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4246	Pennsylvania families demand investigation into rare cancers.	The families of young people diagnosed with a rare childhood cancer confronted Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf on Monday over what they called his administration’s insufficient response to a health crisis they blame on pollution from the shale gas industry.	true	U.S. News, Cancer, Hydraulic fracturing, Health, General News, Pennsylvania, Tom Wolf, Childhood cancer, Pollution	Dozens of children and young adults have been diagnosed with Ewing sarcoma and other forms of cancer in a four-county region of southwestern Pennsylvania where energy companies have drilled more than 3,500 wells since 2008. An investigation by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette this year identified six Ewing cases in a single school district. The cause of Ewing sarcoma is unknown, and there’s been no evidence linking the Pennsylvania cases to drilling and hydraulic fracturing, the method that energy companies use to extract natural gas from shale rock. The American Cancer Society says there are “no known lifestyle-related or environmental causes” of Ewing, a rare bone cancer that’s diagnosed in about 200 children and teens across the U.S. each year. But the families, joined by anti-drilling activists, demanded that Wolf launch an environmental investigation into the cancers that have devastated their loved ones. “I want answers, and I want answers now. Give us the truth,” said Carla Marratto Cumming, whose 19-year-old brother, Luke Blanock, died of Ewing sarcoma in 2016. “What’s going on is killing our families, and it’s not OK.” The region’s lawmakers recently secured a $100,000 state grant for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center to perform genetic testing of Ewing patients, but the families said it’s not enough. They gave Wolf an earful when he met with them in the hallway outside his office at the Capitol on Monday. Luke Blanock’s mother, Janice, invited Wolf to go on a tour of fracking sites “to see exactly how fracking is wreaking havoc on our kids, families, our homes, everything.” Breaking down, she continued: “You have to see it in person. You can’t even understand what we’ve gone through.” Wolf promised to make the childhood cancers a priority and said his health department is looking into the possibility of additional research. In a statement, his spokesman said the potential research would “explore possible effects of natural resource extraction, especially regarding these rare childhood cancers. It is imperative that we more thoroughly research and advance the science on the health effects of fracking by building upon previous research and investigating the concern that there is a relationship between fracking and childhood cancers.” A Pennsylvania Department of Health investigation earlier this year did not confirm a cancer cluster in the region, a finding that was met with skepticism by activists who say the agency failed to include some cases in its study. Gas industry officials, meanwhile, called for an “objective, rigorous and science-based approach” to “these complicated and heartbreaking health matters.” “While some continue to sensationalize tragedy, there’s absolutely no credible link between natural gas-related activities — which are strongly regulated — and instances of rare childhood cancers,” said David Spigelmyer, president of the Marcellus Shale Coalition.
10171	Magnets Might Boost Stem Cell Therapy	"We don’t review stories on animal research unless they make a claim that leaps into the realm of human application. This story did that when it quoted one of the researchers saying ""This remarkably simple method could easily be coupled with current stem cell treatments to enhance their effectiveness."" Since the source of the story was a medical center news release and since the researchers ""are founders of a company that has filed patents for the techniques,"" we would expect a story to apply more scrutiny to these claims. A recent analysis concluded that ""Published animal trials overestimate by about 30% the likelihood that a treatment works because negative results often go unpublished."" But overestimates of efficacy may also come when your only source is a medical center news release and your only quotes come from someone who stands to gain financially from promotion of an approach."	false		"Not applicable due to very early stage of research. We weren’t told how many times the approach was tested, in how many rats. No discussion of even potential harms – just how ""remarkably simple"" it could be to enhance treatment effectiveness. Not one word on how huge the leap may be from ""toy magnet"" research in rats to human application. Yet the story allowed the conflicted researchers to say, unchallenged, ""This remarkably simple method could easily be coupled with current stem cell treatments to enhance their effectiveness."" Not applicable – no meaningful discussion of heart damage in humans. The source is a medical center news release. And the quotes, from that news release, are from a researcher who is ""founder of a company that has filed patents for the techniques,"" according to the story. So, while, that conflict was disclosed, there is no independent perspective in the story. That’s unsatisfactory in our view. No such comparison. No context given on other related stem cell research. The story barely implied that there is still work to be done before this is available for people. Barely satisfactory. No context given on other research to enhance cardiac stem cell interventions. The story states that its source is a Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute news release. There’s no sign of independent reporting or vetting of the claims."
18498	Well over 90 percent of felony cases, all over the nation, are committed by defendants who grew up in father-absent households.	The data we found supports Duncan’s impression that growing up in a fatherless home is one of the factors that contributes to eventual incarceration. But the quantitative research does not show the near-certain link between felonies and fatherlessness that Duncan portrays.	false	National, Children, Families, Legal Issues, Crime, John Duncan,	"A reader recently sent us a letter he received from his congressman, Rep. John Duncan Jr., R-Tenn., asking us to check a surprising claim. ""Well over 90 percent of felony cases, all over the nation, are committed by defendants who grew up in father-absent households,"" Duncan wrote. Patrick Newton, a spokesman for Duncan, said the letter was based on the congressman's ""knowledge obtained from nearly eight years as a criminal court judge dealing with mostly felony cases."" The spokesman went on to say that on Duncan’s first day as a criminal court judge in Knoxville, Tenn., chief probation counselor Gary Tullock told him it was actually 98 percent, a figure Duncan lowered slightly in his letter. ""Mr. Duncan then went on to preside over 10,000 cases in nearly eight years,"" the spokesman said. ""In each case, he was given a report or information on the defendant’s background. Congressman Duncan says in well more than 90 percent of cases, the defendant was described as being from either a ‘fatherless home’ or a ‘broken home.’ He found Mr. Tullock’s comment to be true through his own experience as a judge, and he fully stands by his remark."" We should point out, however, that Tullock’s claim is based on data roughly 35 years old, while Duncan’s observations from his tenure as a judge are now a quarter-century old. That is inconsistent with Duncan’s use of the present-tense ""are committed"" in the constituent letter. In addition, even if these numbers were true for Knoxville, the statistics wouldn’t reflect conditions ""all over the nation,"" as Duncan said in the letter. And of course, PolitiFact always prefers to deal in hard data. So we took a look at the available research. The few studies that address this question aren’t a perfect match to Duncan’s wording, because the data we have often addresses individuals who are in jail or prison, rather than people who are facing a ""felony case."" Still, the data is close enough for us to make an educated assessment. First, we looked at data from the Survey of Inmates in Local Jails, a sample of 7,000 inmates by the U.S. Justice Department. In 1996, almost 40 percent of the sampled inmates had lived with both parents, with just over 60 percent of inmates saying they grew up with only one parent, with grandparents or in another arrangement. The numbers were similar in 2002 -- 44 percent growing up with both parents and 56 percent growing up in other situations. These numbers suggest that there’s a strong link between growing up in a non-two-parent household and becoming an inmate, but at rates well below the 90 percent Duncan cited. Second, we looked at data from the Justice Department’s Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correctional Facilities. The 2004 survey asked inmates who were parents themselves about what kind of family arrangements they had while while growing up. In state prisons, 43 percent of the inmates said they grew up with both parents, while 57 percent said they grew up in other arrangements. The data was similar for federal prisons -- 45 percent with both parents and 55 percent in other arrangements. Once again, this suggests rates lower than 90 percent Finally, we looked at a study co-authored by Cynthia C. Harper of the University of California at San Francisco and Sara McLanahan, a professor at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs who has authored a wide range of studies about disadvantaged Americans. They found that once you control for other factors, such as family income, a child growing up in a mother-only household was almost twice as likely as a child growing up in a mother-father household to end up incarcerated. That would put the percentage somewhere around 60 percent, which is broadly in line with the other studies. Sixty percent is a significant number, but it is not as great as the 90 percent figure Duncan cited. When we contacted McLanahan, she said she was skeptical that the 90 percent figure was accurate. ""I cannot think of any data that would give this information,"" she said. Dewey Cornell, a clinical psychologist and professor of education at the University of Virginia, said that even if Duncan’s statistic were true, ""it would be misleading and incomplete,"" because it does not address how many people grew up in father-absent households and did not commit felonies. ""We could point out that 99 percent of felony offenders drank milk as a child, too, but it is easy to see the fallacy here because we have no preconceptions about milk the way we do about father absence,"" he said. ""Father absence is surely an important concern, but it is only one of a number of risk factors for felony criminal behavior."" Our ruling The data we found supports Duncan’s impression that growing up in a fatherless home is one of the factors that contributes to eventual incarceration. But the quantitative research does not show the near-certain link between felonies and fatherlessness that Duncan portrays."
26629	“I’ve passed more bills than Sen. Larson has, because ... he hasn’t passed any.”	Crowley uses a narrow definition of bill authorship to say he has passed one bill and Larson none. But his claim didn’t specify such a strict criteria, and the state already has an official standard for who is considered an author. Under the state definition, both Democratic lawmakers have passed three bills	false	Wisconsin, David Crowley,	"The coronavirus is affecting nearly all aspects of our lives, but the wheels of democracy grind on. Milwaukee County voters will still (at this point) be tasked April 7, 2020 with choosing a new county executive — and state Rep. David Crowley says voters should factor in how effective he and state Sen. Chris Larson have been as lawmakers. In a March 11, 2020, debate on WISN-TV, both Milwaukee Democrats were asked what sets them apart from their opponent. Crowley said this: ""The biggest difference is that I’ve actually been able to be effective in the state Legislature,"" he said. ""I’ve passed more bills than Sen. Larson has, because if I’m not mistaken he hasn’t passed any."" Is he right? It turns out that – just like deciding whether Minnesota or Wisconsin has the most lakes — it’s all about how you define the term. Bills passed is an interesting place for Crowley to plant his political flag, given that neither he nor Larson has been exactly prolific. Larson has been in office since 2011, and Crowley since 2017. Both the Assembly and Senate have been under Republican control since 2011, meaning slim odds for bills from Crowley, Larson or any other Democrat. Spokesman Garren Randolph said Crowley’s claim referred to bills signed into law on which the legislators were the ""lead author."" Bills can originate in either the Assembly or the Senate, and they must have at least one author or sponsor in each chamber. Other lawmakers in favor of the legislation can also sign on as coauthors or cosponsors. Crowley here is referring to only the first author in the originating house. By that tally, Crowley comes out ahead: 1-0. He was the lead sponsor on a bill enacted in April 2018 that provided a $210,000 grant for a nonprofit organization to set up a website and phone system to provide referrals for community-based services and crisis intervention. It passed unanimously in both chambers. The grant continued an existing program administered by 2-1-1 Wisconsin. So it didn’t create anything new — but it was a bill, and it was authored by Crowley, and it passed. Larson, indeed, has not been the lead author on any bills passed into law. But Crowley’s definition is narrower than the authorship criteria used by the state. The nonpartisan Legislative Reference Bureau maintains an ""author index"" of all legislation. The bureau’s requirement for authorship is established by a Joint Rule of the Legislature. It says lawmakers are listed as the author if they are one of the first two authors in the originating house or the first cosponsor in the other house. By that criteria, both Crowley and Larson have passed three bills into law, according to the author indexes from the 2019, 2017, 2015, 2013 and 2011 sessions. Here those bills are with their official description: Crowley AB779 — the referral grant referenced above (2017 session) AB780 — Relating to notice to a school of a permanency review or hearing, notice to a school district of a foster home or group home license or out-of-home care placement, and transfer of pupil records (2017) SB99— Relating to venue requirements for domestic abuse, child abuse, and harassment cases (2017) Larson SB700 — Relating to creating a fee schedule for certain laboratories (2019) SB99 — Relating to designating and marking the Richard A. Grobschmidt Memorial Bridge (2017) SB512 — Relating to deposits on the sale of certain lead acid batteries (2013) Crowley claimed he has ""passed more bills than Sen. Larson has, because ... he hasn’t passed any."" Crowley’ staff leaned on a narrow definition of authorship — only the first author in the chamber where the bill originated. If we consider authorship as being the person primarily responsible for a bill, Crowley has a point. But his claim didn’t specify such a strict definition, and he’s referring to a subject where the state already has an official definition. Under the state standard, both Crowley and Larson have passed three bills."
10712	Rush is First to Use Microburst Vagus Nerve Stimulation for Drug-Resistant Epilepsy	The headline, lede and much of the text of this news release from Rush University Medical Center appear to describe the “first” availability of a “new” electronic device treatment for drug-resistant seizure disorders, but in fact the release is a veiled marketing and clinical trial recruitment document that has the potential to significantly mislead readers. Medical centers, particularly those that participate in multi-center phase 1 trials (the exact case here) must often compete to fill their trial quotas by getting the word out to the general public as well as to referring physicians and specialty clinic staff. We can sympathize with the need. But this release, for the greater part, suggests the microburst vagus nerve stimulator may already be a proven therapy — at least at Rush — for so-called “refractory” epilepsy, when in fact a quick trip to ClinicalTrials.gov points out that it’s a Phase 1 “feasibility” trial to evaluate the “initial safety and effectiveness” of the technology, one derived from earlier versions of electrical brain stimulating devices. Moreover, although it is technically true that Rush recruited the first patient into the national trial, the emphasis put on the institution’s claim to be the “first” to use it, belies the fact that this is a multi-center trial in which 60 patients at 15 different United States medical centers are participants in the same time frame. Finally, the legitimate news here — that Rush is among 15 medical centers to participate in a study to see if this technology is safe and effective for intractable seizure patients — is missing most of the information people with epilepsy need to see if they might qualify. All in all, this release misses its marks. A significant percentage of children and adults with particular types of chronic seizure don’t respond — or stop responding — to medications designed to stop or limit their seizures. Vagal nerve stimulators, which stimulate a select area of he brain with electrical impulses, have been used along with medications to help control seizures for nearly 20 years. But the stimulators have limitations and side effects, leading researchers to develop a newer experimental version that uses “microbursts” in a more programmable and targeted way. The newer version may or may not benefit patients compared to older versions and a combination of drug and device treatments. In addition, epilepsy is a collection of seizure disorders, and not every patient is a candidate for this type of treatment. Thus, this phase 1 trial is news, but needs to be put in cautious context until the results are in and subsequent trials demonstrate benefits or harms to particular subsets of individuals.	false	Academic medical center news release	The price of the implantable devices already on the market are available but nothing is mentioned about costs of the current or experimental therapies. While the cost of participation in the clinical trial is presumably covered by the trial, the implantation of the device in clinical practice is significant. There are no results to report since the trial is in the recruitment stage. But even when the phase 1 trial is completed it won’t be capable of supporting benefit claims since it is designed to assess safety and feasibility. There’s a disconnect between the statement that patients “may benefit” and the fact that the study hasn’t been done. Further, the current success rate of vagus nerve stimulation is in the 50% range and this information should have been included since it’s critical to anyone considering enrolling in the trial. The release notes that the new study will look at adverse events, but information about the specific harms and failure rates with current stimulator devices should have been included to help place the news of the new trial in some context for would-be recruits. Given the 25-year history of the use of vagus nerve stimulation for epilepsy, its harms are well known. There is no reason to assume that microburst will be any less traumatic than the currently available approach. At the least, the release could have explained what kind of evidence the trial is designed to collect, and what kinds of patients, more specifically, the trial centers are trying to recruit. Adults only? Children only? Medical failure history? The exclusion criteria are readily available on the government website, but not mentioned in the release. No mongering here, but not much information about prevalence of epilepsy, either. The news release doesn’t mention that the clinical trial is sponsored by the commercial maker of the electrical stimulating device, a serious omission. The release mentions the availability of electrical stimulators for epilepsy but neglects to note the ongoing research into non-invasive approaches to trigeminal nerve stimulation for epilepsy. The release describes a clinical trial and not a clinically available device. It could have been much more clear that the device is not a “done deal” instead of implying that the new device is already available, as it does in the first sentence: “Epilepsy patients who have not responded to standard drug treatments may benefit from a new therapy…” The release never really makes clear in what way the “microburst” feature is thought to be a better therapy than the electrical pulses used in the conventional stimulator. It just re-states that the study is designed to help more patients with drug resistant seizures. In other words, the mechanism by which the microburst feature might be better is not described in any comparative detail. As noted above, the lede and headline, along with a good part of the text, overstates the status of the device as a clinical tool, and under-reports the details of the clinical trial that is still recruiting patients. It turns out that Rush was the first to recruit a patient into the study, in February, but saying the institution was the “first to provide the treatment” is misleading. The lede states that patients “may benefit” from the new device and suggests that Rush is the first (and seemingly only) medical enter to have it to offer. Readers don’t learn that 14 other sites will participate in the trial until one of the last few paragraphs.
15065	"Planned Parenthood has ""now (been) found to also illegally sell baby parts."	"Stemberger said Planned Parenthood has ""now (been) found to also illegally sell baby parts."" Videos from the Center for Medical Progress have led to lots of debate among activists and politicians, but federal law allows for fetal tissue donations to researchers. Abortion providers also are allowed to charge a fee for facilitating those donations. At any rate, the Florida affiliates are not participating in these types of transactions. Stemberger’s letter makes it sound as if Planned Parenthood had been proven guilty of a crime, which is not accurate. He also made a host of other accusations against the Florida organization for which we can’t find evidence."	false	Abortion, Florida, John Stemberger,	"An Orlando-based conservative Christian group has called on Gov. Rick Scott to choke off all forms of state funding for Planned Parenthood, saying the organization has broken the law and doesn’t deserve taxpayer money. In a letter dated Sept. 22, 2015, Florida Family Policy Council President John Stemberger thanked Scott for investigating state Planned Parenthood affiliates after videos showing officials discussing fetal tissue were released by the anti-abortion Center for Medical Progress this summer. But Stemberger wanted Scott to go further. Stemberger said because of what the videos show, the group should not get money through the state’s Medicaid program and Title X, a federal grant program for family planning and preventive health services. ""No organization with a record of illegal activity and abuse, now found to also illegally sell baby parts and likely altering abortion practices to do so, should receive taxpayer dollars,"" Stemberger wrote. (GOP presidential candidate and former Gov. Jeb Bush ended direct state subsidies for the group in 2001.) Planned Parenthood has been subject to hearings in the U.S. House of Representatives because of the videos, but has it been proven the organization broke the law with their fetal tissue donations? The short answer is no, but there’s no shortage of accusations. State investigation To get up to speed, part of a Center for Medical Progress video shows Deborah Nucatola, senior director of medical services at the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, telling undercover activists that fetal tissue can be obtained for fees in the $30 to $100 range. Activists against abortion rights say this is proof the group has a history of trying to ""illegally sell baby parts,"" as Stemberger’s letter said. Many critics have argued Planned Parenthood has broken the law. But there has been no legal ruling against the group. The National Institutes of Health Revitalization Act of 1993 allows a woman to consent to donating fetal tissue after an abortion. This tissue then can be donated to researchers, but allows providers to charge vaguely defined ""reasonable payments associated with the transportation, implantation, processing, preservation, quality control, or storage of human fetal tissue."" Planned Parenthood said discussions of payments were only about recouping costs, not making a profit. Experts largely agree that the fees Nucatola describes are within the scope of the law. The videos led to several congressional hearings on how Planned Parenthood uses federal funding. Planned Parenthood is a network of affiliated nonprofit organizations that cooperate with each other, led by the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Funding comes from a wide range of sources, including private donations, grants, health center revenue and Medicaid. State and federal money cannot be used for abortion services. Scott ordered the investigation into 16 Planned Parenthood health centers that provide abortion services and are operated by Florida’s two affiliated chapters. None of the state locations participate in a fetal tissue donation program. The state Agency for Health Care Administration, which ensures health centers comply with state guidelines, cited three clinics for allegedly providing second-trimester abortions without a license, violations Planned Parenthood has denied. A fourth was cited for improper recordkeeping. (Planned Parenthood has sued Florida over the investigation.) None were cited for how they handled fetal tissue. Other allegations Stemberger’s letter makes reference to the result of the Florida investigation, and also mentions a 2008 incident in which Planned Parenthood ended its affiliation with four clinics in Broward County and one in Boca Raton. The chapter running those clinics, formerly known as Planned Parenthood of South Palm Beach and Broward Counties, was mired in harassment complaints and the possible misuse of nearly $450,000, which was just less than the $500,000 it received in taxpayer funding. Florida Alliance of Planned Parenthood Affiliates Executive Director Laura Goodhue said the organization ended its affiliation with that chapter over the mismanagement. The Alliance Defending Freedom, another conservative Christian group that Stemberger said does legal research for the Florida Family Policy Council, included this incident in a report on potential fraud. It’s the only mention of Florida in the report. But Stemberger’s letter goes on to say, ""This is merely a short list of the abuses committed by Planned Parenthood in Florida, not including its stunning failure to report sexual abuse of minors, waste, abuse, and potential fraud of taxpayer dollars."" Stemberger told PolitiFact Florida that he was referring in part to accusations that clinics in other states had failed to report sexual abuse. Alliance Defending Freedom tracks abuse accusations in Arizona, Colorado, Ohio and other places. Accusations of not reporting sexual abuse also are a subject of sting videos by another group called Live Action. Planned Parenthood maintains its policy is to report all suspected instances of sexual abuse. While we found no concrete evidence of similar accusations in Florida, Stemberger said Planned Parenthood as a whole was still culpable. ""If none of these violations occurred in Florida, it still holds true,"" he said. ""There’s a commonality of practice here that ties the two together."" Both Scott’s office and Planned Parenthood have disagreed with Stemberger’s assertion that the governor could end state funding through Medicaid and Title X, saying it would be a violation of federal law. The state said about $45,000 in matching funds goes to Planned Parenthood through Medicaid, and three clinics have contracts for newborn health screening and other services. The clinics have to comply with state and federal laws. Stemberger maintained funding can be pulled if Planned Parenthood no longer qualifies as a provider. Scott’s response to Stemberger’s letter reiterated his disdain for Planned Parenthood, but didn’t offer more detail. ""We took aggressive, immediate action to investigate Planned Parenthood offices in Florida when the horrific videos were released,"" Scott said in a statement in response to the letter. ""When we found that some of their facilities were not complying with state law, we held them accountable."" As for Stemberger’s assertion of other wrongdoing, Goodhue said she didn’t have records of any other investigations besides inquiries this summer. ""We’re heavily regulated. AHCA can investigate us at any time,"" she said. Our ruling Stemberger said Planned Parenthood has ""now (been) found to also illegally sell baby parts."" Videos from the Center for Medical Progress have led to lots of debate among activists and politicians, but federal law allows for fetal tissue donations to researchers. Abortion providers also are allowed to charge a fee for facilitating those donations. At any rate, the Florida affiliates are not participating in these types of transactions. Stemberger’s letter makes it sound as if Planned Parenthood had been proven guilty of a crime, which is not accurate. He also made a host of other accusations against the Florida organization for which we can’t find evidence."
25729	Photos show Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, Gretchen Whitmer and Cory Booker violating COVID-19 safety precautions.	These photos are from before the first case of COVID-19 was identified in Michigan and before the state required people to wear face coverings. They're not from the Democratic National Convention.	false	Corrections and Updates, Facebook Fact-checks, Viral image,	"Recent Facebook posts critical of Democrats feature three photos, all showing the same celebratory scene. Standing behind a podium that says ""Biden"" and ""Michigan,"" Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, cheer, hug and hold hands all while flanked by rows of people holding their phones up to capture the moment. ""Last night at the DNC!! Hypocrites! Can we get back to living now???"" one person who shared the image wrote. ""Mask?"" another poster wrote. ""Only you SHEEP need masks! No 6ft distance or masks here! They all must be immune to covid!"" ""Not a mask in sight, Governor,"" wrote another person who shared the images. ""Tell me again why you are trying to force Michigan to wear one."" This post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) These photos aren’t from the Democratic National Convention, which is happening remotely, or from Biden and Harris’ first appearance together after the presidential nominee named her his running mate. These photos are from March 9, when the politicians gathered for a Biden campaign rally at a high school in Detroit. This was before the first case of COVID-19 was identified in Michigan, and well before the state required people to wear face coverings. Here are some relevant dates, which the Detroit Free-Press includes in its comprehensive timeline of the coronavirus in the state. On Jan. 25, three people from Michigan were tested for COVID-19 but the tests came back negative. On Jan. 29, the Detroit Metro Airport started screening people for COVID-19. On Feb. 5, a sick traveler at the airport is suspected of having COVID-19 but cleared the following day. By Feb. 25, about 325 people in Michigan were being monitored for the disease and self-isolating. There were only 34 confirmed cases in the United States at that point. On March 2, the U.S. surgeon general asks people not to stockpile masks. On March 10, the state’s department of health and human services identified the first two presumptive-positive COVID-19 cases in Michigan. Whitmer declared an emergency. On March 12, Whitmer ordered the state’s schools to close for three weeks. On March 13, President Donald Trump declared a national emergency. Whitmer issued a press release that day about a temporary ban on large gatherings and urged people to stay 5 feet away from each other in public settings. On March 16, Whitmer ordered bars, restaurants, theaters and casinos to close, and she restricted gatherings to less than 50 people. On March 23, she issued a stay-at-home order. On April 1, she declared a state disaster. On April 24, more than a month after Biden’s campaign rally, Whitmer signed an executive order requiring people to wear face coverings in enclosed public spaces. This Facebook post, though, suggests that the politicians in the photos are flouting the restrictions that the state has imposed on residents to try to stop the spread of COVID-19. In reality, the rally happened before such limitations existed. Correction: This story has been updated to reflect that Sen. Cory Booker is from New Jersey. The story initially said he was from New York."
15142	"The Iran deal ""trusts the Iranians to inspect themselves."	"Cruz said the Iran deal ""trusts the Iranians to inspect themselves."" A confidential side deal might allow Iranian staff to take photos and video and collect samples at the Parchin site yet the IAEA has generally insisted its protective protocols aren't being compromised. The Parchin uncertainty aside, Cruz didn’t offer nor did we find evidence the overall agreement trusts Iranians to inspect themselves. In contrast, his statement left the impression Iran would be conducting all inspections under the agreement by itself. That’s not so."	false	Foreign Policy, Nuclear, Texas, Ted Cruz,	"With a dash of imagined dialogue, Ted Cruz of Texas made his case for the United States not to support the agreement backed by most Democrats, including President Barack Obama, that would allow Iran to develop nuclear energy but not nuclear weapons and bring an end to longstanding economic sanctions. The Republican senator and presidential candidate told the Greater Houston Partnership on Sept. 1, 2015, that the Iran deal doesn’t lead to independent inspectors marching in. ""This deal,"" Cruz said, ""doesn’t send in American inspectors; this deal doesn’t send international inspectors. This deal trusts the Iranians to inspect themselves. Let me repeat that: This deal trusts the Iranians to inspect themself."" Cruz said as much again at the Sept. 16, 2015, GOP presidential debate in California. ""And most astonishingly,"" Cruz said, ""this agreement trusts the Iranians to inspect themselves. That makes no sense whatsoever."" In Houston, Cruz likened the self-inspection element to a scene from ""Scarface,"" the 1980 movie starring Al Pacino as Tony Montana, a Cuban immigrant intent on taking over a drug cartel. ""This is the equivalent,"" Cruz said, ""of law enforcement picking up the phone and calling Tony Montana and saying, ‘Hey Tony, you got any drugs?’ ""‘I don’t got no drugs.’ ""‘Thank you, Tony.’ ""That,"" Cruz said, ""is essentially the Iranian nuclear inspection regime."" Setting aside Cruz’s cinematic vignette, is he right the Iran deal, which the Senate fell short of rejecting in a Sept. 10, 2015, vote, trusts the Iranians to inspect themselves? Cruz’s office told us he concluded as much based on reporting by the Associated Press on a confidential ""side agreement"" about how an international agency will check conditions at a longtime Iranian military-industrial site. Spokesman Phil Novack also said by email that Cruz ""has participated in multiple intelligence briefings -- both classified and unclassified -- about this Iranian deal. Without revealing the details of those briefings, they are entirely consistent with the public reports that the so-called inspections regime simply entrusts Iran with inspecting itself."" We’ll get to more of Cruz’s backup. Longstanding safeguards First it’s worth noting international inspections of Iranian facilities date back decades. By phone, Jeffrey Lewis, publisher of armscontrolwonk.com, which presents blogs on arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation, told us that like many nations, Iran has previously committed to ""safeguards"" agreements reached with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations entity entrusted with monitoring nuclear non-proliferation commitments. The agreements confirm the IAEA’s power to check on the possible development of nuclear weapons. A 1974 agreement, for instance, gives the agency authority to monitor ""all source or special fissionable material in all peaceful nuclear activities within the territory of Iran, under its jurisdiction or carried out under its control anywhere, for the exclusive purpose of verifying that such material is not diverted to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices."" Separate from that, Lewis said, the UN agency maintains confidential agreements with the many nations it monitors, including, he said, details on where cameras might be placed inside specific facilities. Typically, the IAEA says, its negotiated safeguards exist to ""to deter the spread of nuclear weapons by early detection of misuse of nuclear material or technology, thereby providing credible assurances that states are honoring their legal obligations. The IAEA plays a crucial independent verification role,"" it says, ""aimed at assuring the international community that nuclear material, facilities and other items subject to safeguards are used only for peaceful purposes. A 24-page agency safeguards booklet, dated June 2015, notes the agency won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005. The booklet calls the safeguards a ""set of technical measures that allow the IAEA to independently verify a state’s legal commitment not to divert nuclear material from peaceful nuclear activities to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices."" Some 182 countries have safeguards agreements, the booklet says. ""Nuclear material subject to safeguards includes special fissionable material from which nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices could readily be made (e.g. plutonium-239; uranium-233; uranium enriched in the isotopes 235 or 233) and source material (e.g. natural uranium, depleted uranium or thorium), which cannot be directly used for nuclear weapons,"" the booklet says. But there’s room for suspicion. We noticed a passage suggesting the agency earlier caught Iran not complying with its oversight--and that was addressed: In 2002, information came to light regarding previously undeclared nuclear material and activities that the Islamic Republic of Iran (Iran) should have declared but had not declared to the IAEA. At time of writing, while the IAEA continues to verify the non-diversion of declared nuclear material at the nuclear facilities and LOFs declared by Iran under its Safeguards Agreement, the IAEA is not in a position to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities. In November 2013, the IAEA and Iran agreed on a Framework for Cooperation, within which verification activities are being implemented by the IAEA to resolve all present and past issues. The 2015 agreement The July 14, 2015, agreement, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, was negotiated with Iran by world powers including the United States and Russia. And far as we can tell, it’s silent about Iran getting to inspect its own facilities. Per the agreement, the IAEA will have Iran’s permission for 15 years to ""implement continuous monitoring, including through containment and surveillance measures, as necessary, to verify that stored centrifuges and infrastructure remain in storage, and are only used to replace failed or damaged centrifuges."" A section in the nearly 160-page deal on modern technologies and the IAEA’s long-term presence states Iran will permit the agency to use equipment that relays changes in nuclear enrichment to IAEA inspectors plus other technologies. Also, the agreement says, Iran will facilitate automated collections of measurements from nuclear sites. That section goes on: Iran will make the necessary arrangements to allow for a long-term IAEA presence, including issuing long-term visas, as well as providing proper working space at nuclear sites and, with best efforts, at locations near nuclear sites in Iran for the designated IAEA inspectors for working and keeping necessary equipment. Iran will increase the number of designated IAEA inspectors to the range of 130-150 within 9 months from the date of the implementation of the JCPOA, and will generally allow the designation of inspectors from nations that have diplomatic relations with Iran, consistent with its laws and regulations. Cruz cites a news story In an email to Novack, Cruz's spokesman, we noted the inspection mentions in the agreement. Novack replied by pointing out other language in the agreement that he said shows Iran will be providing information to the IAEA to create a baseline for future action. ""This does not mean the information Iran initially reports is complete. In these circumstances, we are trusting Iran to give us necessary information,"" Novack said. Novack singled out references in the agreement to Iran providing information enabling the international agency to verify production of ""uranium ore concentrate"" and to track centrifuge rotor tubes and bellows as well as ""heavy water stocks"" associated with nuclear power. The sections also provide for the IAEA to verify and continuously monitor such items. The spokesman earlier said that Cruz reached his conclusion about the deal trusting Iran to inspect itself from an August 2015 AP news story indicating the IAEA agreed to let Iran inspect Parchin, a military-industrial site in the country that critics once accused Iran of using to develop nuclear weapons. The AP’s Vienna-datelined Aug. 20, 2015, news story said its reporter had obtained ""one of the side arrangements between the IAEA and Iran in regards to inspecting Parchin"" in Iran. The story presented what the AP described as the transcript of the original draft agreement between the IAEA and Iran ""covering inspections at the Parchin military site, where Iran has been accused of pursuing nuclear weapons development a decade ago."" The story also noted the Parchin agreement was ""separate from the much broader Iran nuclear deal signed by Iran, the U.S. and five other world powers in July"" 2015. Below is most of the transcript of the draft document which the AP says that two officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed as not differing from the final agreement between the IAEA and Iran: Separate arrangement II agreed by the Islamic State of Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency on 11 July 2015, regarding the Road-map, Paragraph 5 1. Iran will provide to the Agency photos of the locations, including those identified in paragraph 3 below, which would be mutually agreed between Iran and the Agency, taking into account military concerns. 2. Iran will provide to the Agency videos of the locations, including those identified in paragraph 3 below, which would be mutually agreed between Iran and the Agency, taking into account military concerns. 3. Iran will provide to the Agency 7 environmental samples taken from points inside one building already identified by the Agency and agreed by Iran, and 2 points outside of the Parchin complex which would be agreed between Iran and the Agency. 4. The Agency will ensure the technical authenticity of the activities referred to in paragraphs 1-3 above. Activities will be carried out using Iran's authenticated equipment, consistent with technical specifications provided by the Agency, and the Agency's containers and seals. A day earlier, an AP news story said the Parchin agreement allowed Iran to use its own inspectors on the site rather than leaving that to the IAEA, which ""normally carries out such work."" That story said the Parchin agreement was worked out between the IAEA and Iran, with the U.S. and the other world powers involved in the larger Iran deal not being party to it, though the nations were briefed, the story said, and they ""endorsed it as part of the larger package."" The Parchin agreement, the AP story said, ""diverges from normal procedures by allowing Tehran to employ its own experts and equipment in the search for evidence of activities it has consistently denied — trying to develop nuclear weapons. Olli Heinonen, who was in charge of the Iran probe as deputy IAEA director general from 2005 to 2010, said he could think of no similar concession with any other country."" IAEA says ‘safeguards standards’ not compromised We emailed the IAEA about Cruz’s claim and didn’t hear back. But after the AP story broke, the agency’s director general, Yukiya Amano, issued a statement saying he couldn’t release separate agreements with countries without violating confidentiality. Suggestions the agency had given responsibility for nuclear inspections to Iran, Amano added, ""misrepresent the way in which we will undertake this important verification work."" Amano also said the side arrangements ""are technically sound and consistent with our long-established practices. They do not compromise our safeguards standards in any way."" Other analyses In August 2015, Heinonen, a Harvard University researcher who spent more than 25 years with the IAEA, wrote an oped article about the described Parchin side deal stating that if ""the reporting is accurate, these"" inspection ""procedures appear to be risky, departing significantly from well-established and proven safeguards practices. At a broader level, if verification standards have been diluted for Parchin (or elsewhere) and limits imposed, the ramification is significant as it will affect the IAEA’s ability to draw definitive conclusions with the requisite level of assurances and without undue hampering of the verification process."" Heinonen called for the described document to be made public by the IAEA and Iran, with U.S. support, accompanied by explanations responding to concerns about the Parchin process. To our inquiry, Heinonen pointed by email another confidential side agreement as noted by the IAEA in its ""road-map"" to clarify outstanding issues regarding Iran’s nuclear program. That July 14, 2015, document says the IAEA and Iran agreed on a ""separate arrangement"" premised on Iran this year answering agency questions per ""possible ambiguities"" leading up to the general agreement taking effect. Heinonen told us observers need to be able to see relevant side agreements before concluding Iran is being allowed to inspect itself. ""To this end, we are missing facts...By having such facts on the table, we can assess the IAEA approach on this issue,"" Heinonen wrote. To our inquiries, other arms control experts mostly told us the side agreement described by the AP doesn’t show Iran is going to be left to inspect itself. Lewis, referring to the reported Parchin agreement, said: ""This is a one-time managed access to a single facility by the IAEA. It is not the procedure for any other inspection. It is specially designed to answer questions relating to work carried out at this site between 1996-2002."" Similarly, Justin Logan, director of foreign policy studies at the libertarian-oriented Cato Institute, told us by email it’s worth keeping in mind it takes ample ""fissile material"" to make a nuclear weapon and ""large infrastructure."" At Iran’s known facilities where uranium enrichment is taking or has taken place, Logan said, IAEA inspectors will be present and have daily access. By phone, Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, which has encouraged Congress to support the agreement, called Cruz’s claim an ""absolutely incorrect"" mischaracterization. Kimball said that even at the Parchin site, he believes the IAEA will provide information ""about where they want to sample at the site, which areas they want to soil or surface samples to see if there is individual radioactive material in these areas."" Then, Kimball said, ""the Iranian specialists in the presence of the IAEA inspectors will actually do the scooping, the swiping."" After that, Kimball said, whatever is collected will be ""put into packages the IAEA will take possession of (and) take to their labs for testing. By email, Kimball also pointed us to an Aug. 21, 2015, opinion article in The Hill, a Washington, D.C., newspaper, headlined: ""No, Iran is not allowed to inspect itself."" In the piece, Mark Hibbs and Thomas Shea, experts on IAEA safeguards, spell out their expectation that IAEA officials would keep a close watch on Iranian staff gathering samples at Parchin and ensure the samples reached U.N. labs without being tainted. Iran, the two wrote, ""will not be allowed to inspect itself."" Another association official, Kelsey Davenport, followed up with an email noting that NBC News, citing unidentified senior U.S. officials, said in an Aug. 19, 2015, news story that Iran would be allowed to inspect Parchin itself only regarding signs of past military activity and still, U.N. inspectors ""would be on site to supervise the Iranians at every step of the way,"" NBC said. Davenport also pointed out an Aug. 20, 2015, post on the Arms Control Association’s website by Tariq Rauf, director of the Disarmament, Arms Control and Non-Proliferation Programme at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. In the post, Rauf asserted that even if Iranians were permitted to collect samples at Parchin, IAEA officials would be present to ensure no monkey business. Rauf went on: ""It would be unusual but by no means technically compromising to have Iranian technicians collect swipe samples at sites and locations at Parchin in the physical presence and direct line of sight of IAEA inspectors, including filming, and using swipe kits and collection bags provided by the IAEA. The agency inspectors then would seal the bags containing the swipe samples; they could leave behind one sealed bag at the IAEA office in Iran as a ‘control’ to be used if there is a dispute later about the results. The other three or four bags of swipe samples would be taken by the IAEA"" to UN laboratories for testing. We also reached Fred Fleitz, author of a July 2015 National Review article stating Iranians would be permitted to collect samples for the IAEA at Parchin. Fleitz, a senior official with the conservative Center for Security Policy, which focuses on national security in the belief that national power must be preserved and properly used, said by phone that Cruz‘s Houston claim implied ""the Iranians are going to do all the inspections. That's inaccurate. Iranians will be doing some inspections,"" he said, including at Parchin. Fleitz later said by email that Cruz proved ""exactly right"" in a Sept. 15, 2015 National Review commentary by saying ""in certain circumstances, Iran will inspect itself."" In his Houston stump speech, he speculated, Cruz left out such caveats. Our ruling Cruz said the Iran deal ""trusts the Iranians to inspect themselves."" A confidential side deal might allow Iranian staff to take photos and video and collect samples at the Parchin site yet the IAEA has generally insisted its protective protocols aren't being compromised. The Parchin uncertainty aside, Cruz didn’t offer nor did we find evidence the overall agreement trusts Iranians to inspect themselves. In contrast, his statement left the impression Iran would be conducting all inspections under the agreement by itself. That’s not so. – The statement is not accurate."
