actually. At a press conference outside the Florida House of Representatives on April 5, 2011, firefighters, cops and teachers accused the business group of misleading people by suggesting these groups supported the proposal, HB 1021. The measure passed the House 73-40 on March 25 and its companion, SB 830, is currently being considered in the Senate. ""I find it unconscionable that the people who are attacking the law enforcement officers in this state are now using us to try and further their political agenda,"" said Mark Hussey, an Orange County deputy sheriff. You can watch the ad that has Hussey and others angry by clicking here, or by pushing play on the video on the right side of this screen. Here's the text: ""These public servants dedicate their lives to helping others. Firefighters, police officers, teachers are facing uncertain times. So the last thing they deserve is for unions to take away their hard-earned money to play politics, sometimes without asking for approval. ""That's why the U.S. Supreme Court voted to allow workers paycheck protection. After all they do to help us, isn't it time we helped them? Paycheck protection. It's only fair."" The ad includes stock images of firefighters, cops and teachers (including video of a teacher also used in an ad in Wisconsin) and suggests that they are struggling to make ends meet. In one scene, a man is hunched over a kitchen table with his head in his hands as a woman and a baby look on. That got us thinking about this phrase that unions ""take away"" public servants' money to play politics. In a separate item, we checked a response to this ad from the Florida Education Association. First, just a little more about the legislative proposal, since the ad does little to actually explain what it's talking about. Supporters call the idea ""paycheck protection,"" and say House and Senate proposals give individual union members more power over how their dues money is spent. The change in law would do two basic things. First, public unions would be prohibited from utilizing payroll deductions, and second, unions would be required to get annual authorizations from members to use their dues for political reasons. Essentially, workers would be able to be members of the union but opt out of the political arm of the organization. Opponents argue that the House and Senate bills are akin to union busting because they make it more difficult for unions to collect dues. They say the bills also single out unions when more than 360 organizations currently are authorized to deduct money from workers' paychecks by the state. The House sponsor, Chris Dorworth, R-Lake Mary, said that while he's not aware of any unions supporting his bill, individual union members have contacted him and thanked him. (The St. Petersburg Times found no union members supporting the bill through a public records request made to Dorworth's office). The chamber ad, along with glossing over the substance of the proposal, misses a key point that differentiates Florida from other states with government-union political battles brewing -- states like Wisconsin, Indiana, Pennsylvania. In those states, workers in certain jobs are required to join the union. In Florida, workers are under no such obligation. That means that no one can be compelled to join a union in Florida, and as such, no one is required to pay union dues. The protections are written into the state Constitution. SECTION 6. Right to work.—The right of persons to work shall not be denied or abridged on account of membership or non-membership in any labor union or labor organization. The right of employees, by and through a labor organization, to bargain collectively shall not be denied or abridged. Public employees shall not have the right to strike. Why is that so important? Watch the ad again, or read the script with our description. Through its choice of words and images, the chamber is painting a clear picture. Cops, firefighters and teachers -- struggling to make ends meet -- are having their hard-earned money taken away by unions to play politics. But those cops, firefighters and teachers, at the least, are voluntarily deciding to have that money given to the unions. They are under no requirement to participate in the union, or contribute. Using the chamber's logic, they pay the union dues despite being in potentially bad financial straits. Now the only question is the last bit of the chamber ad specifying how that money is spent. Charles Caulkins, an employer labor lawyer with Fisher and Phillips and a member of the board of directors with the Florida Chamber of Commerce, concedes that union members are not required to join the union, and thus they are not bound to contribute money. But practically speaking, workers often feel either pressure from their colleagues to join the union, or feel like they would get substandard legal representation from the union if needed. And some unions will take a vote of local membership of how to support candidates come election time, he says. But others just take their marching orders from the national unions. ""How do they feel about dues being used for a certain political party when they might be in another one?"" Caulkins asked rhetorically. ""There must be some Republicans and independents who don't like all the money going to Democrats."" This comes with caveats, too. Unions don't spend all union dues on political campaigns, said Doug Martin, legislative director of the American Federation of State, Municipal and County Employees in Florida. Unions have separate voluntary political action committees, where members can contribute in addition to their normal union dues. Edie Ousley, a spokeswoman for the chamber, said the ad is factually accurate based on its wording. When PolitiFact Florida began to ask about the combination of the wording and the images, she wrote back: ""From a pure PolitiFact perspective, the ad is true."" We don't agree. When judging visual advertisements, we consider both the words and the images. In this case, the chamber ad says -- ""firefighters, police officers, teachers are facing uncertain times. So the last thing they deserve is for unions to take away their hard-earned money to play politics, sometimes without asking for approval."" As those words are said, the chamber shows an image of a man with his head in his hands looking over paperwork as a woman and child stand nearby. The message the ad is sending is clear: Hard-working police officers, firefighters and teachers -- facing uncertain financial times -- are having money taken from them by unions to be used for politics. The fact is union members are voluntarily contributing to unions. If they didn't want to contribute, they wouldn't have to. The chamber has a point that some union dues do go to political activities -- whether that's lobbying legislators in Tallahassee or campaign mailings or working with a campaign -- and individual union members can't always control how their dues money is spend. But that's no different than how most organizations operate. Whether it be the Public Broadcasting System, the United Way, or even the chamber, people donate or contribute money to be pooled with other donations so that the organizations or candidates can spread a message. If the contributor doesn't like that message, they stop giving. Union membership -- and as a result, the contributions that members make -- is voluntary. No group takes money away from union members."
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41831
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“I’ll soon sign into the law the largest legislative effort in history to address the opioid crisis. ... Very little Democrat support.”
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President Donald Trump has made health care — in particular a “Medicare for All” plan proposed by Sen. Bernie Sanders — a main theme in his campaign rallies across the country.
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false
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Affordable Care Act, health care, medicare, medicare-for-all, opioids, preexisting conditions, right to try,
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Editor’s Note: For weeks, President Donald Trump has been campaigning in states that are key to the Republican Party’s chances of maintaining control of the House and Senate. We have reviewed seven speeches he gave from Oct. 10 to Oct. 22. This is part of a series of stories on his speeches. President Donald Trump has made health care — in particular a “Medicare for All” plan proposed by Sen. Bernie Sanders — a main theme in his campaign rallies across the country.He claims that Republicans will “protect” Medicare, while Democrats will “totally obliterate” it. He supports these sweeping pronouncements by making false statements about the cost and details of Sanders’ plan, as well as who actually supports it. In Trump’s telling, all Democrats do, but that’s not the case.We also found, in our examination of seven speeches over 12 days in October, that the president falsely told a crowd in Ohio that an opioid bill garnered “very little” support from Democrats, when they actually voted unanimously for it. He also boasted in several states of “incredible” or “tremendous results already” from the “right to try” law aimed at giving terminally ill patients quicker access to unapproved medications — but there’s no evidence anyone has received such access under the law. And he continued to make misleading claims about health insurance premiums and protections for preexisting conditions.At a rally in Lebanon, Ohio, on Oct. 12, Trump falsely claimed a bill that seeks to address the opioid epidemic passed Congress with “very little Democrat support.” In fact, the legislation was a bipartisan bill offered by two Republicans and two Democrats. It was unanimously supported by Democrats in the House and Senate. In fact, the handful of votes against the bill all came from Republicans.“I’ll soon sign into the law the largest legislative effort in history to address the opioid crisis where just this year we got $6 billion from Congress,” Trump said at the rally. “Thanks to [Republican Sen.] Rob Portman and a lot of others. Thank you, Rob. But Rob and so many others helped. Very little Democrat support.”Earlier this year, the Senate passed a bipartisan budget bill that included $6 billion to help address the opioid crisis. But the bill Trump referenced was a more recent one, H.R. 6, the “SUPPORT for Patients and Communities Act,” an expansive package aimed at combating the nation’s opioid epidemic.The bill, which Trump signed on Oct. 24, includes expanding Medicaid and Medicare coverage for opioid-addicted patients, helping to create comprehensive opioid recovery centers, encouraging the development of non-addictive pain medications, and combating the importation of illegal drugs from overseas. Read here for a section-by-section breakdown of the many provisions in the bill.The bill was initially introduced in the House by Republican Rep. Greg Walden, who made clear in a press release that it was a bipartisan offering from himself, Republican Rep. Kevin Brady and Democratic Reps. Frank Pallone Jr. and Richard Neal.On the floor of the House, Walden noted that the bill was made up of dozens of pieces of legislation, most of which passed the House with strong bipartisan majorities.“You see, at a time when it seems we couldn’t be more divided, it is clear that striking back against addiction is something that transcends politics and brings us together as a community, as a country, and as a Congress,” Walden said.Several Democrats spoke from the floor in support of the bill, and noted that it incorporated numerous pieces of legislation first brought to the House by Democrats. Other Democrats said they were concerned that the bill did not do enough to address the opioid crisis, but still voted for it.The final version passed the House on Sept. 28 with a vote of 393-8. The eight votes against the bill all came from Republicans. Explaining his opposition to an earlier version of the bill, Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz said that while the bill had an “admirable purpose,” it was “costly, inefficient, and bad governance.”Over on the Senate side, as Trump suggested, Republican Sen. Portman was one of the champions of the legislation and added several provisions to the final draft. But Trump is dead wrong to say the bill got “very little” Democratic support.The final version of the bill passed the Senate 98-1 on Oct. 3 The lone vote against it came from Republican Sen. Mike Lee.In his rallies, Trump makes false and unsupported claims about the “right to try” law he signed on May 30.He claims that until he signed the law, “we couldn’t even come close” to letting terminally ill patients use promising, but unapproved, medications. In fact, the FDA for years has approved applications from patients seeking access to investigational drugs through the agency’s “expanded access” program.Trump also claims there have been “tremendous” and “incredible results” under the months-old federal law, but we could find no evidence that any drug manufacturers have granted access to any medications under the new law. The Goldwater Institute, the group that pushed for the law, told us only that it has “spoken to interested companies.” Trump, Texas, Oct. 22: And what happened is people would be told they’re terminally ill. They have a big problem. And if we had a drug or we had treatment that gave great hope, that looked promising, we couldn’t even come close to letting them use it. …And now they sign a simple document and they go out and they get it. And by the way, this we signed three months ago. We have had tremendous results already.Trump, Pennsylvania, Oct. 10: We have incredible drugs in the pipeline that can cure really horrible, horrific disease. We wouldn’t let anyone use these drugs because they didn’t want to hurt them, but they’re going to die. They’re terminally ill! I said, what are we doing?And two months ago, I signed right to try. Somebody’s terminally ill, we can try. And we’ve had great success. We’ve had great success.On Oct. 13 in Kentucky, too, the president said that “we’ve had some incredible results already.” The right to try legislation aims to circumvent the FDA and give terminally ill patients access to unapproved drugs more quickly than through the FDA’s expanded access program. But the president is wrong to say “if we had a drug or we had treatment that gave great hope, that looked promising, we couldn’t even come close to letting them use it.”FDA Commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb testified to Congress in October 2017 that the FDA had approved 99 percent of the more than 1,000 annual applications it gets for “expanded access to treat patients with investigational drugs and biologics.” Gottlieb said that “emergency requests for individual patients are usually granted immediately over the phone and non-emergency requests are generally processed within a few days.”The agency has data by fiscal year back to 2010 on its website.Under either the FDA’s expanded access program or the new federal right to try law, patients, along with their physicians, can request access to drugs that haven’t yet been approved by the FDA directly from manufacturers if there are no comparable treatments. In the FDA’s program, if a manufacturer agrees to make the drug, or device, available, both the FDA and the medical institution’s institutional review board must approve a treatment protocol before a patient can get the medication. Under right to try, which applies only to drugs, there’s no FDA or IRB oversight.In both processes, the drug manufacturer decides whether or not it wants to make the drug available.The right to try law is nearly five months old — which isn’t a lot of time to see “incredible results,” as the president claims. And, in fact, we asked the FDA, the Goldwater Institute and an expert on pre-approval access to treatments whether any drug companies have granted access to drugs under the new law, and they knew of no such instances. The White House press office didn’t respond to our inquiry.Alison Bateman-House, co-chair of the NYU School of Medicine Working Group on Compassionate Use and Pre-Approval Access, told us she is active in talking with patient groups and pharmaceutical companies, and she is “not aware of anyone getting access” or even the suggestion of someone getting access to drugs via right to try.The Goldwater Institute, a libertarian group based in Arizona that has pushed for state and federal right to try laws, said in a statement to FactCheck.org: “Just a few short months since the federal Right to Try was signed, we are now seeing growing interest and enthusiasm from manufacturers and the medical community around Right to Try.” But there have been no announcements of drug access. (The group points to a doctor in Texas treating neuroendocrine cancer as an example of that state’s law providing access to unapproved medication in the past. However, the NYU working group disputes this, saying the drug — Lutathera, which received FDA approval in January — was available via pre-approval access already. Regardless, they both agree there’s no example of drug access given under the new federal law. )The FDA press office told us that the agency had “convened an internal group to assess how to effectively and efficiently implement the new law. As part of that process, the agency will consider what information the FDA needs to issue to support companies and patients seeking to use the Right to Try pathway, such as guidance, QAs, or other agency recommendations.”Bateman-House said it’s doubtful any company would want to give access to drugs through right to try without such guidance to follow.It’s possible that the new law has prompted more awareness of the FDA’s existing expanded access program. Bateman-House wrote in an Oct. 25 article for the blog of the Health Affairs journal that “some pharmaceutical and biotech company executives have told me that they’ve experienced an uptick in the number of requests for investigational drugs — requests that they are handling via EA. … In a way, patients may have benefited from RTT after all: not because it created a new pathway that cut the FDA out of the picture, but because it raised awareness that non-trial access was possible, thus galvanizing patients and their doctors to request it.”However, we will have to wait “a year or two,” she wrote, for FDA data on the expanded access requests to see whether there has been such an impact.Reversing traditional partisan attack lines, Trump claims Democrats are a threat to Medicare, and that he and Republicans are its defenders. But Trump cuts some corners to make his point.Trump, Kentucky, Oct. 13: We, unlike the Democrats, will protect Medicare and protect Social Security.Trump, Nevada, Oct. 20: We will protect Medicare and we will protect your Social Security. And remember, when I was on that stage, I was the only one that said I’m going to protect your Social Security, and I have. … Because the Democrats will end up destroying them both, Medicare, Social Security.It’s worth noting, as we wrote, Medicare’s finances have worsened since Trump took office. The latest Medicare trustees report says the Medicare Part A trust fund, which covers payments to hospitals, will run out of money by 2026, three years earlier than projected just last year. That’s partly because the tax cut law that Trump signed last year will reduce Medicare revenues and increase expenses.The tax law also had a negative effect on Social Security. The Old Age and Survivors trust fund is scheduled to run out of funds one year earlier in 2035.Trump also argues a Medicare for All plan championed by Sen. Bernie Sanders would upend the health care program for seniors.Trump, Ohio, Oct. 12: Democrats have signed up for a socialist takeover of American health care that would utterly destroy Medicare and rob our seniors of the benefits they paid into their entire lives.Trump, Nevada, Oct. 20: Democrats in Congress have already signed up for a socialist takeover of health care that would eliminate the private insurance of 1.6 million people from Nevada. The Democrats want America to become — it’s not even that they want it, but that’s what’s going to happen — Venezuela. Venezuela. How does that sound?Trump is twisting several facts about the bill. Sanders’ bill would expand Medicare into a universal health insurance program, phased in over four years. While Trump calls it a “socialist takeover of American health care,” that’s not entirely the case. Under Sanders’ plan, the government would reimburse private hospitals and doctors for health care services, as the Canadian government does. So the government would play the role of health insurer, not provider. That’s different than a wholly government-run health care system, such as in Britain — and Venezuela.“Medicare for All would be an expansion of Medicare to a government funded and mostly privately administered and delivered health care system,” Carles Muntaner of the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto, told us via email. “The Venezuelan system at this point has a variety of government funded health care programs. … This is radically different from the U.S. Medicare for All model.”As for Trump’s claim that the plan would “rob our seniors of the benefits they paid into their entire lives,” as we wrote when Trump made a similar claim in an op-ed on Oct. 10, Sanders’ bill, as written, includes an increase in Medicare benefits, including dental, vision and hearing aids, and eliminates deductibles. That would be giving more benefits to seniors, not taking any away.And, for the record, while Americans have paid into Medicare their whole working lives, they haven’t paid enough payroll taxes into the Medicare Part A program to cover costs in the near future. And Parts B (physician services) and D (prescription drugs) are mainly paid with general revenues. In other words, seniors are getting more benefits from Medicare than they paid for. In total, Medicare cost $710 billion in 2017 and about 41 percent of that was paid through general revenues. (See Table II.B1 of the latest Medicare trustees report). Trump claimed in his rally in Kentucky that under Medicare for All, “your taxes are going to triple if you’re lucky.” That’s based on a cost analysis of Sanders’ plan published by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, which gets some of its funding from the libertarian Koch brothers. But that’s the net increase in health care spending – there would be offsetting savings for people, businesses and state governments.The study’s lead author, Charles Blahous, concluded the plan would increase the federal budget by $32.6 trillion over 10 years and, “Doubling all currently projected federal individual and corporate income tax collections would be insufficient to finance the added federal costs of the plan.” And, he wrote, “It is likely that the actual cost of M4A would be substantially greater than these estimates.”An Urban Institute analysis of the Medicare for All plan proposed by Sanders during the 2016 presidential campaign (which differs a bit from the bill Sanders introduced in the Senate) also concluded the federal government would spend about $32 trillion more over 10 years.But the Urban Institute study makes clear that this is just one side of the equation. Much of the increase in taxes would be offset by savings from private spending on health care, which would be nearly eliminated. The Urban analysis concluded national health expenditures overall would increase by $6.6 trillion (16.6 percent) between 2017 and 2026. Trump also overstates the Democratic consensus around the Medicare for All plan. Sanders’ bill is one of a handful of bills proposed by Democrats in this Congress that would expand the role of public programs in health care.Republicans have frequently misidentified Democratic candidates as supporters of Sanders’ Medicare for All plan, even when those candidates have made clear they don’t support it. Our fact-checking colleagues at the Washington Post Fact Checker noted at least 15 such instances.Trump made the same mistake when he singled out Democratic congressional candidate Amy McGrath in Kentucky, claiming she “supports a socialist takeover of your health care,” meaning Sanders’ bill. She does not. “I would not cast my vote for [the Sanders Medicare for All bill], not that plan as it is currently laid out,” she told the Lexington Herald Leader.As she spells out on her campaign website, McGrath would like to reform the existing Affordable Care Act to include a Medicare buy-in option for those over the age of 55 and “a so-called ‘public option’ to create a government-run health insurance agency that would compete with other private health insurance companies within the country.” The State Public Option Act, which would create a Medicaid buy-in option that states could offer through the ACA marketplace, has 20 Senate co-sponsors, including Sanders. That plan has more Democratic co-sponsors in the Senate that Sanders’ Medicare for All bill.In another attack on Medicare for All, Trump says the bill would end Medicare Advantage, which are private plans approved and paid for by Medicare. About a third of Medicare recipients are enrolled in such plans, which generally cost more per beneficiary than traditional Medicare.Trump, Nevada, Oct. 20: The Democrat plan would destroy Medicare and terminate Medicare Advantage for almost 200,000 Nevada seniors who depend on it. Democrats plan to kill Medicare Advantage and, really, it’s especially unfair to Hispanic Americans.It’s true that Sanders’ Medicare for All plan bans “duplicative” coverage from private insurers. That would effectively eliminate Medicare Advantage plans, but that doesn’t mean people would lose benefits they currently “depend on.” Rather, everyone would be put into a universal Medicare program, one with expanded benefits from today’s Medicare. It would offer most of the benefits that currently attract people to Medicare Advantage plans, such as vision, dental and audiology coverage, according to the bill. And once Medicare for All is fully implemented, there would be no deductibles for patients (except for some co-pays on brand-name drugs if a generic is available).“The main benefits of Medicare Advantage plans at the moment are that MA plans have out-of-pocket limits, which traditional Medicare does not have, and MA plans often offer supplemental benefits, especially vision and dental,” said Lori Kearns, a spokesperson for Sanders. “However, those are all things we will be offering under M4A.”Kearns noted that while the Medicare for All plan would ban duplicative coverage from private insurers, “it does not ban supplemental coverage. If there are items excluded from coverage, there could still be a private insurance market for those services.”Presidents often take credit for the good things that happen on their watch — whether they deserve credit for it or not. Trump has boasted of an expected 2 percent average decrease in benchmark premiums on the HealthCare.gov exchanges, saying it’s due to “good management,” even while he claims that Obamacare has been “very much dismantled, but it will be ultimately totally dismantled.”Health care experts told us that most administration actions in the past two years have driven premiums up.In Kentucky, Trump claimed: “And what we have done with the remnants of Obamacare is we’ve kept your premiums down far below what anybody would have thought, through good management, through Secretary Alex Azar.” And in Nevada, he lamented that not one Democrat would vote for a GOP repeal and replace plan last year, adding: “But now, if you notice, your premiums are way, way down. Nobody thought that was possible. And it’s been very much dismantled, but it will be ultimately totally dismantled.”Experts said lower growth was expected for 2019 for several reasons: less political uncertainty this year compared with 2017, slower growth in medical expenses, an overpricing of plans last year, and insurers’ growing familiarity with the market.Kelley Turek, the executive director of employer and commercial policy at the insurer trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans, told us that after several years under the ACA, “we are getting to a point where issuers are getting a better sense of this market,” she said, such as the population, their health costs and how to price plans.The president glosses over some inconvenient facts about Republican health care legislation and his administration’s actions when he tells his crowds that “Republicans will always protect patients with preexisting conditions.”Trump, Arizona, Oct. 19: And Republicans will always protect patients with preexisting conditions. They’re trying to put a false narrative out there. And if there is a Republican out there that doesn’t, let me know. I’ll — believe me, him or her, we’ll talk them into it. We’re going to protect preexisting conditions. It’s — put it down and bank.Trump talks about preexisting conditions because Democrats have made the issue a major campaign theme. In campaign ads, the Democrats have accused Republican incumbents of voting for legislation that guts protections for preexisting conditions.Trump complains of a “false narrative,” and we certainly have seen some inaccurate and misleading claims made about Republicans. But the Trump administration does support a lawsuit that it says would lead to the elimination of the Affordable Care Act’s preexisting condition protections.In June, the Justice Department said that “[a]fter careful consideration, and with the approval of the President of the United States” it had decided to not defend the U.S. government in a lawsuit seeking to overturn the ACA. The administration said that if the suit were successful, most of the health care law could remain, but two provisions would need to be eliminated: those guaranteeing that people can’t be denied coverage by insurers or charged more based on certain factors, including health status. (For more, see our story “Trump Misleads on Preexisting Conditions.”)In addition, it’s worth noting that while the GOP repeal-and-replace bills in 2017 would have continued to prohibit insurers from denying coverage to those with preexisting conditions, they would have changed the ACA’s protections regarding how insurers can price their policies.
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12465
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"Chris Abele Says David Clarke reduced the number of Milwaukee County sheriff's deputies ""from about 700 and something to 300 and something."
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Abele said that before he took over as county executive, Clarke reduced the number of sheriff’s deputies from about 700 to about 300. The sheriff’s office had 649 authorized deputy positions when Clarke took office in 2003 and 328 in 2011, the final county budget before Abele took over. That’s a total reduction of 321. Incomplete county records don’t indicate whether deputy reductions during first three years were requested by Clarke or were simply made by the County Board. But in 2005, he requested and was granted a gradual turnover of 200 positions in the county jail from being deputies to lower-paid correctional officers. So, at least 200 of the 321 deputy reductions were specifically requested by Clarke, although those 200 deputies were jailers who were replaced by lower-paid correctional officers.
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mixture
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County Budget, County Government, Crime, Wisconsin, Chris Abele,
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"Has tough-talking Milwaukee County Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr., who has apparently landed a post in the administration of President Donald Trump, actually slashed the number of his deputies by half or more? That’s the attack from Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele, the millionaire son of the co-founder of the Boston Scientific medical device company and a political nemesis of Clarke’s. On May 18, 2017, the day after after Clarke announced he would be joining the U.S. Department of Homeland Security as an assistant secretary, Abele was asked on WTMJ radio in Milwaukee what legacy Clarke would leave behind. (Clarke said he would take on his new post in June 2017, but the Trump administration has not confirmed Clarke’s announcement. Two days after Abele’s comments, CNN reported that Clarke plagiarized parts of his master’s thesis. Clarke has denied that accusation, but has said the report could kill his appointment.) Abele, who was once accused by Clarke of having ""penis envy,"" said Clarke’s legacies include reducing the number of deputies ""long before I was there from about 700 and something to 300 and something."" Given that Clarke, who calls himself ""America’s sheriff,"" has built a reputation on Fox News and elsewhere as being tough on crime, let’s see if Abele’s statement is on point. Sheriff’s role on crime Clarke’s national profile as a favorite of conservatives has risen largely because of his blunt comments on crime, among other topics. In a 2013 interview, he advised citizens, in the context of a home invasion, to ""point that barrel center mass and pull the trigger"" because ""911 is not our best option."" But given that all of Milwaukee County is served by city and village police departments, the role of the Sheriff’s Office isn’t on the front line as much in fighting crime. In 2011, we rated a claim by Abele that the sheriff’s office ""plays only a limited role as a traditional law enforcement agency."" We noted at the time that Abele had proposed with his county budget cutting 240 positions from the sheriff’s office. That underscores an important point in weighing Abele’s claim: It’s the not the sheriff alone who determines how many deputies there will be. In the annual county budget process, the sheriff asks for a certain number of deputies; then the county executive recommends a number as part of an overall county budget proposal; and ultimately a number is authorized when the County Board of Supervisors approves the county budget. The numbers (Note: All of the deputy figures in this article are authorized positions, rather than an actual count of deputies, given that the number fluctuates with retirements, resignations, etc.) With the 2002 budget that Clarke inherited after he was elected, there were 649 deputy positions authorized for the sheriff’s office. In the 2011 budget, the final one before Abele took over as county executive, there were 328 deputy positions. The executive during those years was Wisconsin’s current governor, Republican Scott Walker. So, as far as the numbers go, Abele was high with the first part of his claim but on target with the second part. But the thrust of Abele’s claim is that Clarke reduced the deputy positions. This chart shows the number of deputies Clarke sought with his budget request; the number that were recommended by Walker with his full county budget proposal; and the number that were ultimately authorized in the final budget approved by the County Board. Again, we’re looking at the period before Abele took over as county executive. Year Deputies requested by sheriff Deputies recommended by county executive Deputies authorized by County Board 2003 * 627 625 2004 * 573 593 2005 * 588 588 2006 538 519 519 2007 443 443 475 2008 457 457 457 2009 439 435 435 2010 393 393 393 2011 328 328 328 *Not available The figures, from the county budget office, are incomplete for the first three years. The number of deputies ultimately authorized by the County Board dropped by 37 by 2005, but the figures don’t show whether Clarke requested any reductions. In any case, 2005 was an important year. In that budget, Clarke requested and the County Board approved, changing 200 positions in the county jail from deputies to lower-paid correctional officers. The change was not immediate; as deputies left the jail jobs, they were replaced by correctional officers. Over the next several years, the number of deputies steadily declined. In fact, Clarke requested fewer deputies than he did in the previous year in each year but one between 2006 and 2011 -- when he requested and was authorized 328 deputy positions. So, there were 649 authorized deputy positions when Clarke took office and only 328 by the time Abele took office. That’s a reduction of 321 deputy positions. But the reduction in total force was less, given that 200 of the deputies were jailers who were replaced by correctional officers. Our rating Abele said that before he took over as county executive, Clarke reduced the number of sheriff’s deputies from about 700 to about 300. The sheriff’s office had 649 authorized deputy positions when Clarke took office in 2003 and 328 in 2011, the final county budget before Abele took over. That’s a total reduction of 321. Incomplete county records don’t indicate whether deputy reductions during first three years were requested by Clarke or were simply made by the County Board. But in 2005, he requested and was granted a gradual turnover of 200 positions in the county jail from being deputies to lower-paid correctional officers. So, at least 200 of the 321 deputy reductions were specifically requested by Clarke, although those 200 deputies were jailers who were replaced by lower-paid correctional officers."
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25907
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Hillary Clinton Says President Donald Trump “is still yet to say anything as the president of the United States about bounties on American troops.”
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Trump has not denounced Russia over reports that it offered bounties to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan. But that tracks with the statements he has made, saying the intelligence about Russia bounties was not credible, and that the information reported by the New York Times was a “hoax.”
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false
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Foreign Policy, Military, Hillary Clinton,
|
"Hillary Clinton said Russia succeeded in its effort to influence the U.S. presidential election four years ago when she was the Democratic presidential nominee, and that Russia was working again to help elect someone ""who is favorable to their agenda."" In a July 20 interview with MSNBC’s Joy Reid, Clinton characterized President Donald Trump’s foreign policy as incoherent and inconsistent. She said she was glad that Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, was trying to warn Americans ""that what happened in 2016 is sadly underway again."" Reid then said: ""Yeah, to say nothing of putting bounties on American troops."" ""It’s unbelievable, Joy,"" Clinton replied. ""I mean, he is still yet to say anything, as the president of the United States, about bounties on American troops."" The ""bounties"" story is about reports that Russia offered Taliban-linked militants bounties to kill American troops in Afghanistan. PolitiFact decided to fact-check whether Clinton was right that Trump hasn’t said anything on the matter. A spokesperson for Clinton, Nick Merrill, told PolitiFact that Clinton was referring to Trump ""abdicating his responsibilities as commander-in-chief to hold a foreign adversary that’s killing our troops to account, and ensuring it stops."" Trump has not challenged Russia over the bounties reports, but he has not been silent on the issue either. Trump has dismissed New York Times reporting as ""just another hoax,"" said the story of Russian bounties wasn’t ""credible"" and that he wasn’t briefed about it. The New York Times reported June 26 that American intelligence officials concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for the killing of coalition forces in Afghanistan, including U.S. troops. A Taliban spokesman told the New York Times that the report was baseless and the press secretary for Russian President Vladimir Putin said the Russian government was not aware of the accusations. The New York Times story relied on officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Other news outlets, including the Associated Press, Washington Post, CNN and Fox News, have also reported on the information, citing officials familiar with the issue. ""While officials were said to be confident about the intelligence that Russian operatives offered and paid bounties to Afghan militants for killing Americans, they have greater uncertainty about how high in the Russian government the covert operation was authorized and what its aim may be,"" the New York Times story said. That story and subsequent reporting said Trump was briefed on the U.S. intelligence finding. Trump hasn’t condemned or warned Russia over the information reported by the New York Times — because he has said the reporting isn’t credible. ""Nobody briefed or told me, @VP Pence, or Chief of Staff @MarkMeadows about the so-called attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians, as reported through an ""anonymous source"" by the Fake News @nytimes. Everybody is denying it & there have not been many attacks on us....."" Trump tweeted June 28. In a follow-up tweet, Trump claimed that no other administration has been tougher on Russia and veered off into a campaign-related talking point on Ukraine and Hunter Biden. Trump ended that tweet with: ""Probably just another phony Times hit job, just like their failed Russia Hoax. Who is their ‘source’?"" Trump also tweeted June 28: ""Intel just reported to me that they did not find this info credible, and therefore did not report it to me or @VP. Possibly another fabricated Russia Hoax, maybe by the Fake News @nytimesbooks, wanting to make Republicans look bad!!!"" On July 1, Trump reiterated his argument that the story was made up and intended to damage him and Republicans. ""The secret source probably does not even exist, just like the story itself. If the discredited @nytimes has a source, reveal it. Just another HOAX!"" Trump wrote. Later that day, Trump repeated that there was no corroborating evidence and that he was never briefed because ""any info that they may have had did not rise to that level."" In a Fox Business Network interview, Trump was asked, ""if there's ever a scenario in which Russia puts a bounty on U.S. troops, how would you respond?"" ""First of all, they’d hear about it,"" Trump said July 1. ""But we never heard about it, because intelligence never found it to be of that level where it would rise to that. … From what I hear and I hear pretty good, the intelligence people didn't even, many of them didn't believe it happened at all. I think it's a hoax. I think it's a hoax by the newspapers and the Democrats."" Trump added that ""many of the intelligence people didn't think it was something that even happened, and if it did happen, the Russians would hear about it and anybody else would hear about it that was involved."" While the White House has said Trump was never orally briefed, warnings that a Russian intelligence unit placed bounties on American forces appeared in the President’s Daily Brief, according to multiple news reports. Not ‘like a mini novel,’ as Fox News host says White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany in press briefings has not directly denounced Russia over the New York Times reporting, offering instead broad warnings to all countries and saying there are dissenting opinions on the intelligence reported by the New York Times. A reporter on July 13 asked McEnany if Trump or the administration planned to ""make it very clear to the Russian Federation that there should not be bounties placed on the heads of American soldiers serving in Afghanistan. McEnany said, ""We tell each and every country that."" But the information on Russia was uncorroborated and there were ""varying views"" about it, she said. ""I’m not going to answer a question based on unverified intelligence, but rest assured, every country in this world is put on notice that bounties on the heads of U.S. troops is unacceptable, and this president will stand for U.S. troops at home and abroad,"" McEnany said. McEnany said ""yes"" when she was asked if that included Russia. Trump and Putin spoke on the phone July 23 and discussed the coronavirus pandemic and arms control issues, the White House said. There was no mention of the presidents talking about the news of Russian bounties to kill U.S. troops. Clinton said Trump ""is still yet to say anything as the president of the United States about bounties on American troops."" There is an element of truth in that Trump has not condemned Russia over the reports. But he has talked about the topic several times. His reaction has been to blast the reporting and the intelligence about Russia bounties as not credible. That would support why he hasn’t publicly condemned Russia."
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22053
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"Compact fluorescent light bulbs are ""toxic"" and ""not environmentally friendly."
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Group opposed to light bulb law claims consumers are being pushed to compact fluorescent light bulbs that are environmentally unsafe
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mixture
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National, Consumer Safety, Energy, Regulation, AmeriPAC,
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"A fundraising letter making the rounds from a conservative political action committee draws a political line in the sand over light bulbs. ""The Democrats have already voted to BAN our conventional lights bulbs (that you and I use even today!) in favor of DANGEROUS fluorescent light bulbs,"" writes Alan Gottlieb, chairman of AmeriPAC, a political action committee that largely supports conservative Republican candidates. In another fact-check, we looked at the first half of this claim, that Democrats voted to ban incandescent light bulbs (and rated it ). In this item. we'll address safety issues regarding the curly-shaped compact fluorescent light bulbs and whether the small amount of mercury contained in them presents an environmental hazard in homes. First, let's take a look at the arguments in the AmeriPAC letter and attached arguments from the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise Action Fund. The letter claims people will be required to ""throw away"" their existing incandescent light bulbs when the new law takes effect (a claim we rated ), and replace them with more expensive (a claim we rated) compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) bulbs that are ""supposedly"" ""environmentally safe."" ""I say 'supposedly' because the one thing the CFLs are not is 'environmentally safe,' "" wrote Ron Arnold of the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise. The letter then relays an anecdote that has made Maine housewife Brandy Bridges a poster child of the anti-CFL movement. ""Just ask Ellsworth, Maine housewife, Brandy Bridges, who dropped and shattered a compact fluorescent light bulb on the carpeted floor in her daughter's bedroom,"" the CDFE letter states. ""Aware that CFLs are potentially hazardous, Bridges called the local Home Depot store to ask for advice. Home Depot told her that the CFL contained mercury and advised her to call the Poison Control hotline. Now remember, this is the replacement to the electric light bulb you've used for your whole life. You know...you drop one on the floor. It breaks. What do you do? Get a broom and dust pan and sweep it up. What happened when Brandy Bridges called the Poison Control hotline? ""The hotline had her contact the Maine Department of Environmental Protection. The DEP sent Andrew Smith, a toxicologist, to her home. He sealed the room with plastic and told Bridges it would cost about $2,000 to clean up the mess from the one toxic $3 CFL device that broke on her floor."" But when a CNN reporter followed up on her story in Sept. 3, 2009, he concluded that the fear engendered by the story was largely overblown. Maine officials said they gave Bridges some bad advice and eventually came to her house and cut out the carpet. ""When contacted about the Bridges case, Maine officials said the advice to get a professional hazardous waste cleaner and remove the carpet was given before a policy on fluorescents was fully developed,"" the CNN story states. ""They no longer tell people to call a hazmat crew or remove rugs, unless the homeowner is particularly concerned."" Maine environmental officials, who continue to be enthusiastic supporters of CFL use, also studied the issue of mercury emissions from broken CFLs and published recommendations on how to clean them up if they break. For example, they recommended using index cards or playing cards to pick up broken pieces of the bulb (don't vacuum it up, as that can spread the mercury dust). Then, place the waste in a glass jar and take it to a recycling center. They also recommend ventilating the room for several hours by opening windows. ""Our advice, if you have one of them break, just clean it up and get it out of the house,"" said toxicologist Dr. Deborah Rice of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. ""There's no question that mercury is a toxic substance. But the amount of it in CFLs is very small."" She also tells people not to put CFLS in rooms where a small child might be likely to knock over a lamp. The CDFE letter also cites an April 3, 2011, San Jose Mercury News story that begins: The nation's accelerating shift from incandescent bulbs to a new generation of energy-efficient lighting is raising an environmental concern -- the release of tons of mercury every year. The most popular new light -- the curlicue, compact fluorescent light bulb, or CFL -- accounts for a quarter of new bulb sales and each contains up to 5 milligrams of mercury, a potent neurotoxin that's on the worst-offending list of environmental contaminants. Demand for the bulbs is growing as federal and state mandates for energy-efficient lighting take effect, yet only about 2 percent of residential consumers and one-third of businesses recycle them, according to the Association of Lighting and Mercury Recyclers. ""If the recycling rate remains as abysmally low as it is, then there will certainly be more mercury released into the environment,"" said Paul Abernathy, executive director of the Napa-based recycling association. ""Until the public really has some kind of convenient way to take them back, it's going to be an issue."" However, CDFE does not include a later passage in the Mercury News article that presents a counterweight to concerns raised about small levels of mercury in CFLs: Even with mercury worries about CFLs, they still ultimately lead to fewer mercury emissions than incandescent lights, according to the California Energy Commission. Although the old-style bulbs contain no mercury, they're often powered by coal-fired electricity plants -- which release mercury as a pollutant. The end result is about 40 percent less mercury emissions per bulb when using energy-efficient CFLs, according to EPA figures. The fact is that incandescent light bulbs result in much more mercury being introduced into the environment, because they require four times as much electricity to operate, and much of that electricity comes from coal-fired power plants that emit mercury into the air, said Noah Horowitz, a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council. ""If you are really concerned about mercury,"" Horowitz said, ""you should really be buying CFLs even though they have small amounts of mercury in them."" Claims about CFL safety concerns are ""wildly exaggerated,"" he said. ""They have extremely low levels of mercury, that's true,"" Horowitz said. ""But it is still in the bulb when you use them. When you are finished with them you should recycle them."" And there are now many more places to recycle spent CFLs than there were just two years ago, he said. For example, Home Depot and Lowe's both allow people to bring their spent CFLs there for free recycling, even non-customers. And, he said, CFLs generally have about half as much mercury in them as they did just a few years ago. Besides, he said, there is nothing in the law that requires people to buy CFLs. Light bulb companies have also developed halogen incandescent bulbs that meet the new efficiency requirements; and LED technology is another option. Neither of those types of bulbs contain mercury. It's misleading to warn about the small amount of mercury in CFLs without also noting that less efficient bulbs require more electricity and result in more mercury in the environment, said Steven Nadel, executive director of the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. ""They tell, shall we say, part of the story,"" Nadel said. The tone of the letter is clearly designed to heighten fears about CFLs in an effort to bolster an argument about government over-regulation. Mercury is, in fact, a toxic substance, and CFLs contain a small amount of mercury (a fraction of the amount contained in a mercury thermometer). But government and environmental officials say the risk they pose is very small, particularly if the light bulbs are disposed of properly and cleaned up properly if one shatters. Moreover, the warnings fail to acknowledge that there is a price to pay for sticking with less efficient traditional incandescent light bulbs. Those bulbs require far more electricity to operate, and, if they are powered by coal-fired power plants, result in even more mercury emitted into the environment."
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31695
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Coca-Cola issued a recall of Dasani water products after a clear parasite was found in bottles across the United States.
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If Coca-Cola really had issued a major recall after a parasite was discovered in “several thousand” bottles of Dasani water, leading to the hospitalization of “several hundred people,” that event would have been widely covered in the media, not limited exclusively to the clickbait site News 4 KTLA.
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false
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Junk News, coca-cola, dasani, news 4 ktla
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In April 2016, the web site News4KTLA published an article reporting that Coca-Cola had issued a recall on Dasani water products after a clear parasite was found in bottles across the United States: If you purchase/drink Dasani water you might want to listen up. There has been a major recall by the Coca-Cola company today after several thousand bottles of their drinking water was found to be contaminated with a parasite. It has sent several hundred people to the hospital and is responsible for parasitic symptoms such as fever, rash, vomiting and stomach bloating. Even though the majority of the impurities have admittedly been removed from Dasani water, and minerals added back in, these parasites have somehow worked their way into their supposedly “clean” water system which has been passed on to the consumer. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has shut down the manufacturing facility and issued a major recall on the brand. Do not drink this water! The FDA is recommending that if you have no choice but to consume the water, you MUST boil the water first to kill the parasite. Otherwise, it will host itself in your stomach lining and intestine and breed offsprings. There was no truth to this article, which originated as a piece of fake news from News 4 KTLA, a clickbait site that mimics the appearance of a local television news station’s online arm. News 4 KTLA carries no “fiction” or “satire” disclaimer anywhere on the site and has a history of publishing fearmongering stories based on little or no factual evidence). Coca-Cola did not issue a recall on Dasani products for any reason in April 2016 and noted in a statement that: “The source of this false and inflammatory information about our brand is a hoax news website. There is no recall of Dasani being conducted in the U.S.” The Food and Drug Administration similarly said they were not aware of any current recalls or disease outbreaks associated with Dasani water. The News 4 KTLA site used an image of a Leptocephalus, a flat and transparent eel larva which is not a parasite, to illustrate the story. The original image came from the Mie Prefecture Fisheries Research Institute:
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9348
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Women with endometriosis experience terrible pain. There’s finally a new treatment.
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The recent approval of a drug for the treatment of endometriosis pain is shared in this story in a way that satisfies many of our review site criteria. The story is carefully written, with lots of detailed explanations of the drug’s potential benefits — and drawbacks. Although some crucial information about funding and possible conflicts of interest is missing, the story otherwise affords the reader a readable and comprehensive “take” on the new drug. One clinical trial detail we think should have been included: The measured benefits for both the drug group and the placebo group. Endometriosis, a condition in which tissue migrates from the uterus into the abdomen of women, is relatively common and can be debilitatingly painful. While there is no cure at present, efforts to control the pain include hormonal treatments and even surgery, which produce their own complications. This story describes a new non-hormonal drug that appears to avoid some—but not all—of those complications.
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true
|
endometriosis
|
The story does a good job of describing the monthly cost ($850) for women who do not have health insurance. The inference is that insurers will cover the cost for others. The story needed to include more information about the study results–in particular, how both the drug and the placebo performed in the trials. As we learn from the NEJM study, the drug reduced pain for about half of the women who took it–but the placebo also reduced pain for about 35% of the women who took it. That’s a good detail to include as it provides a better sense of the drug’s effectiveness. The text does an impressive job of sharing information about the debits of the drug, including bone loss and symptoms of menopause. The double-blind, placebo-controlled trials are described, as are cautions, such as the short-term nature of the research. The reader will find ample information about the unpleasant symptoms of endometriosis. In some areas, it comes close to disease-mongering, when pointing out very rare instances of women needing many surgeries, or a case study of one woman having endometrial tissue in her nose. However, endometriosis is a medical condition, and often under-diagnosed, so we’ll rate this satisfactory. The scientist who led the two trials is clearly identified as such, but his consulting relationship with the company now marketing the drug is not mentioned, nor is the fact that that company, now positioned to benefit from selling the drug, paid for the studies. A number of existing pain-reduction alternatives are mentioned, from hormonal treatments to surgery, and their debits discussed. It would have been helpful to try and articulate how many women find the current alternatives insufficient. The text offers a likely date when this just-approved drug would become available at pharmacies. Although the research report describing the trials was published in The New England Journal of Medicine more than a year ago, this story is pegged to a more useful (to readers) “new event,” the US Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the drug. Abbvie, the company that funded the Stage 3 clinical trials of elagolix (brand name: Orilissa) and will now market the drug, made available an extensive news release on its web site. The Vox story contains a good bit of enterprise reporting and produced a story that is far more clear than the company’s effort.
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7224
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Romania hospital says 39 babies now diagnosed with superbug.
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The number of babies diagnosed with a drug-resistant superbug at a maternity hospital in Romania’s capital has risen to 39, authorities said Monday.
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true
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Health, Bucharest, Romania, Europe
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Raluca Alexandru, spokeswoman for Giulesti Maternity hospital, closed Nov. 30 due to the outbreak, said tests have confirmed the latest figure. It is triple the number of newborns diagnosed with antibiotic-resistant Staphylococcus aureus last month. Health Minister Sorina Pintea said she will decide later this week whether to keep the hospital closed. The infants are hospitalized in three children’s facilities in Bucharest. No deaths have been reported. The bacteria often live on the skin or in the nostrils without causing symptoms but they can become dangerous if they enter the bloodstream, destroying heart valves or causing other damage. Microbiologists say up to 30 percent of humans are long-term carriers. It is not clear how this outbreak began. Health authorities have suggested that the hospital does too many C-sections and that hygiene standards are not respected. Eleven staff members have tested positive for the superbug. They have been suspended from work and face treatment. In a related development, the National Authority of Quality Health Management said only 23 of 147 hospitals it had checked respected all of the approximately 500 requirements to function. It said 106 facilities partially respected the requirements. The requirements include issues such as hygiene, patient confidentiality, personnel structure, budget, fire risk and data protection. A statement said the results explained the poor public image of Romania’s health care system.
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11230
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Novo diabetes drug cuts heart risks by less-than-hoped 13 percentage
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The story reports on findings from a clinical trial of Novo Nordisk’s diabetes drug Victoza published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The trial was designed to measure whether Victoza (generic name liraglutide), which is given by injection, was any less likely than standard diabetes care to lead to severe cardiovascular events like heart attacks or strokes in patients with type 2 diabetes. Along with reporting the key outcomes of the trial, the story quotes the lead scientist involved in the study saying that diabetes treatment can begin to move from managing blood sugar levels to managing the disease’s complications. The importance of finding drugs to manage cardiovascular health in diabetes is made clear, and the story does a good job of contextualizing the significance of the results, comparing Victoza’s performance to rival diabetes drugs and highlighting that the results, although positive, were not as impressive as some pharmaceutical industry observers had hoped. The story would have been stronger if it had mentioned the costs of Victoza, and included independent expert commentary, especially to contextualize the lead scientist’s claims that drugs like Victoza may herald a “shift” in how diabetes is managed. Diabetes is one of the most common chronic conditions in the world and its rate is increasing along with higher rates of obesity and an aging population. Treatment of diabetes seeks to modify the risk factors that increase diabetes-associated complications. Though much of the focus of treatment is in lowering blood sugars, decades of evidence suggest that tight sugar control doesn’t decrease important risks such as heart disease, stroke and kidney failure. For this reason, treatments that not only control blood sugar but also have favorable effects on heart disease have been an area of focus. New classes of medicine such as the GLP-1’s, including Victoza that is studied here, have been evaluated to examine their effect on heart disease and heart disease related death. The favorable results of this study are encouraging and will lead to increased use of these medications. Though not mentioned in this article, Victoza is given by daily injection under the skin, similar to insulin, and may decrease interest among people seeking the convenience of oral medications. The high cost of the drug and others like it will be another barrier to more widespread use, which argues for additional studies in lower risk groups in whom more established, less costly and easier to take medications are currently recommended.
|
true
|
Reuters
|
There is no mention of the costs of Victoza. This would have been easy to include given the drug is widely prescribed and pricing information is freely available on the internet. The article compares the performance of Victoza against rival diabetes drugs, so it would have been informative to have a comparison of costs as well. The story’s key figure, which features in the headline, is a 13% reduction in the risk of heart attack, stroke and cardiovascular death. Unfortunately this figure only measures the relative risk reduction; i.e. the change in risk for patients who got Victoza as a percentage of the actual risk of heart attacks, strokes or cardiovascular death for patients who didn’t get Victoza. However, the story does also give actual risk figures for the treatment and placebo group (13.0% vs. 14.9%). This allows a keen eyed reader to calculate the absolute risk reduction: a less impressive sounding 1.9%. Because of this, the story rates Satisfactory on this criterion. It’s worth nothing the news release didn’t include the placebo group reductions. The story does a good job of mentioning the side effects of Victoza, even pointing towards whether effects were statistically significant. One omission was that the story did not mention the higher incidence of gallstone disease, a side effect that was highlighted as significant in the paper. Although the strength of the evidence is not directly interrogated, the story provides sufficient details about the study, such as trial size, length of trial, and where it was published. Type II diabetes is a major public health problem and, as the story mentions, patients frequently die of heart disease. No disease-mongering here. No third-party scientist is quoted, although the views of one industry analyst are paraphrased. It’s not clear, however, if this analyst was actually interviewed for the story, and his comments pertain only to the market’s expectations for the drug. We didn’t think this was substantive enough to rate as Satisfactory. The story does mention that Novo Nordisk funded the study and the focus is squarely on the pharmaceutical industry, making the company’s role clear to the reader. How Victoza performs in reducing severe cardiovascular events compared to rival drugs is mentioned numerous times. It is worth noting that there was no mention that the drug is given by injection. For individuals with diabetes reading the article, this oversight is important in that it may make them more inclined to oral medicines that are easier to take. The story makes it clear that the drug is already established on the market, calling it “top-selling” in the first line and mentioning that it is typically prescribed as a third or fourth option. The story makes clear that the purpose of this study was to meet FDA requirements. “Since 2008, U.S. regulators have demanded studies for new diabetes medicines to show there is no increase in heart risk, opening a new battleground between different treatments,” it says. The story is not based solely on Novo Nordisk’s news release. As mentioned, some of the relative risk figures which the story leans on, as well as two sources who are quoted, are found in the news release. But the writer clearly conducted independent interviews and sourced information elsewhere.
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5671
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Hundreds gather in Goma, Congo for “Stop Ebola” march.
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Hundreds gathered in Congo’s eastern city of Goma Thursday to support Ebola response teams that have seen increasing attacks and resistance among communities where Ebola continues to spread.
|
true
|
Health, Africa, General News, Ebola virus
|
North Kivu Governor Carly Kasivita, who organized the march, said that anyone spreading misinformation and claiming that “Ebola is a business” will face arrest. “We are very concerned ... Some pastors, some politicians, are venturing into the public health debate and disorienting many of our citizens with misinformation. These pastors who deny the existence of Ebola will be put in jail as soon as they are caught,” Kasivita said. The governor also promised more marches and initiatives to raise awareness in other parts of the province, including Beni and Butembo where Ebola also has spread. “The message is to say we must stop this disease in the province. In the same way that we are concerned about security in the province, we are also concerned about Ebola,” he said. People rode bikes alongside police, soldiers and residents in Goma carrying banners and wearing T-shirts that said STOP. “We do not want other countries to be contaminated through our beautiful province of North Kivu. We want everyone to contribute to Ebola’s end,” Kasivita said. “People need to understand that the disease exists and we call on rebel groups to work with response teams because there are environments where teams cannot get because of insecurity.” The Ebola outbreak, which has killed more than 1,800 people since it was declared one year ago in eastern Congo, has not shown signs of slowing down despite new treatments and vaccines given to more than 197,000 people in the region. New cases emerged in Goma, the capital of North Kivu, in recent months and have spread to a new province in the past week. Insecurity has been one factor in a region where rebel groups have fought for control of mineral-rich lands for decades. Ebola also has spread because of mistrust by communities who have also staged attacks against health workers. The governor of South Kivu and his Rwandan counterpart in the Western Province signed a bilateral agreement on Wednesday in Bukavu to unite their efforts in the fight against Ebola, while respecting peoples’ rights to cross borders. To help combat further spread of Ebola, however, the two delegations agreed to exchange specific information, including a list of high-risk people, said Daniel Lwaboshi, deputy chief of staff of the governor of South Kivu. “These are those people who have been in contact with the sick, because we have them in our province,” he said. Measures are already in place. Days ago, several people from South Kivu had been prevented from crossing the border.
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26631
|
“Sunlight actually can kill the (novel coronavirus.)”
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Dr. Greg Murphy, a Republican Congressman from North Carolina, said sunlight can kill the novel coronavirus. This is a common theory because sunlight contains ultraviolet rays, which can kill bacteria. However, experts say the sun's UV light isn't intense enough to rely on as a disinfectant.
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false
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Public Health, North Carolina, Coronavirus, Greg Murphy,
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"As the nation tries to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus, politicians are offering tips of their own. U.S. Rep. Greg Murphy, a North Carolina Republican, is one of them. Murphy is a physician who won the seat in a special election last year after longtime congressman Walter Jones passed away. Murphy has been posting videos on Twitter, wherein he explains the effects of the virus and the federal government’s response. In a video posted March 16, Murphy stands next to a white board wearing his scrubs. Most of his tips are on-point. He says cold weather won’t kill the novel coronavirus (true). He says gargling hot water doesn’t kill coronavirus (also true). But Murphy also says this. ""Sunlight actually can kill the virus. But we have to be cautious about that. It’s good to be out in the sun, but away at a distance from each other,"" Murphy says. Is that true? We reached out to Murphy but didn’t receive a response. So we did our own research. As it turns out, PolitiFact has already reported on a variation of this claim. Sunlight has not been proven to kill the novel coronavirus, also known as COVID-19. This is one of many unverified claims about the novel coronavirus. At first, the reasoning might make sense. There is, in fact, some evidence that viruses don’t like heat. ""The droplets that carry viruses do not stay suspended in humid air as long, and the warmer temperatures lead to more rapid virus degradation,"" Elizabeth McGraw, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics at Pennsylvania State University, recently told Time Magazine. But, at this point, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control isn’t sure the sun or heat will affect COVID-19 the same way. CDC physician and researcher Nancy Messionnier said on Feb. 12 that ""it’s premature to assume"" the heat and sunlight will temper the virus. ""We haven’t been through even a single year with this pathogen,"" she told NPR. Sun exposure can also raise a person’s vitamin D levels, potentially reducing the incidence of acute respiratory infection, Harvard University professor Marc Lipsitch wrote in his recent paper: ""Seasonality of SARS-CoV-2: Will COVID-19 go away on its own in warmer weather?"" But, Lipsitch wrote, ""On the other hand, we found that this effect was unlikely to be a large factor in the variation in influenza incidence between summer and winter."" Neither the World Health Organization nor the U.S. Centers for Disease Control list sunlight exposure as a method for preventing the coronavirus. In fact, on its ""mythbusters"" webpage, the WHO says COVID-19 can be transmitted in all climates, ""including areas with hot and humid weather."" One reason people might believe sunlight can kill the virus is because sunlight contains ultraviolet light. In Rep. Murphy’s video, he stands next to a white board that mentions UV light from the sun. High-intensity UV light can indeed kill viruses. But natural sunlight doesn’t provide the UV light intensity needed to kill the virus, according to Rachel Graham, assistant professor of epidemiology at the UNG Gillings School of Global Public Health. ""Exposing surfaces to plain sunlight should not be considered sanitation,"" she said, adding: ""I would never ever, ever rely on sunlight to kill coronavirus."" Graham’s claim about UV light is supported by Sally Bloomfield, a professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. To kill a virus, temperatures must rise to about 140 degrees fahrenheit, Bloomfield told the BBC. Murphy said ""sunlight actually can kill the virus."" This claim has not been proven true. His whiteboard mentioned UV light in sunlight. But experts claim the UV rays in sunlight aren’t intense enough to COVID-19. We found no conclusive evidence that someone could prevent the virus by exposing themselves to the sun for long periods of time. And we found no evidence that sunlight exposure could help an infected person defeat the virus."
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22643
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Some politicians … want to put new taxes on a lot of groceries.
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Americans Against Food Taxes' ad during Super Bowl raises specter of soda, snack taxes
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true
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National, Taxes, Americans Against Food Taxes,
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"Along with Doritos and Bud Lite commercials on Super Bowl Sunday, viewers in the Washington area saw a political ad against taxes on food and soft drinks. We wondered if the ad was correct that politicians are seeking to tax sodas and food, so we decided to put the claim to the Truth-O-Meter. The ad features a woman talking to the camera as she shops in a grocery store. It has been airing for several weeks in selected markets on cable channels such as CNN. ""Feeding a family is difficult enough in today's economy,"" the woman says. ""Now, some politicians want the government telling me how I should do it. They want to put new taxes on a lot of groceries I buy, like soft drinks, juice drinks, sports drinks, even flavored waters, trying to control what we eat and drink with taxes. Give me a break. I can decide what to buy without government help. The government is just getting too involved in our personal lives."" At that point, a narrator says, ""Government needs to trim its budget fat and leave our grocery budgets alone."" First, some background on the group airing the ad, Americans Against Food Taxes. The group is spearheaded by the American Beverage Association, which represents the makers of sodas and other drinks. According to Advertising Age, the American Beverage Association decided to form the coalition in June 2009, when the idea of taxing sodas and other sweet beverages was being considered as a way to fund the Democratic health care bill. The coalition includes dozens of members, including 7-Eleven, Inc., Burger King Corp., Domino’s Pizza, the Grocery Manufacturers Association, McDonalds, the National Association of Convenience Stores, Snack Food Association, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Wendy’s/Arby’s Group, Inc. Although the food and beverage tax was not included in the health care law, the group has continued to run advertising to forestall any effort to revive such taxes. People watching the ad might think Congress is still considering such a proposal at the federal level. But if you listen closely, the ad played during the Super Bowl is careful to refer to ""politicians"" and ""government"" rather than ""Washington"" or ""Congress."" (By contrast, other ads the group has run have mentioned Washington.) The ad is correct that politicians in some cash-strapped states are considering food and drink taxes. In the last two years, many states and cities considered such taxes. According to the Campaign for Healthy Kids, an advocacy group that generally favors such efforts, taxes on soda were enacted in Washington state and proposed -- but not passed -- in Mississippi, New Mexico and the city of Philadelphia. In New York, Assemblyman Felix Ortiz, a New York City Democrat, has proposed a tax on foods high in calories, fat or carbohydrates, for the past several legislative sessions. Most state lawmakers were sworn in only a few weeks ago, so we can't predict how many states will consider soda-tax proposals this year. But already, legislators have introduced bills to impose or raise the tax on sodas and/or snack foods in Arizona, Connecticut, Hawaii, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Vermont and West Virginia, according to separate legislative tracking by the Center for Consumer Freedom, a pro-business advocacy group, and Yale University’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity. So while Congress has not been active on this proposal since it was dropped from the health care law, it's been proposed in many states. The ad is correct that ""some politicians … want to put new taxes on a lot of groceries."" We find the statement ."
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4229
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Home sweet volcano: Alaska fur seals thrive at unlikely spot.
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Alaska’s northern fur seal population for three decades has been classified as depleted, but the marine mammals are showing up in growing numbers at an unlikely location: a tiny island that forms the tip of an active undersea volcano.
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true
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AP Top News, Fish, Bering Sea, Alaska, Seals, Science, U.S. News, General News
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Vents on Bogoslof Island continue to spew mud, steam and sulfurous gases two years after an eruption sent ash clouds into the path of jetliners passing over the Bering Sea. Still, northern fur seal moms find the remote island’s rocky beaches perfect for giving birth and mothering pups. “The population growth of northern fur seals on Bogoslof has been extraordinary,” said Tom Gelatt, who leads a NOAA Fisheries group that studies northern fur seals. Federal scientists visited the island in August. Geographically speaking, the island is not a particularly unusual place for the seals known for their thick coats to hang out. Most of the world’s roughly 1.1 million northern fur seals breed in the eastern Bering Sea. The animals live in the ocean from November to June and head for land in summer to breed and nurse pups. But why the seals chose volatile Bogoslof over the dozens of other uninhabited Aleutian Islands is unclear. “The surface is covered with these big, ballistic blocks, some as big as 10 meters (33 feet) in length that were exploded out of the vent,” said Chris Waythomas, a U.S. Geological Survey research geophysicist at the Alaska Volcano Observatory. “They litter the surface. It’s pretty wild.” The eastern Bering Sea population of northern fur seals numbers about 635,000, with their main breeding ground on St. Paul Island, 240 miles (390 kilometers) northwest of Bogoslof. The animals were first spotted on Bogoslof in 1980, and NOAA researchers have since conducted periodic checks on the population. In 2015, biologists estimated an annual growth rate of just over 10% to approximately 28,000 pups on the island. The 2019 estimate likely will be more than 36,000 pups, Gelatt said. A California stock of northern fur seals in the San Miguel, Channel and Farallon Islands is estimated at about 14,000 animals, while an unknown number live in Russian waters. The seals stay on beaches, but on Bogoslof _ which is about a third the size of New York City’s Central Park _ they are never far from signs of volcanic activity. The center of the island supports a field of fumaroles, openings through which hot gases emerge. Some roar “like jet engines” and spurt mud geysers several meters high, Waythomas said. He has visited the last two summers. “It was amazing, the sounds that were being produced,” he said. Eruptions in 2016 and 2017 showered the landscape with rocks and killed all vegetation. They also shrank and grew the island. Explosions destroyed acres of Bogoslof only to have fragmented material blown from lava vents create new real estate. The island remains about 0.5 square miles (1.2 square kilometers). Food in the nearby deep water could be a factor in the seals’ behavior. Bogoslof’s seals eat squid and northern smoothtongue, a deep-water fish that looks like a smelt. Seals on St. Paul, the largest of the Pribilof Islands, forage on the shallow continental shelf for walleye pollock, a fish targeted by commercial fishermen. Females with pups on Bogoslof return from foraging faster than Pribilof mothers, possibly allowing their pups to receive more meals and wean at a larger size, Gelatt said. Bogoslof also is closer to winter feeding grounds south of the Aleutians, possibly allowing pups to reach the grounds with less risk from Bering Sea storms. Northern fur seals are distinct from harbor, ringed, bearded, ribbon and spotted seals in Alaska, which have no ear flaps. Northern fur seals, like sea lions, are eared seals. They were named for their concentrated fur: Fur seals have 350,000 hairs per square inch (60,000 hairs per square centimeter). The animals have a prominent role in the history of colonized Alaska. After hunting sea otters to near-extinction, Russian traders turned to northern fur seals and relocated Aleuts to the Pribilofs to kill and process seals. When Emperor Alexander II needed cash and decided to sell Alaska to the United States in 1867, fur was one of the future state’s known assets. But by 1988, four years after the commercial harvest ended on St. Paul, the northern fur seal population had declined by more than half from its 1950s estimated population of 2.1 million animals. NOAA biologists don’t know why northern fur seals have not made a comeback. “That’s the million-dollar question,” Gelatt said. Competition for prey from the commercial fishing fleet, predation by killer whales, disease and ecosystem changes affecting seal or prey behavior are possibilities. Volcanic activity on Bogoslof has been relatively stable, but Gelatt’s crew chose not to camp there during their weeklong August expedition, fearing a recurrence of explosions that could shoot boulders like bottle rockets. They instead made day trips from an anchored boat. The crew tallied seals and assessed whether aerial images taken from unmanned aircraft could be used in future counts. As fewer seals breed on St. Paul Island, the growth on Bogoslof is significant. “Barring other future catastrophic eruptions that could dramatically change the geography of the island, there is plenty of room for a lot more seals on Bogoslof,” Gelatt said.
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26578
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“I didn’t say that” some of the medical equipment that governors are requesting, they don't actually need.
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When journalist Yamiche Alcindor asked a question of President Donald Trump, she was accurately citing a previous comment Trump had made on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show. During the interview with Hannity, Trump said, “I have a feeling that a lot of the numbers (for ventilators) that are being said in some areas are just bigger than they're going to be. I don't believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators.”
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false
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Public Health, Coronavirus, Donald Trump,
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"President Donald Trump argued with ""PBS NewsHour"" reporter Yamiche Alcindor over what the president had said, or hadn’t said, about New York’s need for ventilators. Ventilators are a type of medical equipment considered vital for saving the lives of patients hit hardest by the virus. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has made urgent calls for more ventilators to cope with a rising number of hospitalizations in his state due to coronavirus. ""All the predictions say you could have an apex needing 140,000 beds and about 40,000 ventilators,"" Cuomo told reporters March 27, citing estimates by Weill Cornell Medicine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and McKinsey & Co. Anthony Fauci, a leading infectious-disease specialist who is on the White House’s coronavirus task force, told CNN, ""There are a lot of different calculations. My experience, I tend to believe Gov. Cuomo."" The exchange between Trump and Alcindor came during a March 29 Rose Garden press conference. It unfolded this way: Alcindor: ""You've said repeatedly that you think that some of the equipment that governors are requesting, they don't actually need. You said New York might need —"" Trump: ""I didn’t say that."" Alcindor: ""— might not need 30,000."" Trump: ""I didn’t say that."" Alcindor: ""You said it on Sean Hannity’s, Fox News."" Trump: ""I didn’t say — come on. Come on."" The exchange continued, with Trump at one point telling Alcindor, ""Be nice. Don’t be threatening."" He later cut her off before she was able to ask her second question, although another reporter subsequently handed her the microphone so that she could ask it. Here, we’ll look at the substance of the dispute between Trump and Alcindor. Which of them was right about what he said during a March 26 phone interview on Hannity’s show on Fox News? Alcindor was. When we looked at Trump’s interview with Hannity, we found two portions in which Trump addressed this question. Here’s the first: ""Gov. Cuomo and others that say we want, you know, 30,000 of them (ventilators). 30,000! All right. Think of this. You know, you go to hospitals, they'll have one in a hospital. And now, all of a sudden everybody's asking for these vast numbers."" Later, Hannity picked up on this theme. Hannity said he was ""kind of angry at Andrew Cuomo. I had a great — I had him on radio for 40 minutes, great conversation. I grew up in — I was born and raised in New York. And then it's, ‘I need 30,000 ventilators.’ And I'm like OK, it really — it was annoying me."" Trump subsequently echoed this sentiment. ""New York is a bigger deal. But it's going to go also. But I have a feeling that a lot of the numbers that are being said in some areas are just bigger than they're going to be. I don't believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators. You know, you're going to major hospitals sometimes, they'll have two ventilators. And now, all of a sudden, they're saying, can we order 30,000 ventilators?"" So, contrary to Trump’s repeated denials during the press conference, this passage clearly shows that the president told Hannity that he feels the numbers of ventilators being requested by governors, including Cuomo, are higher than what’s needed. Trump told Alcindor that ""I didn’t say that"" some of the equipment that governors are requesting, they don't actually need. That’s directly refuted by Trump’s comments during Hannity’s show, in which he said, ""I have a feeling that a lot of the numbers that are being said in some areas are just bigger than they're going to be. I don't believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators."""
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31365
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A respected physicist has warned that fidget spinners could have a harmful effect on the Earth’s center of gravity.
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The laws of physics being what they are, no amount of human fidget-spinning would have any appreciable effect on the Earth’s center of gravity, rotation, or orbit.
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false
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Junk News, fidget spinners, focus times
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On 10 May 2017, the Focus Times web site published an article positing that a renowned physicist had warned that the widespread use of stress-relieving toys known as ‘fidget spinners’ could be having a deleterious and potentially destructive effect on the Earth’s rotation and orbit: One of the nation’s most respected physicists has warned that fidget spinners – a fad device popular with students – could have a harmful effect on the Earth’s centre of gravity. In a research paper published in a leading scientific journal, Professor Michael Taylor of Denver, Colorado has outlined his findings that suggest the exponential growth of fidget spinners could theoretically throw the earth’s centre of gravity out of alignment. Professor Taylor outlined how a cascade of fidget spinners, rotating in the same direction, could impact the rotation of the earth. “Gravitational pull is an invisible force that causes massive objects to pull other objects towards them. For example, when a person jumps up in the air, it is the earth’s gravitational pull that causes them to return to the ground. In the case of fidget spinners, if enough of them are rotating in unison, they have the potential to create enough gravitational pull to effect the orbit of the planet.” Assuming enough of the toys were spinning at the same time, Professor Taylor hypothesized that the impact could be devastating. “Many people may not realise this, but that earth’s centre of gravity is not as stable as you may think. A harmonized cascade of these fidget spinners, aligned in the direction of their spin, could be enough to modify the planet’s centre of gravity to the point that we deviate from our normal orbit.” There was no truth to this report. Focus Times has been making something of a cottage industry out of fidget spinner-related fake news, additionally publishing multiple and nearly identical fabricated stories about schoolteachers who each lost an eye from malfunctioning spinners, and men who were reportedly hospitalized after each experienced one of the popular toys becoming lodged in his anus.
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13466
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Former President Bill Clinton and his Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) distributed ‘watered-down’ HIV/AIDS drugs to patients in sub-Saharan Africa.
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"The Daily Caller said that the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Health Access Initiative distributed ""watered-down HIV/AIDS drugs to patients in sub-Saharan Africa."" At the most literal level, the statement is a misreading of a report from a conservative Republican who said the foundation ""likely facilitated"" the distribution of watered-down HIV/AIDS drugs. Neither version of the claim -- centering around the drugmaker Ranbaxy -- is proven. In fact, a host of regulatory agencies have found the drugs in question to be safe. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said there was no evidence the drugs themselves were substandard. The World Health Organization, South Africa’s Medicines Control Council and the British Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency tested the Ranbaxy drugs and found them to be safe. Such testing dates back to at least 2005."
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false
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Global News Service, Consumer Safety, Corrections and Updates, Public Health, Daily Caller,
|
"For the most part, Republican attacks on the Clinton Foundation have raised questions about its donors, but now an article from the conservative Daily Caller website challenges one of the foundation’s signature efforts, getting affordable HIV/AIDS drugs to patients worldwide. In a story headlined as an exclusive, a Daily Caller reporter wrote ""Former President Bill Clinton and his Clinton Health Access Initiative (CHAI) distributed ‘watered-down’ HIV/AIDS drugs to patients in sub-Saharan Africa."" The primary goal of the Clinton Health Access Initiative when it began in 2002 was to bring down the price tag of AIDS medicines. If the initiative were tied to distributing ineffective drugs, that would be a serious offense. We decided to drill into the details. HIV/AIDS Drugs and the Clinton Health Access Initiative The Daily Caller article is based on a draft version of a report on the Clinton Foundation from the office of Rep. Marsha Blackburn, a conservative Republican from Tennessee. Blackburn’s staff focused on the Clinton Health Access Initiative’s dealings with the Indian generic drugmaker Ranbaxy. The initiative has become a key player in the worldwide supply chain of the antiretroviral drugs used to fight HIV/AIDS. In one fashion or another, it is tied to the treatment of about 11 million people facing the immune deficiency disease. While the details of the initiative’s role get complicated, at the bottom of it all is a simple idea: It brings together drug buyers (governments, nonprofits and multilateral aid bodies) that buy in large volume and generic drug makers who agree to price caps. The model has worked. The price of HIV/AIDS treatment plunged and low-cost Indian drugmakers remain an essential part of the equation. Ranbaxy was one of the original group of Indian firms that signed on with the Clinton initiative in 2003. Questions about non-HIV/AIDS drugs But Ranbaxy has faced serious problems with American regulators. In September 2008, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a warning letter against Ranbaxy, citing the ways it was cutting corners in the production process at two facilities in India. The FDA’s main complaint was that the company had falsified test results on the stability (think shelf life) of a handful of drugs, none of which however were aimed at treating HIV/AIDS. To be safe, government regulators issued an import alert that blocked 30 drugs at the U.S. border. That longer list included two antiretrovirals used to treat HIV/AIDS. In 2013, the Justice Department filed charges, but again, none of the counts involved HIV/AIDS drugs. In 2013, Ranbaxy agreed to pay $500 million in fines and civil penalties. It admitted that it lied on its paperwork and that it allowed defective batches of drugs to treat acne and epilepsy into the U.S. market. The head of the FDA’s criminal investigations said his team had found evidence that those drugs ""were defective, in that their strength differed from, or their purity or quality fell below, that which they purported to possess."" The government calls such drugs adulterated, or, as the Daily Caller put it, ""watered down."" The FDA said in its original 2008 press release ""FDA has no evidence to date that Ranbaxy has shipped defective products."" FDA spokeswoman Lyndsay Meyer told PolitiFact that applied to HIV/AIDS drugs. Were the drugs safe? So to recap: the Clinton Foundation was using HIV/AIDS drugs from a Indian company that was part of a U.S. government investigation. The company eventually admitted that it had falsified records for several drugs and paid a $500 million fine, but none of the drugs included in that group were HIV/AIDS medications. So what do we know about Ranbaxy’s HIV/AIDS drugs? The FDA said there were no grounds for a drug recall, and on that point it had plenty of company. The World Health Organization had been keeping tabs on Ranbaxy since 2004, including testing Ranbaxy’s finished products. That year, inspectors found problems with Ranbaxy’s drugs and decertified three of its HIV/AIDS medicines. The company then withdrew all of its HIV/AIDS drugs from the WHO’s approved drug list. There was a drug recall in South Africa. (At the time, the Clinton initiative did little work there.) In 2005, the WHO restored seven Ranbaxy medications to its list of prequalified HIV/AIDS drugs. In a 2013 summary report, WHO said, ""Since 2004, international cooperation between stringent regulators and WHO-Prequalification Program has been enhanced to allow early sharing of regulatory intelligence and to facilitate coordinated action, when necessary. At present, there is no evidence that any of the Ranbaxy products currently included on the WHO List of Prequalified Medicinal Products are of unacceptable quality."" Put simply, since 2005, no regulator has found its HIV/AIDS drugs defective or issued a recall of its products. That list includes agencies in the United Kingdom and South Africa, where HIV/AIDS is an enormous problem. South Africa has the largest number of people living with HIV/AIDS worldwide. Through our partnership with Africa Check, reporter Vinayak Bhardwaj confirmed that South Africa’s Medicines Control Council had been conducting random tests of Ranbaxy products. In 2013, the council declared the drugs ""safe and effective."" Even Blackburn’s report, which is the evidence for the Daily Caller’s claim, added a key qualifier, saying the ""Clinton Foundation likely facilitated the distribution of watered-down HIV/AIDS medications in sub-Saharan Africa through its Clinton Health Access Initiative"" (emphasis ours). Given that many regulators had declared those drugs safe, we asked Blackburn’s office for evidence that proved the foundation likely distributed watered-down drugs. We have yet to receive a response. (Deeper in its article, the Daily Caller wrote of ""the possibility"" that the Clinton initiative distributed diluted drugs.) Ellen 't Hoen, the former point person at the charity group Doctors Without Borders for HIV/AIDS drugs, told us this allegation is not new. ""It is a nonsense story circulated by right-wing groups,"" 't Hoen said. This is not to say that Ranbaxy has not continued to run afoul of international standards. Since 2012, the FDA has dropped three additional Ranbaxy drugs from its approved list. But generally, it’s violations tend to cluster around failures to follow the best manufacturing methods. Serious allegations that Ranbaxy sells shoddy drugs have come from several quarters. The American government said that when it filed charges against the drugmaker in 2010. So did several former Ranbaxy executives, according to a Fortune magazine article. They told Fortune, ""Ranbaxy had used ingredients that failed purity tests and blended them with good ingredients until the resulting mix met requirements. Such a mélange could degrade or become toxic far more quickly than drugs made from the high-quality materials required."" The Clinton Health Access Initiative and Ranbaxy Still, the cloud around Ranbaxy was enough to force the Clinton Foundation’s hand. In 2008, it offered a two-pronged response. Except for two specialized compounds designed for children, it stopped buying any Ranbaxy drugs itself. It also warned sub-Saharan governments and others in its buyer network to take extra steps to confirm the quality of Ranbaxy’s products. It told them to switch to other manufacturers where possible, and if they had to buy from Ranbaxy, they should step up testing of every batch and toughen up the quality control requirements in their contracts. It continued to list Ranbaxy’s products in its menu of approved generic drugs. Regan Lachapelle, a spokeswoman for the initiative, told us the nonprofit ""left the decision to the governments as to what they should do."" Lachapelle said the Clinton initiative limited its buying of Ranbaxy drugs to the pediatric medications (all of which it tested) to be ultra cautious. But it didn’t push governments to do the same because neither the FDA nor WHO said the drugs were unsafe, nor did they recall any products. Lachapelle said this created a dilemma for sub-Saharan African governments. ""If patients taking antiretroviral drugs suffer an interruption in the drugs they are supposed to take every day, there is a danger that they can develop resistance to the drugs which reduces their effectiveness when they re-start them,"" Lachapelle said. ""They can also suffer an increase in viral load and a decline in the strength of their immune systems which can lead to severe illness and death."" In its 2008 memo to governments, the Clinton initiative said ""CHAI believes that either decision — to continue purchasing these products from Ranbaxy or to purchase from alternative sources — is potentially reasonable depending on a country’s specific circumstances."" Our ruling The Daily Caller said that the Clinton Foundation and the Clinton Health Access Initiative distributed ""watered-down HIV/AIDS drugs to patients in sub-Saharan Africa."" At the most literal level, the statement is a misreading of a report from a conservative Republican who said the foundation ""likely facilitated"" the distribution of watered-down HIV/AIDS drugs. Neither version of the claim -- centering around the drugmaker Ranbaxy -- is proven. In fact, a host of regulatory agencies have found the drugs in question to be safe. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said there was no evidence the drugs themselves were substandard. The World Health Organization, South Africa’s Medicines Control Council and the British Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency tested the Ranbaxy drugs and found them to be safe. Such testing dates back to at least 2005. Update and correction (Sept. 29, 2016): After this item posted, we heard from Mark Tapscott, executive editor of the Daily Caller News Foundation, a 501(c)3 organization that says it provides investigative reporting for the public benefit. The group does not publicly list its donors. Tapscott listed what he called nine factual errors in our story. We reviewed his claims and found most of them without merit, as they failed to distinguish between Ranbaxy’s HIV/AIDS drugs and its other products. Tapscott, however, correctly noted that in 2004 WHO decertified three of Ranbaxy’s HIV/AIDS drugs. Ranbaxy’s HIV/AIDS drugs were recertified the following year. The story now reflects that information, as well as the correct year in which the Justice Department filed charges against Ranbaxy. Our rating remains unchanged.
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10193
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Instant oatmeal for breakfast may help curb your appetite at lunch
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In what appears to be a showdown between two PepsiCo products — Quaker instant oatmeal and Honey Nut Cheerios — instant oatmeal made people feel fuller after breakfast and led to them eat less at lunch in a small study. But the key findings are never quantified. How much more full did the oatmeal eaters feel and how much less did they eat at the lunch? We’re told that calorie intake was “significantly lower” in this group, but this is a statistical term — was the result meaningful in terms of helping people maintain a healthy bodyweight? It’s not difficult to imagine how this news release could be picked up by various news media and nutrition-related blogs, many of which will suggest benefits from Quaker instant oatmeal and other products containing beta-glucan — the type of fiber that researchers suggest is responsible for the findings that were observed. Describing what those benefits were, using data from the actual study, can help journalists, bloggers, and readers understand whether the benefits were real and meaningful.
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false
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industry/commercial news releases
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While the cost per serving of Quaker instant oatmeal versus Honey Nut Cheerios (the brands studied) might be similar, it still would be worth noting as the news release is attempting to make the case that an instant oatmeal breakfast will lead to less caloric intake at lunch. Nevertheless, we’ll rate this Not Applicable since most readers have at least a rough idea of what these products cost. The release talks about two types of benefits. “Satiety,” meaning how full people felt after eating oatmeal, and how much they actually ate after eating oatmeal. It says, “The satiety benefits of instant oatmeal alone were important findings,” And it says that “Total calorie intake was significantly lower following consumption of instant oatmeal compared to the cold cereal.” Neither of these benefits are quantified. Direct harm from consumption of these products isn’t likely, so we’ll rate this Not Applicable. However, the study itself does note that a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios has a lot more sugar than unsweetened oatmeal. In fact, one serving had about 20 grams, which is nearly as much as some experts say women should eat in an entire day. The release talks about “The statistically significant results of the randomized, controlled crossover study” and even provides the number of people studied: “(n=47).” It names the journal where the study was published. But it contains no discussion of possible limitations to the research. The study itself names two such possibilities: The main limitation of this study was that the macronutrient composition of the cereals was not matched; hence, it is possible that differences in the protein and sugar content, although insignificant in their individual effects, may have exerted a cumulative effect on satiety. Further, it is possible that prior perceptions about the satiating properties of the cereals may have influenced the results. We’d add that if a study/news release is going to claim that a certain intervention affects hunger and satiety, it’s not sufficient to simply track calories consumed at the next meal. Clinical experience from working with thousands of patients on improving their satiety suggests that morning choices will often have an impact on afternoon and evening calories as well. No disease-mongering of hunger or obesity. The funding sources for the study are not made clear in the release, nor does the release tell us that the study researchers included PepsiCo employees. The journal article discloses all of this information so it would have been easy enough to find and include. The study is ostensibly a head-to-head comparison of instant oatmeal and cold cereal. But there is no context provided in the release as to whether the purported benefits of oatmeal for breakfast are any better than other foods, including even other brands of the same types of foods. There has been a lot of research into the role of fiber-containing foods in controlling hunger and promoting weight loss — but the release doesn’t get into any of that research. The release, by naming the brand of oatmeal studied, makes it clear that it is available. Few people will not have heard of Quaker instant oatmeal. The release doesn’t establish what is novel about this research, nor does it allude to a previous, very similar study that this experiment was meant to improve upon. How does this study advance the field or differ from other research on fiber? There was nothing out of bounds about the language used in the release.
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22965
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"The radiation coming from the new TSA body scanners is ""equivalent to about three minutes' worth of air travel by anybody, say, at 30,000 feet."
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TSA administrator claims new body scanners emit as much radiation as three minutes of air travel
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true
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National, Homeland Security, Science, Transportation, John Pistole,
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"New airport security measures are coming under fire from pilots and passengers, who fear the latest post-9/11 protocols are too invasive and potentially harmful. You've probably seen the stories. The Transportation Security Administration's new full-body scanners, which are in use at 68 airports nationwide, transfer a potentially harmful amount of radiation and produce what amounts to a naked image, critics say. And the alternative to the scan, an embarrassing pat down, may be even worse. Pilots' unions oppose the measures, as do an increasing number of passengers -- who feel the federal government has taken things too far. PolitiFact can't weigh in on that. But we can explore the safety concerns about the full-body scan. Particularly, we found worth analyzing the defense mounted by John Pistole, head of the TSA. During a Nov. 16, 2010, interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper, Pistole said the ""radiation coming from those machines are equivalent to about three minutes' worth of air travel by anybody, say, at 30,000 feet."" The TSA, on its website, says the radiation emitted from the body scan is equivalent to just two minutes of a plane flight. Are those claims credible? Yes. Though there is some disagreement. Let us explain. In preparing to deploy the scanners to airports across the country, the TSA studied the amount of radiation a person would be exposed to per scan to determine if the machines were safe. Scientists at The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory found that the effective dose per screening was 1.58 microrems of radiation, while a researcher at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce, said an adult would be exposed to 2.4 microrems of radiation per scan. We understand those figures mean nothing to most people. So let's put it into perspective. A single chest X-ray exposes a person to between 8,000 and 10,000 microrems (or 8 to 10 millirems), according to experts at Princeton University and the Department of Energy. A pack-a-day smoker exposes himself to 15,000 to 20,000 microrems of radiation a year (tobacco leaves used in making cigarettes contain radioactive lead and polonium). Put simply, it would take at least 3,300 body scans to reach the equivalent of one chest X-ray. What's also important to note -- and a bit scary -- is that you're being exposed to radiation right now. Radiation is naturally occurring in our environment no matter where you are. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission estimates that each year, the average adult is exposed to 300 millirems of naturally occurring radiation (300,000 microrems) and 60 millirems (60,000 microrems) of man-made radiation. Pistole, in his claim, is talking about naturally occurring cosmic radiation you're exposed to during airplane travel. The amount of cosmic radiation a person is exposed to varies based on a number of factors, but to oversimplify, a key component is how high you are above sea level. People living in Denver, which is 1 mile above sea level, are exposed to more cosmic radiation than someone living in Florida. And people flying 30,000 feet in the air are exposed to more radiation than people on the ground. The amount of radiation varies depending upon the specific flight plan, but the Environmental Protection Agency, the World Health Organization and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission all say that a person on a six- to eight-hour flight will be exposed to somewhere around 2,000 to 5,000 microrems of radiation. For our analysis, however, we are relying on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which calculates the radiation exposure per hour based on the altitude of the flight. According to NOAA, a person flying at 30,000 feet will be exposed to between 285 and 406 microrems of radiation an hour, or between 4.75 and 6.77 microrems per minute of flight. All the numbers and science back up Pistole's claim -- as little as three minutes of air travel produces the equivalent amount of radiation as one TSA body scan. By most estimates, Pistole's claim actually is conservative. However, all scientists aren't sold on the comparison. Nor are they sold on the safety of the scanners. We think it's important for you hear their side, too. Four faculty members at the University of California, San Francisco, authored a letter in April expressing their concerns about the body scanning devices. Primarily, the professors worried that the radiation was being concentrated in the skin and underlying tissue, and that it was not being dispersed throughout the entire body. That concentration of radiation to the skin could be ""dangerously high,"" wrote the faculty members -- John Sedat, Marc Shuman, Robert Stroud and David Agard, who said a comparison to cosmic radiation spread over the entire body is misleading. The FDA, in a detailed response, said the concerns were unfounded, and health risks associated with the full body scanners were ""minuscule."" To be clear, this fact check isn't declaring TSA's new full-body scanners safe. We're simply looking at the comparative exposure to radiation as suggested by Pistole, who said that the radiation coming from the new TSA body scanners ""are equivalent to about three minutes' worth of air travel by anybody, say, at 30,000 feet."" It may sound strange, but it's right."
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10290
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Schizophrenia drug shows promise in trial
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"This article, a considerably shortened version of a feature story that appeared in the New York Times, adequately describes the findings of an early study by Eli Lilly on a new drug treatment for schizophrenia. Although quite short, the Sentinel brief manages to indicate the drug’s potential significance while retaining important caveats. The article would have been stronger if it had described the amount and nature of the relief the drug provided, and how that compared to existing treatments. One additional small but significant error: The Sentinel version states the study appeared in the journal Nature. It appeared in Nature Medicine. The Sentinel article does raise questions about whether findings from an early and tentative study should be published in such a short form. The original Times piece is an excellent feature which explores the mechanism by which the new drug appears to work, the troubled history of another Eli Lilly drug for schizophrenia, the amount of money at stake in finding a novel treatment, and the story of this drug’s development. The Nature Medicine publication provided the news hook for that larger piece. But absent that larger piece, are the findings of the early study significant enough to justify a brief stand-alone report? It is worth considering whether the Sentinel’s readers would be better served by a brief article about a treatment or phenomenon that’s either currently available or about to hit the market. The shorter Sentinel story would have been strengthened by a caution about the proportion of ""promising/breakthrough"" treatments that make it from this stage of drug discovery to market availability. Is this drug as good in improving patients as current treaments? How big was the difference in adverse effects? How long was the trial – long enough to see adverse effects emerge? These details are lacking in the story."
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true
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Because the treatment is experimental and not on the market, there is no cost of treatment to report. The article fails to describe the nature or size of the symptomatic relief the drug trial showed. The article indicates that serious side effects were not observed in this small, early study of the drug. It mentions in the second paragraph that there may be side effects that were not revealed in this report. The article makes clear that the reported studies are early-phase and insufficient to prove efficacy and safety. The article does nothing to exaggerate the nature or severity of the disease. The author summarizes the results of a study that appeared in a high-quality, peer-reviewed journal, and quotes one knowledgable observer with no ties to the company developing the drug or the current study. The editor did a good job by retaining this information. The article makes clear that there are other drug treatments for schizophrenia whose effectiveness is limited by serious side effects. The article makes clear by the second paragraph that the treatment is still being tested and is at least three or four years from approval under the best circumstances. The article accurately states that the treatment is novel, and could potentially open the way to a new class of drug therapies. This article is an edited version of an article that appeared in the New York Times on the same day.
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40313
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Reports have gone viral that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is testing a trial vaccine for the Ebola virus that only works for people with white skin.
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Ebola Vaccine Only Works on White People – Fiction!
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false
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Medical
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There weren’t any vaccines or anti-viral drugs proven to effectively treat people with Ebola — regardless of their skin color — when this eRumor surfaced in September 2014. “Some experimental treatments developed for Ebola have been tested and proven effective in animals but have not yet been tested in randomized trials in humans,” the CDC said. The inspiration for the eRumor was the experimental drug ZMapp, which was used to treat two white American aid workers who contracted Ebola in Liberia. Drug developer Mapp Biopharmaceutical said clinical trials were needed to see how safe and effective the drug was, and that it hadn’t been distributed in West Africa because quantities were extremely limited. ZMapp isn’t a vaccine, however. It’s a therapeutic drug designed to treat people who already have Ebola. Vaccines, meanwhile, prevent people from contracting viruses all together. The eRumor confused the two types of drugs. The CDC said in September 2014 that no vaccines had been developed or tested to defend against Ebola. The eRumor first appeared at TheNewsNerd.com on September 19, 2014. It had been shared more than 13,000 times on social media within days. Posted 09/30/14 Comments
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38054
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Warnings spread across social media about Cadbury products being infected with HIV-positive blood in the weeks leading up to Easter, when many Cadbury products are purchased.
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Cadbury Chocolate Eggs Are Infected With HIV-Positive Blood
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false
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Health / Medical
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False reports about food being tainted with HIV have become somewhat common in recent years. False claims that Cadbury products are infected with HIV became the latest variation of the rumor in spring 2018. The post includes a photo of a handcuffed man and stern warning about Cadbury products being infected with HIV or Aids. A caption states: “This is the guy who added his infected blood Cadbury products. For the next few week(s) do not eat any products from Cadbury, as a worker from the company has added his blood contaminated with HIV (AIDS). It was shown yesterday on BBC News. Please forward this message to people who you care (about).” Comments
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31556
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Bananas that display a red discoloration inside are dangerous to human health if eaten.
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Except for rare cases in which children consumed food that was pre-chewed by an HIV-infected caregiver, HIV has not been spread through food. The virus does not live long outside the body. You cannot get it from consuming food handled by an HIV-infected person; even if the food contained small amounts of HIV-infected blood or semen, exposure to the air, heat from cooking, and stomach acid would destroy the virus.
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false
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Food, bananas, HIV, tainted food
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Photographs showing bananas with unusual red discolorations inside have been passed around online with varying degrees of paranoia for several years: I bought a bundle of bananas from the Walmart in Aberdeen tonight and opened it to give to my 2 yr old daughter. This is what I found on the inside! I opened the rest of the bundle and they appeared to be normal bananas. I’m not saying it’s blood but what else would it be?! One banana out of the whole bundle was like this … a little weird! Check your produce before eating it. You never know what someone put in there. The claims associated with the photographs have evolved from speculation about the discoloration of the bananas (as seen above) to assertions that the discoloration was due to someone’s purposefully injecting bananas with “infected blood” in order to spread HIV: This form of reddish discoloration in bananas has nothing to do with blood of any sort, however: It’s a hallmark of a fungal or bacterial diseases that affect bananas grown in some areas and can cause their centers to turn dark red. Although the discoloration may make bananas seem visually unappealing to consumers, the plant diseases that cause it pose no real health risk to humans who eat such bananas: There are a variety of plant diseases that can cause the inside of bananas to take on a red discolouration. This discolouration has led to false claims of bananas containing blood. Nigrospora is a fungal disease that causes the centre of the banana to turn dark red. Nigrospora can infect the fruit in tropical climates where bananas are grown. Mokillo, moko, and blood disease bacterium are bacterial diseases that can also cause red discoloration in bananas. While unappealing to eat, these diseases affecting bananas are not a threat to human health, however when in doubt, throw it out or compost them. As we noted in another article about a rumor concerning supposed blood-tainted oranges, it is nearly impossible for the HIV virus to be transmitted via foodstuffs:
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1935
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A gluten-free for all drives product sales.
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Los Angeles voice actor Nancy Truman landed a new role as a full-time gluten-free baker after she tweaked her recipes to replace the wheat that was making her feel miserable.