2090	Special report: Targeting teens for gastric bands.	After one patient died and others suffered serious complications following Lap-Band surgery, Dr. Neelu Pal had seen enough. A petite surgical resident now aged 40, she began quietly calling patients about to undergo the weight-loss procedure at New York University’s Medical Center, telling them she feared for their safety.	true	Health News	Dr. Neelu Pal poses for a portrait in New York, July 23, 2010. Pal was fired weeks after authorities at New York University Langone Medical Center Surgical Weight Loss Program learned she had contacted patients about the dangers of Lap-Band surgery in January 2006. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton Pal had previously raised her concerns with hospital officials, complaining — to no avail — about the lack of care given after surgery and incomplete or inaccurate medical forms that were taken prior to surgery. She was fired weeks after hospital authorities learned she had contacted patients in January 2006. She has filed a wrongful termination lawsuit — the case is pending — and enrolled in law school. Pal, who came to the United States from India a little over a decade ago to practice medicine, says she has been blackballed from her chosen profession. The NYU bariatric surgery practice where she worked is widely considered one of the world’s most experienced. But in an interview with Reuters, Pal described the facility as a hectic Lap-Band factory. “My impression at the time was that the practice was disorganized, but once I knew more about the system, I could see what they were trying to do was get as many patients on to the operating table as possible,” she said. During her three months at NYU Langone Medical Center’s Surgical Weight Loss Program in late 2005 and early 2006, two surgeons — Dr. Christine Ren and Dr. George Fielding, who are married — implanted gastric bands into as many as 20 patients in a single day, according to Pal. Known as pioneers in the field, Fielding and Ren are also paid consultants of Allergan Inc, the Botox and breast implant maker which is the leading manufacturer of the gastric band. Though rivals have been gaining, Allergan’s Lap-Band still commands more than two-thirds of a $300 million to $400 million market. To critics, Pal’s allegations — some of which were corroborated by a New York State Health Department investigation around that time — underline the potential risks that go along with the industry’s rapid growth. And the business could soon swell even more if U.S. regulators grant permission to perform the procedure on the nation’s bulging ranks of overweight teens. Ren was an investigator in an Allergan-sponsored clinical trial studying the use of bands on teens. And the company has an application with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration seeking approval to market the device to teens as young as 14. A decision could come any time. Winning regulatory approval for the gastric band in teenagers would allow the companies that make the devices — Allergan, Johnson & Johnson and others — to target that specific age group. Today, regulators consider performing the procedure on teens “experimental” as it has not been approved for that age group. But, like any device, it may be used on teens at a doctor’s discretion. Allergan declined to comment on Pal’s lawsuit or disclose how much it pays the surgeons, though the company did confirm that both remain on the payroll. Through a NYU spokeswoman, Ren and Fielding — who have been the subject of some controversy — declined to be interviewed for this article, also citing the lawsuit. But in some medical circles, concern over gastric banding for teenagers is growing nearly as fast as American waistlines. In particular, some doctors worry about the device’s long-term safety and effectiveness. A gastric band is just what it sounds like: an inflatable silicone band placed around the top portion of the stomach to create a pouch that restricts food intake. It has become increasingly popular in the United States in recent years, and results in reasonable weight loss. The procedure is considered less invasive and risky than gastric bypass. Banding could also be an especially attractive option for teens, say proponents, because it is reversible, whereas bypass is not. The 30- to 60-minute procedure, typically performed with a laparoscope, might require one night in the hospital but can also be done on an outpatient basis. But certain data show gastric bands are less effective and more problematic for teens than adults, said Dr. Thomas Inge, chair of a government study to assess bariatric surgery in adolescents called Teen Longitudinal Assessment of Bariatric Surgery, or Teen-LABS for short. The Teen-LABS study aims to determine if adolescence is the best time to intervene with surgery. It was launched in 2007 and is expected to report results in about five years. In more than one in five teens in another study, Inge noted a high rate of “symmetric pouch dilation” — a complication in which the small pouch created at the top of the stomach by the band gets bigger, allowing patients to consume more food. This issue was reported in the journal Obesity Surgery, and later in the Journal of the American Medical Association. “We await the U.S. trial data, PMS (post-marketing surveillance) data, and confirmation from non-industry-run trials to make final recommendations,” said Inge, who is the surgical director of the weight loss program for teens at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. As Inge and others are quick to point out, trials that studied how teens fared with a gastric band over the short term have been few, and those that were conducted show the device generally is safe and effective, with a relatively low risk for complications or death. But there is a dearth of long-term data on the outcomes from gastric band surgery. And that worries Dr. Mary Brandt, an investigator in the Teen-LABS study, among other experts. “I think there’s a fundamental problem with putting a rigid plastic object around a moving organ. You’re asking it to stay in place and not erode over a long period of time,” said Brandt, who is also director of the pediatric surgical program at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. “I’ll be happy to reverse my position as soon as I see 10 or 20 year data. Unfortunately, that’s not something that industry is excited about funding.” She acknowledged a bias against gastric bands, citing a Swiss long-term follow-up study of 167 adults that showed the band failed almost a third of the time after 10 years. About a fifth of the patients required another operation. And while fewer than 8 percent reported complications in the 30 days following surgery, more than 40 percent had problems after a decade. Long-term complications included the erosion and slippage of the band, both of which might require another operation, and a dilation of the esophagus, which could result in difficulty swallowing. Infections around the port that sits below the skin and allows the doctor to add or remove saline with a syringe to tighten or loosen the band, as well as leaks, were also common. “Bands are definitely safe in the short term and definitely work in the short term. What we don’t know is about the long term,” Brandt said. “I’m not saying it should never be used. We just have to be more careful about how we’re using it.” The Swiss study of adults who had gastric banding, published in Obesity Surgery, came to the same conclusion. Because of complications, the need for another operation, and long-term failure rates, gastric banding should be performed in “selected cases only” until more data are available, it said. Another group of 276 adults who underwent gastric band surgery had similarly disappointing results in a long-term Austrian study published in the same journal. Only a little under 54 percent of the patients still had their original band after nine years, with nearly 18 percent having the original replaced with a new one and nearly 29 percent having it removed. Of those who no longer had any band, more than half had a second bariatric operation. Gastric banding demands that teens do something they often aren’t very good at — sticking to a rigorous follow-up routine. Dr. Roberta Maller Hartman, a psychologist and Lap-Band patient herself, counsels teens and adults after receiving the gastric band. “I’ve worked with a lot of high school students and they just want to be like everyone else and go out and eat pizza with their friends,” she said. “They can, but they have to take little bites and chew a lot.” Success depends most on a patient’s ability to modify their behavior. “The band doesn’t reduce the desire to eat emotionally. That has to be addressed,” said Dr. Maller. “Teens tend to need more hands-on, one-to-one support.” Indeed, there are many success stories of obese teens losing weight, keeping it off and staving off a host of related illnesses, such as diabetes, arthritis and high blood pressure. Surgery — banding or bypass — has been shown to produce the most sustainable results when compared with diet and exercise. Nevertheless, critics abound. Dr. Susan Woolford, Medical Director of the Pediatric Comprehensive Weight Management Center at the University of Michigan, conducted a study, published in Obesity Surgery, to find out how readily primary care physicians and pediatricians — those in the front lines of obesity treatment — would refer patients for bariatric surgery. Nearly half, or 48 percent of the 381 physicians surveyed, said they would never refer an adolescent for any type of bariatric surgery. The controversies swirling around NYU’s influential bariatric surgery center — as well as its two top surgeons — have done little to ease concerns. An investigation by the New York State Department of Health in 2006 found that Fielding falsified data on Vincent Esposito, a 14-year-old boy who was part of the FDA-authorized study that was looking at the use of the device in obese teens. A week after Esposito’s Lap-Band surgery, he developed an infection with an abscess — a common complication with gastric banding — and returned to the NYU facility, where Fielding performed an appendectomy. The investigation by New York health authorities determined there was no evidence of appendicitis, according to the report. “They told me I was a ticking bomb,” Esposito had told the Daily Times in Salisbury, Maryland in 2007, referring to his obesity. Reached by telephone, his father said his son was “fine” and that they are being represented by an attorney and declined to comment. NYU also declined to comment. In its response to the NYDH report, the university maintained no wrongdoing, saying “the surgeon probably misinterpreted his operative findings.” In a statement at the time, the school added, “...we are persuaded that he assumed that the infection did not begin in the gastric band device.” The response and NYU’s plan to correct the issues were accepted by state regulators. In the NYSHD report, Fielding was also cited for failing to address a post-operative patient’s persistent lack of urine output. The patient went into cardiac arrest and died 36 hours later. This was the death that alarmed Pal and led her to warn patients. The same report said the program director, Ren, had permitted two surgeons to practice without the appropriate licenses, in violation of the law. For four months, the unlicensed physicians “performed multiple surgical procedures, made pre- and post-op assessments, and wrote orders to be carried out by nursing staff,” the report said. After Ren learned she was being investigated by an internal committee, she went back and removed the name of the unlicensed surgeon from the operative report, according to court testimony. She was found to have committed professional misconduct and received a letter of reprimand that was put in her file for a year. Fielding, who got a gastric band himself in 1999, is from Australia, where he left behind multiple personal injury lawsuits, most of which have been settled. Dr. Robert “Skip” Nelson, a pediatric ethicist at FDA, said he had no specific knowledge about the incident at NYU Medical Center. If the agency did learn that an investigator has entered false data, he said, there would be an investigation. He added that if the FDA doubted the integrity of the data, they would not be considered in the decision-making process. An investigator, as doctors who run clinical trials are called, could also be disqualified as a result. Despite the reports of misconduct, the NYU Langone Weight Management Program has retained its status as a “Center of Excellence,” a designation conferred by the Surgical Review Corp, an entity created by the American Society for Bariatric and Metabolic Surgery. Surgical Review Corp CEO Gary Pratt said that he was unaware of the incidents and the NYSHD report. He said the corporation’s reviews maintain the highest standards with the goal of advancing the safety and efficacy of bariatric surgery. The company intends to put out a new list of approved bariatric clinics that treat teens later this year — which may coincide with the FDA granting approval, or not. If the FDA does greenlight it, insurers would be more likely to pay for the procedure, which costs the insured patient $2,000 to $4,000. The uninsured, making up about a third of patients who have the surgery in the United States, pay about $15,000 for the surgery. Some health professionals worry that band manufacturers will target teens with direct-to-consumer (DTC) ads on television and radio or in subway stations that have proven effective at luring people to doctors’ offices. The FDA said there is no guidance or regulation on DTC ads to young users. For Allergan, based in Irvine, California, the implications are significant. And the company is acting accordingly. It recently launched a campaign with bariatric surgeons to invite their patients to enter an essay contest and win a chance to go to Washington, D.C. to “share their personal stories with legislators and media.” Allergan has seen its stock underperform the S&P 500 year to date. Botox remains its key product and has weathered increased competition amid the recession, while obesity intervention was hit hardest by the economy. At the same time, Lap-Band has also been slowly losing market share to Johnson & Johnson’s competing device called Realize. In 2009, Allergan’s obesity products generated revenue of $258 million, down 13 percent from 2008. Management is betting that continued investment in direct-to-consumer advertising will stimulate growth in the obesity segment, said Gleacher & Co analyst Amit Hazan. He estimates there will be 83,500 gastric band procedures in the United States in 2010, up 6 percent from 2009. Sanford Bernstein analyst Aaron Gal said FDA approval of the Lap-Band for teens could increase sales by as much as $20 million for Allergan. Even critics of gastric band surgery acknowledge that there are few good solutions to adolescent obesity. It is a mounting problem, affecting nearly 1 in 5 American teens, and many doctors believe that it should be addressed sooner rather than later when other health problems can develop. Some experts are wary but believe the benefits may outweigh the potential harm. “My conclusion is that it makes sense to intervene sooner because surgery can head off other related problems. Kids are better surgical risks, but the downside is that I suspect most teenagers are doing it less for health and more for social and psychological reasons,” said Dr. Jeffrey Zitsman, who is leading an independently funded teen study at Columbia University. Those who do it out of vanity, he cautioned, may have a harder time. “When health reasons don’t motivate them,” he said, “sometimes there are compliance issues.” Yet, Dr. Robert Murray, director of Nationwide Children’s Hospital Center for Healthy Weight and Nutrition, argues that the heavy psychological problems obese teens carry should not be ignored. “They’ve been teased out of school, they have social issues, many are depressed, and their quality of life is equal to that of a kid with cancer,” he said. “If you get them at 14 and reverse weight and health problems, they’ve got a shot at a normal life.” To critics, at least, the question is at how big a price.
9489	Laser Therapy Shows Promise Against Eye 'Floaters'	This HealthDay story does a good job discussing this study for laser treatment of “eye floaters,” taking care to mention important limitations of the research. The story would have been stronger if it had discussed the potential cost of this treatment, and if it would be widely available from most eye doctors, or require specialists. Note: We also reviewed the news release. Floaters tend to plague the eyesight of many people as they age and while for some, they are merely a nuisance, for some others they decrease their quality of life. A new treatment that might alleviate the problem would be an important improvement for those affected. However, the risks and expense of the treatment must be taken into account when deciding to treat a benign disorder. This story ideally would have discussed those points more thoroughly.	mixture	vision	There is no mention of costs for this procedure in this story. Nor is there any indication whether most health insurance plans would cover such procedures. A quick search on the web suggests that the costs may run from several hundred dollars to several thousand dollars per eye, with no assurance that multiple treatments might not be required, raising the costs even more. The story does quantify the benefits of the procedure in question, saying, “Six months after treatment, 54 percent of patients in the YAG group reported significantly greater improvement in floater-related visual disturbances, compared with only 9 percent of those in the placebo group.” It goes on saying, “Nineteen patients (53 percent) in the YAG group reported significantly or completely improved symptoms, compared with none of the patients in the placebo group.” The story addresses harms by saying, “There were no differences between the two groups in harmful side effects, according to the study.” But that’s not enough–What are the potential risks? The small size of the study (52 patients) makes it hard to exclude the possibility of side effects. As with any new surgery, doctors will have to learn how to do the procedure. Would you want to be an eye doctor’s first patient to get the new procedure? The story explains that this was a randomized clinical trial at a single research center that compared a group of patients receiving the actual laser treatments against a smaller group receiving a “sham” treatment, or placebo. The story goes farther by saying that it was a small study — only 52 patients — and a short follow-up of only six months. It also adds that, “”Greater confidence in these outcomes may result from larger confirmatory studies of longer duration,” the study authors wrote.” This is a strong point of the story. The story hints that many people don’t need treatment: “Floaters become more common with age, and although some people simply get used to them, others are bothered by them or their vision is impaired.” However, the story should have been stronger on this point–visual floaters are so common that they can be considered normal and the majority of people don’t do anything about them. The news release, which we also reviewed, noted that “most” people get used to them, in all but the most serious cases. We think the story should have been stronger on this point, too. The story does quote an independent source in the story, rather than relying on the study’s authors. It does not, however, provide any information relating to possible conflicts of interest. For example, the study was funded by a large ophthalmology clinic where this procedure is presumably performed — and which might stand to gain more business if it’s proven to work effectively. The story makes clear that there are alternatives to the YAG laser treatments: “There are three management options for floaters: patient education and observation; surgery; and a laser procedure known as YAG vitreolysis.” Some discussion of the effectiveness of surgery and education would have been useful, however. The story doesn’t discuss the availability of this laser treatment approach. Is it available through most ophthalmic practices? Is the equipment standard in most eye hospitals? The story suggests that this is a possible newer approach to dealing with bothersome “floaters” in the eye, and an alternative to eye surgery. There is no indication that this story relies on the news release.
17451	"Over half of the young people"" in medical, dental and law schools are women."	Paul said more than half of the enrollees in medical, dentistry and law schools are female. While women are close to 50 percent of enrollees in all three fields, they’re not a majority in any of them. And in both law and medicine, the trendlines for female enrollment have actually fallen in recent years.	false	National, Education, Health Care, Legal Issues, Women, Rand Paul,	"Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s attempt to speak on women’s issues at a meeting of the Republican National Committee last week drew as much attention, if not more, than the party’s official business. At the meeting, Huckabee accused Democrats of believing that women ""cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of the government."" On CNN’s State of the Union, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., a possible 2016 presidential hopeful, was asked to weigh in on Huckabee’s comments. He turned the question to female advancement in education and the workplace. ""I've seen the women in my family and how well they're doing,"" Paul said. ""My niece is in Cornell Vet School, and 85 percent of the people in vet school right now are women. Over half of the young people in medical school and dental school are women. Law school, the same way. I think women are doing very well, and I'm proud of how well we've come and how far we've come, and I think that some of the victimology and all this other stuff is trumped up."" Host Candy Crowley didn’t press Paul on his comment about women and advanced degrees, but we decided to weigh in. By the numbers Women are indeed seeking advanced degrees at rates that far outpace men — in fact, that has been the case for many years. In 1990, males made up 53 percent of 25- to 29-year-olds with an advanced degree (that is, a master’s degree or higher). By 2000, the percentages had flipped, with women holding 58 percent of post-bachelor’s degrees among the same demographic, according to the U.S. Census. The breakdown remained similar in 2009. Paul’s problem was that he happened to choose specific fields — medicine, dentistry and law — where the statistics tell a different story. Let’s start with medicine. In 2013, 83,472 individuals were enrolled in medical schools across the United States, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. About 38,950 were women, or 46.7 percent. That’s close to half, but not quite. And the percentage of women in med school actually dropped over the past decade. In 2004, women made up 48.2 percent of the 70,816 med school enrollees. Now let’s move on to dental school. As it turns out, dentistry numbers are pretty similar to medical colleges. According to an American Dental Association education survey, there were 11,613 men in dental schools in 2010-11, and 10,240 women, or about 46.9 percent of enrollees. Unlike what happened in med school, the gender gap has shrunk in dental school over the past 10 years. In 2001-02, the dental school population was 40 percent female and 60 percent male. Finally, we turn to the law. In law school, men make up the majority, as well, and at rates similar to medicine and dentistry. According to the American Bar Association, there were 146,288 people enrolled in a juris doctorate program in 2011-12 and 68,262, or 46.7 percent, were women. Participation rates among women in law schools are far higher than they were in 1950, when they made up just 3 percent of enrollees. By 1980, females made up 35 percent of all law school campuses. But as was the case with medical school, the share of women in law school has actually declined somewhat in recent years. In 1992-93, women were a slight majority of law school students, at 50.4 percent of enrollees. From 2002 to 2004, they were close at 49.0 percent. Since 2006, they have hovered around 47 percent. So Paul’s claim is 0-for-3. We reached out to Paul’s office and they pointed us to an American Enterprise Institute study. The research backed up the overall trend in higher education we already pointed out — women are earning more advanced degrees than men — but it didn’t weigh on the specific fields Paul singled out. We checked out one more possibility: Were women a minority of enrollees, but a majority of those who ultimately earned degrees, because more men were washing out before graduation? We found that’s not the case either. In 2011-12, more men than women finished their medical, dental and law school programs, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. For the record, there are three fields that require specific advanced degrees where women do outnumber men. Of the degrees earned in optometry and pharmacy in 2012, two-thirds went to women, and about 78 percent of veterinary degrees went to females. In the others — dentistry, medicine, osteopathic medicine, podiatry, chiropractic, law and theology — men were the majority. Our ruling Paul said more than half of the enrollees in medical, dentistry and law schools are female. While women are close to 50 percent of enrollees in all three fields, they’re not a majority in any of them. And in both law and medicine, the trendlines for female enrollment have actually fallen in recent years."
9879	Acupuncture May Take Edge Off Menopause Symptoms	When a study is so small that even the news release calls it a “small study” in the lead, journalists might want to explore that point. But this story never discussed the limitations of small, short-term studies. And it never discussed other past evidence that came up with different conclusions about acupuncture and menopausal symptoms. But that’s what you get – or don’t get – in a 165-word story derived from a news release. Journalism is supposed to independently vet claims. There was no evidence that happened in this story.	false	HealthDay,women's health	No discussion of cost. Women in the study were treated for 10 weeks. How much would that cost? Not a trivial issue. The story only stated that women who got acupuncture “had significantly less severe hot flashes and mood swings.” What does that mean? How was it measured? No discussion of any potential harms – only a discussion of benefits. All this story said was ” the researchers acknowledged that they did not monitor how long symptom relief lasted.” That was the only hint of a limitation. But there wasn’t any other evaluation of the quality of the evidence in such a small, short-term trial.
33559	Giant mutant killer hornets created by exposure to radiation from the Fukushima nuclear plant have killed several people in Nebraska.	Have giant mutant killer hornets created by exposure to radiation from the Fukushima nuclear plant killed several people in Nebraska?	false	Uncategorized, asian giant hornet, national report	On 1 October 2013, the National Report published an article positing that giant hornets created by exposure to radiation from the Fukushima nuclear plant had killed several people in Nebraska: Example: [Collected via e-mail, October 2013] Is it true that giant mutant Fukushima hornets are killing people in the United States? The item stated: In the wake of the world’s most catastrophic nuclear disaster, hospitals in central Nebraska have recently been reporting several deaths caused by a particularly venomous species of Asian wasp that has found its way into the states.It was reported that these pests have been contaminated by radioactive debris from the failed Fukushima power plant. This has caused them to nearly quadruple in size, and become hyper aggressive. As if that wasn’t horrific enough, the giant hornet also possesses venom which is nearly 2000 times stronger than that of the common wasp. We spoke to doctor Leon Hobbes of the Nebraska Medical Research Symposium and he reported the following: “I have never seen anything like it … One sting causes nearly immediate necrosis of surrounding tissue. The venom then quickly spreads causing the destruction of organs. Most victims succumb to renal failure often within hours. Some have had such intense allergic reactions that the complications were enough to cause death within a matter of minutes …” The Asian giant hornet (Vespa mandarinia) is indeed a real species of hornet (the largest of its kind in the world), and its venomous string is particularly effective in dispatching victims: The Asian Giant Hornet is the largest species of Hornet in the world with some queens reaching more than 5cm in length. They are found throughout Eastern Asia, particularly in Japan where they are commonlyknown as the Giant Sparrow Bee. This Wasp species is larger than any other with average Asian Giant Hornets growing to between 2.7cm and 4.5cm in length, with a wingspan of around 7cm. The queens can grow to 5.5cm but are similar in appearance to the worker Hornets with an orange head, black mandibles and a black and golden body. The Asian Giant Hornet has two sets of eyes, one compound and one ocelli, both of which are brown in colour along with their legs. Unlike other species of Wasp, and indeed Bees, the stinger of the Asian Giant Hornet is not barbed and therefore remains attached to its body once used. This means that Asian Giant Hornets are able to sting their victims repeatedly, injecting a complex venom that is known to contain eight different chemicals. It is also true that news accounts have recently reported incidents of people in Asian countries such as China, South Korea, and Japan having died after being stung by these “giant killer hornets,” such as the following October 2013 account from CNN: Hornets have killed dozens of people in China and injured more than 1,500 with their powerful venomous sting.The Asian giant hornet, known scientifically as Vespa mandarinia, carries a venom that destroys red blood cells, which can result in kidney failure and death, said Justin O. Schmidt, an entomologist at the Southwest Biological Institute in Tucson, Arizona. But perhaps a bigger problem than the toxicity of the venom is allergy, Schmidt says. Some people are naturally more allergic to stinging insects than others; a sting can trigger a deadly anaphylactic reaction, which may involve airway closure or cardiac arrest. Since July, hornet attacks have killed 42 people and injured 1,675 people in three cities in Shaanxi province, according to the local government. Among those attacked, 206 are receiving treatment in hospitals. However, such “killer hornets” were not mutants created by exposure to radiation from the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant which caused them to quadruple in size, nor have they killed several people in Nebraska. Those claims were taken from a bit of satire originating with the National Report, a web site that publishes outrageous fictional stories such as “IRS Plans to Target Leprechauns Next,” “Boy Scouts Announce Boobs Merit Badge,” and “New CDC Study Indicates Pets of Gay Couples Worse at Sports, Better at Fashion Than Pets of Straight Couples.” The National Report‘s (since removed) disclaimer page noted that: National Report is a news and political satire web publication, which may or may not use real names, often in semi-real or mostly fictitious ways. All news articles contained within National Report are fiction, and presumably fake news. Any resemblance to the truth is purely coincidental.
10734	MS therapy shows promise in test	This news report does a solid job describing the findings of a Phase II study into the use of Rituxan for relapsing-remitting MS. It includes the necessary caveats about the study being preliminary and the need for bigger, longer-term studies to validate the findings. The evidence is reported adequately, and the sourcing is sufficient. The study itself is most important, however, because it appears to verify the important role of B-cells in the development of MS. Since most current MS drugs target T-cells, the implications of these findings for development of new treatments are significant. By focusing on the clinical results of a small trial rather than the important discovery about the role of B cells, the article may invite people with relapsing-remitting MS to wonder whether they could, or should, try to use this drug, which is on the market and approved for other uses, off-label. Other reporters asked sources whether this would be a good idea. Their stories included the useful caution that the drug should not be used off-label at this time. This story would have been better if it had too.	true		The article is silent on the price of Rituxan. Since the company is investing a significant sum to research an additional use, the price is worth mentioning. The article does a good job of sketching the benefits shown in this research. Focusing on the clinical endpoint of relapse, and using percentages of relapse with the drug and the placebo, makes it easy for readers to understand. The article explores the issue of whether Rituxan may suppress the immune response too much, making the patient vulnerable to other diseases. It also explains how this effect has been observed in the drug Tysabri, a different immune suppressant used for MS. This article is based on published results of a Phase II trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The news article does a decent job emphasizing the preliminary nature of the findings, and that larger trials are needed to ensure safety, efficacy and long-term benefits. The article does nothing to exaggerate the severity or consequences of MS. The reporter draws on the journal article and the accompanying editorial. Sources interviewed include the primary author, one medical expert representing the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and one clinician who treated some patients in the study but was not an author. This is sufficient sourcing. It is worth pointing out here, however, that Genentech and Biogen Idec, makers of Rituxan, are “Corporate Star” supporters of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. The article states that six other drugs, all with shortcomings, are available to treat relapsing-remitting MS. The article makes clear that the drug is currently on the market and approved for other uses. But it did not state whether Rituxan is, or may become, used off-label for relapsing-remitting MS. And, as noted in our summary comment below, there are issues surrounding off-label use that could have been addressed. The article makes clear that the drug is on the market and used for related conditions, but its use in relapsing-remitting MS patients is being explored in this research. There is no evidence the article draws from a press release.
1966	Going into hospital far riskier than flying: WHO.	Millions of people die each year from medical errors and infections linked to health care and going into hospital is far riskier than flying, the World Health Organization said on Thursday.	true	Health News	A surgeon washes his hands before enter in an operating room at a hospital in Marseille, France, April 3, 2008. REUTERS/Jean-Paul Pelissier “If you were admitted to hospital tomorrow in any country... your chances of being subjected to an error in your care would be something like 1 in 10. Your chances of dying due to an error in health care would be 1 in 300,” Liam Donaldson, the WHO’s newly appointed envoy for patient safety, told a news briefing. This compared with a risk of dying in an air crash of about 1 in 10 million passengers, according to Donaldson, formerly England’s chief medical officer. “It shows that health care generally worldwide still has a long way to go,” he said. Hundreds of millions of people suffer infections linked to health care each year. Patients should ask questions and be part of decision-making in hospitals, which must use basic hygiene standards and WHO’s checklist to ensure safe surgical procedures were followed. More than 50 percent of acquired infections can be prevented if health care workers clean their hands with soap and water or an alcohol-based handrub before treating patients. Of every 100 hospitalized patients at any given time, 7 in developed and 10 in developing countries will acquire at least one health care-associated infection, according to the United Nations agency. “The longer patients stay in an ICU (intensive care unit), the more at risk they become of acquiring an infection,” it said. Medical devices such as urinary catheters and ventilators are associated with high infection rates. ‘HIGH-RISK BUSINESS’ Each year in the United States, 1.7 million infections are acquired in hospital, leading to 100,000 deaths, a far higher rate than in Europe where 4.5 million infections cause 37,000 deaths, according to WHO. “Health care is a high-risk business, inevitably, because people are sick and modern health care is delivered in a fast-moving, high-pressured environment involving a lot of complex technology and a lot of people,” Donaldson said. A heart operation can involve a team of up to 60 people, about the same number needed to run a jumbo jet, he said. “Infection is a big problem, injuries after falls in hospitals is a big problem and then there are problems that are on a smaller scale but result in preventable deaths. Medication errors are common,” he said. Risk is even higher in developing countries, with about 15 percent of patients acquiring infections, said Dr. Benedetta Allegranzi of the WHO’s “Clean Care is Safer Care” program. “The risk is really higher in high-risk areas of the hospitals, in particular ICUs or neonatal units in developing countries.” About 100,000 hospitals worldwide now use the WHO’s surgical safety checklist, which the agency said has been shown to reduce surgery complications by 33 percent and deaths by 50 percent. If the checklist is effectively used worldwide, an estimated 500,000 deaths could be prevented each year, it says. “Frankly, if I was having an operation tomorrow I wouldn’t go into a hospital that wasn’t using the checklist because I wouldn’t regard it as safe,” said Donaldson.
35997	Image shows tears of grief, tears of change, onion tears, and laughing tears.	Do Images Show Tears of Grief, Tears of Change, Onion Tears, and Laughing Tears?	mixture	Fact Checks, Viral Content	In December 2019, a months-old post by the Facebook page “Words of Women” that purportedly showed a four-square collection of tears produced by grief, change, laughter, and cutting onions continued to circulate:The status update read:Someone recently told me that emotions are chemical levels in your brain and your body is constantly trying to maintain equilibrium. So if one emotion sky rockets, that chemical becomes flagged and signals the tear duct to open as an exit to release that emotion packaged neatly within a tear. It’s why we feel more stable after crying, as if whatever emotion we were feeling had been released and we were refreshed. This is also why tears from different emotions look different under an electron microscope. They’re literally made up of different things. According to Joseph Stromberg of the Smithsonian’s College of Arts and Sciences, happy tears are structurally different than sad tears than angry tears than overwhelmed tears etc. Different types of tears have distinct molecules. Emotional tears have protein-based hormones including the neurotransmitter leucine enkephalin, which is a natural painkiller that is released when we are stressed. (Photography by Rose-Lynn Fisher http://rose-lynnfisher.com/tears.html?fbclid=IwAR1GI_IvO75LUWDLqaELs_qcOtUSf8XPyXlaDgGwNcXl5k3okHf-eT_EvgA)All four images appeared in a November 2013 Smithsonian Magazine article, credited to writer Joseph Stromberg. Stromberg himself did not capture the images, as the post indicated.As the American Academy of Ophthalmology states, there are three distinct types of human tears. The first (basal tears) are protective and relatively constant, the second (reflex tears) are a response to irritants like “onion fumes,” and the third (emotional tears) span all states of emotion:Basal tears are in your eyes all the time to lubricate, nourish and protect your cornea. Basal tears act as a constant shield between the eye and the rest of the world, keeping dirt and debris away.Reflex tears are formed when your eyes need to wash away harmful irritants, such as smoke, foreign bodies or onion fumes. Your eyes release them in larger amounts than basal tears, and they may contain more antibodies to help fight bacteria.Emotional tears are produced in response to joy, sadness, fear and other emotional states. Some scientists have proposed that emotional tears contain additional hormones and proteins not present in basal or reflex tears.In Stromberg’s article, “The Microscopic Structures of Dried Human Tears,” he notes that photographer Rose-Lynn Fisher had published a book involving microscopic views of honeybees. Inspired by that project, Fisher moved on to the subject of human tears:“I started the project about five years ago, during a period of copious tears, amid lots of change and loss — so I had a surplus of raw material,” Fisher says. After the bee project and one in which she’d looked at a fragment of her own hip bone removed during surgery, she’d come to the realization that “everything we see in our lives is just the tip of the iceberg, visually,” she explains. “So I had this moment where I suddenly thought, ‘I wonder what a tear looks like up close?’”Fisher said she captured and dried one of her own tears on a slide, causing her to become curious about whether human tears for different reasons might present differently in the same format. That led Fisher to use both her own tears and tears from a “handful of others.”In the piece, that effort was not described as a project of science per se, nor one of strict protocols. Rather, it’s framed as something artistic and philosophical in nature:This idle musing ended up launching a multi-year photography project in which Fisher collected, examined and photographed more than 100 tears from both herself an a handful of other volunteers, including a newborn baby.Further into the article, Fisher explained that myriad variables caused tears of different types to look radically different to one another. For example, “grief tears” from two separate people or the same person on two separate occasions might appear somewhat different due to biological, environmental, or circumstantial factors, like hydration:Additionally, because the structures seen under the microscope are largely crystallized salt, the circumstances under which the tear dries can lead to radically dissimilar shapes and formations, so two psychic tears with the exact same chemical makeup can look very different up close. “There are so many variables — there’s the chemistry, the viscosity, the setting, the evaporation rate and the settings of the microscope,” Fisher says.Selected images curated by Fisher for her book The Topography of Tears underscored the interpretive bent of her work. Individual slides are labeled with phrases such as “the irrefutable,” “what it meant long after a time forgotten,” “in the end it didn’t matter #65,” and “the brevity of time (out of order) losing you.” Based on those titles, the nature of the tears cried looked far more subjective than objective.None of the tear slides curated by Fisher on the page seemed to exactly match the ones chosen in the Facebook post. Interestingly though, the snowflake-like “onion tears” were similar to one simply called “quiet ripening.” Blocky structures seen in “tears of change” were mirrored to some degree in “in the end it didn’t matter #65.” And the straight lines labeled on Facebook as “tears of grief” shared some characteristics with “timeless reunion (in an expanding field).”Alongside the “tears of grief, tears of change, onion tears, and laughing tears” image, the “Words of Women” Facebook post claimed that “happy tears are structurally different than sad tears than angry tears than overwhelmed tears” and “different types of tears have distinct molecules.” It is possible that was the case, but the appended images were misleading. Those photographs were part of an artistic venture, not scientific research. Original images presented by the photographer bore far more abstract titles, and the creator of the images explained that innumerable variables (biological, environmental, and circumstantial among them) affected the actual structure of the observed tears.
10618	Marijuana May Help HIV Patients Keep Mental Stamina Longer	Marijuana’s health benefits are widely touted but poorly understood. This release does little to add to the evidence. The health claim made in the headline has little to do with what was evaluated in the published study. There is no true quantification of the benefits of marijuana as a therapy for preserving cognitive function in AIDS patients, no context about the risks associated with smoking marijuana, no comparison to alternatives, no mention of costs, and not much in the way of explaining the strength of the study in question. This is especially problematic when it comes to marijuana. Like chocolate, marijuana is something that is often heralded for its health benefits, often with questionable findings underpinning the claims. As noted above, marijuana is widely used and many claims are indeed made about its benefits. It’s great that this study was undertaken if it adds to the body of knowledge. The objective of the study, however, was not to make clinical recommendations on marijuana benefits for HIV patients as suggested in the headline. According to the study, the objective was to measure the level of a biomarker indicating the presence of inflammation in HIV patients who used marijuana compared to those who did not. Researchers still need to better understand the plant’s biology and physiology to determine which populations will in fact benefit from its use, and to determine the best modes of delivery, dosing schedules, etc.	false	University news release	There is nothing in this release about costs. And there’s really nothing about dosing, either. So a reader and an HIV patient would have no idea what a true marijuana therapy would cost to see any — assuming there are any — benefits. The release notes that the study relies on self-reporting of marijuana use by the blood donors and then correlation with THC levels in the blood. We are at least a couple steps away from knowing how much THC is needed for an actual clinical outcome (which is not addressed in the study) and as a consequence would not be able to estimate cost. The first sentence makes a bold claim about benefits: “A chemical found in marijuana, known as tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, has been found to potentially slow the process in which mental decline can occur in up to 50 percent of HIV patients, says a new Michigan State University study.” Based on the research, this statement about benefits is problematic. There is nothing in the study that showed the people who used marijuana had higher cognitive function than non-users. No cognitive function was measured. Instead, researchers were looking at biomarkers for inflammation that may–may–be linked with cognitive decline, but no one is sure yet. So even if marijuana users have less of these particular inflammatory biomarkers, they may still suffer mental decline for other reasons. It’s also not clear what “up to” 50 percent of patients means. Does this mean that 50 out of 100 HIV patients saw their mental faculties preserved by marijuana? Or does it mean that 20 out of the 40 people mentioned in the study saw a benefit? It is unclear and misleading. That phrase “up to” always gives us pause. Be clear with your audience. Show them the math. There is nothing in the release about the harms of ingesting or smoking marijuana. The release (nor the study) never mentions specifically how the HIV patients consumed their marijuana — whether through smoking, edibles, cannabis oil or other means, or any potential risks associated with any of the methods. Anytime we inhale smoke into our lungs we are taking a risk. At a minimum, some of those risks should be mentioned. And, better yet, if the study did not adequately track patients to assess the negative effects of marijuana smoking or otherwise ingesting, that should be acknowledged. It’s likely that the negative impact of marijuana was not mentioned because the study was in vitro (using blood samples). However, that underscores the fact that no true clinical correlation can reasonably be made from this study alone. There is one tiny mention of the fact that the study was published in the journal AIDS so we are to presume it underwent peer review and some sort of editorial scrutiny. But there are no caveats about the study mentioned and not a very clear explanation of how it was conducted. For example, were the 40 patients equally divided between those who smoked marijuana and those who did not? Was any of this smoking done in the presence of the researchers? Was this all just based on self-reporting? If so, this is highly problematic, especially with a drug that is still illegal in many places by federal law. It’s unfortunate because as a “hard science” paper, it seems pretty rigorously done and would stand on its own merit, but the release leaves out details which would make the purpose of the study more clear. The study was not designed to show clinical outcomes. There is no disease mongering in the piece. The funding sources of the study are not mentioned. There is no mention of any alternatives in the release. Given that marijuana is still illegal in most states and considered illegal by the federal government, it would be worth mentioning that patients hoping to receive a marijuana treatment would have to live in a state where it is legal for medicinal purposes. The release does not establish the novelty of the findings. We find the headline and the quotes in the story unjustifiable given the lack of supporting evidence. This is significant speculation on a study this small with a protocol that appears to be little more than surveys plus blood cell examination.
9716	Sugar Is Definitely Toxic, a New Study Says	This news story reports that a diet study, conducted on 43 overweight minority children and teenagers, is believed by the researchers who did it to definitively prove that sugar — in and of itself — is metabolically toxic regardless of how much or little of it is eaten, and irrespective of the weight of the eaters. It does a solid job of describing the design of the study and discussing why the evidence it provides is qualitatively different from previous research. But we thought the framing of the story was off kilter, as it leads with lots of glowing discussion about the strength and importance of the research, while putting important caveats and limitations far down in the piece. We also think the story could have been more thorough in its discussion of those limitations — including the fact that 43 is a small number of participants, the study was very short in duration, and it had no control group. But while there was room for improvement, readers who make it to the end of the piece should come away with a reasonably thorough understanding of the study’s findings and what they might mean. It’s hard to imagine that any American family could be completely uninformed about the health-related risks of consuming high fructose corn syrup and table sugar (sucrose), major components of sweet drinks, and a supermarket full of processed foods. But as the article points out, it has been difficult to design studies that show that such “added sugar” is an independent toxic substance even when total calories and weight stay the same. That difficulty, in turn, has made it hard to say with certainty whether people who reduced their sugar consumption and were improving their metabolic health (e.g. blood pressure, liver function, cholesterol levels, fat accumulation in the abdominal region) were getting the benefit from less sugar or from fewer overall calories. Given the growing rates of diabetes, fatty liver disease and heart disease in ever-younger populations, adding to evidence that not all calories are equal in harm or benefit is more than welcome by physicians and parents. And studies like this one to add to a growing body of evidence that restricting sugar may be good public health policy. If additional studies, longer in duration and larger in scope are done, this could result in policy change that may help keep everyone healthier.	true	diabetes,Dr. Robert Lustig,sugar,weight loss	Many sugar-rich packaged and prepared foods are more expensive than home-made foods.But the study was not designed to compare the costs of diets, and most people know how much different types of food that contain sugar cost. So we’ll rate this Not Applicable. On the other hand, it would have been useful to cite estimates of the cost of treating the disorders linked to metabolic syndrome components, such as high blood pressure, as well as the costs of treating the chronic diseases that are a consequence of the syndrome, such as diabetes and heart disease. The quantification of the results does not quite clear our bar here. The story says this: Overall, their fasting blood sugar levels dropped by 53%, along with the amount of insulin their bodies produced since insulin is normally needed to break down carbohydrates and sugars. Their triglyceride and LDL levels also declined and, most importantly, they showed less fat in their liver. We would have preferred more numbers documenting the changes for each outcome, in absolute terms (the “53%” figure is a relative reduction), along with a comment or some description of how meaningful the changes were clinically. It’s hard to say what “harms” or risks would result from cutting sugar from childrens’ diets. We’ll rate this Not Applicable. The story does a fine job of explaining how the study was done and why the evidence it provides is meaningful. It explains that compared with previous research, which was observational in nature and couldn’t prove cause and effect, the new study suggests that cutting out sugar may be causing the beneficial metabolic changes observed. We do have a problem with the story’s framing, however, which frontloads discussion about how important the findings are, while burying discussion of limitations far down in the text. Experts point out some problems with the study, but we think the story could have gone further — explaining for example that the study was small and time-limited and that it had no control group. Though the story feels slightly unbalanced, we’ll acknowledge that it did make an attempt to critically evaluate the findings — hence the Satisfactory rating. As noted, increased sugar consumption, especially in children, has long been linked to alarmingly high and growing rates of obesity, diabetes and other chronic diseases in children and adults. There is no disease mongering here, and indeed, some numbers (prevalence) would have helped the story. The story includes restraining comments from two independent experts, although those comments come far down in the story and should have been placed higher. The story perhaps also could have mentioned that Dr. Lustig is author of a 2012 book called “Fat chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar, Processed Food, Obesity, and Disease,” and so may have an intellectual and financial conflict of interest when it comes to sugar. The study was funded by the NIH and Touro University, as well as UCSF — another aspect that could have been mentioned for context. The article did a fairly good job of describing the limitations of previous dietary studies, compared to this one, especially as it relates to the effects of cutting sugar vs. losing weight. It would have also been helpful to mention the role of exercise in controlling metabolic disease. The story explains that the dietary changes they made in the study could be made by anyone. The story says: “We took chicken teriyaki out, and put turkey hot dogs in. We took sweetened yogurt out, and put baked potato chips in. We took pastries out and put bagels in,” says Lustig. “So there was no change in [the children’s] weight and no change in calories.” It’s always risky at best to call something a first of its kind as this story does, without citing any evidence for that or being more specific about what, exactly, was a “first.” But the story does give the general sense of what’s new and important about the study — the fact that it suggests beneficial changes of reducing sugar independent of weight loss. And it also draws a line between previous correlation studies and this experiment. Close call here but we’ll give the benefit of the doubt. There’s enough original reporting here for us to be sure this story didn’t rely on a news release.
27195	In 2006, the skeletal remains of Joyce Carol Vincent were found in her home, with the television on, years after her death.	Vincent did not take drugs or smoke and did not drink alcohol to excess. From the outset, the Metropolitan Police made it clear that they did not suspect foul play in her demise.	true	Horrors	In November 2018, the “Weird Facts” Facebook page posted a widely-shared meme which outlined the death of Joyce Carol Vincent, summarizing it as “In 2006, a woman (Joyce Carol Vincent) was found in her London flat, skeletonized, after 3 years of being dead — with the TV still running”: Notwithstanding the somewhat crass imagery used in the meme, this was unfortunately a largely accurate description of the tragic circumstances surrounding the death of Joyce Carol Vincent, who did indeed remain undiscovered at home for around two years, dying around December 2003. According to material prepared for release to the news media by the Metropolitan Police, as well as reports by the BBC and the Press Association, the following are the known facts surrounding Vincent’s demise. Some readers might find the details disturbing. On 26 January 2006, Vincent’s remains were discovered at her apartment in Wood Green, north-east London. Workers from the Metropolitan Housing Trust, an organization which provides affordable housing and is now known as Metropolitan Thames Valley, had forced entry while attempting to inquire about thousands of pounds of unpaid rent arrears. Vincent had been placed in the small apartment as part of a scheme for victims of domestic violence. Vincent’s remains were badly decomposed, and pathologist Dr. Simon Poole later described them as being “largely skeletal,” which supports the claim made in the “Weird Facts” meme. According to evidence heard at a coroner’s inquest, Vincent was found lying on her back on the floor of her living room next to a shopping bag and Christmas presents which she had wrapped but never delivered. Her television was indeed still switched on when Vincent was found. She was identified by reference to dental records. Based on the expiration dates of food and medication found in Vincent’s flat, it was estimated that she had died around December 2003, some two years earlier — not three years earlier, as the “Weird Facts” meme and several news reports mistakenly stated. She was born in London to Grenadian immigrant parents in 1965, and was 38 years old at the time of her death. In the years after Vincent was discovered, the filmmaker Carol Morley tracked down her friends, colleagues and associates. In interviews which would ultimately form the basis of the 2011 documentary film Dreams of a Life, those who knew Vincent universally recalled their shock and disbelief at the circumstances of her death and discovery. In the film some friends recounted actually having read news accounts of her death in April 2006, but without an accompanying photograph, they did not connect the horrific circumstances of her discovery with the person they had known. According to those accounts, Vincent had for many years been a very social, popular professional young woman who worked in London’s fast-paced financial district in the 1980s and 1990s, was highly intelligent and charming, and was remarkably attractive and frequently the object of male attention. Vincent, who was at one time an aspiring singer, was acquainted with the soul vocalist Betty Wright, and had dinner with other iconic musical artists, including Gil Scott-Heron, Jimmy Cliff, and Ben E. King. In 1990, Vincent briefly met and conversed with Nelson Mandela backstage at a concert in London’s Wembley Stadium. Although she had many friends, Vincent’s friendships appear to have been somewhat fleeting, and despite the deep affection in which she was held, she was known for “drifting” in and out of social groups and relationships and sometimes appeared troubled. Her acquaintances recalled that she was distant towards her family members. According to Morley’s interviews with friends of Vincent, she became engaged to marry an unidentified man in the late 1990s, and the Metropolitan Police later noted that she had been involved in a “domestic incident” in 1998. In Morley’s documentary, Vincent’s friends observed that she was likely to have been in at least one abusive relationship during that time. By 2001, Vincent left her job at the accounting firm Ernst & Young and progressively lost contact with her family members, friends and former colleagues, working for a time as a cleaner. She changed addresses frequently but moved into her final apartment in Wood Green in February 2003, having been placed there as part of a women’s refuge program for victims of domestic violence. Her friends have speculated that she may have become isolated and withdrawn over time because she was ashamed of the abuse she had suffered and the shift in her professional and personal circumstances, and she may also have been avoiding detection by an abusive former partner. In November 2003, she was briefly hospitalized after vomiting blood and was diagnosed with a peptic ulcer. Although she is believed to have died around a month later, the coroner was unable to arrive at a cause of death due to the decomposition of her remains by January 2006. She also suffered from asthma, which was cited by her friends as a possible cause of death.
10225	Urine test for prostate cancer may be better than blood test	This story didn’t meet as many of our criteria as the competing WebMD story did, but this one was much shorter. Perhaps as a direct result of its brevity, it didn’t adequately address the current status of availability of the test, the cost (even projected cost), quality of the evidence, harms, benefits (potential number of unnecessary biopsies that might be avoided), and didn’t quote anyone except the lead author with the quote coming from a news release. There is merit in helping readers understand that prostate cancers differ in the risks they pose to the health of men and that there is value in being able to better distinguish between those that do and don’t need to be treated.	false	Cancer,Los Angeles Times,Screening	The story did not discuss costs. While the test for the fusion protein mentioned is not yet commercially available, some estimate could have been given on what it may cost. The test for PSA3 is already available and a cost could easily have been cited. Given how the story projects a possible widespread use for this approach, cost is an important consideration. The story did not provide an estimate of the potential number of unnecessary biopsies that might be avoided with the use of this test – which is the potential benefit of concern. While providing information about how the test might provide information that could be used by men faced with the decision about what steps to take following up on their elevated PSA level, the story should have stressed that while this test might reduce the number of false positives, there would still be substantial numbers of men whose results would fail to correctly predict their risk. Additionally – it is important to know that this test – at least in the current study design – does not change the absolute risk of missing an aggressive cancer. We wanted the story to tell us the number of men whose tests fell in the low, intermediate, and high ranges. Without that, it makes it difficult to interpret the predictive values (e.g., % with cancer, % with aggressive cancer). Ultimately, we need to know how many (absolute risks) unnecessary biopsies could be avoided (and how many aggressive cancers missed) if we use the new biomarkers. It would also be helpful to note whether the investigators provided any indication of the cutoff that would be used clinically–and the performance of the cutoff for avoiding biopsies and missing aggressive cancers. The story did not engage in overt disease mongering. The story did not mention that the study reported on was funded by the company that makes the test; there were no experts without ties to the company or study quoted. By providing a clear explanation of overtreatment of prostate cancer using the current approach to testing, the story provided readers with the insight to glean the value in a test that would better distinguish whether a man had aggressive or indolent prostate cancer. The story only described this as a “new test.” Is it available? (No, the TMPRSS2:ERG is still experimental.) This story was clear about the novelty of the test described. The only quote in the story is attributed to a news release. There is no other source cited. If there was another source, it would be easy to list that at the end of the piece as a growing number of news organizations do.