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true
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Health News
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Co-owner Nancy Truman prepares a box of donuts for a customer at Fonuts bakery, which offers unfried, gluten-free and vegan donuts, in Los Angeles, California September 19, 2011. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson Truman is among the estimated 18 million people in the United States who are sensitive to gluten — a hard-to-digest protein found in wheat, rye and barley. Another 3 million-plus Americans are thought to have celiac disease, a potentially life-threatening autoimmune disorder that is treated by eliminating dietary gluten. In business, as in acting, good timing proved crucial for Truman. Sales of gluten-free products have been booming despite the weak U.S. economy. Health advocates and gluten-free celebrities such as 2011 U.S. Open champion Novak Djokovic, Chelsea Clinton and TV host Elisabeth Hasselbeck have helped drive demand by raising awareness about celiac disease and gluten sensitivity. Truman also had the good luck of being a friend and neighbor to Waylynn Lucas, one of Los Angeles’ most celebrated pastry chefs, who is a fan of her gluten-free goodies. The two now are partners in (fonuts), a new coffee shop that sells baked, not fried, doughnuts. Gluten-free options account for half of sales at (fonuts). Lucas said customers are either avoiding gluten themselves or “have a friend, a boyfriend, a girlfriend, a cousin, a father, a mother, a whatever, who is gluten intolerant.” “When they see it can be delicious and a little more healthful, they’re really turned on,” Truman said. GLUTEN-FREE GROWTH Gluten is everywhere. It is in baked goods, pasta and beer, as well as some unexpected items, such as McDonald’s french fries, lunch meat, lipstick and some medicines. Euromonitor International forecasts 2011 gluten-free sales of $1.31 billion in the United States and $2.67 billion worldwide. Sales have more than doubled since 2005 and are expected to hit $1.68 billion in the United States and $3.38 billion globally in 2015. “Consumers do feel some sort of reward when they eat gluten-free products. They don’t feel bloated. They don’t have belly aches. This usually encourages them to repeat the purchase,” said Ewa Hudson, Euromonitor International’s head of health and wellness research. Europe is ahead of the United States when it comes to celiac disease testing and awareness. Italy, for example, helps people with celiac disease pay for the additional cost of gluten-free foods. But big U.S. companies are jumping into the fray. General Mills Inc is a leader, having reformulated some Chex breakfast cereals, Betty Crocker cake and brownie mixes and Bisquick pancake mix to remove gluten. Anheuser Busch Inbev SA sells a gluten-free beer called Redbridge, which is sold in many mainstream supermarkets. P.F. Chang’s China Bistro Inc for years has had a gluten-free menu and Subway, the popular sandwich chain, is testing gluten-free bread and brownies in Texas and Oregon. Media mogul Oprah Winfrey and actress Gwyneth Paltrow have talked about avoiding gluten as part of detox diets, comments that prompted critics to dub gluten-free the diet du jour. Trend chasers who have no medical reason to be on a gluten-free diet account for more than half of the daily consumption of gluten-free products, said Alessio Fasano, medical director at the University of Maryland Center for Celiac Research. Top-notch professional athletes are the only other people who get some measurable benefit from cutting out gluten without a doctor’s orders, he said. Eliminating dietary gluten appears to free up energy that otherwise would be used to break down the tough-to-digest protein, said Fasano, who joked that athletes use the diet as a “legal performance enhancer.” Still, he does not mind that fads are boosting sales. “If anything, it’s good for the market” because the extra customers should help improve quality and lower cost, he said. Interest from big retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc also should help bring down gluten-free product prices, which run 2 percent to 3 percent higher than similar items containing gluten, said Alice Bast, founder of the National Foundation for Celiac Awareness. Consumers have been preoccupied with food sensitivity for some time (remember lactose intolerance?) and there is growing interest in foods that support digestive and overall health, said Tamara Barnett, ethnographic research manager at the Hartman Group, a research and consulting firm. Gluten-free products overlap those trends, she said. Better-tasting products also help. “They went from being sawdust to being really good,” said “Living Gluten-Free for Dummies” author Danna Korn. Shauna James Ahern was diagnosed with celiac disease in 2005 and recommends focusing on readily available and naturally gluten-free foods such as fruit, vegetables, dairy and meat. The cookbook author and “Gluten-Free Girl” blogger, says the category has staying power and suspects she knows why people who do not have a medical reason for going gluten-free feel better when they do. “They’re eating whole foods for the first time in their lives,” she says.
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26703
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“Anybody that wants a test (for the coronavirus) can get a test.”
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The CDC says health care providers are the ones who decide whether someone gets tested for coronavirus. Factors clinicians should consider include whether individuals were in close contact with a lab-confirmed or suspected COVID-19 patient within 14 days of symptom onset, or traveled from affected geographic areas within 14 days of symptom onset. Symptoms of COVID-19 are fever, cough, and difficulty breathing.
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false
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Health Care, Public Health, Health Check, Coronavirus, Donald Trump,
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"To show that his administration has been fast and effective in its response to the new coronavirus, President Donald Trump claimed that anybody who wants to get tested for the respiratory disease caused by the virus can do so. ""Anybody that wants a test can get a test. That’s what the bottom line is,"" Trump told reporters March 6 during a visit to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. Moments later, Trump added that anybody that needs a test gets one. ""But as of right now and yesterday, anybody that needs a test — that’s the important thing — and the tests are all perfect, like the letter was perfect. The transcription was perfect, right? This was not as perfect as that, but pretty good,"" Trump said. (Trump’s mention of ""the letter"" and ""transcription"" was a reference to his recent impeachment.) As large public gatherings around the United States are being cancelled and some colleges are suspending in-person classes to avoid the spread of the disease, PolitiFact decided to fact-check Trump on his ""bottom line"" assessment that anybody who wants a test will get one. He’s wrong. Current supply of the test is limited, and it is clinicians who decide whether a patient meets criteria to warrant testing. Testing is not as easy as just calling your doctor or pharmacy, saying you want to be tested for COVID-19 and getting it done. ""Unfortunately, it’s not that simple yet,"" said Christopher Mores, a professor of global health at George Washington University. There is greater availability of tests, but the number of labs involved in the testing process is still limited, Mores said. Testing is expected to increase as more commercial labs participate, but even they have limits in the number of patients that can be tested daily, Mores said. PolitiFact found news reports of people who wanted to get tested and couldn’t, or of hindrances in the testing process. Here’s a sample: CBS Miami reported March 2 that a woman who had returned from Italy was told at a hospital that she likely had COVID-19 but was refused a test. The woman, not named by CBS Miami, said one of the reasons she wasn’t tested for the new coronavirus was because she was not in a high-risk category, since she was in her 30s and otherwise healthy. (She tested positive for earlier coronavirus strains, coronavirus 229E and NL63, according to CBS Miami.) The hospital and state health department did not comment on the case. Texas Tribune reported March 11 that Texas’ largest public health lab can do a maximum of 26 tests per day. Doctors and hospitals did not yet have capability to do tests on their own premises. (An NPR report indicates this issue is not limited to Texas.) The Mercury News reported that the president of the California Academy of Family Physicians said no one had been trained to do the test. (The story published March 7 and was updated March 10.) The CDC on its website said that if people come in close contact of someone with the respiratory disease and they develop symptoms, they should call their health care provider. ""They will decide whether you need to be tested, but keep in mind that there is no treatment for COVID-19, and people who are mildly ill are able to isolate at home,"" the federal health agency said. Elsewhere on its website, the CDC said, ""Clinicians should use their judgment to determine if a patient has signs and symptoms compatible with COVID-19 and whether the patient should be tested."" Factors to consider for testing include whether individuals were in close contact with a confirmed or suspected COVID-19 patient within 14 days of symptoms, or if they traveled from affected geographic areas within 14 days of symptom onset. Clinicians who want to test a patient should work with local and state health departments to coordinate testing through public health labs, CDC said. That process could be delayed if the labs are running at capacity. The CDC is typically the first one to develop a diagnostic test because they have access before others to clinical specimens and viral samples. The CDC test then becomes the basis for tests developed by others. But there were manufacturing problems with the CDC test at first. Trump administration officials have provided conflicting information regarding how many people can be tested. Stephen M. Hahn, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, acknowledged the confusion on March 7. Hahn said that production issues were eventually resolved by a third-party manufacturer. That manufacturer is producing tests for state public health labs, academic medical centers, community hospitals and other nonpublic health labs. The CDC has shipped tests to public health laboratories to test about 75,000 people, Hahn said. Additionally, 1.1 million tests were shipped to nonpublic health labs, and around 1 million more tests were close to being shipped, he said. But the number of tests shipped doesn’t equal the number of people that can be tested. For instance, 2.1 million tests would roughly translate to testing for 850,000 Americans, according to Hahn. Manufacturers plan to scale up production so they can ship 4 million more tests by mid March, Hahn said, and large commercial and academic labs are also expected to make more tests. Trump said, ""Anybody that wants a test can get a test."" This is wrong. It is health care providers who make the call on who gets tested, based on recommendations from the CDC. There’s an increase in the number of tests being manufactured, but an increase in the availability of tests does not mean that ""anybody that wants a test can get a test."" Trump’s statement is inaccurate and a gross oversimplification of the facts."
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29225
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The Boy Scouts implemented a new policy requiring condoms to be available at its quadrennial World Scout Jamboree, shortly after announcing that girls would be able to join the organization.
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What's true: The World Organization of the Scout Movement requires condoms to be available at the World Scout Jamboree. What's false: This decision was made by the World Organization of the Scout Movement, not Boy Scouts of America; condoms have been available at these events since the early 1990s and an official policy mandating condoms was implemented in 2002; the 2019 World Scout Jamboree won't be the first such event with women and girls in attendance.
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false
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Politics, boy scouts of america
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The late 2017 decision to allow girls into the Boy Scouts of America caused considerable outrage in certain circles, as some argued that the change would lead to the organization’s downfall. In May 2018, as BSA eyed a name change, blogs such as DailyWire.com took advantage of the controversy by publishing articles connecting the change to a policy requiring condoms to be available at the World Scout Jamboree: The Boy Scouts World Scout Jamboree, which is held every four years and next will be held in West Virginia in 2019, may offer something to Scouts that would have been unthinkable years ago: condoms. A WND.com article had similarly misleading paragraphs: The Boy Scouts have decided to accept people who identify as gay and lesbian among their ranks. And girls are welcome now, too, into the iconic organization, which has renamed itself Scouts BSA. So what’s next? A mandate that condoms be made available to “all participants” of its global gathering. These articles heavily implied that the condom policy was new, and that it was directly connected to the decision to allow girls into BSA: At best this is misleading, as the policy requiring condoms to be available at the World Scout Jamboree comes from the World Organization of the Scout Movement, not BSA. WOSM is an international scouting organization that oversees a regular Jamboree (usually every four years) attended by scouts from all over the world. In guidelines for the event adopted in March 2016, the WSOM said: The host organization must ensure that condoms are readily and easily accessible for all participants and IST at a number of locations on the site. Heads of Contingent must be informed in advance and made aware of their responsibility in communicating this policy to their Participants, Unite Leaders Contingent Staff, and IST in an appropriate way. When making this information available onsite, consideration shall be given to the various cultures and beliefs present. The 2019 Jamboree will be far from the first time condoms have been made available at the event. A 2011 handbook for an event in Sweden encouraged safe sex and noted the availability of condoms at the health center: It is important to always take care of yourself and others. Sex without a condom or other form of contraception can result in pregnancy, and if your partner has HIV or a sexually transmitted infection (and you might not always know they do), you can become infected too. About sex and relationships If you are considering having sex, condoms are the best way to protect yourself against infections and pregnancy. These are available from the Health Centres or can be purchased from the pharmacy on Four Seasons Square. An article from BBC also reported that condoms would be made available to attendees of the 20th World Scout Jamboree in Thailand in 2002. (Some outlets at the time expressed outrage about the availability of condoms and warned about a Boy Scout “orgy.”) According to a 2006 report, condoms have been made available at international scouting events at least 1992: For nearly 15 years the policy of the World Organization of the Scout Movement — which is the authority responsible for the World Scout Jamboree — has been to hand out free condoms in the health centres set up for the event, to all participants that may request them. The fight against AIDS and the resurgence of sexually transmitted illnesses (STIs) prompted WOSM to work closely with UNAIDS, UNICEF, WHO and UNFPA to set up educational programmes that, on the one hand, contribute to the emotional and sexual education of young people by integrating the emotional development of young people – whether boys or girls – and, on the other hand, through the prevention of risks linked to sexually transmitted illnesses (see story). The presence of the Scout Movement in many countries affected by STIs has naturally led national Scout organisations to include this problem into their educational programmes. WSOM officially implemented a policy requiring condoms to be available at the World Scout Jamboree in 2002, releasing a statement about it at the time: It is the policy of the World Organization of the Scout Movement, which is the authority responsible for the World Scout Jamboree, to have condoms freely available in each health centre of the event for any participant that makes this request. The spread of AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) has led the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM) to coordinate with UNAIDS, UNICEF, the World Health Organisation and the UNFPA to create educational programmes for the emotional and sexual education of young people. These programmes integrate both the emotional development of youth, boys and girls, and the prevention of risks related to sexually transmitted infections. The presence of Scouting in a number of countries particularly affected by STIs has led these National Scout Organizations to include this issue in their educational programmes as well. We reached out to WSOM about the articles attempting to connect the decades old policy to the Boy Scouts of American recent decision to include girls and were told that these two decisions were in no way related. WSOM also clarified that condoms are not “distributed directly to participants” but are available at the health center: WOSM is committed to offer a safe space for all participants during World Scout Events. While condoms are not distributed directly to participants at activities during World Scout Jamboree, condoms are still made available as part of the youth-friendly services offered at the health centre and in line with the international best practices recommended by the United Nations. WOSM advises at the beginning of the event the organisers and delegation leaders of all health services provided to participants at the centre. In accordance with WOSM’s guidelines and in line with the best international health practices as recommended by the United Nations specialised agencies, WOSM makes condoms available in each health centre of the event for any participant that makes this request. The policy on condoms started in 2002 and is not connected to the Boy Scouts of America’s decision to open all its educational programmes to young women. Vice Chairperson of the World Scout Committee Andy Chapman confirmed to us that WSOM sets the guidelines for the Jamboree, and that the three host organizations of this year’s event —Scouts Canada, the Scout Association of Mexico, and the Boy Scouts of America — are working to implement the requirements in an appropriate manner. Chapman also noted that the WSOM policies take into account the concerns of a variety of countries, not just the United States: Planning for the 2019 World Scout Jamboree is currently underway between the World Organization of Scout Movement (WOSM) and the three National Scout Organizations who are co-hosting the event – Scouts Canada, the Scout Association of Mexico and the Boy Scouts of America. “The World Scout Jamboree is an official program of the World Organization of the Scout Movement. As a world Scouting event, WOSM previously established the requirements and guidelines for the 2019 World Scout Jamboree. The co-hosts are working with WOSM to appropriately implement these requirements. The World Scout Jamboree organizing team has worked with the co-host countries to align these requirements, which have been in place for the past two World Scout Jamborees, in a manner that is respectful to local laws and preferences. For instance, alcohol will not be offered at the 2019 World Scout Jamboree at the Summit Bechtel Reserve. The 2019 World Scout Jamboree will focus Scouts from around the world on personal development, faith and beliefs, sustainability, adventure and other topics that cross cultural lines. Scouting’s founder Lord Baden-Powell of Great Britain believed that bringing youth of the world together would help foster greater cultural awareness, acceptance and cooperation. The 2019 World Scout Jamboree is being planned with this spirit in mind. The articles insinuating that the condom policy was new and somehow connected to Boy Scouts of America’s decision to welcome girls into the organization were ignoring the fact that girls already make up a large portion of the global scouting community, and that they have for years been allowed to join the Scouts in a majority of countries (emphasis ours): So, obvious question, but will there be girls at the 2019 World Scout Jamboree? This is still a great question to ask because not only will there be girls at the 2019 WSJ, they will make up about half of all participants attending! In recent years, more girls than boys have joined Scouting globally. If you are curious about how co-ed Scouting works, you have to see how the rest of the world does it. Of the 169 members of the World Organization of the Scouting Movement (WOSM), only fourteen countries have specifically boys-only Scouting. So that means that our co-hosts, Canada and Mexico, will be bringing tons of young women to the 2019 WSJ. Not to mention, almost every other nation across the globe will be joining them! In fact, a group of girls were in attendance at the first World Scout Jamboree in London in 1920. The WSOM has officially accepted female members since the early 1970s, and the majority of scouting programs welcome both boys and girls: This is definitely not the first time that girls will be attending the World Scout Jamboree. A patrol of girls was present at the 1st World Scout Jamboree that was held in London in 1920. In response, the Girl Guide Movement was established by Lord Baden-Powell as a “sister organisation” to Scouting. WOSM itself is made up of 169 National Scout Organizations, and has formally accepted female members since the early 1970s. The majority of these organisations now offer Scouting programmes that welcome both boys and girls, young men and young women. In other words, 2018 headlines about condoms being the latest symptom of scouting decline are little more than warmed-over outrage clickbait.
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37982
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12,000 plus Christians gather[ed] to worship at the California State Capital on [September 6 2020] because they are locked out of their churches ... No fights with Law Enforcement and NO MEDIA coverage.
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Did More Than 12,000 Christians Defy Governor, Worship at California Capitol in September 2020?
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mixture
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Disinformation, Fact Checks
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On September 7 2020, a Facebook user shared the following post claiming that thousands of Christians had flocked to the California State Capitol the previous day — but the media did not report the large turnout.The post claimed:12,000 plus Christians gather to worship at the California State Capital on Sunday [September 6 2020] because they are locked out of their churches. No rioting, looting, burning down business. No fights with Law Enforcement and NO MEDIA coverage.Discourse About the EventOn the same day the Facebook claim was posted, commentator Todd Starnes — who was, the last time we checked, a member of the media — blogged about the gathering on his website. His post, which was headlined “More Than 12,000 Christians Defy Governor, Worship at California Capitol,” mentioned media coverage in its first few sentences:More than 12,000 thousands of all races and backgrounds gathered in the sweltering heat to worship Jesus Christ at the state capitol building in Sacramento, California.The Christians did so in defiance of Governor Gavin Newsom, the Democrat governor responsible for shutting down many churches across the state.The Sacramento Bee, a leftist newspaper, noted that most of those attending were not wearing masks and they were not in compliance with the governor’s mandates.On Twitter, users reiterated the claim that either 10,000 or 12,000 people attended the event:At least 10,000 gathered at the California capitol to worship tonight. While yeah that’s cool you could do that I guess, but not one of the videos or photos I saw of the event had people wearing masks and obviously nobody was social distancing…— Candice Joy ✌🏼 (@CandiceJoy218) September 7, 2020Official Capitol Hill police estimate was 12,000 tonight in Sacramento!!! 😭😭😭😭GOD IS NOT DONE WITH CALIFORNIA!! !#LetUsWorship pic.twitter.com/4sRGwbQbIl— Sean Feucht (@seanfeucht) September 7, 2020News About the September 6 2020 RallyAlthough one of the most popular Facebook posts about the rally claimed “NO MEDIA coverage” followed it, as Starnes mentioned, the Sacramento Bee reported the event. That article described the crowd as numbering in the “thousands,” adding that few attendees wore masks or practiced social distancing:Neither coronavirus restrictions nor record-smashing heat could stop a large crowd from assembling outside the Capitol in Sacramento for a Christian music concert Sunday evening [September 6 2020].Almost none of the thousands attending wore a mask during the hours-long event, and spectators were packed in about as tight as could be, photos and video from the concert/protest demonstration show. That prompts concern amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has infected close to 20,000 people in Sacramento County and killed over 330 residents, including 190 deaths in the capital city.Christian musicians and speakers, including the state senate’s Republican party leader, nonetheless took the stage on the west steps of the Capitol for what organizers called a “Let Us Worship” rally. Events branded under that title have toured West Coast cities in recent weeks, including Redding, Fresno and Pismo Beach.A crowd size estimate was not available at press time:[Organizer Sean] Feucht boasted on social media that Sunday’s concert drew more than 11,000 people to California’s Capitol. A CHP spokesperson did not immediately respond to The Bee’s request for comment including an estimate on crowd size, but images from the event show it reached at least several thousand, exacerbating COVID-19 concerns even further. CHP said late Monday it allowed the protest to go ahead because it was a relatively short event.That outlet linked to a site for a broader movement, LetUsWorship.us, which was sparsely populated with content. A landing page in part addressed restrictions on large gatherings due to the active pandemic:… our freedom to worship God and obey His Word has come under unprecedented attack. Powerful politicians and social media giants have engaged in unchartered abuses of religious liberty, silencing the faithful, banning our voices, and outright attacking our God-given right to declare His goodness.States across America, including here in California have shut down church services and even outlawed singing in church. Instagram and Twitter is censoring Christian voices every single day. And every hour that passes they grow bolder in their efforts to silence the faithful.On September 8 2020, KOVR-TV covered the rally, but it was not able to confirm the claim that 12,000 people attended:On [September 6 2020], Feucht held an event on the front steps of the California State Capitol building. He claims that Capitol Police estimated about 12,000 people attended.As could be seen in videos taken from the rally, social distancing was not enforced and many – if not most – attendees were not wearing face masks.Infectious Disease expert, Dr. Dean Blumberg, says it’s possible that there were many people at the gathering who were potentially infectious, who were either pre-symptomatic or asymptomatic, and could transmit COVID-19 to others.“That’s really a recipe for transmission and can lead to further outbreaks not only among the people who are in attendance but their contacts, too,” Dr. Blumberg said.According to California Highway Patrol’s guidance for in-person protests on Capitol grounds, there is no longer a limit on how many people can attend constitutionally-protected First Amendments activities. However, strict physical distancing of a minimum of six-feet between attendees should be implemented for events.Among other news outlets reporting on the rally was KTXL via Associated Press, noting that “Feucht tweeted that the turnout amounted to 12,000 people, which the California Highway Patrol has yet to verify.” CBS News, a national network, also published an article about the event, again reiterating that the 12,000 attendees count had originated with the event’s organizer, Feucht, who would likely have a vested interest in overestimating its popularity:A pastor associated with Bethel Church in Redding, California, held a prayer service and protest against coronavirus prevention measures on the California State Capitol grounds on [September 6 2020]. He is claiming more than 12,000 people attended, CBS Sacramento reports.Worship Pastor Sean Feucht has been holding Christian concerts across the U.S. amid the coronavirus pandemic in defiance of local orders against large gatherings.Feucht rails against the preventive measures being taken to stop the spread of the virus, arguing that freedom of being able to practice religion is being infringed.What’s True, What’s Not True, and What’s UnknownSocial media posts claimed 12,000 Christians flooded the California State Capitol on September 6 2020, in defiance of state orders prohibiting large gatherings, and “no media coverage” followed the massive event. It is true that Feucht organized a prayer rally and protest against preventive measures during the pandemic, but the claim 12,000 people attended came from him alone. It was not true that the event went unreported; local outlets (the Sacramento Bee and affiliates) as well as national news sources (CBS News and AP) reported on the event.Comments
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1882
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New plan to cut the fat of the military.
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Obese Americans in the military are a national security hazard and first lady Michelle Obama wants to see that change.
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true
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Health News
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U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama joins the lunch line at Parklawn Elementary School in Alexandria, Virginia January 25, 2012. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque Obama, who has spearheaded a healthy eating and fitness program for children for two years, will lend her voice on Thursday to the military’s efforts to overhaul the food it serves. In an event in Little Rock, Arkansas, Obama will join top Pentagon officials to announce a new obesity and nutritional awareness campaign that will change nutrition standards across the services for the first time in 20 years. The changes will bring more fruits, vegetables, whole grains and food choices that are lower in fat to 1,100 service member dining facilities in the coming months. According to the White House, more than one quarter of 17- to 24-year-olds are too overweight to serve in the military. Active members of the military are also becoming more overweight, a Pentagon official said, and that causes a “readiness problem.” “The Department of Defense considers obesity not only a national problem but a national security issue,” Assistant U.S. Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs Jonathan Woodson told reporters in a call to discuss the first lady’s visit to Arkansas and other states to promote healthy eating. “Our primary focus is on the health and well-being of service members, their families, and our retirees,” Woodson said in remarks to be delivered in Little Rock. “Obesity is a preventable problem which, if combated, can help prevent disease and ease the burden on our overall Military Health System.” There is a lot of money involved. Woodson says the U.S. military spends about $4.65 billion in food services each year. It also spends an estimated $1.1 billion a year on medical care associated with excess weight and obesity. In an effort to promote good choices, the military will redesign menus and try to supply healthier foods in mess halls and on bases and in vending machines and snack bars on military bases. The first lady, who has been doing the rounds of television talk shows and late-night comedy shows to promote her “Let’s Move” campaign to improve the nation’s eating and exercise habits, said changes by the Pentagon would send an important message. “Whenever our men and women in uniform step forward, Americans take notice. When our service members make healthy eating a priority in their lives, the rest of us are more likely to make it a priority in our lives,” she said in remarks prepared for delivery at Little Rock Air Force Base. “Simply put, this is America’s entire military once again stepping forward to lead by example.”
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16558
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"Heroin and prescription opioids are ""the number one cause of accidental or preventable death in Wisconsin."
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"Schimel said heroin and prescription opioidss are ""the number one cause of accidental or preventable death in Wisconsin."" Schimel acknowledged to us that he misspoke and in fact opioid deaths are down the list. The latest figures, for 2012, show falls was the leading causes of accidental death in Wisconsin. Tied for second were motor vehicle deaths and drug overdose of all types -- including 511 deaths from heroin or prescription opioids."
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false
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Drugs, Health Care, Crime, Public Health, Wisconsin, Brad Schimel,
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"Federal health officials have documented a rise in overdose deaths from opioids -- heroin, as well as prescription painkillers such as OxyContin that can lead to heroin abuse. The latest figures, reported in July 2014, show there were 4,397 heroin deaths across the country in 2011, up 44 percent from 2010. Meanwhile, prescription opioid deaths, following a more than decade-long rise, claimed many more lives -- 16,917, up 2 percent. But, comparatively speaking, just how serious is the opioid problem? In an Aug. 15, 2014 interview on Wisconsin Public Television, Waukesha County District Attorney Brad Schimel, the Republican candidate for state attorney general, was asked what he considered the most important facing the winner of the Nov. 4, 2014 election. Schimel -- who faces Jefferson County District Attorney Susan Happ, a Democrat -- gave this response: ""Well, right now, the biggest public safety issue we face is the heroin and prescription opioid problem. It is the number one cause of accidental or preventable death in Wisconsin. It surpassed traffic crashes quite a few years ago already."" Is it true that overdoses from heroin or prescription opioids not only outnumber traffic fatalities, but are the top cause of accidental deaths in Wisconsin? The statistics The latest figures from the U.S.Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that nationally, there were 41,340 fatal drug overdoses of all types in 2011, making it the leading cause of injury death in the country. But what about in Wisconsin? When we asked Schimel’s campaign about his claim, Schimel replied in an email that he had misspoken. He told us he meant to say that the number of all drug overdose deaths in Wisconsin -- not just heroin and prescription opioid deaths -- exceed the number of motor vehicle deaths and are the top cause of accidental deaths. We checked the latest report from the state Department of Health Services, which said there were 2,789 accidental deaths in 2012. The leading cause was 1,091 falls (which also was the leading cause in 2011, according to the department). There were 615 motor vehicle deaths. The same number of deaths -- 615-- was caused by ""accidental poisoning and exposure to noxious substances."" But those 615 included deaths caused by a variety of drugs, as well as other substances such as alcohol. Separately, we obtained figures from the health department showing there were 511 opioid deaths in Wisconsin in 2012. That included 187 heroin deaths, up from 27 in 2002. And there were 324 deaths caused either by prescription opioids or a mix of prescription opioids and heroin, up from 144 in 2002. Our rating Schimel said heroin and prescription opioidss are ""the number one cause of accidental or preventable death in Wisconsin."" Schimel acknowledged to us that he misspoke and in fact opioid deaths are down the list. The latest figures, for 2012, show falls was the leading causes of accidental death in Wisconsin. Tied for second were motor vehicle deaths and drug overdose of all types -- including 511 deaths from heroin or prescription opioids."
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26976
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FDA finally admits dental fillings are toxic.
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"The story we’re fact-checking claims that the FDA finally admitted that ""dental fillings are toxic."" That’s not quite right, and it’s old news — not from 2018, when the story was posted, but 2008, when the FDA settled a lawsuit with consumer groups. It’s true that as part of the settlement the FDA warned that a type of dental filling, amalgams, may have neurotoxic effects on some people — pregnant women, fetuses and young children. But it didn’t declare without caveats that dental fillings are toxic, full stop."
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false
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Health Care, Facebook Fact-checks, Bloggers,
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"Facebook users have been sharing a story that warns the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ""finally admits dental fillings are toxic."" This post, which was published on Principia Scientific on Dec. 12, was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) The story says that, as part of a lawsuit settlement with consumer groups, the FDA was forced to publicly admit that ""all ‘silver’ dental fillings are poisoned with mercury."" It’s referring to dental amalgam, a filling material dentists use to fill cavities. According to the FDA, its primary component is elemental mercury. Amalgam fillings are also known as ""silver fillings"" because of their silver-like appearance. The agency says such fillings have been used in hundreds of millions of patients around the world for over a century, and are beneficial because they’re strong and less likely to break than those made of other materials. But there are also risks. Amalgam releases low levels of mercury vapor that can be inhaled and absorbed by the lungs. High levels of mercury vapor exposure can harm the brain and kidneys. The FDA says it reviewed scientific evidence to determine whether low levels of mercury vapor from dental amalgam fillings were cause for concern. Based on the evidence, according to the agency, the FDA considers them safe for adults and children 6 and older. But fetuses and young children may be more sensitive to the ""neurotoxic effects of mercury vapor,"" according to the FDA. It says there is ""very limited to no"" clinical data on the long-term health outcomes for pregnant women, their fetuses and young children, and advises concerned patients to talk to their dentists. The agency also discourages patients from removing their dental amalgams if they’re in good condition and there’s no tooth decay under the filling because, in part, it could expose that person to additional mercury vapor released during the removal process. Though the Principia Scientific story was published in 2018, it uses an FDA statement from 2008 to show that the agency ""was finally forced to admit"" amalgam fillings are toxic. It was then, Reuters reported in June 2008, that the FDA settled a lawsuit with several consumer advocacy groups, including Consumers for Dental Choice and Moms Against Mercury. The group sought to ban mercury fillings from the U.S. market. As part of the settlement, according to Reuters, the FDA agreed to alert consumers about the potential risks on its website and to issue a more specific rule about fillings that contain mercury. In a notice on its website — and this is what the Principia Scientific story quotes — the FDA said that amalgams contain mercury, which may have neurotoxic effects on the nervous systems of developing children and fetuses. ""Pregnant women and persons who may have a health condition that makes them more sensitive to mercury exposure, including individuals with existing high levels of mercury microburden, should not avoid seeking dental care, but should discuss options with their health practitioner,"" the FDA said. At the time, a lawyer for Consumers for Dental Choice described the FDA’s statement as a major shift. ""Gone, gone, gone are all of the FDA’s claims that no science exists that amalgam is unsafe,"" he said. The Associated Press, reporting on the settlement, said that ""silver dental fillings contain mercury, and the government for the first time is warning that they may pose a safety concern for pregnant women and young children."" It described it as a victory for ""anti-mercury activists."" But the report also notes that the warning isn’t aimed at everybody — just two groups of people who are already urged to limit mercury from seafood because too much can harm a developing brain. Our ruling The story we’re fact-checking claims that the FDA finally admitted that ""dental fillings are toxic."" That’s not quite right, and it’s old news — not from 2018, when the story was posted, but 2008, when the FDA settled a lawsuit with consumer groups. It’s true that as part of the settlement the FDA warned that a type of dental filling, amalgams, may have neurotoxic effects on some people — pregnant women, fetuses and young children. But it didn’t declare without caveats that dental fillings are toxic, full stop."
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16098
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"Dick Cheney Says Saddam Hussein ""had a 10-year relationship with al-Qaida."
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Cheney said Hussein had a 10-year relationship with al-Qaida. Two comprehensive, high-level government reports largely refute that statement. That includes one Pentagon study that relied on a trove of secret Iraqi government documents that fell into American hands after the invasion. While there are cases where the two interests overlapped, there is no evidence of a deep-rooted, meaningful relationship over 10 years as Cheney claimed.
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false
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Afghanistan, Ethics, Human Rights, Iraq, Military, Terrorism, PunditFact, Dick Cheney,
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"Former Vice President Dick Cheney has been a consistent defender of past interrogation techniques. ""We are castigating the CIA for doing what the president ordered them to do and the Justice Department said was legal,"" Cheney said on NBC’s Meet the Press, Dec. 14, 2014. For Cheney, the deaths of 3,000 people on 9/11 at the hands of al-Qaida terrorists justified expanded interrogation methods and the subsequent invasion of Iraq. ""We got to the point where we were very concerned about the possible linkage between terrorists on the one hand and weapons of mass destruction on the other,"" Cheney said. ""Saddam Hussein had previously had twice nuclear programs going. He produced and used weapons of mass destruction. And he had a 10-year relationship with al-Qaida."" Cheney and the rest of the administration of President George W. Bush made the link between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida a linchpin in its rationale for war. In that light, Cheney’s claim about a 10-year relationship merits a closer look. His statement runs counter to at least two major official inquiries. The 9/11 Commission, an independent, bipartisan body created by Congress and Bush, had the job of writing a complete account of the circumstances surrounding the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Among its tasks: Examine the ties between al-Qaida and Hussein’s regime. The commission found isolated contacts over the years between Iraq and al-Qaida terrorists but nothing more. The commission released its report in 2004. ""To date we have seen no evidence that these or the earlier contacts ever developed into a collaborative operational relationship,"" the report said. ""Nor have we seen evidence indicating that Iraq cooperated with al-Qaida in developing or carrying out any attacks against the United States."" In 2007, the Institute for Defense Analyses, a nonprofit research branch of the Pentagon’s Joint Forces Command, completed its assessment based on over half-a-million captured Iraqi documents. That study ""found no ‘smoking gun’ (i.e., direct connection) between Saddam's Iraq and al-Qaida,"" the analysts wrote. When it suited their goals, both the Hussein regime and al-Qaida leaders might support the same third-party militant groups in different countries, but the researchers said the two parties had little else in common. ""To the fundamentalist leadership of al-Qaida, Saddam represented the worst kind of ‘apostate’ regime,"" they wrote. ""A secular police state well practiced in suppressing internal challenges."" Al-Qaida had good reason to mistrust Hussein. In the mid 1990s, the Iraqi government cracked down and arrested religious extremists who it saw as a threat to Hussein’s power. Peter Neumann is a professor in the War Studies Department at King’s College in London and the author of several books on terrorism. Neumann called Cheney’s statement ""absolutely ."" ""There was no relationship of any kind, and Vice President Cheney, despite making these claims for more than 10 years now, has failed to present any evidence to support it,"" Neumann said. ""He's, as far as I can see, also the only significant person in the Bush administration that's left making this claim."" There are isolated examples where Iraqis operating on their own joined forces with al-Qaida and still maintained contacts with members of the Iraqi military, but there is no sign that the connection was any stronger than that. We tried to reach Cheney through a spokesman and did not hear back. Recently, Cheney said that Hussein either supported or tolerated some fundamentalists who went on to become al-Qaida leaders. The Washington Post Fact Checker looked at Cheney’s evidence in July 2014 and found it lacking. Hussein was ready to encourage extremists when he thought they would destabilize his enemies such as the Kurds in northern Iraq. That’s not the sort of relationship that would tie Iraq to the 9/11 attacks. Our ruling Cheney said Hussein had a 10-year relationship with al-Qaida. Two comprehensive, high-level government reports largely refute that statement. That includes one Pentagon study that relied on a trove of secret Iraqi government documents that fell into American hands after the invasion. While there are cases where the two interests overlapped, there is no evidence of a deep-rooted, meaningful relationship over 10 years as Cheney claimed."
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10371
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Cervical cancer vaccine gets OK
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The recent FDA approval of an HPV vaccine has made headlines all over the world not only because it will be the first vaccine marketed to prevent cancer, but also because of the intense political and social debates that it has inspired. This story reports on the FDA’s decision, but has many flaws, providing little context and perhaps leading readers to many incorrect assumptions. Although the story mentions some clinical trials, the story does not adequately describe the strength of the available evidence. Most importantly, the story does not explain that the clinical trials did not include actual cases of cervical cancer, but rather a pre-cancerous condition. The story does not mention harms, provides quantification of benefits in relative terms only, and does not mention the obvious alternative – pap smears. Nor does the story mention the use of condoms to prevent HPV or other communicable diseases. The story also only quotes one expert, the president of the American Cancer Society. The story should have provided additional perspectives. Although the story describes the number of deaths per year from cervical cancer along with the lifetime risk of HPV infection, by mentioning the 240,000 women worldwide who die of cervical cancer, the story exaggerates the benefits of the vaccine. Cervical cancer is much more common in the developing world, where women are the least likely to have access to or be able to pay for the vaccine.
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false
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The story mentions that the cost of the three-injection series is $360. The story should have provided more context. For example, implementing a full-scale immunization program for all females age 9 to 26 in the U.S. would cost billions of dollars. The story provides quantification of benefits in relative terms only. Failing to give context may lead readers to incorrect assumptions. The story does not mention any potential harms. Although the story mentions some clinical trials, the story does not adequately describe the strength of the available evidence. Most importantly, the story does not explain that the clinical trials did not include actual cases of cervical cancer, but rather a pre-cancerous condition. Although the story mentions the number of deaths per year from cervical cancer along with the lifetime risk of HPV infection, by mentioning the 240,000 women worldwide who die of cervical cancer, the story exaggerates the benefits of the vaccine. Cervical cancer is much more common in the developing world, where women are the least likely to have access to or be able to pay for the vaccine. The story only quotes one expert, the president of the American Cancer Society. The story should have provided additional perspectives. The story does mention the obvious alternative – pap smears. Nor does the story mention the use of condoms to prevent HPV or other communicable diseases. The story clearly states that the vaccine was recently approved by the FDA. The story clearly states that the vaccine is a novel approach. There is no way to know if the story relied on a press release as the sole source of information.
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8666
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Pentagon eyes Chicago, Michigan, Florida, Louisiana as coronavirus spreads.
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The U.S. military is watching coronavirus infection trends in Chicago, Michigan, Florida and Louisiana with concern as it weighs where else it may need to deploy, after boosting aid to New York, California and Washington, a top general said on Friday.
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true
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Health News
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Air Force General John Hyten, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the military was doing its own analysis as well as looking at data on infections compiled elsewhere in the government. “There’s a certain number of places where we have concerns and they’re: Chicago, Michigan, Florida, Louisiana,” Hyten told a group of reporters, when asked where field hospitals could head next. “Those are the areas that we’re looking at and trying to figure out where to go next.” Confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States reached 100,040 on Friday, the highest number in the world, a Reuters tally showed. The Army Corps of Engineers said on Friday it was aiming to provide facilities for 3,000 people with the coronavirus at Chicago’s McCormick Place convention center by April 24 for about $75 million. Lieutenant General Todd Semonite, the Corps’ commander, said the Corps was looking at potentially converting 114 facilities in the United States into hospitals. Asked about Hyten’s remarks, Semonite said he continued to be concerned about Michigan, Florida and Louisiana and had spoken with the governor of Louisiana. He said there could be a high demand for medical resources in Florida because of the aging population and added the Corps was developing options for the state. The military is already deploying field hospitals to Seattle and New York. A Navy hospital ship arrived on Friday in Los Angeles and another one is expected to reach New York City on Monday, where Hyten said the city was still dredging the harbor to allow the massive ship to dock. Each ship has a capacity of about 1,000 beds and would not treat coronavirus patients, instead taking pressure off overwhelmed civilian hospitals. But Hyten cautioned that the U.S. military only had limited medical capacity in the United States and, at some point, it would have to tap the reserve forces — while guarding against drawing medical staff away from civilian facilities. President Donald Trump on Friday signed an executive order authorizing the Pentagon and Department of Homeland Security to call up reservists. “We made a decision about five or six years ago that we would downsize our military (health care) capabilities in the United States ... to only really focus on our deployed requirements,” Hyten said. He estimated that the military only had 1,329 adult hospital beds staffed at any one time in the United States. “We’re digging into the active duty force really heavily,” he said. “So the next thing that we’re going to need is to look into the reserves.”
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28336
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President Donald Trump, in applying for permission to build a wall at his golf course in Ireland, warned against the threat of coastal erosion caused by global warming.
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What's true: As part of a May 2016 planning application in County Clare, Ireland, a local firm -- acting of behalf of Trump's company TIGL -- submitted a report that repeatedly referred to global warming and climate change as real phenomena posing specific risks (rising sea levels and extreme storms) to the erosion of sand dunes at the Doonbeg golf course. What's false: Trump himself did not make these references to global warming and climate change, nor did anyone else from his company. The report was written by an Irish environmental consultancy and submitted on behalf of Trump's company.
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mixture
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Politics, climate change, donald trump, global warming
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President Donald Trump has for years attracted scrutiny and criticism for his pronouncements on climate change and global warming, which he has variously described as “bullshit” and a “hoax.” In 2012, Trump famously claimed on Twitter that global warming was a “concept” created “by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” In 2013, he referred to global warming as a “total hoax,” and in 2015 he told conservative talk radio host Hugh Hewitt: “I’m not a believer in global warming. I’m not a believer in man-made global warming.” In recent years, Trump has frequently referred dismissively to the reality of global warming during periods of cold weather in the United States. Against that background of Trump’s clear, consistent, and long-standing position on global warming and climate change — that he does not believe in a steady, man-made increase in the global temperature — reports from the spring of 2016 prompted accusations of hypocrisy on the part of the then-Republican front-runner in that year’s presidential election. On 23 May, the website Politico reported that Trump, while dismissing global warming as a hoax in his political rhetoric, was taking a very different approach in his private business dealings. The article carried the headline “Trump acknowledges climate change — at his golf course”: Donald Trump says he is “not a big believer in global warming.” He has called it “a total hoax,” “bullshit” and “pseudoscience.” But he is also trying to build a sea wall designed to protect one of his golf courses from “global warming and its effects.” The New York billionaire is applying for permission to erect a coastal protection works to prevent erosion at his seaside golf resort, Trump International Golf Links & Hotel Ireland, in County Clare. A permit application for the wall, filed by Trump International Golf Links Ireland and reviewed by POLITICO, explicitly cites global warming and its consequences — increased erosion due to rising sea levels and extreme weather this century — as a chief justification for building the structure. That article gained widespread traction in 2016, at a time when Trump’s once-ridiculed presidential campaign had gained enormous momentum, leaving him as the presumptive Republican nominee. It was aggregated by CBS News, the Washington Post, the Daily Telegraph, and other news outlets. In December 2018, the left-wing Facebook page “Occupy Democrats” posted a meme citing the Politico article which read: This is Trump’s hotel and golf course in Doonbeg, Ireland, where last year, Trump applied for and received a special permit to build a 14-foot-high sea wall to fight rising sea levels from “global warming and its effects.” Now, Trump denies climate change. So he’ll act to protect HIS property, but NOT yours. LET THAT SINK IN. Background In 2014, the Trump Organization (led by Donald Trump) bought a golf course and resort at Doughmore Bay in Doonbeg, Co. Clare, on Ireland’s Atlantic west coast. Subsequently, Trump International Golf Links and Hotel Enterprises Ltd (TIGL) tried to get planning permission from national and local authorities in Ireland to build a limestone berm (a kind of raised land bank) along a section of Doughmore Bay, with the intention of preventing further erosion of sand dunes adjacent to the golf course. In February 2016, the company submitted an application to Clare County Council, which subsequently referred the case to An Bord Pleanála (“the planning board”), the national body in Ireland that rules on planning applications of strategic importance, as well as disputes that may arise on the level of Ireland’s 31 local authorities (such as Clare County Council). An Bord Pleanála declined to rule on the application, holding that it was not a “strategic infrastructure development,” and thereby returning the decision to Clare County Council. On 10 May 2016, an Irish planning and environment consultancy firm called Cunnane Stratton Reynolds applied to Clare County Council, again seeking permission on behalf of TIGL, to build “coastal erosion management works at and adjacent Carrowmore dunes, White Strand, Doughmore Bay, and Trump International Golf Links and Hotel.” Cunnane Stratton Reynolds acted as the official agent of TIGL in this process, with the then-U.S. presidential candidate listed in the planning application as a director of the company, along with his children Ivanka, Eric, and Donald Jr. (President Trump resigned as a company director in January 2017, but he retains a 100 percent ownership stake in the golf course and earned more than $14 million from it in 2017, according to his financial disclosure.) European Union law requires that in E.U. member states such as Ireland, planning applications be accompanied by two important documents known as an Environmental Impact Statement and a Natura Impact Statement. As part of the Doonbeg application, an Irish environmental consultancy firm called Creagh House Environmental prepared the Environmental Impact Statement on behalf of TIGL. This was the source of the quotations included in Politico’s article. What the application said It was that three-volume Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) which on several occasions referred to global warming and climate change as being a threat to the sand dunes which the limestone wall was intended to protect, in two ways: because the rise in sea levels brought by climate change will continue to cause Ireland’s coastline (including the coastline at Doughmore Bay) to recede, and because climate change is associated with extreme weather events such as strong storms, which have also been shown to accelerate the erosion of the sand dunes in question. For example, Volume One of the EIS described the damage that dune erosion causes to groundwater (water immediately below the surface) at Doughmore Bay: The key pressure posed to groundwater is from erosion of the dune complex. It has been shown that there has been a steady retreat of the dune line over the past 100 years, with significant losses occurring after major storms. The evidence for increased storm activity associated with climate change suggests that the erosion will accelerate. If the current rate of erosion is allowed to continue, this will result in a significant loss of habitat, and infrastructure, with linear losses up to 150m being experienced by 2050. (Page three). The document went on to note that: Several reasons are though to be responsible for the retreat of [Ireland’s Atlantic] coastline. The majority of Irish dune systems and virtually all west of Ireland systems are retreating (due to sea level rise and increased Atlantic storminess.) (Page four.) Volume Three of the EIS comprised three “design reports,” one of which was prepared by HR Wallingford, a civil engineering firm based near Oxford, England. One section of that report (“Doonbeg Golf Resort — Review of Coastal Processes”) outlined the medium- to long-term prospect of further erosion of the sand dunes at Doughmore Bay: There is no good reason to believe that the present-day tendency for erosion and landward retreat of the dunes in Doughmore Bay will reduce naturally in the medium to long-term future. The recent study undertaken for the Office of Public Works … predicted future coastal erosion until 2050 assuming the same rates that have occurred in the recent past. If the predictions of an increase in sea level rise as a result of global warming prove correct, however, it is likely that there will be a corresponding increase in coastal erosion rates not just in Doughmore Bay but around much of the coastline of Ireland. In our view, it could reasonably be expected that the rate of sea level rise might become twice of that presently occurring, i.e. increasing from about 1-2 mm/year now to about 3 mm/year in the next 50 years or so. As a result, we would expect the rate of dune recession to increase. This was the section highlighted by Politico in their article, which correctly stated that the HR Wallingford report “acknowledges one Irish government study [the Office of Public Works study] that assumes a steady rate of erosion through 2050, but argues that the study fails to account for the effects of climate change.” However, the next paragraphs in the HR Wallingford report played down the contribution that rising sea levels (caused by climate change) make to the rate of coastal erosion, instead emphasizing the important role of extreme storms — events that, according to this part of the HR Wallingford report, are less clearly associated with global warming: However, as discussed in Section 4.1 above, the increase in sea level relative to the land has been assessed to be a modest contribution, estimated as 10-20 percent of the observed recent dune recession rate. It may be difficult to detect, even during the next century, any increase in this overall recession rate due to higher sea levels. Instead, we believe that any change in the average dune recession rate is more likely to be as a consequence of more frequent or larger storm events, in particular the occurrence of very high tidal levels caused by larger surges. As with other predictions of global warming and its effects, there is no universal consensus regarding changes in these [storm] events. As last winter’s events demonstrated, the position and strength of the jet stream high above the North Atlantic has a major influence on storms experienced in Doughmore Bay. There is very little evidence available that suggests that any global warming will result in changes in this jet stream. In summary, the HR Wallingford report speculated that the increase in sea levels off the coast of Ireland, a phenomenon the report associated with climate change, could accelerate over the next few decades, in turn causing an acceleration in the erosion of the sand dunes at Doughmore Bay. However, the report estimated that this increase in sea levels accounted for 10-20 percent of the erosion of the sand dunes, instead emphasizing the role of strong and damaging storm events, which (according to the report) have a more ambiguous, less clear connection with global warming. Interestingly, these references to climate change and global warming did not appear in an updated version of the HR Wallingford report submitted in December 2016. Similarly, an updated version of Volume One of the EIS also no longer contains any references to climate change. Trump’s company withdrew their May 2016 application, then submitted a new proposal for a scaled-down version of the wall, which Clare County Council eventually accepted in December 2017. That decision is subject to an ongoing legal challenge, meaning construction on the wall had not started as of December 2018. Conclusion Donald Trump did not personally invoke global warming and climate change as real phenomena and a genuine threat to the future of his Irish golf course, nor did anyone from the Trump Organization or Trump International Golf Links and Hotel Enterprises Ltd. However, an Environmental Impact Statement written on behalf of TIGL (of which Trump was a company director, and which he still owns) did indeed repeatedly refer to global warming and climate change as real phenomena with specific consequences (rising sea levels and more frequent, stronger storms) which posed a threat to the sand dunes at Doughmore Bay, and therefore to Trump’s golf resort at Doonbeg, Co. Clare. We don’t know whether, or to what extent, Trump’s company TIGL altered or influenced the final Environmental Impact Statement, but we do know that Trump’s company allowed that report to be submitted, on its behalf, as part of a planning application in May 2016. We also know that when the company submitted a fresh planning application in December 2016, the references to climate change and global warming had been removed from updated versions of those documents.
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9477
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Silicon Valley Startup Grail Sees Hope for Cancer Blood Test
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This story about a blood test for nasopharyngeal carcinoma focuses on the business angles of the research as much as on the potential health contributions of a new screening test. It clearly reports that there is much work to be done before such a test could be considered for clinical use. It passes along a calculation by the researchers that detecting one case would cost almost $30,000 based on the results of this study. However, the story also says that the test is more accurate than existing methods and “boosted patients’ chances of survival,”even though this study was not designed to test either of those claims. The story should have been clearer about how rare this type of cancer is. The participants in this study had a rate of cancer many, many times higher than the general population in the US, which would greatly affect both its effectiveness and its cost. The comment that the cancer “is prevalent” in southern China and Southeast Asia is misleading–it’s more prevalent, but rates are still on the order of 10 to 20 per 100,000. It would have been nice to see more context from an independent source. Stories about medical studies should never proclaim findings that the studies were not designed to produce. This story includes several cautious descriptions of the study as a proof-of-concept and something that provides a “glimpse of evidence” that a blood test might be able to detect at least one rare type of cancer. However, the story states this test is more accurate than existing methods, despite the fact that the study did not directly compare the new test to standard clinical diagnosis. It also claims the test boosted survival, even though again there was no direct comparison to standard care. The relative accuracy and survival claims stick out from the rest of the reporting in a way that suggests they might have been added to juice up the impact of the story.
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true
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blood test,nasopharyngeal carcinoma
|
The story reports not only the cost of the blood test ($60), but the cost to detect one case (including follow-up), which the researchers calculated to be $28,600. This is excellent context. The story would have been better if it had noted that the people included in this study were at unusually high risk for developing this cancer. The 34 cases found after screening 20,000 people is almost 200 times the typical annual rate in the US and other countries (less than 1 per 100,000 people per year). The ultimate measure of cost is cost-effectiveness (cost per life-year saved) which requires survival data. These analyses can also be adjusted for quality of life. While most of this story is careful to note that this test has yet to show clinical effectiveness, that caution is trampled by the claim that this blood test “boosted patients’ chances of survival,” something that this type of study cannot determine. The claim that this test is more accurate than existing methods is also premature, since the study did not directly compare the blood test to existing methods. Finding more early-stage cancers is a necessary but hardly sufficient step in the pathway of demonstrating benefit for a new screening test. Clinical trials are needed to address issues of false positives, over diagnosis, over treatment, and survival. The story reports that developers of this blood test still need to show low rates of false positive or negative results. A low false negative rate means there are fewer missed cases of serious disease. The trade-off, though, is a higher false positive rate. All positive tests will need to be evaluated with a gold standard diagnostic test and the safety, acceptability, and costs of that gold standard test will profoundly affect the uptake of the new screening test. While the story reports that this study was a “proof-of-concept” experiment, it then says the test boosted survival, something that can only be known after directly comparing the new test to existing methods. Making treatment “dramatically more effective” can be proven only with randomized trials. All screening tests that can detect cancers at an earlier stage will be associated with an apparent increase in survival time, but as explained in more detail below, this does not necessarily mean that patients with screen-detected cancers actually live longer than they would have otherwise. Efficacy can be established only with an RCT. The story could have done a better job pointing out the many limitations in the work. For example, there was no follow-up testing for people who had negative blood test results. Even though the researchers surveyed participants a year after the testing, they didn’t produce any data on how many of the people with negative blood tests actually had cancer. What’s more, the researchers compared the survival rates of their patients to a different group of cancer patients from another study, which raises questions about how comparable the groups really are. There was also no discussion of the possibility that at least some of the tumors discovered through this screening might not have developed into dangerous cancers. The story does not address lead-time bias (that longer survival might be at least partly due to finding the tumor earlier in its natural course, rather than to just the effect of treatment). The researchers noted that the effect of lead time bias can only really be known through a randomized, controlled trial. We will rate the story satisfactory on this criterion because it is careful to note that this test is not ready for clinical use and that the study results apply to only one type of cancer. However, the story would have been better if it had pointed out just how rare this cancer is, less than one case per 100,000 people in the US per year. That is about 3,000 cases in the US per year — out of about 1.7 million cancers diagnosed annually. And the comment that the cancer “is prevalent” in southern China and Southeast Asia may be misleading. While it may occur more often in the region, rates are still on the order of 10 to 20 per 100,000 which is hardly widespread. The story squeaks by on this criterion because it includes a quote from an editorial in the journal that was written by an independent source. It would have been more useful to readers to include more comment and context from someone without financial ties to this study. The story is upfront about the financial interests of the researchers themselves and the company that owns the rights to their work, noting the keen interest in bringing this test to market. Although the story reports that “that nasopharyngeal carcinoma typically goes undetected until later on, when patients report symptoms such as recurring nosebleeds,” it does not tell readers anything about how often these cancers are found at an early stage. Readers are not given a sense of how patients typically fare with existing methods of diagnosis. The story clearly reports that the test is still experimental and that developers have yet to show that it could be practical and effective in clinical practice. The story highlights the desire for a new blood test that could be clinically useful. The story doesn’t appear to rely on a news release. It includes quotes from a telephone interview with an executive at the company developing this test.
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28162
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"Morris ""Moe"" Berg, a multilingual Princeton University graduate who played major league baseball throughout the 1920s and '30s, lived a life of danger and intrigue as a U.S. military intelligence officer in Europe during World War II."
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“[Ethel] died in 1987,” Dawidoff writes, noting a plot twist Berg himself would have approved, “so the final mystery of Moe Berg’s life is that nobody knows where he is.”
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true
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History, baseball, moe berg, sports
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American baseball player Morris “Moe” Berg, whose major league career spanned 15 unillustrious seasons on four different teams between 1923 and 1939, never advanced beyond the positions of backup catcher and substitute shortstop. He spent more time on the bench than he did on the diamond, it was said. “He can speak seven languages but he can’t hit in any of them,” a teammate complained of Berg, who, despite being a Princeton graduate and holding a law degree from Columbia University, led an outwardly unremarkable, even mysterious, life. If not for his secret exploits as a military spy during World War II, in fact, Moe Berg might not be remembered at all today. Thanks to his work for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS, the progenitor of today’s CIA), Berg will go down in history. Principal shooting began in February 2017 on a feature film about the life of Moe Berg, whose wartime activities, though not unknown to historians, have gone largely unrecognized by the general public. The film, titled The Catcher Was a Spy, focuses on Berg’s mission to track down the famous German physicist Werner Heisenberg in Europe, for purposes of assessing the Nazis’ nuclear capabilities. Some say he was ordered to assassinate Heisenberg, if necessary, to impede the Germans’ atom bomb program. A number of newspaper and magazine articles have been written about Berg’s adventures as a spy (including one by the CIA), not to mention the 1994 book on which the film is based, The Catcher Was a Spy: The Mysterious Life of Moe Berg by Nicholas Dawidoff. To the extent most people are aware of Berg’s name at all these days, however, the more familiar source is probably this anonymous, unabashedly hyperbolic viral article circulating via social media since 2013: Speaking fifteen languages – including Japanese – Moe Berg had two loves: baseball and spying. In Tokyo, garbed in a kimono, Berg took flowers to the daughter of an American diplomat being treated in St. Luke’s Hospital — the tallest building in the Japanese capital. He never delivered the flowers. The ball-player ascended to the hospital roof and photographed the harbor, military installations, railway yards, etc. Eight years later, Colonel Jimmy Doolittle carefully studied Berg’s photos in planning his spectacular raid, later characterized as “Thirty Seconds over Tokyo.” Berg’s father, Bernard Berg, a pharmacist in Newark, New Jersey, taught his son Hebrew and Yiddish. Moe, against his wishes, began playing baseball on the street at age four. His father disapproved and never once watched his son play. In Barringer High School, Moe learned Latin, Greek and French. He graduated magna cum laude from Princeton, having added Spanish, Italian, German and Sanskrit to his linguistic quiver. During further studies at the Sorbonne in Paris, and Columbia Law School, he picked up Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Indian, Arabic, Portuguese and Hungarian, plus some regional dialects. During World War II, he parachuted into Yugoslavia to assess the value to the war effort of the two groups of partisans there. He reported back that Marshall Tito’s forces were widely supported by the people and Winston Churchill ordered all-out support for the Yugoslav underground fighter, rather than Mihajlovic’s Serbians. The parachute jump at age 41 undoubtedly was a challenge. But there was more to come in that same year…. [Read full article] The text, which proceeds to recount Berg’s trip to Zurich to find (and possibly kill) Heisenberg, appears to have been drawn from published sources (a 1992 Chicago Tribune article by Ron Grossman titled “Berg — Moe Berg”, for one), but Nicholas Dawidoff’s more thorough research calls some of its more outlandish claims into question. Berg had a natural facility for languages and word origins, for example, but he wasn’t fluent in any foreign language, a New York Times review of Dawifdoff’s book notes (certainly not Sanskrit!). Nor is it known for certain that a critical part of Berg’s mission in Switzerland was to assassinate Heisenberg: As for his spying exploits: Mr. Dawidoff writes that Berg was never ordered to photograph Tokyo; the notion was purely Berg’s invention. Nor were his pictures ever consulted for Doolittle’s raid. And while Berg may well have been assigned to assassinate Heisenberg, Mr. Dawidoff writes that “the whole situation was charged with improbability.” As he concludes: “Only a large dose of O.S.S. wishful thinking finds Heisenberg, with his bomb nearly built, telling a lecture hall full of foreigners about it.” Berg adored being a wartime spy, it seems, and did not do well when he returned to the United States after the war came to an end. Despite accepting occasional work for the CIA, Berg found himself penniless, rootless, and aimless in later years, Dawidoff notes. He lived with his older sister, Ethel, until he died in 1972 at the age of 70. He was cremated and his ashes interred in his parents’ New Jersey cemetery plot, but the urn was exhumed by his sister and moved to an unknown location in Israel.
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18158
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A little-known unit of the Department of Justice, the Community Relations Service, was deployed to Sanford, FL, following the Trayvon Martin shooting to help organize and manage rallies and protests against George Zimmerman.
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"Armed with public documents, Judicial Watch said the Department of Justice sent the Community Relations Service to Sanford in the wake of Martin’s death ""to help organize and manage rallies and protests against George Zimmerman."" Judicial Watch’s statement contends an element of truth: Justice Department employees were sent to Sanford, in part to deal with community uprising, including protests. But they were sent with the idea of keeping the situation peaceful and calm, not to instigate or condone protests or violence. That’s a critical distinction being ignored in this particular claim."
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false
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Criminal Justice, Florida, Judicial Watch,
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"To the right-leaning crowd, it’s the latest blight against the Obama administration. Citing a public records haul, Judicial Watch says the Justice Department’s ""Community Relations Service"" responded to escalating racial tension in Sanford, Fla., following Trayvon Martin’s shooting death by helping ""organize and manage rallies and protests against George Zimmerman,"" his shooter. Sanford police did not arrest Zimmerman because he said he was acting in self defense, churning outrage among the African-American community and national civil rights leaders. But two months later, a special prosecutor appointed by Gov. Rick Scott announced second-degree murder charges against Zimmerman. His trial on those charges was this week, and a verdict is expected soon. Amid the trial, Judicial Watch released the results of federal and state public-information requests it received regarding CRS involvement in Sanford. CRS workers applied for various reimbursements for working in Sanford from March 25-April 12, 2012, Judicial Watch announced July 10, 2013. The group said it obtained the information from a Freedom of Information Act request filed around that time. In a separate ""investigative bulletin"" post touting the findings, the group went further, saying the ""group actively worked to foment unrest, spending thousands of taxpayer dollars on travel and hotel rooms to train protesters throughout Florida."" ""These documents detail the extraordinary intervention by the Justice Department in the pressure campaign leading to the prosecution of George Zimmerman,"" president Tom Fitton states in a news release. ""My guess is that most Americans would rightly object to taxpayers paying government employees to help organize racially-charged demonstrations."" The news sparked outrage among conservative sites, including the Heritage Foundation and The Daily Caller, and attracted mainstream attention at CNN. The Rush Limbaugh Show went with the headline ""Obama Regime Organized Trayvon Protests."" We wanted to take a closer look. Did the Justice Department team really organize rallies against Zimmerman? The Community Relations Service bills itself as the Justice Department’s ""peacemaker,"" established in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and intended to resolve local conflicts grounded in race. The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act in 2009 broadened the agency’s charge to include unrest dealing with sexual orientation, religious bigotry or disability. CRS requested a $12 million budget for 61 positions for the 2012-13 fiscal year. Responding to hate crimes and police-community relations typically dominate the agency’s work, according to annual reports. After the Sept. 11 attacks, for example, CRS employees responded to attacks against Muslim and Arab-American communities. Some of the ways the unit works to calm potential riots is by sending its employees to help officials or volunteers manage tense situations when police use force against citizens or when there are major demonstrations or school disruptions, according to the agency’s website. Sometimes they draw up mediation agreements to help parties move forward. News accounts portray CRS employees responding to trouble as inconspicuous, secretive bystanders. They’re not part of the chaos, but quietly monitoring it (usually in navy blue windbreakers, dark sunglasses and caps embroidered with the DOJ logo, according to the Orlando Sentinel). Judicial Watch includes links to travel vouchers it received as part of its FOIA request to build the case that the DOJ team helped organize anti-Zimmerman rallies. The vouchers do not include much information beyond travel and lodging expenses, the date and location of the trip, and a short description of the purpose. The employee’s name is among redacted information. In an interview, Fitton said the voucher costs seem reasonable, but his group still objects to public funds being used to deploy the CRS to Sanford in connection with the protests. Here’s a sampling: ""On March 25-27, 2012, CRS deployed to Sanford, FL to work marches, demonstrations and rallies related to the shooting and death of an African American teen by a neighborhood watch captain."" Amount paid to voucher: $674.14. A similar itinerary for March 30-April 1, 2012, says, ""CRS was in Sanford, FL to provide technical assistance to the City of Sanford, event organizers, and law enforcement agencies for the march and rally on March 31."" Voucher cost: $751.60. CRS went to Altamonte Springs on March 30-April 1, 2012, ""to provide interregional support for protest deployment in Florida."" Total voucher: $751.60. ""On April 3-12, 2012, CRS was in Sanford, FL to provide technical assistance, conciliation, and onsite mediation during demonstrations planned in Sanford."" Total voucher: $1,307.40. The CRS was contacted by a senior project manager for the city of Sanford as community dissent reared up, according to news reports. A key player in the Sanford controversy is Thomas Battles, the CRS southeastern regional director who has acted as a neutral party in dicey racial issues for three decades, including the Elián González custody case. He does not talk to the media, per CRS policy, but his work has not gone unnoticed. The mayor of Sanford called him ""a voice of reason"" in the tumultuous weeks following Martin’s death, according to a Miami Herald profile of Battles. Battles did not organize protests, as Judicial Watch claims. His team did meet with organizers and city officials to make sure protests happened peacefully, news stories show, and he helped the city draft a nine-point plan aiming to foster better communications between police and residents. As Judicial Watch points this out, Florida newspapers report he also secured police protection for a group of students who marched 40 miles from Daytona to Sanford over three days. The student group staged a sit-in in front of the Sanford police department’s doors, causing it to shut down for the day. Fitton said helping them get there was inappropriate. Battles also organized a league of local pastors, known as Sanford Pastors Connecting, to help the community move on regardless of the verdict in Zimmerman’s case. Fitton said he remains convinced the Department of Justice unit went too far in siding with the Zimmerman protesters. He pointed to a local pastor’s comments in the Orlando Sentinel about the peacekeepers, saying, ""They were there for us,"" and ""We felt protected."" But the point of the program was to take steps to avoid exacerbated confrontation that could have cost the taxpayer even more money in the long run, said Robin Davis, director of the University of Florida’s Institute for Dispute Resolution. ""I don’t think there’s any cause and effect between this mediation and the prosecution going forth,"" she said. Our ruling Armed with public documents, Judicial Watch said the Department of Justice sent the Community Relations Service to Sanford in the wake of Martin’s death ""to help organize and manage rallies and protests against George Zimmerman."" Judicial Watch’s statement contends an element of truth: Justice Department employees were sent to Sanford, in part to deal with community uprising, including protests. But they were sent with the idea of keeping the situation peaceful and calm, not to instigate or condone protests or violence. That’s a critical distinction being ignored in this particular claim. CORRECTION: An earlier version of this fact-check wrongly attributed the misspelling of ""foment"" to Judicial Watch. That was our mistake, not theirs."
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9591
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Allergy sufferers find relief in immunotherapy toothpaste
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This story touts a new product, a toothpaste laced with extracts of allergens, as an alternative to existing allergy treatments using injections or drops. It discusses a tiny clinical trial comparing the toothpaste to drops in a minuscule number of volunteers. The only “results” it offers are the claims of the inventor and anecdotes from one participant. It omits the fact that the main researcher has a financial stake in the company supporting the trial. Like a long line of previous stories we’ve reviewed from Fox News, this story is supposed to be a piece of journalism but it reads like a paid advertisement. Millions of people suffer miserably from allergies to pollen, pet danders and a myriad of other allergens. If a treatment for these irritations was a simple as brushing one’s teeth daily, the public would rejoice. But there is nothing in this story that supports such hopes, except comments from two people, one of which stands to get a financial windfall should the claims be proven. Such stories are unfair to the public in that they are premature at best, flat-out wrong at the worst. They also lead people to invest money and false hope in treatments that could be a waste of time.
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false
|
single source stories,sponsored content
|
The story earns a Satisfactory rating because it says that the toothpaste mentioned in the story costs $400 every three months (or $1,600 per year), and that it isn’t covered by health insurance. But we would have liked it better had the writer offered comparative costs for a year’s worth of the current allergy treatment of choice. There is no quantification of benefits in this story, period. It states that both groups in the trial “reported a significant decrease in their symptoms,” but offered no numbers to back that up. Nor do we know exactly what “symptoms” they are referring to that supposedly decreased. Where these the itchy, watery eyes and sneezing or where they more subtle symptoms? The only other “results” are basically a testimonial from one participant, which has little or no value to readers. There is no mention of potential harms or the safety of the immunotherapy toothpaste in this story. Does the product carry the risk of systemic reactions that one might see with allergy shots? Does the toothpaste make you drowsy like some antihistamines? There is no statement that the product is FDA-approved, which might help readers gauge its merits. All we are given is the praise of one of the trial’s participants and a comment from the product’s inventor. Again, this Fox News story offers nothing for readers to weigh except one person’s anecdotal experience. Moreover, the scant description of the clinical trial it mentions points out that only a dozen people took part in the study and only half of those used the toothpaste, hardly enough to warrant the story’s claims that the new toothpaste offers “the same benefits as an allergy shot or drops.” This story is built upon the major discomfort that allergy sufferers face and fails to offer any substantive research data backing up its claims. It talks about “millions” of sufferers, but doesn’t quantify the total with any precision. It also presents a heart-tugging anecdote of a woman faced with the prospect of abandoning her two cats because of insufferable symptoms. We think the story goes too far both in its portrayal of the condition and the benefits of the potential toothpaste remedy. There are no independent sources used in this story, just comments from one study participant and the principal investigator. There is no mention of conflicts although a quick web search reveals that the quoted researcher is also “co-founder and chief medical officer” of the company funding the research. It also shows that he has an “equity ownership” in the company, a clear vested interest and potential conflict. The story mentions that normal treatments incorporate shots or drops of allergen extracts as a way of sensitizing patients.It also mentions medications. We’ll award a minimal Satisfactory on that basis, but we’d note that it’s not clear how long the participants used the toothpaste before they started to see a decrease in their symptoms. Usually allergy medication works anywhere from 30 minutes to a few hours to a few days. We saw no comparison on this factor between the toothpaste and regular allergy medication. The story mentions the product price tag, the fact that it’s not covered by insurance, and includes a link to the company website that can link readers to a prescribing doctor. While the promotional aspect of this information in a news story is somewhat troubling, it does satisfy the criterion. The idea that a toothpaste containing material that might alleviate allergy symptoms seems novel enough to warrant a news story. But what specifically are the advantages of the toothpaste over other approaches such as shots or drops? This story isn’t explicit about what’s new or better. A CBS story published back in 2014, by contrast, quoted a researcher on the toothpaste’s specific novelty appeal. Talking about the drops, he said, “People forget to do it and also it’s difficult for small children to keep a liquid under their tongue for two minutes.” There is no indication that this story relied on a news release. However, the researcher’s institution did produce a news release in 2014 that in some respects mirrors the Fox News story, relying on the anecdotes of one patient and comments from the inventor.
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5563
|
1 confirmed bacterial meningitis death in North Carolina.
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Authorities in a North Carolina county have confirmed that a recent death was caused by bacterial meningitis.
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true
|
Health, North Carolina, Meningitis
|
News outlets report the Macon County Public Health Department announced Wednesday that a second death within the past three weeks is also suspected to be caused by the disease. That death is still under investigation. No further details were provided, with the department citing privacy laws. County officials say preventative antibiotics are being given to those who came in close contact with people infected with the Neisseria meningitidis bacteria. They’re working with the state Division of Public Health to help contain the outbreak. Officials say anyone experiencing symptoms of bacterial meningitis, which include sudden fever, severed headache, a stiff neck and stomach pain, should go to the emergency room. Macon County is in western North Carolina.
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24482
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"Forty-five percent of doctors ""say they'll quit"" if health care reform passes."
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Beck says 45 percent of physicians would quit if health reform passes
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false
|
National, Health Care, Pundits, Glenn Beck,
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"Physicians are important players in the health care debate. They've been courted by both supporters and opponents of the Democratic reform plan. President Barack Obama held a Rose Garden ceremony with some of them recently. And now opponents of the Democratic health care plan are citing poll results that supposedly show that lots of doctors would be so unhappy with the reforms that they'd quit their jobs. Fox News Channel political commentator Glenn Beck mentioned this on his Oct. 12, 2009, show during a wide-ranging critique of the Democratic plan. He said that the plan could harm doctors financially and make medical students have doubts about pursuing the profession. ""Do you really think that you're going to see an increase in medical students? I don't think so,"" Beck said. ""Especially consider that the percentage of doctors who say they'll quit if this is passed is only 45 percent. No worries. Ha! You'll be able to find a good doctor. Really, you will."" If true, the sudden departure of 45 percent of the nation's doctors would indeed constitute a stinging rejection of the Democratic effort by an influential health care constituency. But that number sounded high to us, so we decided to look into the statistic's origins. It came from a survey of ""practicing physicians"" published in mid September. The survey was sponsored by the newspaper Investor's Business Daily and was done by the firm TechnoMetrica Institute of Policy and Politics, or TIPP. The survey was conducted between Aug. 28, 2009, and Sept. 15, 2009. It was mailed to 25,600 physicians nationwide at addresses purchased from a list broker. We found several problems with the poll and the way Beck described its results: • Beck misstated what the poll asked . Beck said that 45 percent of doctors will quit. But in fact, the poll found that 45 percent of doctors said they will consider quitting. Considering quitting isn't the same thing as quitting, which makes Beck's statement a significant exaggeration. In addition, the specific question asked of respondents was, ""If Congress passes their health care plan, will you ... continue your practice, [or] consider leaving your practice or taking an early retirement?"" This wording leaves open the possibility that respondents are saying they might simply leave their current practice to join another practice, rather than quit. • The poll had a low response rate . According to the statistics published in IBD , 1,376 practicing physicians responded to the poll, out of the 25,600 solicited nationally. That's a 5.4 percent response rate. In one of its articles about the poll, IBD bills this as ""a high rate of return, considering how difficult doctors are to get hold of."" But another survey of doctors released around the same time managed to do better — much better. That other survey was conducted by Salomeh Keyhani and Alex Federman, internists and researchers at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, who published the results in the New England Journal of Medicine . They mailed 5,157 questionnaires and got a response rate that exceeded 43 percent — nearly eight times the IBD survey's rate. In fact, Keyhani and Federman reached almost 50 percent more doctors despite sending out only one-fifth the number of inquiries. (They did not ask doctors if they would consider quitting as the other poll did.) Does a higher response rate matter? In this case, it's hard to know for sure, said Karlyn Bowman, a polling analyst with the conservative American Enterprise Institute. However, she added, ""higher response rates give me more confidence in results,"" a point echoed by other experts we interviewed. • The sponsor was listed prominently on the survey, possibly influencing who responded . The survey was sent out on Investor’s Business Daily letterhead, and the introduction said in part, ""The results of this survey will be on Investor’s Business Daily’s front page and investors.com. A press release will also be prepared. This will give doctors a voice in this key issue."" This type of framing matters because IBD 's editorial page is known for its conservative stance, including opposition to the Democratic health care effort. While it’s safe to assume that not everyone who received the survey knew about IBD 's political leanings, some respondents presumably did — and among those who did, such knowledge could have made a difference in determining who responded. Liberals might have been less likely to respond, while conservatives in tune with the IBD editorials would have been more enthusiastic about responding. In such a small sample, even a modest bias of that sort could skew the results. • The wording of questions may have influenced who responded . In an interview, Mark Blumenthal, who blogs at pollster.com and has written critically of the IBD poll, said the wording of the questions could have skewed the results. He noted that, unlike telephone polls, mail polls enable the recipient to skim the entire list of questions before deciding to answer any of them. With the IBD poll, respondents might have thought some of the questions had a subtext that was critical of the Democratic proposal. One was, ""Do you believe the government can cover 47 million more people and it will cost less money and the quality of care will be better?"" Another was, ""If Congress passes their plan, do you expect fewer students to apply to med schools in the future [or] more students to apply to med schools in the future?"" A third was, ""Under a government plan, do you think drug companies will have incentives to continue developing as many life saving new drugs?"" (Grammatical errors in original; full survey text available here.) ""Collectively, these questions imply that health care reform will mean very bad things for medicine,"" Blumenthal said. ""I'm guessing that a proreform doctor would be inclined to ignore, and not return, a survey if the questions seem leading or biased."" Could the prominence of the IBD name and the question wording have made a difference? The evidence suggests that may be true. In the IBD poll, 65 percent of the doctors who responded said they opposed ""government's proposed health care plan"" while just 33 percent supported it. By contrast, the Keyhani-Federman poll found that 63 percent of doctors surveyed favored giving patients a choice between public and private insurance, as congressional Democrats and President Barack Obama have advocated. Another 10 percent said they favored a single-payer health care system — a solution that is actually to the left of the president. In other words, the results of the two polls are so far apart that they are essentially opposites. The truth may actually lie somewhere in between the two surveys. It's worth noting that the Keyhani-Federman poll received financial support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which favors health care reform. Also, National Public Radio has said that ""Keyhani and Federman belong to ... the National Physicians Alliance. It supports a public option, and Keyhani has spoken publicly about her own support for a public option."" A campaign finance database search found that both researchers donated to the Obama campaign in 2008 — $500 from Keyhani and $300 from Federman. In addition, the initial postcard Keyhani and Federman sent to doctors included the subheading, ""Congress wants to hear from doctors on health care reform"" — advocacy-style language similar to what the IBD poll said. This may have produced some ideological bias in the opposite direction from IBD 's poll. (In an interview, Federman said the reason for choosing the words they did stemmed from ""what the literature shows about what works to get docs to respond to surveys."") Finally, Don Dillman, an expert in mail-based polls and a professor at Washington State University, suggests another factor that could make the IBD poll results on doctors quitting vastly overstated: People don't usually make decisions about changing careers lightly. ""If one is trained to be a physician, then are you going to take on another occupation?"" he asks. This concern is especially relevant for younger physicians, who would likely find few new careers that would earn them enough income to pay off their debts from attending medical school. So, back to Beck's statement. First, he misstated the results of the poll. The survey didn't say 45 percent would quit; it said they would consider quitting, which is considerably different. Moreover, polling experts have raised significant questions about the poll's methodology. Of special concern are the combination of the heavy mention of IBD 's name and questions that experts said appeared to be seeking answers critical of health reform. We'd like to see an independent poll assessing doctors' views of health care reform, but neither the findings from the IBD survey nor those from the Keyhani-Federman study are fully persuasive to us."
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2722
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Indian regulator to test samples of Johnson & Johnson baby powder: media.
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India’s federal drug regulator will on Wednesday seize samples of Johnson & Johnson’s (JNJ.N) baby powder for testing, local media said, following a Reuters report that the company knew for decades that cancer-causing asbestos lurked in the product.
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true
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Health News
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The Times of India quoted an official source as saying that a team of 100 drug inspectors had been assigned to examine different manufacturing facilities, wholesalers and distributors, starting early Wednesday. “Samples of all brands of the powder will be collected and sent for testing,” the unnamed official told the paper. The Mint business daily also quoted an unnamed official as saying that the drug inspectors would visit J&J’s manufacturing operations and draw samples for further investigation. On Tuesday, a spokeswoman for the Central Drugs Standard Control Organization (CDSCO) said the Reuters report was “under consideration” but that it was too early to say if a formal investigation would be launched into the baby powder that is ubiquitous in many Indian homes, a potential market of 1.3 billion people. The CDSCO spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday. An Indian health ministry spokeswoman declined to comment. J&J in India did not have any immediate comment on the reports of sample seizures by Indian authorities. On Tuesday the company said in a statement that the Reuters article, which was published on Friday, “is one-sided, false and inflammatory”. “Johnson & Johnson’s baby powder is safe and asbestos free,” it added. “Studies of more than 100,000 men and women show that talc does not cause cancer or asbestos-related disease. Thousands of independent tests by regulators and the world’s leading labs prove our baby powder has never contained asbestos,” the company said. A Reuters examination of many company memos, internal reports and other confidential documents, as well as deposition and trial testimony, showed that from at least 1971 to the early 2000s, the company’s raw talc and finished powders sometimes tested positive for small amounts of asbestos, and that company executives, mine managers, scientists, doctors and lawyers fretted over the problem and how to address it while failing to disclose it to regulators or the public. The documents also depicted successful efforts to influence U.S. regulators’ plans to limit asbestos in cosmetic talc products and scientific research on the health effects of talc. J&J said on Monday it planned to buy back up to $5 billion of its stock, after the Reuters report wiped about $40 billion from its market value.
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1879
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Pre-ski preparations help before hitting the slopes.
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Hitting the slopes can be daunting for an out-of-shape beginner and even for more experienced skiers, but fitness experts say whatever your level of expertise, everyone can benefit from a bit of pre-ski preparation.
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true
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Health News
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A skier takes a jump during sunny winter weather at the Swiss mountain area of Hoch-Ybrig, south of Zurich, February 23, 2011. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann Lisa Wheeler, a New York-based fitness instructor, believes it’s never too late to get in shape to make skiing more enjoyable and safe. But don’t overdo it. “Do some basic strength training for the legs, core and arms,” said Wheeler, fitness program director for DailyBurn, an online workout site. “But if you haven’t done anything, dial it back a little.” Wheeler recommends lunges to strengthen the quadriceps, the long muscles in the front of the thigh. “Lunges are quad-dominant and skiing is very quad dominant because your knees are bent and you’re going downhill,” she said. “And lunges also work the hamstrings and glutes,” she explained, referring to the large muscles that form the buttocks. Wheeler thinks the novice can forgo jumping or hopping lunges and concentrate instead on matrix lunges, basically stepping to and pushing off different directions across the range of motion. “For the last-minute person I recommend taking it easy,” she said. Wheeler said people think of skiing as going in one direction, downhill, and neglect to prepare their hips and core for the considerable demands of the activity. “If you analyze skiing there’s a lot of rotation and lateral movement of the hips,” she said. “I would do some core exercises, such as planks, and rotational movements with the medicine ball,” she said. “Because going down the slopes your body is turning, your hips are turning.” Jessica Matthews of the American Council on Exercises suggests exercises that mimic the activity of skiing, which along with cardiovascular fitness and muscle strength, demands a measure of speed and agility. “I’m a huge fan of cone drills,” she said. “I just picked up a set for the house.” Sold in sporting goods stores, cones are smaller and lighter than traffic cones. Matthews, an exercise physiologist, thinks they are ideal for setting up a circuit to train for the movements of weaving down a mountain. “You can work on developing lower body strength, lateral movements, do cone jumps and practice proper landing,” she said. Squats and lunges build lower body strength but for those challenged by a full squat, Matthews suggests the wall sit, which is essentially placing the back against the wall with knees bent. Ideally, she said, you want to begin a pre-ski routine at least six weeks prior to hitting the slopes. “That’s a good time from physiological standpoint,” she said. Another crucial element to skiing is the ability to react quickly. “Downhill is not straight downhill,” said Matthews. “You have to dodge people. You’ve got to be able to make quick changes, you might have to counter a fall, so it’s important to make sure your hips, legs, shoulders, spine are all ready to go.” Wheeler said.
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23435
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"John Boehner said the jobs of ""teachers and nurses and police officers and firefighters"" are ""'government jobs' that weren't worth saving."
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Obama says Boehner doesn't think jobs for teachers, police, firefighters are worth saving
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false
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National, Economy, Education, States, Barack Obama,
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"President Barack Obama defended his economic policies in a campaign-style speech in Milwaukee on Labor Day, drawing a sharp contrast with Republicans in Congress. ""When it comes to just about everything we've done to strengthen our middle class, to rebuild our economy, almost every Republican in Congress says no,"" Obama said. ""Even on things we usually agree on, they say no. If I said the sky was blue, they say no. If I said fish live in the sea, they'd say no."" Obama mentioned specific legislation and singled out Republican House leader John Boehner of Ohio for criticism. ""When we passed a bill earlier this summer to help states save jobs -- the jobs of hundreds of thousands of teachers and nurses and police officers and firefighters that were about to be laid off -- they said no. And the Republican who thinks he's going to take over as speaker... when he was asked about this, he dismissed those jobs as 'government jobs' that weren't worth saving. That's what he said, I'm quoting -- 'government jobs.'"" We wanted to check Boehner's comments to see if Obama was making an accurate claim. Obama signed the bill into law on Aug. 10. It sends $26.1 billion to states facing budget shortfalls, providing $10 billion for salaries and compensation for teachers and another $16.1 million to help states pay for Medicaid, the long-standing government insurance program for the poor and disabled. Medicaid is a major part of state budgets, and Democrats says that this funding will help states avoid cuts to other parts of their budgets that pay for public employees like ""nurses and police officers and firefighters."" We want to be clear that the law only directly funds teachers. The other job categories are potential secondary effects and likely vary by state. We checked with the White House about what Boehner said about those jobs, and they pointed us to remarks he made in a major speech on the economy in Cleveland on Aug. 24, 2010. Boehner criticized the Obama administration's economic policies both broadly and in several specifics. One of the news highlights from the speech was Boehner's advice that Obama fire his top economic advisers, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and National Economic Council director Larry Summers. But Boehner also singled out the state aid package for brief criticism. Businesses, he said, are not creating jobs because of uncertainty about what the federal government will do, something he said he told Obama in a recent meeting. ""Not long after we spoke, he signed a $26 billion 'stimulus' spending bill that funnels money to state governments in order to protect government jobs. And even worse, the bill is funded by a new tax hike that makes it more expensive to create jobs in the United States and less expensive to create jobs overseas. Listen, this cannot continue,"" Boehner said. (The quotes around ""stimulus"" are from the text Boehner's office posted online.) So, Boehner did call the jobs the bill aimed to save ""government jobs."" To be clear, public school teachers are government employees. But did Boehner say they ""weren't worth saving""? The quote above is the only time Boehner specifically mentions that law in the speech, but he repeatedly condemns government spending and says that real job creation must come from the private sector. He does not mention the professions of teachers, nurses, police or firefighters, and he never said that ""government jobs"" weren't worth saving. We asked Boehner spokesman Michael Steel about Obama's charge. He said that Boehner ""did not say that government jobs, 'weren't worth saving.' The president's statement is inaccurate."" (Two days after the Labor Day speech, Obama repeated the remarks in a speech in Cleveland but softened them slightly. This time Obama said that Boehner ""dismissed these jobs – teaching our kids, patrolling our streets, rushing into burning buildings – as quote 'government jobs – jobs that I guess he thought just weren't worth saving."") Obama's Labor Day statement was accurate in that Boehner did refer did refer to teachers' jobs as government jobs. But the Republican leader did not say government jobs weren't worth saving. He merely said the stimulus was misguided because it put too much emphasis on government spending."
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3075
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Democrats propose spending trillions fighting climate change.
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Five Democratic presidential candidates in the span of 24 hours have released sweeping plans to address climate change, ahead of a series of town halls devoted to the issue.
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true
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Cory Booker, Climate, Climate change, General News, Politics, Election 2020, Elizabeth Warren, Science, Business, Pete Buttigieg, Kamala Harris
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On Wednesday, California Sen. Kamala Harris and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg each unveiled their climate plans. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and former Obama cabinet member Julián Castro each laid out theirs on Tuesday. The flurry of plans comes ahead of a CNN town hall event on global warming, which 10 Democrats seeking the White House plan to attend. The forums come after liberals had demanded that the Democratic Party focus at least one debate on climate change, but a climate debate resolution was defeated at the Democratic National Committee’s summer meeting last month. Many Democrats see climate change as an urgent crisis. The issue is so urgent among Democratic voters that Washington Gov. Jay Inslee made action to limit the worst extremes of climate change the core of his presidential bid. But Inslee dropped out of the presidential race in August after failing to earn a spot in the September primary debate. Inslee would not have been invited to Wednesday’s climate change forum, either, having fallen short of the polling criteria. Since he abandoned his presidential bid, a number of candidates including Harris and Warren have embraced parts of the agenda he championed. Harris is embracing a “climate pollution fee,” designed to drive down pollution while increasing government revenue. Her $10 trillion plan includes proposals supported by her Democratic rivals. She calls on the United States to achieve a clean economy by 2045 and to reach the goal of 100% carbon-neutral electricity by 2030. She says she will end fossil fuel production on public lands and end federal subsidies for fossil fuels. Harris also calls for the passage of the Climate Equity Act, a bill she introduced with New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, which would require Congress to measure how potential environmental legislation would impact poorer communities. Warren’s plan, which she released on Tuesday night, embraces the 10-year clean energy plan that Inslee ran on. Warren said Inslee’s ideas “should remain at the center of the agenda,” and she met with him in Seattle when she visited Washington state for a rally before Labor Day, according to two people familiar with the meeting who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a private meeting. She says she will increase her planned spending on research and investment to cut carbon emissions to $3 trillion. She embraces tough deadlines for sharply cutting or eliminating the use of fossil fuels by the U.S. electrical grid, highways and air transit systems and by cities and towns. That includes making sure that new cars, buses and many trucks run on clean energy — instead of gasoline or diesel — by 2030 and that all the country’s electricity comes from solar, wind and other renewable, carbon-free sources by 2035. Buttigieg’s $1.1 trillion climate change plan has a goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050 and creating more than 3 million clean infrastructure jobs in the next decade. Like other Democrats, Buttigieg would renew the country’s commitment to the Paris climate agreement. He is calling for ending subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and closing public lands to new fossil leases. He also is calling for enacting an economy-wide price on carbon, set to automatically increase each year, as well as more investment in carbon capture techniques. Booker’s $3 trillion plan calls for getting the U.S. economy to carbon neutral no later than 2045. He also is calling for the creation of a “United States Environmental Justice Fund,” which, among its areas of focus, would replace all home, school and day care drinking water lines by the end of his second term. Castro’s $10 trillion plan aims to have all electricity in the United States be clean and renewable by 2035. He wants to achieve net-zero emissions by 2045 and at least a 50% reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. And, like Booker, he focuses on environmental racism, in which people of color are disproportionately affected by environmental hazards. Among Democrats seeking the presidency, there is little disagreement that climate change is a building disaster. Wednesday’s town halls will give candidates an opportunity to show the distinctions between their plans as the Democratic party’s base increasingly demands aggressive action. Nationally, 72% of Democratic midterm voters said they were very concerned about the effects of climate change, and 20% were somewhat concerned. That’s according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 115,000 midterm voters nationwide. Last month, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders released his $16 trillion plan to fight global warming, the costliest among the Democratic field. His plan, which he is calling The Green New Deal, declares climate change a national emergency, calls for the United States to eliminate fossil fuel use by 2050 and commits $200 billion to help poorer nations reckon with climate change. Former Vice President Joe Biden has proposed $1.7 trillion in spending over 10 years, on clean energy and other initiatives with the goal of eliminating the country’s net carbon emissions by 2050. Some liberals have criticized Biden for not being aggressive enough in confronting a growing crisis. The relatively minor differences among Democrats on climate change come in sharp contrast to President Donald Trump, who has dismissed and mocked the science of climate change and has reversed course on U.S. climate policy. Trump made pulling the country out of the Paris climate accord one of his administration’s first priorities, and his wholehearted support of the petroleum and coal industries has been one of the enduring themes of his presidency. ___ Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price in Las Vegas contributed to this report.
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37562
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"Facebook post accurately provides a firsthand ""cry from Italy,"" where a user described dire conditions in Bergamo on March 10 2020."
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‘A Cry from Italy’: ‘Heart of Coronavirus’ Outbreak Facebook Post
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unproven
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Fact Checks, Viral Content
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"On March 10 2020, screenshots of a “cry from Italy” attributed to a doctor in Bergamo appeared on several platforms; one iteration on Imgur was viewed more than 100,000 times in just half a day as people searched for reliable information about the spread of a novel coronavirus strain known as COVID-19:Cry from ItalyText in the screenshots matched a similar thread circulating on Twitter. The thread, shared by @ZhouLabUCR in the early hours of March 11 2020, was broken up into 13 tweets:1/n A letter from Italy, please share: ""I am writing to you from Bergamo, Italy, at the heart of the coronavirus crisis. The news media in the US has not captured the severity of what is happening here. I am writing this post because each of you, today,@JoyceLauNews @DrEricDing— Zhou Lab (@ZhouLabUCR) March 11, 2020Both posts were verbatim reproductions of a widely-viewed and broadly-shared Facebook post published on March 10 2020:That post was shared by Cristina Higgins. Higgins’ profile did not display information about whether she lived in the United States or Italy, nor did it provide any contextual information about her line of work.Higgins’ viral post was shared as an open letter. However, it was further unclear if Higgins herself wrote it or copied it from a different source. It began with a warning “from Bergamo” to Americans and other Europeans:I am writing to you from Bergamo, Italy, at the heart of the coronavirus crisis. The news media in the US has not captured the severity of what is happening here. I am writing this post because each of you, today, not the government, not the school district, not the mayor, each individual citizen has the chance, today to take actions that will deter the Italian situation from becoming your own country’s reality. The only way to stop this virus is to limit contagion. And the only way to limit contagion is for millions of people to change their behavior today.If you are in Europe or the US you are weeks away from where we are today in Italy.Higgins’ post continued by addressing claims COVID-19 was “just a flu” or only affected the elderly or immunocompromised. From there, the post maintained that the novel coronavirus had, in the author’s words, “brought Italy to its knees,” and described the reaction to a national quarantine in the country:I can hear you now. “It’s just a flu. It only affects old people with preconditions”There are 2 reasons why Coronavirus has brought Italy to it’s knees. First it is a flu is devastating when people get really sick they need weeks of ICU – and, second, because of how fast and effectively it spreads. There is 2 week incubation period and many who have it never show symptoms.When Prime Minister Conte announced last night that the entire country, 60 million people, would go on lock down, the line that struck me most was “there is no more time.” Because to be clear, this national lock down, is a hail mary. What he means is that if the numbers of contagion do not start to go down, the system, Italy, will collapse.Higgins’ post claimed that intensive care units were “at capacity” or “more than capacity” in the Lombardy region, further constrained by the rate of infection among doctors and nurses. After that, the post indicated that “younger patients — 40, 45, 18” were being hospitalized:Why? Today the ICUs in Lombardy are at capacity – more than capacity. They have begun to put ICU units in the hallways. If the numbers do not go down, the growth rate of contagion tells us that there will be thousands of people who in a matter of a week? two weeks? who will need care. What will happen when there are 100, or a 1000 people who need the hospital and only a few ICU places left?On [March 9 2020] a doctor wrote in the paper that they have begun to have to decide who lives and who dies when the patients show up in the emergency room, like what is done in war. This will only get worse.There are a finite number of drs, nurses, medical staff and they are getting the virus. They have also been working non-stop, non-stop for days and days. What happens when the drs, nurses and medical staff are simply not able to care for the patients, when they are not there?And finally for those who say that this is just something that happens to old people, starting yesterday the hospitals are reporting that younger and younger patients – 40, 45, 18, are coming in for treatment.Finally, the post urged readers in the rest of Europe and in the United States — and, presumably, beyond — to take measures to prevent being as hard hit as Italy, advising readers to “stay home” if they had “any fever,” and to pressure schools to close:You have a chance to make a difference and stop the spread in your country. Push for the entire office to work at home today, cancel birthday parties, and other gatherings, stay home as much as you can. If you have a fever, any fever, stay home. Push for school closures, now. Anything you can do to stop the spread, because it is spreading in your communities – there is a two week incubation period – and if you do these things now you can buy your medical system time.And for those who say it is not possible to close the schools, and do all these other things, locking down Italy was beyond anyone’s imagination a week ago.Soon you will not have a choice, so do what you can now.Please share.That excerpt claimed that “there is a two week incubation period” for COVID-19 or novel coronavirus; research published on March 10 2020 in the Annals of Internal Medicine cited a similar estimated incubation period for the strain, and noted that information coming out remained in flux:The median incubation period was estimated to be 5.1 days (95% CI, 4.5 to 5.8 days), and 97.5% of those who develop symptoms will do so within 11.5 days (CI, 8.2 to 15.6 days) of infection. These estimates imply that, under conservative assumptions, 101 out of every 10 000 cases (99th percentile, 482) will develop symptoms after 14 days of active monitoring or quarantine … Publicly reported cases may overrepresent severe cases, the incubation period for which may differ from that of mild cases.To recap, Cristina Higgins post circulated in at least three places — on Facebook via the original post, on Imgur in screenshots, and transcribed by a user on Twitter. All three posts represented the same original missive of unknown origin. Higgins may have authored the account herself, or it may have been copied from another source. As such, attribution of the item was unclear. Finally, the post was largely anecdotal from the perspective of its unidentified author, and its conclusions did not necessarily reflect information or recommendations from a doctor or public health officials in Bergamo, Italy or elsewhere."
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10436
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Treatment may quiet noisy mind
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Exxon Mobil Corp won a major victory in a closely-watched lawsuit on Tuesday when a judge ruled that the company did not defraud investors out of up to $1.6 billion by hiding the true cost of climate change regulation.