9307	Incontinence Drug May Cut Hot Flashes in Breast Cancer Survivors	The San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium typically generates extensive media coverage of new research studies. However, not all of the studies presented are of the same caliber and some will never undergo the peer review that will lead them to be published in a medical journal. This means reporters needs to be at the top of their game when evaluating the news releases they receive about studies that will be presented at the meeting. This story from HealthDay does many things right — it covers costs, side effects, study limitations, and more. This earned it five stars from us. However, we do think the story would have been even stronger if it had better emphasized a key fact: The overall reduction in hot flashes was roughly 28 to 23 in the drug group and 28 to 25 in the placebo group. That’s not much, and raises eyebrows in light of a physician in the story calling it “game-changing.” Many breast cancer treatments are known to cause hot flashes. Some premenopausal women have treatments that put them into immediate menopause; others enter menopause naturally while they are being treated for breast cancer; and still others are postmenopausal and find the drugs used to treat their breast cancer cause their hot flashes to return or become more frequent. Hot flashes and night sweats can affect quality of life, and it would be great if there was an easy way to control them without using menopausal hormone therapy which has never been recommended for women with breast cancer as it is known to increase breast cancer risk. However, as multiple studies have shown, many drugs over the years rarely perform much better than a placebo–as was the case in this study of oxybutynin. Yet, this study got widespread play as game-changing.	true	breast cancer,hot flashes	Using the lead researcher as a source, the article states that most insurers cover oxybutynin; that a month’s supply can range from $21 to $42; and that the cost could be less, depending on the type of insurance a patient has. Kudos to HealthDay for explicitly addressing cost. The article reports that the study found the women on oxybutynin had an average of five fewer hot flashes per week, while those on the placebo had three fewer. It’s not clear if the benefit was the same for both doses. The story explains that this was from a group 150 women who experienced at least 28 hot flashes a week. This is enough information to glean the magnitude of benefit. But, the story could have used more context: The drug resulted in five fewer hot flashes a week. That’s not even one less hot flash per day. And those on the placebo, which costs nothing and has no side effects, has three fewer hot flashes a week. That’s a difference of two hot flashes a week–which seems like a really low bar. The article says that side effects included constipation, mild diarrhea, dry mouth, dry eyes, episodes of confusion and difficulty urinating. It’s not noted if these side effects were seen in both the low-dose and high-dose groups. There is also no indication of which side effects were most common or how many women experienced them. Importantly, though, the article does note that the long-term effects of the drug aren’t known and that oxybutynin is in a class of drugs that “have been linked with mental decline” and that previous studies have found “the drugs may raise the risk for problems with short-term memory, reasoning and confusion, and may also hike the risk for dementia among older patients.” Information on ClincalTrials.gov about the trial suggests this study evaluated two doses in an effort to find an effective dose with fewer side effects. The concluding paragraph of the article states that the study was scheduled to be presented at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium and that “studies presented at meetings are usually considered preliminary until peer-reviewed for publication in a medical journal.” It’s important to note this. But the wording also indicates that the article was written before the presentation was even given and the the reporter never saw the researcher’s data or slides or heard any questions the audience may have asked regarding the findings. It’s indisputable that many women going through menopause experience hot flashes and that side effects of many breast cancer treatments include hot flashes, in some cases because the treatment puts a woman into immediate menopause. They result from fluctuations in women’s hormones. The article quotes Dr. Alice Police, regional director of breast surgery at the Northwell Health Cancer Institute in Sleepy Hollow, NY, who was not affiliated with the study. We did not detect any conflicts of interest that should have been disclosed. The article makes it sound like the only option for treating hot flashes is menopausal hormone therapy. But, in fact, there are other ways to treat hot flashes that are currently recommended. These include drugs used for other purposes as well as non-drug options like mind-body approaches. The article states that the drug, which is approved to treat incontinence, is readily available. This is the first time that a drug is this class has been shown to have an effect on hot flashes, and so is newsworthy for this reason. That could have been more explicit in the story, though. The article included original comments not found in the news release.
30993	A hapless man somehow got his head stuck in his wife's vagina during sex, resulting in the couple's hospitalization.	The article about a man getting his head stuck in his wife’s vagina was reproduced by several lesser known (but equally disreputable) web sites, such as Pagez.com, which do not carry readily available disclaimers. As a result, some readers mistook this article as a genuine news item.	false	Junk News, fake news, medical accidents, pagez	Entertainment web site World News Daily Report has put out more than its fair share of fake news articles over the years. Although its stories touch on a variety of topics, the web site frequently focuses on genitalia-based horror, publishing dubious stories about a babysitter inserting a baby into her vagina, a woman training squirrels to attack her boyfriend’s testicles, and a man who was castrated after attempting to have sex with a pit bull terrier. The site added another article to this category on 14 September 2017, when it published a story reporting that a couple had been hospitalized after a man got his head stuck in his wife’s vagina: A couple was transported to the hospital in a very awkward position last night after a man somehow got his head stuck in his wife’s vagina during a strange sexual game. Tom and Janis Morrison, a young couple from the small town of Greensboro in Alabama, called 911 around 10:00 pm last night to ask for an ambulance. There is, as usual, no truth to this story; as explained, WNDR is a well-known fake news site with a long history of publishing hoaxes. A disclaimer on the web site reads: World News Daily Report assumes all responsibility for the satirical nature of its articles and for the fictional nature of their content. All characters appearing in the articles in this website – even those based on real people – are entirely fictional and any resemblance between them and any person, living, dead or undead, is purely a miracle.
16103	The city of San Antonio reuses almost 40 percent of its water. You know how much the city of Austin reuses? About 5 percent. And that's not right. We can do better.	Adler said San Antonio reuses 40 percent of its water while Austin reuses just 5 percent, indicating that the capital should catch up to its sprawling southern neighbor. Those percentages are offered by the respective local water utilities. However, both cities have been piping about the same share of treated water to local industrial and irrigation customers. This statement failed to acknowledge that San Antonio lays claim to even more recycling in ways Austin cannot match. This is mainly because, unlike San Antonio, Austin doesn’t own any of the treated wastewater it pours into its major river (while SAWS owns the water it puts into the San Antonio River).	false	City Budget, City Government, Water, Texas, Steve Adler,	"An Austin mayoral candidate suggested the Texas capital greatly lags the Alamo City in a wet way. In a Nov. 19, 2014, Time Warner Cable News debate with his Dec. 16, 2014, runoff opponent, Mike Martinez, Steve Adler said: ""The city of San Antonio reuses almost 40 percent of its water. You know how much the city of Austin reuses? About 5 percent. And that's not right. We can do better."" Adler has talked up San Antonio before; in his September 2014 water agenda, he pointed out San Antonio’s wide lead in water reuse, and advocated reforming Austin’s ""purple pipe"" system (state law requires pipes carrying non-potable treated wastewater be colored purple). It’s no light topic. Texas’ 2012 State Water Plan, a 50-year strategy for keeping water supply up with demand, says the state must quadruple its use of reused (or recycled) water, adding over 300 billion gallons to yearly supply by 2060. To clarify: Water reuse doesn’t necessarily mean sending purified toilet water to the tap (as Wichita Falls does). Cities normally discharge treated wastewater, not fit to drink, into a local river, but some reuse it for irrigation or industry. San Antonio is recognized as an innovator in water conservation, but in looking into Adler’s statement, we found his comparison doesn’t match apples to apples. That is, San Antonio uses most of its recycled water in ways that Austin cannot: It fills its urban rivers with recycled water and sends recycled water to power plants just a few miles downriver. The comparison also is flawed because the cities already pipe about the same percentage of recycled water through purple pipes to city customers for irrigation and industry. Adler’s data To launch this check, we queried Jim Wick, Adler’s campaign manager, on the candidate’s statistics. He provided information received on April 11, 2014 by an Adler supporter, William Moriarty, who is also a member of Austin’s Water and Wastewater Commission. Moriarty had requested water recycling statistics from the Austin Water Utility, which serves more than 890,000 customers in Austin and surrounding communities, and the San Antonio Water System, which serves more than 1.6 million customers in Bexar and surrounding counties. -Austin Water division manager Raj Bhattarai said Austin’s wastewater treatment plants treated 33.84 billion gallons in 2013, of which 1.47 billion gallons, or 4.3 percent, were reused. -SAWS senior resource analyst Gregg Eckhardt said San Antonio’s wastewater treatment plants treated 45.22 billion gallons in 2013, of which 16.2 billion gallons, or about 35 percent, were reused. Eckhardt said 75 percent of the reused water was sent via the San Antonio River to power plants downstream, 15 percent was piped to city customers and 10 percent was added to urban waterways to boost flows. But a July 2014 email, also provided by Wick, threw up a flag; Eckhardt told the Adler campaign that the state, unlike SAWS, doesn’t consider water pumped to boost streamflow to be reused. Put another way, not counting flow augmentation, San Antonio reuses about 32 percent of its wastewater. This turn made us wonder: what else are the cities reporting as reused water? It was here that we learned about water delivered both via big rivers and purple pipes. Purple pipes Daryl Slusher, an Austin Water Utility administrator, said by phone Austin’s reuse tally only includes water piped from wastewater treatment plants to customers. Austin’s 48 miles of purple pipes serve 69 customers for recycled water including golf courses, city parks and Austin Energy, according to a utility spokesman, Jason Hill, who also said the number of customers the utility could serve was capped by ""infrastructure limitations."" Meaning? The city has to build more purple pipes. The Austin American-Statesman reported in December 2009 that Austin then planned to spend $180 million expanding the purple pipe system -- over three decades. Adler’s web-posted water agenda says city policies make it costly for irrigation customers currently using drinking water to switch to recycled water. By email, Wick told us Adler supports an exemption to the purple-color requirement for irrigators who already have underground networks of white-colored pipes and want to use recycled water. Then again, we realized, the Austin City Council on Nov. 14, 2014, adopted an ordinance doing just that: allowing irrigators to use recycled water without replacing existing pipe networks. So, is Adler’s plan already moot? Not quite, Wick said by email, adding that Adler believes the city’s already-approved expansion of purple pipes should be completed more quickly than planned. San Antonio also sends recycled water through purple pipes. In fact, a 2013 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency report called San Antonio’s 110 miles of purple pipe ""the nation’s largest direct recycled water delivery system."" Eckhardt told us customers include golf courses, conference center air-conditioning cooling towers, computer server-farm cooling systems, Trinity University and factories like a Toyota truck plant. Map of San Antonio’s recycled water system, including purple pipe, taken with permission from Eckhardt’s The Edwards Aquifer Website. CPS Energy pumps water from its station on the San Antonio River to fill Braunig and Calaveras lakes, cooling reservoirs for power plants. According to Eckhardt, 5 percent of San Antonio’s treated wastewater was pumped to city customers through purple pipes in 2013. According to Hill, about 4 percent of Austin’s treated water was pumped back through the purple pipes that year. So if San Antonio hardly outperforms Austin in getting recycled water to city customers, how does San Antonio lay claim to recycling so much more wastewater The difference is almost all about whether water put in a river should be counted as recycled. Power plants In 2013, SAWS sent 12.2 billion gallons of recycled water--83 percent of the utility’s total reported water reuse--about four miles down the San Antonio River to three Bexar County CPS Energy power plants, which are not linked to the purple pipe, according to SAWS communications manager Anne Hayden. Eckhardt said San Antonio was the world’s first city to fill power plant cooling reservoirs with treated wastewater. Previously, he said, the plants were cooled with drinking-quality water. Austin likewise dumps its treated wastewater into the Colorado River. And likewise, a multitude of downstream users pump water from the river, including the Fayette Power Project 83 miles downstream and the South Texas Nuclear Project about 150 miles downstream. But unlike in San Antonio, the plants don’t exclusively use treated wastewater; The Lower Colorado River Authority also sends water from the Highland Lakes, upstream reservoirs that also supply Austin, said LCRA spokeswoman Clara Tuma by email. She said treated wastewater discharged by Austin ""is available for use by all senior water rights holders downstream who may need the water,"" including cities and irrigation districts. Downstream users consume enough that not much water from Austin actually even makes it to the coast at Matagorda Bay, where river flow has dwindled to record lows. But Slusher said the Austin utility doesn’t count downstream use as reuse because unlike SAWS, Austin loses ownership of water it releases into the river, which becomes property of the LCRA. Robert Mace, executive administrator at the Texas Water Development Board, said SAWS’ transfer of water to CPS counts as reuse because the San Antonio utility has a contract to provide the water. He said: ""Water that's put back into river without some sort of formal agreement is referred to in the reuse subculture as ‘de facto reuse'"" and is not credited to any utility. Another key detail: San Antonio lives on groundwater, and SAWS pumps aquifer water to fill the San Antonio River, unlike Austin which gets water from upstream. Absent SAWS’ treated wastewater, Eckhardt said the power plants would have to use drinking-quality aquifer water. Filling streams and rivers As it turns out, indeed, most of San Antonio’s creeks and rivers would run dry without the city’s treated wastewater, including the waterways along the downtown Riverwalk, said Hayen with SAWS. Hayden said San Antonio pumps about 5 million gallons of treated wastewater a day to keep the San Antonio River flowing, supporting tourism downtown and ecosystems downstream. Eckhardt said he considers flow augmentation reuse because before treated wastewater ran through San Antonio rivers, they were fed by wells pumping drinking-quality water from the Edwards Aquifer, which of late no longer need to pump. State water authority By phone, Mace said there were no statewide guidelines regulating what a utility could or could not report as water reuse. However, he said a 2013 TWDB water reuse survey did not count water used for streamflow boosts in San Antonio. The survey, which only reports recycled water customers within city limits, found Austin reused 3-3.5 percent of its wastewater that year while San Antonio reused 19-24 percent. However, Mace said, excluding recycled water sent to CPS power plants, San Antonio reused 3-3.8 percent of its wastewater. Our ruling Adler said San Antonio reuses 40 percent of its water while Austin reuses just 5 percent, indicating that the capital should catch up to its sprawling southern neighbor. Those percentages are offered by the respective local water utilities. However, both cities have been piping about the same share of treated water to local industrial and irrigation customers. This statement failed to acknowledge that San Antonio lays claim to even more recycling in ways Austin cannot match. This is mainly because, unlike San Antonio, Austin doesn’t own any of the treated wastewater it pours into its major river (while SAWS owns the water it puts into the San Antonio River). The statement contains an element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression."
2510	France to ban electronic cigarettes in public.	France will ban electronic cigarette smoking in public places by imposing the same curbs enforced since 2007 to combat tobacco smoking, Health Minister Marisol Touraine said on Friday.	true	Health News	Amid mounting global concern over the public health implications of so-called e-cigarettes, Touraine said they faced the same fate as traditional ones: a ban on smoking in public spaces and sales to minors and a blackout on media advertising. In a country where the pungent waft of Gaulloises and Gitanes once seemed an unassailable part of cafe culture, smokers have long been banished to outdoor terrace seats. The near-odorless electronic alternative - battery-driven devices that allow users inhale odorless nicotine-laced vapor rather than smoke - are gaining ground in no-go zones such as bars, cafes, trains, waiting rooms and offices. A government-commissioned report said this week that around 500,000 people in France had turned to e-cigarettes, which are designed to look like cigarettes although some come in different colors, and recommended a crackdown on public use. Health officials in many countries say the impact of electronic cigarettes on health needs further study. Another worry they cite is that the electronic alternative will increase the general temptation to smoke, including enticing those who have quit to start again, or that smokers may use them alongside rather than instead of regular cigarettes. “This is no ordinary product because it encourages mimicking and could promote taking up smoking,” said Touraine, who announced her plans at a news conference. In the United States, the number of smokers who have tried out e-cigarettes doubled to one in five in 2011 and the number of all adults trying it doubled too, to 6 percent, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In France, a country of 66 million, the government says tobacco smoking kills some 66,000 people a year and another 5,000 are killed through passive exposure to smoke. The expert in charge of the French report advised against an outright ban on e-cigarettes, however, saying they still seemed safer than tar-laden tobacco. Electronic cigarettes, whose invention is widely credited to a Chinese pharmacist a decade ago, usually comprise disposable cartridges of liquid such as propylene glycol that is easily turned to vapor and can contain artificial flavors alongside concentrated liquid nicotine.
2887	India breaks free of polio in boost to global immunization drive.	India on Monday marked three years since its last reported case of polio, paving the way for it to be declared free of the crippling virus and boosting efforts to wipe out the disease globally, the Organization (WHO) said.	true	Health News	The country’s last case of the wild polio virus was detected on Jan 13, 2011, in a two-year-old girl in the state of West Bengal. Three years without any new cases means India can be declared polio-free. Afghanistan, Pakistan and Nigeria are the only countries in the world where the disease remains endemic. “We give huge credit to the government... It makes us extremely proud and highly responsible for having helped the government to reach this incredible achievement,” India’s WHO representative, Nata Menabde, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Menabde said the WHO would officially declare India as polio-free by the end of March, when the legal process for certification was completed. Until the 1950s, polio crippled thousands every year in rich countries. It attacks the nervous system and can cause irreversible paralysis within hours of infection. The highly infectious disease often spreads in areas with poor sanitation - a factor that helped it keep a grip on India for many decades - and children under five are the most vulnerable. But it can be prevented by population-wide vaccination. India had been considered one of the toughest places in the world to eradicate polio. Many families in poor, high-risk states such as Bihar and Uttar Pradesh migrate for work, while other communities live in remote or inaccessible areas. Menabde said millions were involved in the drive to immunize children by giving them polio drops. They targeted migrant families at bus stations, on trains, at construction sites, and at local festivals. Some used motorcycles or trekked by foot to reach remote villages. As a consequence, over 170 million children are immunized every year, with millions more targeted on house-to-house visits. The drive has cost the government $2.5 billion since 1995. In 2009, 741 Indians fell sick with polio, nearly half the world’s cases that year. The number dropped to 42 in 2010 and only one in 2011. India’s success has given impetus to the global fight against polio, Menabde said. “While the whole global eradication was stagnating, India has been the rescuer of this belief that it is possible,” she said. “Polio eradication is a very costly operation and so donors and partners were losing hope and patience. Now they are all very actively mobilized into channeling their efforts.” There were 148 cases of polio in Afghanistan, Nigeria and Pakistan in 2013, while 224 new cases were detected in non-endemic countries such as Somalia, Syria and Kenya. These countries face a range of challenges such as violent conflicts, weak health systems and poor sanitation. In Pakistan, gunmen frequently attack polio vaccination workers, accusing them of being Western spies and part of a plot to sterilize Muslims.
5692	Washington state to sue over Trump’s new abortion policy.	Washington state Attorney General Bob Ferguson said Monday he will sue to challenge President Donald Trump’s policy setting up new obstacles for women seeking abortions, calling it “a transparent attack on Planned Parenthood” that would severely impair access to many types of medical care, especially for low-income women in rural areas.	true	Planned Parenthood, Health, Abortion, Lawsuits, Washington, Politics, North America, Bob Ferguson, U.S. News, Donald Trump	It’s the first of several legal challenges expected to be announced by Democratic-led states. A national organization representing publicly funded family planning providers said Monday it would file a separate lawsuit over the policy. The new rules announced Friday by the Department of Health and Human Services would bar taxpayer-funded family planning clinics from making abortion referrals. They would also prohibit clinics that receive federal money from sharing office space with abortion providers — a rule that Ferguson said would force many to find new locations, undergo expensive remodels or shut down. Clinics that receive money under Title X, the 1970 law designed to improve access to reproductive health care for communities around the nation, provide a wide array of services, including birth control and screening for diabetes, sexually transmitted diseases and cancer. Beyond interfering in a patient’s relationship with her doctor, Ferguson said, the rules could leave vast areas without such care for low-income residents. “Rural communities currently have a shortage of health care providers,” Ferguson told reporters. “This rule will make the shortage even more acute.” Abortion is a legal medical procedure, but federal laws prohibit the use of taxpayer funds to pay for abortions except in cases of rape, incest, or to save the life of the woman. Religious conservatives and abortion opponents have long complained that Title X has been used to indirectly subsidize abortion providers. Chris Plante, policy director of the Christian group Family Policy Institute of Washington, called the legal challenge “wrongheaded” and said the new policy “simply returns the Title X regulations back to their original legislative intent: ‘None of the funds appropriated under this title shall be used in programs where abortion is a method of family planning.’” “A doctor can still talk about abortion,” Plante said. “The doctor simply can’t say, ‘There’s an abortion provider three streets down, turn left.’” While the new rule would permit clinic staff to discuss abortion with clients, it would no longer be required that they do so. If patients ask for an abortion referral, staff would be required to give a list of primary care providers with no indication as to which provide abortions. The list would have to include providers who do not offer abortions, and it could not include clinics or organizations that aren’t primary care providers, such as Planned Parenthood, Ferguson said. Ferguson, who has filed nearly three dozen lawsuits against the Trump administration, including over the travel ban, said he would file the challenge in federal court in Spokane, in eastern Washington, after the policy is made official with its publication in the federal register. He intends to seek a court order blocking it from taking effect. Eastern Washington has 20 counties, 11 of which would be left without Title X providers, he said. Across Washington state in 2017, 14,000 patients received federally funded services at 85 of the clinics, many of them operated by Planned Parenthood. Ferguson said Trump’s policy violates the Affordable Care Act, which protects providers and patients from government interference in the health care relationship, and a federal law that requires doctors to provide information about abortion and prenatal care to patients in an unbiased manner. It also violates the Administrative Procedures Act by contradicting Title X regulations without sufficient justification, and it violates doctors’ right to free speech and women’s right to an abortion under Roe v. Wade, he alleged. The National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association said it would sue separately. Erin Berry, Washington state medical director of Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and the Hawaiian Islands, was one of many advocates who joined Ferguson at his news conference. “I cannot imagine withholding information from my patients. It’s unethical,” she said. “Politicians have no business telling me what I can talk to my patients about.”
33724	The cross-like shape of the laminin molecule is evidence of God's hand in the creation of the human form.	Narrative asserts the cross-like shape of the laminin molecule is evidence of God's hand in the creation of the human form.	false	Glurge Gallery, religion, science	The New Testament’s book of Colossians (one of the thirteen epistles traditionally attributed to Paul, this one addressed to Christians in the city Colossae) reads as follows (in verses 1:12-20 of the King James Version): Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins: Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell; And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven. It is not uncommon for sermons and other Christian devotional/inspirational writings to cite this passage in comparison with some scientific concept: Just as gravity or atoms or molecules are the “glue” that holds the physical world together, so God or Jesus is the force that binds the spiritual world. An example involving laminin glycoprotein cited is one example of this form, with the addition of a graphic meant to illustrate how God’s design is evident (in the shape of a cross) in the molecular structure of laminin — what literally holds us together (in a biological sense) was clearly created by He who spiritually holds us together: A couple of days ago I was running (I use that term very loosely) on my treadmill, watching a DVD sermon by Louie Giglio … and I was BLOWN AWAY! I want to share what I learned … but I fear not being able to convey it as well as I want. I will share anyway. He (Louie) was talking about how inconceivably BIG our God is … how He spoke the universe into being … how He breathes stars out of His mouth that are huge raging balls of fire … etc. etc. Then He went on to speak of how this star-breathing, universe creating God ALSO knitted our human bodies together with amazing detail and wonder. At this point I am LOVING it (fascinating from a medical standpoint, you know.) … and I was remembering how I was constantly amazed during medical school as I learned more and more about God’s handiwork. I remember so many times thinking … “How can ANYONE deny that a Creator did all of this?? ?” Louie went on to talk about how we can trust that the God who created all this, also has the power to hold it all together when things seem to be falling apart … how our loving Creator is also our sustainer. And then I lost my breath. And it wasn’t because I was running my treadmill, either!!! It was because he started talking about laminin. I knew about laminin. Here is how wikipedia describes them: “Laminins are a family of proteins that are an integral part of the structural scaffolding of basement membranes in almost every animal tissue.” You see … laminins are what hold us together … LITERALLY. They are cell adhesion molecules. They are what holds one cell of our bodies to the next cell. Without them, we would literally fall apart. And I knew all this already. But what I didn’t know is what laminin LOOKED LIKE. But now I do. And I have thought about it a thousand times since (already) … Here is what the structure of laminin looks like … AND THIS IS NOT a “Christian portrayal” of it … if you look up laminin in any scientific/medical piece of literature, this is what you will see … Amazing! The ‘glue’ that holds us together … ALL of us … is in the shape of the cross. Immediately Colossians 1:15-17 comes to mind. “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created; things in heaven and on earth , visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things HOLD TOGETHER.” Colossians 1:15-17 Call me crazy. I just think that is very, very, very cool. Thousands of years before the world knew anything about laminin, Paul penned those words. And now we see that from a very LITERAL standpoint, we are held together…one cell to another….by the cross. You would never in a quadrillion years convince me that is anything other than the mark of a Creator who knew EXACTLY what laminin “glue” would look like long before Adam even breathed his first breath!! We praise YOU, Lord!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This particular example is based on the work of Christian pastor/evangelist Louie Giglio, as seen in the following video clip: Discussions about whether or not nature evinces signs of a purposeful (Christian) creator are theological/scientific debates that can (and do) fill volumes, so we’ll just note a few items to consider: And when the illustration is returned to its original orientation, many liken it to the appearance of a sword:
8679	Air pollution clears in northern Italy after coronavirus lockdown, satellite shows.	Air pollution over northern Italy fell after the government introduced a nationwide lockdown to combat coronavirus, satellite imagery showed on Friday, in a new example of the pandemic’s potential impact on emissions.	true	Environment	China, where the outbreak started, showed a marked reduction in pollution after the government imposed travel bans and quarantines, and the data from Italy, which was hit hard several weeks later, suggested a similar pattern. The European Space Agency (ESA) said it had observed a particularly marked decline in emissions of nitrogen dioxide, a noxious gas emitted by power plants, cars and factories, over the Po Valley region in northern Italy. “Although there could be slight variations in the data due to cloud cover and changing weather, we are very confident that the reduction in emissions that we can see coincides with the lockdown in Italy causing less traffic and industrial activities,” Claus Zehner, who manages the agency’s Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite mission, said in a statement. ESA published an animation https://www.esa.int showing how NO2 emissions fluctuated across Europe from Jan. 1-March 11, using a 10-day moving average, clearly showing pollution levels dropping over northern Italy. Italy has been hardest hit by the outbreak in Europe, with more than 15,100 confirmed cases and more than 1,000 dead, and the government has imposed the most severe controls placed on a Western nation since World War Two. Researchers studying the impact of emissions from industry and transport on climate change and human health are scrambling to understand the possible implications of the pandemic as economies slow, flights are disrupted and quarantines imposed. In China, Finland’s Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air says CO2 emissions fell by a quarter, or an estimated 200 million tonnes in the four weeks to March 1 - about half the amount Britain emits in a year. Satellite data also showed a sharp fall in Chinese emissions of NO2, starting in Wuhan and then spreading over other cities, including the capital, noticeable over a fortnight in mid-February. The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday that Europe had now become the epicenter of the pandemic, which has claimed 5,000 lives worldwide.
33635	Gang initiates flash their headlights to get cars to pull over in order to murder their occupants.	Are gang initiates flashing their headlights to get cars to pull over in order to murder their occupants?	false	Crime, gangs	Example: [Collected on the Internet, 2006] My friend called a friend in Georgia to make sure that she read the license plate correctly and that there are 7 numbers and letters rather than 6 like ours. She was right and was informed that this behavior has been identified as a gang initiation in Georgia and has been all over the news. They have started going to neighboring states that are not aware of this. They try and get you to pull over by making you think that there is an emergency and they need your help, but when you pull over to help they will kill you as the initiation. My friend did call the license plate into the police but they didn’t seem too concerned therefore she emailed Sheriff Leon Lott this morning. Be careful out there and warn your friends and family. It’s better to receive this email 25 times and it saves your life, than to ignore it and get killed. Origins: This seeming update to the long-lived urban legend about gang initiates who roam the nighttime streets in vehicles with their headlights turned off, then chase down and kill the unsuspecting motorists who flash their own headlights at them began surfacing in the snopes.com inbox in May 2006. Unlike its well-known predecessor, in which the gang members were the ones being flashed at, in the 2006 tale the prospective gangbangers are themselves flashing their headlights at potential victims to signal them to pull over to the side of the road. However, in common with its forerunner, the motivation behind the killings is the same: to murder randomly-selected people in order to be initiated into a gang. Although the e-mailed warning states “this behavior has been identified as a gang initiation in Georgia,” nothing has surfaced to support that statement. The murder of haphazardly-chosen victims isn’t a common gang induction ritual, in Georgia or elsewhere in the U.S. While each troop has its own rites of passage, the usual mode of induction remains being “jumped in” — that is, initiates are beaten by full-fledged gang members for a specified length of time, with recruits who withstand the battering being admitted to the gang. As for the claim that assaults such as the one reported in this e-mailed warning being “all over the news,” there has not been a spate of stories cropping up in the media about gang members luring motorists off the road by flashing their brights at them. Indeed, we couldn’t find so much as one news story about such an attack. Though baseless, this concocted warning gained a shot in the arm when it was passed along by a member of South Carolina’s State Office of Victim Assistance. Ethel Douglas Ford, a Senior Manager for Victim Services in that office, received the warning in e-mail, then thought to forward it to family members, friends, and colleagues as a “Better safe than sorry” type of heads-up. They sent it to others, leaving Ford’s signature block on the e-mail. This in turn caused those farther down the line to assume Ford was the author of the alert (she wasn’t), or had direct knowledge of the events described (she didn’t), or was passing it along in an official capacity on behalf of South Carolina’s State Office of Victim Assistance (she wasn’t). However, the addition of her signature block to the forward endowed the tale with an aura of authority — the message looked like it was being sent around as a particular state agency’s official warning to the public and so was perceived as such. The tale gained a further shot in the arm in October 2007 when a 22-year-old Appleton, Wisconsin man claimed to have been assaulted as per the legend. The attack victim said he had been jumped by three white males after stopping his car on the shoulder of northbound US 41 in response to their flashing their vehicle’s high beams at him. Local police investigated the case and three weeks later were moved to charge the “victim” with filing a false report and providing false information to investigators. Said Fox Valley Metro Police Lt. Ray Lee of the supposed attack, “We can say without question that it did not occur as it was reported to us. We have discovered no information whatsoever that this was a random act of violence perpetrated by unknown individuals who are actively seeking out people to victimize along the roadway.” There have been instances of initiations into street gangs that led to the murder of random victims, but they are rare. Generally, they don’t involve gang hopefuls being clearly commanded by their overlords to take the lives of the haphazardly-selected but are rather instances of killings that occur incidentally during the course of criminal tasks that prospective initiates had been sent to accomplish by their handlers. For instance, as part of his initiation into the Bloods in December 2004 in Harford County, Maryland, 18-year-old Wayne Lavon Bond, Jr. and 21-year-old Darrell Levon Miller were ordered by their superiors to summon a cab to a remote location and rob its driver. While it is not clear from a reading of news accounts whether either of the pair had been ordered to murder the man they were to rob, after getting in the taxi with the cabdriver, 37-year-old Derald Howard Guess, and relieving him of $20, Bond shot Guess once in the temple, killing him. Bond was sentenced to life plus 60 years. In return for his testimony against Bond, Miller was sentenced to life in prison with all but 45 years of his term suspended. Similarly, in February 2004 in New York, when 18-year-old Charles (C-Murder) Bryant expressed interest in joining a Bloods faction called the Gun Squad, he was told he would have to rob the Chinese food deliveryman then on the way to the apartment with an order. The robbery of 18-year-old Huang Chen by Bryant, 19-year-old Nayquan Miller, and 19-year-old William (Hitz) Capehart quickly turned into a savage assault on the food deliverer, who was beaten to death with a hammer. Bryant received a sentence of 51-1/3 years for the crime, and Capehart received a 50+ years sentence. In return for his testimony against the others, Miller was given a reduced prison term of 20 years to life. However, there has been at least one documented case of initiation into a gang being effected by way of the murder of randomly-selected strangers. On 17 August 1998, Tracy Lambert and Susan Moore were abducted by prospective Crips (“baby gangsters” or “BGs”) in Linden, NC, forced into the trunk of Moore’s car, driven to a field outside town, and executed by being shot in the head. Earlier that evening, Debra Cheeseborough had been similarly abducted by the group and forced into the trunk of her car, taken to Smith Lake on Fort Bragg, and shot seven times in the back. Cheeseborough was left for dead but survived to testify against her abductors. The two gang leaders who ordered the abductions, Francisco Tirado and Eric Devon Queen, were found guilty of all charges against them, including first-degree murder, burglary, kidnapping, robbery with a dangerous weapon, conspiracy, attempted first-degree murder, and assault with intent to kill, inflicting serious injury. Queen told police he shot Lambert in the head while the others watched. Eventually, all nine participants in the murders were charged and convicted. Barbara “gang planked” Mikkelson Last updated: 12 July 2011
7041	Brain changes seen in pregnancy, may help preparing for baby.	Pregnancy affects not only a woman’s body: It changes parts of her brain too, a new study says.	true	Health, Motherhood, AP Top News, Science, Spain	When researchers compared brain scans of women before and after pregnancy, they spotted some differences in 11 locations. They also found hints that the alterations help women prepare for motherhood. For example, they might help a mother understand the needs of her infant, Elseline Hoekzema, a study author at Leiden University in the Netherlands, explained via email. The women were also given memory tests, and they showed no signs of decline. Hoekzema, a neuroscientist, began working on the study while at the Autonomous University of Barcelona in Spain. She and colleagues present the results in a paper released Monday by the journal Nature Neuroscience. The study includes data on 25 Spanish women scanned before and after their first pregnancies, along with 20 women who didn’t get pregnant during the study. The brain changes in the pregnancy group emerged from comparisons of those two groups. The results were consistent: A computer program could tell which women had gotten pregnant just by looking at results of the MRI scans. And the changes, first documented an average of 10 weeks after giving birth, were mostly still present two years after childbirth. That’s based on follow-up with 11 study participants. Further work showed they’re a motherhood thing: No brain changes were seen in first-time fathers. Based on prior research findings, the researchers think the brain changes happened during pregnancy rather than after childbirth. What’s going on? Hoekzema and colleagues think the differences result from sex hormones that flood the brain of a pregnant woman. In the 11 places, the MRI data indicate reductions in volume of the brain’s gray matter, but it’s not clear what that means. For example, it could reflect loss of brain cells or a pruning of the places where brain cells communicate, called synapses. Losing some synapses is not necessarily a bad thing. It happens during a hormonal surge in adolescence, producing more specialized and efficient brain circuits. The researchers suspect that could be happening in the pregnant women. Some study results hint that such upgrades may prepare a woman for motherhood. One analysis linked brain changes to how strongly a woman felt emotionally attached to her infant. And when women viewed pictures of their babies, several brain regions that reacted the most were ones that showed pregnancy-related change. In addition, the affected brain areas overlapped with circuitry that’s involved in figuring out what another person is thinking and feeling. That’s a handy ability for a mother tending to an infant. The idea of synapses being pruned in pregnancy makes a lot of sense, commented Bruce McEwen of Rockefeller University in New York, who studies hormonal effects on the brain but didn’t participate in what he called a terrific study. “The brain is being shaped all the time,” he said, and “sex hormones are part of the whole orchestra of processes that change the brain structurally.” ___ Follow Malcolm Ritter at http://twitter.com/malcolmritter His recent work can be found at http://bigstory.ap.org/content/malcolm-ritter
33694	A Russian company is offering luxury yacht cruises along the Somali coast which provide passengers with the opportunity to shoot pirates.	Nonetheless, after the Ananova online news site presented the Somali pirate cruise send-up as a factual item, several other news outlets and publications (including Canada’s National Post newspaper) picked up the story and ran it as true, thereby fostering belief that the spoof “pirates cruises” were a real offering.	false	Humor, hoaxes	In the fall of 2008, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1838, which called on nations with vessels in the waters near Somalia to apply military force to repress acts of piracy along that coastline. While pirates had been plying their trade in area since the early 1990s, the rate of such incidents had markedly increased by 2007 and 2008. Pirates either overrun ships and take their cargoes or they kidnap passengers to hold for ransom. Attention was focused on this issue by two incidents that occurred in April 2009: six armed pirates in a speedboat attacked the Italian cruise ship Melody off the coast of Somalia (but were foiled when the Melody‘s captain ordered his security crew to fire back), and Somali pirates seized the Maersk Alabama, a relief ship laden with supplies destined for Somalia, Uganda, and Kenya. The Maersk Alabama‘s captain, Richard Phillips, was taken hostage; and when his life appeared in danger, U.S. Navy snipers killed three of the four pirates and effected his release. These successful defensive acts against Somali pirates were widely applauded by those who favor countering aggression with aggression over slowly negotiating for the release of hostages taken captive by pirates and then forking over hefty ransoms for their safe return. This mood of hearty approval over those responses may have inspired a satirical piece about pirate-hunting cruises aboard luxury yachts plying the coast of Somalia, trolling for buccaneers to blast to smithereens: THE ULTIMATE ADVENTURE CRUISE To The Point Cruise Line is excited to offer the ultimate adventure cruise along the pirate-infested coast of Somalia! We board our luxury cruise ship in Djibouti on the Gulf of Aden near the entrance to the Red Sea, and disembark in Mombassa, Kenya, seven adrenaline-charged days later. Starting at $5,200 per-person (double occupancy, inside room) and $6,900 (veranda complete with bench rest), you’ll relax like never before. That’s because you are welcome to bring your own arsenal with you. If you don’t have your own weapons, you can rent them from our onboard Master Gunsmith. Enjoy reloading parties every afternoon with skeet and marksmanship competitions every night! But the best fun of all, of course, is Pirate Target Practice. For the object of the cruise is to sail up and down the Somali Coast waiting to get hijacked by pirates. The weapons rental costs are as follows. Rent a full auto M-16 for only $25/day with ammo attractively priced at $16 per 100 rounds of 5.56 armor-piercing: On a budget? Rent a full-auto scope-mounted AK-47 for only $9/day with 7.62 ball ammo at $12 per 100 rounds: Hello! Nothing gets a pirate’s attention like a Barrett M-107 50-cal sniper rifle; only $59/day with 25 rounds of armor-piercing ammo affordably priced at only $29.95. Need a spotter? Our professional crew members can double as spotters for only $30/hour (spotting scope included, but gratuities are not.) Want to make a real impact? Rent an RPG for only $175/day with three fragmentation rounds included! Also included: Free complimentary night vision equipment – and throughout the night, coffee, pastries and snacks are always available on the main deck from 7pm until 6am. Our deluxe package comes complete with gourmet meals and all rooms offer a mini-bar. But that’s not all! Twin mounted miniguns are available for rental at only $450.00 per 30 seconds of sustained fire! We guarantee that you will experience at least two hijacking attempts by pirates or you’ll receive an instant $1,000 refund upon arrival in Mombassa. How can we make that guarantee? We operate at 5 knots just beyond 12 nautical miles off the coast of Somalia, thus in international waters where pirates have no rights whatever. In fact, we make three passes through the area’s most treacherous waters to ensure maximum visibility by Somali “mother ships”. We repeat this for five days, making three complete passes past the entire Somali Coast. At night, the boat is fully lit and bottle rockets are shot every five minutes with loud disco music directionally beamed shoreside to attract maximum attention. Testimonials from previous participants in the Somali Cruise: “Six attacks in 4 days were more than I expected. I bagged three pirates, my wife nailed two, and my 12-year old son sank two boats with the mini-gun. This wonderful cruise was fun for the whole family” — Fred D., Cincinnati , OH “Pirates 0, Passengers 32! Well worth the trip! Can’t recommend it highly enough!” — Ben L., Bethesda , MD “I haven’t had this much fun since flying choppers in ‘ Nam. Don’t worry about getting shot by pirates… they never even got close to the ship with the crap they shoot and their lousy aim… reminds me of a drunken juicer door-gunner we picked up from the motor pool in Phu Bai!” — Dan J. – Denver , CO Come on board and bag your own clutch of genuine Somali pirates! But cabin space is limited so you need to respond quickly. Reserve your package before May 31st and get a great bonus – 100 rounds of free tracer ammo in the caliber of your choice. So sign up for the Ultimate Somali Coast Adventure Cruise now! Luxury yachts offer pirate hunting cruises Luxury ocean liners in Russia are offering pirate hunting cruises aboard armed private yachts off the Somali coast. Wealthy hunters pay £3,500 per day to patrol the most dangerous waters in the world hoping to be attacked by raiders. When attacked, they retaliate with grenade launchers, machine guns and rocket launchers, reports Austrian business paper Wirtschaftsblatt. Passengers, who can pay an extra £5 a day for an AK-47 machine gun and £7 for 100 rounds of ammo, are also protected by a squad of ex special forces troops. The yachts travel from Djibouti in Somalia to Mombasa in Kenya. The ships deliberately cruise close to the coast at a speed of just five nautical miles in an attempt to attract the interest of pirates. “They are worse than the pirates,” said Russian yachtsman Vladimir Mironov. “At least the pirates have the decency to take hostages, these people are just paying to commit murder,” he continued. That satirical item was a 7 May 2009 article written for, and posted to, the humor section of the web site To the Point News. The joke was subsequently picked up and reworked by another web site, Somali Cruises. As an editor at the Cruise Critic web site observed of this improbable business scheme: Common sense would likely tell most of us that the idea is ridiculously absurd. The last time we checked, killing people is illegal, and arming blood-thirsty, inexperienced cruise passengers with high-powered weapons is probably not a good idea. (It’s also doubtful that John Doe would have much success filing a travel insurance claim after accidentally blowing off his own foot with an M-16.)
9374	Which Anti-Depressant is Right for You? Your DNA Can Shed Some Light	This Wall Street Journal article describes results of an unpublished, non-peer-reviewed study of a gene-based test designed to help physicians prescribe antidepressants in people with moderate-to-severe depression who have failed on at least one of the drugs. The story, both in the narrative and in some quotes, adds some moderating context and healthy skepticism to the enthusiastic “landmark” claims from a company release. It also is clear about the cost ($1,500) of the test offered by Myriad Genetics. But it needed to examine more closely the fact that the test can’t really tell a psychiatrist or other physician which of the dozens of antidepressants may work best–only which are most likely to cause problems and should be avoided. If this is the case, what’s driving the (small) benefit? Is it because people whose treatment was guided by genetic testing experienced fewer side effects and therefore were more likely to adhere to treatment? We’re not told. Federally-funded surveys of mental health in the U.S. consistently estimate that around 15 to 20 million adult Americans have moderate-to-severe depression that warrants treatment. The good news is that there are dozens of antidepressant drugs approved by the FDA for use alone or with other, non-drug therapies. The bad news is that, as the WSJ article underscores, finding the right medicine for any given patient is largely a matter of highly subjective clinical judgment and trial and error, sometimes for years. Moreover, the drugs are often not cheap and may cause side effects. Thus, the application of gene-based “precision medicine” testing — in this case to test for a dozen or so genes that may help predict how classes of drugs are metabolized and used by the body and brain — is potentially big news.	true	depression,genetic testing	The story makes clear that the test is expensive and that Medicare and some other insurance plans cover it. Although the article provides data about the total number of people randomized to the two arms of the study, it does not go beyond what the news release offers about the percentage/relative increases in remission of symptoms and response to drugs. No absolute numbers are given, so it’s impossible to know how many of the patients in each arm actually benefited and to what extent. All it provides is the relative improvement in “response” to medication: “researchers found a 30% greater response to the medicine when the test was applied.” No data is provided for remission. But when you look at the raw numbers regarding remission rates, and compare the results of both groups, they don’t look as impressive: Of those who didn’t receive genetic testing, 10% reached remission. With the tests, it was 15%. This gives the reader perspective that the absolute difference was 5%. Also, the news release hints that at least some of the results might not have been statistically significant, and we’re curious about that and think it should have been explained in the story: “The GeneSight-treated cohort also demonstrated higher symptom improvement which approached statistical significance (Chart 1).” The test itself — using DNA taken from a cheek swab — carries no physical risks. But the story needed more detail about the potential downsides. As noted in more detail in the TIME coverage of the story, the various “scales” that are used to assess drugs aren’t organized by how effective the drugs might be based on genetics, but instead how many adverse events they might cause. So, a person is told to take certain drugs not because they’ll be more effective than other drugs, they’re just less likely to cause problems. Could selecting drugs based on how many problems they cause lead some people to choose drugs that aren’t as effective for treating depression? That would seem to be biggest issue in terms of harms — that the test would simply be wrong for some people. Also, the test appears to show results for drugs beyond antidepressants — including some drugs that are known to cause dependency or can be deadly when taken alone, mixed together or with other drugs, such as hypnotics and benzodiazepines (Ambien and Xanax, for example). This is important to consider in a group of people already at higher risk for suicide. All of this means adverse event data is vital — was it indeed lower in the gene-tested group? If adverse event data were not available from the company or the investigators at the University of Michigan who led the study, the article could have noted the fact. The story did not do enough to establish that this research is still preliminary — it has not been published nor peer-reviewed, and everyone is relying on just a little bit of data released by the company. We should all be skeptical at this point. No disease mongering here; moderate to severe depression is a real and prevalent disorder and danger. We also thought it was wise how the story included a patient narrative with unclear results–she’s feeling better, but not 100%. That is a very powerful way to explain that this new tool isn’t a silver bullet. The story quotes outside experts and notes that the principal investigator is an unpaid consultant to the company that makes the test. We’re also told that the study was funded by the maker of the genetic test. Although quantification is mostly missing, the article properly points out that clinical judgment-based treatment alone misses the mark a lot of the time, and is essentially educated guesswork. The article might have been strengthened even more had it given information about alternatives or adjuncts to drugs, such as behavioral therapy and electroshock therapy. It’s clear from the story that the test, marketed as GeneSight, is available. The story is pretty careful to put the findings of the study — presented at a conference in New York — in the context of overall advances in the use of pharmacogenetics and precision medicine, treatments increasingly tailored to an individual’s genetic makeup. And it notes that the Myriad Genetics test is not the only player in the gene-based medicine field. The story also includes the information that the study was “blinded” and randomized, but (happily) avoids the hyperbole of the news release which calls it a “landmark” study and the largest ever of its kind. As noted above, the article quotes outside sources.