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false
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The ruling by Justice Barry Ostrager in Manhattan Supreme Court followed a trial featuring testimony from investors, experts and former Exxon Chief Executive Officer Rex Tillerson. The judge found that the New York State Attorney General’s case failed to produce evidence that investors were misled. It was the first of several climate change lawsuits against major oil companies to go to trial. Attorney General Letitia James said in a statement that her office “will continue to fight to ensure companies are held responsible for actions that undermine and jeopardize the financial health and safety of Americans.” She did not say whether she would appeal. Exxon said that the ruling affirmed the company’s position that the investigation was “baseless.” “We provided our investors with accurate information on the risks of climate change,” spokesman Casey Norton said in a statement. The state’s 2018 lawsuit said Exxon Mobil caused investors to lose up to $1.6 billion by falsely telling them it had properly evaluated the impact of future climate regulations on its business. It said Exxon told investors it was projecting the impact of future regulations by using a “proxy cost” of up to $80 per ton of carbon emissions in wealthy countries by 2040, but internally used figures as low as $40 per ton or none at all. Exxon Mobil countered that the proxy cost and the internal greenhouse gas costs were distinct and used for different purposes. Ostrager’s decision said the evidence supported the company’s argument that the two types of projected costs were “different metrics.” “What the evidence at trial revealed is that Exxon Mobil executives and employees were uniformly committed to rigorously discharging their duties in the most comprehensive and meticulous manner possible,” the judge wrote. In October, as the New York trial was getting underway, Massachusetts announced its own lawsuit against Exxon, including allegations about proxy costs similar to those Ostrager rejected. Unlike New York’s lawsuit, Massachusetts accuses Exxon of misleading consumers, not just investors. Cities and counties across the United States have also sued Exxon and other oil companies seeking funds to pay for seawalls and other infrastructure to guard against rising sea levels caused by climate change. The companies have denied liability.
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11425
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Prevention: Breast-Feeding Protects Against Arthritis
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"This 212-word news brief covers a lot of bases, but not enough. It quickly summarizes a new population-based, case-control study from Sweden which suggests that breast-feeding may be protective against rheumatoid arthritis. Unfortunately the news story reduces the study’s conclusion to a fact–breast feeding ""reduces the risk of rheumatoid arthritis""–when, in fact, the researchers themselves say more research is needed to confirm their results. The story provides important hints about both the advantages and disadvantages of the study’s design—which are critical to understanding the limitations of the study’s conclusions. It mentions the study’s ""large community-based approach,"" but that ""it is difficult to separate the effect of breast-feeding from childbirth itself"". Still, as the researchers themselves acknowledge, it is also possible that the study is too small to be conclusive or that they simply overlooked some other risk factor(s) that could account for the reduction in RA. Moreover, the news story fails to ask whether the reduction in RA risk is really meaningful. How many lives are we talking about? It would appear that the number protected by breast-feeding is extremely small—reductions of mere hundredths of one percent—almost surely too small to accurately measure in a study of this type, or any other (see Quantification of Benefits…"" below). If the news story had sought out an independent source, it might have found someone to offer a different perspective on the lead author’s belief that even a month or two of breast–feeding ""makes a difference."""
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mixture
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Not mentioned but also not terribly important. The news brief says women who breast-feed reduce their risk of rheumatoid arthritis by 25% to 50%. But ideally, readers would also learn the absolute numbers on which these estimates of relative benefits are based. However, the published study also failed to report the reduction in absolute numbers. What’s a reporter to do? Run the numbers on a calculator? Ask the researchers for more information? If the estimated prevalence of RA is 72/100,000, a 25% reduction might be somewhere in the neighborhood of 18/1000,000 or about two-hundredths of one percent (0.02%), and a 50% reduction might be an absolute reduction of 0.04%–a small number any way you look at it. At the least, readers should be made aware that the true meaning of these numbers is uncertain.
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2386
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Sisterhood shown to be powerful incentive at women's gyms.
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Women-only gyms, once seen as the exercise alternative for out of shape women of a certain age, are actively shedding that reputation, fitness experts say.
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true
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Health News
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Young, professional women are discovering that female-only fitness zones can be what a morning of golf or shooting the hoops is to their male counterparts: a chance to network, negotiate and bond while working out. “Men have been combining fitness and a social aspect for ages, doing business and creating relationships at the same time,” said Leanne Shear, trainer and founder of Uplift Studios, a boutique women-only venue in Manhattan. “Women have not, to their detriment.” Shear said her studio, which opened in 2012, attracts professional women in their 20’s, 30’s and 40’s, and aims to provide a social atmosphere where they can come together as a community. As for the workouts, Shear believes that while women are certainly capable of doing everything that men do, many find the gym equipment in weight rooms bulky, off-putting and ill-suited to them. Equipment in Shear’s studio includes an elliptical machine with a smaller stride better suited to women, and instead of huge plates and bars, there are lots of dumbbells, balls, balancing equipment and body weight exercises. A 2014 report by International Health, Racquet & Sportsclub Association (IHRSA) showed that while health club members are equally likely to be male or female, what they do when they visit the club differs considerably. Women are more likely to gravitate to group exercise classes, Pilates, stretching, yoga, boot camps, and cardiovascular exercise machines, while men are drawn to free weights, resistance machines and sports such as racquetball and squash. Curves International, Inc., the large chain of fitness centers for women, is known for its 30-minute circuit of cardio, strength and stretching training. Hannah Karass, vice president of programs and science for Curves, said the circuit is in a circle for a reason. “The members face each other, help each other,” she explained. Karass said Curves has initiated a rigorous high intensity interval training workout designed by trainer Jillian Michaels, of the TV reality show “The Biggest Loser,” to attract younger women. Karass, 50, believes women’s gyms are simply less intimidating than co-ed clubs. “I think of myself in a big co-ed gym,” she said. “If I work with a 10-pound (4.5 kg) dumbbell and I see men lifting 25, there is an emotional reaction.” Dr. Barbara Bushman, of the American College of Sports Medicine, said both sexes require a balanced exercise program of aerobic activity, resistance training, and flexibility and, for older adults, balance and agility. “To me the women-only gym fits into the enjoyment aspect,” she said. “If someone feels more comfortable in that environment and that helps them to stick with their program better, it’s a great thing.” She added that women tend to lag behind men in resistance training, which is important for bone health. Being properly fitted on standard machines can also be difficult for smaller women. “At university I was only female in weight room,” said Bushman, whose 5ft 10-inch height mitigated the sizing issue. “It wasn’t an environment that welcomed women.” Shear sees women-only venues as a place where women are free to work their hardest without feeling self-conscious or trying to impress the opposite sex. “The workouts are just as hard and intense as any man’s,” she said.
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6766
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Florida Gov. Scott signs bills mandating backup power.
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Gov. Rick Scott signed legislation Monday requiring backup power sources in Florida nursing homes and assisted living facilities, months after the deaths of several residents from a sweltering nursing home that lost power in a hurricane.
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true
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Nursing homes, Health, Legislation, Hurricane Irma, Florida, Rick Scott, Assisted living, Hurricanes, U.S. News
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The legislation require the facilities to have a generator capable of keeping nursing homes and assisted living facilities at 81 degrees Fahrenheit (27 degrees Celsius) or lower for at least four days. All of Florida’s 685 nursing homes and 3,089 assisted living facilities must be in compliance by the June 1 start of hurricane season. State agencies can grant an extension until Jan. 1, 2019, for facilities that would face delays in installing equipment or need zoning or other regulatory approval. “As we near hurricane season, families can now know the facilities responsible for caring for their loved ones will have the resources needed to be fully prepared ahead of any potential storms,” Scott said in a statement. Officials from the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration, which oversees nursing homes, and the Department of Elder Affairs, which regulates assisted living facilities, did not have updated numbers on how many facilities were already in compliance. As of January, 108 nursing homes and 138 assisted living facilities had installed the necessary equipment. “Florida faces an annual risk from Mother Nature, and these rules will help keep seniors safe during a possible devastating weather event or ... prolonged power outage,” said Justin Senior, secretary of the Agency for Health Care Administration. The rule was originally issued by Scott, Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration and the Department of Elder Affairs following the deaths at the Hollywood Hills Rehabilitation Center after Hurricane Irma in September. The original rule stated that nursing homes and assisted living facilities had to be in compliance by Nov. 15 or face a fine of $1,000 per day. But a state administrative judge sided last October with nursing homes that had challenged the tight deadlines. In January, state nursing homes agreed to the revised rules. The rules also now take into consideration that assisted living facilities are licensed differently based on number of beds. The original rules mandated 50 square feet (4.6 square meters) per resident needed to be kept cool but it has been lowered to 30 square feet (2.7 square meters) for nursing homes and 20 square feet (1.8 square meters) for assisted living facilities. While nursing homes need 96 hours of fuel on site during a weather emergency, the hours vary for assisted living facilities from 48 hours for facilities with 16 beds or less to 72 hours for those with 17 or more beds. State officials estimate it will cost nearly $430 million for facilities to comply. Legislators though during the recently concluded session agreed to waive sales taxes up to $15,000 for facilities that still haven’t purchased generators or did so after July 1, 2017.
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2000
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With head in the sand, Indonesia struggles to tackle AIDS.
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Financial troubles drove Liana into prostitution almost four years ago, but the 30-year-old ex-accountant said she’d had no idea then that unprotected sex could give her HIV/AIDS, a disease she now has to live with.
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true
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Health News
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An Indonesian activist stands behind an AIDS banner during a rally to mark World AIDS Day in Jakarta November 29, 2006. REUTERS/Dadang Tri Liana, who holds an economics degree, is one of 300,000 Indonesians in the world’s most populous Muslim nation who have fallen victim to widespread ignorance about AIDS, and the government’s inability to campaign effectively against it for fear of being accused by conservatives of promoting promiscuity. Social taboos and strict laws that ban prostitution also work against those most vulnerable to the incurable disease, because police often use condoms — one of the best protection against AIDS — as evidence against sex workers. Although HIV prevalence in Indonesia’s population is low at 0.2 percent, the government and health experts are worried because the number of newly confirmed cases has more than doubled to 4,158 in the five years to 2010. “When I started the job, I did not know anything about HIV/AIDS or that condoms can prevent you from getting infected with the disease”, said Liana, who quit her job and turned to prostitution after her husband died in 2007 because she needed to pay off a mortgage and support their daughter. A few months after she started sex work, Liana heard about HIV and tried getting tested. But was turned away two times by healthcare workers, who often do not understand the disease and are afraid of getting infected themselves. Liana tested positive last year after falling ill and is now on AIDS drugs, which cost her 30,000 Indonesian rupiah ($3.5) a month as they are subsidized. Until today, she doesn’t know how she became infected. Her 4-year-old daughter is uninfected. “Thinking it over, I’m not lacking in education. But how is it that I never heard of this disease nor how to prevent it? Why does the government not spread the information,” said Liana, a graduate of an East Java university who now insists all her clients use condoms. “How can we prevent HIV/AIDS if we can’t use the only protection that we have? There is no cure for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), which is caused by the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), but drugs can help to control the replication of the virus and prolong life. While Liana uses condoms, she says many of her friends do not as they are tempted by offers of more cash from clients who don’t want to practice safe sex. They are also afraid they may be thrown in jail if police find condoms on them. Health Minister Endang Sedyaningsih told Reuters the government faced enormous opposition in the fight against AIDS in this country of 238 million people. “We cannot put ads for condoms openly on television or promote their use, or people will say the Ministry of Health promotes promiscuity,” she said in a recent interview. Islam is the dominant religion in Indonesia and society remains largely conservative. “We have a program for methadone substitution and clean needle exchange (for drug users) but it’s very difficult to expand it as it is seen as legalizing narcotics use.” Indonesia’s approach is in sharp contrast to the aggressive interventions taken in nearby Thailand, which implemented a high-profile “100 percent condom use campaign” in the early 1990s to rein in an explosive HIV epidemic. That campaign was hugely successful and brought down drastically new HIV infection rates particularly in young men. The disease, which has killed 4,539 people so far in Indonesia, used to be spread mainly by injecting drug users. Eight out of 10 addicts have HIV. But in 2010, 65 percent of newly confirmed HIV infections came through unsafe heterosexual sex between sex workers and clients, who went on to infect their wives or girlfriends. The government estimates there are 200,000 female sex workers in the country and a male clientele of up to 3 million. Only 10 to 15 percent of clients use condoms. A sharp jump in mother-to-fetus HIV infections is one of the clearest signs that the AIDS epidemic may be moving from particularly vulnerable groups, such as injecting drug users and sex workers, into the general population. These perinatal infections made up 3 percent of all newly confirmed HIV cases in 2010, up from 0.2 percent in the 1990s. “This means that HIV transmission within the family is increasing ... If we have no new approach for HIV prevention within the family, it (the HIV epidemic) may become generalized. We should think out of the box to protect the family from AIDS,” said Inang Winarso, assistant deputy secretary of the National AIDS Commission for program coordination. When HIV/AIDS becomes generalized and widespread, as in many parts of Africa, it takes a huge toll on countries, draining them of resources and economic productivity. In many parts of Asia, HIV has made a comeback in recent years among vulnerable groups. Governments and concerned groups in China, Hong Kong, Australia and Cambodia are battling hard to contain the epidemic. Through the use of high-profile campaigns, sometimes even involving state leaders as in China, they push hard for the use of condoms and clean needles to prevent the disease from spreading into the general community. But such high-profile interventions cannot be adopted in conservative Indonesia. Winarso, who was involved in a successful campaign against HIV transmission among gay and bisexual men, hopes to stop the virus from spreading among sex workers through empowering the women, quietly. “In every story that was told to me, nobody said they liked or that they trained to be sex workers. They all started because of trafficking or because of poverty, but they have no awareness that they are victims,” he said. Winarso and his colleagues plan to reach out to sex workers in a pilot project in Semarang in East Java. “We will visit brothels, we will avoid the pimps. We will spread awareness, get them to tell us their stories, so that they realize they are victims, and continue to be victims under their pimps,” said Winarso. “How do they fight? They need to fight their customers (for condom use) and they must fight the government to provide them with jobs.” The World Health Organization estimates there are 300,000 people in Indonesia living with HIV/AIDS, with the worst affected places being Jakarta and Papua province, where 2.3 percent of the population is infected. Some 50,000 HIV patients require drugs but only 20,000 are getting them. “There are several reasons: no access and shortage of drugs even though there are 200 (HIV drug distribution) sites all over the country,” said Khanchit Limpakarnjanarat, the WHO’s representative in Indonesia. The WHO has a 10-member team in Indonesia and one of its missions is to train medical personnel in treating HIV patients. “We need to strengthen the healthcare system in terms of human resources ... To provide HIV services requires human resources, like counseling and testing. Drug treatment is complicated. These remain a challenge,” he said. ($1 = 8,677.5 Rupiah)
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290
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EU nations aim high with plan to tax air travel.
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The Netherlands and France are trying to convince fellow European nations at a conference in The Hague to end tax exemptions on jet fuel and plane tickets, as part of a drive to make the EU carbon neutral by 2050.
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true
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Environment
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In the first major initiative on air travel tax in years, the conference on Thursday and Friday - which will be attended by about 29 countries - will discuss ticket taxes, kerosene levies and value-added tax (VAT) on air travel. The Netherlands wants to agree on steps toward ending the near complete lack of taxation on air travel and France is also pushing for an end to tax breaks on jet fuel, as European leaders discuss carbon neutrality at a separate summit in Brussels.. “The new president of the commission will have to present plans for the fight against climate change in Europe. It is a no-brainer that the possible contribution of the aviation sector will be put on his agenda in the first week in office,” Dutch deputy finance minister Menno Snel told Reuters. The conference will be attended by European Union economics commissioner Pierre Moscovici and finance and environment ministers. The goal is to present conclusions to the new European Commission, which will be sworn in this autumn. If no EU deal is found, the Netherlands plans to introduce a 7.50 euro ticket tax for departing passengers from 2021. Friends of the Earth estimates that between 1990 and 2016, aviation emissions more than doubled, while overall emissions fell by 43%. A combination of low aviation taxes, a proliferation of budget airlines and the rise of Airbnb have led to a boom in intra-European city-trips. The conference organizers hope that higher taxes will lead to changes in consumer behavior, with fewer people flying and choosing less carbon-intensive transport options instead. Research has shown that if the price of air travel goes up by one percent, demand will likely fall by about one percent, according to IMF tax policy division head Ruud De Mooij. He said that in a typical tank of gas for a car, over half the cost is tax, which not only compensates for CO2 emissions but also for congestion, accidents and road maintenance. “Airline travel is nearly entirely exempt from all tax, despite having many externalities of its own. Ending its undertaxation would level the playing field versus other modes of transport,” he said. Introducing a kerosene levy could be the quickest way to restore the tax imbalance that has given airplane travel a huge cost advantage over cars and trains, activists say. Environmental NGOs such as Transport and Environment (T&E) have long criticized the EU for being a “kerosene tax haven”. “Europe is a sorry story. Even the U.S., Australia and Brazil, where climate change deniers are in charge, all tax aviation more than Europe does,” T&E’s Bill Hemmings said. The US, Australia and Japan charge excise duty on jet fuel according to a European Commission report on aviation tax released this month. But not a single EU country taxes kerosene although a 2003 EU directive allows countries to agree bilaterally to tax fuel on flights between them. “It’s really strange: emissions at high altitude are more dangerous than emissions on the ground, but we tax them on the ground and not in the sky,” Swedish Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson told Reuters. Snel said that, contrary to popular belief, the 1944 Chicago Convention does not block countries from taxing kerosene - only from taxing fuel already in a plane’s tanks upon landing. The EU report shows that just six out of 28 EU member states levy ticket taxes on international flights, with Britain’s rates by far the highest at about 14 euros for short-haul economy flights and up to 499 euros for long-haul business class. French ticket taxes are as low as 1 euro for short-haul economy and 45 euros for long-haul business class, while EU-wide the average weighted tax per passenger is around 11 euros. This compares with an average 15 euros in the US and as much as 30-40 euros in Australia, Mexico and Brazil. Tickets for flights between EU cities are exempt from VAT in all EU countries, but 23 EU member states charge VAT on domestic flights at rates ranging from 3% in Luxembourg to 27% in Hungary with an average weighted EU VAT of 4 euros per ticket. Introducing VAT on intra-EU flights would require agreement from the 28 EU member states, and is widely seen as an unlikely outcome in The Hague. At a subdued Paris Airshow this week, it was evident that environmental pressures are being felt by the aerospace industry which is looking at options such as biofuel and new technology like electric planes. The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) is also developing the CORSIA carbon offset scheme, under which airlines would fund cuts to CO2 emissions elsewhere. Friends of the Earth says there are no easy answers and that the only way to reduce airline CO2 emissions is by constraining aviation trough taxation, frequent flyer levies and limiting the number of flights at airports. “Flying is the fastest way of frying the planet,” T&E’s Hemmings said.
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28989
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CFL light bulbs are dangerous compared to conventional incandescent bulbs because they emit higher levels of radiation.
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What's true: The use of some types of CFL bulbs results in greater exposure to some forms of radiation than incandescent bulbs under some conditions. What's false: It's not true that all use of CFL bulbs should be avoided because they emit harmful levels of radiation.
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mixture
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Medical, cfl, cfl bulbs, cfl light bulbs
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On 23 March 2015, a video that purportedly showed a radiation detector picking up a “soft attack” from a CFL (compact fluorescent lamp) was posted to Facebook from an unvetted and anonymous source, along with claims that CFLs are dangerous because they emit unhealthy levels of radiation: If you are using these type of bulbs, I’ll show you the reason why you should not. Here I have a electromagnetic radiation detector. We’re at zero right now. When I come to this light bulb, you’ll see why you shouldn’t use it. (Radiation detector starts beeping) That’s how much radiation these things emit. I advise you to go back to the old incandescent. This is not healthy for you. Claims about electromagnetic radiation and electromagnetic fields (EMFs) — produced by everything from radios to light bulbs to cell phones — causing deleterious health effects have been around for decades, with no definitive scientific evidence proving such claims. The World Health Organization (WHO) concluded in a survey of available scientific literature on the topic that “current evidence does not confirm the existence of any health consequences from exposure to low level electromagnetic fields” such as those produced by CFL bulbs: In the area of biological effects and medical applications of non-ionizing radiation approximately 25,000 articles have been published over the past 30 years. Despite the feeling of some people that more research needs to be done, scientific knowledge in this area is now more extensive than for most chemicals. Based on a recent in-depth review of the scientific literature, the WHO concluded that current evidence does not confirm the existence of any health consequences from exposure to low level electromagnetic fields.Some members of the public have attributed a diffuse collection of symptoms to low levels of exposure to electromagnetic fields at home. Reported symptoms include headaches, anxiety, suicide and depression, nausea, fatigue and loss of libido. To date, scientific evidence does not support a link between these symptoms and exposure to electromagnetic fields. At least some of these health problems may be caused by noise or other factors in the environment, or by anxiety related to the presence of new technologies. Moreover, a Science-Based Medicine round-up of claims surrounding CFLs noted that although those lamps can put out more EMF than other types of bulbs, that fact poses no health hazard. Moreover, the EMF levels fall off so sharply with distance that measuring them from a few inches away (as shown in the video) is highly misleading: The major health claim being made against CFLs, however, is that they put out “dirty electricity” which can allegedly cause a variety of health problems. There is now a video circulating on Facebook making such claims. Fear of dirty electricity goes beyond CFLs — the new bulbs are just the latest target.What about CFLs specifically? They do indeed put out more EMF in certain frequencies than incandescent or halogen bulbs, but there is no evidence that this level of EMF poses any health consequences. Further, one thing is absolutely clear — EMF falls off sharply with distance. Even after a couple of feet the EMF put out by light bulbs falls from tiny by many orders of magnitude to negligible. The EMF intensity at a distance of inches (as shown in the Facebook video) is irrelevant. What about other forms of radiation emitted by CFLs, such as ultraviolet (UV)? A Canadian government study in 2009 found that CFL light bulbs do result in exposure to more UV radiation when used within a distance of one foot from the subject. The United Kingdom Health Protection Agency came to a similar conclusion, and the FDA recommends that single-enveloped CFL light bulbs should not be used at distances closer than one foot for more than one hour per day: Unless you are one of the few individuals who have a medical condition (such as some forms of Lupus) that makes you particularly sensitive to either UV or even visible light, you should be able to use these lamps at the same distance as you would use traditional incandescent lamps. However, a recent study from the United Kingdom Health Protection Agency has found that there are measureable levels of UV from single envelope CFLs when used at distances closer than 1 foot. As a precaution, it is recommended that these types of CFLs not be used at distances closer than 1 foot, for more than one hour per day. This does not, however, mean that CFL light bulbs are unsafe for consumer use. In fact, the aforementioned organizations all concluded that CFL light bulbs are just as safe as incandescent light bulbs when used at a distance greater than one foot: CFLs as demonstrated by the test results do not pose a health hazard to the general population from either the ultraviolet radiation or the associated electric and magnetic fields. UVR At 30 cm, single-envelope CFLs have a maximum daily UVR exposure similar to the test results for a 60W incandescent lamp. Therefore, it is recommended that single envelope CFLs not be used at distances less than 30 cm to avoid any long-term health effects in the general population.Based on an analysis of the spectral irradiance data for CFLs at a distance of 30 cm, (and by extension greater distances), the bulbs do not pose a significant risk of acute injury to the eyes or skin, as compared to traditional incandescent lamps. It should also be noted that the amount of UV radiation emitted from a CFL bulb can be reduced by using double-enveloped (enclosed in a second layer of glass) bulbs. In fact, double-enveloped CFL light bulbs were found to emit less radiation (even at distances as close as 3cm) than incandescent light bulbs: The glass used in CFLs already provides a UV filtering effect. In addition, any additional glass, or plastic, or fabric used in lighting fixtures that is between you and the CFL will further reduce the already low levels to still lower levels since these materials act as additional UV filters. Increasing the distance between you and any radiation source, including CFLs, will also reduce the small level to a lower level.However, if you still wish to take additional steps then you might wish to purchase the type of CFL that has an additional glass or plastic cover that enclosed the CFL to make it appear more like a traditional incandescent lamp. These covers provide an additional reduction of the low level of UV to a lower level. While it is true that CFLs may emit more radiation that other types of light bulbs at short distances, CFLs are considered just as safe as incandescent light bulbs for general use.
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14394
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"Sid Miller Says Barack Obama was happily photographed holding a T-shirt with revolutionary Ernesto ""Che"" Guevara’s face on it."
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"Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller posted a picture on Facebook showing President Obama holding a T-shirt with Marxist revolutionary figure Che Guevara’s face on it. The photo accompanies a mini-rant from Miller complaining that the president was rubbing elbows with Cuba’s communist leaders instead of flying back to Washington in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Brussels. The pic is a doctored version of a photo from Obama’s 2009 visit to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Excitonics Lab. The T-shirt in the original photo read ""And Moses said "" followed by equations that govern the flow of fluids, concluding ""and the waters parted."" Get it? (A lot of nerds weren’t impressed either, questioning why Moses saying the equations out loud would cause the Red Sea to part, a scene more reminiscent of witchcraft than the invisible hand of God.) Any suggestion the president picked up an inappropriate souvenir on his Cuban trip was based on Photoshop, not fact."
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false
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Terrorism, Texas, Sid Miller,
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"During President Barack Obama’s historic trip to Cuba, he took in a baseball game, met with leader Raul Castro and attended a wreath ceremony for a Cuban journalist and poet. In the background of the ceremony was a mural of Marxist revolutionary Ernesto ""Che"" Guevara several stories high on the side of a building. Guevara, who met exiled brothers Fidel and Raul Castro in Mexico in 1955, and was a key figure in the Cuban Revolution that overthrew the dictator Fulgencio Batista. Obama’s photo in front of the mural drew criticism, but according to one Republican politician, it wasn’t the only such picture. Back in Texas, Sid Miller, the state’s agriculture commissioner, posted a photo to his Facebook fan page that provided a rare, if unseen, glimpse into Obama’s Havana trip from 1,000 miles away. In a March 22, 2016 post on his Facebook fan page, Miller shared a photo of the president holding a blue T-shirt adorned with the face of Guevara, with the caption: ""President Obama refuses to return to the United States in order to meet with European leaders to discuss a response to today's terror attacks in Brussels -- attacks that severely injured a number of Americans. Instead, he remains in Cuba holding a shirt depicting the image of Che Guevara--one of the most reviled terrorists of the modern age -- a murdering thug who was responsible for thousands of innocent deaths. President Obama is laughing at us. He understands the symbolism of this picture and yet he doesn't care. I believe his actions are disgraceful. Do you agree?"" First, a little background. As Texas' agriculture commissioner, Miller is charged with running the national school breakfast and lunch programs, protecting crops from pests and disease and regulating all fuel pumps in the state, among other duties. He also has a flair for newsworthy behavior. In his first act as commissioner, he granted amnesty to cupcakes as an approved dessert and got national attention for lifting a ban to allow deep fat fryers back in public schools. His Facebook presence shares headline-grabbing material. In one example, a photo on his Facebook page showed a detonated atom bomb with a caption that read, ""Japan has been at peace with the US since August 9, 1945. It’s time we made peace with the Muslim world."" The photo was taken down less than 24 hours later. Miller’s team said a staffer posted the photo, not him. Recently, he’s drawn attention for taking a taxpayer-funded trip to Oklahoma to get a supposed cure-all injection known as the ""Jesus Shot."" Back to the images. It’s clear a photo captured Obama in front of a Guevara mural. But Miller claimed he went further and picked up a shirt on his oft-criticized Cuba trip. Standing in front of an image that’s permanently there and voluntarily holding up that same image are different things. We had to know if the leader of the free world knowingly posed with an image of the revolutionary, as Miller claimed. We called Miller’s office and emailed the White House; neither immediately replied. But we quickly came across several news articles declaring the photo a fake -- including a Houston Chronicle story that found an image believed to be the original from a 2009 presidential visit to a lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In the original photo, Obama is holding a T-shirt emblazoned with lengthy equations, which an online thread describes as the ""Navier-Stokes equation coupled with the conservation-of-mass equation."" Next, we did a reverse Google image search to determine if similar images exist. The Chronicle article read through comments on Miller’s Facebook post alleging the photo was fake, and found a Reddit thread from 2009 that explained the science on the original T-shirt in question. Our results brought up ""visually similar images"" of Obama holding up a blue T-shirt with a series of equations on them, as well as links to pages that included matching images. Most links were from Getty Images, showing Obama in 2009 also wearing the same pink dotted tie. Another link went to a San Antonio Current article debunking the photo. The photo caption: ""US President Barack Obama holds a T-shirt given to him as he toured a research laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), an institution that has been developing cutting-edge clean energy technology, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on October 23, 2009."" Even in the background of the Miller Facebook photo, behind Obama’s head, there is a poster labeled ""Center for Excitonics."" In the Getty image picture, the poster is in the same position. An online search for the center landed us on the center’s MIT web page. So, we wondered, did Obama drop in at some time and did he smile while holding a blue T shirt? We called and emailed the lab to ask if the supposed original Getty image was taken there, and if Obama visited in 2009. Kimberly Allen, MIT’s media relations director, replied to our email and confirmed the Getty image link we included in the email was in fact taken in their lab, and the president visited in October 2009. Allen said MIT did not own the original photo of Obama holding up the T-shirt, but she provided a web link to a photo of the president dressed in the same suit exploring a lab with a poster in the background reading ""Center for Excitonics."" Also, in the reverse Google image search, some of the ""visually similar images"" showed Obama holding the T-shirt in the lab with a man with a beard in a colorful printed shirt. In the link Allen sent over, the header image showed Obama watching the same man, Professor Alex Slocum, do a demonstration. As of March 25, the post and photo remained on Miller's Facebook page despite several comments below it linking to news articles such as the Chronicle’s claiming the picture is fake. Our ruling Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller posted a picture on Facebook showing President Obama holding a T-shirt with Marxist revolutionary figure Che Guevara’s face on it. The photo accompanies a mini-rant from Miller complaining that the president was rubbing elbows with Cuba’s communist leaders instead of flying back to Washington in the wake of the terrorist attacks in Brussels. The pic is a doctored version of a photo from Obama’s 2009 visit to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Excitonics Lab. The T-shirt in the original photo read ""And Moses said "" followed by equations that govern the flow of fluids, concluding ""and the waters parted."" Get it? (A lot of nerds weren’t impressed either, questioning why Moses saying the equations out loud would cause the Red Sea to part, a scene more reminiscent of witchcraft than the invisible hand of God.) Any suggestion the president picked up an inappropriate souvenir on his Cuban trip was based on Photoshop, not fact. PANTS ON FIRE – The statement is not accurate and makes a ridiculous claim."
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7624
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Amgen antibody shows promise in myeloma trial, gets FDA fast track.
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Amgen Inc, updating the first trial of its bispecific antibody for multiple myeloma, said on Monday seven out of 10 patients given the second-highest dose of AMG420 responded to the drug, including four with no detectable cancer.
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true
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Health News
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Six patients were still responding at 7.5 months of follow-up, according to research presented in San Diego at the annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology (ASH). The highest trial dose was discontinued due to toxicity. Nearly a third of trial patients developed serious infections and other side effects included nerve damage and liver failure. Amgen said AMG420, which targets a protein linked to multiple myeloma known as BCMA, has been given fast track status by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. “Based on these data, we plan to open an expanded trial,” David Reese, Amgen’s head of research and development, said in an interview. “We want to begin exploring quickly enrollment in earlier lines of therapy.” Amgen’s pipeline of bispecific antibodies, which are designed to attach to a cancer cell and an immune cell, bringing them together so the body’s immune system can kill the cancer, are a cornerstone of the biotech company’s oncology research. Other companies are exploring different ways to attack the same BCMA target, including bluebird bio Inc, Celgene Corp and Johnson & Johnson. Earlier at the ASH meeting, bluebird and Celgene presented early trial data showing that experimental cell therapy bb21217 induced responses in 10 out of 12 heavily pre-treated myeloma patients. Bb21217 is a next-generation version of bb2121, the companies’ more advanced, but still experimental therapy in a class called CAR-T that requires harvesting a patient’s own disease-fighting T-cells, modifying them in a laboratory so they target specific proteins on cancer cells and infusing them back into the patient. The manufacturing process for bb21217 is designed to improve the persistence of the altered cells. J&J, which licensed BCMA-directed CAR-T LCAR-B38M from a unit of China-based GenScript Biotech Corp, on Monday presented updated results from a Chinese study of the cell therapy in 57 previously treated myeloma patients. It showed that 88 percent of patients responded to the treatment, and 74 percent achieved remission. J&J is currently enrolling patients in an international study aimed at validating those findings. Amgen has suggested the “off the shelf” nature of its antibody platform could be an advantage from both a clinical and commercial standpoint, but oncologists say more data is needed. Trial patients are hospitalized for their first cycle of AMG420, after which they receive the drug by continuous 24-hour infusion for four weeks, followed by two weeks off therapy, for up to 10 cycles. Amgen has another BCMA-targeting antibody that lasts longer in the body, requiring less frequent infusions, but that research is at an earlier stage. In the current study, 42 patients with multiple myeloma that worsened after at least two prior treatments were given AMG420 at varying doses. A total of 13 patients responded to the treatment, including seven who achieved remission. Of the 20 patients with serious adverse events, 17 required hospitalization and four had prolonged hospitalization.
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4117
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Whooping cough case at Texas Capitol leads to vaccinations.
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Nearly 50 people who work at the Texas Capitol have been vaccinated this week because a page contracted whooping cough, a health scare that comes as legislatures around the country grapple with rising immunization exemptions and recent measles outbreaks.
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true
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Legislature, Houston, Immunizations, North America, Health, Infectious diseases, Whooping cough, Texas
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Texas health officials have been offering the vaccinations since Monday, three days after lawmakers were notified that a page had come down with the highly infectious disease. At least two House members and their staffs received vaccinations, and one representative who often takes her 9-month-old to work called her pediatrician to check what precautions she should take. The whooping cough case is being held up as a warning in the Texas House, where politically active vaccination opponents have tried to claim territory. “I know it’s on people’s minds,” said state Rep. Gene Wu, a Democrat from Houston. “People speculate about which members are going to come down with it because they didn’t get vaccinated.” Vaccinations are a recurring fight in statehouses, including in Washington state, where a measles outbreak has lawmakers trying to limit vaccine exemptions. A bill in New York would let minors get vaccinated without parental consent, while a California proposal would give state health officials — instead of local doctors — the power to decide which children can skip vaccinations before attending school. Whooping cough is a bacterial infection also known as pertussis that often starts with what feels like a mild cold, followed by weeks of intense coughing fits. The disease gets its name from the sound some people make at the end of a coughing jag when they gasp for breath. There are about 10,000 to 40,000 cases of pertussis reported each year, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control. Forty-seven people in the Texas Capitol received pertussis vaccinations supplied by state health officials Monday and Tuesday, said Lara Anton, a spokeswoman with the Texas Department of State Health Services. She said she could not disclose any details about the person who contracted whooping cough, citing privacy, but House pages are typically children around middle-school age. “It was a large number of people who were potentially exposed,” Anton said. In Texas, the number of schoolchildren claiming vaccine exemptions has surged from about 2,300 students in 2003 to more than 56,000. Some legislation filed this year would make it easier to opt out of vaccines or prevent state health officials from tracking exemption data. On Wednesday, worries over vaccination exemptions in Texas could even creep into a vote over a new $250 billion state budget. A Democrat filed one amendment that would study vaccination levels at child-care facilities. “That a case of pertussis was confirmed on the House floor should be a wake-up call,” said Rekha Lakshmanan, director of advocacy and public policy for The Immunization Partnership, based in Houston. “The fact it happened inside lawmakers’ own house should give everyone a reality check.” ___ Follow Paul J. Weber on Twitter: https://twitter.com/pauljweber
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6679
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Number of US overdose deaths appears to be falling.
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U.S. overdose deaths last year likely fell for the first time in nearly three decades, preliminary numbers suggest.
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true
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AP Top News, Alex Azar, Health, General News, U.S. News
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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday posted data showing nearly 68,000 drug overdose deaths were reported last year. The number may go up as more investigations are completed, but the agency expects the tally will end up below 69,000. Overdose deaths had been climbing each year since 1990, topping 70,000 in 2017. The numbers were celebrated by the U.S. secretary of health and human services. “Lives are being saved, and we’re beginning to win the fight against this crisis,” Alex Azar wrote in a tweet. But the overdose death rate is still about seven times higher than it was a generation ago. “We’re still in a pretty sad situation that we need to address,” said Rebecca Haffajee, a University of Michigan researcher. Researchers do not believe this is the start of a dramatic decline. Data from the first months of this year likely will show that the decrease is not gaining steam, said Farida Ahmad of the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics. The improvement was driven by a drop in deaths from heroin and prescription painkillers. Those falls were offset somewhat by continuing growth in deaths involving a different opioid, fentanyl, as well as other drugs such cocaine and methamphetamines. Overdose deaths often involve more than one drug. The improvement is not uniform: Some states seem to be making dramatic progress, while deaths continue to rise in others. The preliminary CDC data suggested deaths last year were down by as many as 1,000 or more in Ohio and Pennsylvania — each seeing declines of about 20%. Meanwhile, deaths increased by about 17% in Missouri, which had more than 200 additional deaths. It can take months for authorities to complete toxicology tests and other elements of a death investigation involving drugs. And some states report faster than others. The CDC is expected to report more complete data later this year. The current overdose epidemic has killed more people than any other in U.S. history, and it had been on a soaring trajectory. From 2014 to 2017, overdose deaths jumped by 5,000 or more each year. Experts trace the epidemic’s origins to 1995 and the marketing of the prescription painkiller OxyContin. It was meant be safer and more effective than other prescription opioids, but some patients got hooked and found they could crush the tablets and snort or inject them to get high. Gradually, many turned to cheaper street drugs such as heroin and fentanyl. In 2015, heroin began causing more deaths than prescription painkillers or other drugs. In 2016, fentanyl and its close cousins became the biggest drug killer, and in 2018 they were involved in about 46% of the reported overdose deaths, according to the preliminary CDC data. Strategies to reduce drug overdose deaths have included tougher policing, treatment program expansions, policies to limit opioid painkiller prescriptions and wider distribution of the overdose-reversing drug naloxone. Haffajee and other researchers are trying to figure out what measures are most responsible for the slight improvement. “It’s complicated because there are so many policies going on, and as an evaluator it’s very hard to separate them out and determine which is working,” she said. Valerie Hardcastle, a Northern Kentucky University administrator who oversees research and other work on local health issues, has seen the overdose epidemic play out in her region, near Cincinnati. She believes a major factor is Narcan, a nasal spray version of naloxone, that has been widely distributed through the efforts of philanthropists and local, state, and federal officials. “It’s fantastic that we have fewer deaths, don’t get me wrong,” she said. “But I’m not sure it’s an indication that the opioid problem per se is diminishing. It’s just that we have greater availability of the drugs that will keep us alive.” ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content. ___ This story has been corrected to show Ahmad’s first name is Farida, not Farid.
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24583
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76 percent of Americans want a public health care option.
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Groups claim overwhelming support for the public option
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false
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National, Health Care, Progressive Change Campaign Committee,
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"A Web site called ""We Want the Public Option"" includes this headline at the top of the home page: ""76% of Americans Say We Want the Public Option."" The Web site also includes a video that has no voice-over, just a list of signatures supporting a public option in the health care reform plan, plus a smattering of statistics about reform. The signatures were collected by the two liberal groups — Democracy for America and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee — that paid for the ad. The ad aired for the first time on July 23, 2009, in Washington, D.C., and Montana. It's no longer on the air, but the video remains prominent on the Web site. The video opens with this claim: ""76% of Americans support President Obama's public health insurance option."" That number seemed high to us, especially in the light of recent polls, so we decided to check it. The statistic comes from a poll conducted June 12-15 by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal that asked, ""In any health care proposal, how important do you feel it is to give people a choice of both a public plan administered by the federal government and a private plan for their health insurance — extremely important, quite important, not that important, or not at all important?"" About 41 percent of respondents said it was extremely important, and about 35 percent said it was quite important. Add those numbers together, and you get 76 percent. But in the health care debate, June was a long time ago. Since that poll was published, rowdy town hall meetings and a barrage of criticism have made Americans more skeptical of health care reform. The public option has become less popular as well; several surveys done since that first NBC/ Wall Street Journal poll indicate declining support for a public plan. Here are just a few examples: • The Kaiser Family Foundation , a health care think tank, polled 1,205 people July 7-14 and found that 59 percent of people questioned would favor ""a government-administered public health insurance option similar to Medicare to compete with private health insurance plans"" and that 36 percent would oppose the idea. • A second NBC/ Wall Street Journal poll done July 24-27 asked 1,011 people whether they ""would favor or oppose creating a public health care plan administered by the federal government that would compete directly with private health insurance companies."" Forty-six percent said they would favor the plan while 44 percent said they opposed the idea. The two news organizations asked the same question to 805 people between Aug. 15-17 and found that 43 percent favor a public option and 47 percent who oppose it. Both statistics fall within the three-point margin of error of the July poll. • A New York Times/CBS poll of 1,050 people between July 24-28 asked whether they would ""favor or oppose the government offering everyone a government administered health insurance plan — something like the Medicare coverage that people 65 and older get — that would compete with private health insurance plans."" Around 66 percent favored the idea and 27 percent opposed it. • From July 27-Aug. 3, Quinnipiac University asked 2,409 voters whether they ""support or oppose giving people the option of being covered by a government health insurance plan that would compete with private plans."" Around 62 percent were in support and 32 percent were opposed. That's down from a July 1 Qunnipiac survey in which 69 percent supported the public option and 26 percent opposed it. House Democratic leaders and the group Health Care for America Now, which is supporting the Democratic plan, say the July and August NBC/ Wall Street Journal polls are misleading because they changed the framing of the question. Instead of asking if the choice of a public plan was important, they simply asked whether respondents were in favor of a public plan. ""These polls are not comparable,"" the group wrote in it blog. ""The first poll (June) accurately framed the question — should people be able to choose a public health insurance option. The second poll (July and August) pushed them towards an answer by leaving out the essential question of choice and asking a yes or no question."" Regardless, these numbers are all over the map, and the only thing we can say with certainty is that they are each well below the 76 percent figure cited by Democracy for America and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee. We also wondered whether the two groups accurately characterized the original NBC/ Wall Street Journal poll in the first place, and we got a mixed response. ""It's fine to add those two numbers together,"" said Karlyn Bowman, resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. ""But [respondents] were responding to a question about choice, not necessarily the idea of a public plan,"" she said. Democratic pollster Mark Mellman, president of the Mellman Group, said that the ad does a ""fair reading of the question. Basically, you have 76 percent in favor of a choice."" Humphrey Taylor, chairman the Harris Poll, Harris Interactive, agrees that the group characterized the two-month-old poll results correctly, but that ""it's a mistake to say that large numbers of people support the public plan, because they don't understand what it would do,"" Taylor said, noting that ""most people don't have an opinion until they are asked."" Language often skews opinion polls, Taylor said. When it comes to the public plan, supporters often call it the ""public option"" while opponents call it a ""government-run plan,"" so the Harris Poll tried to bridge that gap during a survey of 2,276 people between July 9-13. Respondents were asked whether they supported a ""public, or government-sponsored, health plan,"" and the group found that 52 percent were in favor while 30 percent opposed the idea. That brings us back to the ad's original claim that 76 percent favor the public plan. That's a classic case of cherry-picking where they have found the highest number possible. They've also relied on a poll with wording that might lead people to think they were being asked if they favor choice in picking their health plan rather than whether they support a government-run option. Most of the other polls show support, but not nearly the landslide as the June poll. What's more, they continue to display the ad on their Web site even though the poll is sorely out of date and eclipsed by more recent and more precisely worded surveys. By most accounts, there's slightly more support for the public plan than there is opposition, but that support has dwindled throughout the summer. As a result, we give the Progressive Change Campaign Committee a ."
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217
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E-cigarette firms probed over health concerns by U.S. House panel.
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Four dominant e-cigarette manufacturers face a probe into the health impacts of their products, as the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee asked on Wednesday about the firms’ research and marketing practices.
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true
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Health News
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The committee sent letters to Juul Labs Inc, 35% owned by Marlboro maker Altria Group Inc, Fontem Ventures, Japan Tobacco Inc, and Reynolds American Inc, a unit of British American Tobacco Plc. The letter to Juul asked if the company has conducted or financed studies on the health implications of using its products and the effectiveness of Juul in helping users quit smoking. It asked if Juul has sent information to the Food and Drug Administration. Kaelan Hollon, a spokeswoman for Reynolds American, said the company is reviewing the letter and believes “minors should never use tobacco products, including vapor products.” Japan Tobacco said in a statement it welcomes any opportunity to “set out the responsible approaches” it takes in its marketing. Juul and Fontem Ventures did not respond to requests for comment. The probe comes amid growing scrutiny of the e-cigarette industry by lawmakers. A separate House panel in July released internal Juul emails that committee staff described as attempts to “enter schools and convey its messaging directly to teenage children.” James Monsees, Juul’s co-founder and chief product officer, told the panel the company’s target audience is adult cigarette smokers. Representative Frank Pallone, the Democratic chair of the committee, cited vaping-related lung illnesses recently reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He requested answers and documents by Sept. 20. The CDC said on Wednesday it is investigating 153 possible cases of severe lung illness associated with e-cigarette use in 16 states. No deaths have been reported, they said.
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7888
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Pakistan's first coronavirus death exposes nation's vulnerability.
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When Saadat Khan, 50, returned to Pakistan on March 9 from a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia, he was greeted in his village with a rousing welcome and a grand feast attended by more than 2,000 people, many of whom embraced him warmly.