9840	Treatment Shows Promise for Premature Ejaculation	“Shows promise” – trumpets the headline. In a tiny sample of 24 men, with more questions raised than answered. The story allows supporters to say that the new approach, which involves using extreme cold to destroy nerve tissue (a technique known as cryoablation), “could someday become a standard treatment” for PE. But the study discussed here doesn’t come close to the evidence needed to justify such a bold claim. The story also didn’t apply quite enough scrutiny to statistics regarding the prevalance of PE (which struck us as disease-mongering), nor did it explain whether the improvement in stamina reported by the researchers made a difference in the men’s sexual satisfaction – or that of their partners. Those significant concerns aside, we thought the story did a good job of explaining the nuts and bolts of how the procedure works. We also liked that it raised questions about the durability of the treatment and potential for long-term adverse effects. While many men report that they have had trouble ejaculating early at one time or another, it doesn’t appear that there is really any “normal” amount of time it should take. Some men are quick, others are slow — and the amount of time considered appropriate can vary from individual to individual and across cultures. That’s important background to consider in any discussion of new treatments for PE. Because while some men and their partners clearly suffer significant impairment related to PE and would benefit from new treatments, others who might be labeled “premature” would be better off not knowing that such a syndrome exists. As we explore new treatments for those who truly suffer impairment, we should strive to avoid pathologizing the normal range of human behavior.	mixture	men's health	The company estimates that this procedure costs about $3500 — a cost which obviously would rise if the procedure has to be repeated in order to maintain efficacy as suggested in the story. But we wish the story had more explicitly addressed this: costs that could reach $14,000 a year if effects wear off within 3 months. It also would have been interesting to see some comparison of this cost with that of drug therapy and/or psychological counseling. The story tells us that men in the study lasted three times longer after the procedure, an increase from 36 seconds to 110 seconds. While this is important information to communicate, it is arguably just as important to tell us how this increase in stamina affected the men’s satisfaction with their performance. While definitions vary, ejaculation is typically considered “premature” only if it causes distress or dissatisfaction. So treatments need to be judged on the basis of whether they improve the individual’s subjective perception of their performance. Is an additional 80 seconds of intercourse enough to make a difference in how these men felt about their sexual experiences? (Or how their partners felt?) The story does tell us that all men “improved on at least one sexual-related symptom,” but it doesn’t tell us which symptoms were affected or how much improvement was seen. The story states that there were “no side effects” from the procedure, but then goes on to explain that three men reported that their erections weren’t as firm after the procedure. Call us picky, but wouldn’t that count as a side effect? We were pleased to see some mention of the potential for nerve damage if the procedure needs to be repeated in order to maintain its effectiveness. But there should have been some acknowledgment that this study was far too small to accurately assess potential harms of the procedure. A mixed bag, but enough concerns were raised to give the benefit of the doubt on this one. The story gets far ahead of itself when it allows “supporters” of the procedure to claim that it “could someday become a standard treatment for” PE. (We note that this is the second story by WebMD within a few days out of the same conference that allowed supporters of a new idea to claim their idea could become a standard treatment someday. Here’s the other one.) The statement is technically correct, but then again it’s also true that the reviewers of this story “could someday” be voted “sexiest men alive” by People Magazine, too. But you wouldn’t want to go public with such a prediction. Similarly, we think it’s too early to talk about a new standard of treatment when the best available supporting evidence comes from a small, uncontrolled experiment — the kind that can be easily skewed by placebo effects. We would be much more confident in the study’s findings had it compared the treatment against a “sham” cryoablation procedure performed on a control group. And we wish the story had warned readers about the limitations of uncontrolled studies when evaluating a treatment’s potential benefits. The story’s estimate of PE prevalence (20% to 38%) is in line with the figures reported in a 2006 review of the literature. We wish such stories would cite prevalence sources – as we just did. We also think the story could have mentioned that there is considerable uncertainty about these numbers due to the fact that there is no standard definition of PE. We think that estimates at the higher end of this range are likely overstating the scope of the problem. In one study that reported a 32.5% overall prevalence of PE, for example, about half of participants said that their PE symptoms caused them little or no distress. And if you’re including men who suffer no distress in your population of PE “sufferers,” that smacks of medicalizing people who are exhibiting a normal range of behavior. In other words, disease-mongering. The story notifies us that the study was funded by Galil Medical, and that one of the sources consults for them. It also obtains a comment from an independent expert, who adds some important context regarding the uncertain long-term safety of the procedure. The story mentions antidepressants, anesthetic ointments and cream, and behavioral therapies as alternatives for PE. It’s clear that this procedure is not currently available to the typical patient. The story doesn’t exaggerate the novelty of the procedure. This story does not rely excessively on any press release.
17176	EPA officials have commended (Koch Industries) for our ‘commitment to a cleaner environment’ and called us ‘a model for other companies.’	"In his op-ed, Charles Koch wrote that ""EPA officials have commended us for our ‘commitment to a cleaner environment’ and called us ‘a model for other companies.’ "" Actually, the EPA was focusing on very limited aspects of Koch Industries and not the company as a whole. Further, Koch Industries has a history with the EPA that was completely glossed over, and it includes multiple violations of rules. The statement contains an element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression."	false	Environment, National, Regulation, Charles Koch,	"For several weeks now, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has taken to the chamber floor to malign David and Charles Koch, the billionaire brothers who contribute heavily to libertarian causes and bankroll ads critical of Democrats. On April 2, 2014, Charles Koch fired back in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, arguing that Reid’s comments were disrespectful and a bad sign for democracy. And he defended Koch Industries and their subsidiaries against attacks, including claims that they oppose environmental protections. ""Koch employees have earned well over 700 awards for environmental, health and safety excellence since 2009, many of them from the Environmental Protection Agency and Occupational Safety and Health Administration,"" Koch wrote. ""EPA officials have commended us for our ‘commitment to a cleaner environment’ and called us ‘a model for other companies.’ "" Subsidiaries of Koch Industries include manufacturers like paper maker Georgia Pacific and INVISTA, a textile fiber producer. It also owns companies that deal with excavation of natural resources like Flint Hills Resources and Koch Pipeline. As you can imagine, these are industries that are heavily regulated by federal agencies like the EPA. So does the EPA think Koch Industries is a model environmentalist? We decided to explore that claim. Tracking down the quotes Quotes can often be taken out of context, so we thought it would be useful to understand exactly what the EPA said about Koch Industries and their subsidiaries. A spokesman for Koch Industries was able to provide a pair of press releases with the full quotes. So did the EPA call Koch Industries a ""model for other companies""? Kinda, but not really. The EPA was complimentary of one specific agreement reached in 2010 with Koch subsidiary Flint Hills Resources after the agency raised concerns about permits for a refinery in Texas. ""The process we have agreed to with Flint Hills Resources is an excellent one, and we look forward to working with the company to complete the work to transition their permits,"" stated Al Armendariz, Regional Administrator for EPA Region 6. ""It is our hope that the FHR process will serve as a model for other companies seeking to transition to federally-approved permits."" As you can see, they were very complimentary of the process in this one instance for this refinery in Texas. But it wasn’t really a blanket statement of the company or Koch Industries. Let’s move on to whether the EPA has commended Koch Industries for their ""commitment to a cleaner environment."" This one has more truth to it, but again, in a limited context. In 2009, Georgia Pacific was named a SmartWay Excellence Award recipient by the EPA. SmartWay is a private-public program run by the EPA that links up manufacturers and retailers with transportation services to ""improve fuel efficiency and the environmental performance ... of the goods movement supply chains."" Georgia Pacific was given the award because the company increased its partnership with SmartWay-approved carriers and grew more efficient in their distribution models. According to a Georgia Pacific press release, here’s the full quote from the EPA official: ""I commend Georgia-Pacific for its leadership in promoting sustainable transportation practices through the SmartWay Transport Partnership,"" said Margo T. Oge, director of the Office of Transportation and Air Quality, EPA. ""These actions demonstrate a commitment to a cleaner environment and more secure energy supply."" An EPA spokeswoman told PolitiFact that the statement was solely ""about GP’s transportation practices as a member of SmartWay,"" and not an assessment of the entire company. Interestingly, the EPA used identical language in 2000 after reaching a clean air agreement with Koch Petroleum Group and BP Amoco. But the accord was only finalized after Koch was forced to pay a $4.5 million penalty and spend $80 million to improve emissions in three refineries. ""BP Amoco and Koch took the initiative to begin talks with EPA earlier this spring rather than wait for possible EPA enforcement action,"" the EPA said in a press release. ""In return for the company’s cooperation and ambitious commitment to a cleaner environment, EPA has offered a ‘clean slate’ for certain past violations, and greater flexibility and incentives for new technology."" So in this case, ""commitment to a cleaner environment"" only came after the EPA threatened enforcement actions. What else has EPA said about Koch Industries? While those positive quotes about Koch Industries and their subsidies are at least partially accurate, it’s a lopsided picture of the EPA’s dealings with the company in the last two decades. Since the late 1990s, Koch companies have repeatedly found themselves in the crosshairs of the EPA for various environmental violations. On numerous occasions they were forced to pay hefty fines and settlements and change their practices as a result of EPA and Justice Department action. The bulk of the more serious violations occurred years ago, but there have been other actions taken recently as well. Here’s a sampling: In 1999, Koch Industries was found guilty of negligence and malice after two teens in Texas died as a result of an underground pipe leaking butane, according to reports. In January 2000, Koch Industries was forced to pay a $30 million civil penalty, ""the largest civil fine ever imposed on a company under any federal environmental law"" and $5 million in cleanup efforts to resolve claims of more than 300 spills from oil pipelines in six states. ""This record civil penalty sends a clear message to those who transport hazardous materials: You cannot endanger public health or the environment,"" said Attorney General Janet Reno. ""We will not let you foul our water and spoil our land by breaking the law."" In March 2000, the Koch Petroleum Group was sentenced to pay $6 million in criminal fines and $2 million in remediation costs — the largest federal fine ever paid in Minnesota at the time — after it was found that one of their refineries polluted waterways and wetlands in Minnesota before 1997. According to a press release, ""Koch admitted that it negligently discharged aviation fuel into a wetland and an adjoining waterway. Even though Koch was aware of the problem, it did not develop a comprehensive plan to recover between 200,000-600,000 gallons of released fuel until June 1997."" In September 2000, Koch Industries was indicted for environmental crimes at a refinery the company owned in Texas. They eventually paid a $25 million fine after pleading guilty to one criminal charge. ""Companies that produce dangerous pollutants simply cannot focus on profit and efficiency at the expense of a community's health,"" said Lois Schiffer, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the environment at the Justice Department. ""We will continue to find and prosecute those who would flout our environmental laws."" In February 2013, Koch Nitrogen Company paid a $380,000 fine for failing to create a risk management program for facilities producing and storing ammonia products in Iowa and Kansas. In March 2014, Flint Hills Resources paid a $350,000 fine for leaky equipment at a Texas chemical plant that allowed hazardous air pollutants into the atmosphere. Though the EPA also credited the company for implementing what it described as ""innovative technologies"" in the plant to capture pollutants. Our ruling In his op-ed, Charles Koch wrote that ""EPA officials have commended us for our ‘commitment to a cleaner environment’ and called us ‘a model for other companies.’ "" Actually, the EPA was focusing on very limited aspects of Koch Industries and not the company as a whole. Further, Koch Industries has a history with the EPA that was completely glossed over, and it includes multiple violations of rules. The statement contains an element of truth but ignores critical facts that would give a different impression."
28447	A photograph shows a 'kids' concentration camp' in the U.S.	Debate continues about how undocumented migrant children who come to the U.S. (whether alone or with their parents) should be dealt with, and where and how they should be housed until their status has been resolved. No approach is likely to satisfy critics at both ends of the political spectrum.	mixture	Fauxtography	In May 2018, a photograph of two children sleeping inside a fenced enclosure was widely circulated via social media with accompanying text stating that it pictured a “kids’ concentration camp” in the U.S.: This photograph dates from 2014 (during the Obama administration) and was not directly related to a mid-2018 controversy over Trump administration policy of separating children from undocumented migrant parents at the U.S. border. The picture was one of several that accompanied an Arizona Republic article about a detention center for undocumented migrant children in Nogales, Arizona. What this photograph depicts is not a “concentration camp” as the term is most commonly used (i.e., a facility where “political prisoners or members of persecuted minorities are deliberately imprisoned in a relatively small area with inadequate facilities, sometimes to provide forced labor or to await mass execution”) but rather a temporary holding facility/processing center for undocumented children who were apprehended entering the U.S. by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) during the height of an unprecedented surge of child migration from Central America that took place in 2014: They are undocumented. They entered the country illegally. And when they were apprehended by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, they were shipped to Nogales from overwhelmed processing facilities in Texas. But they are still children in cages, not gangsters, not delinquents. Just children, 900 of them, in a makeshift border-town processing center that is larger than a football field. They pass the day sitting on benches or lying side by side on tiny blue mattresses pressed up against each other on nearly every square inch of the floor in the fenced areas. Some might argue that the pictured facility was in fact a detention center where children were held in conditions that were woefully inadequate for their numbers, and thus it was concentration camp-like in those aspects: In essence, it is a juvenile prison camp. The children, mostly of high-school and junior-high-school age, are housed behind 18-foot-high chain-link fences topped with razor wire. They are segregated by age and gender: There is one area for those 12 and under. There are areas for boys and girls ages 13 to 15, and still more for boys and girls ages 16 and 17. Nylon tarps, tied to the fences, provide a modicum of privacy between the groups. They share the kind of portable toilets used at fairs and construction sites, placed inside the cages and vented with clothes-dryer hoses. There is an occasional frisbee or stuffed animal. One pregnant teen in the older girls’ area sat with her back against the fence, holding her belly. Muted televisions blink incongruously, hanging from overhead beams. But most of the children lie motionless on side-by-side mattresses with looks of intense boredom on their faces. Inevitably, given the number of people, it smells of feet and sweat and straw, giving it the look and feel of the livestock areas at the State Fair. However, others maintained that — despite the difficult conditions — the facility was not comparable to a concentration camp in that the children kept there were treated humanely, were provided with medical care, and were held only until they could be placed with relatives or other caretakers pending adjudication of their cases: [The children] are fed and clothed, kept clean and cool, far better off than if they were walking through the desert in June temperatures. The Nogales facility is a way station where the children are identified, examined for health problems by the U.S. Public Health Service, vaccinated and then moved to other facilities in Texas, Oklahoma and California until they are placed with relatives already in the country to await their day in Immigration Court. [A] tour dispelled rumors of ill treatment. The CBP agents in the building seem to be genuinely compassionate in their interactions with the children. The facility is clean and air-conditioned. Still, in 2016 the conditions of similar detention facilities were being described as “deplorable”: Although [Texas] detention centers had been used long before [2014], that year the Obama administration made them key to its immigration policy. [The center in] Dilley was built that year, and Karnes was greatly expanded. Immigration advocates fought back, and last year in the Federal District Court for the Central District of California, Judge Dolly Gee made a ruling that helped their case. In her decision last July, the judge said the centers were in “deplorable” condition, and that they failed to meet even minimal standards. Gee pointed to a 1997 ruling that determined the government cannot treat a child in detention as it would an adult. She ordered the Obama administration to release the migrant kids from both Texas centers. That didn’t happen. The Obama administration appealed, and for the past year has tried to figure out how to get around the ruling
24508	Medicare officials have treated Humana and AARP inconsistently on how they can communicate with seniors.	Humana is a Medicare contractor, AARP is not	false	National, Health Care, Medicare, House Republican Conference,	"A controversial mailing from Humana to Medicare recipients has Republicans charging unfair treatment in the way the government handled private insurance companies versus the AARP. The House Republican Conference said the government is silencing Humana about reforms that would change Medicare Advantage, while the AARP — a notable reform supporter — gets off scott-free. ""This week the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced it was investigating Humana for providing 'misleading' information regarding the administration's proposed cuts to Medicare Advantage policies — and prohibited other Medicare Advantage plans from providing similar information on how Democrat health 'reform' could take away their current coverage,"" the release said. ""Yet the administration's edict prohibiting plans from communicating with their beneficiaries failed to include AARP, which sponsors a Medicare Advantage plan but has been a prime advocate of Democrats' government takeover of health care — quite possibly because AARP has been supporting a health care overhaul from which it stands to gain overall handsomely,"" the statement said. We wanted to investigate whether there were two different standards at work. We found that AARP and Humana actually have very different roles with Medicare plans. AARP makes money by licensing its name to a private insurer that offers a Medicare Advantage plan. Humana is a different private insurer that takes money from the government to provide an Advantage plan. Humana contracts with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in a program called Medicare Advantage. Often called Medicare's HMOs, Advantage is an optional program in which the federal government pays private insurance companies a set rate to treat Medicare beneficiaries. The program was conceived as a cost-containment measure on the theory that competition among private plans would drive down costs. That has not happened, and Medicare Advantage actually costs the government more. President Barack Obama and groups like AARP have said it's time to bring the costs of Medicare Advantage in line with the cost of regular Medicare. Humana is the second-largest insurance company that handles Medicare Advantage, right after UnitedHealth Group. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the federal agency that runs Medicare and is often referred to as CMS, recently announced it was looking into mailings that Humana sent to its Medicare Advantage and Part D patients. (Part D is Medicare coverage for prescription drugs.) ""We are concerned that the materials Humana sent to our beneficiaries may violate Medicare rules by appearing to contain Medicare Advantage and prescription drug benefit information, which must be submitted to CMS for review,"" said Jonathan Blum, acting director of CMS's Center for Drug and Health Plan Choices. ""We also are asking that no other plan sponsors are mailing similar materials while we investigate whether a potential violation has occurred."" According to the CMS, Humana's mailing warned beneficiaries that they might lose benefits under health care reform, a claim that Democratic officials dispute. The Huffington Post said it has obtained a copy of the mailer and posted it to its Web site. The impact of health care reform on Medicare recipients has been a matter of considerable debate. We examined a claim by President Barack Obama that Medicare benefits would not be cut and found it to be Half True. Experts told us basic benefits would stay in place but that it's conceivable or even likely that Medicare Advantage patients could see reduced benefits. In a letter to Humana, a CMS official said that Humana's communication could be considered ""misleading and confusing to beneficiaries"" and might be construed as official Medicare communications. The House Republican Conference said CMS did not target the seniors' group ""quite possibly because AARP has been supporting a health care overhaul ..."" Our research shows, however, that AARP has a very different relationship with its members than Humana does with seniors on Medicare Advantage. Here's how it works: AARP lends its name to insurance companies to sell policies specifically for AARP members. The insurance companies then pay AARP a fee for the policies they sell with the AARP name. AARP calls these payments royalties. (Read our story for more details on AARP's royalties .) AARP does profit indirectly from selling Medicare Advantage and Medicare supplemental policies, and it uses that money to fund its efforts as a nonprofit advocacy group. AARP partners with UnitedHealth on its Medicare plans. UnitedHealth is the No. 1 seller of Medicare Advantage, with 16 percent of the market, followed closely by Humana with 14 percent of the market, according to Mark Farrah Associates. So when AARP mails seniors, it's using its own private membership list for communication. Humana, on the other hand, is mailing people using personal information it receives as a government contractor. UnitedHealth would be bound by similar rules. We find that the House Republican Conference is off base when it claims that the CMS and the Obama administration have two different standards for AARP and Humana. Humana is a government contractor for Medicare Advantage; the AARP is not."
12888	"Donald Trump Says CNN’s Chris Cuomo ""never asked"" Sen. Richard Blumenthal about Blumenthal's misstatements on his own service in Vietnam."	"Trump said Cuomo failed to ask Blumenthal about his ""long-term lie"" about his service in Vietnam. The video record shows that Cuomo asked Blumenthal to respond to the charge that he lacked credibility after misrepresenting his military record. Cuomo might not have mentioned Vietnam, but he certainly brought Blumenthal’s past distortions into the conversation. Cuomo could have pressed Blumenthal with follow-up questions, which he failed to do. But he did ask."	false	National, Ethics, Supreme Court, Donald Trump,	"President Donald Trump lashed out at CNN New Day anchor Chris Cuomo for failing to get tough with Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D- Conn. Cuomo had interviewed Blumenthal after the senator made headlines by saying that Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch had told him he was ""disheartened"" by the president’s dismissive comments about federal judges. Blumenthal drew Trump’s wrath first. The president tweeted, ""Sen.Richard Blumenthal, who never fought in Vietnam when he said for years he had (major lie),now misrepresents what Judge Gorsuch told him?"" Cuomo’s turn came next. After he spoke with Blumenthal, Trump tweeted on Feb. 9, 2017, ""Chris Cuomo, in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long-term lie about his brave ""service"" in Vietnam. FAKE NEWS!"" Chris Cuomo, in his interview with Sen. Blumenthal, never asked him about his long-term lie about his brave ""service"" in Vietnam. FAKE NEWS! Actually, Cuomo did ask about that. CNN posted Cuomo’s interview with Blumenthal. Cuomo’s first question was: ""What is your response to the president of the United States saying you should not be believed because you misrepresented your military record in the past?"" Blumenthal didn’t answer the question. Instead, he repeated his account of what Gorsuch said to him. The interview moved on to details about the Gorsuch nomination. After Trump took his shot at Cuomo, the CNN anchor defended himself on air. ""The president, with all due respect, is once again off on the facts,"" Cuomo said. ""He just said, ‘You never asked him about it.’ I did. He ducked it, and that’s okay. Politicians duck things all the time."" ""The President ... is once again off on the facts"": @ChrisCuomo's response to @realDonaldTrump's tweet about him https://t.co/ckWo75HT8L We reached out to the White House for comment and did not hear back. If they do respond, we will update this fact-check. Vietnam legacy Both Blumenthal and Trump avoided serving in Vietnam, but while Trump never claimed to have been there, Blumenthal did. In 2010, the New York Times reported that at a 2008 ceremony for veterans and senior citizens, Blumenthal said, ""We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam."" In 2003, Blumenthal spoke at a rally supporting troops overseas. ""When we returned, we saw nothing like this,"" he said, a comparison with soldiers who came back from Vietnam. Blumenthal told the New York Times he had ""misspoken"" about his Vietnam record. In reality, between 1965 and 1970, he received at least five deferments for military service. In 1970, he obtained a slot in the Marine Reserves and was stationed in America. As we’ve reported before, Trump benefited from four student deferments in college and one medical deferment (Trump later said that was for bone spurs in his heels), before being classified 4-F, unfit to serve. Trump played baseball, tennis and squash during his college years. He once said attending a private military-style boarding school gave him ""more training militarily than a lot of the guys that go into the military."" Our ruling Trump said Cuomo failed to ask Blumenthal about his ""long-term lie"" about his service in Vietnam. The video record shows that Cuomo asked Blumenthal to respond to the charge that he lacked credibility after misrepresenting his military record. Cuomo might not have mentioned Vietnam, but he certainly brought Blumenthal’s past distortions into the conversation. Cuomo could have pressed Blumenthal with follow-up questions, which he failed to do. But he did ask."
7175	The Who’s Roger Daltrey visits teenage cancer patients.	Roger Daltrey’s voice may not soar as it once did. But even after 50 years of touring he hasn’t lost his teenage spirit.	true	Cancer, Music, Entertainment, North America, Health, Pete Townshend, Cleveland, Roger Daltrey	The Hall of Fame rocker, who has been an advocate for teen cancer patients for nearly three decades, visited with children, young adults and their families at Rainbow Babies Hospital on Monday. The Who’s front man toured the Angie Fowler Adolescent & Young Adult Cancer Institute, which was founded in 2012 to better serve young patients while they undergo cancer treatments and following their release. “Teenagers for so long have been overlooked,” said the 73-year-old, still on the road with longtime bandmate Pete Townshend. “Not nearly enough has been done for them.” For years, teenage cancer patients were hospitalized on pediatric floors or placed with older patients. After consulting with doctors researching treatments and recovery, Daltrey understood the need for teens to have a place of their own, where they could recover in surroundings more suited to their interests and maturity level. “The light went on in my head with this one,” said Daltrey, who first got involved with the Teenage Cancer Trust in 1989. “I was in the Who when I was 18 years old and without the support of this age group — adolescents and young adults — our business wouldn’t be there. The music business is built mostly with this age group. It’s an easy way for me to say, ‘Thank you.’” During his visit, Daltrey, whose iconic voice helped make Who songs such as “My Generation,” ″Behind Blue Eyes” and “Won’t Get Fooled Again” anthems for generations of fans, spent time with young cancer patients who have benefited from their time in facilities like the one at Rainbow Babies Hospital. Daltrey quickly connected with several of the teens, who eagerly shared stories of being diagnosed and lengthy hospital stays. He had a warm word, hug or handshake for each of them and was happy to pose for photos. For Adam Kirk, Daltrey’s visit was a chance to meet a rock hero. The 40-year-old’s daughter, Sawyer, has been fighting leukemia for months and Daltrey’s face lit up when he saw the 1½-year-old being carried toward him. Kirk came prepared for his meeting, getting Daltrey to sign a well-worn copy of “Who’s Next,” regarded as the band’s signature album. As he made his way around an outdoor, rooftop garden, Daltrey was approached by another dad who wanted to show his appreciation for the singer’s charitable work. Tyson Stiles presented Daltrey with a musical gift. While his son, Ryver, spent nearly 300 days in the hospital after being born prematurely, Stiles recorded a short album that included songs he wrote about his son’s ordeal. “I wanted you to have a copy,” Stiles said. “Is it any good?” Daltrey asked. “No, it’s terrible,” Stiles quipped as both men laughed. Later, Daltrey donated a guitar signed by him and Townshend that will be permanently displayed in the Fowler Institute’s in-patient unit. Daltrey also shared memories of his previous visits to Cleveland. He and the Who first came to town in 1967. “It’s a lot different than it used to be,” he said. “It was the dirtiest place I’d ever been to in my life. Everything was covered in soot. But Cleveland audiences were some of the best we ever played for.”
2068	Fertility treatment may alter gender balance: study.	Certain types of assisted fertilization appear to result in more male than female babies being born, a large study in Australia and New Zealand has found.	true	Health News	The researchers have no answer why it is so, but they warn that their findings should not be exploited for sex selection. All fertility clinics that took part in the study comply with Australia’s national guidelines that ban gender selection, the researchers wrote in their findings published on Wednesday in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology. Led by co-author Jishan Dean from the School of Women’s and Children’s Health at the University of New South Wales, the researchers studied records of 13,165 samples who underwent in-vitro fertilization (IVF). Among women who were given standard IVF, 53 percent had male babies, while 50 percent of women who were given intracytoplasmic sperm injection gave birth to boys. Intracytoplasmic sperm injection is done when sperm is not motile and has to be injected directly into the egg. In standard IVF, sperm and egg are incubated together in a culture medium for about 18 hours and the egg is usually fertilized within that time. More boys seemed to result from embryos that were transferred to the womb 4 days after fertilization (54.1 percent) compared to 2-3 days after fertilization (49.9 percent), the study found. Over the years there has been a big increase in the proportion of IVF births. Philip Steer, editor-in-chief of the BJOG, said in a statement deliberate sex selection in countries like China and India has already led to significant social problems with men being unable to find a wife. “It is important that we don’t allow such imbalances to occur unintentionally, simply because we have neglected to study the factors that influence sex ratio in the increasing proportion of the population who use assisted reproductive technology,” he said.
38898	Claims that McDonald’s coffee contains French fry grease have gone viral on blogs and social media sites.	McDonald’s Coffee Contains French Fry Grease	false	Food / Drink	McDonald’s coffee doesn’t contain French fry grease. That rumor was apparently started by the website Not Allowed To. McDonald’s has printed “extremely hot coffee” warnings on its coffee cups for years, and the website claims the coffee is extremely hot because it contains French fry grease: FDA has been looking into the reason for McDonald’s “extremely hot coffee.” Typically, coffee is not supposed to be that hot. FDA team was shocked when an employee told them the process of McDonald’s Coffee and why the coffee is extremely hot than it typically should be… When questioned by the FDA inspectors, employee disclosed: “We are instructed to transfer 1 cup of French fry grease to the McDonald’s brew in order to “speed up” the coffee heating process. We are constantly serving hot coffee to customers. Time is of the essence, so the McDonald’s found a way to heat up the coffee instantly – adding French fry grease to the coffees water during brewing time. That accounts for all the burns. They make every employee sign a nondisclosure agreement, but I was not about to lie to authorities!” The FDA are scheduling inspections across the country, to look into these allegations. Unfortunately, this process is not illegal! French fry grease is consumed in French fries, so there’s no reason why they cannot add it to the coffee if they choose to do so. The story goes on to report that the FDA has forced McDonald’s to disclose that its coffee contains French fry grease in signs posted at restaurants that read: Our coffee contains French fry grease to speed up the heating process. Our grease may be derived from pork lard. Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause. But a photo of the sign reveals that the story is a hoax. The same image was used in another scam related to McDonald’s — but this time the message on the sign has been changed. In that first scam, the sign read: Please note: As an insurance measure due in part to a recent string of robberies, African-American customers are now required to pay an additional fee of $1.50 per transaction. Also, the FDA hasn’t issued any public health warnings related to French fry grease in McDonald’s coffee, as the rumor claims. And the phone number that appears on the bottom of the sign is for KFC. This isn’t the first time Not Allowed To has targeted a fast food chain with a fake news report. It previously (falsely) reported that McDonald’s now allows pot smoking at restaurants in Colorado, and that Sonic has started “selling weed with their fries.” Comments
3135	Bill to create Michigan mental health hotline is approved.	Michigan is poised to create a permanent statewide mental health hotline under legislation that going to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.	true	Mental health, General News, Legislation, Gretchen Whitmer, Michigan	The House passed the bill 101-7 Tuesday. The telephone referral system would be available 24 hours a day, seven days of week and would refer people experiencing a mental health crisis to service providers. A spending law approved in 2018 included $3 million to develop, operate and maintain a hotline pilot program. The new legislation is intended as a way to expand that program statewide, which could cost the state between $1 million and $2.5 million more annually. Supporters say the hotline would help those who do not know where to turn — potentially keeping families together and saving lives. A spokeswoman for Whitmer said the bill was under review.
23351	"Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani ""was never sentenced to stoning."	Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad claims woman was never sentenced to stoning	false	National, Human Rights, Crime, This Week - ABC News, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,	"Asked about his thoughts on stoning in light of the international uproar over the case of an Iranian woman who reportedly received the sentence for adultery, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad dismissed the case as pure western media propaganda. In fact, he said on ABC's This Week that Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani, 43, was never actually sentenced to stoning in the first place. ""First, what I want to say is that Miss Mohammadi was never sentenced to stoning,"" Ahmadinejad told This Week host Christiane Amanpour in an interviewed aired on Sept. 19, 2010. ""This was news that was produced and incorrect, and regretably, U.S. media affected -- was infected by U.S. politicians to make a piece of news out of it."" ""But the Iranian government lifted the sentence..."" Amanpour interjected. Said Ahmadinejad: ""Allow me. Allow me. When I represent the Iranian government, how is it that I am unaware of what you are telling me and that you should be aware of it? This is an issue that is being considered. It is still being processed. Given that there was no sentence of stoning issued in the first place this was the news that was made up. The propaganda behind it was big, and then those same murderers of people become supporters of human rights. ""Now this is ancient method, an ancient method that needs to change."" The following day, a spokesman for Iran's Foreign Ministry echoed Ahmadinejad's claim, saying the controversy over Ashtiani being sentenced to death by stoning for adultery was ""organized media propaganda against Iran and to build up a human rights (violation) case,"" according to the news agency Deutsche Presse-Agentur. When pressed about the matter while attending a U.N. anti-poverty summit on Sept. 21, Ahmadinejad defended the handling of the case, telling reporters, ""You do not understand our judicial system."" Iranian officials have made it clear that the case involving Ashtiani, who, in addition to adultery, is also charged with having been an accomplice in the killing of her husband, is still under investigation, and Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said no final sentence has been issued yet on either of the charges. But was Ahmadinejad correct that the issue of stoning in this case was pure fabrication, that Ashtiani ""was never sentenced to stoning""? Ahmadinejad's claim is at odds with earlier comments from Iranian justice officials who seemed to acknowledge the stoning sentence while announcing in July the penalty had been shelved ""for now."" In July, Malek Ajdar Sharifi, the top judicial official in the province where Ashtiani was convicted, told the Iranian state news agency IRNA that her crimes were ""heinous"" and that the stoning would still take place if the judiciary wanted. ""Although the verdict is definitive and applicable, the verdict has been halted due to humanitarian reservations and upon the order of the honourable judiciary chief, and it will not be carried out for the moment,"" according to reports from the Associated Press and Agence France Presse. That same week, Mohammed Javad Larijani of Iran's human rights council told the state news agency that the ""review and appeal of the verdict is on the agenda,"" and maintained that ""the hue and cry that the West has launched over this case will not affect our judges."" ""The implementation of Islamic regulations like stoning and the headscarf have always been faced with their impudent hostility and opposition,"" he said. Moreover, Ahmadinejad's claim is directly contradicted by two court documents smuggled out of the country by Mohammad Mostafaei, Ashtiani's original attorney. We spoke to Mostafaei, who fled Iran in August under threat of arrest and sought amnesty in Oslo, Norway. ""Everything Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on TV is not true,"" Mostafaei said, adding that the sentence of stoning was handed down by the lower court, and confirmed in an appeals court, before the international furor among human rights activists pressured Iranian officials to review the case. Mostafaei thinks Ahmadinejad simply didn't calculate that he had taken copies of court documents with him. One of the documents, he said, is the original sentencing document, obtained by Amnesty International and posted online by the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. Amnesty International provided us with a translation of the document, which was originally written in Persian. It reads, in part, ""In this case, Ms. Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, born in 1968, from and resident of Oskou, daughter of Asghar, is accused of adultery with strangers. In consideration of the file contents, the complaint of her children from her murdered husband, the late Ebrahim Qaderzadeh, the police report, and the express confessions of the aforementioned during all preliminary investigations and cross examinations...it seems that the main motive of the aforementioned for murdering her husband in complicity with one of the strangers -– this charge against her is being examined by another court of the province –- was her illicit relations with strangers and strong moral corruption. Other indications and adminicles all point to the committing of the said adultery offence and have led to the achievement of knowledge by the majority. Therefore, invoking Articles 63, 83 and 105 of the Islamic Penal Code, the majority of court members sentence Ms. Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, daughter of Asghar, to stoning for adultery (repeatedly with strangers). This sentence may be appealed before the Supreme Court within 20 days of its notification."" (An adminicle is something that contributes to proving a point.) In addition, the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran posted a document that Mostafaei said was issued by the Supreme Court administration on July 7, 2010. The document is also written in Persian, and Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, said the document acknowledges the receipt of an appeals request to rule on the stoning sentence of Sakineh Ashtiani. We had the documents independently translated and confirmed both documents list stoning as the sentence. ""It explicitly states her sentence as stoning,"" Ghaemi told us. ""If there was no stoning sentence, the Supreme Court would not have issued this report."" Amnesty International pointed us to one other piece of evidence. A press release issued by the Iranian embassy in London on July 8, 2010, ""denies the news aired in this respect (the Ashtiani case) and notifies the Ministry that according to information from the relevant judicial authorities in Iran, she will not be executed by stoning punishment. It is notable that this kind of punishment has rarely been implemented in Iran, and various means and remedies must be probed and exhausted to finally come up with such a punishment."" The statement also notes that ""the stoning punishment has not been cited in the draft Islamic Penal Code being deliberated in the Iranian Parliament."" According to a 2008 report from the United Nations on human rights issues in Iran, the head of Iran's judiciary issued a circular to prohibit stoning as a punishment. ""However,"" the report states, ""as in the case of the ban on public executions, this circular does not have a binding legal effect and serves only as an instruction for individual judges."" Reports of stoning sentences in Iran are uncommon, and it's even more rare that the sentence is actually carried out. The U.N. report notes that stoning verdicts have been suspended for at least 14 people (11 women and three men); and an active coalition exists in the country seeking to ban the practice of stoning altogether. Nonetheless, the practice of stoning still occurs -- with the most recent instance in 2007, according to the U.N. Mostafaei said he has handled about 10 cases involving stoning. In a handful of cases, the punishment was later reduced to 99 lashes, he said. About 14 people in Iran have been sentenced to stoning and are in prison awaiting punishment. Mostafaei believes international denunciation has worked, and in an open letter, he talks broadly about human rights issues facing Iran. ""I think the government can't continue this punishment in the future, in my opinion,"" he said. Iranian officials have accused Mostafaei of taking advantage of the case to get asylum in Europe. In August and September, a woman claiming to be Ashtiani appeared on state television (with her face blurred out) and confessed to being an accomplice to her husband's murder. The woman also criticized Mostafaei, saying that he had shamed her by making the case an international human rights issue. Her lawyer said the interviews were coerced. We are not weighing the issue of Ahtiani's guilt or innocence but whether she was ""never sentenced to stoning."" We think there's enough evidence -- from previously reported statements from Iranian judicial officials and from court documents provided by Ashtiani's one-time attorney -- to show that stoning was the sentence by the lower court. In this case, the sentence has been suspended, and the case is under review. Ahmadinejad may have a point that stoning sentences are rare, that the sentence is often overturned and that there is often a prolonged process of review before such sentences are carried out. But we rule his claim that Ashtiani was never sentenced to stoning in the first place is ."
33253	X-rays document a man in China whose body became riddled with tapeworms due to his consumption of sashimi.	In summary, what these images show is the aftermath of a parasitic tapeworm infection caused by the eating of raw or undercooked pork, not sashimi. And what’s viewable in the x-rays are not the tapeworms themselves, but rather calcified cysts that were the end result of the infection.	false	Fauxtography, sashimi, tapeworms, x-rays	In September 2014, images of x-rays were circulated on Chinese-language web sites accompanied by the claim that they documented a man whose body had become riddled with tapeworms he had contracted from consuming sashimi (i.e., raw fish): The Chinese-language web site hk.on.cc then published an article stating that medical officials had confirmed the x-rays as genuine: Recently x-rays were circulated on the Internet showing a body seemingly containing swarms of white insects. The Fifth Affiliated Hospital of Guangdong confirmed that these x-rays were of a patient from the Shunde District who spent 14 days in the hospital after complaining of severe abdominal pains and itchy skin. After the patient revealed one of his favorite foods was raw fish, additional x-rays and a medical examination were undertaken, his condition was judged to be serious, and he was sent to a hospital Guangzhou for further treatment. Dr. Yin of Guangzhou’s No.8 People’s Hospital said that the dense white spots seen in the x-rays were worms, and that a lot of people are eating infected food containing tapeworm eggs and thereby contracting cysticercosis (i.e., a parasitic pork tapeworm infection that creates cysts in different areas in the body). Dr. Yin pointed out that wild snakes, fish, pork, and beef consumed raw are most likely to be infected with such tapeworms (especially fish raised in freshwater ponds, which are often contaminated with feces). Dr. Yin also pointed out then when people consume foods containing tapeworm eggs, the eggs make their way into the digestive system where they are absorbed as nutrients. As the eggs hatch, the larvae are spread throughout the body via the bloodstream, and they may even enter into the brain and develop into cerebral cysticercosis. Dr. Yin said that tapeworms in other parts of the body may be treated through methods that kill them, but it is difficult to use such treatment on tapeworms in the brain as it may cause cerebral edema and endanger the patient’s life. At Guangdong 999 Brain Hospital, neurosurgeon Hai Dengxing said that two months ago he had admitted a female student who complained of cramps and appeared to be suffering from memory loss. The patient said she had recently eaten raw frogs, and a brain scan revealed irregular shadows and white spots which turned out to be parasites infecting her brain. This information was picked up and passed along by the dubious Central European News agency, which passed it along to Western media outlets such as BuzzFeed and the Daily Mail, who unquestioningly ran it as straight news — even though it bore a strong resemblance to the fictitious backstory of another image that has been circulated widely on the Internet for several years (one which is falsely claimed to show a man whose brain became “infected with maggots” through his consumption of sushi). This news item as presented had some contradictory details (possibly due to translation issues), referencing tapeworms contracted through the consumption of raw fish but then discussing a type of tapeworm found only in pork. In fact, the x-ray images were similar to those included in a 2014 case report published by the British Medical Journal that dealt with a man who contracted a rare case of disseminated cysticercosis through the consumption of uncooked pork (with no mention of raw fish): We present the case of a 74-year-old patient who, as an adult, enjoyed eating uncooked pork and beef. Recently, he had suffered from a sudden onset of gait disturbance, memory loss and disturbance of consciousness. He was brought to the emergency department for evaluation. On arrival, his vital signs were stable. The physical examination revealed mild weakness of the right extremities (muscle strength grade 3/5), slurred speech, left facial palsy and general appearance of weakness. ELISA was positive, as were serum and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) parasite antibody immunoglobulin G for cysticercosis. We strongly suspected neurocysticercosis. The brain CT scan, brain MRI, abdominal CT scan and plain X-rays had a characteristic ‘starry sky’ appearance, revealing calcified foci in muscles. Treatment of neurocysticercosis lesion includes administration of albendazole and steroids, and surgical ventriculoperitoneal shunting to alleviate the symptoms. Disseminated cysticercosis is a very rare infectious disease. It is important to recognise disseminated cysticercosis clinically and to perform appropriate radiological investigations, because this condition requires an appropriate therapy. Patients who have not undergone treatment and who have active cysts remain at a risk of serious complications.
5093	Knife suspect detained under UK’s Mental Health Act.	Police said Saturday that a man who allegedly lunged at shoppers with a knife at a northwestern England mall has been detained under the Mental Health Act.	true	England, Mental health, Ariana Grande, Health, General News, Arrests, Manchester, Europe	Five people were hurt during the attack Friday at the Arndale Centre in Manchester. Thee of the injured needed hospital treatment but none of the injuries are believed to be life-threatening. Police arrested the 41-year-old man on a charge of “the commission, preparation and instigation of an act of terrorism.” The incident revived uncomfortable memories of another attack in 2017 only a few hundred meters away. A suicide bomber killed 22 people after targeting a concert by pop star Ariana Grande at Manchester Arena,
26286	Viral image Says kitchen worker in viral video is potentially spreading coronavirus by blowing into food containers.	This video appeared online as early as 2017.	false	Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Viral image,	"In a widely shared Facebook video, a woman wearing what looks like a white baker’s hat and a jacket with an ID card pinned to the lapel appears not to realize she’s being recorded. She’s working in front of an espresso machine and appears to be blowing on small paper packages — like cupcake wrappers — to separate them so that she can put pastries inside. ""CHECK THIS OUT,"" the video caption on the March 14 post says. ""CORONA VIRUS / DROPLETS IN FULL FORCE …. LET THIS GO VIRAL."" This post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) It’s noisy in the video, and two more people can be seen in the background, including a man rolling dough. But like the woman in the foreground, neither of them is wearing a mask. Using InVID, we searched for other places that this video has appeared online. In recent days and weeks, many people have shared it on social media. One tweet, from March 15, says: ""You can wash your hands ALL day long, use alcohol afterwards and protect yourself from the virus as much as you can ... then this happens at your favorite restaurant and you wonder where the covid is coming from."" Another one from March 12 says: ""There is no point in washing your hands, rubbing alcohol, using a mask, but keep eating coxinha. #coronavirusbrasil"" But this video didn’t make its first appearance online in March. We found it published four months ago, on these Russian sites in March and April 2017, and on gfycat.com in March 2017. Certainly, watching someone in a commercial kitchen handle food as the woman in the video does could concern viewers anytime, not just during a pandemic. Paul Dawson, a professor of food, nutrition and packaging sciences at Clemson University, told us that this ""is definitely NOT an advisable practice regardless of COVID."" ""There are several infectious diseases that can be transferred from the oral cavity,"" he said in an email. ""The only additional question is how long will the packaged food be held before someone eats it. The longer before someone consumes that food, the less chance that the contamination that may have been placed there by the person blowing on the wrapper will survive."" The caption on this Facebook post, and others who have posted the video online, portray the clip as having been recorded recently amid the novel coronavirus outbreak. In reality, it was taken at least three years ago, long before the first case of the new coronavirus was reported in late 2019."
15426	"Texas has ""the nation's highest rate and highest number of uninsured."	Howard said Texas is No. 1 in its uninsurance rate and its total uninsured residents. Texas leads the nation in its percentage of uninsured. Also, it newly looks like Texas has the greatest raw number of uninsured residents, though that’s evidently backed up only by rough calculations like our own, a clarification missing from this claim.	true	Health Care, State Budget, States, Texas, Donna Howard,	"An Austin legislator stressed the number of Texans who lack health coverage after applauding the U.S. Supreme Court for upholding federal subsidies under the Obamacare law. On a positive note, Democratic state Rep. Donna Howard said in a June 25, 2015, press release that the share of uninsured Texans has decreased thanks to more people buying insurance, some with help from the subsidies written into Affordable Care Act of 2010. Now, she said, the Republican-led state should act to draw more federal money to insure more residents—perhaps a reference to Texas’ refusal so far to expand Medicaid to more adults with the federal government initially picking up costs. Inaction, Howard said, ""has only left Texas with the nation's highest rate and highest number of uninsured."" Whatever the reasons, does Texas lead the nation in its uninsurance rate and its count of uninsured residents? That wasn’t so before. In 2013, we rated a declaration by Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, that Texas had the nation’s most uninsured people, 6 million. As of 2011, then the latest year of survey data, Texas led the nation with its 24 percent share of uninsured residents. But more-populous California was home to about 1 million more uninsured residents. Also in 2013, we found True a claim that Texas had the most uninsured children. In 2012. According to federal survey results, Texas ranked first nationally with 1.1 million uninsured children, followed by California with 891,000. California is among states, unlike Texas, that expanded Medicaid access in accord with the Obamacare law. It stands to reason its uninsured population consequently shrunk. Another post-2013 factor: Key provisions of the Obamacare law—including the mandate that most Americans obtain coverage and the offer of subsidies for individuals to buy insurance—took effect in 2014, likely affecting who has a policy. Texas No. 1 in rate of uninsured Texas has evidently continued to rank No. 1 for its share of uninsured residents. To our inquiry, Scott Daigle, Howard’s chief of staff, noted by email a June 23, 2015, Austin American-Statesman story citing a national survey by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stating Texas had a higher percentage of uninsured adults in 2014 than any other state. Nearly 26 percent of Texas adults were uninsured, the story said, down from about 28 percent in 2013. We wondered about all residents of the states at issue. Separately, the Kaiser Family Foundation, drawing on U.S. Census Bureau survey results, keeps up with how many residents of each state have health coverage. Its latest charts indicate that per the bureau’s 2013 Current Population Survey, Texas and Nevada were tied for No. 1 that year with 20 percent of residents lacking coverage. At the time, according to the survey, 15 percent of California residents lacked coverage. In raw numbers, 5,769,600 Californians were uninsured, compared with 5,357,700 Texans, according to the survey. We also reached out to bureau spokesman Robert Bernstein who suggested by email we consider its American Community Survey results for 2013, the latest available, indicating 22 percent of Texans and 17 percent of Californians were uninsured that year. According to this survey, Nevada had the nation’s No. 2 uninsurance rate, nearly 21 percent. In raw numbers, the survey suggested, 6.5 million Californians lacked coverage compared to more than 5.7 million Texans. California vs. Texas in uninsured residents In question: Whether California kept its raw-total lead in uninsured residents through 2014. Doesn’t seem so, experts told us, because far fewer Californians continued to lack coverage through the year, causing Texas to end up No. 1 for its uninsured rate and total residents without insurance. However, we fell short of landing governmental confirmation of such a shift. Responding to our request for backup information, Daigle in Howard’s office emailed us a link to a September 2014 Rice University press release stating Texas ""has now surpassed California to become the state with the highest number of uninsured residents."" But the related report, from Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy and the Episcopal Health Foundation, said only that Texas has ""potentially surpassed"" California in its uninsured count. According to quarterly surveys of Texans undertaken by the researchers, an additional nearly 379,000 Texans aged 18 to 64 had health coverage after the first Obamacare enrollment period, reducing uninsurance rates among such adults from 25 percent in September 2013 to 22 percent in May 2014. An April 2015 follow-up report by the institute and foundation said that thanks to more adults obtaining coverage, the share of uninsured Texans aged 18-64 as of March 2015 had dropped even more to 17 percent. The report said: ""Despite this progress, Texas remains the state with the highest percentage of uninsured residents and, for the first time, Texas now has the largest number of uninsured residents."" That report did not say how the researchers decided California no longer had the most uninsured. By email to our inquiry, co-author Elena Marks told us an undated web post on Wallethub.com, a personal finance website, fueled the conclusion. After the Obamacare law took effect, she noted, WalletHub projected that 14.26 percent of Californians and 24.81 percent of Texans lacked coverage. WalletHub also said its estimates were limited to beneficiaries under 64 years of age. Those state-by-state percentages, according to WalletHub’s post, were calculated in part from a June 2014 Kaiser Family Foundation look into insurance sign-ups during the first Obamacare enrollment period, which WalletHub described as ""the best estimate to date of the proportion of private health plan enrollees under Obamacare who previously lacked health insurance and therefore would be gaining coverage under the new law."" Marks told us the Texas researchers multiplied the WalletHub projections by each state’s population to estimate that more than 6.8 million Texans and 5.5 million Californians were uninsured once the Obamacare law had rolled into place. Other analysts Seeking other perspectives, we queried experts including Paul Fronstin of the Washington, D.C.-based Employee Benefit Research Institute, which says its mission is to enhance the development of public policy through objective research and education. In 2012, Fronstin wrote that the year before, California had the largest number of people under age 65 without health insurance of any state, at 7.1 million. But he also wrote that with Obamacare taking effect, the western state’s share of uninsured adults would likely drop. As it was, Fronstin told us at the time, his analysis of bureau research released in March 2012 showed more Californians than Texans were lacking coverage. That also held in Fronstin’s latest analysis, published in 2013, which said that nationally in 2010-12, Texas and California were among 14 states with 20 percent or more of residents lacking insurance. California had an average of 7 million uninsured non-elderly residents, according to a chart in the report, outpacing other states including No. 2 Texas, which averaged 6.1 million uninsured non-elderly. Still, those counts reflected conditions before the Obamacare law took fuller effect. By email, Fronstin told us this month that he believes California no longer leads the nation in uninsured residents, likely due to more people there taking advantage of coverage options thanks to the state expanding Medicaid and residents otherwise buying insurance with the subsidies offered thanks to the Obamacare law. Fronstin pointed out Gallup polls taken through 2014 indicating Texas that year had the nation’s greatest share of uninsured adults (24.4 percent) for the seventh straight year. That was a slight improvement from the 27 percent rate Gallup gauged in 2013. From 2013 to 2014, per Gallup’s results, California’s adult uninsurance rate fell from 21.6 percent to 15.3 percent. We considered multiplying the 2014 Gallup percentages by federal population estimates to approximate the number of uninsured adults in each state. But Howard referred to all uninsured residents. We sought the same broad focus. On this front, Anne Dunkelberg of the Austin-based Center for Public Policy Priorities, which advocates for programs serving low-income Texans, guided us to a June 23, 2015, report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stating that according to its surveys undertaken through 2014, 11.5 percent of all Americans were uninsured. Also, a chart in the report indicates 19.4 percent of all Texans were uninsured at the time they were interviewed while 12 percent of Californians reported no coverage. We multiplied these percentages over July 2014 Census Bureau population estimates for each state, reaching estimates of 5.23 million uninsured Texans in 2014 and 4.66 million uninsured Californians. Next, we reached Gerald ""Jerry"" Kominski, director of UCLA’s Center for Health Policy Research, who said by phone that results of its 2014 survey indicating the number of uninsured Californians at that time were to be released later this summer. Kominski otherwise said our calculation using the CDC study and federal population estimates seemed reasonable. ""California has been very successful in reducing the number of uninsured,"" Kominski said, ""because of its aggressive promotion of the Affordable Care Act."" We also ran our calculation by the Kaiser foundation. Researcher Rachel Garfield cautioned by phone against reaching conclusions by making calculations using figures from different sources. Generally, she said, data is not yet available to assess how many people were uninsured in each state in 2014 though the census bureau is expected to release relevant survey results in September 2015. Our ruling Howard said Texas is No. 1 in its uninsurance rate and its total uninsured residents. Texas leads the nation in its percentage of uninsured. Also, it newly looks like Texas has the greatest raw number of uninsured residents, though that’s evidently backed up only by rough calculations like our own, a clarification missing from this claim. The statement is accurate but needs clarification or additional information."
26533	Photo shows a crowded New York City subway train during stay-at-home order.	An image circulating online of an overcrowded New York City subway car is legitimate. It was taken on March 30 during evening rush hour.	true	Transportation, Facebook Fact-checks, New York, Coronavirus, Viral image,	"New York continues to be the epicenter of the novel coronavirus in the United States, with the lion's share of cases coming from, or around, New York City. The city’s residents have been warned to stay home for weeks, with Gov. Andrew Cuomo formally signing a state-wide ""stay-at-home"" order on March 20 that banned all non-essential businesses from conducting in-office work and stopped all ""non-essential gatherings of individuals of any size for any reason."" Yet a photo shared on Facebook April 2 showed an overcrowded NYC subway car along with a caption that seemed almost unbelievable during a time of extreme social distancing: ""This is NYC#2 train this afternoon!!!! And their mayor and governor wants to blame trump!!!! Damn what a disgrace!!!! Spread this far and wide!!!!"" The image 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.) In this case, the post isn’t far off – the image is real and was taken just three days earlier, during rush hour on a Bronx-bound train on March 30. The photo was posted that evening on Twitter by user Hiam Abbas, who wrote: ""4:30 PM today, #2 BX bound train. Trains are infrequent. All cars were this crowded. Social distancing? Containment? Essential workers are at risk."" 4:30 PM today, #2 BX bound train. Trains are infrequent. All cars were this crowded. Social distancing? Containment? Essential workers are at risk. @NYCTSubway @WajahatAli @NYCMayor @NYGovCuomo @Gothamist @NY1 @nyc311 @nytimes @JumaaneWilliams @AOC @shaunking @NewYorker @ABC7NY https://t.co/IEx8B9KdyM pic.twitter.com/Wp7Kj5Ca8i Abbas’ post includes another photo of an overcrowded train, this one heading into Manhattan during the morning commute. With ridership plummeting and fewer crew members working, New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority announced implementation of its ""essential service plan,"" which aims to to help move healthcare workers, first responders and essential personnel while scaling back train and bus service overall; some lines are running on modified schedules and others aren’t running at all. But public transit is a commuting lifeline for many essential workers, and the reduction in service can make it difficult to maintain the social distancing that health officials recommend. The MTA responded to Abbas’ photo on Twitter, saying it would be ""escalated to supervision for investigation."" In an interview with the news channel New York 1 that same day, Mayor Bill de Blasio said fewer people are riding the subway, so this kind of problem isn’t typical. He said subway cars can get overcrowded sometimes due to a train breaking down or a service delay, but he also concluded that crowding on trains was ""not acceptable."" ""I understand people are trying to get somewhere, but no one should be getting on a crowded train,"" de Blasio said. ""Spread out throughout the train. Wait for the next train."" According to a report by the New York Times, although overall subway ridership is down 87%, the steepest declines have occurred in richer neighborhoods. Manhattan, which has a median income around $80,000, saw a 75% decrease in ridership, the Times reports, while the Bronx, where the median household income is about $38,000, saw only a 55% decrease. The post is off on the date of the photo, but only by a few days; it was taken well into New York’s stay-at-home order."
35884	"U.S. President Donald Trump's diagnosis with COVID-19 spurred the launch of ""doomsday planes."" "	"What's true: Two Boeing E-6B Mercury planes — sometimes referred to as ""doomsday planes"" — took flight around the same time that news broke that Trump tested positive for COVID-19. What's false: However, the E-6B Mercury airborne command post is routinely flown over the United States. A U.S. Strategic Command spokesman said that these flights were scheduled before Trump's diagnosis and that this was ""purely coincidental."""	false	Politics, 2020 election, COVID-19	Late in the evening of Oct. 1, 2020, news broke that U.S. President Donald Trump had tested positive for COVID-19, a highly contagious disease responsible for the deaths of more than 200,000 Americans. Shortly afterward, social media users noted that two “doomsday planes” had been mobilized and speculated that the launch of these planes was a show of strength to deter an attack from adversaries in the aftermath of Trump’s diagnosis. One person wrote on Facebook: Continuity protocols were activated not long before Trump came out as positive for covid-19. These planes are mobile command centers sent up on the west and east coasts. They can control the nuclear arsenal and activated as a message to any adversaries to not try any funny business in a time of potential weakness. Even if D.C. were gone, these planes can talk to our missile subs underwater etc. The Boeing E-6B Mercury is an airborne command post capable of launching nuclear weapons and is sometimes referred to as a “doomsday plane.” While it’s true that two of these “doomsday planes” were launched around the time that news broke about Trump testing positive for COVID-19, there’s no evidence that these two events are related. In fact, a U.S. Strategic Command spokesman told Fox News that this was “purely coincidental” and that these flights were planned before Trump’s diagnosis: Two Boeing E-6B Mercury planes were detected flying along both coasts of the U.S. mainland early Friday, around the time President Trump announced he and first lady Melania Trump were diagnosed with coronavirus — but the flights were “pre-planned” and the timing was “purely coincidental,” a U.S. Strategic Command spokesman told Fox News.
6145	Nonprofit donates cots to preserve stillborn babies.	A nonprofit has donated the region’s first two temperature-controlled beds to preserve stillborn babies at hospitals.	true	Health, Heather Wilson, Norfolk, Virginia	The Virginian-Pilot reports that the nonprofit called Kennedy’s Angel Gowns has donated the so-called “Cuddle Cots” to Sentara Leigh Hospital. The cots cool the bodies of stillborn infants to allow parents more time to grieve. The nonprofit was started by Heather and Demetri Wilson. The couple lost a baby girl 36 weeks into a pregnancy 8 ½ years ago. Heather Wilson tells the newspaper she would give anything for just a “couple more minutes” with the infant if she could turn back the hands of time. Nurse clinician Kelly Rockel says the temperature-controlled cots “give our moms more time with their babies” at the Norfolk hospital. The temperature-controlled cots cost about $2,500 each. ___ Information from: The Virginian-Pilot, http://pilotonline.com
1742	Hunting for pictures, and crocodiles, in remote Aboriginal country.	We are deep in a forest crowded by Australian paperback trees, the air thick with humidity but eerily silent save for the screeching of tropical birds, when Marcus shouts: “Look, crocodiles!” As a Reuters photojournalist, I’m a trained observer, but I can’t see any crocs. I can’t see anything beyond mud and what little water is left in the small billabong. Aboriginal hunters Marcus and Roy, a father and son team, take off running past a herd of water buffalo and by the time I catch up Roy is standing ankle-deep in murky water, his shotgun pointed at the surface. Hang on a minute: wasn’t your son pointing at crocodiles in that water ten seconds ago? Is this safe?	true	Environment	Roy treads carefully as the water rises to his knees, seeming for a moment to lose sight of his prey. Then in one swift action he steps back, takes aim and shatters the outback calm, and a crocodile, with a single booming shotgun blast. I am definitely not in Sydney anymore. For more than 10 years I have dreamed of photographing the daily lives of Aboriginal Australians in the northern-most tip of the Northern Territory, Australia’s rugged “Top End”. Their Arnhem Land reserve - closer to Bali than Sydney - covers an area of around 97,000 sq km (37,500 sq miles), has a population of around 16,000 and access for non-Aborigines is by invitation only. Australia’s Aborigines are the custodians of the longest unbroken cultural tradition on Earth, having migrated Down Under from Africa via Asia between 40,000 and 60,000 years ago, and connection to the land is practically written into their DNA. But the arrival of European settlers in the 18th century marked the beginning of a painful disenfranchisement. Massacres are still tearfully remembered and today the majority of Aborigines live in abject poverty. Last year, while on patrol with the Indigenous Australian Army unit known as NORFORCE, I met Sergeant Norman Daymirringu, a Yolngu Aborigine, who invited me to go hunting with him near Ramingining, located a bumpy and dusty 600 km drive east of Darwin. Norman is allowed by tradition to share his ancient culture with those he deems worthy, and I was honoured to have been told the Yolngu people’s creation stories and shown their sacred sites. But entering Arnhem Land as a “White Fella” means changing gears and seeing the world through a completely different set of eyes, a great challenge for a photographer. For example, an outsider might struggle to understand a site such as “Dog’s Tongue”, an orange rock amid a barren salt pan, but for Norman it is an integral part of the creation of the universe. The rock has tipped over from its normal position and Norman, as custodian of the land, affords me the rare honor of watching as he puts it back in place, where it has stood for countless millennia. At Yathalamarra, a community consisting of around a dozen houses, we pick up some relatives for the hunt and head on foot to an isolated billabong. With the sun blazing and temperatures reaching 40 degrees Celsius, or 104 Fahrenheit, I am getting pessimistic, when suddenly Roy fires his shotgun. At his feet lies a dead crocodile. Roy pulls the beast from the water, while Marcus keeps lookout. Not far from the shoreline the water starts moving. Suddenly Marcus pounces and, from just beneath the surface, he pulls another crocodile, this one a bleating baby. Roy is nervous about crossing the billabong carrying a heavy dead crocodile, but wanders downstream and grabs a boat hidden in the bushes. Using a stick as a paddle he navigates towards us, throwing the two crocs onto the muddy shore. Wow, its over, I think. We can head off with a great catch and potential feast awaiting. Roy has other ideas: “It’s easier to carry them without all that skin,” he tells me. Any butcher would have been extremely impressed with the skill he showed at filleting this massive beast. The baby was carried out alive. As we are leaving, Roy wraps the intestines in leaves, as nothing that can be eaten is wasted, and he and his sons walk the few kilometers back to the car with crocodile meat and a goanna lizard slung over their shoulders. As for me, I walked away with a unique insight into their culture and some photographs that not many others have had the privilege of taking.
5254	Massachusetts confirms year’s first case of measles.	Massachusetts public health officials have confirmed the state’s first case of the measles this year and say people who have not been immunized who visited the same locations as the infected person may be at risk.	true	Health, Boston, Waltham, Massachusetts, Framingham, Measles, Public health, Hyannis	The state Department of Public Health says the person from greater Boston was diagnosed with the highly contagious disease Sunday. They were diagnosed at a clinic in Wellesley. In the week before the diagnosis, the person visited KKatie’s Burger Bar in Plymouth on Tuesday; a Starbucks in Waltham and the Mass Pike rest stop in Framingham on Wednesday; a Staples and a Dunkin’ Donuts in Waltham, a Whole Foods Market in Hyannis, and a Target in Braintree on Thursday. Anyone who thinks they were exposed and begins to develop symptoms of measles should call their health care provider.
3348	N Carolina to get $56M for early childhood education, health.	North Carolina will receive up to $56 million toward improving early childhood education and health outcomes for at-risk children, Gov. Roy Cooper announced on Thursday.	true	Early childhood education, Health, General News, North Carolina, Medicaid, Education	Cooper’s office said the two competitive grants, which will be distributed over seven years, come from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. “The science is just overwhelming as how much of a difference that early childhood education makes in whether a child is going to succeed in school and in life,” Cooper said during a visit to a Cary day care center for the announcement. A $40.2 million Preschool Development Grant from DHHS in part will help pay for professional development and coaching for early childhood teachers, as well as to expand a home-visitation program by nurses for parents of newborns, Cooper’s office said in a news release. The CMS grant, which could reach $16 million, implements “Integrated Care for Kids,” a program for children who receive Medicaid coverage and other services. Speaking at the Bright Beginnings Child Development Center, Cooper said he is working on ways to improve pay for pre-kindergarten teachers and expand Medicaid coverage to more working people, such as those working in child care.
8559	Taiwan rebuffs accusations it racially attacked WHO chief.	Taiwan on Thursday angrily condemned accusations from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) boss that racist slurs against him had come from the island, saying racism did not exist in Taiwan.	true	Health News	Taiwan’s exclusion from the WHO, due to objections from China which claims the island as its own, has infuriated the Taipei government during the coronavirus outbreak. Taiwan says it has been unable to get timely information and that Taiwanese lives have become political pawns. The WHO denies this. Taiwan has long described this as a pattern of behaviour that puts it at risk because of Chinese pressure to exclude it from international bodies. On Wednesday, WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus rejected “racist slurs” against him, which he said had originated in Taiwan. Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen said Taiwan opposed any form of discrimination. “For years, we have been excluded from international organisations, and we know better than anyone else what it feels like to be discriminated against and isolated,” she said in a statement. “If Director-General Tedros could withstand pressure from China and come to Taiwan to see Taiwan’s efforts to fight COVID-19 for himself, he would be able to see that the Taiwanese people are the true victims of unfair treatment.” Tedros is not a popular figure in Taiwan due to suspicions he is too close to China and the WHO’s listing of Taiwan’s virus case numbers under China’s, despite it being totally separately governed. U.S. President Donald Trump sharply criticised the WHO on Tuesday, accusing it of being too focused on China and issuing bad advice during the coronavirus outbreak. Taiwan Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou said Tedros’ accusations were groundless and “imaginary” and Taiwan had not made any racist comments nor encouraged anyone to do so. Tedros’ comments were irresponsible and he should clarify them and apologise to Taiwan, Ou said. “The concept of racism does not exist in Taiwan. We do not have a problem of racism,” she told reporters. In Beijing, China’s Foreign Ministry did not directly say whether it believed Taiwan was responsible for racist attacks on Tedros, but said the island was trying “to use the epidemic to seek independence” and that its plots would not succeed. Taiwan has been proud of its early and so far effective measures against the coronavirus, logging just 380 cases and five deaths to date, far lower than many of its neighbours. Taiwan reported just one new case on Thursday. The WHO said last month it was closely following the development of the coronavirus in Taiwan and learning lessons from how they are fighting it. However, Taiwan says the WHO ignored its questions at the start of the outbreak and has not shared with member states information Taiwan has provided, including details on its coronavirus cases and prevention methods. Under the slogan “Taiwan can help”, the government last week announced the donation of 10 million faces masks to the United States, Europe and the 15 countries that still maintain formal diplomatic ties with the island. Ou said Taiwan would donate another six million masks, to northern and eastern Europe, Latin America, Southeast Asia and U.S. states hardest hit by the pandemic.
34708	Bride-to-be sends over-the-top list of instructions to her attendants.	Those who’ve yet to have their fill of bridezilla stories will find many, many more stashed in the archives of Etiquette Hell, your one-stop shop for horrifying accounts of people behaving badly.	unproven	Embarrassments, bridesmaid, bridezilla, dear abby	We began seeing this intriguing letter in our inbox in February 2002, when countless readers began forwarding it to us to ask if it was the real thing. Was this yet another glimpse into the machinations of a “bridezilla,” a gal so caught up in the plans for her wedding that she turns into a monster? Or was it something else? Example: [Dear Abby, 2003] MEMO TO MY ATTENDANTS: Hey, girls! Mom has your dresses for the wedding. She’ll bring them to the shower next weekend. You can pick them up there. Allison sent me an e-mail asking what style shoes and jewelry to wear. Great question, Allison! There are so many details. I keep forgetting to tell my girls what to do.This is an excellent opportunity to go over my expectations for each of you: About the shoes, please wear tasteful flats. Most of you are taller than me. I’d rather you not all tower over me. I want all of you to wear your hair down. Since Babs and Allison have similar hair, I’d prefer that Babs straighten hers and let Allison be the curly-haired girl. After all, she’s my friend and you are just bridesmaids! I’m sure you understand. Judy and Molly, you have both mentioned that you intend to shed a few pounds. This would be the perfect time! Watch your diets; we will all start weekly weigh-ins. Allison could use some trimming down, too. Also, you should all stay away from alcohol for at least a week before the wedding. None of us should be puffy or bloated. I think this is mainly for Babs, as none of my ladies drink all that much. Other than that, I don’t have any real suggestions. Oh, please don’t go tanning! I prefer to blend in with you than stand out as the pale one! Judy, Allison and Molly, please call me. There are a few other things that I need to go over with you on this topic. Babs, you are Scotty’s friend, so I wouldn’t presume to tell you what needs to be corrected — plus, your own wedding is coming up after mine. So I’m sure you’re already more than a little aware of what you need to work on. See y’all on Saturday. Babs, remember you’ll attend the shower with us girls rather than the paintball fun with the boys. Dress accordingly, dear! Bridezilla tales are nothing new to the Internet, and usually after blossoming briefly to horrify the masses, they quietly fade into obscurity. This one, however, gained a shot in the arm when it appeared in a Dear Abby column in September 2002. Readers sent the much-traveled e-mail to Abby, seeking her comments. She offered no opinion on whether the story was true but replied: If the document you sent me is on the level, the bride-to-be appears to have an abundance of unresolved control issues and an astounding lack of tact. Abby’s observation was dead on. It also brings us back to the “was this for real or not?” element of the tale. You see, if this had been a hoax, it would have been designed to make its purported author look especially heinous. And there’s a strong chance that’s exactly what happened. A couple of small sections of the earlier e-mail were left out of the Dear Abby version, namely: [Following “Most of you are taller than me, so would rather you all not tower over me’] Plus, many of you are unaware, but Addie is terribly ill and sometimes is paralyzed from the waist down. And we do want to take care of Adam’s girl! [Following “Lindsay could use some trimming up too”] Addie, you just take care of yourself. I know that some of us have trouble with food and I don’t want to encourage any bad habits with those who have had problems in the past. (In the February 2002 original, all the participants had different names: The curly-haired friend was Lindsay instead of Allison; Leisha and Sissy were the gals who needed to lose weight, not Judy and Molly; Addie, instead of Babs, was the paintball-loving two-fisted drinker who was soon to marry the problematic Adam, not Scotty; and the now-nameless bride signed herself as Jenny.) A careful reading of the original reveals little digs are made at Addie (Babs) throughout the piece. Granted, brides do not always get along famously with their bridesmaids, but this level of barely suppressed hostility is unusual. The unrelenting Addie-bashing should sound a few distant warning bells in those tempted to take the letter at face value, because the behavior doesn’t fit the occasion. Addie drinks too much, has “food problems,” is marrying a loser, is dead from the waist down, should have her hair straightened because another bridesmaid preferred by the bride also has curly hair, and has to be reminded to dress properly for the shower on Saturday to head off her turning up in shorts and a dirty T-shirt. The letter wasn’t so much an “It’s my wedding and here’s how I want to run it” missive as it was a bashing of one girl. Some mailings identified the bridezilla in question, so we asked her about it. She replied that while she’d been made the goat of this affair, she hadn’t written the letter; the piece had been the work of a disgruntled ex-boyfriend of Addie’s. This fellow had somehow gained access to Addie’s e-mail account, fabricated a letter supposedly written by the bride, and propagated it as if it were something Addie had received and was now forwarding to others. In this way, everyone in Addie’s address book got to see all the little digs at her. Is this a reasonable scenario? In an oddball way it is — it certainly better explains the “Addie bashing” element of the letter than does the “bitchy bride” construct. Bridezillas are generally far too lost in what’s going on with them to spare much attention for any member of the wedding party other than themselves. A true bridezilla would barely recognize that her bridesmaids had lives outside of the wedding, let alone be capable of diverting the focus of attention from herself to any of them. Jenny’s explanation may be plausible, but since we can’t prove the story one way or the other, we’ll leave this one marked as “Undetermined.” The letter in question appeared in the May 2002 issue of Cosmopolitan as a sidebar to a larger article about bridezillas. All the names were changed once again. The current bridezilla tale echoes an older e-mail similarly transmitted across the Internet in 1999. Please note that the claims of this letter’s having been penned in all seriousness by a real bride have not been substantiated, but the piece did run in Harper’s magazine in 1991. Harper’s presented it as: “From a letter sent by a Youngstown, Ohio, bride-to-be to her bridesmaids and ushers in 1976. Since then, copies of the six-page, single-spaced letter have been circulating nationally among engaged and newlywed couples.” EDITORS NOTE: This is an actual 1976 letter from a Youngstown,Ohio, bride-to-be to her bridesmaids and ushers. Read it and count your blessings. (FROM HARPER’S MAGAZINE)Dear Bridal Party: From time to time I will be dropping everyone a line or two to keep each of you informed about how the wedding plans are progressing so that no one thinks I have forgotten them and no one is in the dark. Bridesmaids: Each bridesmaid will receive her dress via mail from Priscilla of Boston sometime in January. This will give each of you enough time to have the dress “professionally” altered if need be. The dresses are chiffon “Priscilla” dresses and can be worn after the wedding. The right shoulder is bare and there is no sleeve on the left arm. Each has its own cape, which goes almost to the floor. The two matrons of honor will be in silver and the four bridesmaids in peppermint green. As of this date, I have not decided whether the two in silver will wear green gloves and the four in green silver gloves, but long gloves will be worn. I strongly suggest that each person shops now for the typical cloth “closed-toe” shoe. Keep the heel size reasonable – of course, no platforms of any kind. Anyone having trouble with their legs should wear support hose. Ushers: Each usher will be dressed identically to the groom, best man, and the head groomsman: black tails. Be sure you have black silk socks and black dress shoes polished to a high shine. Reception Rehearsal: On Saturday afternoon (early) we will go to Powers Auditorium to practice for the reception that night after the wedding ceremony. Why? Well, there is a long staircase at the auditorium that will be put to full use: Each bridal-party couple will be introduced separately and will proceed down the first half of the staircase (accompanied by music). Upon reaching the platform in the middle of the stairs, the girl will be required to “swirl” from the right side of the steps and move to the left side, and her partner (an usher) will move to the right; then they will proceed down the second half of the stairs and take their positions for the Bridal Dance. Dancing: I will try to find a choreographer to help with the Bridal Dance — but each person can please do his or her part by learning to waltz correctly in three-quarter time. Now, when I say waltz, I do not in any way mean two steps here and two steps there, always standing in one spot. When we waltz it will be to “Tales of the Vienna Woods.” Each usher will be twirling his partner while moving in a large circle and maintaining even spacing between each couple. Turn on some old-time movies and you can see how it is supposed to be done. But, PLEASE, PLEASE, practice now! Suggestion: Go take dancing lessons!! That’s what we have to do!! Also, there will be some polkas, the Charleston, jitterbug, and others. These are not “required” dances. There will not be any up-to-date dances. I personally dislike them and think they look terrible-they simply are not dances, in my estimation. Photographs: There will be plenty. First and foremost, there will be “sound motion pictures” taken throughout the wedding ceremony, during the Bridal Dance, and while each bridal-party couple walks down the steps at the reception. Flash pictures will be taken in the church ONLY until my father and I arrive at the altar-after that there will be NO flash pictures; the official photographer will be taking time exposures. I believe it is the height of ill manners for any guest to leave his or her seat and proceed to the altar to take pictures. Dress Requirements: Makeup — It is requested that you wear a little more than usual because of the photographs and the movie pictures. Any ladies with short eyelashes are requested to wear either false eyelashes or go to a beauty parlor and have false eyelashes put in one by one. The matrons of honor wearing the silver dresses must have a lot of pink in their makeup. That is straight from Priscilla. Be sure that each of the four other bridesmaids has green eyeshadow and that every one wears blusher, powder, eyebrow pencil, foundation, lipstick, and mascara — the works!! There will be two experts in the field of makeup to help anyone who needs it or wants it. As for the men, ho, ho, you will have your turn also. If you have a shiny face, be sure to use some of your wife’s face powder to take the shine away. For the wives and husbands of those who are in the wedding party: Ladies-the color of the bridesmaids’ dresses has been stated, and all that I ask is that your dress be a color that will not contrast with the peppermint green, that it is of full length, and fairly simple in line. Also, please do not wear an extensive amount of jewelry, as the bridesmaids will possibly wear only small pearl earrings. Be sure each of you has gloves. You need wear nothing in your hair. Men — Amy Vanderbilt’s book on etiquette says that anyone receiving a formal invitation is to wear “black tie,” which means tuxedo. Now, this could get rather touchy, so I will put it this way: If you do not wish to wear a tux, or do not wish to take on the expense of renting one, it will be perfectly fine to wear a “black” suit, white shirt with French cuffs, black silk socks, black shoes, and a black-and-silver tie. I hope this doesn’t inconvenience too many, but I would hate to look at color pictures of the head table and see some men in black tails and others in brown or blue suits!! Children at the Wedding or Reception: It is my wish, and also Z.’s [the fiancé], that there be no children at the wedding ceremony or at the reception. For purposes of clarification, a child is anyone eighteen years or younger. There are many reasons for this request, but the best is the simple fact that I don’t have the money to invite children who only pick at their food, cry, run around, etc. One friend of mine, who married about a year ago, says that when she got her wedding pictures back, there wasn’t one that didn’t have a kid in it and she was disgusted. Don’t get me wrong, children are great. But there is a time and a place for them and this isn’t it. This is an adult, ultra-formal affair and I want to keep it that way. One point of etiquette: When a formal invitation is sent out with Mr. and Mrs. Paul J. Smith on the outside envelope and Mr. and Mrs. Smith on the inside envelope, that is exactly what it means — only Mr. and Mrs. Smith are being invited and no one else; no others in the family, no guests who might be visiting at the time, etc. If asked about guests, you can “diplomatically” pass this on. I know it sounds like I am being a real fusspot, but I would hate to tell each of you what the cost is per person just for the reception alone. I’m doing this for my friends and relatives, for all of us to have a good time, but since there are only so many hours in the day, and I already have three jobs, and I am not a Vanderbilt, some lines must be drawn, and I hope everyone understands. I’ve never wanted a small country-type wedding — Z. says this is no wedding but rather a coronation!! Well, not quite. But it sure has been fun so far, and I just cannot wait for everyone to arrive and for all our friends and relatives to have one great, fabulous night. Everyone think positive and keep your fingers crossed. Pray — that will bring more help. Won’t each of you come with Z. and me to fantasyland — a place where dreams come true and fun abounds for everyone? Where the bride is Cinderella and the groom is Cinderfella for an evening. You are going to attend a ball at “Buckingham Palace” (pretend) and the King and Queen have invited only “royalty” — YOU! This will be a time to remember when you were courting the person to whom you are now married-a time to take a second honeymoon. We want everyone to be as happy as we are and to rekindle (add extra “fire” to) their own marriages. If you have a happy marriage now (which I know you all do), we expect the Palace to be really electrified with all that LOVE. May your every dream come true!
29109	Hydrogen peroxide will cure a variety of ailments.	As to what to make of the numerous claims asserted of the hydrogen peroxide, in the main, most external uses of household-strength hydrogen peroxide are relatively harmless (if not necessarily helpful), but internal use should be shunned. Gargle with it, wipe wounds with it, foam the wax out of your ears with it, bleach your hair and your clothes with it, but don’t drink it or let someone shoot it into your veins.	mixture	Medical, Home Cures	Hydrogen peroxide is a first aid staple in many households, routinely used to disinfect small wounds. Bottles of it are readily available at drug stores, with the compound formulated for home use vended in dilute form of 3% to 10%. Hydrogen peroxide also finds application as an antiseptic gargle, a clothes and hair bleach, and an aid to ear wax removal. A paste of hydrogen peroxide and baking soda is used as a tooth scrub, and hydrogen peroxide is the major component of any number of tooth-whitening products. Higher concentrations (30% or greater) of hydrogen peroxide are used in industry as a bleach for textiles and paper, as a component of rocket fuels, and for producing foam rubber and organic chemicals. Hydrogen peroxide in these strengths is dangerous for the untrained to handle or come into contact with. Spills of industrial-strength peroxide in transit have resulted in freeway and rail line closures, because at such concentrations hydrogen peroxide presents an imminent danger of fire and explosion, and inhalation of its fumes can send people to the hospital. While some of the peroxide-related tips enumerated in the following example above have previously appeared on other Internet-circulated lists, this particular compilation seems to have begun its on-line life in January 2006: I would like to tell you of the benefits of that plain little O’l bottle of 3% peroxide you can get for under $1.00 at any drug store. My husband has been in the medical field for over 36 years, and most doctors don’t tell you about peroxide, or they would lose thousands of dollars. 1. Take one capful (the little white cap that comes with the bottle) and hold in your mouth for 10 minutes daily, then spit it out. (I do it when I bathe or shower.) No more canker sores and your teeth will be whiter without expensive pastes. Use it instead of mouthwash. 2. Let your toothbrushes soak in a cup peroxide to keep them free of germs. 3. Clean your counters, table tops with peroxide to kill germs and leave a fresh smell. Simply put a little on your dishrag when you wipe, or spray it on the counters. 4. After rinsing off your wooden cutting board, pour peroxide on it to kill salmonella and other bacteria. 5. I had fungus on my feet for years – until I sprayed a 50/50 mixture of peroxide and water on them (especially the toes) every night and let dry. 6. Soak any infections or cuts in 3% peroxide for five to ten minutes several times a day. My husband has seen gangrene that would not heal with any medicine, but was healed by soaking in peroxide. 7. Put two capfuls into a douche to prevent yeast infections. I had chronic yeast infections until I tried this once or twice a week. 8. Fill a spray bottle with a 50/50 mixture of peroxide and water and keep it in every bathroom to disinfect without harming your septic system like bleach or most other disinfectants will. 9. Tilt your head back and spray into nostrils with your 50/50 mixture whenever you have a cold, plugged sinus. It will bubble and help to kill the bacteria. Hold for a few minutes then blow your nose into tissue. 10. If you have a terrible toothache and can not get to a dentist right away, put a capful of 3% peroxide into your mouth and hold it for ten minutes several times a day. The pain will lessen greatly. 11. And of course, if you like a natural look to your hair, spray the 50/50 solution on your wet hair after a shower and comb it through. You will not have the peroxide burnt blonde hair like the hair dye packages, but more natural highlights if your hair is a light brown, faddish, or dirty blonde. It also lightens gradually so it’s not a drastic change. 12. Put half a bottle of peroxide in your bath to help rid boils, fungus, or other skin infections. 13. You can also add a cup of peroxide instead of bleach to a load of whites in your laundry to whiten them. If there is blood on clothing, pour directly on the soiled spot. Let it sit for a minute, then rub it and rinse with cold water. Repeat if necessary. I could go on and on. It is a little brown bottle no home should be without! With prices of most necessities rising, I’m glad there’s a way to save tons of money in such a simple, healthy manner. As to how good its advice is, the best that can be said is that some of the items are accurate, while others are unproved and possibly unprovable. In the main, however, one would likely not suffer much ill effect by following the list’s recommendations. The two possible exceptions to the “no ill effects” pronouncement are the tips that involve putting hydrogen peroxide into direct contact with mucous membranes: spraying it into the nose to clear plugged sinuses or combat colds, and adding it to a douche to prevent yeast infections. While we don’t know if such suggestions work as touted, given the Centers for Disease Control’s statement that “When used for household disinfectant purposes (3% to 5%), [hydrogen peroxide] is mildly irritating to the skin and mucous membranes,” we’d have to advise that trying out either tip might not be such a good idea. Of the list’s suggestions that can be vetted, no less an authority on germs than Dr. Philip Tierno advocates pouring hydrogen peroxide or mouthwash over toothbrushes after every use. Hydrogen peroxide has also long been touted as an effective remover of bloodstains, but people do need to be reminded that it is also a bleach and so might lift out the color of the item being cleaned along with the stain. Disinfecting countertops and cutting boards with hydrogen peroxide can also be handy as the liquid does combat a number of household nasties, but the 3% dilution hydrogen peroxide is commonly sold at won’t be the “sudden death to all germs” answer that this list of tips presents it as. As for killing foot fungus, putting the run on boils, curing canker sores, or cleaning out infections, it is not known if hydrogen peroxide is effective for these purposes. Soaking an infected wound in hydrogen peroxide several times throughout the day for five or ten minutes at a crack is probably not a good idea, though, because the solution can damage tissue if left in contact with skin for any length of time. Two additional health-related uses for hydrogen peroxide should also be examined, even though neither of them was mentioned in this list of tips: injecting and swallowing hydrogen peroxide. While such treatments do have their advocates (who in turn claim such dosings will cure everything from AIDS to cancer), both uses amount to quackery. The proponents of “oxygen therapy” assert they are boosting the body’s ability to destroy disease-causing cells, but there is no medical proof to support such use. Moreover, according to the American Cancer Society (ACS), both such uses are dangerous. Hydrogen peroxide can be harmful if swallowed. Drinking the concentrated solutions sold in some health food stores (35%, or “food grade” hydrogen peroxide) can cause vomiting, severe burns of the throat and stomach, and even death. Direct skin contact or breathing the vapors of hydrogen peroxide can also be harmful. Hydrogen peroxide injections can have dangerous side effects. High blood levels of hydrogen peroxide can create oxygen bubbles that block blood flow and cause gangrene and death. Destruction of blood cells has also been reported after intravenous injection of hydrogen peroxide. The ACS also notes “The medical literature contains several accounts of patient deaths attributed directly to oxygen therapy.” One such case was the 14 March 2004 death of Katherine Bibeau of South Carolina. The coroner who handled the case attributed her death to the intravenous infusion of hydrogen peroxide Ms. Bibeau had been receiving as a treatment for her multiple sclerosis. Hydrogen peroxide destroys blood platelets, the cells that coagulate to stop bleeding, and puts oxygen into the bloodstream that can form bubbles which stop the flow of blood to organs, said Clay Nichols, the pathologist on the case.
10339	Overnight Fasting May Reduce Breast Cancer Risk in Women	The headline, “Overnight Fasting May Reduce Breast Cancer Risk in Women,” suggests that an association between fasting and breast cancer was studied. (Actually, with the words “may reduce,” it suggests that a causal link may have been established, which is not the case.) But the release does not show any data to support even an association. It appears the study merely hypothesized that the benefits of fasting may be associated with breast cancer reduction, but this hypothesis was not directly tested by the researchers. The release provides no evidence that the researchers looked at actual breast cancer risk in the subjects. We’re only told about “fasting associated with a 4 percent lower postprandial glucose level” – a surrogate, perhaps, but not the risk described in the headline. It’s misleading to claim that a study may show a new way to reduce breast cancer risk when, in fact, no such evidence is presented.	false	Academic medical center news release,Breast cancer	We will rule this criterion Not Applicable in this case because the intervention in question is fasting, which costs nothing. The news release discusses how increasing nighttime fasting is associated with a lower postprandial glucose level, but there is no discussion about how this is associated with a reduced breast cancer risk. This is a significant gap that needed to be addressed. There was no discussion of any potential harms associated with increasing the time periods between eating and decreasing overall calorie consumption. The mean duration of nighttime fasting in the study was 12 hours, with discussion of “each three hour increase in nighttime fasting” being associated with a lower glucose level. It makes one wonder – but the release doesn’t address this – just how long some women in the study fasted. There is no discussion of possible limitations of the study. From what we read in the news release, the researchers are merely speculating about the impact of lower glucose levels and calorie intake. The release provides no evidence that the researchers looked at actual breast cancer risk in the subjects. We’re only told about “fasting associated with a 4 percent lower postprandial glucose level” – a surrogate, perhaps, but not the risk described in the headline. The assumption is that by lowering blood glucose or keeping it in a lower state, you reduce insulin production, decrease chronic inflammation and mediator release, and can potentially reduce breast cancer development. But obviously many other factors are at play, and it’s never going to be as simple as lowering glucose = less breast cancer. There was no overt disease-mongering in the news release. But there is an element of it in the researcher’s quote: “This is a simple dietary change that we believe most women can understand and adopt.” This implies a suggestion then, that most women should consider fasting longer at night to reduce risk. That smacks of disease-mongering. Funding sources are clearly stated at the end of the press release. There are no apparent conflicts of interest. The researchers state that “limiting consumption of red meat, alcohol and refined grains while increasing plant-based foods” reduce breast cancer risk, which is enough to earn the release a satisfactory rating. But we’d note that obesity after menopause is another factor associated with increased risk, one that may be reduced through caloric moderation/restriction and maintenance of a healthy body weight. The release noted that participants who had longer fasting durations had a lower caloric intake, but it did not suggest that the lower calorie intake alone might be a factor in lowering breast cancer risk. That additional context would have been useful. Again, we’ll rule this criterion Not Applicable. Fasting is something that anyone could do, although some people should consult with a doctor before limiting their calorie intake or increasing the amount of time between meals. This is a tough call. The news release quotes a researcher saying “Increasing the duration of overnight fasting could be a novel strategy to reduce the risk of developing breast cancer.” So that is a claim of novelty. But that claim – and the association – are not explained adequately in the release. All they showed is that increasing the fasting interval decreases glucose levels and calorie intake. For that reason, we’ll rule it Not Satisfactory. The headline – by stating that fasting may be associated with breast cancer risk reduction – implies that the release is going to show evidence to support this statement. It didn’t.