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true
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Health News
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On March 18, less than 10 days later, Khan died at an isolation center for coronavirus patients in the northwestern city of Mardan. He died from COVID-19, the day his test results came back positive. Khan was Pakistan’s first fatality from a disease that is rapidly spreading through the country of 220 million people. The virus has already infected over 317,000 people worldwide, and killed more than 13,000. The number of confirmed cases in Pakistan has soared to more than 750 from 22 last week, largely driven by a wave of pilgrims returning from Iran who Pakistani authorities said were inadequately tested and improperly isolated. At least four people have died from the disease in Pakistan in the past week. Thousands of people now need to undergo the slow process of retesting, and authorities fear the number of cases could surge in coming days. Health experts say there is a lack of public awareness in Pakistan about the virus and that the cash-strapped government is ill-prepared to tackle its spread. A shortage of quarantine facilities and testing labs have also hampered efforts to effectively deal with high-risk cases. In Sindh, Pakistan’s hardest-hit province, the situation is already grim, said Dr. Naseem Salahuddin, the head of department for infectious diseases at Indus Hospital in Karachi. She said that the few hospitals equipped to handle COVID-19 cases in Karachi are either close to capacity or have shut their doors because they can’t handle the influx of suspected cases. “We’re likely to have a very big outbreak no matter what we do now,” she said. “And we will not be equipped to handle the numbers. There will be breakdowns at many levels.” Better border controls and quarantine measures should have been instituted a lot earlier, she said. “I think the cat’s now out of the bag.” Zafar Mirza, Pakistan’s health minister, who said last week that some of Pakistan’s quarantine facilities had not been “ideal”, did not respond to Reuters’ requests for comment. The provincial health minister in Khan’s home province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa also did not respond to a request for comment. Reuters interviewed three doctors involved in the case, as well as four people from Khan’s village, and reviewed medical case notes detailing his travel history. Together, they provide a picture of Khan’s last days, and illustrate why the South Asian nation is rapidly becoming the latest hotbed of the fast-spreading disease. In late February, Khan flew to Saudi Arabia to visit the holy city of Mecca for Umrah, a religious pilgrimage performed by millions of Muslims from across the world each year. Khan entered the country just before it shut its borders to Umrah pilgrims, in a bid to stem the spread of COVID-19. Khan was in Saudi Arabia for two to three weeks, according to the doctors handling his case and an acquaintance from his village. (GRAPHIC: Pakistan’s first fatality of COVID-19 may have endangered thousands - here) Medical case notes, provided by one of Khan’s doctors, show that he departed from the kingdom’s Jeddah International Airport on March 8 via flight number PK736, which landed the following day at Peshawar International Airport, in northwest Pakistan. At least two people who knew Khan said he was already ill when he got on the plane and needed assistance on arrival in Pakistan. Despite Pakistan having identified its first confirmed cases of COVID-19 two weeks prior, the case notes state Khan was only asked to fill out a form and did not undergo a medical screening at the Peshawar airport. Khan did not mention any illness, and he would have escaped detection anyway if he had taken fever suppressors, said a Peshawar airport official who asked not to be named. Authorities are also scrambling to trace dozens of other passengers on flight PK736 that night, as well as airport staff who assisted Khan. Khan first visited a district hospital close to his village on March 16, complaining of cough, fever and breathing issues. The doctor diagnosed him as a potential COVID-19 patient and had him tested for the virus. The sample was sent to Islamabad for testing, according to the case notes reviewed by Reuters. While it is unclear if doctors could have forced Khan into quarantine, the case notes indicate he refused to be isolated. Instead, he went home, where he lived with his wife, three sons, two daughters-in-law, three daughters and four grandchildren. Hospital officials say Khan returned on March 17, when his symptoms intensified. On March 18, test results confirmed he was infected with COVID-19, and he was moved to an isolation center, where he died the same day. It is the events before his death, though, that have worried medical officials and alarmed many residents of his village. On March 9, Khan was greeted with a mass gathering in his village, as is traditional in Pakistan when someone returns from Umrah. According to local authorities, some 2,000 people were in attendance at the lunch – most of whom embraced Khan. Khan also ran a popular “medical clinic” in his village – though he wasn’t a qualified doctor, say local health officials. As is the case in many rural areas of Pakistan, people with just rudimentary medical knowledge often run such dispensaries to treat patients with ailments like fevers and colds, despite not having any qualifications. Khan had not resumed his practice on returning to Pakistan, but his sons ran it for him while he stayed at home in “self-quarantine,” health officials from the village told Reuters. However, they added, the “self-quarantine” involved his sons staying in the same room as him. The sons in turn also tended to dozens of patients at their father’s clinic during that period. Reuters was unable to speak with anyone in Khan’s family. There is mass panic in the village, local residents told Reuters via phone, adding that no one had taken the coronavirus threat seriously prior to this. “There are hundreds of people believed to have been infected but they are hiding and reluctant to go to hospital,” said Liaqat Ali Shah, a local social worker, adding that villagers feared being ostracized by the community and shunned by healthcare workers. The village, Union Council Mangah, was locked down following Khan’s death, according to an official directive from authorities. A complete lockdown was ordered “with immediate effect and there shall be no entry and no exit,” the order seen by Reuters read. The village of about 7,000 people, has been declared a mass quarantine zone, according to the provincial government, and testing has begun. But residents of Mangah say none of the officials surveying the area have testing kits with them. A medical worker on the ground said test kits were limited so they couldn’t test everyone and were only testing patients displaying symptoms. “There’s a virtual lockdown in the village and movement is restricted,” a school teacher in the village, told Reuters via phone. Despite this, at least four people showing symptoms, including two members of Khan’s family, are now missing and have gone underground, health officials told Reuters. All four had tested positive for COVID-19, the officials said.
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11489
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‘Female Viagra’ May Treat Low Sexual Desire
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"This story reports on a investigational drug, flibanserin, that is being developed to treat what is a controversial diagnosis called ""hypoactive sexual desire"" in women. The popular press has dubbed this drug ""Female Viagra"" despite that fact that it has few similarities to drugs that treat erectile dysfunction. Preliminary research examining the drug’s efficacy in treating sexual distress and/or low sexual desire were presented at the May 2010 annual clinical meeting of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG). To place the story in context, previous reports from the manufacturer claimed that flibanserin resulted in ""clinically significant"" improvement in the number of sexually satisfying events reported by women taking the drug vs. those taking placebo, an absolute difference of 0.7 events per month. The story was detailed and did a good job of presenting information in absolute terms so that the reader could clearly see that reported benefits were small and of unknown clinical significance. Good reminders that this is a controversial diagnosis and that ""some experts see it as the medicalization of what is for many women a relationship issue."""
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true
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"Cost data for flibanserin is not provided. Some projection of cost should be available for any drug this far along in Phase III trials – and for which the company has already begun marketing campaigns. If not from the company, then from stock analysts. The story properly quantifies the reported benefits in absolute terms which allows the reader to see that they are small. (Results are described in Quality of Evidence comments.) In an interview a study researcher conceded that the absolute number of women reporting benefit was not large. The story provided statistics on common side effects including daytime sleepiness, dizziness, fatigue, anxiety, dry mouth, nausea and insomnia. These side effects resulted in 15% of those taking flibanserin vs 7% taking placebo withdrawing from the study. The story does a good job of presenting and evaluating the available evidence. Results are presented in absolute terms, for example that just under one third of women taking flibanserin reported improvement in sexual distress/desire compared to approximately one fifth of women taking placebo. In contrast, these results were presented in relative terms by the manufacturer. Except for the headline, "" ‘Female Viagra’ May Treat Low Sexual Desire"", this story avoids disease mongering and notes that ""hypoactive sexual desire disorder"" in women is a controversial diagnosis. The text clarifies that while the popular press is dubbing flibanserin as the ""female Viagra"", it is not similar to Viagra or other drugs to treat erectile dysfunction. Conflicts of interest are disclosed. The story noted that the study researcher interviewed is a paid consultant for the drug manufacturer. An alternative point of view is provided by two independent experts, a psychologist and a sex-therapist. The independent sources comment on the role that personal relationships play in sexual desire and experience which was not addressed or acknowledged by the researchers. The story indicates that an alternative drug called the Intrinsa testosterone patch is available in Europe, but not in the U.S. The story also notes a difference between these dugs; Intrinsa is a hormonal treatment compared to flibanserin which is a non-hormonal. The story indirectly informs that reader that flibanserin is not available by noting that it is in phase III clinical trials and that the manufacturer is seeking FDA approval (despite early direct to consumer marketing campaigns). The story makes it fairly clear that this is a new treatment – also for a new and controversial diagnosis. The story was apparently based on research presented in abstract form at the annual clinical meeting of the American College of Gynecologists and Obstetricians, although this information has not been published in independently, peer-referred scientific journals. There is no direct evidence that it relied largely on a news release. In fact, the use of interviews with independent experts makes it clear that independent reporting took place."
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38662
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Social media posts show images of burgers and fries from McDonald’s Happy Meals that sat untouched for years without decomposing, rotting or growing mold.
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McDonald’s Hamburgers Won't Rot for Years
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mixture
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Food / Drink
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McDonald’s food won’t decompose or rot for years if its stored in moisture-free conditions, but the same is true for most foods. Claims that food from McDonald’s Happy Meals won’t decompose after sitting untouched for years go back at least 20 years. They’re usually used to argue that food from McDonald’s and other fast food chains are packed with artificial preservatives that render them unable to rot, which means that they are unnatural, unhealthy food options. One of the first and most well documented accounts of forever burgers came from Karen Hanrahan, the administrator of the wellness site Best of Mother Earth. In teaching a workshop titled “Healthy Choices for Children,” Hanrahan famously used a McDonald’s hamburger from 1996 that hadn’t decayed as a prop to demonstrate that there are healthier food options available for children. In 2008, Hanrahan blogged: This is a hamburger from McDonalds that I purchased in 1996. That was 12 years ago. Note that it looks exactly like it did the very day I bought it. The flecks on the burger are crumbs from the bun. The burger is starting to crumble a bit. It has the oddest smell. The Happy Meal Art Project is another example of the un-decomposing McDonald’s burger in popular culture. Its creators photographed a McDonald’s burger every day for 137 days, noting the lack of decomposition. Similar examples can be found across the web, and especially on social media sites. Lucky for us, Serious Eats has logged some serious research. The website documented how nine different burgers — different varieties made at home and by McDonald’s — decomposed. After being left in open air for 25 days, all burgers showed little sign of decomposition or rot: Well, well, well. Turns out that not only did the regular McDonald’s burgers not rot, but the home-ground burgers did not rot either. Samples one through five had shrunk a bit (especially the beef patties), but they showed no signs of decomposition. What does this mean? It means that there’s nothing that strange about a McDonald’s burger not rotting. Any burger of the same shape will act the same way. The real question is, why? Serious Eats concluded that the hamburgers didn’t rot or mold because their small size and large surface area allow them to lose moisture quickly. And, without moisture present, decomposition of beef and bun can’t take place. Turns out that McDonald’s has said as much, too. Back in 2014, McDonald’s responded to questions about why its burgers rarely rot in the FAQ section of its website “The reason our food may appear not to decompose comes down to a matter of simple science. In order for decomposition to occur, you need certain conditions — specifically moisture. Without sufficient moisture— either in the food itself or the environment — bacteria and mold may not grow and therefore, decomposition is unlikely. So if food is or becomes dry enough, it is unlikely to grow mold or bacteria or decompose. Food prepared at home that is left to dehydrate could see similar results.” So, in conclusion, it’s true that McDonald’s hamburgers won’t rot for years at a time if stored in the right conditions, but the same is true for all hamburgers. Their shape and size allow them to shed moisture quickly, which slows decomposition to a standstill. That’s why we’re calling claims about McDonald’s burgers refusing to rot both true and misleading. Comments
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26254
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A long list shows “new CDC guidelines for reopening schools.”
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This image is not from the CDC website, but it roughly summarizes suggestions the agency has for reopening schools as safely as possible.
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true
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Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Viral image,
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"As school districts grapple with how to educate students in the next academic year amid the coronavirus, a list summarizing some of the federal government’s suggestions for how to safely return to the classroom is being shared on social media — but it’s missing some context. Some people reading the list on social media are misinterpreting these suggestions as mandates. But the language throughout the CDC’s actual advice comes with numerous caveats such as ""when possible,"" ""schools may consider,""and ""as feasible."" ""Here we go,"" begins the text of the image being shared widely on Facebook. ""New CDC guidelines for reopening schools."" They’re written as follows: ""This is off CDC website about school starting back in the fall,"" one account wrote about the image, linking to a web page about ""considerations for schools"" on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. This post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) The inconsistent punctuation and casual language — ""here we go"" — were the first clues: this image of ""guidelines"" isn’t directly from the CDC website. But the CDC did update its ""considerations for schools"" on May 19, describing ""ways in which schools can help protect students, teachers, administrators, and staff and slow the spread of COVID-19."" These are not mandates. Rather, the CDC says, schools can work with state and local health officials to decide ""whether and how to implement these considerations while adjusting to meet the unique needs and circumstances of the local community."" Implementation ""should be guided by what is feasible, practical, acceptable, and tailored to the needs of each community."" The agency notes that online classes and activities are the least risky way to educate kids. Small, in-person classes with students social distancing are riskier, while full-sized, in-person classes where students aren’t spaced apart and share supplies pose the highest risk. The CDC also released on May 19 what the Washington Post described as a ""low-key guide to reopening,"" including ""a raft of social distancing policies"" schools. Let’s look at what the agency says compared to the list circulating on Facebook. We’ll break it down and show you what the CDC actually said: ""Wear masks over the age of 2"" Yes, the CDC says children younger than 2 should not wear masks. As for kids over the age of 2, though, it suggests schools ""teach and reinforce use of cloth face coverings"" and notes that masks are most essential when physical distancing is difficult. ""No sharing of any items or supplies, all belongings in individual cubbies or labeled containers; no sharing electronic devices, toys, games, learning aids"" The CDC says ""schools may consider"" implementing strategies that include avoiding sharing electronic devices, toys, books and other games or learning aids, and limiting the use of shared gym or PE equipment, art supplies, toys and games. ""Discourage sharing of items that are difficult to clean or disinfect,"" it says. ""Keep each child’s belongings separated from others’ and in individually labeled containers, cubbies or areas."" ""Desks 6 feet apart, all facing the same way"" This is mostly right. The CDC does recommend desks and student seats be at least 6 feet apart ""when feasible."" And, it says, ""turn desks to face in the same direction (rather than facing each other), or have students sit on only one side of tables, space apart."" ""Distance on school buses- one child per seat, skip rows"" Yes, ""when possible"" the CDC suggests creating distance between children on buses. It gives as an example the idea of seating only one child per row and skipping rows. ""Install sneeze guards and partitions wherever you cannot space 6ft apart"" It says to ""install physical barriers"" in areas where it is hard for people to keep at least 6 feet apart. Sneeze guards and partitions are examples of such barriers. ""One way routes in hallways; tape on sidewalks and walls to assure kids stay 6ft apart"" In areas where it’s hard for people to keep 6-feet apart, ""physical guides, such as tape on floors or sidewalks and signs on walls,"" can be used to help make one-way hallway routes. ""No communal shared spaces - cafeterias, playgrounds"" Yes, the CDC suggests closing communal spaces like dining halls and playgrounds with shared playground equipment ""if possible."" ""Otherwise,"" it says, ""stagger use and clean and disinfect between use."" ""Physical barriers or screens between sinks in bathrooms"" Yes, the CDC suggests adding ""physical barriers, such as plastic flexible screens, between bathroom sinks especially when they cannot be at least 6 feet apart."" ""Only pre-packaged boxes or bags of food instead of cafeteria food; kids eat in classrooms"" ""As feasible,"" kids should bring their own meals or else schools should ""serve individually plated meals in classrooms instead of in a communal dining hall or cafeteria."" At events, the CDC recommends food come in pre-packaged, single-serve boxes or bags instead of a buffet or family-style meal. ""No field trips, assemblies, or external organizations in schools. Limit volunteers and visitors."" It does recommend that schools opt for ""virtual activities"" instead of field trips, student assemblies, special performances, school-wide parent meetings, and spirit nights."" Nonessential visitors and volunteers should also be limited ""as possible."" ""Same children stay with same staff all day, no switching groups or teachers."" Essentially, yes, but without the hard line: ""Ensure that student and staff groupings are as static as possible by having the same group of children stay with the same staff (all day for young children, and as much as possible for older children). Limit mixing between groups, if possible."" ""Stagger arrival and departure times for students to limit exposure to crowds of kids."" The CDC suggests staggering arrival and drop-off times or locations in groups of students, or putting protocols in place to limit contact between each group. ""If possible, daily health and temperature checks."" ""If feasible, conduct daily health checks (e.g., temperature screening and/or symptom checking) of staff and students."" ""And several rules about cleaning and disinfecting throughout the day and hand washing frequently."" The CDC says to ""teach and reinforce handwashing with soap and water for at least 20 seconds"" and advises schools to provide hand sanitizer if soap and water aren’t readily available. It also suggests cleaning and disinfecting touched surfaces like playground equipment, door handles, sink handles and water fountains at least daily or between use as much as possible. Our ruling The image being shared on Facebook roughly summarizes some of the CDC’s suggestions for reopening schools amid the new coronavirus. But the guidelines listed are not mandated by the CDC, and they’re not comprehensive — the agency has other suggestions not mentioned in the image, such as offering options to protect staff and students who have a higher risk of severe illness."
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25719
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Viral image Says Nancy Pelosi “wants to remove votes from soldiers overseas” and said, “They don’t even live here.”
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The number of confirmed cases of cholera in the cyclone-hit Mozambican port city of Beira jumped from five to 138 on Friday, as government and aid agencies battled to contain the spread of disease among the tens of thousands of victims of the storm.
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false
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Elections, Military, Facebook Fact-checks, Viral image,
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Cyclone Idai smashed into Beira on March 14, causing catastrophic flooding and killing more than 700 people across three countries in southeast Africa. Many badly affected areas in Mozambique and Zimbabwe are still inaccessible by road, complicating relief efforts and exacerbating the threat of infection. Although there have been no confirmed cholera deaths in medical centers in Mozambique yet, at least two people died outside hospitals with symptoms including dehydration and diarrhea, the country’s environment minister Celso Correia said. A Reuters reporter saw the body of a dead child being brought out of an emergency clinic in Beira on Wednesday. The child had suffered acute diarrhea, which can be a symptom of cholera. “We expected this, we were prepared for this, we’ve doctors in place,” Correia told reporters. The government said for the first time that there had been confirmed cholera cases on Wednesday. Mozambique’s National Disaster Management Institute said the local death toll from the tropical storm had increased to 493 people, from 468 previously. That takes the total death toll across Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi to 738 people, with many more still missing. “Stranded communities are relying on heavily polluted water. This, combined with widespread flooding and poor sanitation, creates fertile grounds for disease outbreaks, including cholera,” the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a statement. The World Health Organization’s Tarik Jasarevic said 900,000 doses of oral cholera vaccine were expected to arrive on Monday. The U.S. Defense Department said on Friday it had authorized an additional $8.5 million in humanitarian assistance for Mozambique, bringing the total to $15 million. About 50 U.S. military personnel have been sent to Mozambique to assist with logistics, including transporting food and medical supplies. Cholera is endemic to Mozambique, which has had regular outbreaks over the past five years. About 2,000 people were infected in the last outbreak, which ended in February 2018, according to the WHO. But the scale of the damage to Beira’s water and sanitation infrastructure, coupled with its dense population, have raised fears that another epidemic would be difficult to put down.
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9941
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New therapy promising for skin cancer
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CNN afforded an unusual amount of time to this story about a National Cancer Institute study, published in the journal Science, about a gene therapy approach for advanced melanoma. But there were some critical pieces of information missing from the story, even with the amount of time afforded it. While this experimental approach is, of course, of interest, it is important to be mindful that the majority of individuals diagnosed with melanoma are successfully treated using conventional methods. The gene therapy approach was not effective for most patients studied. When the story projected possible effectiveness of this mode of treatment to other forms of cancer, it left the world of evidence and entered the sphere of pure speculation. The story didn’t discuss any side effects from the treatment and gave only cursory mention that the treatment was ineffective for the majority of patients involved in the trial (15 of 17 died). The story should have mentioned that because so few people have experienced this gene therapy approach, there is insufficient information about the potential harms. The only source of information used on the air was the principal investigator of the study. Inclusion of other clinicians involved with immunotherapy could have provided grounded estimates of the benefit and risks to patients. Other news media across the country offered such perspective on this story, offering a much more complete and balanced view. The story seemed particularly fawning, when the anchorman asked the principal investigator, “Do you need more money, more support, more help? Or do you have everything you need right now to see how far you can take this?” Other perspectives were needed to balance the story. There was also no estimate given for the cost of such a gene therapy approach, not even a projection of what it might cost. There was also no mention that it was tested in patients who had received other treatments both before and after the immunotherapy. This is an important issue. If these experiments lead to a new therapy, it would make all existing forms of treatment look inexpensive. This would be individualized treatment in its ultimate form.
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mixture
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There was no estimate for the cost of such a gene therapy approach, not even a projection of what it might cost. There was also no mention that it was tested in patients who had received other treatments both before and after the immunotherapy. This is an important issue. If these experiments lead to a new therapy, it would make all existing forms of treatment look inexpensive. This would be individualized treatment in its ultimate form. While featuring one patient who had a successful outcome (i.e. ‘virtually cancer-free’ 2 years after treatment), the story did mention that there were two patients in whom the experimental approach was successful and 15 people for whom it was not effective. However the air time given to the success was far greater than that given to the point that this experiment did not benefit ~88% of the patients, a point that is important for viewers to understand. There was no mention of side effects from the experimental approach and only cursory mention that it was ineffective for the majority of people involved in the trial (15 of 17 died). The story should have mentioned that because so few people have experienced this gene therapy approach, there is insufficient information about the potential harms. The story explained that the results presented were drawn from a clinical trial, with results being published in the journal Science. This story failed to inform the viewer about how common death from melanoma is. While it presented an estimate for the number of Americans that will be diagnosed with melanoma in 2006 (~ 60,000) there was no mention that it is estimated that there would be <8,000 deaths attributable to melanoma. This information is helpful for recognizing that melanoma is much less common and deadly than a number of other diseases. The only source of information used on the air was the principal investigator of the study. Inclusion of others clinicians involved with immunotherapy could have provided grounded estimates of the benefit and risks to patients. Other news media across the country offered such perspective on this story, offering a much more complete and balanced view. There was no mention of the use of autologous tumor infiltrating lymphocyte treatment which, although effective in roughly half the patients for whom it is an option, is not a possibility for all patients. The was no meaningful discussion of surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and biologic therapy that are currently used in the treatment of melanoma. The story didn’t explain that at least some of these treatments were used in conjunction with the experimental treatment. This report mentioned several times that this is a highly experimental approach and that it was still currently only in the clinical trial stage. No estimate was provided for when this type of experimental approach might be more readily available, but this research is at such an early phase that it is difficult to predict. The impression from this piece is that the study reported on was the only one of its kind. The approach of using cells from a patient’s own immune system as part of the therapeutic approach to the treatment of cancer is an area of active investigation. The current study is one of several clinical trials underway to determine whether this approach will be effective for the treatment of melanoma. This is, however, the first time that anyone has actually seen a positive, durable response. The story does not appear to rely solely on a news release.
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7459
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Governor considers reopening plans as Iowa reports 18 deaths.
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Gov. Kim Reynolds said Tuesday she’s still considering how far to go in lifting local public health restrictions, as the state reported 18 more deaths from the coronavirus.
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true
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Iowa, Health, General News, Sioux City, Iowa City, Kim Reynolds, Des Moines, Virus Outbreak, Public health, Restaurants
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Reynolds had planned to announce which business closures that she would allow to expire Friday and which she would extend through May. But she said she was still looking at data, and now expects an announcement Wednesday. Restaurants in 22 counties remain closed. Statewide, bars, salons, barber shops, movie theaters, casinos, museums and several other businesses are ordered closed until Friday. Reynolds has hinted that parts of eastern Iowa that remain under restrictions, such as Iowa City and Cedar Rapids, are on a positive trajectory and could see some lifted. But the Des Moines area has seen a large increase in cases, and cities like Sioux City and Waterloo are still managing the aftermath of huge meatpacking plant outbreaks. Experts have warned that reopening too soon could lead to another wave of infections. Meanwhile, the Polk County Sheriff’s Office announced Monday that 19 inmates at the county jail had tested positive for COVID-19. The office said in a news release that the jail is keeping affected inmates in isolation. The state reported more than 500 new cases Tuesday, including 319 Sioux City-area workers who tested positive at a Tyson beef plant in Nebraska last month. Nebraska had delayed reporting those results to Iowa. The 18 new deaths brought Iowa’s official count to 289.
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36182
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"In 1992, Donald Trump said ""women, you have to treat them like shit."
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Did Donald Trump Say ‘Women, You Have to Treat Them Like S—‘ in a 1992 Interview?
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mixture
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Disinformation, Fact Checks
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On September 14 2019 the popular — but not always accurate — Facebook page “Occupy Democrats” shared a Donald Trump quote meme (archived here), alleging that the President said “women, you have to treat them like shit” in a 1992 New York Magazine profile.To the right of an image of President Trump, text stated:“Women, you have to treat them like shit.” – Donald Trump, 1992, New York MagazineThis is an ACTUAL Trump quote, AND THE PART OF “FAMILY VALUES” COULDN’T CARE LESS!The meme’s claim was presented in the second part of the text, that “you have to treat [women] like shit” was an “actual Trump quote.” The group helpfully provided a specific citation window, namely a 1992 article in New York Magazine.As our friends at Lead Stories pointed out, New York Magazine‘s archives from 1992 were searchable on Google Books. We searched that particular issue, and Trump appeared on the November 9, 1992 cover under the text: “Fighting Back, Trump Scrambles Off the Canvas.”On page 41 of the issue, what appears to be a paraphrase by author Julie Baumgold appeared:The final paragraph above appeared to be the author’s paraphrasing of Trump’s sentiments toward women he perceived as seeking attention (even negative attention) from powerful men:[Trump’s] contempt for beautiful women who like to be abused is boundless, and he is full of stories of supermodels, women he might call twelves (not their size), clinging to a rockstar’s legs and the rock star kicking them away. You have to treat them like s—. He’s seen the disloyalty of wives and widows; a “disloyal lady” like Barbara Walters, who asked him about his divorce on TV when she promised she wouldn’t; and major babes who fall for guys with voices and guitars. He’s a “guarded guy.” Babes are bad …[page 42, continued] … but necessary. [Quotation.] Women are two types for him — those of use, and those he beds, or “sacks,” and, of the two, the former probably get more of his heart.That excerpt featured the author’s characterization of Trump in the profile, based on the writer’s personal observations. In that appearance, the quote is part of a pastiche of commentary made by Trump himself and descriptors appended by that journalist, such as the “two types of women” commentary.However, the quote appears a second time on page 43 of the same issue, that time in a different context. Philip Johnson, the individual referenced, is a noted architect who worked on Trump’s casino around the period the article was published:In the screenshot above, the second appearance of the quotation appears in the second complete paragraph on the left. It appears to represent half of a conversation, the other half to which readers were not privy. It begins with a setting (the “early-morning hours” and a “casino floor”), and the relevant part begins:Philip Johnson looks at his watch. He is going to Berlin this evening to design a building at Checkpoint Charlie. Trump is talking about women and says “You have to treat ’em like s—.”“You’d make a good mafioso,” says Johnson.“One of the greatest,” says Donald as the car glides through the protected pinelands into the corrupted city.Donald is discussing his buddy Mike Tyson. Tyson told Trump the woman who put him in jail “wanted it real bad.” Trump feels Tyson is doing time on a bad rap: “She knocked on his door at 1 AM and was up and dancing at eight the next morning.” This speech is another of the set pieces he is so fond of delivering. When he defended Tyson and suggested a payoff and community service for the champ, his mother got so angry she raised her voice to him for the first time in his 46 years.Based on the format of the article, which jumped around and featured quotes without preceding context, Donald Trump may have been more broadly voicing his negative opinion of a woman who accused boxer Mike Tyson of rape in the early 1990s. Tyson was convicted and jailed in February 1992; the boxer was imprisoned when the Trump profile ran in November of that year.From the context, it was difficult to discern whether Trump’s “you have to treat ’em like shit” comment was spoken outside the context of Tyson, as part of his distaste for the decision to convict his friend, or in some other context not provided.However, the citation on page 41 provided the quote in paraphrase form, in a broader characterization of Trump’s commentary about powerful men and the bad behavior women “allowed” them to indulge in. Additionally confusing was that a nearly exact version of the phrase was presented as a direct quote attributed to Trump two pages later. In that portion, the writer claims Trump was “talking about women” and said “you have to treat ’em like [shit. ]”Trump denied making the remarks in any context in a 2016 The Hollywood Reporter interview:[Interviewer]: Let’s talk about women. Your feelings toward them seem conflicted, even chauvinistic, confusing since you adore and respect your mother so much. [Trump]: I have great relationships with women, my mother, Ivana, Marla, my female executives are better than the men: tougher, smarter. [Interviewer]: So why in 1992 did you tell a writer for New York magazine, Marie Brenner, that ‘You have to treat women like shit” — ultimately pouring a bottle of wine down her back? [Trump]: I didn’t say that. The woman’s a liar, extremely unattractive, lots of problems because of her looks. [Interviewer]: That statement is exactly why women think you’re a chauvinist pig. [Trump]: They’re right — and not. People say, “How can you say such a thing?” but there’s a truth in it, in a modified form. Psychologists will tell you that some women want to be treated with respect, others differently. I tell friends who treat their wives magnificently, get treated like crap in return, “Be rougher and you’ll see a different relationship.’ Unfortunately, with people in general, you get more with vinegar than honey.That interview mentions Marie Brenner, a Vanity Fair writer who profiled Trump in 1991; Brenner accused Trump of pouring wine on her because he was displeased about something she’d written. The interview appeared to conflate Brenner, upon whom Trump had purportedly poured wine, and Baumgold, author of the 1992 New York Magazine profile.Confusion may have also stemmed from what appeared to be the first post-candidacy appearance of the claim via The Daily Beast in 2015, which mentioned both the wine claim as well as the quote from a conversation with Johnson. In March 2016, the quote in it’s “women, you have to …” form appeared in an attack ad.According to Baumgold, Trump was talking about women when he made the remarks, but their complete context did not appear in the piece. “Occupy Democrats” presented a modified version of the quote, attributing the phrase to Trump as such: “Women, you have to treat them like shit.” Although Baumgold broadly reported Trump was speaking about women when he said “you have to treat them like [shit],” the complete context of the quote was missing.
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4919
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Utah lawmakers approve changes to medical cannabis law.
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Utah legislators approved changes to the state’s medical marijuana law, an issue that has faced fierce criticism from people on both sides of the debate.
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true
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Medical marijuana, Utah, Marijuana, Crime, General News, Gary Herbert
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The Utah Senate and House of Representatives voted unanimously Monday evening during a special session to send the proposal to Republican Gov. Gary Herbert’s desk. The measure would replace plans for an unusual state-run dispensary system with 14 privately run pharmacies and adopt protections for patients who are concerned they could be prosecuted for drug crimes, among other changes. Utah backtracked from the state-run dispensary after county attorneys expressed concern that such a system would put public employees at risk of being prosecuted under federal drug laws. Republican Senate Majority Leader Evan Vickers, who drafted the law, said his team is “doing everything we can” to improve patient access and have product ready by next March. Some lawmakers said they still have heartburn over certain aspects of the bill, sharing reservations about product distribution and a looming fear of federal prosecution. Democratic Sen. Derek Kitchen said he’s concerned patients in rural parts of the state may have to pay more to access marijuana. Before the House vote, Republican Rep. Keven Stratton suggested Utah seek a federal waiver to protect the state program from prosecution under federal drug laws. Marijuana is banned at the federal level, though a congressional amendment blocks the Justice Department from interfering with states’ medical marijuana programs. The measure dictated that the courts may not treat a medical marijuana patient differently than someone who uses any other prescribed, controlled substance. Another change prohibited the state from issuing cultivation and pharmacy licenses to legislators. “A lot of money flows through this industry, some back to legislators,” Vickers said. “We don’t want legislators to have undue influence in an industry they want to have ownership in.” Debates in the chamber reflected ongoing tensions over amendments regarding distribution and prosecution of drug crimes. During a tense public hearing last week, members of the conservative group Utah Eagle Forum lamented the loss of the state-run dispensary system, while some medical marijuana advocates raised concern that there wouldn’t be enough private dispensaries to meet growing patient demand. An earlier version of the law imagined 12 privately run dispensaries instead of the state-run system. In the same meeting, a proposal outlining patient protections caused an emotional back-and-forth between conservative attorneys who argued parents couldn’t take care of children while using marijuana and patients who said the drug makes them better caretakers and helps them manage their pain. Utah residents voted to legalize medical marijuana via ballot measure in November. The revised law became effective in December after a compromise that secured the support of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and some marijuana advocates. However, the deal drew backlash from other advocates as it banned many marijuana edibles, placed additional restrictions on growing cannabis and made fewer medical conditions eligible for treatment with pot. Other changes addressed issues with land ordinances for cultivation facilities and marijuana research at in-state universities. Marijuana advocates said they are optimistic about the changes adopted. “There’s a light at the end of the tunnel, we see legislators working together, and they’re willing to work out a plan for patients,” Desiree Hennessy, director of the Utah Patients Coalition, said. Republican Rep. Brad Daw acknowledged the measure as a good first step but expects additional changes to the program in January. “I have close friends who, for them, cannabis is the only option, it relieves the kind of pain they have ... we have every right and responsibility to work toward a law that allows medical cannabis to patients who need it,” he said. “Is this bill perfect? Of course not. Is this done? No, it’s not.”
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1527
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Spanish hospital offers nipple tattoos to breast cancer survivors.
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Arms covered in red and green ink, tattoo artist Alvaro Quesada is hardly what cancer survivors expect at a Madrid infirmary, the first public hospital in Spain to offer nipple and areola tattooing.
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true
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Health News
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Yet his service of tattooing realistic-looking nipples onto women who have had their breasts reconstructed after mastectomies signals the final step of recovery from cancer, and women react with emotion to the process. “They leave crying and hugging me. This is therapy,” says 32-year-old Quesada, who takes time out from his tattoo parlor to attend patients at the hospital. Reconstruction can occur months, or even years, after breast cancer surgery with tissue expanders typically installed to stretch the skin and make room for a future implant. Creating the nipple comes later and involves one more operation. “At this point most patients are exhausted,” said Lorenzo Rabadan, the doctor who first approached Quesada about providing women with an alternative to surgery. He invited the tattoo artist to train staff on the technique. Clutching a pale pink tattoo gun, Quesada creates the three-dimensional illusion of a nipple on a patient’s reconstructed breast, mixing colors with names like ‘rose pink’, ‘brown sugar’ and ‘tribal black’ to mimic the natural shade of an areola. Half-blind, Quesada offers his service free of charge. The national health service did not cover the cost of his false eye after he lost his left eye to a benign tumor. For many, a quick and relatively painless session marks the end of a chapter. “This means it’s over and I can pick up my life again,” said Mamen Malagon, 43. She was diagnosed with the disease in 2011 resulting in the mastectomy or removal of her left breast. “All done,” she sighed as she got dressed. “Do you know what it means to say that it’s over?”
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35380
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"Richard Rose of Port Clinton, Ohio died of COVID-19 after earlier vowing not to buy a face mask and dismissing advice to use face masks as ""hype."
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On other occasions, the content Rose posted to his Facebook profile suggested he was, in fact, cognizant of the potential for harm from the pandemic. In March, for example, Rose posted a meme that, although humorous, indicated he had existing immune deficiencies that could make him particularly vulnerable — a post that turned out to be tragically prescient. On April 23, he posted another humorous meme that appeared to mock plans to end economic and social lockdowns as being premature.
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true
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Medical, COVID-19, Editor's Picks
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"In the summer of 2020, we received multiple inquiries from readers about a collage of social media posts that appeared to show the public pronouncements of Ohio man Richard Rose. One image appears to be a screenshot of a Facebook post by Rose, vowing not to wear a face mask in the context of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, while a later image appears to be a screenshot of his obituary, which states that he died on July 4 “due to complications of COVID-19.” An Ohio man, Richard Rose, who said masks were ""hype"" in Facebook posts and who went to a crowded pool party in June, has died of COVID-19 coronavirus, his family and friends say: https://t.co/nX35Uj1GLB pic.twitter.com/q1oy3LyTyB — Heavy.com (@HeavySan) July 10, 2020 The story was reported by national and international news outlets, and the collage of Rose’s Facebook posts was presented by some internet users as a stark warning for those who failed to take seriously the risk of spreading and contracting the virus, and in particular, the effectiveness of wearing face masks. However, some expressed skepticism about the story, claiming that Rose was a crisis actor, and that the circumstances of his death, and his earlier social media posts, amounted to a hoax. But the posts and obituary were authentic. Richard Donald Rose III, known as Rick, died on July 4 after suffering complications from COVID-19, with which he was diagnosed three days earlier. Two months earlier, he had indeed vowed not to wear a face mask, dismissing their use as “hype.” Three weeks before his passing, Rose did visit a holiday resort in Ohio, posting a photograph of a crowded swimming pool area there. Rose’s obituary, which was published on the Legacy.com website, in the Sandusky Register, the Port Clinton Beacon, and on the website of Crosser and Priesman funeral home, stated the following: “Richard Donald Rose, III, 37, of Port Clinton passed away Saturday, July 4, 2020 due to complications of Covid-19 at his home. He was born July 25, 1982 in Port Clinton. He graduated from Port Clinton High School. He served his country in the United States Army for nine years serving two tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. He enjoyed social media, online streaming, paranormal and his two cats Dale and Tucker. He was a fan of NASCAR, Dirt Track Racing and Georgia Bulldogs Football. Surviving are his mother and step-father: Tina and Kenny Heschel of Port Clinton; sister: Krystal Campbell of Genoa; brother: K. C. Heschel of Concord, NC; half-sister: Melissa Rose of Port Clinton. He was preceded in death by his grandparents: Carl and Marla Kessler, Cooper and Janice Heschel, Richard Rose, Mildred DeBlase…” In the months leading up to his death, Rose posted to Facebook several observations regarding COVID-19, but the tone of the posts was not consistent throughout. In general, much of what Rose posted on the site was humorous, and some of his COVID-19-related posts kept the spirit of lightheartedness and mischievousness. At one point, in early April, he appeared to be at the very least curious about the potential benefits of various kinds of face masks, but on the other hand, a meme he posted on May 18 promoted a baseless claim that policies requiring face masks to be worn were a precursor to mandatory Muslim dress codes. Rose was clearly personally aware that COVID-19 was a real phenomenon. In March he noted in a Facebook post that his own cousin had tested positive for the disease, and he requested prayers and “positive vibes” on behalf of that cousin, who was in a medically induced coma at that time."
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28934
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"Lawmakers ""slipped"" the repeal of county of origin labeling for meat into the December 2015 Omnibus Appropriations Bill."
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What's true: The FY 2016 omnibus appropriations bill repealed existing regulations requiring meat be labeled by country of origin. What's false: The bill was news in 2015; all meat will be unlabeled; the process was kept under wraps; the bill prevents country of origin labeling. What's undetermined: Whether anyone took note of meat's country of origin labeling to begin with, whether manufacturers will continue to exercise the option to label meat by country of origin despite the legislation.
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mixture
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Food, david avocado wolfe, meat, USDA
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"On 28 December 2015 David “Avocado” Wolfe (a social media personality and alternative medicine product promoter) published the above-reproduced Facebook post, the text of which read: IT’S OFFICIAL COUNTRY OF ORIGIN LABELING HAS ENDED HOUSE: 300-121 (PASSED) SENATE: SLIPPED INTO SPENDING BILL PRESIDENT: SIGNED INTO LAW [Photo of meat] NOW YOU WILL NOT KNOW WHICH COUNTRY YOUR MEAT COMES FROM HAPPY HOLIDAYS AMERICA! The meme was nearly identical to one shared by Wolfe on 1 July 2015; both pertained to Country of Origin Labeling (COOL), effective in the United States following the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002: // <! [CDATA[ (function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = ""//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3""; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); // ]]> Posted by David Wolfe on Wednesday, July 1, 2015 Wolfe was a controversial figure in both the alternative health and science/skepticism communities on social media; critics maintained that Wolfe’s affinity for memes was part of a larger strategy to foster a base of customers: For the most part, David will create a rather innocuous meme that is either cute or motivational in nature, so the casual Facebook user will be naturally inclined to share them. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with following a page that makes/disseminates good motivational quotes. However, David has a method to his madness, and does this in what I call “The David Avocado Wolfe Effect” (or DAWE). What He Really Does Make up all kinds of weird shit so he can sell you “superfood” supplements. He makes you mistrust your own body processes, and only he has the secret “alchemical” ingredients to make it work right. He’s a self-acclaimed “expert” without any sign of a relevant education. The meme contained a mixture of true, false, and misleading information. H.R. 2393 was introduced in the House on 18 May 2015, a contemporaneous [PDF] summary explained that the bill would repeal some country of origin labeling requirements for meat (but not all): H.R. 2393 would repeal existing requirements for retailers of beef, pork, and chicken to inform customers at the final point of sale of the country of origin of those products. The repeal would not affect existing requirements for country-of-origin labeling for lamb, venison, goat meat, perishable agricultural commodities, peanuts, farm-raised and wild fish, ginseng, pecans, and macadamia nuts. The meme maintained that after passing the House the bill moved on to the Senate, where it was “slipped” into a spending bill. That assertion was misleading; agricultural regulations are commonly attached to budget bills, and a Google search revealed myriad examples of this legislative process over the years. The repealed provisions weren’t all that old. While some had roots in the above-linked 2002 Farm Bill, many only dated to 2009 [PDF]: On January 15, 2009, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Marketing Service published a final rule, which became effective on March 16, 2009 (U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Marketing Service, 2009b). Commodities covered in this MCOOL final rule include muscle cuts of beef, chicken, pork, and several other species and products (Link, 2009). Processed meat products, meat purchased at restaurants, and certain commodity meats (e.g., turkey) are exempt from MCOOL (U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Marketing Service, 2009a). Examples of the MCOOL labels now appearing on covered meat products include “Product of the U.S.;” “Product of Canada;” and “Product of the U.S., Canada, Mexico.” Neither meme explained why COOL provisions were repealed to begin with. A Food Safety News article from 21 December 2015 titled “USDA Ends COOL Enforcement With President’s Signature on Omnibus Bill” reported that the bill was part of broader trade concerns: Congress included COOL repeal in the $1.4 trillion omnibus spending bill after the World Trade Organization (WTO) ruled Canada and Mexico could begin imposing more than $1 billion in tariffs on U.S. products to punish it for the harm the labeling requirements were doing to them. On 18 December 2015, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) issued a press release titled “Statement from Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack on the Country of Origin Labeling Requirements for Beef and Pork”; it confirmed: Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today released the following statement regarding the language in the omnibus bill repealing the country of origin labeling requirements for beef and pork products. “The omnibus bill repealed the country of origin labeling (COOL) requirements for muscle cuts of beef and pork, and ground beef and pork. Effective immediately, USDA is not enforcing the COOL requirements for muscle cut and ground beef and pork outlined in the January 2009 and May 2013 final rules.” USDA will be amending the COOL regulations as expeditiously as possible to reflect the repeal of the beef and pork provisions. In addition, all imported and domestic meat will continue to be subject to rigorous inspections by USDA to ensure food safety. As Vilsack’s statement explains, the previous country of origin labeling regulations were of debatable value to consumers. Regardless of a meat’s country of origin, all meat sold inside the United States is subject to the same USDA regulations and standards as before. In short, it is true that mandatory COOL labeling was officially repealed in the U.S. late December 2015, but those revised labeling requirements applied only to some meats and had no effect on the required certifications that apply to meat sold in the U.S. (whatever its source). Attachment of the bill to omnibus spending legislation wasn’t sneaky, as USDA provisions are generally passed as part of budget bills for upcoming fiscal years. Finally, nothing about the COOL repeal prevents manufacturers from labeling meat: those vendors who wish to do so are free to label their meats without penalty."
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16176
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Congress Approves Bill Offering Free Cars To Welfare Recipients.
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This post on social media claims that welfare recipients, thanks to Obama, will be eligible for a free vehicle and monthly gas cards. But it was ripped straight from a fake news website.
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false
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National, Welfare, AmericanNews.com,
|
"Does the ""welfare queen"" now have a new car and gas card to go along with her trusty Obama phone? A recent claim circulating on the Internet says she does. A reader recently sent us a November American News article that says welfare recipients will be eligible for a free vehicle and receive a monthly $100 gas card beginning Jan. 15 under new legislation proposed by President Barack Obama. The article said: ""Recently, the White House announced a plan to offer free vehicles to welfare recipients. According to reports, the bill passed in a narrow vote. The program was initiated by President Barack Obama, and in many way mirrors what has become known as ‘The Obama Phone’, or the program through which welfare recipients can get free cell phone service. ""John Earnest announced the program launch, stating ‘The free automobile program gives low-income Americans the opportunity to take ownership of a vehicle at no cost, and will also include a monthly gas card for $100.’ ""Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell told reporters that this passing will be the downfall of President Obama. "" ‘This absurd plan that the democrats have conjured up is beyond belief. I have no idea how or why congress passed this,’ McConnell stated."" The story earned more than 80,000 Facebook likes by Nov. 17, but here’s the deal: It's not accurate. There was no such bill proposed by the Obama administration, and Congress did not pass any such measure. The White House spokesman is Josh Earnest, not John Earnest. (The premise is also kind of amusing -- Congress hasn’t been in the habit of passing Obama initiatives for some time now, whether by a ""narrow"" margin or not.) Rather, the claim originated at an acknowledged fake-news site. First, let’s dispense with the old claim about ""Obama phones."" This claim is, at best, greatly exaggerated. We’ve checked various versions and found that their accuracy rated. As for the idea that the federal government has established a welfare program involving no-cost gas cards and cars for low-income Americans -- well, this is pure fiction. The story was originally posted on Empire News in August. Empire News offers a disclaimer on its About page: ""Empire News is a satirical and entertainment website. We only use invented names in all our stories, except in cases when public figures are being satirized. Any other use of real names is accidental and coincidental."" We have debunked other Empire News claims, such as one in a story headlined, ""Obama Signs Bill Forgiving All Student Loan Debt"" (this one got a ) and another that said a judge in Austin, Texas, sentenced a 34-year-old man to death row after committing his third offense for marijuana possession. Some of the site’s other posts have headlines like ""New Hollywood Trend Has Celebrities Getting Baby Pig Semen Injections To Look Younger"" and ""Kanye West Insists On Nobel Prize, Claims He ‘Brings Peace’ Everywhere He Goes."" The fact checkers at Snopes.com busted the claim earlier this fall. The article then made its way to American News, a site that received a ""!"" last week for a claim that ""death panels"" under the Affordable Care Act had recently executed their first patient. American News offers a mixture of ads and has no information about the site or who runs it. But it includes many fake, yet often nominally believable, articles ripped from other sources that attract clicks from social media users and, presumably, Web revenue for American News. Footnote: Although Obama has not proposed a federal program that offers welfare recipients a car and monthly gas cards for free, his 2012 opponent -- former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a Republican -- actually implemented one. The Massachusetts program that gave low-income Massachusetts residents vehicles and paid for various related expenses, such as insurance and AAA membership, according to a 2012 ABC News article. Our ruling This post on social media claims that welfare recipients, thanks to Obama, will be eligible for a free vehicle and monthly gas cards. But it was ripped straight from a fake news website."
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37665
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Wish.com ships all products from Wuhan, China, and Wish.com products might cause you to contract coronavirus.
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Can You Get Coronavirus from Wish.com Products?