29166	"Tom Brady attributed his success as an NFL quarterback to the ""witchcraft"" of his wife, Gisele Bündchen."	"What's true: At an event in February 2019, Brady described — in a lighthearted, tongue-in-cheek tone — the superstitious, new-age rituals his wife, Gisele Bündchen, has designed for him, and recalled a conversation in which Bündchen described herself as a ""good witch."" What's false: Brady was clearly speaking tongue in cheek, smiling as he shared to a laughing audience the dynamics of his marriage to Bündchen. He did not himself describe her as a witch, and he never attributed his success as an NFL quarterback to her ""witchcraft."""	false	Junk News	Conservative Christian radio host Rick Wiles, founder of the TruNews channel, raised eyebrows in February 2019 when he claimed that New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady had “admitted” he was under the control of his wife, the supermodel Gisele Bündchen, who Wiles said was a witch who was “taking him to hell.” Wiles’ solemn pronouncements came in response to a video recorded in Boston on 7 February. The video showed Brady, fresh from his sixth Super Bowl victory against the Los Angeles Rams, bantering about the dynamics of his marriage to Bündchen at an event hosted by the razor blade company Gillette, during which he had his beard shaved to raise money for charity. Brady discussed the regimen of new-age, superstitious rituals which Bündchen sets out for her husband, including “healing stones,” mantras and an altar to the couple’s children, and shared with the audience Bündchen’s self-description as a “good witch.” On that basis, Wiles and his guests, the broadcasters Kerry Kinsey and Doc Burkhart, criticized the legendary quarterback’s purported lack of a “spiritual backbone,” and warned that the celebrity couple were bound for damnation if they did not repent for purportedly engaging in witchcraft, and should allow themselves to be “saved.” It’s true that Brady did recall a conversation in which Bündchen referred to herself as a “good witch,” but his tone throughout the anecdote was clearly tongue-in-cheek and in keeping with the lighthearted, storytelling atmosphere of a charity public event. Rather than earnestly “admitting” his wife’s status as a witch, and his own complicity in her pagan rituals, Brady was speaking, as many married people often do, in an affectionate and self-deprecating way about his wife’s influence over how he prepares for football games and the keen, if superstitious, interest she takes in his career. During the course of the charity event, Brady was asked: “Any superstitions going into the game? Any special thing that you carried into the game on Sunday [Super Bowl 53] that you had tucked away somewhere.” Brady grinned and laughed throughout his response: Uh, I did. I always — you know I’ve learned a lot from my wife over the years. She’s so about the power of intention, you know, and believing things that are really going to happen. And she always makes a little altar for me at the game, because she just wills it so much. So she put together a little altar for me that I could bring, with pictures of my kids, and I have these little special stones and healing stones and protection stones and she has me wear a necklace and take these drops she makes [audience laughter]. And I say all these mantras [audience laughter.] And I stopped questioning her a long time ago [audience laughter]. I did. I just shut up and listen. And at first I was like “This is kind of crazy,” and then about four years ago, we were playing the [Seattle] Seahawks and she said “You better listen to me — this is your year, but this is all the things you’re going to have to do to win,” and I did all those things and by God, you know, it worked, it was pretty good. [The Patriots defeated the Seahawks 28-24 in Super Bowl 49 in February 2015.] And then in 2015, it was about early January and she said “You know how much I love you,” and I said “Yeah,” and she said “I just want to let you know this is not going to be your year,” [audience laughter] and of course we lost. [The Patriots lost to the Denver Broncos in the AFC Championship game in the 2015-16 season.] I said “What does ’16 look like?” and she said “’16 is going to be your year” [audience laughter]. [The Patriots won an overtime victory against the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl 51 at the end of the 2016/17 season]. So it was early January this year and I said “Babe, I’m asking, do we have a chance?” and she said “Yeah, but you’re going to have to do a lot of work and you’re really going to have to listen to me” [audience laughter]. So man, I listened to her. And right after the game [Super Bowl 53 in February 2019] she said “See? I did a lot of work. You do your work, I do mine.” She said “You’re lucky you married a witch, I’m just a good witch” [audience laughter]. Wiles: Six-time Super Bowl winner Tom Brady made some surprising remarks about his wife Gisele Bündchen, a Brazilian model. The New England Patriot quarterback revealed why he has won so many Super Bowl games. He made the stunning admission at the Gillette world shaving headquarters in Boston — yes Gillette, the company that doesn’t like male masculinity. After playing the video clip of Brady’s anecdote, the panel delved deeper: Wiles: … Today’s the first time I was aware Tom Brady was married to a witch. Kinsey: … This is sad, I had no idea he believed in — his wife, that he thinks she has such prophetic powers… Wiles: It’s obvious Tom Brady has no spiritual discernment at all. It’s obvious that he’s spiritually lost. He’s being led through life by a witch. He thinks it’s cute, he thinks it’s — pardon the pun — charming, and he thinks it works because he keeps winning…. Kinsey: … He believes she’s a soothsayer, he trusts her, right? Wiles: Yeah. And he sleeps with her. He’s sleeping with a witch. There’s [sic] deep spiritual ramifications for that. He’s sleeping with a witch. His soul is defiled because he’s having intimate relations with a witch. She’s a witch! She’s not just somebody who has some goofy new age ideas, she’s a witch. Burkhart: And for those that watched this particular clip that we just aired, and just kind of laugh it off and everything — and you hear them laughing — Wiles: — they all thought that was funny. Burkhart: Well the Bible takes witchcraft really really seriously. In Revelations 21.8 it says “But cowards, unbelievers, the corrupt, murderers, the immoral, those who practice witchcraft, idol worshippers, and all liars — their fate is in the fiery lake of burning sulphur. This is the second death.” The Bible is very very clear, it equates it with murder, Rick. Wiles: …Here’s this guy that’s put up on a pedestal as the ultimate masculine man in America right now…but his witch-ey wife controls him…He doesn’t have the spiritual backbone to take charge of his home, and so his wife is taking him to hell. Brady did recount a conversation with Bündchen in which she described herself as “a good witch,” and he did outline a regimen of rituals (“healing stones,” mantras and an “altar” to his children) that would not be in keeping with mainstream Christianity. For what it’s worth, Brady’s personal religious beliefs are ambiguous and eclectic. In 2015, USA Today reported that he had a statue of the Hindu god Ganesh in his Patriots locker, and the same year Brady told the New York Times “I don’t know what I believe” and “I think we’re into everything.” However, his remarks in February 2019 hardly amounted to a “stunning admission” (as Wiles described them) that he and his wife are sincere practitioners of witchcraft. Indeed, Brady did not himself describe Bündchen as a witch. Rather, he recalled, in a lighthearted tone, a moment when Bündchen described herself in those terms. Contrary to the deathly serious warnings pronounced by Wiles and his TruNews panel guests, Brady was sharing what he presented as pre-game superstitions, designed by his wife and dutifully carried out by the superstar quarterback. He recalled, smiling throughout and speaking before a laughing audience, Bündchen’s accurate predictions about the outcome of a series of Patriots seasons during the 2010s. He did not, contrary to Wiles’ claims, attribute his success to his wife’s “witchcraft.”
22874	In the case of a catastrophic event, the Atlanta-area offices of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will self-destruct.	Hit zombie series shows CDC blowing up after generators fail	false	Georgia, Health Care, Pop Culture, The Walking Dead,	"OK, OK, enough of that political stuff. The winter holidays approach. State politicians are hibernating. Now PolitiFact Georgia' staff can investigate what's really important. Is there a doomsday plan for Atlanta's Centers for Disease Control and Prevention? ""Huh?"" you ask. And ""Why?"" Because of AMC's hit series ""The Walking Dead."" Flesh-eating zombies take over Atlanta, and in Sunday's season finale, survivors who take refuge at the CDC find out things are even worse than they thought: The building is locked down and rigged to explode. When the CDC's generators run out of fuel, a two-stage device more powerful than anything known to mankind short of a nuclear bomb will blow it to kingdom come. ""It sets the air on fire,"" fictional CDC scientist Dr. Edwin Jenner said. ""No pain. An end to sorrow, grief, regret. Everything."" Thirty minutes later, KAAABOOOOM!!!! No more CDC. Really? Don't laugh. PolitiFact Georgia readers and more than a few Atlanta Journal-Constitution staffers asked PolitiFact to check whether the CDC has an endgame plan. ""The Walking Dead"" follows survivors of a plague that turns people into zombies. In the show's post-apocalypse Atlanta, the undead lurch down Marietta Street and through the countryside hungry for human innards. The Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre stands in as the CDC's stunt double. ""The Walking Dead"" is by far the most popular show shot in Atlanta, according to ajc.com's Radio & TV Talk blog. It averaged 5 million viewers during the fall season, which is 2 million more than second-place Bravo's ""The Real Housewives of Atlanta."" This makes it the most popular drama in basic-cable history among the coveted 18- to 49-year-old demographic. And when a show this popular turns a major DeKalb County employer into a smoldering pit of rubble, AJC PolitiFact Georgia readers take notice. We called the CDC. Officials there said the agency was not consulted during production of the show. While the agency does have safeguards in case generators fail, a subnuclear blast is not one of them, spokeswoman Karen Hunter said. ""We do have systems in place, but none of them involve explosives,"" Hunter said. The CDC has safeguards for a variety of emergencies, but they don't specifically address the possibility of the end of humanity. ""We do not have a doomsday scenario at the CDC,"" Hunter said. If for some reason the CDC were unable to operate from its main campus, designated employees would travel to another location and work from there, Hunter said. Backup generators have failed at least twice in recent years. In June 2007, lightning knocked out power at the CDC's $214 million infectious disease building -- including the agency's six high-tech labs designed to contain Ebola, smallpox, avian influenza and other killer bugs. In July 2008, a bird shorted out a Georgia Power transformer, cutting off power to part of the CDC's main campus. Critics worried the generator failures showed the lab was unsafe. The Government Accountability Office investigated. While ""The Walking Dead's"" CDC seemed to use fire as a kind of disinfectant, the real CDC typically uses other cleaning methods. In the second-to-last episode, Jenner accidentally spills a caustic chemical as he works in a lab, which automatically decontaminates by setting itself on fire. In reality, CDC scientists disinfect spills with some very uncinematic household products, said Tom Skinner, another CDC spokesman. ""Lysol and bleach,"" Skinner said. Materials used to clean the spill are burned, but not by a self-immolating lab. They use incinerators. Scientists work with dangerous pathogens in rooms with negative airflow to prevent germs from leaking outside. Air entering and leaving those rooms is scrubbed with filters. Scientists wear protective suits. While we are disappointed to find that real life is not nearly as cinematic as fiction, we walk away from our effort heartened. We are pleased to reassure the CDC's neighbors that they do not need to install flame-proof siding. The CDC said none of its emergency plans involve blowing up its campus. Plus, the AJC reported two cases in which the CDC emergency generator failures did not coincide with subnuclear explosions. And by the way, we can't wait for Season 2."
24917	If an Iranian woman shows too much hair in public, she risks being beaten or killed.	Iran ain't Miami Beach, but beatings and killings for immodesty? No	false	National, Foreign Policy, Sarah Palin,	"In arguing for a hard line against Iran, Gov. Sarah Palin invoked not just that country's uranium-enrichment efforts and attitude toward Israel, but also its treatment of women. ""It is said that the measure of a country is the treatment of its most vulnerable citizens,"" Palin wrote in a Sept. 22, 2008, opinion piece in the New York Sun . ""By that standard, the Iranian government is both oppressive and barbaric. Under (President Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad's rule, Iranian women are some of the most vulnerable citizens. If an Iranian woman shows too much hair in public, she risks being beaten or killed."" We've looked elsewhere at how candidates from both parties have strayed from the truth in their tough rhetoric about Iran's alleged pursuit of nuclear weapons. Now let's check Palin's grasp of the consequences of improper head-covering. Restrictions in Iran go back centuries, but the strength of enforcement has varied. Modesty has been a component of Islam since the Prophet Mohammed revealed purported advice on the subject from God in the seventh century. It has been interpreted differently among and within Muslim cultures around the world, including Iran. In 1936, Iran's largely secular ruler Reza Shah Pahlavi, intent on modernizing the country, banned the practice of wearing the veil, known in the Muslim world as hejab. That law was rescinded after Pahlavi was forced to relinquish power in 1941, but the policy of discouraging and disparaging hejab remained, said Ziba Mir-Hosseini, an Iranian anthropologist and a visiting professor at the New York University School of Law. In the 1960s, many women did not go to college because they would be forced to remove their hejab, Mir-Hosseini said. ""They were caught between tradition and resistance on the one hand and education and modernity on the other,"" she said. ""Many women took up hejab in the early 1970s as a sign of protest."" An Islamic revolution overthrew Pahlavi's son in 1979 and instituted a 180-degree turn with respect to hejab, mandating it in 1983. The punishment for breaking that law was imprisonment or 70 lashes of flogging. The penalty was changed in 1988 to a fine and imprisonment of one to two months. ""It has been really rare that it has been applied,"" Mir-Hosseini said. ""It goes so much against people's sense of justice and public order in Iran. But at the same time the radicals, the hard-liners, the hejab is so central to them. It is not only religious, it is anti-Western."" Hejab remains mandatory today. The custom has evolved under the influence of modern fashion, though. Some Iranian women still wear the chador , a full-length garment, often black, that fully covers their hair and drapes over their entire body. But many might wear colorful, tight-fitting overcoats, long boots, and a light scarf that covers only a token amount of their hair. The government has periodically cracked down on dress it does not consider conservative enough, typically for a month or so as the weather warms in the summer. In recent years, though, the crackdown has persisted, as hard-liners such as Ahmadinejad have gained influence. Generally, women who are stopped are told to cover up, or asked to sign an agreement to cover up more in the future, or perhaps fined or even arrested. There have been regular reports of confrontations between the police and women who resent being hassled for alleged immodesty. And yes, there have been accounts of brutality by police against some women after such stops. In defending Palin's statement, the McCain campaign pointed us to three such accounts, one from the Asia Times , one from the U.S.-funded Radio Farda, and a third from the Economist of Aug. 25, 2007. The latter said: ""Much of the police action has been accompanied by complaints of brutality, and in many cases by documentary evidence such as graphic footage of beatings, posted on dissident Web sites."" There's an important caveat to make here, though. The beatings are not administered by the government as punishment for an improper hejab — that was outlawed in 1988. Rather they are imposed in the course of an arrest and are generally due to resistance, according to the vast majority of news accounts we read and our interviews with experts on Iran. (Similarly, plenty of protesters in the United States are arrested, but it would be innaccurate to say they're arrested for protesting — in fact they're arrested for other offenses, such as ignoring police requirements about where to protest, or disrupting traffic.) ""For some of the younger people, this (defying modesty rules) is a way of protesting. They get away with it as long as they can. But usually the punishment for that is just paying fines,"" said Faegheh Shirazi, an Iranian women's rights advocate, professor of Middle-Eastern Studies at the University of Texas and author of the forthcoming book, Velvet Jihad: Muslim Women's Quiet Resistance to Islamic Fundamentalism. ""When the police come, you have to abide by what they say. I'm sure if the woman resists and starts backfiring, there would be some struggle."" To the extent that there are beatings, they are extrajudicial, said Elizabeth Rubin, an expert on Middle Eastern culture at the Council on Foreign Relations. ""If you are showing too much hair you may be asked to fix your scarf,"" she said. ""You would not generally be beaten or killed except by a crazy zealot outside the law."" To be sure, Iran has been widely criticized by human-rights organizations for harsh restrictions on dissent and personal behavior. Adultery is punishable by death. Abortion is illegal, and punishable by blood money. Gay people have been subject to arbitrary arrests and harassment . And the government regularly tries to quash dissent, holding political activists without charge and denying them access to counsel. But in this instance Palin overstated the case. The McCain campaign did not provide any account — nor could we find any — of an Iranian woman being killed for improper hejab. If there are any such instances they are extremely isolated. So it was misleading for Palin to suggest beatings are punishment for immodesty in Iran. More to the point, the restrictions related to modesty are routinely flouted without consequence. And her claim that killing was a possible consequence of immodesty pushed her statement into the realm of outright hood."
30026	Before the 1973 HMO act was signed into law by Richard Nixon, it was illegal to profit from healthcare.	All told, little factual basis supports the meme’s assertion that Nixon altered the legality of for-profit insurance by signing the HMO Act of 1973, or its claims that the act was a secret method for Nixon and his cronies to enrich themselves. The only sliver of truth here is the fact that the increase in popularity of HMOs that occurred after passage of the act (and its amendments) greatly expanded for-profit health care in America.	false	Politics	A long-lived but inaccurate meme on social media ties an act signed into law in 1973 by President Richard Nixon to the development of for-profit HMO and health insurance agencies: Did you know that before 1973 it was illegal in the US to profit off health care? The Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973 passed by Nixon changed everything. In 1973, Nixon did a personal favor for his friend and campaign financier, Edgar Kaiser, then president and chairman of Kaiser-Permanente. Nixon signed into law, the Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973, in which medical insurance agencies, hospitals, clinics and even doctors, could begin functioning as for-profit business entities instead of the service organizations they were intended to be. And which insurance company got the first taste of federal subsidies to implement HMOA73 gasp … why, it was Kaiser-Permanente! This text conflates two separate issues: the development of Health Maintenance Organizations (HMOs) in conjunction with alleged cozy ties between Kaiser-Permanente and the Nixon Administration, and the legal permissibility of for-profit healthcare. However, as for-profit health care existed prior to 1973, the Health Maintenance Organization Act clearly did not create or enable that phenomenon. The growth of employer-sponsored health insurance was instrumental to the development of the current for-profit healthcare insurance system in America, which arose largely as a result of federally mandated wage freezes that occurred during and after World War II. This progression was described in a history of American Healthcare by Elisabeth Rosenthal, abridged in a Spring 2017 issue of Stanford Medicine: When the National War Labor Board froze salaries during and after World War II, companies facing severe labor shortages discovered that they could attract workers by offering health insurance instead. To encourage the trend, the federal government ruled that money paid for employees’ health benefits would not be taxed. This strategy was a win-win in the short term, but in the long term has had some very losing implications … Within a decade, the model spread across the country. Three million people had signed up by 1939 and the concept had been given a name: Blue Cross Plans. The goal was not to make money, but to protect patient savings and keep hospitals — and the charitable religious groups that funded them — afloat. Blue Cross Plans were then not-for-profit. As time wore on and medical science became both more advanced and more expensive, other organizations realized the existence of a market for plans tailored to younger and healthier people, and by 1951 both Aetna and Cigna were major players in offering major medical coverage in a for-profit model: For-profit insurance companies moved in, unencumbered by the Blues’ charitable mission. They accepted only younger, healthier patients on whom they could make a profit. They charged different rates, depending on factors like age, as they had long done with life insurance. And they produced different types of policies, for different amounts of money, which provided different levels of protection. Aetna and Cigna were both offering major medical coverage by 1951. With aggressive marketing and closer ties to business than to health care, these for-profit plans slowly gained market share through the 1970s and 1980s. It was difficult for the Blues to compete. From a market perspective, the poor Blues still had to worry about their mission of “providing high-quality, affordable health care for all.” In 1994, after state directors rebelled, the Blues’ board relented and allowed member plans to become for-profit insurers. Their primary motivation was not to charge patients more, but to gain access to the stock market to raise some quick cash to erase deficits. This was the final nail in the coffin of old-fashioned noble-minded health insurance. It is inaccurate to say that “before 1973 it was illegal in the US to profit off of health care,” as Aetna and Cigna had been profiting from health care for over 20 years before that. Ballooning health care costs became a serious political issue in the 1970s, and it was in this environment that the concept of HMOs grew in popularity. An HMO differed from the other insurance models in that it was a prepaid, managed plan that granted a patient access to a specifically contracted network of physicians and specialists, generally combined with some form of financing: In traditional managed care plans (e.g., Health Maintenance Organizations) the money follows the “member,” whether ill or not. Although there are many definitions of managed care, generally the term describes a continuum of arrangements that integrate the financing and delivery of health care. Purchasers contract with (or “own”) selected providers to deliver a defined set of services at an agreed per-capita or per-service price. The concept had existed in various forms prior to the 1970s, but during the Nixon administration the HMO model was viewed as the solution to massive increases in government spending taken on by the federal government through the Medicare and Medicaid programs. Both liberals and conservatives supported the concept at the time, as described by Stuart Altman and David Shactman in their book Power, Politics, and Universal Health Care: Richard Nixon was concerned about health care costs. Federal spending for the Medicare and Medicaid programs had surpassed everyone’s expectations. Their cost grew from 4.1 percent of the federal budget in 1961 to 11.3 percent by 1973. HMOs seemed to have everything Nixon needed … They appealed to Nixon and Republican conservatives became they were a free market approach, and they preserved the private insurance market. Moreover, they did not require large government spending as in the case of liberal, Democratic reform proposals. Differences between liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans shaped the trajectory of legislation that would become the Health Maintenance Organization Act of 1973, which was signed into law with bipartisan support. The act initially provided $45 million in grants and loans and $300 million in loan guarantees to spur the development of HMOs: With support from a broad coalition in Congress, President Nixon secured the passage of the HMO Act of 1973. The Act enabled individual HMOs to receive endorsement (referred to as qualification) from the federal government, and it required employers to offer coverage from at least one federally qualified HMO to all employees (dual choice). However, the dual choice requirement was never enforced, and many large HMOs, including Kaiser, never sought federal qualification. The Act did facilitate growth in HMO enrollment by helping to create several successful HMOs around the country, and it legitimized the HMO concept. Over time, the restrictions on which HMOs could receive federal endorsements were eased in a series of amendments to the act, leading to a massive increase in for-profit HMOs that medical historian Paul Starr described as the “conservative appropriation of liberal reform”: Paradoxically, the efforts to control expenditures for health services also stimulated corporate development. The conservative appropriation of liberal reform in the early seventies opened up HMOs as a field for business investment. And in ways entirely unexpected, the regulation of hospitals and other efforts to contain costs set off a wave of acquisitions, mergers, and diversification in the nonprofit as well as profit-making sectors of the medical care industry. Pressure for efficient, business-like management of health care has also contributed to the collapse of the barriers that traditionally prevented corporate control of health services. In this light, it is fair to say that Richard Nixon’s support for HMOs presaged a dramatic transition in the American healthcare system that increased for-profit health insurance enterprises, but it is not fair to say that the act itself first made for-profit health insurance legal. The primary emotional hook in the meme is the assertion that the HMO Act was a handout to Edgar Kaiser, a friend of Nixon’s who donated heavily to his campaign for president. It is true that Kaiser advocated on behalf of the HMO Act to Nixon’s aide John Ehrlichman, and that the concept proposed in the bill was modeled on HMO plans already offered by Kaiser. The claim that the act was a quid pro quo, however, is belied by the fact that the original 1973 act, in its final form, did not allow Kaiser’s plan to be recognized: While Kaiser Permanente was in operation for many years before, it did serve as a model for the HMO Act of 1973. Paul Ellwood Jr., MD, a community physician working with the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, in 1971 found a model for his “health maintenance organization” vision in Kaiser Permanente … Ironically, when Nixon signed the HMO Act in 1973 it had been so diluted by the political process from Ellwood’s ideas that Kaiser Permanente, a central model at the outset, did not qualify as an HMO until the act was amended four years later. Such a truth also makes the meme’s claim that Kaiser was the insurance company to get the “first taste of federal subsidies” incorrect. Additional controversy stems from a conversation between Ehrlichman and Nixon captured in the Nixon White House tapes that makes it sound as though Nixon believed the motivation behind the act was that “the less care [insurance companies] give [patients], the more money they make”: Ehrlichman: “Edgar Kaiser is running his Permanente deal for profit. And the reason that he can … the reason he can do it … I had Edgar Kaiser come in … talk to me about this and I went into it in some depth. All the incentives are toward less medical care, because …” President Nixon: [Unclear.] Ehrlichman: “… the less care they give them, the more money they make.” President Nixon: “Fine.” [Unclear.] Ehrlichman: [Unclear] “… and the incentives run the right way.” President Nixon: “Not bad.” Kaiser Permanente contended that this was a crude and inarticulate paraphrase of what Edgar Kaiser was trying to explain to Ehrlichman, and that Nixon’s later statements to Congress about the act made it clear what the two men were attempting to explain. The issue was that doctors needed to be incentivized to provide preventative medicine to reduce overall healthcare costs, but the rate-based, for-profit insurance model currently in play did not provide incentives for this less profitable area of healthcare, unlike HMOs: Despite Ehrlichman’s miscommunication, Nixon eventually grasped the Kaiser Permanente model of integrated, preventive health care. In a communication to Congress about his Health Strategy Initiative on Feb. 18, 1971, Nixon called “health maintenance” an important part of “a new national health strategy.” He continued: “If more of our resources were invested in preventing sickness and accidents,” Nixon said, “fewer would have to be spent on costly cures. If we gave more attention to treating illness in its early stages, then we would be less troubled by acute disease. In short, we should build a true ‘health’ system—and not a ‘sickness’ system alone. “… Under traditional systems, doctors and hospitals are paid, in effect, on a piecework basis. The more illnesses they treat, and the more service they render, the more their income rises. This does not mean, of course, that they do any less than their very best to make people well. But it does mean that there is no economic incentive for them to concentrate on keeping people healthy.”
815	Spain issues international alert as listeria cases hit 150.	Spain’s health ministry issued an international alert over the country’s biggest ever listeriosis outbreak on Wednesday as the number of people affected rose to 150, including one fatality.	true	Health News	Amid concerns over possible infection among the more than 80 million tourists who visit Spain annually, the ministry said it was checking another 523 suspected cases. Most confirmed cases have been recorded in the southern region of Andalusia, where the packaged pork plant linked to the outbreak is situated. But there have been others as far away as Catalonia in the northeast and more around 50 people remain in hospital. Listeria, the bacteria behind the infection, usually causes mild illness but can be dangerous to pregnant women, 23 of whom are among those still hospitalized, and those with weakened immune systems. The ministry said it had issued alerts to EU authorities and the World Health Organization over the outbreak, which was on Tuesday confirmed to have killed a 90-year-old woman. The plant in question, owned by Seville-based Magrudis, was inspected by health authorities after lab tests showed the presence of listeria in one of its products, the ministry said. All products manufactured in the plant since May 1 have been recalled. The company has not responded to requests for comment. “Obviously there was a failure to follow the established procedures,” acting health minister Maria Luisa Carcedo told reporters. “Now we need to carry out the inspections and investigations to figure out exactly where this failure took place.”
34786	Prayers are needed for Christopher Hamrick, who was injured in a car accident in 2012.	According to online memorials, Christopher Hamrick died July 5, 2015 at the age of 15.	mixture	Inboxer Rebellion, Prayer Requests	Across social media sites, the hashtag #PrayForChristopher has been appended to prayer requests for a 12-year-old boy named “Christopher Henrick” who is purported to have been seriously injured in a recent car accident involving a tractor trailer. Example: #prayforchristopher. He & his father was stopped at a red light when a tractor trailer hit them in their truck. #PrayForChristopher Young Footbal Player was hit by Tractor Trailer wreck. Be heal in Jesus Christ’s name Please RT this Thank you Pray for this little boy.he was in a car accident w all of the impact.No blood flow to the brain. #prayforchristopher That crash occurred in 2012, however, and the young man’s condition later stabilized. One popular Facebook page recently deviated from their focus on child abuse to post a status about “Christopher Henrick,” prompting many users to include the boy in their prayers and seek updates as to whether his recovery was on track. That post (no longer available online) linked back to an earlier prayer request for Christopher Henrick from Jason Crabb, a Christian musician: Crabb’s original post, which has been shared nearly half a million times, was published on 5 October 2012. Given its massive reach, the status update and shared photo may be the origin of the common misspelling of the boy’s name. And judging from the volume of recent comments, many users are unaware that the accident occurred years ago. A 12-year-old boy was gravely injured in a car accident, but the child’s name is “Christopher Hamrick,” not “Christopher Henrick.” The spelling inconsistency may be why social media users are having trouble finding out whether Hamrick has recovered from his injuries or locating updated information about his condition. Hamrick (not Henrick) is no longer 12, and the accident in which he was injured is not recent. Hamrick’s mother, Tena Hamrick-Schneider, maintains a Facebook page for Christopher with more than 4,000 users subscribed for updates on the teen’s condition. In response to renewed interest in her son’s recovery, Hamrick-Schneider amended the page’s “about” section to clarify the timeline and circumstances of Christopher’s injuries for new members: On 23 September 2014, Hamrick-Schneider explained: Christopher Hamrick is now 14 years old. On September 23, 2012, when Christopher was 12 years old, we were in a tragic car accident. Christopher was in the back seat of our family car. We were stopped on Route 19 at Mt. Nebo, WV, at a red light when a tractor & trailer who was nowhere in sight when we stopped at the red light came up behind us at a high rate of speed & did not stop. The tractor part of the truck struck the back of our car & run up on top of the side of the car Christopher was sitting on. Then the logging trailer that was attached to the truck struck the same side of our car as it jack knifed, pushing us into a concrete light pole which was alongside the road. Christopher was trapped in the rubble of what was once the back seat of our car. The whole trunk area of the car was pushed up into Christopher & he had to be cut out of the rubble of metal by the Jaws of Life. He was life- fllighted to Charleston, WV, where we were given no hope for his poor little life. We as parents could not give up on our baby boy no matter how bad of news we received. We were told by the doctors that there should have been no way possible that Christopher’s little body could sustain the damage that it had & still survive. Christopher was in Charleston, WV, in intensive care where he had to have his skull removed due to having a large amount of fluid & swelling on his brain. They told us in the hospital that his brain stem & brain was so destroyed that he would never come off of the ventilator & would never be able to breathe on his own, control his blood pressure or do anything the body regulates on its own. He had several broken ribs, a broken leg, his lungs were collapsed, he lost a kidney, & the list goes on & on. The doctors were basically going to send Christopher home to die. They said there was no hope. We could not let our son go that easily. We fought for our son’s rights to continue medical care & on October 18, 2012, Christopher was transferred to HealthSouth in Morgantown, WV, to continue to receive medical care & rehabilitation. Christopher had several surgeries & had his final surgery of getting his skull put back in the month of April, 2013, which is when he released from HealthSouth at Morgantown, WV. We have had him at home since that time & have been working with him on our own along with some wonderful nurses that he has. We have started some outpatient physical therapy but have not been given much hope by his therapists. Doctors & therapists have discouraged us to continue our fight of finding help for our son to improve, but we keep fighting the fight as any parents would to help our son. God spared Christopher’s life that horrible September day & I believe God has a plan for him. That is why this prayer page is still in circulation. We need the prayers & encouragement from other Christians who believe God can still perform miracles. In one update, Hamrick-Schneider posted a picture of Christopher holding his infant nephew. A GoFundMe page was set up to help finance Christopher Hamrick’s recovery.
3774	US permits sale of cigarettes with 95% less nicotine.	U.S. health officials on Tuesday endorsed a type of cigarette that could help ease the addictive grip of smoking by delivering very low levels of nicotine.	true	Health, General News, Business, Smoking, U.S. News, Tobacco industry regulation	The Food and Drug Administration will allow 22nd Century Group to begin selling the first low-nicotine cigarettes reviewed by federal health regulators. The products contain roughly 95% less nicotine than standard cigarettes, according to the FDA. Nicotine, which occurs naturally in tobacco plants, is the addictive chemical that makes cigarettes, chew and related products so hard to quit. Past efforts to sell similar low-nicotine products have fallen flat. Regulators stressed that their ruling does not mean the new products are safer than regular cigarettes. The agency noted there are no safe tobacco products. Cigarettes cause cancer, lung disease, stroke and a number of other deadly diseases. But the agency’s tobacco chief, Mitch Zeller, noted in a statement that 22nd Century Group’s products are the first cigarettes to show the potential “to help reduce nicotine dependence among addicted smokers.” The FDA is continuing to review a separate application from the company on whether the cigarettes present a reduced risk to smokers. The U.S. smoking rate has fallen to an all-time low of 14% of adults, or roughly 34 million Americans. But smoking remains the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the U.S., responsible for some 480,000 deaths annually Low-nicotine cigarettes are not a new idea. Philip Morris experimented with selling a line of them in the U.S. in the late 1980s, without much success. Since then, most low-nicotine cigarettes have been used for research purposes to study addiction in smokers. Kenneth Warner, a tobacco expert at the University of Michigan’s school of public health, called the idea “good in concept,” but said he would be “astonished if there’s much of a market for this.” There are several techniques for reducing nicotine, including chemical extraction and cross-breeding plants. Williamsville, New York-based 22nd Century Group plans to sell its cigarettes under the brand name Moonlight, in regular and menthol flavor. Last year, the FDA began the process for regulating nicotine in cigarettes to make them minimally or non-addictive. But the agency recently dropped the nicotine plan from its list of regulatory priorities. And tobacco companies have signaled their opposition. The FDA has sponsored several studies showing that when smokers switch to low-nicotine cigarettes they smoke less and are more likely to try quitting. The research was considered pivotal to establishing that smokers won’t compensate by smoking more cigarettes or inhaling more deeply if nicotine levels are low. That was sometimes the case with “light” and “low tar” cigarettes marketed in decades past. Those products were banned as misleading. ___ 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.
35457	A Missouri school district asked parents to sign a COVID-19 liability waiver in advance of the 2020-2021 school year.	"What's true: A template for an athletic waiver that included warnings about the threat of COVID-19 was created by a Missouri-based insurance provider for all school districts covered under its policy. Representatives from the school district noted that the mention of ""death"" is common in athletic liability waivers. What's false: Not all parents were asked to sign, only those whose children were participating in 2020 summer athletic programs, according to a school district representative."	true	Politics Education, COVID-19	In July 2020, social media posts and news reports claimed that a Missouri school district asked parents to sign COVID-19 “death” waivers in advance of the academic school year. The waiver went viral after a Twitter user shared it. The focus on the word “death” came from an article published by online tabloid Raw Story that extrapolated language from the waiver meant to release Hazelwood School District (HSD) in Missouri from legal liabilities in the event a child dies “in any way related to COVID-19.” While it is true that HSD issued a waiver related to COVID-19, Anthony Kiekow, HSD director of communication and public relations, told Snopes that parents would only be required to sign if their child planned on participating in summer athletic programs. The waiver asked that a parent confirm their acknowledgment of the public health crisis “related to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (‘COVID-19’)” and confirmed that they would not allow a child to participate in programs if they showed any symptoms of COVID-19 or had been exposed to anyone diagnosed with the disease or awaiting test results. It further notes: The undersigned agrees to release, discharge, hold harmless and indemnify the Hazelwood School District, it’s agents, employees, officers, Board of Education members, insurers and others acting on the District’s behalf (the Releasees”), of and from any and all claims, demands, causes of action and/or legal liabilities for injuries to or death of my child occurring during, or resulting from, or participation in the above-mentioned program or activity and related in any way to COVID-19, even if the cause, damages or injuries are alleged to be the fault of or alleged to be caused by the negligence or carelessness of the Releasees. Such verbiage is not uncommon in school athletic waivers and headlines referring to the document as a COVID-19 “death” waiver were “sensationalizing” and largely misleading, added Kiekow. The waiver was created by the Missouri United School Insurance Council (MUSIC), a non-profit program that provides insurance coverage for Missouri public schools and community colleges. Snopes spoke with MUSIC Executive Director Mark Stockwell who said that the organization supplied all member school districts with two waiver templates recommended for summer athletic programs and not necessarily for those that take place during the academic school year. Kiekow confirmed that the waiver was sent in late June 2020 and was intended for parents whose students typically participate in summer athletics. He noted that required athletic waivers and documents from the previous school year were “very different from this waiver,” but that language related to COVID-19 is likely to be the “new norm for sports.” For the 2020-21 school year, the district announced that it would be offering families the option of selecting “100% virtual school” or a blended option that includes both virtual and in-person learning. A statement issued by HSD further reads that: Parents who want their child to participate in athletics are asked to sign a waiver. This year’s waiver includes language about COVID-19 to ensure that parents can make an informed decision… Our district has implemented unprecedented safety precautions in all of our buildings; however, it is important for parents to understand that school districts can only mitigate the risk of COVID-19. No district, organization, or business can offer 100% protection against exposure to a global pandemic. Visit the Centers for Disease Control website for more information about COVID-19. Parents of HSD students who choose to allow their children to attend in-person class would not be required to sign a COVID-19 waiver. When asked why HSD adopted this policy, Keikow replied via text message that “athletics are optional” and that a waiver for in-person instruction is “just not something that we’re requiring.” EdCounsel, a Missouri-based law firm that represents over 200 public school districts, wrote in a blog post that state “law is not clear” on whether school districts can require that families sign a COVID-19 waiver for students attending in-person instruction, but liability waivers for extracurricular activities are largely exempt.
7444	Maryland governor eases restrictions caused by virus.	Maryland residents will no longer be required to stay at home but will be strongly advised to continue doing so, especially if they are older and more vulnerable to the coronavirus, Gov. Larry Hogan said Wednesday as he announced the first stage of a state recovery plan and the reopening of retail stores with limits.	true	Technology, General News, Business, Larry Hogan, Maryland, Virus Outbreak, Public health	The Republican governor said the state is gradually moving into stage one of the state’s recovery plan at 5 p.m. Friday, after 14 days of plateauing of key hospital metrics. He also said the decision came after consultation with a state team of public health experts and business leaders. “I want to be very clear: while lifting the stay at home order and gradually moving into stage one of our recovery is a positive step forward, it does not mean that we are safe or that this crisis is over,” Hogan said at a news conference. “Low risk does not mean no risk. All Marylanders, particularly those older and more vulnerable populations, are advised to continue staying home as much as possible.” Retail stores may reopen at up to 50% capacity, with curbside pickup and delivery strongly encouraged and all public health precautions in place. Examples of businesses that may reopen include clothing and shoe stores, pet groomers, animal adoption shelters, car washes, art galleries and bookstores. All manufacturing may resume operations, with multiple shifts encouraged. Churches and houses of worship may start holding religious services, at up to 50% capacity, with outdoor services strongly encouraged. Some personal services, including barbershops and hair salons, may open with up to 50% capacity and by appointment only. Maryland residents are still urged to work from home if they can. A requirement that people wear masks in public areas indoors will remain in effect. Limits prohibiting gatherings of 10 or more people will remain in place, with the exception of religious gatherings. The plan provides a flexible and community-based approach that enables individual jurisdictions to make decisions on the timing of stage one reopenings. Local governments can keep restrictions in place, but they can only act within the guidelines announced by the governor. Hogan noted that officials in two of Maryland’s largest jurisdictions, Montgomery and Prince George’s counties in the suburbs of the nation’s capital, have made clear they are not ready to move into stage one. Of the state’s 34,812 confirmed cases, 10,072 are in Prince George’s, and 7,283 are in Montgomery. Baltimore County has 4,160 cases, and the city of Baltimore has the fourth-highest number with 3,476. Hogan also noted that other counties in the state feel strongly that they are able to begin stage one. “As our state cautiously moves forward we fully understand that not all counties are in the same situation,” Hogan said. “Just four of Maryland’s 24 jurisdictions currently account for more than 70% of our state’s total confirmed cases.” Some counties in rural parts of the state have had far fewer cases. Foe example, Garrett County in western Maryland has had six confirmed cases. Somerset County, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, has reported 51 cases — the second fewest number of confirmed cases for a Maryland jurisdiction. As of Wednesday morning, Maryland has confirmed 34,812 virus cases. That was 751 more cases than on Tuesday. Maryland also has had a total of 1,694 confirmed deaths, 51 more than on the day before. Maryland has had 138,762 negative test results. On Wednesday, 1,550 people were hospitalized in the state due to the virus. That’s 13 less than on Tuesday. ___ For more AP coverage of the virus outbreak, visit https://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak or https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak.
35110	A critically endangered Malabar civet was seen for the first time since the 1990s during a COVID-19 lockdown in India.	What's true: A video shows an animal that resembles a civet crossing the street in March 2020 in India. What's undetermined: This video likely shows the relatively common small Indian civet, not the critically endangered Malabar civet, but the specific species has yet to be confirmed. It's also unclear if this sighting was related to any shelter-in-place orders.	false	Critter Country, COVID-19	On March 26, 2020, a short video clip supposedly showing the first sighting of a critically endangered “spotted Malabar civet” since the 1990s started to circulate on social media. This video was widely shared along with comments connecting this rare sighting to a reduction in outdoor human activity due to various lockdown and shelter-in-place orders that were implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic. Spotted Malabar civet… A critically endangered mammal not seen until 1990 resurfaces for the first time in calicut town.. seems mother earth is rebooting! #COVID2019 pic.twitter.com/oG6Kg8Opoi — Dón Grieshnak (@DGrieshnak) March 26, 2020 This is a genuine video of an animal in India that was spotted in March 2020, when many people were practicing social distancing to help slow the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus disease. However, this video likely shows the more common small Indian civet, not the critically endangered Malabar civet. This video was reportedly taken in Meppayur, a town in the Kozhikode district of the Kerala state in southern India. Parveen Kaswan, a member of the India Forest Service, identified the animal as a “Small Indian Civet” on Twitter. Kalyan Varma, a wildlife photographer, also identified it as the small Indian civet, not the Malabar civet: Conservation India writes that the small Indian civet and the Malabar civet are similar in appearance. They both have a banded tail and similar markings on their bodies: Until recently, few people have known of the existence or distinguishing characters of the Malabar civet. Among the civets seen in the Western Ghats, the small Indian civet is somewhat similar in appearance to the Malabar civet due to its banded tail and black-and-white markings, but is smaller in size. Both these civet species are mainly ground-dwelling in habit. At most, there are only a few hundred Malabar civets in the world, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The small Indian civet, on the other hand, has a much healthier population.
40949	The way to cure this is antibiotics, anti-inflammatories and anticoagulants.	Antibiotics do not directly treat Covid-19, which is caused by a virus. The anti-inflammatory ibuprofen is being trialled for use against Covid-19 and an anticoagulant has been used in some Covid-19 cases. Aspirin is not a specific cure.	false	online	Italy has concluded Covid-19 is not a virus, and people are actually dying of amplified global 5G electromagnetic radiation poisoning. Italy disobeyed world health law from the WHO saying not to carry out autopsies on Covid-19 patients. The WHO never said autopsies couldn’t take place. Italy has found that Covid-19 is actually disseminated intravascular coagulation (thrombosis). The way to cure this is antibiotics, anti-inflammatories and anticoagulants. Antibiotics do not directly treat Covid-19, which is caused by a virus. The anti-inflammatory ibuprofen is being trialled for use against Covid-19 and an anticoagulant has been used in some Covid-19 cases. Aspirin is not a specific cure. Covid-19 is not a virus, but a bacterium being amplified by 5G which causes inflammation and hypoxia. Covid-19 patients can get secondary infections from bacteria. Hypoxia and types of inflammation can be symptoms of Covid-19. There’s no proof Covid-19 is in any way related to 5G. People with Covid-19 should take aspirin 100mg and Apronax or paracetamol. Trials into both of these drugs’ effectiveness in treating Covid-19 are ongoing, but haven’t concluded yet. Paracetamol can ease symptoms but isn’t a specific treatment. Covid-19 clots the blood causing thrombosis, stopping blood flow and oxygenating the heart and lungs. Severe Covid-19 can cause blood clotting problems and issues like this have been seen in Covid-19 patients, but this is not the only thing that can be fatal in patients. In a day, Italy sent home more than 14,000 patients after treating them with Aspirin and Apronax. The Italian Medicines Agency doesn’t mention aspirin or apronax in its list drugs used to treat Covid-19 outside of clinical trials. And there’s no record of a day when 14,000 people were sent home from hospital in Italy. There is an order to incinerate or immediately bury Covid-19 bodies without autopsy. There is no such order. Claim 1 of 10
2395	China aims to ban smoking in public places by end of the year.	China aims to impose a nationwide ban on smoking in public places this year, as authorities move to stamp out a widespread practice that has taken a severe toll on citizens’ health.	true	Health News	China, home to some 300 million smokers, is the world’s largest consumer of tobacco, and smoking is a ubiquitous part of social life, particularly for men. Tougher regulation of smoking is a priority this year, officials from the National Health and Family Planning Commission said this week, adding that the agency was pushing lawmakers to toughen laws on tobacco use. “Compared to the damage to health that smoking causes, tobacco’s economic benefits are trivial,” Mao Qun’an, a spokesman for the commission, told a news conference on Tuesday. The drumbeat to reduce tobacco use has grown steadily louder in the past few years, but experts say China’s powerful tobacco industry, which has resisted raising cigarette prices and use of health warnings on cigarette packs, has been a tough opponent. The nationwide smoking ban has long been in the works. Several cities have banned smoking in public places, but enforcement has been lax. Beijing pledged in 2008 to prohibit smoking in most public venues, including government offices, but no-smoking signs are frequently ignored. Steps recommended by the commission range from beefing up education on the dangers of tobacco to banning smoking in schools and hospitals. An official in the tobacco control office of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention said in December that lawmakers would consider the nationwide ban on smoking in public places this year. The commission’s statement follows a government circular urging Communist Party cadres and government officials not to light up in schools, workplaces, stadiums, and on public transport, among other places, so as to set a positive example.