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mixture
|
Fact Checks, Viral Content
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As concern over coronavirus spread in late January 2020, Facebook users began to share memes claiming that all products from ubiquitous seller Wish.com shipped from Wuhan, China — thought to be the region from which a massive outbreak of what epidemiologists are calling 2019 novel coronavirus (or 2019-nCoV) originated:One widely screenshotted and shared iteration of the meme seen above featured white text against gray hearts on a black background. It read:Stop ordering from wish….at least temporarily. The warehouse is in Wuhan, China.On January 26 2020, as the meme about Wish.com spread, news organizations like CNN reported on the rapidly evolving situation in Wuhan and beyond (“China goes into emergency mode as number of confirmed Wuhan coronavirus cases reaches 2,700”):The death toll from the Wuhan coronavirus now stands at 80 [on January 26 2020], with almost 2,800 cases confirmed across China, as the country initiates emergency procedures to try and rein in the pathogen’s global spread … Wuhan itself has been effectively quarantined, with all routes in and out of the city closed or highly regulated. The government announced it is sending an additional 1,200 health workers — along with 135 People’s Liberation Army medical personnel — to help the city’s stretched hospital staff.On the same day, CNN reported five confirmed cases of Wuhan coronavirus in the United States; all five patients had apparently recently returned from Wuhan. Those cases were in the state of Washington, Arizona, California’s Orange and Los Angeles counties, and Chicago, Illinois.Wish.com is both widely advertised on Facebook and known for the number of humorous suggested novelty items appearing in users’ feeds. The meme claimed that Wish.com’s “warehouse” was specifically located in Wuhan, but that wasn’t entirely true.Some products from the Wish.com marketplace ship from various Chinese factories, and some ship from the United States. Others ship from different countries:In exchange for these bargains, Wish demands patience. Most delivery estimates range from two to four weeks, giving the marketplace’s vendors time to ship their products from countries like China, Myanmar, and Indonesia. And apparently, even in the age of free one-day shipping, patience is a thing a shockingly large number of people still have.… By the time it launched e-commerce, it had 500,000 daily users, Wish’s co-founder and CEO Peter Szulczewski told All Things Digital at the time. Its biggest vendors were Chinese wholesalers, and as the company grew, it directed its efforts toward the products that were selling fastest: inexpensive women’s clothing, consumer electronics, jewelry, and accessories — all of which are still among Wish’s top-selling categories. (The company also now has four category-specific apps — Geek, Home, Mama, and Cute — but says they aren’t a significant part of the business. )According to that June 2019 reporting, Wish.com’s warehouses were both based in and shipping to various countries:[In June 2019], according to Marketplace Pulse, 87 percent of the app’s 1 million active merchants are based in China, with an additional 7 percent in the US, and less than 1 percent in the UK and Canada. The company doesn’t break out the geographic distribution of its sellers or its customers, but says the US is its largest market (according to Recode, American customers account for 30 percent of its sales), while Europe does more sales overall.It has been able to maintain its rock-bottom prices thanks in part to a 2011 agreement between China Post and the US Postal Service that sets special rates on shipments from China weighing 4.4 pounds or less. It often costs less to ship these “ePackets” across the ocean than it does to ship a small parcel from one state to another, making already-inexpensive Chinese-made products look even more attractive to American consumers.That was China as a whole, not Wuhan specifically, and we were unable to turn up any information suggesting that Wish.com vendors were primarily or even partially based in Wuhan. In general, large cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen are commonly home to many e-commerce warehouses.A March 2019 Forbes piece reported that Wish.com co-founder Danny Zhang oversaw three outposts in China. A 2015 Recode article about the early days of Wish.com noted the same outside-the-United States shippers were not exclusive to Wish, and often found selling on Amazon and eBay. (Wish.com itself is headquartered in San Francisco, but we were unable to find a media contact listing. )As for the coronavirus, it is typically but perhaps not exclusively spread from contact with people (not surfaces.) It remains unclear how long it might live on surfaces:Coronaviruses “primarily spread through close contact with another individual, in particular through coughing and sneezing on somebody else who is within a range of about 3 to 6 feet from that person,” said Dr. Kathy Lofy, a state health officer for Washington, where the patient with confirmed coronavirus has been hospitalized.If an infected person sneezes or coughs onto a surface — a countertop, for example — and another person touches that surface and then rubs his or her eyes or nose, for example, the latter may get sick.It’s still unclear, however, how long the virus particles for this new coronavirus can live on surfaces.What’s more, it’s unknown at what point a person with the virus becomes contagious. Health care workers are operating under the assumption that the incubation period for the illness is about 14 days, meaning that it takes roughly that amount of time for symptoms to show up after a person is infected. Scientists still do not know whether a person is infectious during the incubation period.Nevertheless, coronoavirus is a respiratory virus, and respiratory viruses typically do not live on hard or porous surfaces for very long:Many different types of viruses can cause colds. The viruses can sometimes survive on indoor surfaces for more than 7 days. In general, viruses survive for longer on non-porous (water resistant) surfaces, such as stainless steel and plastics, than porous surfaces, such as fabrics and tissues. Although cold viruses have been shown to survive on surfaces for several days, their ability to cause an infection reduces rapidly and they don’t often survive longer than 24 hours.… Flu viruses capable of being transferred to hands and causing an infection can survive on hard surfaces for 24 hours. Infectious flu viruses can survive on tissues for only 15 minutes.Overall, the shorter windows seem to be the most accepted:On porous items, like soft toys, clothes and wooden surfaces, viable viruses disappeared after four hours.Most viruses that cause colds and flus remain contagious on non-porous surfaces like computer keyboards longer than porous surfaces like fabric and Kleenex … Because common colds are caused by a plethora of viruses, research on surface infectious rates are harder to nail down. In general, most are no longer dangerous after 24 hours, and their ability to infect dissipates faster on porous materials like facial tissues.What’s the best surface for killing viruses? Our skin. In the cases of both flu and cold-causing viruses, infectious particles on our hands are usually gone after 20 minutes.Although reporting on Wish.com often indicates waits of “weeks or months,” China Post suggests a slightly shorter window for most deliveries from China to the US:China Post has an agreement with the postal service of United States (USPS) and usually you will receive your shipment in your American address by USPS within 9 to 12 days using ePacket. You must insist the seller make ePacket shipping, otherwise it would take 60 to 80 days to arrive for service regular China Post.Stories about coronavirus and Wish.com’s purported location in Wuhan were not the only sinophobic rumors circulating around the outbreak, many of which seemed to be fueled by nothing but xenophobia:Seeing a lot of this kind of thing now in response to the emergence of the Wuhan coronavirus. You may have run across viler tweets denigrating and misrepresenting China and its varied cuisine, but this one is old and, sadly, widespread across North America and parts of Europe. pic.twitter.com/du0os3X4KW— It's an Urban Legend (@ULTweets) January 25, 2020Although it is true that Wuhan, China was the location of an early outbreak of coronavirus, claims that Wish.com’s warehouse is there were baseless. Wish.com was a marketplace of sellers with shippers in many locations in China and elsewhere; Amazon and eBay items sometimes shipped from China, as well. Even if package handlers were infectious, the longer shipping time for items from China to the United States or Europe meant the risk was still low. However, Wish.com was not located in Wuhan, and the rumor capitalized on outbreak fears.
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24143
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There will be no public funding for abortion in this legislation.
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Stupak revises abortion stance on health care bill, citing Obama's executive order
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true
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Abortion, National, Health Care, Bart Stupak,
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"With the health care bill teetering in the balance, antiabortion Democrat Rep. Bart Stupak's announcement hours before the final vote that an agreement had been reached on the abortion issue marked a momentous shift. For weeks, Stupak insisted he and a group of other abortion foes in the House could not support the Senate bill because it would result in federal funding of abortions, contrary to longstanding federal policy. But on the afternoon of March 21, 2010, Stupak said in a news conference that the promise of an executive order on abortion from President Barack Obama convinced him ""there will be no public funding of abortion in this legislation."" Stupak's comments several hours later on the House floor provided some of the most emotionally charged moments of the late-night health care debate. ""It is the Democrats who, through the president's executive order, ensure that the sanctity of life is protected,"" Stupak said. His comments were interrupted by catcalls from the bill's Republican opponents, one of whom was heard to yell ""baby killer!"" Texas Republican Rep. Randy Neugebauer later said he was the one who shouted. But he said he yelled ""It's a baby killer,"" referring not to Stupak (to whom he apologized), but to the agreement Stupak helped forge with the president. The abortion issue in the health care reform debate has been thorny from the start. From early on, legislators on both sides of the abortion issue professed a desire to maintain the status quo on abortion in the health care bill. But that quickly proved difficult, if not impossible. Here's why: Since 1976, the federal government has been guided by the Hyde Amendment, a law that prohibits the use of federal funds for abortions except in cases of rape, incest or when the mother's life is in peril. Due to that amendment -- which must be renewed every year -- abortion services are not provided in health care plans offered to federal employees and for active and retired military. But the health care reform bill proposes a health care exchange in which private insurance companies could compete for the business of people who do not get their insurance through an employer. The question then: Should private companies be allowed to offer abortion coverage (as most already do)? And what if the people buying policies are getting government subsidies to buy insurance? In the House, Stupak helped add an amendment that bars anyone who accepts federal subsidies for health coverage from buying a plan with abortion coverage on the exchange. The amendment does let them choose a plan with abortion coverage if they pay for it without using federal subsidies. And those who accept subsidies can still buy an abortion ""rider"" -- that is, a separate policy covering abortion -- as long as they pay for it entirely with their own money. The Senate took a different tack. The Senate language on abortion, written by an abortion opponent, Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., would allow companies in the exchange to offer abortion services, even to people who get federal subsidies. But Nelson inserted measures to ensure abortion services would be paid through patient premiums, not federal subsidies. In order to accomplish that, the Senate bill requires that anyone who selects a plan that covers abortion must pay $1 a month toward a segregated fund that would pay for abortion services. One plan in every state exchange must offer coverage that does not include abortions, so there would be an option for those who morally object to $1 of their premiums going toward abortion services. Legislators supporting the bill -- along with President Obama -- insist that segregation of funds stays to the Hyde Amendment restriction on federal funds for abortions. The Senate bill's proposal on abortion is opposed by activists on both sides of the abortion issue. Abortion rights groups like NARAL Pro Choice America, the National Organization for Women and Planned Parenthood all put out statements denouncing the requirement that policy owners or their employers write separate checks -- one for abortion services and one for everything else. NARAL called the provision ""unacceptable bureaucratic stigmatization (that) could cause insurance carriers to drop abortion coverage, even though more than 85 percent of private plans currently cover this care for women."" Abortion foes like the National Right to Life Committee and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops also vehemently opposed the Senate bill's abortion language, arguing that if you send federal subsidies to a person who then chooses a plan that cover abortions, that's federal funding of abortion. They called the plan to segregate money so that abortions are paid only through premiums -- not government subsidies -- nothing more than a bookkeeping scheme. Until March 21, 2010, that was Stupak's consistent position. In a Fox News interview on March 17, 2010, Stupak said of the Senate bill, ""It is very clear that abortion is, for the first time ever, a funded benefit by the federal government."" So, what changed on Sunday that prompted Stupak to say ""there will be no public funding for abortion in this legislation""? In the hours leading up to the vote, he and several other antiabortion Democrats in the House agreed to back the health bill after Obama promised to sign an executive order reinforcing the commitment that no federal funds would be used for abortions. The Senate bill already spelled out strict payment and accounting requirements to accomplish that, but Obama's executive order went one step further, putting the president's weight behind specific measures to ensure that funds are properly segregated. By our reading, the order mostly restates and reinforces the intent of the Senate bill. But it doesn't fundamentally change the fact that people getting government subsidies for health care will be able to buy a policy on the exchange that covers abortions. That's why some abortion foes -- not all -- believe Stupak essentially traded his vote for a handful of beans. ""It was issued for political effect,"" said Douglas Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee. ""We don't see any value in the order."" We don't think Rep. Stupak can credibly claim one day that the bill is federal funding of abortions, and then the next day, after getting the agreement on the executive order, that it does not. Stupak's issue all along was that if federal subsidies went to someone who could then choose a plan that covers abortions, that was federal funding for abortion. And that hasn't changed. The president's order spells out safeguards to ensure the funds are segregated. But if you thought that was a bookkeeping trick before, there's nothing in the executive order that would change your mind. At the climax of the health care debate from the floor, House Republican Leader John Boehner said that even with the executive order from the president, the Senate bill would provide ""taxpayer funding of abortions for the first time in 30 years."" We don't agree. It's understandable that abortion foes opposed a proposal that gives more people the opportunity to obtain insurance that cover abortions. But it's another thing to say those abortion services would be paid with federal dollars. The Senate bill states very clearly that public funding through tax credits and government subsidies for elective abortion services offered in the exchange is prohibited. But more than that, the bill sets up a mechanism to ensure that abortion services offered in the exchange are paid entirely from patient premiums, premiums paid by people who have chosen a private plan that covers abortion. The executive order puts the weight of the president's word behind providing a way to ensure two checks go to insurers every month, so that abortion dollars and federal dollars are not commingled. We think that's enough to back up Stupak's claim, ""There will be no public funding for abortion in this legislation."" But that's a conclusion we reached before the president promised an executive order, back when Stupak disagreed with us and insisted the bill would have had federal dollars subsidizing abortions. We don't understand how the executive order changes Stupak's logic on this issue, but no matter how he arrived as his conclusion, we think he's right now. And we rule his claim ."
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1927
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Study: can school nurses help teens quit smoking?.
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Counseling sessions with a school nurse may help some high school students, especially boys, quit smoking — but only for a little while, according to a U.S. study.
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true
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Health News
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Researchers, who studied about 1,000 teens who said they wanted to quit smoking, wrote in the journal Pediatrics that close to 11 percent of those who got counseling for three months had quit smoking, compared to six percent of those who only received educational pamphlets. “A school nurse-delivered smoking-cessation intervention proved feasible and effective in improving short-term abstinence among adolescent boys and short-term reductions in smoking amount and frequency in both genders,” wrote study author Lori Pbert of the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester. But a year after the sessions, there was no difference in smoking rates based on what kind of assistance teens had gotten from their nurses. In addition, fewer than one in five teens said they hadn’t smoked recently. “It’s nice that there was some effect at three months, what we really care about is sustained cessation,” said Michael Siegel, who studies tobacco control at the Boston University School of Public health but wasn’t involved in the study. “The overwhelming majority of these kids are not quitting.” In the 35 Massachusetts schools covered in the study, half the nurses were trained to give their students one-on-one counseling based around goal setting and problem solving, including making a plan to quit and then preventing relapses. The other nurses gave students information pamphlets on quitting smoking and volunteered to answer any questions they had about the process. Both groups of nurses saw their students at four weekly sessions, ranging from 10 to 30 minutes. The counseling intervention appeared to especially help boys in the short run. Those who had made goals and tracked progress with the nurses were three times more likely to say they had stopped smoking than boys in the “control” group. But between 13 and 17 percent of both boys and girls reported they had stopped lighting up a year later, regardless of whether or not they had received counseling. Other smoking cessation experts noted that relapsing into smoking is the biggest hurdle at any age, and that teens were especially likely to do so. But they added that the more options teens had for help, the better. SOURCE: bit.ly/o4z0xc
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17090
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"Mark Udall Says Cory Gardner ""championed an eight-year crusade to outlaw birth control here in Colorado."
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"Udall’s ad said Gardner ""championed an eight-year crusade to outlaw birth control here in Colorado."" It’s clear Gardner has supported personhood in the past, and it’s hard for him to claim ignorance about the measure’s threat to contraception, given the media attention that aspect of the law attracted at the time. Gardner also voted against a bill that would have legally protected birth control. Still, the effort is probably more accurately described as a crusade against abortion than against birth control, and ""championed"" is also a strong word to describe Gardner’s role, since it implies that he was a leader in the cause. Udall’s ad is partially accurate but leaves out important details."
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mixture
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Abortion, National, Congress, Sexuality, Mark Udall,
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"Women, particularly single women, voted strongly for President Barack Obama and other Democrats in 2012. Hoping to replicate that success, Democrats this year are hammering Republicans on women’s health issues in the early stages of the 2014 midterm campaign season. A good example is Colorado, where Democratic Sen. Mark Udall is expected to face Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., in November. Udall recently released a 30-second ad attacking Gardner on abortion and birth control. ""Congressman Cory Gardner’s history promoting harsh anti-abortion laws is disturbing,"" the narrator says. ""Gardner sponsored a bill to make abortion a felony, including cases of rape and incest. Gardner even championed an eight-year crusade to outlaw birth control here in Colorado."" Udall’s campaign said Gardner’s ""crusade to outlaw birth control"" stems from his support of efforts to add so-called ""personhood"" language that would define life beginning at fertilization to the Colorado Constitution. Opponents of personhood legislation say that giving a fertilized egg all the rights of person could make illegal several FDA-approved contraceptives. (More on that in a bit.) Anti-abortion groups successfully petitioned to get personhood measures on the Colorado ballot in 2008 and 2010. Both times it was rejected by more than 70 percent of voters. In a further complication, Gardner recently made a major about-face, saying he no longer supports the personhood movement, partly because he now thinks it could potentially impact access to certain forms of birth control. ""The fact that it restricts contraception, it was not the right position,"" Gardner told The Denver Post. ""I've learned to listen. I don't get everything right the first time."" Despite this, Gardner’s camp still contends Udall’s ad is misleading because Gardner thought he was supporting an anti-abortion measure, not a referendum on birth control. Gardner’s campaign argues that it’s an exaggeration of his position to claim that he’s ""championed"" a ""crusade to outlaw birth control."" What are we to make of this? We can’t predict how the courts would interpret personhood legislation or its impact on legal birth control. Though even Gardner acknowledges that some contraceptives could be at risk if personhood passed, a lot of legal ambiguity remains. Because no state has passed a personhood measure, we don’t know how it could impact specific types of contraceptives. As we’ve noted in past articles about the debate over personhood, some legal scholars and the medical community have cautioned that it could potentially impact access to birth control. In a 2011 op-ed to the New York Times, Glenn Cohen, co-director of the Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology and Bioethics at Harvard University, and Jonathan Will, law professor at Mississippi College, said what is considered ""fertilization"" is not even clear. Fertilization could mean at least four different things: ""penetration of the egg by a sperm,"" successful combination of the genetic information from sperm and egg, activation of the genetic information, and ""implantation of the embryo in the uterus,"" Cohen and Will wrote. Sperm penetration occurs almost immediately, but implantation can take up to two weeks. ""Thus, on some reasonable readings of the amendment, certain forms of birth control ... would seem impermissible, while on other equally reasonable readings they are not."" Therefore, it is difficult to know how courts would react, especially considering that past rulings have affirmed the right of access to birth control. A personhood law could present proponents an opportunity to challenge those rulings. So we’re left trying to determine whether Gardner’s past positions in support of personhood could reasonably be considered as championing a crusade against birth control. Gardner’s history In 2006, Colorado Right to Life asked all politicians running for office if they supported the Right to Life Act in Congress, ""recognizing that personhood begins at fertilization."" Gardner, then a first-term state representative answered yes. Udall’s campaign provided a television news story from March 17, 2008, that appears to briefly show Gardner in a room with several Republican colleagues signing on to the petition to put personhood on the Colorado ballot (around the 1-minute mark). Gardner’s campaign did not respond to questions about his support of the 2008 referendum. His campaign did, however, acknowledge that Gardner supported the referendum efforts in 2010 at a candidate forum. In a video clip from the forum, Gardner says he signed the petition and circulated it at his church. He also said the measure ""backs up my support for life,"" but did not mention contraceptives or birth control. News stories from Colorado papers in 2008 and 2010 mention the debate over contraceptives involved in personhood legislation. In fact, Ken Buck, the 2010 Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in Colorado, backed away from his previous support of the personhood referendum because he said it could impact some forms of birth control. So contraception was a live issue at the time. But Cohen, the Harvard professor, told PolitiFact that ""it is unclear that the Colorado 2008 and 2010 referendums were intended to ‘outlaw birth control in Colorado’ — that's what the word ‘crusade’ seems to imply. It is more clear that the language of those amendments might have outlawed some forms of birth control, whether that was the goal or not."" In other words, Gardner may have been in favor of the amendment, but for reasons other than curbing contraception. Since getting elected to Congress in 2010, Gardner has co-sponsored the Life Begins at Conception Act in 2012 and 2013, which has been described as federal personhood legislation. But he was hardly alone in doing so, nor was he an early backer. In 2012, he was one of the final cosponsors of 120 lawmakers, joining a full 14 months after the bill was introduced. In 2013, the bill had 128 sponsors, with Gardner signing on four months after introduction. Gardner’s campaign notes that in 2007, he was one of five to cosponsor an anti-abortion measure in Colorado that specified that ""nothing in this section shall prohibit the sale, use, prescription or administration of a contraceptive measure, device, drug or chemical."" This bill, his campaign said, demonstrates that while Gardner is pro-life, he is not anti-contraceptive. Udall’s campaign, though, noted Gardner also voted against the ""Birth Control Protection Act"" in 2009, a response to the 2008 personhood ballot referendum, which became law. Our ruling Udall’s ad said Gardner ""championed an eight-year crusade to outlaw birth control here in Colorado."" It’s clear Gardner has supported personhood in the past, and it’s hard for him to claim ignorance about the measure’s threat to contraception, given the media attention that aspect of the law attracted at the time. Gardner also voted against a bill that would have legally protected birth control. Still, the effort is probably more accurately described as a crusade against abortion than against birth control, and ""championed"" is also a strong word to describe Gardner’s role, since it implies that he was a leader in the cause. Udall’s ad is partially accurate but leaves out important details."
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33734
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A new product allows people to perform laser surgery on their own eyes at home.
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The mugs and t-shirts, however, appear to be both harmless and genuine.
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false
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Inboxer Rebellion, ASP Article, eye surgery, hoaxes
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In 2006, an hoax web site wended its way through the Internet and into our e-mail that appeared to be an advertisement for a “new” breakthrough in at-home laser eye surgery: The key to the LASIK@Home system is the Scal-Pal™ Scanning Adjusting Laparascopic Personal Laser. This hand-operated combination femtosecond/excimer laser is made exclusively for LASIK@Home by Walton Group Manufacturing, the same company that makes the the LASIK equipment used by more clinics nationwide. The Scal-Pal™ is actually two lasers in one! First the Scal-Pal™ femtosecond laser cuts a small flap in the cornea of your eye. Then the excimer laser vaporizes a tiny section of the lens without damaging the surrounding tissue. The whole procedure takes only a few minutes and is virtually painless. * […] *This statement has not been evaluated by the FDA. LASIK (Laser in Situ Keratomileusis) surgery is a technique for correcting certain types of refractive problems with the eye (e.g., myopia, hyperopia, and astigmatism) through the precise and controlled removal of corneal tissue by a special laser that reshapes the cornea. In the United States, only ophthalmologists (i.e., physicians who specialize in the medical and surgical care of the eyes) are allowed to perform LASIK surgery, and all such procedures must use lasers that have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Any vendor, therefore, offering LASIK devices for patients to use on themselves to perform at-home eye surgery would be both dangerous and acting illegally. Fortunately, the LASIK@Home web site referenced above is merely a hoax, not a serious attempt to market such devices. (Among the many clues to the site’s invalidity are a lack of a phone number, a physical or mailing address, and a functioning mechanism for ordering the product supposedly being advertised). For reasons that remain inexplicable, the hoax web site made a brief resurgence in 2017, eleven years after its first publication. However, as sincere as the image of “Dr. Amir Khadim, M.D., Ph.D” might appear, this web site remains a hoax, and despite the tremendous strides that have been made in in technology and medicine since 2006, home eye surgery without training or oversight remains just as dangerous as it ever was.
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9354
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Drugmakers Call Experimental Alzheimer’s Drug Study Positive
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This story covered the announcement of “positive” early results for an experimental Alzheimer’s drug called BAN2401, an antibody that attacks beta-amyloid clumps, and which appeared to trigger a surge in the stock prices of two companies developing the drug. The story did an exemplary job of tempering positive spin from the get-go, with cautions in the headline and lead about the financial interests at stake, past failures of Alzheimer’s treatments, and need for more data. It also alluded to the huge potential market for any drug that could arrest or cure Alzheimer’s. Business stories about unproven treatments must explain the news driving investors without creating false hopes for patients. That can be a tall order. Alzheimer’s — which has no cure or treatment to stop its progression — is a particularly good example of an area where business stories can elevate expectations of vulnerable patients and their families, only to see them dashed when fuller data becomes available.
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true
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BAN2401
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The story frames the discussion in terms of income to the company, but doesn’t address the costs to patients or society. The story said the estimated market for a drug that could alter the course of Alzheimer’s “could be worth more than $10 billion in yearly sales.” Some discussion of the cost to society of treating Alzheimer’s would have been a good addition. Or, the story could have explored the cost per patient using the potential revenue estimates to give readers a sense of how much a drug like this might cost. There was no mention of the size of the benefit observed. A STAT news story on this same trial noted that the study failed to meet its primary endpoint, which means the trial failed. As in many past Alzheimer’s drug trials, the company found positive results only in a sub-group of patients. As we’ve written previously, in larger subsequent studies, the drugs have all failed. The story said reported side effects included reactions at the sites of the infusion and swelling around blood vessels observed with brain imaging, and that the companies “said they plan to present the results in detail at [an] academic conference.” The story could have been clearer on how common these side effects are and how serious they were. According to the companies’ news release, infusion-related reactions “were mostly mild to moderate in severity. Incidence of ARIA-E (edema) was not more than 10% in any of the treatment arms, and less than 15% in patients with … the highest dose per the study protocol safety and reporting procedures.” These are concerning potential harms for which no one knows the long-term consequences. Cautions were given early and often about the uncertainty of the evidence. For example, a secondary headline cautioned it’s “too soon to say drug marks real advance,” while the lead mentioned that “a string of failures shadow the efforts” to develop a treatment for Alzheimer’s. The second paragraph further tempered expectations: Alzheimer’s has proved an especially tough drug target. Approved therapies only relieve symptoms temporarily, and one experimental treatment after another promising to stymie the neurodegeneration has ultimately failed to work. Some pharmaceutical companies, after costly failures, pulled out. Also mentioned high in the story was the data were preliminary and based on “a mid-stage study looking for the right dose.” Further down readers were informed of uncertainties around outcomes measures and analytical methods and the need for independent review. There was no disease-mongering. The story offered some perspective on the impact of the the disease: “An estimated 5.7 million Americans live with Alzheimer’s, a figure expected to rise as the population ages, the Alzheimer’s Association says.” In addition to business analysts, the story quoted Lon S. Schneider, an Alzheimer’s researcher at the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine, who “warned against reading too much” into the announced results. The story mentioned there are 126 therapies in clinical development, according to the Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation, with beta amyloid being the most common drug target being tested in human trials. It also mentioned approved therapies that “only relieve symptoms temporarily.” There is also evidence that a healthy lifestyle can be of benefit to people at risk for Alzheimer’s and those with early symptoms. The story made clear this drug is still in development. The story explained that this is one of many attempts to find a treatment for Alzheimer’s. The story didn’t rely on the companies’ news release.
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10763
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Study Shows Inhaled Flu Vaccine Safe
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The $200 billion green bond market is set for a shake up after the European Union on Thursday reached a deal on a new set of rules governing which financial products can be called “green” and “sustainable”.
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mixture
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Under the agreement, all financial products that claim to be green or sustainable will have to disclose exactly what proportion of their investments are environmentally friendly. “With credible and ambitious definitions for sustainable investment the EU will lead the world in sustainable finance,” said Green EU lawmaker Bas Eickhout, lead negotiator on the matter, in a statement Thursday. The deal, which will classify products into three levels of greenness, also requires full disclosure for all financial instruments, forcing funds without any sustainability claims to disclose that they are not assessed under the green criteria. “Now that we have credible definitions on which economic activities can be considered sustainable, the new Commission will have to start preparing to clearly identify environmentally harmful activities and the investments that currently support them,” Eickhout said. Environmental organizations welcomed the announcement, saying it was a step in the right direction to avoiding so-called greenwashing - where firms give the impression their products are more environmentally sound than they actually are. “While it’s still not the full taxonomy we are calling for, it is to the credit of the negotiators that they found balanced compromises on sticky issues like disclosure,” said Sébastien Godinot, an economist with the WWF European Policy Office, in a statement. Negotiations have been taking place for the better part of the autumn, with the biggest sticking point around whether investments into natural gas or nuclear energy could be considered green. An EU parliament official said such investments would not be excluded from the classifications, but labeling them as green would be very difficult under the new rules. EU member states had wanted looser definitions. Green lawmakers said the deal would avoid nuclear energy being considered an environmentally sustainable investment based on a ‘no-harm’ test. The negotiations were held between lawmakers from the European Parliament and the European Council, consisting of representatives of the 28 EU member states. The deal now needs to be approved by the European Commission.
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10443
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Lithium should be more widely used for bipolar disorder, researchers say
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This story is about a study on the frequency of different side effects of four drugs used in the treatment of bipolar disorders. The researchers conclude that lithium should be used more widely, given its lower rate of side effects. The story notes that lithium is documented by other studies to lower the risk of suicide, something that few treatments do in people with bipolar disorders–and a significant advantage given the substantial suicide risk in this group. It also notes that some of the drug’s bad reputation likely stemmed from the higher doses used in decades past and subsequent more side effects. All in all, the story hit many of the important points in explaining the findings, though we wanted to see some discussion on the limitations of this kind of research, as well as costs of the drugs. Bipolar disorder, previously known as manic depressive disorder, is relatively common with a lifetime prevalence of about 3% in general population. Understanding the side effect profile of the drugs used to treat this disease, along with their relative effectiveness in reducing the burden of disease, are both essential in identifying the best treatment options for people. Unfortunately, comparative effectiveness studies are uncommon, but those that have been done have shown that the newer drugs are not better than lithium in terms of effectiveness. This study adds the important finding that lithium’s side effects are also not as burdensome as thought. It’s vital that this new information is conveyed accurately to the public.
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true
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The Guardian
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The story did not address costs. Because this ran in the U.S. edition of The Guardian, this is important and useful information for readers stateside, who often have substantial out-of-pocket drug costs. The research examined the side effect profiles of lithium, valproate, olanzapine, and quetiapine and provided hazard ratios for the most commonly recognized side effects. The Guardian story reflects those findings in a qualitative way with some quantitative details, such as: “Meanwhile, lithium patients were less likely to put on weight than patients on the other drugs. While 15%-20% of those on the three other drugs were more likely to gain more than 15% of their body weight, just 10% of those on lithium put on the same amount of extra pounds.” The story does a reasonable job in outlining the side effects seen with the four drugs in question and provides them in context. The reader is told: “The researchers studied a nationally representative sample of 6,671 patients across the UK who were treated for bipolar disorder between 1995 and 2013. Of those, 2,148 had taken lithium, 1,670 had used valproate, 1,477 had been on olanzapine and 1,376 had taken quetiapine. They experienced side-effects including chronic kidney disease, thyroid disease, weight gain and high blood pressure.” These are important details, but we also wanted to see some nod to the caveats of the study, which were noted by the researchers in their paper in the “strengths and limitations” section. There is no evidence of disease mongering. Given the seriousness of the disorder and its prevalence, we would have liked to have seen read more on how many people it affects. Although the majority of the quotes come from a senior author of the research, the comments of Stephen Buckley, head of information at the charity Mind were welcomed and provided an important second voice. A few words from other clinicians would have been a bonus. The research examined the side effect profiles of the most commonly used drugs to treat bipolar disorder, it also discusses “talk therapy” (but not until the end of the story). The story makes it clear that the four drugs studied are indeed available. The story begins with: The new study is the first to compare the side-effects of the four main mood-stabilising drugs prescribed by the NHS.” Based on our review of the medical literature, we agree. The story does not appear to rely on a news release.
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8128
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Coronavirus forces states to order nearly one in three Americans to stay home.
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Nearly one in three Americans was under orders on Sunday to stay home to slow the spread of the coronavirus pandemic as Ohio, Louisiana and Delaware became the latest states to enact broad restrictions, along with the city of Philadelphia.
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true
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Health News
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The three states join New York, California, Illinois, Connecticut and New Jersey, home to 101 million Americans combined, as cases nationwide topped 32,000, with more than 415 dead, according to a Reuters tally. (Graphic: tmsnrt.rs/2w7hX9T) “Every piece of evidence that I can lay my hands on indicates that we’re at an absolutely crucial time in this war and what we do now will make all the difference in the world,” said Ohio Governor Mike DeWine. “What we do now will slow this invader. It will slow this invader so our healthcare system ... will have time to treat casualties.” In the U.S. Senate, partisan disagreement blocked a massive coronavirus response bill from advancing, with Democrats saying the Republican measure focused too heavily on helping corporations. But Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer said he believed differences could be overcome in the next 24 hours. Ohio has 351 cases and three deaths, while Louisiana has 837 cases and 20 deaths, several in a senior-care facility. Louisiana has the third highest number of cases per capita and saw a 10-fold increase in cases in the past week, Governor John Bel Edwards said. Ohio’s order will go into effect at midnight EDT on Monday and stay in effect until April 6. Louisiana’s order goes into effect at 5 p.m. CDT on Monday and lasts through April 12. Delaware’s order starts at 8 a.m. EDT on Tuesday. Dallas County in Texas, home to over 2.5 million people, and Philadelphia, with 1.6 million residents, told non-essential businesses on Sunday to close and residents to stay home. In Kentucky, non-essential businesses must close by 8 p.m. EDT on Monday but authorities stopped short of ordering residents to stay home. Republican U.S. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky on Sunday became the first member of the Senate to announce he had tested positive for the coronavirus. At least two members of the House of Representatives previously said they tested positive. Around the globe, billions are adapting to a new reality, with countries such as Italy, Spain and France on lockdown and several South American nations taking similar measures to try to stay ahead of the contagion, as global cases exceeded 325,000 and deaths topped 14,000. The mayor of New York City, the epicenter of the nation’s coronavirus epidemic, on Sunday described the outbreak as the biggest domestic crisis since the Great Depression and called for the U.S. military to mobilize to help keep the healthcare system from becoming overwhelmed. “If we don’t get more ventilators in the next 10 days, people will die who don’t have to die,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio, as the nation’s most populous city saw COVID-19 cases top 9,600 and deaths climb to 63. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo urged the federal government to take over acquisition of medical supplies so states do not have to compete with each other for desperately needed resources. Help is not coming quickly enough, Cuomo said. “Time matters, minutes count, and this is literally a matter of life and death,” he said. “At the same time, there is not going to be chaos, there is not going to be anarchy. Life is going to go on. Different. But life is going to go on.” Cuomo gave New York City officials 24 hours to come up with a plan to deal with residents still congregating in parks and other places and not practicing social distancing. De Blasio said New York City was not getting needed medical supplies from the federal government to contend with the rapid spread of the sometimes deadly illness. Hospitals are scrambling for protective equipment for healthcare workers and for ventilators as they brace for a wave of patients who will need help breathing as severe cases often lead to pneumonia and decreased lung function. Over the past week, U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has been pushing for aggressive steps to stem the economic hit, after Trump spent several weeks downplaying the virus’ risks. Trump said on Sunday the National Guard would help New York, California and Washington state respond to the coronavirus crisis. He said the U.S. hospital ship Mercy would be in Los Angeles within a week and provided detailed numbers for the first time on the types and quantities of medical supplies sent to outbreak centers. Vice President Mike Pence said 254,000 Americans had been tested for the coronavirus and 10% were positive. The number of cases of the highly contagious respiratory illness in the United States and Spain are exceeded only by China and Italy. Italy reported record numbers of daily coronavirus deaths last week. “This is going to be the greatest crisis domestically since the Great Depression,” de Blasio told CNN, referring to the economic crisis of the 1930s. “This is why we need a full-scale mobilization of the American military.” Texas Governor Greg Abbott lamented the lack of personal protective equipment (PPE) available for health workers. He said they were seeing delivery dates in July. “That’s not going to work. We need delivery dates tomorrow,” Abbott said at a briefing. “We have ready money today for anybody who can sell us PPE. We’ll cut you a check on the spot.”
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32147
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Leaked DNC e-mails from May 2016 reveal a plot to contrive fake stories about Donald Trump groping women.
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The evidence shows that allegations Trump groped and kissed women inappropriately were already in the air before the idea of creating a mock Craigslist ad was floated. Moreover, there’s nothing within the texts of the leaked e-mails themselves to indicate a conspiracy to do anything more ambitious than fabricating a single satirical ad.
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false
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Politics Conspiracy Theories, donald trump, election 2016, hillary clinton
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On 14 October 2016, amidst an onslaught of public accusations by women alleging that GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump had kissed or “groped” them inappropriately, several pro-Trump web sites ran articles holding up a leaked May 2016 e-mail exchange between Democratic National Committee staffers as evidence that the sexual assault allegations were supposedly “contrived” months earlier in a “plot” to smear Trump. “The Democrats have been planning the ‘Grope hit’ on Trump for a very long time now,” claimed one such report on TruthFeed: Back in May 2016, Democrats prepared a FAKE Craigslist “Trump employment ad,” using the word “grope,” which as we now know is a common term among these fake Trump accusers. How “coincidental” that Democrats were play-acting out a scenario with Trump “groping” and a “kiss on the lips.” Why would they do this when there was never any accusations of his GROPING prior to week three of the presidential election? It’s true that the e-mails, published by WikiLeaks in July 2016, detailed a proposal to design a satirical Craigslist ad seeking “hot” women to work at a Trump organization: From: FreundlichC@dnc.org To: PaustenbachM@dnc.org, MirandaL@dnc.org Date: 2016-05-18 21:27 Subject: Re: need comms approval – craigslist job post Bumping this for comms approval please On Wed, May 18, 2016 at 7:09 AM -0700, “Freundlich, Christina” <FreundlichC@dnc.org<mailto:FreundlichC@dnc.org>> wrote: Mark and Luis – digital created a fake craigslist jobs post for women who want to apply to jobs one of Trump’s organizations. This will be a microsite and we still need to send it to Perkins. Since we will be pitching this, need your approval please. Thanks — Multiple Positions (NYC area) Seeking staff members for multiple positions in a large, New York-based corporation known for its real estate investments, fake universities, steaks, and wine. The boss has very strict standards for female employees, ranging from the women who take lunch orders (must be hot) to the women who oversee multi-million dollar construction projects (must maintain hotness demonstrated at time of hiring). Title: Honey Bunch (that’s what the boss will call you) Job requirements: * No gaining weight on the job (we’ll take some “before” pictures when you start to use later as evidence) * Must be open to public humiliation and open-press workouts if you do gain weight on the job * A willingness to evaluate other women’s hotness for the boss’ satisfaction is a plus * Should be proficient in lying about age if the boss thinks you’re too old Working mothers not preferred (the boss finds pumping breast milk disgusting, and worries they’re too focused on their children). About us: We’re proud to maintain a “fun” and “friendly work environment, where the boss is always available to meet with his employees. Like it or not, he may greet you with a kiss on the lips or grope you under the meeting table. Interested applicants should send resume, cover letter, and headshot to jobs@trump.com<mailto:jobs@trump.com> Clearly, there was a plan discussed (or at least joked about) on or about 18 May 2016 to fabricate a Craigslist ad mocking Trump’s behavior toward women, and it did deploy phrases such as “kissing on the lips” and “groping under the table,” but — contrary to what the Trump defenders claim — the idea wasn’t floated until after groping accusations against the candidate had already surfaced. In point of fact, the e-mail conversation took place two days after a New York Times article dated 16 May 2016 laid out specific allegations identical to the behaviors spoofed in the ad. For example, the title of the position advertised is supposedly “Honey Bunch” (“that’s what the boss will call you,” the ad says) — precisely the nickname former Trump employee Barbara Res said Trump gave her on the job. The spoof says, “Like it or not, [the boss] may greet you with a kiss on the lips or grope you under the meeting table” — and the 16 May Times article reported the experiences of former Miss Utah Temple Taggart, according to whom Trump introduced himself by walking up and kissing her on the lips, and former Trump business associate Jill Harth, who was quoted as saying, “Basically, he name-dropped throughout that dinner, when he wasn’t groping me under the table.”
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4792
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Indians pitcher Carrasco being treated for leukemia.
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Indians pitcher Carlos Carrasco is being treated for leukemia, and he says it’s going to make him stronger than he was before.
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true
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Baseball, MLB, Terry Francona, Health, Leukemia, Sports, Cleveland, Carlos Carrasco
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Carrasco hasn’t played for Cleveland since May 30. The 32-year-old right-hander says he got a blood test after a spring-training physical prompted some concern, and he was diagnosed with leukemia in May. “I never thought that I would have something like this, because I play baseball, I’m like super healthy or something like that,” Carrasco says in a video posted on the Indians’ Twitter account. “But you never know what’s going on inside your body. “When I found out, it made me even stronger, then I push myself to work through this. Then I have a lot of people behind me, helping me, especially my teammates and family.” Manager Terry Francona said the club knew the details of Carrasco’s condition before the video was released. Carrasco plans to talk to the media in Cleveland next Thursday. Francona declined to talk about the pitcher’s condition beyond what he said in the video. “There’s nothing that came out that we didn’t know,” Francona said before Saturday’s interleague game in Cincinnati. “Carlos is going to talk to you guys Thursday night at our workout. He’s still throwing and doing all that.” Carrasco also told a TV station in the Dominican Republic about his condition while visiting a hospital, where he was seeing patients. He said he feels positive about his prognosis and he’ll be back with the team “at the end of July.” Asked if Carrasco’s optimism about a quick return is realistic, Francona said: “We’re not putting any timetables. I don’t think that’s fair to anybody.” Leukemia is a type of cancer that affects the blood and bone marrow. There are numerous forms of the disease, many of which are highly treatable. Carrasco’s announcement led to a wave of support from all over baseball. The Reds tweeted “Reds Country is rooting for you” to Carrasco. Following his diagnosis, Carrasco spoke with long-time teammate Jason Kipnis, who helped him research and understand what he was dealing with. “He’ll get through this with the help of everybody,” Kipnis said last month. “I know the city will be very supportive of him. Every time anyone sees him they will wish him well and ask him how he’s doing. I’m sure he’ll still have a big smile on his face. He’s always in a good mood.” Carrasco initially joined the Indians as a reliever, but has developed into one of the AL’s steadiest front-of-the-rotation pitchers. With a fun-loving personality, he’s also one of the team’s most popular players. Carrasco won 17 games last season and went 18-6 in 2017, when he finished fourth in the AL Cy Young Award voting. Before he was diagnosed, Carrasco was not pitching well. He went 4-6 with a 4.98 ERA in 12 starts, and gave up 14 home runs in 65 innings. Carrasco, who is from Venezuela, has been with Cleveland since 2009, when he came over from Philadelphia in the blockbuster trade for ace Cliff Lee. The Indians signed him to a $47 million, four-year contract in December. ___ More AP MLB: https://apnews.com/MLB and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
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10608
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Gastric Bypass May Improve Diabetes Quickly
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This story lacks appropriate context. There has been an enormous amount of research in the past decade on the mechanisms behind surgery-induced diabetes remission. The story implies that a major breakthrough has been made, when in fact many prior research studies have provided far more evidence than this one. The story failed to report on the cost of treatment, how likely it is that diabetes resolves, or how commonly diabetes reoccurs as a chronic condition requiring management. It simply didn’t give readers sufficient information to evaluation the treatment reported on. Type II diabetes is a common chronic illness and in evaluating treatments, readers need more complete information about the chances for benefit, harm and costs to determine value in a particular treatment.
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mixture
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WebMD
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Although there was an acknowledgment that it simply wasn’t possible to offer gastric bypass surgery to everyone with type II diabetes, there was no discussion about the costs of gastric bypass surgery. The story reported on the impact of gastric bypass surgery on diabetes in a very small group of patients (10) in which all of them experienced improvement in their diabetes. However – there are numerous larger studies which have been conducted that have examined the impact of this surgery on diabetes. While the impact on diabetes is good, rather than all patients demonstrating benefit, broader experience indicates that about 80% of those with type Ii diabetes will see improvement. The story also implies that there could be some benefit to readers of knowing that branch chain amino acids are reduced by surgery. There is no quantifiable benefit to this piece of the puzzle. While the story did mention some of the common side effects that occur following gastric bypass surgery, it actually neglected to mention some of the serious side effects of surgery. In addition, since the story was about the impact of gastric bypass surgery on diabetes, it also should have mentioned that resolution of diabetes is not guaranteed to be permanent and reoccurs in as many as 30 out of 100 people who had improvement. The story reported on a preliminary study to compare amino acid profiles in individuals with type II diabetes losing following gastric bypass surgery or solely through caloric restriction. But it never adequately explained the significance of changing amino acid levels – bouncing from a statement in one sentence that these amino acids are associated with insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease, to a news release-lifted statement in the next sentence that we don’t understand how the amino acids influence diabetes risk. Since the story – in its subhead and body copy – focused so much on the change in amino acids, it should have emphasized that there is no quantifiable benefit to this piece of the puzzle. And the story could have done a better job describing the much broader substantive research that has been done on this same topic. The story does not engage in overt disease mongering. In addition to two authors of the study reported on, a spokesperson from the American Diabetes Association commented on the impact of gastric bypass on type II diabetes. The story briefly mentioned the difference in short term improvement in diabetes in those having gastric bypass and those losing weight through caloric restriction. But it really didn’t quantify the benefits and harms of the two alternative approaches. It’s clear that gastric bypass is a readily available surgical procedure. Gastric bypass is not novel and the story – in reporting that 200,000 people have it each year – did not portray it as such. Turning improved understanding about branched chain amino acids impacting diabetes into an effective treatment for diabetes is at this time hypothetical and was discussed as having potential for use. The story indicated that it drew some of its information from a news release. But it also included interviews with one of the researchers and with an American Diabetes Association official. So it did not appear to rely solely on a news release.
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11104
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Genetic testing can help predict likelihood of disease
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This newspaper article presents an overview of genetic testing for common diseases, an important development in clinical medicine and one likely to increase rapidly in importance. It does a good job of providing lists and bullet points that help people understand key considerations. But the story falls short of best practices in several important ways. It draws only on professionals who support and provide testing. The result is a falsely rosy picture of the benefits of testing, without corresponding attention to risks. It fails to refer to the well-documented cases of women who may have had prophylactic mastectomy unnecessarily. It fails to put genetic testing in the context of other options–essentially, not getting the tests and using close monitoring with lifestyle changes. It fails to refer to any published research on the risks and benefits–particularly the effect genetic testing has shown on reducing morbidity and mortality. Essentially the article provides a one-sided view of genetic testing, with the addition of some useful consumer information provided by the practitioners themselves. For such an important topic about critical health decisions, readers deserve a well-balanced story.
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mixture
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The article fails to state how much these tests cost, a serious shortcoming in a story like this. It makes generalizations about testing being covered by private insurance and Medicare, but this creates a false impression. Testing is often covered only for certain conditions and under specified circumstances. The story does not attempt to quantify the benefits of testing and treatment based on the tests. For instance, it would be very interesting to know whether research has established reduced mortality or morbidity in patients who have had the testing and treatment compared to a control group. The article states that results need to be interpreted carefully and rationally. But it fails to address two specific potential harms in a substantial way: The article provides no evidence to verify the claims about the accuracy and benefit of the tests. The article refrains from exaggerating the prevalence or severity of the diseases for which genetic testing is available. Sourcing for this story is inadequate. It does not provide a range of views and proper context. What’s clearly missing are the perspectives of dispassionate sources–clinicians and researchers who can talk about the value of these tests more generally. Information from sources who can describe poor outcomes (excessive anxiety, emotionally-driven decisions, false positives, inappropriate testing and serious treatment side effects) would have been particularly useful. The story fails to mention the options facing those who choose not to be tested or who are tested but prefer to choose less invasive responses: lifestyle changes, medication (the birth control pill, for example, to reduce ovarian cancer risk) and close monitoring. The choice is often testing vs. interventions to reduce risk, or testing plus treatment vs. testing with other interventions. This is not adequately explained. This story is minimally satisfactory under this criterion. It provides a link to a source where to find a genetic counselor in your area. But the article should have spelled out whether these services are widely available, only in large teaching hospitals, specialty clinics, etc. The story correctly describes the testing as well-established but quickly developing as research into the links between specific genes and conditions continues. There does not appear to be a press release that may have triggered the article.
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38337
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Reports have emerged claiming that a new form of HPV that spread by kissing, and it kills faster than AIDS.
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New HPV Virus Spread by Kissing, Kills Faster than AIDS
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false
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Medical
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There’s no medical or scientific proof to back up claims that a new form of Human Papillomavirus Virus (HPV) can be spread by kissing and kills people faster than AIDS. Claims about a new form of HPV that can be spread through kissing first appeared at Nation Newspaper, an infotainment website based in Nairobi that appears to publish reader-submitted articles. The story, which appeared under the headline “Warning!!! Don’t Go About Kissing Everyone; New HPV Virus That Kills Faster Than HIV/AIDS Erupts” begins: Students from Kisii University, Kenya and the general public at large have been warned against kissing carelessly due to an outbreak of Human papilloma virus, which has seen several people admitted at Kisii level 5 hospital after testing positive to the disease. HPV is an infectious viral disease which cause mouth cancer and is transmitted through infected body fluids and that’s why people have been warned against kissing any how they want. The symptoms include sore throat, severe headache, High fever, Vomit and abdominal pains. A photo appearing with the story supposedly shows one of the people from Kisii University who fell victim to the new HPV kissing bug — but the photo was actually taken from a Public Wellness Group blog about infectious mononucleosis, also known as “kissing disease”: Kissing disease otherwise known as infectious mononucleosis is common among people between the ages of 15 and 24 years. The term refers to the fact that people afflicted with this condition have an increase number of mononuclear leukocytes in their blood. It is caused by the Epstein-Bar (EB) Virus named after its founders, M.A. Epstein and Y.M. Barr. In reality, HPV is a sexually-transmitted infection that is “so common that nearly all sexually active men or women get at some point in their life,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports: You can get HPV by having vaginal, anal, or oral sex with someone who has the virus. It is most commonly spread during vaginal or anal sex. HPV can be passed even when an infected person has no signs or symptoms. Anyone who is sexually active can get HPV, even if you have had sex with only one person. You also can develop symptoms years after you have sex with someone who is infected making it hard to know when you first became infected. So, reports about a new form of HPV that can be spread through kissing and kills faster than AIDS are false. However, HPV is a dangerous STI that can lead to ovarian cancer in women if left untreated. Comments
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23833
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Health reform eliminates co-pays, deductibles, and other costs for preventative care and provides for free annual wellness checkups starting next year.
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Health care changes give seniors free checkups, Democrats said
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true
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Georgia, Health Care, Jane Kidd,
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"Even after all the hollering over health care reform, average citizens remain confused over how the bill will change their lives. Among them are retirees, a powerful voting bloc, which means Democrats who pushed for the reform have some explaining to do. How do they convince them that they have their best interests in mind? Enter Georgia's Democratic Party, whose chair Jane Kidd wrote a column to address these concerns. That opinion piece was e-mailed to the press. Thanks to health care reform, the op-ed said, seniors will get free services that can help keep them healthy. She wrote: ""For example, while seniors today must pay for preventative care, health reform eliminates co-pays, deductibles, and other costs for preventative care and provides for free annual wellness checkups starting next year – ensuring that every Georgia senior has the care they need to better maintain their health.""Free? Is this too good to be true? To back up their claim, Georgia's Democrats referred us to an article in The Record newspaper of Troy, N.Y., that cited the AARP. It states that ""many preventative services . . . will now be free for Medicare beneficiaries, and they won’t have to shell out co-pays for those services."" They also sent an article from CNN.com that said, ""Medicare will provide free annual wellness visits and personalized prevention plans starting in 2011,"" and a fact sheet from WhiteHouse.gov that said the same thing. We called the AARP, a group known for its extensive research on issues that affect seniors. They confirmed that seniors who have Medicare will receive annual wellness visits and personalized prevention plans starting in 2011.These benefits were established by Title IV of the massive health care overhaul bill, dubbed ""Prevention of Chronic Disease and Improving Public Health."" By 2010, Medicare recipients will receive free ""annual wellness visits"" from their health care providers. The checkup will include the creation of a personal prevention plan and a schedule of recommended health screenings for the next five to 10 years, the bill states. Since the AARP took sides on the issue, we sought additional verification. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the government agency that administers these programs, confirmed the AARP account and gave some additional information. There is some question about whether members of Medicare Advantage plans -- the privately managed plans that operate under the Medicare umbrella -- will also receive these wellness visits for free. A spokesman for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said federal law requires that Medicare Advantage plans provide, at a minimum, the services included in Medicare. So by 2011, these plans will also have to provide wellness visits without charge. Generally speaking, the health care law has several provisions that attempt to change Medicare so that it pays for good outcomes instead of paying per procedure, a system known as ""fee for service."" The free preventive care is part of that overall philosophy.Tests such as cancer screenings that are already free under Medicare will remain so, and additional tests may also be included, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said. Still, we at PolitiFact Georgia remained dubious. Is there no provision that will make seniors pay for the ""free"" preventive services in an indirect way? Well there's free. And then there's ""free."" It's free if you paid your Medicare taxes, and make below a certain income. Over time, higher-income seniors will find that their overall Medicare costs increase, according to tax expert Howard Gleckman, a resident fellow at the nonpartisan Urban Institute, Joseph Antos, a health policy expert with the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, a nonpartisan think tank with conservative roots, and a PolitiFact Georgia review of the legislation.Under the current system, recipients with individual incomes of $85,000 or family incomes of $170,000 pay higher premiums to receive coverage. Under the new system, the pool of people who pay this bigger bill will gradually increase because the income thresholds will not be adjusted for inflation until 2019,according to Section 3402 of the legislation. For those who cross the threshold, this could mean an increase of roughly $50 a month, Antos said. All taxpayers, including seniors, who make more than $200,000 individually or $250,000 as a family will pay more in payroll taxes under Section 9015 of the bill. Also, seniors who like to work on their tans -- whoever you are -- should watch out. Indoor tanning salons will have to pay an excise tax under the new law. That cost will likely be passed on to customers, Gleckman said. But the overwhelming majority of retired seniors will find that free preventive services are just that. Free."
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10445
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MS pills show promise and risk, studies say
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Nice job explaining harms and benefits – including putting the potential risks/harms right in the headline. The appeal of an oral drug for MS is clear. The risks emphasized in this story, though, raise important questions
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true
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"There is no mention of cost. The story could have at least reported what the drug costs in its current use against blood cancer. The story did a good job of explaining both the potential benefits and harms of the drugs. This was a particular strength of this story – and made it stand out in comparison with the LA Times blog story that we also reviewed. Harms were emphasized from the outset – even in the headline – in the AP story but were never mentioned in the LA Times story. And this story reminded readers of the side effects encountered with another MS drug, Tysabri. Outstanding job on this issue by the AP. The story did a very good job of explaining the studies. There is no sign of disease-mongering in this story. Two apparently independent sources were quoted. The story did a good job comparing the new drugs with existing approaches to treat MS. Story explains that the drug is already sold to treat a rare blood cancer and stated that ""it’s too soon to know if the pills will be approved by the government or widely adopted by physicians."" It does not report, however, as the LA TImes blog did, that ""The drug company MD Serono, an affiliate of Merck, has requested approval from the Food and Drug Administration to market the tablet. However it recently received a ""refuse to file"" letter from the FDA, which means the agency is requiring additional information or data. MD Serono said it is pursuing the matter with the FDA and hopes to re-submit its application."" We think that’s a crucial piece of information that affects availability, although, of course, doctors can still prescribe it for off-label use even before the FDA acts on the new request. The novelty of ""tests of the first two oral drugs developed for treating MS"" was clear in the story. It is clear that this story did not rely on a news release."
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30839
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An Alabama woman claimed the Washington Post tried to pay her to come forward and make accusations of sexual abuse against Roy Moore.
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Moore, who was twice elected to, and removed from, the state Supreme Court of Alabama, has denied the allegations reported in the Washington Post.
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false
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Media Matters, gateway pundit, pedophile, roy moore
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On 10 November 2017, the disreputable web site GatewayPundit.com reported — without any evidence whatsoever beyond a single anonymous Twitter account — that investigative journalists from the Washington Post had paid a woman to go on the record and accuse Roy Moore, a Republican candidate running to fill Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ vacant U.S. Senate seat in Alabama, of sexually abusing her when she was 14 years old. Leigh Corfman told the Post that she was 14 and Moore was a 32-year-old assistant district attorney when they met. Corfman said Moore picked her up around the corner from her home and took her to his residence, where he undressed and molested her. Three other women also went on the record and said Moore had made advances towards them when they were between the ages of 16 and 18 and he was in his thirties. After the Post story broke, a fifth woman, Beverly Young Nelson, came forward and said Moore had tried to rape her when she was 16. GatewayPundit.com reported (in an article bearing the oddly-worded headline “Report: Alabama Woman Claims Reporter Offered Her $1000s to Accuse Roy Moore of Sexual Abuse?”) that: A Navy veteran who served 22 years for his country and then served in the Secret Service claims a family friend who lives in Alabama told his wife that a Washington Post reporter “named Beth” approached her and offered her THOUSANDS to accuse Judge Roy Moore of inappropriate sexual advances! Of course this is HUGE news if true. Indeed it would be big news — except for the inconvenient fact that it was not true and thus was not “HUGE.” While the Washington Post‘s story was based upon interviews with no fewer than thirty sources, the only source cited by GatewayPundit.com was hearsay from a questionable Twitter account bearing the handle @umpire43, which belonged to someone going by “Doug Lewis #MAGA” who claimed (again, with no sources offered other than a vague “friend of my wife’s”) that : A family friend who lives in Alabama just told my wife that a WAPO reporter named Beth offered her 1000$ to accuse Roy Moore???? In follow-up tweets, “Doug” stated the a family friend (purportedly named “Jean”, but of course with no last name provided) recorded the conversation in which “Beth” (probably Washington Post journalist Beth Reinhard, who co-wrote the Moore report) offered a source money to accuse Moore of sexual improprieties. The tape of that conversation was supposedly turned over to law enforcement, according to “Doug.” We contacted the Washington Post to ask whether there was any possibility the reporters on their story had paid their sources and received a flat denial from spokeswoman Molly Gannon Conway: The accusation against the Post is categorically false. We have an explicit policy that prohibits paying sources. We called the Etowah County district attorney’s office to check whether any such allegations had been brought to their attention, but as of yet we haven’t received a response. Notably, however, the accusatory tweets from the “Doug Lewis #MAGA” were deleted, and then, a few hours later, the entire account was deleted as well. The @umpire43 account was launched in 2011, and as of 11 November 2017 it had tweeted 17,000 messages to 18,300 followers. On 13 November 2017, the account was temporarily set to private, and when it was made public again, its owner had deleted all but fifty posts — including the ones claiming that women had been paid off to accuse Moore. As Washington Post political reporter Dave Weigel observed, the account’s owner had trouble keeping key facts about even his own biography straight: The dude attacking my newspaper over the Moore story can’t remember how many purple hearts he supposedly has. pic.twitter.com/4iW4FqQR4U — Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) November 10, 2017 The progressive nonprofit media watchdog Media Matters for America observed that the same Twitter account had been used to post a similar unfounded allegation in a now-deleted 2016 tweet, claiming: LA Times and NY Times are offering 1000.00 for any dirt on Donald J Trump.Is this what the crooked evil Democrats have sunk to?? Later on 13 November 2017, the entire Twitter account was deleted. According to The Daily Beast, “Doug Lewis” was a false identity co-opted from a real Navy veteran who died in 2007. Despite the fact the GatewayPundit story was entirely unsourced, it gained traction among Moore’s supporters. In an appearance on CNN with host Don Lemon, attorney Trenton Garmon, who represents a legal foundation headed by Moore’s wife, said: Well the process here is both sides reporting and Judge Moore continuing his campaign and being elected on December the twelfth, and us going against the Washington Post for the false information which includes people who have now — Don, I’m still talking — people who have now come out to say they offered money — then offered money as false accusers to do this and there has now been reports that had come out, she was not 14 at the time but 17 and there’s a history of her bringing false accusations against pastors and false accusations against people in the past. Moore’s wife Kayla, who heads the Foundation for Moral Law, also made a similar allegation on Facebook, writing: After the accusations came out against Judge Moore his polling numbers did not change, so do you think they will let up?? We knew something was coming, just did not know what next. This is the same Gloria Allred that did the very exact same thing to Trump during his campaign . Going on two months now they’ve been on a witchhunt here in Etowah County and our state advertising people to step forward with accusations and we are gathering evidence of money being paid to people who would come forward. Which is part of why we are filing suit! The GatewayPundit story now carries a disclaimer at the bottom of their article that reads, “UPDATE: We have not been able to confirm these allegations by Doug Lewis.” This is not the first time GatewayPundit.com has spread unfounded and misleading information. In the hours after a 1 October 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas, the web site misidentified the gunman in that shooting, spreading the name and image of an innocent man far and wide, resulting in his (and his family’s) being targeted for death threats.
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33854
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Coca-Cola became a carbonated drink when a soda jerk accidentally mixed Coca-Cola syrup with soda water.
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A top U.S. pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) owned by UnitedHealth Group Inc has included new migraine drugs from Amgen Inc and Eli Lilly and Co as preferred treatments on its lists of covered drugs, according to an OptumRx client note viewed by Reuters.
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false
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Cokelore
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Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd’s rival migraine headache preventer is excluded on one list and patients can pay more for it in some cases on a second list, the note said. As with rival PBMs Express Scripts and CVS Health Corp, OptumRx’s lists of covered drugs, or formularies, cover tens of millions of consumers who receive their healthcare from employers and health insurers. About 39 million Americans suffer from migraine headaches, according to the Migraine Research Foundation, and global migraine drug sales could reach $8.7 billion by 2026, according to analytics firm GlobalData. OptumRx’s decision secures easier access to customers for Lilly’s Emgality at all three of the biggest PBMs - including CVS and Express Scripts - and gives Amgen’s Aimovig a leg up after CVS decided not to include it on its preferred drug list. Teva’s Ajovy only has preferred status at CVS, while Amgen also has it at Express Scripts, part of Cigna Corp. “We are pleased that all three companies have chosen Emgality to be one of the preferred medications, making it accessible to even more patients suffering from migraine,” Lilly said in an emailed statement. Inclusion on a preferred drugs list by the largest PBMs and health insurers is critically important for sales of new medicines. Increasingly, PBMs are choosing a subset of treatments for their coverage list when there are multiple treatments that are considered equivalent. The three treatments, approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration last year, belong to a class of drugs called CGRP inhibitors that have proven effective in helping to prevent migraines. A Teva spokeswoman said the company is committed to increasing access to Ajovy regardless of formulary decisions and is still offering discounts that allow patients to pay nothing in some cases, regardless of insurance. “Since Ajovy injection launched in September, we have experienced strong demand and steady growth, and we continue discussions with payers,” the spokeswoman said. An Amgen spokeswoman said that the company was pleased with the decision and is committed to ensuring affordable access to its drug. Amgen, which shares Aimovig U.S. revenue with Novartis AG, earlier this week reported fourth-quarter sales of $95 million, nearly doubling Wall Street estimates. The OptumRx decision becomes effective Feb. 1. The OptumRx select formulary relegates Teva’s drug to a lower access level that would typically require a higher out-of-pocket cost, it said. PBMs typically extract discounts from drugmakers in return for favorable placement on their preferred list of covered drugs, such as through a low co-payment, or coinsurance payment, for their members. All three migraine drugs have a list price of $575 a month, or $6,900 a year. Those prices do not reflect the rebates and discounts to PBMs, who design and negotiate benefits for employers and insurers. All three drugmakers are providing a limited duration supply of the new drugs at no cost directly to patients in addition to other assistance programs. Amgen’s Aimovig was first-to-market from the new class. But the rivals from Teva and Lilly followed soon after. The three large PBMs together cover the majority of the more than 150 million Americans who receive benefits through their employers. Their clients, including insurers and corporations, may choose not to follow a PBM’s recommendations on coverage, but that typically would cost more. Amgen shares were off 28 cents at $186.63, Lilly was up nearly 1 percent at $120.90 and Teva shares traded in New York were down nearly 1 percent at $19.69.
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34689
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A dying black veteran named William G. Lillas spoke out on his deathbed about a number of issues in black culture.
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"Is a circulating e-mail really the opinion of a dying ""old black vet"" named William G. Lillas?"
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unproven
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Politics Soapbox, ASP Article, Racial Issues, racism
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In August 2014, shortly after the controversial shooting death of teenager Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, the above-quoted e-mail forward began circulating. In it, a “dying black veteran” rattled off a laundry list of loosely related (and some entirely unconnected) issues the author perceived to be prevalent among black Americans: I was told by my parents (yes, a married man and woman with my last name), that I was nigger. We lived in “Nigger Town” in a small Texas town, no A/C, grass growing through the floor, no car, no TV. We washed our bodies with lye soap that my mother made, by hand. I thought I was a nigger, until I graduated high school, went to college, did an enlistment in the Army, and got a job. I am now retired, own my own home, have 6 children by ONE WOMAN, and we all have the same last name. I have a Bachelor’s Degree in Liberal Arts, a Master’s Degree in Sociology. My retirement, VA disability from combat in the Korean War (I only have one leg), and part-time pay in a local college, is about $125,000 a year. From dirt poor nigger, to old, black, proud American. Yes, I am black, and I can say “nigger”, because I understand the true meaning of the word.Let’s clear up a few things about the Michael Brown incident. -Fact: It is not called “shoplifting or stealing”, it’s called “robbery”, which is a felony. Brown stole something and assaulted someone, that means ROBBERY. It’s on video, and it’s a fact. Not shoplifting, not theft, not “lifting” a few cigars, but ROBBERY! -Michael Brown, like Trayvon, was portrayed by the media as a “little black boy”, cute little headphones, and his cap and gown photo, gunned down by a ruthless police assassin, executed by “whitey”. First, I have never seen a cop drag a person into their car’s driver door to arrest them. So, let us be clear, Michael Brown was a nigger; a sorry assed, criminal, hoodlum, nigger. Nobody wants to say that, but I will. He had a criminal record a mile long, was known for numerous assaults, robberies, including the one you saw with your own eyes, and still refuse to call it a robbery. He was, like so many others, living a life that he thought he was “entitled” to, just for being alive. Gangsta rap, weed, drinking, guns, and those stupid-assed low profile rims, makes him some kind of bad-ass nigger. -I have fought communist Chinese and North Korean soldiers in the 1950’s with more honor than that nigger. Yep, I peeled potatoes and shot communists. That’s the only job a nigger soldier could get. -Rodney King? Black Riots! -Trayvon? Black Riots! -Hurricane Katrina? Black Riots! Stealing TV’s, designer clothes, etc. -O.J. Simpson kills white man and white woman, found NOT GUILTY? Did white folks riot? Nope! -In fact, when is the last time white people rioted? Civil War, maybe? That’s because they are, relatively, civilized people, much like many black Americans. Protesting is one thing, hell, I’m all for it. Even if you are an ignorant idiot, you have a right to protest. -Stop only showing the young black “cap and gown” photos of Michael. Charles Manson may have a few of those laying around, as well. Show the nigger “gangsta” photos of the “poor unarmed teenager” (grown man) pics that have been removed from his Facebook page, holding the loaded pistol, smoking weed, with a mouthful of money. -Militarization? The stupid-assed media that publicizes this has no idea what “militarization” really is. Cops wear helmets and vests, and drive armored vehicle because unemployed niggers thrown bricks at them, moron! You put on an “Adam 12” uniform and walk down the streets of Ferguson during the criminal riots. I can guarantee that you’ll jump into the first armored “military tank” that you see. -You only “want the police” when you “need the police”, otherwise, you mock and fear what you do not understand about the police. And by the way, the police are trained to take your shit, but I wouldn’t fuck around with those Army National Guard, they aren’t as well disciplined “culturally” to take your shit like police do every day. They will ventilate your black asses with M-16s, with military precision and extreme prejudice. -And finally, the way we protest and demand justice, is run down the streets breaking shit, looting stores, and acting like a bunch of untrained monkeys? Hell, after Rodney King, criminal niggers were actually killing people, thinking they were entitled to be worse criminals than they already were. For those black criminals that do that, you are a disgrace to your race, inflamed by idiots like Al Sharpton, instead of listening to logic from proud black Americans, like Bill Cosby, Samuel Jackson, Colin Powell, Allen West, me, etc. -You blame white people for your ignorance, criminal acts, unemployed laziness, etc. -You blame white people for 89% of the prisons in America being full of blacks. They did nothing wrong, the racists white cops framed them all, right? No chance at school, no chance for college, military, employment? BULL SHIT! -More niggers kill niggers, than niggers killing whites, whites killing niggers, and whites killing whites … COMBINED. I find this astounding. -It’s not white peoples’ faults, the Emancipation Proclamation was signed by a white man years ago. You can go to school, get a job, buy a house, and vote, JUST LIKE WHITE FOLKS!!!! You are not a slave, you are not discriminated against! Slavery is abolished, and nobody alive today, was alive when it was popular. Get over it! You are discriminated against because you are a criminal, sorry-assed nigger. Otherwise, black Americans are treated like everyone else. -If you choose to create “baby daddy and baby mama”, and fake disabilities as an excuse for laziness to draw social security disability…… instead of husband, wife, family, job, mortgage, it’s YOUR FAULT, not white folks. And there are a lot of proud black Americans that will tell you the same, as I AM ONE OF THEM!!! -Remember, the way you act on the camera, is remembered by everyone who sees it. They will never forget it. It shows them how you, as the black race, responds to situation that don’t particularly go the way you think they should. It will become a reference standard, something they expect from you when the next media report doesn’t go your way. Stop being stupid niggers, and be a proud black American. My parents raised me well, but they were wrong about one thing, I am not a nigger. I will not be around long. While my mind is still sharp, and my aim is still good, my body is eating away with cancer. It started in the prostate, and is spreading rapidly. After I die, I have asked my children to publish my writings, and include my name. Although I am not expecting any miracles, I can only hope that American will stop blaming color, start blaming criminals, and see people for what they really are. We have too many countries that want us dead. We should not be fighting each other. Since it began appearing in our inboxes in August 2014, the “dying black vet” e-mail has changed a bit. Many versions are prefaced with a brief introduction suggesting the original “author” wasn’t the author at all, making its true origins murky. The paragraphs commonly introducing the e-mail suggest even in its initial circulation the piece was not the work of a “dying black veteran,” but rather of a white person inventing an authoritative black person to convey a message: OLD BLACK VET SPEAKS OUT, “WAKE UP!” The words of a dying man have always captured my attention, right or wrong, they are worth reading. I believe what this dying man has to say has a lot of truth. May not be what some will want to hear. I wanted to clear up a few black and white questions and answers. The things I state are facts. They are not downloaded from some media website, not propaganda, just observations from a 70 year old black man, born in America. (If the “black vet” who supposedly authored this piece were truly 70 years old, he could not possibly have seen combat in Korea as he states in the initial paragraph of the message: that war took place from 1950-53, when he would have been a mere elementary school-age child. Later iterations of this piece conveniently “upgraded” his age to 83 to support the Korean War vet timeline.) The author of the introduction above is unknown, as is the author of the original e-mail. However, on 27 August 2014, the e-mail was posted to the personal blog of a person who prefaced it thusly: I have no way of verifying this. It was sent to me by a friend of mine who I think is reliable and he admitted up front that since no name was associated with it, he could not verify it and he was also concerned that even if he could it would endanger the person who wrote it. Symptoms of the times in which we are living. So I’m putting up my Uncle Remus picture to go with it. It rings true, but I don’t know. The text seemingly did not enter widespread circulation until this 27 August 2014 blog post, and given the qualifiers of “sent to me by a friend” who “admitted up front no name was associated with it” and who was “unable to verify it” due to unspecified safety concerns, it’s possible the “words of a dying black veteran” originated with the blog post itself. By November 2014, it seems that concerns about the anonymity of the e-mail hampered its spread, as a name became attached to the commentary: William G. Lillas. For months, the remarks circulated without attribution, and it’s not clear how the name “William G. Lillas” adhered to it. It’s possible the missive was reposted or e-mailed by a person of that name, creating the incorrect impression the reposter was the original author. While the words are aimed at the presumed failings of black Americans, we can’t find one forward or notable repost of the item that didn’t come from a white person. Most likely, the e-mail forward was authored by a white person who wished to express unpopular racial prejudices and felt the image of an elderly (and wise) black gentleman with a proud history of military service was the most authoritative candidate to deliver his list of grievances with a number of racial issues and general events.
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9905
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The pros and cons of Prolia, Amgen’s new osteoporosis drug
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The story detailed what is known about the impact of this drug on various types of bone fractures associated with osteoporosis, how its mode of action is someone different than other osteoporosis treatments, its administration and how the costs compare with other treatments. The one shortcoming of the story was that it had elements of disease-mongering, as explained below. The gestalt about osteoporosis is that women should live in fear of bone breaks. While the story provided very good information about this new treatment, it did not provide much context about the problem. And its inconsistent use of relative vs. absolute risk/benefit data didn’t help.
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true
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This story not only mentions the cost for this drug but also for other treatments for osteoporosis as well. The story did a great job of distinguishing among various fracture types and reporting both relative and absolute risk reduction for vertebra fracture. But then it was disappointing that the risk reduction for hip fractures and that of wrist, leg, or shoulder were reported as only relative risk reduction. Since the story characterized hip fractures as ‘devastating’, it should have provided the reader with some sense of how frequently they occur rather than simply indicating how often they result in a person entering a nursing home or dying within 5 years of having one. Nonethless, because of the elements that were well done, we’ll give the story the benefit of the doubt on this criterion. The story gave a rather complete listing of the potential harms associated with the use of this drug, including specific mention of those problems that are unique to this drug as compared with other medications used to manage bone loss. Although the list was complete, the story did not indicate the frequency with which these harms occurred. Nonethless, we’ll give the story the benefit of the doubt on this criterion. The story provided information about the clinical trial it described, including the number of people studied, the length of time they were studied and the impact on various types of fractures. The story only indicated lifetime risks of fracture (i.e. 1 out of every 2 women over the age of 50) and that 25% of people die within 5 years of breaking a hip without providing some context for these concerns. The 5 year risk of fracture for a woman aged 55 is not the same as that for a woman aged 75; similarly, there are other factors compounding the statistic about death following hip fracture. Since the drug is marketed as being for women who are postmenopausal, rather than simply parroting these seemingly alarming pieces of information, the story should have provided more context for these statistics. This was one weak point in an overall strong story – but an important nuance that should not be overlooked. Comments about this drug and its potential utility from two clinicians noted as not having industry ties to this or other osteoporosis drugs were included in this story. This story compared the benefits, harms and costs for the new drug, with those treatments already on the market. The story opens with a statement about this drug’s approval by the FDA. The story provided a useful explanation of how this medication differed from the other treatments available for osteoporosis. Does not appear to rely exclusively on a news release.
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38711
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There are reports among social media communities that two cops from Georgia have killed 250 people in the line of duty.
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Sydney was wreathed in hazardous smoke on Thursday as strong winds fanned dozens of bushfires across Australia’s east coast, prompting health warnings for the city that is home to more than 5 million people and the state of New South Wales (NSW).
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false
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Humorous
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Firefighters were battling to control more than 40 wild fires that remained ablaze across NSW, the state’s Rural Fire Service (RFS) said. There were no reports of injuries caused by the fires by mid-afternoon local time, though 45 homes were destroyed. The strong winds have blown the dangerous smoke across large parts of NSW. The RFS said the smoke was unlikely to clear for at least 24 hours, while hot, dry conditions are expected to linger for several days more - exacerbating the threat of more fires as authorities try to access the damage of blazes now extinguished. “Dust may aggravate existing heart and lung conditions and cause symptoms like eye irritation and cough,” said Richard Broome, director of environmental health, NSW Health. “Symptoms can occur for several days after dust is inhaled, so people with the chronic conditions need to be vigilant with their treatment programs.” One of the biggest fires in recent days was recorded in Lake Cathie, 379 kilometers (235.5 miles) north of Sydney - which has destroyed more than 2,000 hectares (4,942 acres) of a national park. The fire is now contained, though the area is a prime breeding ground for koalas, stoking fears that hundreds will have been killed by the fires. “Based on our calculations, with a minimum 60% mortality rate about 350 koalas will be lost,” Sue Ashton, president of the Port Macquarie Koala Hospital told Reuters. “It’s terrible, it’s absolutely devastating. It’s a national tragedy.” Ashton said seven rescuers on Thursday attempted to enter the worst affected areas but were advised to leave as strong winds stoked fears of the fires spreading.
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11524
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Implant procedure helps patients with sacroiliac joint pain
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This news release summarizes a recently published paper on a randomized trial of sacroiliac joint fusion (SJF) using titanium implants versus non-surgical therapy for treating sacroiliac joint dysfunction (SJD), an inflammation of the joints connecting the lower spine and pelvis. The study included 148 patients with chronic low back pain caused by SJD who were treated at 19 U.S. spine surgery clinics. While the study was funded and staffed by the manufacturers of the implant, the release doesn’t overtly hype the surgical procedure or promote the manufacturer. However, failure to point out the trial design’s potential bias and the inadequate discussion of harms were weaknesses, according to our reviewers. Chronic low back pain is a common cause of disability in the United States and available treatments have not been associated with a cure or even major long-term relief for most individuals. Attempts to identify specific causes of the pain have also met with limited success. One potential pain generator is the sacroiliac joint (SIJ). In recent years, considerable research has helped identify those patients with chronic low back pain due to the SIJ and then to offer treatments. Few high quality studies have compared treatments for patients thought to have pain due to the SIJ. SJF is becoming a widely used treatment for a condition that poses chronic pain and disability in its sufferers. A minimally invasive treatment for SJD that has a reasonable success rate and is safe is desirable as a treatment option.
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mixture
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Journal news release,medical devices,Pain management
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The release doesn’t discuss costs for the implant procedure. Although “minimally invasive,” surgical treatment options can still run into tens of thousands of dollars. Not all insurance providers cover SJF procedures. Some cover it for certain conditions but not others. The procedure was recently approved for coverage by Medicare and by Medicaid in some states. The release cited the primary outcome of the implant procedure in terms of an absolute percentage. Using reduction in pain and absence of complications at 6 months as the primary outcome, “treatment was rated successful in 81 percent of subjects assigned to the SIJ implant procedure, compared to 26 percent with nonsurgical treatment,” according to the release. In addition, the average pain score decreased to 30 in the surgical group versus 72 in the nonsurgical group. “Seventy-three percent of subjects undergoing the implant procedure had “clinically significant” reduction in disability scores, compared to just 14 percent in the nonsurgical group.” We thought that the release’s implication that it is easy to figure out who has chronic pain due to SI joint inflammation was inadequate. In practice, it is very difficult to diagnose patients with sacroiliitis and it’s often mistaken for other types of back pain, as the study itself indicates. Some harms are mentioned but in insufficient detail. The published study cites a small number of serious complications. Although the adverse events are rare, they should still be mentioned. The most common side effects among those receiving the procedure were leg and pelvic pain within the first year, according to the study. We thought the release should have explained why there were twice as many patients in the surgical group compared to the group receiving non-surgical treatment. Normally, a randomized trial aims to have equal numbers in each group. The release would have benefited from mentioning this was an unblinded study and thus subject to observer bias, among other types of bias. The published study stated that “At baseline, 67.6% and 63% of SIJ fusion and NSM [non-surgical management] subjects were taking opioid analgesics for SIJ or lower back pain. By month 6, the proportions were 58.4% and 0.5%, representing a 9% decrease in use for the fusion group and a 7.5% increase in the NSM group (P = .08). ” Although surgical patients were said in the release to have dramatic improvement at 6 months post-surgery, according to the published study, only 9% had stopped using opiate pain medicines. In addition, almost all non-surgical patients crossed over to surgery after 6 months, again suggesting that there may be a strong bias towards surgery. All this said, we thought the release deserved a satisfactory for its presentation of the evidence. The release adequately disclosed some trial limitations, notably that there was a lack of long-term outcomes in the nonsurgical group due to the high crossover rate and that future analysis will look at two-year follow-up CT scans and the cost-effectiveness comparison of SIJ fusion versus nonsurgical treatment. The release does not engage in disease mongering. The news release states early on that the research was funded by the company that makes the titanium implant but doesn’t mention that the researchers were either employees or consultants to the company. At a minimum, the release should state what sort of financial relationship the authors had with the company. The release lists alternative therapies for SJD which include “physical therapy, steroid injections and/or radiofrequency ablation of sacral nerve root lateral branches” as well as the therapy compared in the trial. Because the study involved 19 U.S. sites we know there are a number of medical institutions capable of performing the implant. In addition, the release states that the procedure is FDA approved. The release identifies the study as the first randomized trial of a surgical procedure versus conservative,non-surgical care for SIJ dysfunction. There were several instances of careless language in the release including the phrases: “clinically and statistically important” improvements in clinical outcomes for patients and “profound differences” between the surgical and nonsurgical groups. “Profound” is in the category of “breathtaking” and is inappropriate in a news release. In addition, the claim that the procedure “Produces significant and lasting improvements in pain, disability, and quality of life” is not justified. Even the study authors acknowledged that it is unclear how these improvements will look in the long term.
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37836
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"A chart titled ""Major Events in USA History that Cause Major Death Tolls and 2019 Data"" provides figures about COVID-19 deaths that are accurate as of May 23 2020."
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‘Major Events in USA History that Cause Major Death Tolls’ COVID-19 Chart
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mixture
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Fact Checks, Viral Content
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In late May 2020, the following chart (attributed to a user named Mario Hardy) began circulating on Facebook, awkwardly titled “Major Events in USA History that Cause Major Death Tolls and 2019 Data”:“Major Events in USA History that Cause Major Death Tolls and 2019 Data” Chart and Similar ContentAt the bottom of the chart, text read “as of May 23, 2020 10:00 PM by Mario Hardy.” It contained three headings (“event,” “total deaths,” and “time [length]”), and nineteen lines for major historical events and their purported mortality numbers in the United States. In the name, death toll, and duration format above, those events were listed as:Previous and similar purported death toll statistics circulated via Twitter in early April and mid-May 2020:Estimated American deaths:Civil War: 655,000WWI: 117,000WWII: 405,400Korean War: 36,500Vietnam War: 58,2209/11- 2,996Covid-19 Pandemic: ~100,000-240,000Just to put things in perspective. This is serious…Stay Home! #USA #COVIDー19— B. Ellerbrock (@bbrock13) April 1, 2020American deaths in:419,400: World War II365,000: Civil War (USA)116,708: World War I95,021: COVID-19 Pandemic [We are here]58,318: Vietnam War36,574: Korean War15,000: War of 18124,496: Iraq War2,977: 9/11 Attacks1,836: Hurricane Katrina146: Desert Storm4: Benghazi pic.twitter.com/KrgC49MCOK— MPS, Esq. (@mpsever) May 21, 2020Although the chart was credited to a “Mario Hardy,” it seemed largely to appear in individual user posts rather than from any centralized post or site. If an individual by that name had originally posted the chart, we were unable to find it.Text at the bottom of the chart also indicated that it was either created on or intended to be accurate as of 10 PM on May 23 2020. That said, the entries on the list were a mixed bag of fixed events in United States and world history (such as World Wars I and II), and individual yearly death statistics for random causes (automobile accidents, gun violence, or flu) in the years 2018 and 2019.97,414 American Deaths Due to COVID-19Based on information in the image, the COVID-19 death toll statistic was intended to be a snapshot in time — marked the evening of May 23 2020. The same precise number (97,414) appeared in a very popular tweet published at 11:18 PM on the same date:Current US death toll: 97,414Incubation period: 2-14 daysLake of the Ozarks, Missouri – today 👇#COVIDー19pic.twitter.com/3Kn8U4g8Gv— Tom Folan, MD 🌶 (@tomfolanmd) May 24, 2020That tweet made reference to widely reported crowds at the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri. One of the viral images was captured in Twitter Moments:Despite the state of Missouri’s social distancing guidelines, images are emerging of at least one packed venue in the Lake of the Ozarks.https://t.co/zkOlJdGHv6— Twitter Moments (@TwitterMoments) May 24, 2020Purported War Deaths on the ChartWe attempted to verify the “war deaths” claims, and noticed that in late April 2020, National Geographic had contrasted the number of COVID-19 deaths in the United States at that time with death tolls for various wars. However, the numbers at which the magazine arrived were not really in line with the numbers on the chart:Some of the numbers varied tremendously from those presented in the chart, such as World War II at 291,557 (versus 405,399), World War I at 53,402 (versus 115,516), and the Civil War at 498,332 (versus 655,000+). Figures for the Vietnam War and Korean War were more in line with those in the chart.The Department of Veterans’ Affairs hosted a document simply titled “America’s Wars” [PDF], and it provided figures similar to those of National Geographic, although they were broken down differently:And so on. A rough estimate of Civil War deaths combined added up to the 498,000 figure provided by National Geographic, not 655,000+ as the chart suggested. It was unclear from where or by whom the figures were derived, but many of them appeared to be off by a significant number.Verifying the 97,414 COVID-19 Deaths in the U.S. StatisticThe only reference we could find that mentioned precisely 97,414 COVID-19 deaths in the United States was in the tweet embedded above; resources providing the exact number of deaths due to COVID-19 typically updated constantly, and as a result did not include easy access to prior days’ numbers.As of May 26 2020, the widely-referenced COVID-19 Dashboard by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University (JHU) listed the total American death toll of COVID-19 to be a very similar 98,787. A contemporaneous report by NBC News placed the death toll at just over 100,000:One hundred thousand coronavirus deaths in the U.S. is the low estimate [as of May 26 2020].That figure is the bottom end of the White House’s best-picture scenario of 100,000 to 240,000 deaths, which had predicted that the U.S. will hit a peak death rate of more than 2,000 deaths a day in mid-April [2020]Already, the death toll in the U.S. has eclipsed those of every other country.ConclusionAlthough the chart attributed to Mario Hardy (“Major Events in USA History that Cause Major Death Tolls and 2019 Data”) was roughly accurate in terms of COVID-19 deaths in the United States (hovering at approximately 100,000 as of May 26 2020), some of its other base data didn’t match information on death tolls for various wars. The chart cited no sources, and the only 97,414 figure we located was in a similarly popular — and similarly sourceless — tweet published at around the same time the chart began spreading. It was certainly true the COVID-19 death toll in the United States eclipsed the death toll for various wars, but the balance of information was not aligned with any statistics we could find for battle and theater deaths in wartime.Comments
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23572
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McCain opposed the border fence.
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Hayworth claims McCain opposed the border fence
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false
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Immigration, National, Message Machine 2010, J.D. Hayworth,
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"As the U.S. Senate race in Arizona heats up, the TV ads are getting more and more brutal. In its latest ad, J.D. Hayworth's campaign attacks Sen. John McCain for alleged opposition to constructing a fence on the U.S.-Mexico border. The ad begins with a narrator announcing that ""McCain lies...again."" Then, over the course of several slides, it says that ""McCain wrote the Amnesty Bill ... opposed the border fence,"" and supported ""Social Security and Medicare benefits for illegals."" In this item, we'll be checking the claim that McCain opposed the border fence. The ad cites McCain's vote on an amendment to the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act of 2007. Introduced by Sen. Jeff Sessions, an Alabama Republican, it would have provided an additional $1.8 billion to ""construct double-layered fencing and vehicle barriers along the southwest border."" It also called for offsetting increased funding for the fence ""by reducing all other discretionary amounts on a prorata basis."" We checked Senate voting records and found that McCain voted against the amendment. He was joined by several other Republican lawmakers, and the amendment was rejected. Still, it is a gross exaggeration to make the leap that voting ""nay"" on a single amendment translates into opposing the construction of a fence on the border. McCain voted for the final version of the bill signed into law by President George W. Bush on Oct. 4, 2006. ""The bill I sign helps us address one of the central issues facing all states, but particularly a state like Arizona, and that's illegal immigration. I understand full well that illegal immigration puts pressure on the public schools and hospitals. It strains state and local budgets. In some communities, it increases crime. The administration and Congress have been taking decisive steps to address this issue,"" Bush said before signing the bill. According to the president's remarks, the legislation appropriated $1.2 billion for strengthening the border. More specifically, it provided funding for more border fencing, vehicle barriers, and ""cutting-edge technology"" such as ground-based radar, infrared cameras and advanced sensors. Even more telling, however, is what happened three weeks later. On Oct. 26, 2006, President Bush signed The Secure Fence Act of of 2006. This separate legislation, which had solid Republican support, authorized the construction of a 700-mile, double-layered fence on the U.S.-Mexico border. McCain not only voted for the bill, but the New York Times referred to him as one of the ""Republican architects"" of the legislation. That's hard to square with the anti-border enforcement candidate that Hayworth's ad describes. (We first learned about the New York Times article, along with a few other sources which we double-checked, from our friends over at FactCheck.org) Why did so many Republicans, including McCain, vote against an amendment to increase funding for the fence construction? According to Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., who also voted ""nay"" on the amendment, the extra funding would have been offset with cuts elsewhere in the bill, which would have meant not being able to hire 750 new border-patrol agents. Hayworth's ad claims that McCain opposed the border fence. As ""proof,"" Hayworth cited McCain's vote on an amendment that would have provided increased funding for the construction of a double-layered fence on the U.S.-Mexico border. What the ad conveniently left out, however, is that McCain voted for the final bill, which provided $1.2 billion for strengthening the border. It also ignored McCain's key role in securing the passage of The Secure Fence Act of 2006, which authorized construction of a 700-mile fence on the border. Finally, it neglected to mention that the defeated amendment would have been paid for with cuts from other parts of the 2007 Homeland Security appropriations bill. Republican leaders -- who voted with McCain -- say that adopting the amendment would have resulted in cutbacks in hiring new border patrol agents. The ad is technically right that McCain voted against additional funding at one point. Still, we found that the claim is a gross exaggeration, so"
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5934
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Zanzibar tests drones spraying rice fields to fight malaria.
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For the first time drones are being tested to help fight malaria on the island of Zanzibar, off the coast of Tanzania.
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true
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Health, Africa, General News, Tanzania, Malaria
|
The drones will spray a silicone-based liquid on rice paddies, where there are large expanses of stagnant water where malaria-carrying mosquitoes lay their eggs. The substance will spread across the water and prevent the eggs from hatching. It is hoped this will significantly reduce the numbers of the malaria-carrying anopheles mosquitoes in the area. The spraying by drones is a test to see if it will help the government of Zanzibar reach its goal of eliminating malaria on the archipelago by 2023, according to the strategic plan adopted by Zanzibar Malaria Elimination Program. The drone spraying is a relatively inexpensive way to stop the mosquitoes from reproducing, said Bart Knols, a medical entomologist and lead researcher of the program. “We are getting to the bottom of it as we will spray the breeding grounds of mosquitoes,” said Knols, who is with the Dutch Malaria Foundation. The drone will spray Aquatain, a liquid gel that will spread over a section of water and kill mosquitoes’ larvae, said Knols. The substance has been tested internationally and has been found to be harmless to non-target organisms, non-toxic and biodegradable. In the initial test, in the Cheju area of southern Zanzibar, the drone flew over and sprayed the shallow, sunlit water bodies in the rice paddies teeming with mosquito larvae, which were trapped as the gel spread across the water. Without the gel, the larvae would have emerged as adult mosquitoes in search of a blood meal. When those mosquitoes bite humans infected with malaria, they become vectors for the disease and continue its deadly transmission cycle. Along the Indian Ocean coast of East Africa, Zanzibar and mainland Tanzania have had a long, well-documented battle with malaria. In the last 10 years, Zanzibar, with a population of 1.2 million people, has embarked on different methods of fighting malaria. Thousands of mosquito nets have been distributed to put over beds and insecticide was supplied to spray in homes. The campaigns have succeeded in decreasing the disease’s prevalence. Some areas of Zanzibar have seen the prevalence of malaria drop from 40% of the population to less than 10%, according to the malaria elimination program. The spraying by drones is a new part of the strategy. The use of drones will be essential to efficiently spraying the large rice fields, which have been identified as malaria hot spots on Zanzibar. The drone is efficient because spraying by hand is very time consuming and using a helicopter is too expensive, said Eduardo Rodriguez of DJI, a Chinese drone manufacturer. With the help of drone pilots from the State University of Zanzibar, the DJI Agras drone is being tested to spray the rice paddies. “The ultimate vision of our fight against malaria is to bring malaria down to zero in year 2023 as our target,“said Abdullah Suleiman Ali, manager of the Zanzibar Malaria Elimination Program. ___ Follow Africa news at https://twitter.com/AP_Africa
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3494
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Psych hospital’s financial woes won’t stop services, for now.
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Officials at Vermont’s largest private psychiatric hospital said Monday they are dedicated to providing quality mental health care to patients amid the possibility of the facility shuttering or being forced into a sale.
|
true
|
Health, General News, Brattleboro, Mental health, Vermont
|
Brattleboro Retreat Board Chair Elizabeth Catlin said the organization is ready to work “with all willing partners” to help it achieve financial stability. The board began considering its options last week when the state of Vermont rejected a $2 million request for additional funding. “In recent years, the Brattleboro Retreat’s board and its management team have taken a number of creative, cost-conscious steps to reshape and modernize hospital operations while meeting the rising tide of soaring labor costs,” said Catlin’s statement. “The Brattleboro Retreat’s quality of care, even with these financial pressures, continues to be excellent.” The facility serves more than half the people in Vermont who need psychiatric care and provides all of the child and adolescent psychiatric care in the state. It also provides addiction services including inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation, and treatment services for those who get Suboxone, a prescription medication used to treat opioid addictions. If it closes, the letter said that would mean finding services for 2,500 inpatients annually as well as filling new gaps for Suboxone treatment services, residential programs for children and meeting other critical health needs. On Sunday, Vermont Human Services Secretary Michael Smith said he had rejected a request for an additional $2 million in funding from the retreat. That request would be added to a financial package valued at an estimated $16 million for new beds and a recent rate increase valued at an estimated $3.5 million per year. Smith said he rejected the request in part because he believes it would constitute a taxpayer bailout of financial miscalculations by Brattleboro Retreat’s management. But Josephson said the state wasn’t paying it enough to care for the patients the state wants cared for. On Friday, Josephson sent a letter Friday to Smith and Gov. Phil Scott, a Republican, that said the facility cannot continue operating without more support from the state. He said the board had authorized him to begin planning for the sale or closure of the retreat “in the very near future.”
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10234
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IUD Proposed to Treat Uterine Cancer
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This story carefully reports on these results, with appropriate caveats that emphasize the small size of the study, the preliminary nature of the results and narrow patient population (those with pre-cancerous lesions or early-stage cancer). It quotes several independent experts and discloses potential conflict of interest. The story could have been improved by mentioning the cost of the IUD and insurance coverage. The progestin-containing IUD (brand name Mirena) is a highly effective, well-tolerated form of birth control. Pathology studies have also shown that the IUD can cause reversal of cellular changes, known as hyperplasia, in the lining of the uterus (enodmetrium) that could later lead to certain kinds of endometrial cancer.Oral progestins are an established treatment for endometrial hyperplasia and have also been used in some cases of endometrial cancer in younger women. Targeting progesterone release directly to the uterine lining through the IUD presents a potential advance in effectiveness and tolerability of treatment, while preserving fertility. The primary treatment for endometrial cancer is hysterectomy, or surgical removal of the uterus. However, for some women, particularly younger women who wish to preserve their fertility, the idea of a non-surgical alternative, is welcome news. A small study was published in this week’s Annals of Oncology followed 20 women with hyperplasia and 14 women with early-stage endometrial cancer who had a progestin-IUD implanted. Almost all (95%) of those with hyperplasia experienced reversal, while about half (57%) of those with early-stage endometrial cancer did.
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true
|
"The story does not mention any costs of the IUD or other treatments. The story quantifies the benefits of the progestin IUD in several ways. The story accurately notes that the study reported no adverse effects. The study’s authors reported only on adverse effects that were sufficient to require suspension of treatment. The story provides important details about the current study that help the reader evaluate the strength of the evidence. It even emphasizes that the new treatment approach is ""still uNPRoven"". The story does not exaggerate the seriousness or prevalence of uterine cancer and is clear to point out that this treatment is only appropriate for a small subset of cases. The story quotes several independent experts and notes that none had a conflict of interest. The story compares the progestin IUD with systemic hormones and hysterectomy The progestin IUD is clearly available. The story clearly states that the Mirena IUD is not a new idea, but using it to treat early-stage endometrial cancer is relatively novel. Because the story quotes several independent experts, the reader can assume that the story did not rely on a press release as the sole source of information."
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