10637	Experimental Drug May Treat Hepatitis C	While still needing some improvement, this WebMD story does a better job than a competing HealthDay piece of covering an experimental new treatment for hepatitis-C. The major difference is that this story stayed focused on the study at hand, while the HealthDay piece got sidetracked into making unsupported claims about other experimental drugs mentioned by an expert source. Considering how few experimental drugs make it all the way from phase I testing to FDA approval, it’s debatable whether it is even appropriate to cover a new drug in this early stage of testing in a consumer publication. If you’re going to cover stories like this, it is important to maintain a consistently cautious tone throughout, which this story mostly manages to do. The competing piece from HealthDay alternated between skepticism and cheerleading.	true		"SInce the test drug is in the very early stages of development, this criterion is technically not applicable. However, the present treatment regimen of an interferon and ribavirin costs thousands of dollars monthly for 6-12 months and it is likely that any newer antivirals will be additive and not replacements. A comment on the potential for significant additional costs would have been desirable. The story got a little carried away here. It said participants treated with the experimental drug had a ""dramatic"" reduction in viral load. While this may be true, it would have been helpful to point out, as the HealthDay story did, that the study lasted only a few days. We don’t know whether this benefit can be maintained over a longer period of time, especially considering that the hepatitis C virus has proven to be quite capable of developing resistance to antivirals over time. The story says study participants who took the drug exhibited ""few side effects."" But what were those side effects and how serious were they? The story doesn’t say. While the implication here is that the drug seems to be safe — a conclusion that we can’t really draw based on a small, early phase test — the story does include a cautionary quote from an expert about the need for additional testing to demonstrate safety. It also noted that patients taking this drug might still need to be treated with interferon, which many individuals can’t tolerate because of side effects. A close one, but we’ll call it satisfactory. This story includes appropriate caveats about the early nature of this research and includes a restraining quote from an expert who warns that the drug might not make it out of phase II tests. Unlike the competing HealthDay piece, this story resisted getting too worked up about the other experimental drugs for hepatitis-C that are closer to potential FDA approval. This story does not exaggerate the prevalence or severity of hepatitis C. According to disclosure statements from a 2008 CME program, Dr. Bruce Bacon, an expert source for this story, received research funding from Bristol Myers Squibb, which is developing the experimental drug being discussed. He also is a consultant to drug companies developing competing drugs for hepatitis C. To avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest it is desirable to identify relationships such as these clearly. This story fails to do so. The story compares the new drug with intravenously administered peg-interferon and ribavirin — the current standard of care for hepatitis C. The story called the research on BMS-790052 ""preliminary"" and made it clear that the drug was not close to approval. It also was more cautious than the competing HealthDay piece in its description of two other antiviral drugs that are nearing FDA approval. The story notes that there are many other drugs being developed to treat hepatitis C. It explained that a potentially novel advantage of the new compound is that it seems to be effective against all genotypes. We can’t be sure whether this story relied on a news release."
8843	High dose Lipitor reduces artery inflammation: study.	High doses of Pfizer Inc’s Lipitor was more effective than low doses of the cholesterol fighter in reducing arterial inflammation in patients with carotid artery disease, according to a small, 12-week study.	true	Health News	Inflammation in arteries has been associated with an increased risk of stroke. Inflammation and emboli, or small blood clots, were significantly reduced in patients treated with 80 milligrams of Lipitor compared with those who received 10 mg of the drug each day for 12 weeks, said researchers, who presented the data at the American College of Cardiology scientific meeting on Monday. The study divided 40 patients with diseased carotid arteries into the two groups. The artery was examined for changes in inflammation at six weeks and 12 weeks using a unique contrast agent with high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). While the 80 mg Lipitor, known generically as atorvastatin, reduced inflammation, researchers appeared even more enthusiastic about the technique used to measure the results. The arteries were viewed using Ultra Small Particles of Iron Oxide, or USPIO-enhanced, high-resolution MRI. “The real star of this study is this new way of imaging, which allows you to zero in on what is actually going on in these arteries,” said Dr Jonathan Gillard, one of the study’s lead researchers. The study demonstrates that if you treat patients who have inflammation of the carotid artery with “a high dose of atorvastatin, you substantially reduce the amount of inflammation and risk of stroke, whereas low dose atorvastatin does not reduce risk,” Gillard said. “Thanks to this imaging technique, we can now figure out which patients need the aggressive treatment before we begin our therapy,” he added. Lipitor, which lowers levels of LDL, or bad, cholesterol in the blood, is the world’s top-selling prescription medicine with some $12 billion in annual sales.
8183	Australian researchers map immune response to coronavirus.	Australian researchers said on Tuesday they have mapped the immune responses from one of country’s first coronavirus patients, findings the health minister said were an important step in developing a vaccine and treatment.	true	Science News	The coronavirus has infected more than 168,000 people worldwide and killed at least 6,610, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). While the bulk of those infected experience only mild symptoms, it is severe or critical in 20% of patients. The virus mortality rate is about 3.4%, the WHO has estimated. As scientists scramble to develop a vaccine, researchers at Australia’s Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity said they had taken an important step in understanding the virus. By examining the blood results from an unidentified woman in her 40s, they discovered that people’s immune systems respond to coronavirus in the same way it typically fights flu. The findings help scientists understand why some patients recover while others develop more serious respiratory problems, the researchers said. “People can use our methods to understand the immune responses in larger COVID-19 cohorts, and also understand what’s lacking in those who have fatal outcomes,” said Katherine Kedzierska, professor of microbiology and immunology at the University of Melbourne, which took part in the research. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus. As researchers monitored the Australian patient’s immune response, they were able to accurately predict when she would recover. Researchers did not name the patient, but said she was an Australian citizen who was evacuated out of Wuhan, the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak in China. Health Minister Greg Hunt described the development as “world leading” and a major development in research on the disease. “It’s about fast-tracking a vaccine by identifying which candidates are most likely to be successful,” Hunt told reporters. “It’s also about fast-tracking potential therapies and treatments for patients who already have coronavirus.” At least a dozen drugmakers around the world are working on vaccines or antiviral and other treatments for the fast-spreading contagion. But investment costs for vaccines could run as high as $800 million in a process that, even if accelerated, will likely take more than a year until approval, according to executives from companies involved in the effort.
21571	Josh Mandel used to be pro-choice, now he’s anti-choice. He used to be sympathetic towards gay and lesbians and now he’s [not].	Former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland raps Josh Mandel as a flip flopper on abortion, gay rights	mixture	Abortion, Ohio, Gays and Lesbians, Ted Strickland,	"Former Gov. Ted Strickland recently pulled a page from the Ohio Democratic Party’s playbook to attack Josh Mandel, the Republican state treasurer who now appears to be running for the U.S. Senate. Mandel, 33, hasn’t formally announced his candidacy but is raising money for the race and taking shots from Democrats as if he’s an official candidate. Mandel, a former state legislator from Lyndhurst, has his eye on the seat held by Sen. Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Avon. Strickland took up for his fellow Democrat in a recent interview with Politico, a national political news website. Strickland framed Mandel as a candidate willing to shift his ideals to further his political career. Strickland told Politico that Mandel – whose likely Senate run has gained the support of the Senate Conservatives Fund – has not always been so staunchly conservative. ""Josh Mandel used to be pro-choice, now he’s anti-choice,"" Strickland said. ""He used to be sympathetic towards gay and lesbians and now he’s [not]."" Democrats have portrayed Mandel as a political opportunist going back to his run last year for state treasurer, so PolitiFact Ohio decided to check Strickland’s claim to see if Mandel is the shape-shifter his opponents have made him out to be. Let’s slice Strickland’s attack in half, examining the accuracy of each claim. There is no question Mandel is now anti-abortion. He has endorsed the ""heartbeat bill,"" a controversial proposed law banning abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, which can occur as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. When asked about Strickland’s comments, a spokesman for Mandel’s campaign said, ""Josh has always been solidly pro-life and believes all innocent human life should be protected."" When we talked to Strickland, he said that Mandel seemed to grow more stringent in his anti-abortion views over time, culminating with his support of the heartbeat bill. Mandel supported exceptions to anti-abortion laws for cases of rape and incest, according to an Ohio Right to Life 2006 candidate survey. On a similar survey two years later, he didn’t list those exceptions to qualify his support for anti-abortion laws. Ultimately, Strickland said he has no evidence to show Mandel ever supported abortion rights. ""I’m just going to have to be straight with you, I can’t give you a document or recording that supports what I said,"" Strickland said. So Strickland’s claim that Mandel used to be ""pro-choice"" is unsupported. But did Mandel change course on his support for the gay community? When we asked the former governor to back up that part of his statement, Strickland cited quotes from Mandel when he was involved in student government in college, and compared those words with Mandel’s more recent legislative voting record. Mandel was president of the undergraduate student government while he attended Ohio State University. In April 2000, the student government voted to support a domestic partnership plan to allow qualified students to buy student health insurance for their domestic partners, according to The Lantern, Ohio State’s student newspaper. Mandel supported the plan at the time. ""The undergraduate student government representatives have been and will continue to advocate for domestic partner benefits in public and private settings,"" Mandel told The Lantern. ""Students want it, students deserve it and the university has a responsibility to provide it."" Despite his support for domestic partner benefits in 2000, Mandel nine years later voted against a bill to shield gay and transgender Ohioans from being discriminated against in housing and employment issues. House Bill 176 sought to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of classifications for which it is illegal to discriminate for housing, employment and public-accommodation purposes. The bill passed the Democrat-controlled House by a vote of 56-39, with five Republicans joining Democrats to support the measure. But the bill did not go anywhere in the Republican-controlled Senate. Mandel voted against the bill. He was not among a handful of Republicans to explain their vote on the House floor that day. Mandel’s campaign now says he was wrong in college. ""Josh has always opposed discrimination against any American citizen and has also always believed that marriage is between one man and one woman,"" his spokesman, Anthony Conchel, said in a statement. ""He also feels he was wrong in college about domestic partner benefits and feels strongly that they should never be funded with taxpayer dollars."" So where does that leave us? Strickland claimed Mandel reversed his stances on two social issues – abortion and gay rights. On the latter, Mandel’s legislative voting record and recent statements do not match up with his position in college, and the treasurer now says he was wrong in college. Mandel said he’s always held the same view on abortion rights, and Strickland cannot prove otherwise. So we have to conclude Strickland was wrong there. On the Truth-O-Meter, that two-part statement rates a ."
34228	"Foam ""Squishies"" toys have been determined to contain toxic materials and were recalled as a result."	We also contacted Health Canada and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission asking whether any investigations were underway in their respective countries regarding the toys but did not receive a response. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, which would typically assess possible consumer complaints of Squishies in the states, is currently closed as a result of the partial federal government shutdown that began in December 2018.	unproven	Politics	Social media users became alarmed in early January 2019 after a Facebook post linked a child’s illness to foam “Squishies” toys that had already been recalled in at least one country outside of the U.S. Elaine Lee said in her post that her 8-year-old daughter developed unusual symptoms after receiving several of the toys for Christmas: Within a day of acquiring them she started having nightmares and disrupted sleep. On the 4th day she started having what I believe were hallucinations or delusions. She became convinced the pictures of cats on her walls were watching her and believed the oscillating fan and dresser in her room were alive. She stared at me as I was sitting with her in her room and insisted my nose was moving around my face. She was very anxious and distressed, unable to fall asleep until she came to sleep in our room with us. Lee then cited a 20 June 2018 statement by the Ministry of Environment and Food in Denmark regarding an analysis performed by that country’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). According to the Danish EPA’s study, 12 out of the 12 toys they examined “contained high levels of harmful chemicals,” prompting Jakob Ellemann-Jensen, the country’s minister for environment and food, to say: Selling toys that may be harmful to children is completely unacceptable. The toy industry is responsible for ensuring that the products they sell are legal and do not contain harmful chemicals. In this case, we’re talking about serious violations, where children breathe in substances that may cause mucous membrane irritation and which may, in the long term, be harmful for fertility and cause liver damage. The Ministry of Environment and Food added that the toys would be withdrawn from the market: The twelve tested products will now be transferred to the Danish EPA Chemical Inspection Service who will ensure the withdrawal of the products from the market and ascertain whether there are grounds to report this to the police. In the case of gross violations, these can be reported to the police. The Danish EPA Chemical Inspection Service will now assess whether to do so. The study also drew international attention, with news outlets in Canada and Australia reporting on the issue. However, Ellemann-Jensen said in a parliamentary response published on 30 August 2018 that “no final conclusions have yet been reached” regarding the sale of the foam toys in Denmark, indicating that no recall effort had yet been implemented. “The question of whether the individual squishies products are illegal, thus depends on the progress of the further case processing in the Danish EPA,” he wrote. We contacted the ministry seeking clarification but have yet to hear back. Lee said that after removing the toys from her daughter’s room and “airing out the house,” her child began to feel better. But her story was concerning enough to readers that they shared it more than 204,000 times on social media.
9742	Psychedelics Promise a ‘Paradigm Shift’ in Treating Mental Illness	Psilocybe cubensis aka “magic mushrooms” Can psychedelic drugs such as psilocybin, the active ingredient in magic mushrooms, Ayahuasca, an Amazonian brew, or MDMA, the active ingredient in the party drug Ecstasy help people who are addicted, anxious or depressed? That’s the question increasingly asked by researchers who are testing these psychedelic drugs in small numbers of patients to see if they bring any relief. As the article nicely points out, mental health problems like addiction or depression are thought of as chronic, lifelong diseases, but what if that’s an ineffective approach for many people? What if anxious or depressed people were, instead, treated by a small number of episodes of profoundly perspective-altering drugs, which rewires one’s underlying personal philosophy and brings relief that way? Would this not represent a dramatic paradigm-crushing approach to treating mental illness? While the story raises these questions in an intriguing fashion, details on the research are fleeting and there’s not enough context to give readers a balanced view of the issues involved. As the story points out, early results suggest that these substances might be worth substantial increases in research in treating mental illnesses. But the current evidence base is characterized by tiny numbers of subjects and is almost anecdotal in nature, so a bit more caution about the likelihood of a “paradigm shift” in this area would have been welcome. Editor’s note: Two ratings in this review — see the “Independent Sources” and “Availability” criteria — have been changed from Not Satisfactory to Satisfactory and the star score has been changed from 2 to 3 stars. See the specific criteria, as well as the comments section, for an explanation of the changes. There are many people who have addictions, are uncontrollably anxious or suffer severe depression who are not well served by the current armamentarium of conventional prescription drugs and so increased research on a range of psychoactive substances derived from plants or fungi seem a promising area of research. Assurances that such research can be done in controlled, monitored situations by competent scientists may help revamp an area of drug therapy that was up to now written off as dangerous, addictive and generally pushed to the margins of society.	mixture	psychedelics	Not discussed at all. Presumably without patentable drugs derived from these substances, they could be very economical, yet we have no idea if the substances used in these experiments underwent substantial processing or packaging which, of course, would all affect cost. Unfortunately the details on the various studies cited are few and far between, though the links to the actual studies are helpful for those wishing to dig deeper. Because of the lack of quantification of benefits permeates the piece, it can only rate as Not Satisfactory. Obviously the harm potential of these drugs is probably what gave them a bad reputation in the first place–particularly in their potential for abuse–so it would have been useful to hear which adverse effects were experienced by these users in these small experiments. It was good that the story stipulated that the drugs were used under controlled and supervised conditions, and so the obvious question arises: is that how these drugs would be used in the wider population, and if not, would that not alter the harm/benefit potential of the drug? As we circle back to re-evaluating these drugs, focusing on one specific area (anxiety/depression), it seems a little too easy to forget they are powerful drugs that affect multiple chemical and who knows what other systems in the brain. Informed consent documents for future studies will be tricky. We learn that the studies were small, done under strictly controlled situations, and usually involved patients with specific conditions. But there’s no specific caution about the limitations of the existing research, or the fact that the “paradigm shift” suggested by the article might not pan out. And details about the studies are spotty. Some of the claims pertaining to ayahuasca, for example, seem to be based on an interview with an ethnobotanist book author whose evidence mainly consists of anecdotes such as: “One time I accompanied a friend who was addicted to antidepressants for 30 years down to Peru, and then he came out a free man and isn’t depressed anymore.” The story mainly argues for more research, a point that we can agree with, but overall it seems a bit unbalanced in favor of the possibilities without sufficient acknowledgment of the potential that the research might go nowhere. No obvious disease mongering. The only expert quoted is the author of the Canadian Medical Association Journal review article that seems to be the news hook for the story. It would have been interesting to hear a second opinion. Editor’s note: This review originally stated that that there was no independent source quoted, which is incorrect. The story quotes Dr. Charles Grob who was not involved with the review article that’s the launching point for the story. The rating has been changed to Satisfactory. There is also no information about the potential conflicts around such research, and even though such conflicts may be unlikely given the source of drugs studied, a sentence to confirm the independence of the research would have raised the credibility of the article. Although it mentions that mental health problems are often treated with drugs like serotonin-specific reuptake inhibitors, it doesn’t discuss how the psychedelic drugs compare to those drugs or each other, or other types of non-drug therapy. We’ll give the benefit of the doubt here, though we wished for more detail. Magic mushrooms and MDMA may be ‘available’ in our society, but hardly through channels that one would consider reliable or trustworthy. While we might want more details on how to obtain these substances, in the interests of public service, it may be just as well that the story didn’t delve into this issue too far. The story establishes that what is ‘novel’ here is the research, as we know many of these substances have been around for decades, or in the case of the Ayahuasca, probably thousands of years. There’s especially some novelty in studying the drugs’ usefulness in treating anxiety in terminal patients. But otherwise, the idea of quick fixes in the forms of pills containing psychoactive substances for these serious and chronic problems is not all that new. This shows no hallmarks of having been generated by, or dependent upon, a news release.
16115	More than 70 percent of American adults have committed a crime that could lead to imprisonment.	"Carter said that more than 70 percent of American adults have committed a crime that could lead to imprisonment. Based on a strictly technical reading of existing laws, the consensus among the legal experts we reached is that the number is reasonable. Way more than a majority of Americans have done something in their lives that runs afoul of some law that includes jail or prison time as a potential punishment. That said, experts acknowledged that the likelihood of arrest, prosecution or imprisonment is exceedingly low for many of Americans’ ""crimes.""."	true	Criminal Justice, PunditFact, Stephen Carter,	"Conventional wisdom would tell us that most normal folks will never have an interaction with police like the one Eric Garner had that ultimately led to his death. Yale Law School professor Stephen Carter warned that might not necessarily be the case. Citing the work of Rutgers University law scholar Douglas Husak, Carter wrote on Dec. 4 that ""70 percent of American adults have committed a crime that could lead to imprisonment."" Carter noted that’s in part because there are 300,000 or more federal regulations that may be enforceable through criminal punishment. It's as though, Carter said, lawmakers tack on imprisonment to give a law heft. To paraphrase the old line, we are not just a nation of laws, we are a nation overrun by laws. Carter suggests reigning things in. The fact that 70 percent of people have committed a jailable offense is part of Carter's evidence. We wanted to know if other legal experts thought it was correct. They do. Before we get to their reasons, let’s be clear about what Carter and Husak are saying. By the way, Husak told us that Carter quoted him accurately. For Husak, the question wasn’t whether any court would be likely to put someone behind bars for a particular offense, but whether the law gives them the power to do so. Husak said one need look no further than the laws on prescription drugs. If a doctor gave you a prescription for the common painkiller vicodin and your spouse brings it to you as you lie in bed, ""your spouse is dispensing a controlled substance without a license,"" Husak said. Would that ever be enforced? Not likely. But Husak said that is how the law is written. If that were not enough to get to 70 percent of adults, Husak factored in illicit drug use. According to a 2012 survey by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, over half of the people in every age group born after 1950 said they had used an illicit drug at some time in their lives, primarily marijuana or prescription drugs. That alone comes to about 84 million people, or 37 percent of all people over 20. While some legal experts we reached said they didn’t know how you could come up with an exact number, just about all said it would be no trouble to keep adding more. Sonja Starr at the University of Michigan Law School said many people drink and drive. ""The Centers for Disease Control found 112 million self-reported incidences of drunk driving,"" Starr said, with the caveat that some drivers would report multiple offences. ""And that’s just in a single year."" Starr said you could easily get to the 70 percent mark. By and large, Starr’s counterparts at other law schools agreed. Bennett Capers, professor of law, Brooklyn Law School ""This doesn't give me pause at all. There are thousands of criminal statutes on the books, criminalizing things that some of us do without thinking. This runs the gamut from the serious (in New Jersey, it is technically a crime to have sex without first receiving ""freely given affirmative permission to the specific act of sexual penetration"") to the routine (fudging tax returns) to the mundane (illegal downloads)."" David Gray, professor of law, University of Maryland School of Law ""70 percent seems low to me. Once you factor in illegal drug use, crimes of recklessness (which seldom are detected because no harm accrues), downloading, DUI, failures to report income, and the scores of relatively innocuous offenses that just happen to carry the possibility of jail time in some jurisdictions, I’d be surprised if the percentage wasn’t much higher than 70 percent over the course of most adults’ lifetimes."" Jeffrey Fagan, professor of law and public health, Columbia Law School Fagan said he didn’t know the right percentage, but he could believe the 70 percent figure. ""I’ve violated imprisonable offenses while fishing,"" Fagan said. Robert Weisberg, professor of law, Stanford Law School ""The number is unknowable, but it strikes me as plausible."" Laurie Levenson, professor of law at Loyola Law School Los Angeles ""It does seem to exaggerate the likely number of Americans who are at actual risk of prosecution and imprisonment,"" Levenson said. ""What we really need to pay attention to is the percent of Americans who commit crimes that are on the prosecutors' radar screens."" Levenson’s point gets at a key ambiguity in Carter’s statement. Much depends on the interpretation of ""could lead to imprisonment."" In his article, Carter made it clear he did not mean that imprisonment was in any way likely. His point was simply that too many laws carry too hefty a penalty and in theory, anyone could become ensnared. Our ruling Carter said that more than 70 percent of American adults have committed a crime that could lead to imprisonment. Based on a strictly technical reading of existing laws, the consensus among the legal experts we reached is that the number is reasonable. Way more than a majority of Americans have done something in their lives that runs afoul of some law that includes jail or prison time as a potential punishment. That said, experts acknowledged that the likelihood of arrest, prosecution or imprisonment is exceedingly low for many of Americans’ ""crimes."""
2575	"Wood stoves, extreme cold blight air at Alaska's ""North Pole""."	Santa may need more than Rudolph’s bright nose to get through the grimy North Pole atmosphere.	true	Environment	North Pole, Alaska - the Fairbanks suburb, not the spot at the top of the globe - has posted some of the nation’s worst air-quality readings in recent days, thanks to high levels of wood smoke streaming into stagnant cold air. Concentrations of particulates have made North Pole’s air “very unhealthy,” meaning children, the elderly and other vulnerable people should stay indoors and all residents should refrain from prolonged exercise, according to local government officials. The “very unhealthy” classification was given in the past few days. A search of airnow.gov - the government portal which monitors air quality - did not reveal any other U.S. community currently with such poor quality air. The problem stems from residents’ dependence on wood-burning stoves for heat in an extremely cold region prone to pollution-trapping temperature inversions, said officials with the Fairbanks North Star Borough, the regional government. “As long as it’s cold and the air is still, we have a particulate problem,” said Jim McCormick, a technician with the borough’s Air Quality Division. With temperatures in some spots below minus-30 degrees Fahrenheit (-34.4 C) and no relief forecast until next week, the air is expected to stay dirty, McCormick said. As of Friday, particulate pollution in North Pole was worse than in Beijing, which is notorious for chronic air pollution, a Fairbanks newspaper columnist reported, although Reuters was unable to verify the claim independently. Dermot Cole of the Fairbanks News-Miner said his research found only one city in the world, Guangzhou in southern China, with particulate readings that are currently worse than those in North Pole. Alaska’s pristine, mountainous landscapes suggest crystal clean air. But the city of Fairbanks also has had recent problems, with air quality classified by the borough on Friday as “unhealthy” - not as dire as in North Pole, but still triggering warnings against outdoor activities. The entire Fairbanks North Star Borough has been plagued for years with wintertime air pollution. It is consistently in violation of federal air-quality standards and is required under federal and state laws to come up with measures to clear the air, although they have proved elusive. A local program that allowed residents to swap out old wood stoves for more efficient models was halted by an anti-regulation initiative that borough voters passed in October. “That stopped it cold,” McCormick said.
10508	Erasing Age Lines: New Wrinkle in Anti-Aging Devices	Just as cosmetic treatments provide the appearance of youth, without actually offering any real health benefits, this story appears to be about a new laser device intended to reduce wrinkles, but it fails to provide viewers with meaningful information about the device or how it compares to alternative procedures. The fault is not entirely that of the reporters; the manufacturer put out a news release announcing FDA approval of the device, but then refused to give out any further details. Of course, the journalists could have decided not to do the story at all. Gertrude Stein said of Oakland, “when you get there, there isn’t any there there.” With its lack of useful information about the laser device, the same could be said of this story that isn’t a story.	false		This story barely meets the criterion. It discusses costs, and does a good job of emphasizing that most treatments that reduce the appearance of wrinkles have only temporary effects and need to be repeated indefinitely, often at great cost. However, it lacks specific figures about the cost of the new laser device. The story does emphasize that the effects of this device are much smaller than those of cosmetic treatments offered by dermatologists; but the magnitude of the difference is not defined. Also, this statement is made without reference to any evidence to support a conclusion about the relative effectiveness of the device compared to established procedures. The dermatologist quoted in the story says, “I think you’re looking at a device that’s going to only produce a single digit fraction of results as compared to what you can get in a dermatologist’s office.” The meaning of “a single digit fraction” is a mystery left unanswered in this story. The medical correspondent states the obvious by pointing out that a device used at home would be more convenient than going to a physician for treatment. Although the headline of this story is about a home laser device, there is almost no discussion of the device itself. A dermatologist warns against a tendency to “over-abuse and overuse,” but these terms are not defined. No evidence is discussed. Indeed, the manufacturer refused requests from other news organizations for details about the device, so there are no facts to report. What’s more, when discussing laser treatments done by a dermatologist, the correspondent relies on a single set of before-and-after photographs of a patient, without making reference to any controlled trials or other scientific evidence. The story repeatedly confuses wrinkles with aging. Wrinkles are not a disease. Treatments that reduce the appearance of wrinkles have no effect on the underlying process of aging… or of certain conditions that affect the appearance of the skin. A person who has wrinkles burned or scrubbed away or disguised by cosmetic treatments is no younger or healthier than someone who covers up the wrinkles with make-up. This story feeds misconceptions about health and aging. In an odd reversal of the usual pattern of stories that fail to meet this criterion, this report included only doctors who were independent of the company marketing this laser device. There was no interview or other information that came from anyone with first-hand knowledge of the device, how it was tested, or what results it has demonstrated in trials. Viewers were left to figure out on their own that the dermatologist interviewed for this story has a vested interest in persuading people to pay him or his colleagues for treatment, rather than trying an over-the-counter device. There were no quotes or statements from professional societies, public agencies, or others who could offer an independent overview of the pros and cons of the new device. Most of this report is about alternative procedures, so it would seem to meet this criterion. However, the lack of information about the new device makes any meaningful comparisons impossible. This one is a close call. The story does state that the device has received FDA approval, but is not yet available. However, the absence of any detail about device or the manufacturer leaves viewers in the dark. There are other devices available to consumers that use “light therapy” to affect the appearance of the skin. Since this story provided no information about the recently-approved device, it is impossible to tell whether or how it may be different from competing products. By looking at other sources, it does appear that this device is the first laser specifically approved for over-the-counter treatment of wrinkles; but this distinction is not clear from viewing the story. The story included an interview with a dermatologist and does not appear to rely only on a news release.
35888	Judge Amy Coney Barrett, U.S. President Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee, is a member of a Christian group that inspired Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel “The Handmaid’s Tale.”	"What's true: Amy Coney Barrett, U.S. President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, is affiliated with People of Praise, a charismatic Christian group. The group’s practices reportedly include calling female members' advisers “handmaids” and giving men authority over their families, both themes that are employed in ""The Handmaid's Tale."" What's false: Margaret Atwood, author of “The Handmaid’s Tale,” has not explicitly cited People of Praise as an inspiration for the book, though she has more than once cited a similar religious sect that calls female members “handmaids.” Despite contradictory statements from Atwood suggesting uncertainty on her part, we found no evidence that People of Praise, specifically, served as the inspiration for the book."	false	Politics	Following the death of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in September 2020, Judge Amy Coney Barrett was selected as U.S. President Donald Trump’s nominee to the court. But her religious affiliation with one Christian group was the subject of scrutiny and widespread rumors, because its treatment of women appeared to eerily mirror a few elements of Margaret Atwood’s dystopian novel “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Snopes readers shared memes and articles about Barrett with us and asked us to confirm her religious affiliation with People of Praise. Many queries were curious about whether this group served as the inspiration for the world of “The Handmaid’s Tale,” in which women’s rights are severely limited. Reports of Barrett’s membership in the group and its alleged role in inspiring Atwood’s book sparked outrage on social media. “Oh look, her fucking cult literally fucking inspired the Handmaids Tale,” one person tweeted. “Cool. This is cool.” However, we were unable to find examples of Atwood directly referencing People of Praise in her research for the book or in subsequent interviews, and she has said on more than one occasion that her inspiration came from press clippings about a “different but similar” group. In September 2017, The New York Times reported that Barrett — now a federal judge and academic — was part of the conservative Christian group People of Praise. According to the group’s website, the movement was involved in “the growth of charismatic renewal in the Catholic Church.” The charismatic movement includes Christians of many denominations — Barrett herself is a devout Catholic — and in the 1960s had adopted Pentecostal practices like speaking in tongues, belief in prophecy, and divine healing. Barrett’s father, Mike Coney, was also a coordinator for the group’s chapters. In 1981, the group established the Trinity Schools, a number of private Christian schools around the country. According to a disclosure Barrett filed as part of her nomination to the federal bench in 2017, she was a trustee of a Trinity School. The New York Times report also said that members of the group “swear a lifelong oath of loyalty, called a covenant, to one another,” and are accountable to a personal advisor, who is called a “head” if he’s a man, and “handmaid” if she’s a woman. Furthermore: “The group teaches that husbands are the heads of their wives and should take authority over the family. Current and former members say that the heads and handmaids give direction on important decisions, including whom to date or marry, where to live, whether to take a job or buy a home, and how to raise children.” The National Catholic Reporter, a liberal media organization, covered People of Praise and its alleged mistreatment of members in a 2018 report. But leaders from the group have defended the practice of getting advice from a “head” as a way of receiving spiritual direction from fellow members. Craig Lent, a leader and member of the movement, told the National Catholic Reporter: “‘It’s just somebody you can talk to in confidence,’ said Lent, explaining that when he was a young father, his ‘head’ gave him advice about matters as varied as raising kids and septic systems. He said he has not found the process to feel controlling.” Coral Anika Theill, a former member of the group, described her experiences in the 1970s and ’80s as “traumatizing,” while admitting that there were regional differences among the group’s practices. Adrian J. Reimers, a founding member of People of Praise who was forced out of the group for raising concerns about them for having too much control over their members’ lives, wrote a book about them in 2017. In it he described how a married woman in the group is “expected always to reflect the fact that she is under her husband’s authority.” Tim Kaiser, another former member who left as an 18-year-old in 1997, spoke to Newsweek about the group’s rule regarding women submitting to their husbands: “In the case of a woman, her ‘head’ is her husband — that’s who is in charge of her. That is the person who is supposed to be making all of her moral decisions and taking responsibility for the condition of her soul. It’s really creepy, but that’s the idea.” A parent handbook for the Trinity School where Barrett served as a trustee said marriage is “between a man and a woman” and “the only proper place for sexual activity is within these bounds of conjugal love.” These views are in keeping with mainstream Catholic teachings, however. Update: We should also note that these past reports do not fully represent the workings of the group today. Since we first published this story, an Oct. 7 Washington Post report revealed more details about Barrett’s role in People of Praise and their practices. In a statement to The Washington Post, People of Praise’s spokesperson, Sean Connolly, said that the group replaced the title of handmaids with “women leaders” back in 2017. He said in a 2018 statement that the title was dropped due to the recognition that its meaning had “shifted dramatically in our culture in recent years.” A 2010 directory from the group stated that Barrett had also held the title of “handmaid” and her mother had served the same role. Connolly maintained that the role of women leaders were to “help other women who are seeking advice and guidance.” We have reached out to Connolly to learn more about these reported practices. We also left messages with Judge Barrett’s chambers, and the University of Notre Dame Law School where she is a faculty member. We will update this post if we hear back. The second element of the claim focuses on whether this group did indeed serve as the inspiration for “The Handmaid’s Tale.” In the novel, a futuristic American society is ruled by a Christian fundamentalist government, and women are deprived of their rights, including reproductive rights. The fertile among them are assigned as “handmaids” to give birth to the children of a ruling class of men. Atwood herself did not explicitly reference People of Praise in past interviews discussing inspiration for the book, though she did make reference to an unnamed “Catholic charismatic spinoff sect” in a 1986 interview with The New York Times. I started noticing that a lot of the things I thought I was more or less making up were now happening, and indeed more of them have happened since the publication of the book. There is a sect now, a Catholic charismatic spinoff sect, which calls the women handmaids. They don’t go in for polygamy of this kind but they do threaten the handmaids according to the biblical verse I use in the book — sit down and shut up. A 2017 New Yorker profile described her research materials for the book. She clipped articles from newspapers about abortion and contraception being outlawed in Romania, the falling birth rate in Canada, and U.S. Republican attempts to withhold federal funding from abortion clinics. Also in the profile: “An Associated Press item reported on a Catholic congregation in New Jersey being taken over by a fundamentalist sect in which wives were called “handmaidens” — a word that Atwood had underlined.” According to Newsweek, this clipping referenced People of Hope, a sect based in Newark, New Jersey. But a 2017 report in the New Jersey Star-Ledger pointed out that the October 1985 Associated Press article didn’t come out until after Atwood’s book was published. Furthermore, based on the branches listed on their website, People of Praise does not have a presence in the state of New Jersey. “The Handmaid’s Tale” was printed in Canada in the fall of 1985. It is possible that Atwood pulled this clipping around the same time the book was being released, and included it in her research materials. Atwood herself offered slightly conflicting accounts. In a Sept. 23, 2020, interview with UC Santa Cruz, she said the group did not serve as an inspiration for the book: “It wasn’t them. It was a different one but the same idea,” she said. But in a statement to Politico, she said she was “unsure” whether People of Praise were among the inspirations for her book. At the time, she could not access her notes in the rare book library at the University of Toronto because of COVID-19 restrictions, and said, “Unless I can go back into the clippings file, I hesitate to say anything specific.” On Sept. 27, she tweeted a correction to someone claiming that People of Praise inspired her book title, saying “not that group.. a different but similar one”: Book of Genesis. Quoted at front of book. And no, not that group.. a different but similar one. :(
3407	Venice tide barriers pass another test but skeptics remain.	Floated along by barge , one of the 10-ton barriers designed to relieve Venice’s perennial flooding looks like a giant plaything: an oversized hinged yellow Lego.	true	AP Top News, Italy, International News, Floods, Tides, Technology, Science, Europe, General News	Central to the plan to protect the city, some or all of the 78 barriers will one day be raised when the sea rises more than 110 centimeters (43 inches), to prevent damaging high tides from pushing into the lagoon city, a world heritage site built picturesquely — but somewhat precariously — upon more than 120 islands. Concerns that high tides are becoming more frequent because of climate change have increased the urgency. While the concept is simple, its realization has been anything but. The system of movable underwater barriers, dubbed Moses, has been beset by corruption, cost overruns and delays. Projected at 1.8 billion euros ($2 billion) and meant to be completed by 2011, the project has so far cost 5.5 billion euros and is running a decade behind schedule. In the wake of last month’s flooding of Venice, the worst in 53 years, the consortium that oversees construction of Moses is eager to demonstrate that the project — after years of bad news — is on track and will be fully operational by the end of 2021. Venetians say they cannot afford to be wrong. Skeptics and critics say they may be. A recent test of the deepest expanse of barriers — at the Malamocco entrance to the lagoon — was declared a success by the New Venice Consortium. It was the last of the four sections of barriers to be completely raised — but so far only in calm seas. The real test will come when all four are raised at once, and not only in serene waters, but under flood conditions. That isn’t scheduled to take place until the end of next year. It took six years to test each of the four movable sea walls covering the three openings to the lagoon, partly because work was slowed by a 2014 corruption scandal that implicated the three main contractors and sent 35 people to jail. Work is continuing largely with the original subcontractors now contracting directly with the consortium, which itself has been placed under government control as a result of the scandal. The fact that the barriers have not yet been physically tested in rough seas is a concern to critics. Paolo Vielmo, an offshore marine engineer who has long criticized the project, said that tests carried out in a laboratory in the Netherlands in the 1990s indicated that the barriers, under certain conditions, would oscillate out of control — possibly even breaking apart. “Its behavior is not predictable,’’ Vielmo said. He said that the trials so far declared successful have been under only modest sea conditions that fail to represent anywhere near the threat of the phenomenon of extreme oscillation called subharmonic resonance. Vielmo and two other offshore engineers have compiled a report for the Codacons consumer and environment protection advocacy group, which is asking officials to run additional calculations to see if the project is indeed viable. And if it is not, Codacons says Moses should be stopped. “We don’t want to delay by one minute the possibility to make Moses operational. But we say we cannot make it operational until we are sure it will work,’’ said Franco Conte, president of Codacons in Venice. “Naturally, the Venetian community is exasperated and they say, ‘If we did 95%, let’s do 100% and see if that works.’ But that is unconscionable. If we don’t know if it works, we cannot experiment.” The barrier system is made up of giant flood gates, each 20 meters (66 feet) long. The gates are attached by hinges to giant cement blocks placed on the seabed along the three openings from the sea into the lagoon, Malamocco, Chioggia and the Lido. The gates can be lifted to create a temporary barrier in high tides. Once the water has receded, they can be lowered again — allowing shipping traffic to continue and for the tidal system to flush out the lagoon. The idea behind the project was to create a mobile system that would not impede views of the unique and protected landscape. But Moses has suffered criticism from the start that there were simpler, cheaper systems that could have been deployed. Venetians have been waiting since the record 1.94-meter (6.36-foot) flood of 1966 for a system to protect them from regular inundations. The flooding in November, the second-worst recorded, proved the urgency. In the 150 years that they have been recording the tide levels in Venice, two high tides above 1.5 meters have never been recorded in a year. In November, there were three in one week. Climate scientists note that exceptional tides — those over 1.4 meters — have become much more frequent in the past two decades, with more than half of all recorded occurring since 2000. “One has to realize the kind of existential question that that serious flooding has given rise to,” said Jane Da Mosto, an environmental scientist and executive director of the non-profit group We Are Here Venice, which is working to defend the city against myriad issues, including depopulation, cruise traffic through St. Mark’s basin and overtourism. “People are asking: will Venice be defendable against these kinds of episodes?’’ It’s not just the still-uncalculated damage to landmarks like St. Mark’s Basilica, where corrosive salt water creeps through porous brick and tile. It’s also the boxes of ruined belongings and piles of soaked mattresses discarded in alleyways and loaded onto motorboats and trash barges for disposal. The relentlessness of the Venetian fall and winter tides make one-third of ground floors uninhabitable in the historic canal city. “I am very old, I cannot say that I want to die, but I certainly do not want to be witness to the fact that it does not work,” 84-year-old resident Paola Scarpa said of the Moses barriers, as she walked to check on a family property in the Canareggio neighborhood on a recent December morning. “It would be a pain too great.” ___ Associated Press journalist Trisha Thomas contributed to this report.
31478	The April 2005 issue of Parents magazine displayed unfortunate cover placement.	An issue of 'Parents' magazine displaying unfortunate cover placement is just an illustrative mockup, not the real thing.	false	Risqué Business	Back in the days when I toiled at our local newspaper, I was part of the group responsible for the paper’s daily layout, which meant we were also tasked with catching and preventing typos, misprints, undesirable placement of advertising content, and other sorts of errors. Despite our diligent efforts, we’d occasionally make mistakes such as printing an advertisement for men’s shirts in which the typesetter had accidentally omitted the ‘r,’ placing a tobacco company ad adjacent to an article on the health risks of cigarette smoking, or running an ad for women’s clothing in the sports section. An image from March 2005 illustrates a similar type of unfortunate error that can easily be overlooked in the publishing business, one in which the placement of graphic elements in a composition creates an unintended element of its own. In this case (although many viewers don’t notice the effect until it’s pointed out to them), the photograph of the mother and the green teaser dot occlude just enough of the masthead on this Parents magazine cover to make it appear that the editorial focus of the publication is a portion of the male anatomy (i.e., the title reads as “Penis”): Although this image displays a gaffe one could easily imagine occurring, it doesn’t correspond to the real cover of the April 2005 issue of Parents magazine. A glimpse of what actually hit the newsstands that month reveals that its cover included some of the same graphic and text elements, but they were arranged in a substantially different way: The faux Parents cover was actually the work of Andrew Hearst, who published it on his Panopticist blog back in March 2005 as an example of what can happen when magazine titles are “partly blotted out by celebrity heads, torsos, hair, and other body parts”: In their quest for newsstand “pop,” many magazines design their covers in such a way that the logotype is almost an afterthought. Titles of magazines are often partly blotted out by celebrity heads, torsos, hair, and other body parts. This April 2005 cover of Parents magazine demonstrates the perils of this design technique. [Note that I never said this was the real cover.]
33494	"During a photo opportunity at a 1992 grocers' convention, President George Bush was ""amazed"" at encountering supermarket scanners for the first time."	Even if Bush had been in a grocery store or two since the advent of scanners, everybody knew he had “people” to do his shopping for him, and therefore it was easy to paint a picture of him as someone who no more knew how to handle the economy than he knew the price of a carton of milk or a loaf of bread. All that was needed was a hook to hang the picture on, and Bush’s encounter with a scanner at the National Grocers’ Convention provided it.	false	Politics, george h w bush	The ability of a single image to influence and shape history has long been a part of American politics. Even before there was a United States of America, Paul Revere’s masterful — and grossly inaccurate — engraving of the Boston Massacre helped solidify colonial support for a break with Great Britain. In more recent times, specific images from presidential campaigns have been deemed instrumental in deciding the outcomes of elections. Lyndon Johnson’s infamous 1964 “daisy” commercial, although aired only once, helped crystallize the image of Republican opponent Barry Goldwater as a dangerous, hot-headed militant. The sight of Edmund Muskie’s breaking down as he defended his wife’s honor outside the offices of Manchester Union Leader almost certainly cost him the 1972 Democratic nomination for president. And video footage of 1988 Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis’ attempting to show his support for the military by riding around in a tank while popping his head up and down in a “Snoopy-like” manner was the object of so much derision that opponent George Bush’s campaign incorporated it into an anti-Dukakis commercial. Images are easily manipulated, however, and President George H.W. Bush (father of President George W. Bush) found himself the victim of one during his failed re-election bid in 1992. The fun began during a primary season photo opportunity on 5 February, as President Bush dropped by a National Grocers Association convention in Orlando. One of the exhibits Bush visited was a demonstration of NCR’s checkout scanning technology, an event New York Times reporter Andrew Rosenthal turned into a chiding front page story about Bush’s lack of familiarity with the details of ordinary life in America: Today, for instance, [Bush] emerged from 11 years in Washington’s choicest executive mansions to confront the modern supermarket.Visiting the exhibition hall of the National Grocers Association convention here, Mr. Bush lingered at the mock-up of a checkout lane. He signed his name on an electronic pad used to detect check forgeries. “If some guy came in and spelled George Bush differently, could you catch it?” the President asked. “Yes,” he was told, and he shook his head in wonder. Then he grabbed a quart of milk, a light bulb and a bag of candy and ran them over an electronic scanner. The look of wonder flickered across his face again as he saw the item and price registered on the cash register screen. “This is for checking out?” asked Mr. Bush. “I just took a tour through the exhibits here,” he told the grocers later. “Amazed by some of the technology.” Marlin Fitzwater, the White House spokesman, assured reporters that he had seen the President in a grocery store. A year or so ago. In Kennebunkport. Some grocery stores began using electronic scanners as early as 1976, and the devices have been in general use in American supermarkets for a decade. Editorial writers were quick to seize on the notion that President Bush’s “amazement” demonstrated he had never seen a supermarket scanner before and criticized him for being out of touch with the daily concerns of ordinary Americans: [The Boston Globe, 1992] President Bush, according to reporters who followed him around Tuesday at the National Grocers Association convention in Orlando, Fla., had never before seen a supermarket cash register on which the name of the item and its price flashed on a screen when the item was dragged across an electronic scanner. The scanner was introduced at supermarket checkouts in 1980, the year Bush was elected vice president, and is just one of the many aspects of everyday life from which a president (or vice president) is shielded in the private life of public office. Like getting money out of a bank with an ATM card. Or going down to a local video store to rent a movie. Even trying to figure out how much four 29-cent stamps cost. With a Secret Service agent driving the car, there is probably no chance to play around with the station scanner on the car radio. And with a switchboard in the basement, there is certainly no need to figure out which long-distance telephone service to sign up with. And the operators handle any telemarketing calls. Somebody else handles the recycling – before 1980 that was called “taking out the trash” – and is responsible for separating the plastic bottles from the glass jars and taking the biodegradable grocery bags back to the supermarket. Maybe there will be time next year to try some of these things. After 12 years’ vacation from the real world, there will be a lot of catching up to do. [Lewis, 1992] When President Bush expressed amazement last week at a supermarket’s electronic checkout scanner, he was ribbed for being so out of touch with American life. Commentators went on to remark that high government officials as a group, with their chauffeured lives, are cushioned from reality. Fair enough. But the episode of the President and the unfamiliar supermarket suggests a broader point, a much more serious one. Upper-income Americans generally, whether in public or private employment, live not just a better life but one quite removed from that of ordinary families. They hardly experience the problems that weigh so heavily today on American society. And that fact has dangerous political consequences. Health care, for example. The possibility of serious illness without insured care is now said to be the number one worry of Americans: not just the 30 million without any health insurance but the many millions more who have inadequate coverage or who are afraid to change jobs lest they lose protection. President Bush does not have those concerns. He gets socialized medicine: care at public expense. Congressmen and other top officials may also be treated in government hospitals. Nor is health insurance likely to be a concern for private Americans with incomes in the top 20 percent. Comprehensive coverage goes with the territory for them. Then the details of the story started to dribble out. Andrew Rosenthal of The New York Times hadn’t even been present at the grocers’ convention. He based his article on a two-paragraph report filed by the lone pool newspaperman allowed to cover the event, Gregg McDonald of the Houston Chronicle, who merely wrote that Bush had a “look of wonder” on his face and didn’t find the event significant enough to mention in his own story. Moreover, Bush had good reason to express wonder: He wasn’t being shown then-standard scanner technology, but a new type of scanner that could weigh groceries and read mangled and torn bar codes. The New York Times then defended Rosenthal’s original article by reviewing videotape of the event and proclaiming that both ordinary and newfangled scanners had been demonstrated for President Bush, and that he was clearly “unfamiliar with” and “impressed” by the former: But a videotape of the encounter last Tuesday shows that Mr. Bush seemed unfamiliar with even basic scanner technology. Shown an ordinary scanner, he was clearly impressed.The incident occurred on a visit to the National Grocers Association conference in Orlando, Fla., last Tuesday. Robert Graham, an executive with the NCR Corporation, showed Mr. Bush a scanner and said: “Of course, this looks like a typical scanner you’d see in a grocery store.” “Yeah,” the President responded. “There’s one big difference,” Mr. Graham added, and lifted the plastic screen over the glass through which the codes are scanned to show that a grocery scale was built into the device. But Mr. Bush seemed more interested in the scanner. Pointing to the scanning window, he asked, “You cross this, this open place?” Mr. Graham nodded, so Mr. Bush passed a drink carton over the window and looked up when the price showed up on the cash register display. After that, Mr. Graham tried to show Mr. Bush the new scanner that can read mangled bar codes, but he had to wait because Mr. Bush was still trying the basic model. The President passed a bag of candy over the window and then pointed at the register, shaking his head with wonder when the price appeared with a beep. After that, Mr. Graham showed Mr. Bush the new scanner, and the President was also impressed with that. Later, Mr. Bush said he had been “amazed by some of the technology.” The New York Times seemed to be one the only major print medium to take this view of the event, however. Newsweek screened the same tape and reported: “Bush acts curious and polite, but hardly amazed.” Michael Duffy of Time magazine called the whole thing “completely insignificant as a news event. It was prosaic, polite talk, and Bush is expert at that. If anything, he was bored.” And Bob Graham of NCR, who demonstrated the scanner technology for President Bush, said, “It’s foolish to think the president doesn’t know anything about grocery stores. He knew exactly what I was talking about.” And no one heaping scorn on Bush seemed to consider that people typically react very differently when they get to try for themselves technology they have previously only passively experienced being handled by others, no matter how common it might be. A stethoscope is hardly a cutting edge medical tool, for example, but how many times have we seen non-doctors react with amazement when they put one in their own ears for the first time and a listen to a live human heartbeart? What it all came down to was that President Bush (whose popularity rating had been at a record high just a year earlier) became the scapegoat for an economic recession. Once the hoopla over the Persian Gulf War receded into the past and Americans once again turned their attention to more mundane matters (i.e., money), Bush’s public image shifted from “conquering hero” to “politician befuddled by economic matters.” He had told us that a recession wouldn’t happen, and now that it was here, all he had to say about it was that it would end soon.
3656	Bacteria-infected mosquitoes take bite out of deadly dengue.	They still bite, but new research shows lab-grown mosquitoes are fighting dangerous dengue fever that they normally would spread.	true	Brazil, Dengue fever, Australia, General News, Indonesia, Latin America, Africa, AP Top News, Science, Vietnam, Queensland, Asia Pacific	Dengue infections appear to be dropping fast in communities in Indonesia, Vietnam, Brazil and Australia that are buzzing with the specially bred mosquitoes, an international research team reported Thursday. It’s the first evidence from large-scale field trials that mosquitoes are less likely to spread dengue and similar viruses when they also carry a type of bacteria that’s common in insects and harmless to people. Rather than using pesticides to wipe out bugs, “this is really about transforming the mosquito,” said Cameron Simmons of the nonprofit World Mosquito Program that is conducting the research. The first hint of success came from Australia. Mosquitoes bred to carry Wolbachia bacteria were released in parts of North Queensland starting in 2011, and gradually spread through the local mosquito population. Dengue is transmitted when a mosquito bites someone who is infected, and then bites another person, but somehow Wolbachia blocks that — and local transmission has nearly disappeared in those North Queensland communities, Simmons said in an interview. The real test would come in dengue-plagued areas in Asia and Latin America that regularly experience outbreaks where millions get the painful and sometimes deadly disease. Thursday, Simmons’ team reported a 76% decline in dengue recorded by local authorities in an Indonesian community near the city of Yogyakarta since the 2016 release of Wolbachia-carrying mosquitoes. That’s compared to dengue transmission in a nearby area where regular mosquitoes do the biting. Researchers found a similar drop in a community near the southern Vietnamese city of Nha Trang. And preliminary results suggest large declines in dengue and a related virus, chikungunya, in a few neighborhoods in Brazil near Rio de Janeiro. The studies are continuing in those countries and others. But the findings, presented at a meeting of the American Society for Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, suggest it’s possible to turn at least some mosquitoes from a public health threat into nuisance biters. The work marks “exciting progress,” said Michigan State University professor Zhiyong Xi, who wasn’t involved with the project but has long studied how Wolbachia can turn mosquitoes against themselves. Reducing disease “is the ultimate success of our field,” added University of Maryland biologist Brian Lovett, who also wasn’t part of the project. More research is needed, specialists cautioned. These studies used local health groups’ counts of dengue cases rather than blood tests, noted Penn State University professor Elizabeth McGraw. And while Wolbachia has persisted in North Queensland mosquitoes for eight years and counting, whether mosquitoes maintain dengue resistance that long in harder-hit regions remains to be seen. “The results are pretty exciting — strong levels of reductions — but there clearly are going to be things to be learned from the areas where the reductions are not as great,” McGraw said. More than half of insect species, from fruit flies to butterflies, naturally are infected with Wolbachia — but not the main dengue-spreader, Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. They’re daytime biters that thrive in hot urban and suburban localities where, for now, widespread pesticide spraying is the main protection. Researchers with the World Mosquito Program first injected mosquito eggs with Wolbachia in a lab. Infected females then pass the bacteria on through their eggs. Releasing enough Wolbachia carriers, both the females that bite and the males that don’t, allows mating to spread the bacteria through a local mosquito population. The approach doesn’t reduce bites. Simmons said the up-front cost is cheaper than years of spraying and medical care. It’s just one of multiple novel mosquito-control methods under study: —Michigan State’s Xi uses Wolbachia in a different way — to eliminate mosquitoes. Release only male Wolbachia carriers and when they mate with uninfected females, the eggs don’t hatch. —Other researchers zap male mosquitoes with a small dose of radiation, sterilizing them before releasing them into the wild. —Genetically modifying mosquitoes is another approach. Furthest in development is Britain’s Oxitec, which gives male mosquitoes a gene to weaken their offspring so they don’t survive to adulthood. Each approach has pros and cons, but “our best hope to control the mosquitoes that make us sick is to box them in with multiple technologies,” said Maryland’s Lovett. ___ 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.
29458	Dandelion root can kill 98 percent of cancer cells in 48 hours.	"What's true: Anecdotal evidence suggests dandelion root may contain ""anti-cancer properties"" and has prompted some study into the subject. What's false: No firm scientific or medical evidence supports dandelion root as an effective treatment for cancer."	false	Medical, alternative medicine, cancer, cancer conspiracy	On 21 September 2016, the Health Eternally web site published an article headlined “Scientists Find Root That Kills 98% of Cancer Cells in Only 48 Hours,” proclaiming that: According to Dr. Carolyn Hamm from the Windsor Regional Cancer Centre in Ontario, Canada, dandelion root extract was the only thing that helped with chronic myelomonocytic leukemia. This form of cancer typically affects older adults. John Di Carlo, who at the time was a 72-year old cancer patient at the hospital, was sent home to live out his final days after all efforts failed to treat his leukemia. He told CBC News that he was advised to drink dandelion root tea as a last ditch effort. Perhaps it should have been the first option offered in his treatment plan, as his cancer went into remission only four months later! His doctors attributed this to the dandelion tea that he drank. Recent studies have shown that dandelion root extract can work very quickly on cancer cells, as was evidenced in Di Carlo’s case. Within 48 hours of coming into contact with the extract, cancerous cells begin to disintegrate. The body happily replaces these with healthy new cells. No particular research of the type touted by the headline was referenced in the Health Eternally article, and although its wording suggested that the cited case and purported findings were recent, the article’s text linked only to a single CBC news report published back in February 2012. That CBC reporting indicated only that researchers “hoped to test” dandelion root’s potential as a treatment for one specific type of cancer, not that dandelion root had actually been established as an effective cancer cure: Researchers hope to test dandelion tea on patients at a Windsor, Ont., clinic after it was found the roots of the weed killed cancer cells in the laboratory. The promising research is being led by a University of Windsor oncologist, in association with the Windsor Regional Cancer Centre. Dr. Caroline Hamm said dandelion root extract is unique, and is one of the only things found to help with chronic myelomonocytic leukemia. The roots of the common dandelion were ground up and made into tea. According to researchers, early results show that the tea kills cancer cells in the lab. Interest in dandelion root as a cancer-fighting substance was not new in September 2016, as the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center has (among others) been looking at the plant since at least 2010. Sloan-Kettering’s web site currently indicates that as yet no data support the claim of dandelion root as an effective cancer preventive or treatment: Dandelion has not been shown to treat or prevent cancer. Dandelion is used in traditional medicine to treat many ailments. Laboratory studies have shown that dandelion can kill certain bacteria and other microbes. It was also found to have anticancer properties in colon cancer, pancreatic cancer, leukemia, and melanoma cells, but studies have not been conducted in humans. Dandelion has estrogenic activity. It may increase the growth of hormone-sensitive cancer cells. Dandelion can also promote urination. Laboratory studies have shown dandelion to have anticancer properties, but clinical studies have not shown this effect in humans. As for the “cured” patient and the promise of dandelion root trials referenced in the February 2012 CBC report, a December 2015 update indicated that study was set to commence shortly (and as such, had not yet yielded results): Dr. Caroline Hamm, a medical oncologist at the Windsor Cancer Centre in Windsor, Ont. who is leading the study [says] she’s seen improvements in some patients who drink dandelion root tea purchased at health food stores, “Most of the responses that I have seen are very short. but there’s a signal there that I think is worthwhile of further investigation,” she said. Hamm expects the trials to start within the next month. We were not able to locate any published research indicating dandelion root affirmatively demonstrated an anti-cancer effect in humans, much less any information from scientists suggesting it kills “98 percent of cancer cells within 48 hours.” As with most bombastic cancer cure claims, the danger is not so much that people will attempt to use inexpensive and fairly harmless dandelion as a supplemental treatment while adhering to accepted protocols, but that patients averse to standard cancer treatments might opt for unproven “cures” in lieu of science-based therapies (allowing the disease to progress dangerously in the interim). It’s also possible that the patient who supposedly saw his leukemia go into remission due to his drinking of dandelion tea simply experienced a phenomenon commonly known as spontaneous remission (or regression), a rare but long-documented outcome wherein cancer resolves on its own. Hard data about its likelihood of occurrence are scant because cancer is infrequently left untreated.
8937	Scientists report CRISPR restores effectiveness of lung cancer treatment	This news release reports on preliminary research that suggested the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing system might be capable of knocking out a gene that helps lung cancer tumors develop resistance to chemotherapy drugs. The study was published in Molecular Therapy Oncolytics. The news release mentions alternatives and doesn’t misrepresent the novelty of this approach, but it doesn’t address costs, give actual data on the observed results, or caution about the many hurdles of translating observations made in tissue samples and mice to human bodies. We also wish the headline hadn’t overreached. Chemotherapy is a mainstay of treatment for advanced lung cancer, but its effectiveness is stunted because some tumors are either intrinsically resistant to it or develop resistance over time. Eliminating such resistance could extend patients’ lives and reduce the doses of chemo needed to kill tumors, sparing patients from toxicity and leading to a better quality of life.	mixture	Christiana Care Health System,CRISPR,lung cancer	The news release mentioned this as a potential “affordable” way of making lung cancer treatment more effective, and that it can “hopefully help contain costs” and provide reliability that “increases the chance that insurance companies will provide coverage.” However, it doesn’t mention the cost of either gene editing or chemo. The release is unable to claim a benefit in humans since the study was done in cell cultures and mice models and findings in the lab don’t always translate to similar outcomes in humans. But even in describing the benefits in animal models and cell culture, the release fell short. It says, “tumor growth stopped and there was a dramatic decrease in the volume of existing tumors when chemotherapy was combined with CRIPSP-Cas9, which was used to disable a tumor gene known as NRF2.” But there’s no data to give readers a sense of the scope of this potential benefit, such as how much the volume decreased, for what period of time, and in what percentage of the tested samples. The news release doesn’t talk about specific harms but it does note that “the CRISPR application being developed for lung cancer does not involve directly editing a patient’s genome — only the genes in the tumor.” The release calls this application a “relatively conservative” use of CRISPR and that it might “provide a level of safety and reliability that is reassuring for patients.” The release would have been better had it explained that there’s potential for viral vectors that are used to carry genes into the body to infect healthy cells as well as cancer cells; the study cites a need for “more effective delivery methods of these genetic tools to lung tissue” that would eliminate the potential for disrupting normal cells. It would have been helpful to note why this is important: a germ line can be passed on to children while somatic mutations generally can not be passed on. In the second paragraph the news release explains that this tumor shrinkage was observed “in both tissue culture and in a mouse.” We think that should have come with a strong caution that results observed in tissue samples and mice are seldom sustained in human testing. For example, the researchers cite the lack of a safe and effective delivery system for these genetic tools into lung tissue (see harms). It would have been better to stress in the release that this study was a “proof of concept” which would need to be transitioned into human subjects. The news release also doesn’t tell us much else about how these studies were performed — in how many mice and tissue samples, for example. According to the study, a reduction in tumor growth was observed in an immunocompromised mouse for 16 days. There’s no disease-mongering. The release says lung cancer is “the leading cause of cancer death in the United States.” The news release could have helped readers by explaining how many patients are in a position to possibly benefit — that is, how many patients have cancer that is resistant to chemotherapy drugs or how many develop resistance after being exposed to the drugs — as well as whether this would apply to non-small cell or small-cell lung cancer, or both. The funders (NIH and State of Delaware) are noted on a sidebar on the EurekAlert! site which hosts the release. We encourage news release authors to include funding sources in the body of the release as well. The authors did not report any conflicts of interest. The news release mentions “many efforts under way to modify CRISPR so that it can be used to not only remove or ‘knock out’ a section DNA, but also to replace or ‘knock in’ a new strand of code.” It’s also worth noting that there have been theories about “re-sensitizing” tumors to treatment that have not been successful, usually having to do with the sequence of drugs given after the first line. The news release makes it clear that this is not yet a treatment option. The lead researcher calls the study “an exciting step in the journey of exploring the health benefits of gene editing” and says it is focused on a technique of cutting out the resistance gene using CRISPR. This would be a novel approach and a novel use of CRISPR. In the study, the authors say that to their knowledge, “we are the first to generate” cells that are deficient in a gene NRF2, which helps promotes chemotherapy resistance in lung tumors. The news release uses cautious language. However, the headline overreaches in declaring that “CRISPR restores effectiveness of lung cancer treatment.”
26327	"Jerome R. Corsi Says Dr. Anthony Fauci's name appears on ""4 U.S. patents for a key glycoprotein” used to “create the current COVID-19 epidemic.”"	Jerome Corsi, a conservative author and conspiracy theorist, wrote on his blog that Dr. Anthony Fauci’s name appears on four patents for a protein linked to the novel coronavirus. Three of the patents Corsi cited are active. They deal with a potential treatment for HIV and are owned by the Department of Health and Human Services. There is no credible evidence that COVID-19 is related to HIV or was created in a lab. The coronavirus’ genetic makeup precludes the possibility that it was man-made.	false	Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Jerome R. Corsi,	"A conservative author who previously promoted the Obama birth certificate conspiracy is now publishing claims about Dr. Anthony Fauci’s connection to the coronavirus pandemic. An April 28 article published on Jerome Corsi’s blog alleges that Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, owns some intellectual property tied to the novel coronavirus. It also floats the debunked idea that the virus was ""laboratory-created, possibly as a bioweapon."" ""Why does Dr. Anthony Fauci’s name appear on 4 U.S. patents for a key glycoprotein that appears to have been inserted into a SARS virus chassis to create the current COVID-19 epidemic?"" Corsi wrote. The article was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) (Screenshot from Corsi Nation) Corsi is a conservative author and conspiracy theorist. He has made baseless allegations about former President Barack Obama’s birth certificate and spread misinformation related to QAnon, a broad right-wing conspiracy theory. As a friend of Roger Stone, a former campaign adviser to President Donald Trump, Corsi was part of former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into 2016 election meddling. Since the pandemic began, we’ve fact-checked several claims about Fauci’s connection to the coronavirus. Corsi’s article is similar to a claim made in ""Plandemic,"" a viral documentary that makes a slew of wrong allegations about Fauci, vaccines and COVID-19. So we wanted to look into this article, too. Corsi uses a discredited research article to draw an unwarranted connection between a patent family for a potential HIV treatment and the novel coronavirus. His article feeds into the debunked conspiracy theory that the virus was created in a lab. Corsi lists four patents in his article. They all have to do with a potential HIV treatment patented by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The patents, three of which are active, all deal with a potential method for preventing HIV infection. That method includes ""a therapeutically effective amount of an agent that interferes with the interaction of gpl20 and α4 integrin ... thereby treating the HIV infection."" In plain English: the potential treatment aims to impede a chemical interaction between HIV and human cells that can lead to transmission of the virus. It was based on a 2008 study conducted by NIAID scientists. Fauci is listed as an inventor on the patents alongside a few other authors of the 2008 study. But the assignee — the entity that owns the patents — is HHS. We reached out to the NIAID for more context, but we haven’t heard back. Corsi is using a withdrawn article and a debunked conspiracy theory to link the HHS patents to the coronavirus pandemic. In his article, Corsi mentions a Jan. 31 piece published by a group of Indian scientists on bioRxiv, a repository of preprint research papers. The article — which was not peer-reviewed and was later withdrawn — found a connection between a protein present in HIV and the novel coronavirus. The authors wrote that ""amino acid residues"" in the coronavirus were similar to gpl20, the HIV protein that NIAID scientists studied in 2008. The protein is mentioned in the HHS patents. But the authors withdrew their findings after other scientists criticized them as circumstantial and adding fuel to an unfounded conspiracy theory that the novel coronavirus was created in a lab. A Nature article published March 17 says the genetic makeup of the coronavirus, documented by researchers from several public health organizations, does not indicate it was altered. Instead, scientists have two plausible explanations for the origin of the virus: natural selection in an animal host, or natural selection in humans after the virus jumped from animals. ""Our analyses clearly show that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus,"" the article reads. We contacted Corsi by email but haven’t gotten a response. Corsi’s article claims that Fauci’s name appears on four patents for a protein that was used to create the novel coronavirus. That’s wrong. Three of the patents that Corsi identified are active and owned by the Department of Health and Human Services. But they are unrelated to the coronavirus pandemic. They deal with a potential treatment for HIV that NIAID researchers studied in 2008. Fauci is listed as an author on that study and as one of the inventors on the patents. There is no credible evidence that COVID-19 is related to HIV or was created in a lab. The coronavirus’ genetic makeup precludes the possibility that it was man-made. And Fauci is helping lead the U.S. response to the pandemic. The article is inaccurate."
34189	A man collapsed into a coma for three days after discovering his wife owned the property they had been renting for 10 years.	In sum, we find the story improbable and redolent of an urban legend that was going around years before it became a meme, but insufficient evidence exists to definitively rule it true or false.	unproven	Junk News	In late December 2017, posts appeared on social media reporting that a man had fallen into a three-day coma after discovering that his wife owned the house they had been renting together for 10 years. Most included an image purporting to be a screen capture of a story on CNN headlined, “Man Wakes Up From 3Day Comma [sic].” One of the earliest instances we found on Twitter was dated 31 December 2017 and included text written in Swahili: Man wakes up from a 3 day coma that he suddenly went into after realizing the house they’ve been renting for 10 yrs is owned by his wife. She’s been his Landlady without his knowledge 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂 pic.twitter.com/pXJCU6XSX0 — Hashi, MD (@SomPundit) December 31, 2017 Someone loosely translated part of the text into English, and the resulting meme has been circulating ever since, appearing in tweets as recently as June 2019: Wait what? pic.twitter.com/G2yPSh6bMw — Give Me Internet (@GiveMeInternet) June 17, 2019 These posts were widely shared and discussed thanks to their comedic value (people never seem to tire of “battle of the sexes” tales), but some commenters questioned the story’s veracity, and we received requests from readers to authenticate it. Starting with the most prominent feature of the meme, the CNN image is clearly fake. It’s beyond improbable that a major news outlet would run such a story “live” and label it “breaking news,” as was done in the image. It’s equally improbable that they would run a segment with such an obvious chyron error: the misspelling of “coma” as “comma.” We found no evidence that CNN or any other legitimate news organization ever covered this story. We did find, interestingly enough, that it was covered (in a sense) on a South African junk news website, ABCNews.co.za, in 2018 (roughly nine months after it first took off on social media). But although it was illustrated with the fake CNN graphic, the article repeated a similar-but-different tale (no coma here) that had been making the social media rounds since mid-2016, with at least one variant dating back to 2011: A Man rented a house and moved in with his family, After 2 years the rent was increased, he did not complain because he liked the house and environment. After another 2 years, typical of landlord in Lagos, the rent was again increased and the man could not come up with the money. Pressure from the agent made him miserable and that point the wife offered to help, she decided to go borrow and the husband agreed to pay later. He was happy thanking God for the life of his wife. Another 2 years, Another increase on rent, he was so upset that he decided to meet with the landlord for dialogue but the agent prevented him. After doing underground Investigation to uncover who the landlord was, the revelation shocked him: He REALIZED HE HAS BEEN A TENANT IN A HOUSE BUILT AND OWNED BY HIS WIFE. What would you do ? We weren’t surprised, once we traced the photograph of the gentlemen in the hospital bed to its origin, to find that it has nothing to do with a man recovering from a coma. The subject is actually Cecil Williams, a blind New Yorker who narrowly escaped death after falling off a subway platform in 2013 thanks to his service dog, who alerted bystanders to his plight. Williams’ injuries weren’t serious, nor was he at any point in a coma. We also discovered via a reverse-image search that this wasn’t the only time Williams’ photo was re-used under false pretenses. For example, it was co-opted for another junk news story about a man recovering from a coma in 2015. World News Daily Report (WNDR), a humor website that describes its content as “satirical” and “fictional,” published an article reporting that a man woke up from a six-day coma speaking only ancient Hebrew: As we noted above, anecdotal reports of a man finding out that his wife owns the house they’ve been renting were making the rounds in Africa years before a variant emerged claiming that the discovery caused the man to collapse into a coma. A possible point of origin for that variant was this late-December 2017 post by Twitter user @PabloHoggs: My uncle has been in a coma for the past two days after realizing the house he had been paying rent for the past 10 years was owned by his wife — Pablo Martini (@PabloHoggs) December 29, 2017 The tweet received a lot of attention, garnering thousands of likes and re-tweets, and may well have inspired the creation of the CNN meme. We contacted @PabloHoggs and asked him a few questions via direct message in hopes of establishing whether the story had any basis in fact. Unfortunately, we know little more now than we did before we conversed with him. He did insist that the tweet was true. “Yes, he later discovered the house he’s been paying rent for is owned by his legally married wife,” he wrote. “The wife and my uncle [have] parted ways and he’s doing well now.” He also answered affirmatively when we asked whether his uncle was entirely unconscious for three full days, but when we asked if a doctor had actually diagnosed him as comatose, @PabloHoggs said he didn’t know. He then asked us if he would be rewarded for the information he was providing, and when we said no he cut off the interview (such as it was). The most important thing we learned is that he didn’t know if his uncle was clinically diagnosed with a coma. Taking the story at face value, it appears that his uncle may have suffered extreme emotional distress upon learning he had been paying rent to his own wife for years and was bedridden for three days in a condition his relatives described as a “coma.” Perhaps something like this happened, but he wasn’t literally comatose. Emotional trauma isn’t normally listed among the causes of a coma, which is defined as a state of prolonged unconsciousness that can result from a brain injury, seizures, diabetes, a drug overdose, or other physical cause. We did find mentions in the medical literature of a psychological condition known as “psychogenic coma” (or “psychogenic unresponsiveness”) — described as a dissociative disorder with coma-like symptoms. But although case studies suggest that severe emotional trauma may be a contributing factor in such a condition, we came across no examples of a subject falling into a prolonged state of unconsciousness due to an instance of spousal deceit.
10518	Aggressive Treatment May Be Beneficial for Early Prostate Cancer	As with the NPR and AP stories we also reviewed, this story helped frame this issue in the first few lines rather than burying it at the end as so often is the case. To have an expert not involved in study quoted in the second paragraph saying “findings are not likely to be practice-changing” provides readers with balanced perspective right from the start. It was also good that the story concluded with a quote that expanded on what it means to “individualize” treatment. Unlike the concluding quote in the NPR story, this one provided language suggestive of shared decision making by adding ‘in relation to the risk stratification of disease, PATIENT DESIRES, health status, and RISK TOLERANCE”. (emphasis added) Good way to end the story. Decisions about what, if anything, to do when facing a diagnosis of early stage prostate cancer is difficult and this story provided readers with useful information to consider.	true	Cancer,HealthDay	There was no discussion of costs. Costs would include treating the double digit rates of incontinence and erectile dysfunction in these younger men who do have surgery. The surgery may help them live longer, but many, especially since younger at time of surgery, live decades with these potential harms and folllowup costs of the surgical choice. This should get at least a line in such stories. While describing some of the differences observed in general terms without quantification, the story provided absolute percentage of men dying from prostate cancer in the two study groups. The story then went on to explain that the difference was in the men who were less 65 years of age at the time of diagnosis. The story would have been better if it had more clearly explained this important caveat about the benefit seen. The potential harms associated with various approaches to treating prostate cancer as well as the increased risk of prostate cancer progression and death seen in the cohort of men who followed the watchful waiting approach were discussed. The story did a laudable job of providing information about the study reported on including the fact that the results most recently published basically expand the timeframe of followup on these men which have previously been published. It provided insight about the number of men involved in the study, how their prostate cancer was detected and that the men had been randomly assigned to their treatment group. The story did not engage in overt disease mongering. Two clinicians who were not involved in the study provided quotes which were used in the story. The story included a list of the commonly available treatment options for early stage prostate cancer. But we must give an unsatisfactory score because the story included a factually incorrect statement indicating that watchful waiting is synonymous with active surveillance. It is not. The story went on to misinform readers by indicating “watchful waiting is often recommended when a man is not expected to die of the cancer” by failing to complete the thought by explaining that the reason they are not expected to die of the cancer is because their advanced age makes it unlikely that the cancer will have sufficient time to progress to lethality OR because they have other diseases from which they are likely to succumb before there is time for the prostate cancer to be deadly. An important caveat about how the prostate cancer in the study differed from the way in which prostate cancer is most commonly detected today in the US was explained. The story provided a reasonable view of the novelty of the treatment options detailed in the study along with the critically important caveat that the majority of the men in the study had their prostate cancer first detected at a later state than is seen with the current screening practices in the US. The story did not rely on a news release.
34398	Ariana Grande contacted the families of those who died in the Manchester Arena attack, and will pay for their funerals.	Although it’s not implausible that a celebrity would do such a thing, the claim that Ariana Grande offered to pay for the bombing victims’ funerals is based on a tweet that did not cite any sources and was posted from an unofficial Twitter fan account with a record of posting unconfirmed and false rumors surrounding the Manchester Arena attack. We could not find any news reports that cited a second source for the claim. It should therefore be viewed with extreme skepticism.	unproven	Entertainment, ariana grande, manchester bombing	On 24 May 2017, the @ArianaDailyWW Twitter account (also known as Ariana Updates!) posted the claim that the singer had contacted the families of those who died in a bomb attack at her 22 May concert in Manchester, England, and offered to pay for the victims’ funerals. As of 23 May 2017, authorities had confirmed 22 fatalities in the suicide bomb attack at the Manchester Arena. News on Ariana: Ariana has reached out to the families who’s [sic] loves ones died last night….she is gonna pay for the funerals! News on Ariana: Ariana has reached out to the families who’s loves ones died last night….she is gonna pay for the funerals! pic.twitter.com/lmGHt4GbEg — Ariana Updates! (@ArianaDailyWW) May 23, 2017 Later that day, the tweet formed the basis of several articles in the British press, including in the Daily Mail, Daily Mirror, the Independent, Daily Express, and the Daily Record in Scotland. The Sun newspaper also published an article saying “Ariana Grande fans claim ‘broken’ star is going to ‘pay for the funerals’ of those who lost their lives in Manchester terror attack.” However, this article was later removed from the Sun’s web site. Later in the day, the celebrity gossip website PerezHilton.com also published an article based on the tweet, adding: What an incredible gesture. Although Ari’s team has yet to confirm the report, we bet the 23-year-old actually made this offer. The tweet also formed the basis of reports by Business Insider and the music and entertainment website Vibe. We contacted Ariana Grande’s spokesperson, but did not receive a response to our queries. So the claim could not be definitively confirmed. However, it’s worth noting that the source of the claim was a fan page that is not affiliated with the artist or her management in any way. The claim was not made via the Twitter account of Ariana Grande herself, her official news account, or her management team. Furthermore, @ArianaDailyWW has a record of posting claims and rumors, some of which later turn out not to be true. Just a few hours before “announcing” the singer’s offer to pay for the victims’ funerals, the account tweeted this “rumor”: RUMOR: Ariana is in the Hospital for Mental Health Issues (We are not trying to spread any false news…this is a rumor..)#DWTManchaster pic.twitter.com/2CSyq6nDCH — Ariana Updates! (@ArianaDailyWW) May 23, 2017 A few hours before that, Ariana Updates! tweeted that it had deleted a previous claim after finding out it was unconfirmed. We don’t know what that claim was. We deleted our last tweet about Ariana because we just found out that it’s not confirmed so please forgive us! — Ariana Updates! (@ArianaDailyWW) May 23, 2017 And on 22 May, the account tweeted that a “second bomb” had been found at the Manchester Arena. This too was false, although police did conduct a precautionary controlled explosion on what turned out to be abandoned clothing: BREAKING NEWS: second bomb has been found around the arena… pic.twitter.com/1glaKwC4YL — Ariana Updates! (@ArianaDailyWW) May 23, 2017
2419	Amid holiday canned-food drives, U.S. food banks take up farming.	Surrounded by rows of kale and collard greens, Bill Shick ticks off statistics about yields and the man-hours it takes to harvest the leafy green vegetables.	true	Health News	What he can’t tell you is what he would sell it for - because it will all be given away by the Chester County Food Bank in its efforts to grow food for the needy. The fresh produce program gives low-sodium, low-sugar foods to the poorest Americans year-round, including during the holiday season often associated with canned-food drives. “We picked a thousand pounds this weekend and we’ll do another thousand next week,” Shick, the food bank’s agricultural director said, while standing in a greenhouse where the program grows seedlings in a suburban Philadelphia park. Chester County is among about 20 food banks across the country that have started their own farms to boost healthier eating by the needy, said Domenic Vitiello, a University of Pennsylvania professor who has studied food pantry agricultural operations. Low-income Americans are a demographic often plagued by diet-related ailments such as diabetes and heart disease. Chester County Food Bank opened about five years ago, springing from the ashes of a similar program that relied on nearby Amish farmers. It was started explicitly with the goal of distributing food straight from the field. Canned food that is often donated to food banks because of its long shelf life is typically higher in sodium, which the American Heart Association says may increase risk for heart failure. People with diabetes also are encouraged to limit the sodium in their daily diet to 1,500 mg to help prevent or control high blood pressure, according to Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “The cans we’ve gotten in through the years - it’s not the healthiest stuff,” said Larry Welsch, Chester County Food Bank’s executive director. “I’ve gotten cans of pickled cactus with 2,800 (milli) grams of sodium.” “When we formed this food bank,” Welsch said, “it wasn’t going to be cans in, cans out.” The farming effort has offered the public new ways to contribute to the food pantry. “People are very excited to volunteer in the field,” Shick said. “It isn’t stuffing envelopes and putting cans in a box.” In three growing houses in Chester County’s Springton Manor Farm park, the food bank cultivates seedlings for its partners, including private farmers and corporations such as Endo Health Solutions and Malvern, Pennsylvania-based Vanguard Group. Some schools use the seedlings to grow vegetables for student lunches, others raise their own crops in horticulture and culinary programs, and donate to the food bank what they do not use. The charity grows food on more than a dozen acres spread across multiple sites. To supplement its crop yield, the food bank buys from a farm auction in nearby Lancaster County. Fresh produce makes up about 22 percent of the edibles the Chester County Food Bank distributes. It ranks sixth-highest in the nation for the amount of fresh produce it distributes as a percentage of all the food it gives out, according to statistics compiled by a University of Pennsylvania researcher. Growing produce allows food banks to distribute a wider variety, including leafy greens, Shick said. But it also means footing the expense of buying commercial refrigerators and refrigerated trucks, said Ross Fraser, a spokesman for the nonprofit Feeding America. Those costly hurdles have slowed the transition of food cupboards away from canned goods able to last for months in church basements and toward often more nutritious, but perishable food. Nationwide, most food bank agricultural programs are still in the experimental stages, but they share some characteristics, Vitiello said. They are usually located in wealthier areas because of the start-up expense, and they tend to have educational components that can be just as important as feeding people. Chester County is Pennsylvania’s wealthiest, with an economy buoyed by the pharmaceutical industry. But it also has pockets of poverty, particularly in the Kennett Square area, where there are numerous migrant farm workers who pick mushrooms; and Coatesville, a city whose fortunes have declined as a local steel mill closed and then re-opened with fewer jobs. Food bank farming programs have important roles to play in educating people to cook and use healthier food, Vitiello said. “When these programs are training low-income people in learning how to produce their own food, they’re playing a different role in the food system and promoting food justice,” Vitiello said.
1753	Reggae icon Bob Marley's family to lend name to cannabis brand.	The family of Reggae icon Bob Marley and a Seattle-based private equity firm on Tuesday said they are launching the first global cannabis brand with marijuana products sold under a name long tied to a plant he lovingly called “the herb”.	true	Health News	The brand, dubbed Marley Natural, marks the first time the family’s name would adorn packages of cannabis products ranging from strains similar to those Bob might have smoked in his homeland Jamaica to concentrates, oils and infused lotions sold in countries and U.S. states that have taken steps to decriminalize and legalize pot use and sales. Marley, credited with helping to spread Jamaican music to a world-wide audience with hits like “No Woman, No Cry”, and “I Shot the Sheriff,” died of cancer in 1981 at the age of 36. “He viewed the herb as something spiritual that could awaken our well-being, deepen our reflection, connect us to nature and liberate our creativity,” Cedella Marley, Bob’s daughter, said in a statement announcing the deal. The agreement came weeks after two U.S. states voted to legalize marijuana for recreational use in systems that would usher in retail shops similar to those already operating in Colorado and Washington state. The sale of cannabis remains illegal in much of the world, but countries mainly in Europe and the Americas have decrminalized it by varying degrees. The Netherlands permits the sale of marijuana in “coffee shops”, Israel and Canada and nearly half of U.S. states have allowed its medicinal use, and Uruguay has legalized its use. In the United States, marijuana remains illegal under federal law. The Justice Department and the Drug Enforcement Administration did not immediately respond to interview requests about the plans. The Marley Natural brand would likely be seen on cannabis and other products and accessories by late 2015 under the 30-year global licensing arrangement struck between the family and Seattle-based private equity firm Privateer Holdings. The brand, a wholly-owned subsidiary based in New York, would produce and sell hemp-infused topicals and accessories in countries around the world and could enter into licensing agreements governing production and packaging requirements with growers and processors that sell cannabis and cannabis-infused products in U.S. states, among other plans. Marley’s family said in 2009 it would partner with Hilco Consumer Capital to license products ranging from apparel to video games.
11540	International trial changing standard of care for advanced breast cancer	A study presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) scientific conference that supposedly will “change the standard of care” for patients with advanced breast cancer should have more evidence backing up the claim. This news release gives short shrift to salient details, including costs, risks, the quality of the evidence, and proof of the novelty of this surgery-first approach. The release doesn’t acknowledge that the study found no difference between groups for the primary outcome (survival at 36 months). A statistical difference was found when the study was extended to 40 months but on a smaller subset of the original full sample group. The release makes the results sound like a success by focusing on subgroups of patients, but those results should be interpreted very carefully. Although the news release was able to discuss in simple terms some of the results of the study, there is concern when broad statements such as claims of a change in practice will occur based on the results of one study. There were also some study limitations that were not addressed in the news release. The original study was powered to detect differences in survival between the two groups at 36 months, but the study failed to find a difference. It was only with subgroup analyses and a longer follow-up time did the researchers find significant differences between the groups. The concern is that the study may not have been adequately powered for these subgroup analyses and therefore, the results may not be accurate.	mixture	Academic medical center news release,Breast cancer	There was no discussion of costs in the release. This would be an easy addition, given how common these types of surgeries are. The release does quantify the benefits, but we have concerns with how the release states: “At about 40 months after diagnosis, the women who received the surgery plus standard therapy lived an average of nine months longer than their counterparts…” This is a difficult sentence to follow since 40 months was the median survival (with a range of 20-51 months). The sentence might be interpreted by some readers that most women lived to at least 40 months, which was not the case. There is no mention in the release of the risks associated with surgery. It’s unclear from the abstract whether the study captured the risks involved in the surgeries. We understand that findings such as these are often presented at academic conferences. But there is a difference between findings going out unchallenged at an academic conference and findings having to go through the rigors of peer review for publication in an academic journal. In this case, these findings are just being announced at a conference (not published in a journal), and by not making that distinction, the release presents the findings as more rock solid than they actually are, even adding in a little “best of” moniker to make them more believable. It says: “The results of the phase III randomized, controlled trial will be presented Saturday at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting in Chicago. The study was selected for the society’s “Best of ASCO,” an effort to condense the research “most relevant and significant to oncology” into a two-day program to increase global access to cutting-edge science.” The release only includes the study’s positive results based on a subgroup analyses, not the limitations of the research. The main study purpose — to detect differences in survival between the two groups at 36 months — revealed there was not a significant difference. A difference was found when the study was extended to 40 months and a smaller selection of study participants were analyzed. But this isn’t mentioned. The study is also being conducted in Turkey and other studies have shown some differences in breast cancer incidence in Turkey compared with Western countries. The differences in incidence could be a result of differences in risk factors, age at diagnosis, and screening — all of which could also affect treatment outcomes. There is no disease mongering in this release. The release mentions who did the study and how it was funded. The release does not adequately compare surgery with alternatives, although it does mention them: “Half the women received standard therapy, which avoids surgery and consists of a combination of chemotherapy, hormonal therapy and targeted therapy,” How did surgery compare? We aren’t told. notes that “At about 40 months after diagnosis, the women who received the surgery plus standard therapy lived an average of nine months longer than their counterparts who received standard therapy alone.” [Editors note: This rating has been revised to reflect that this criteria is satisfactorily addressed in the news release.] It should be clear to any audience that these types of basic surgeries are available, and so we are giving this criteria a pass. The release presents these findings as a novel breakthrough for surgery for breast cancer. It says: “Our findings will change the standard of care for women newly diagnosed with stage IV breast cancer,” said principal investigator Atilla Soran, M.D., M.P.H., clinical professor of surgery, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, and breast surgical oncologist with UPMC CancerCenter. “We’ve shown that surgery to remove the primary tumor–either through lumpectomy or mastectomy–followed by standard therapy, is beneficial over no surgery.” It’s pretty apparent what they’re claiming is novel here — surgery for metastatic stage IV cancer is beneficial. But the problem is that’s not a novel finding. This is a longstanding question and one which was discussed in a previous story review. What’s different about this study and why is it practice-changing when other research has reported similar findings? The release doesn’t say. The headline and quote in the text about “changing the standard of care” for breast cancer treatment was unjustifiable given the size of the trial and the fact that the findings have yet to undergo peer review.
5877	Mayor: Officials waited days to warn of lake chemical spill.	An Indiana mayor accused state environmental officials Friday of waiting several days before notifying his city about a steel mill’s spill of cyanide and another chemical that led to a fish kill and prompted the closure of beaches along Lake Michigan.	true	Lake Michigan, Michigan, Fish, Lakes, Environment, Chemical spills, Indiana, General News	Portage Mayor John Cannon said the Indiana Department of Environmental Management and others learned Monday about an ArcelorMittal mill’s cyanide and ammonia-nitrogen spill, but didn’t inform his city until Thursday, The (Northwest Indiana) Times reported. “The Mayor is calling for action to be taken,” Cannon said in a statement. “Further, the City of Portage will be taking aggressive action with the EPA to ensure the breakdown of communication, like this, does not occur again.” IDEM and the U.S. Environment Agency’s Chicago office did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Cannon’s comments left Friday by The Associated Press. The National Park Service said Thursday that in response to the chemical spill it has closed the Portage Lakefront and Riverwalk beach areas at Indiana Dunes National Park as well as waters out to 300 feet (91 meters). Portage is about 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Chicago. The nearby city of Ogden Dunes also closed its beach and while that city’s drinking water was not affected, it has restricted water intake by its filtration plant as a precaution. News of the chemical spill followed reports of a large fish kill in the area of the Marquette Yacht Club and Sammie L. Maletta Public Marina, both in Portage. “There are dead fish everywhere. They’re up on shore, under the docks. I’m saying there are probably hundreds of fish,” Lake Station resident Janice McMullen told The Times when she arrived Wednesday at her boat in the Marquette Yacht Club IDEM said Thursday that ArcelorMittal’s Burns Harbor steel mill had released excess amounts of the chemicals into the Little Calumet River’s east branch. The agency and the Indiana Department of Natural Resources also asked the public Thursday to avoid the river’s east branch while state environmental officials conduct a cleanup. ArcelorMittal said in a statement that it’s investigating and will “continue to work closely with the agencies involved.” Cannon said in his statement he “holds ArcelorMittal responsible for this event, and also parts blame to IDEM for not informing the City of Portage until several days after the first incident.” It was unclear how much of the two chemicals entered the Lake Michigan tributary. IDEM spokesman Barry Sneed said Friday the state agency is awaiting test results on water samples taken from the area in question. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says cyanide “is a rapidly acting, potentially deadly chemical that can exist in various forms” including cyanide salts, which are used in metallurgy for electroplating, metal cleaning and removing gold from ore.
10523	Prenatal blood test for Down syndrome shows high level of accuracy	Overall, this story didn’t provide some of the key information readers need to make sense out of this study on a new blood test for Down syndrome. We wanted to see cost information, hear some good independent commentary on the study and, above all, read some context about why this test is worth any ink at all. Doing testing for 824 screenings, of which 11% were technical failures, is not a proof of concept yet for what would need to be millions of tests nationally and thousands per clinical lab if used in clinical practice. This story needed more context to give people the proper context to understand that. Screening for genetic anomalies during pregnancy can be stressful for expectant mothers. They dread that they will find out something is wrong with their baby, and they also dread that the test itself will cause them to miscarry. This story helps women understand the long odds that either of those scenarios will happen, and it goes part of the way toward helping them understand the importance of these new findings. But the story does conflate the screening and diagnostic process beginning with the first paragraph when it links the new test with “prenatal testing” done by amniocentesis and chorionic villus sampling. This new test is not a diagnostic test, as those tests are. Rather, as the authors of the BMJ paper confirm, it is a “screen for fetal trisomy 21 among high risk pregnancies.” This is a “hope for the future” level test that may be inching its way to market. It’s not available now and won’t be in the immediate future.	mixture	Los Angeles Times	The story doesn’t discuss costs. By comparison, an expert in the WebMD story that we also reviewed was paraphrased as saying the test is “likely prohibitively expensive and time consuming.” Even in a short blog piece, we think this is an important issue. The story should have presented the actual number of pregnancies in which Down syndrome was identified, as the WebMD story did. It did manage, though, to provide this one figure: “Using the new technology, researchers found they could rule out Down syndrome in 98% of cases, sparing the women from further testing.” Like the WebMD story that we also reviewed, this story notes, “The blood test did not produce false negative results (showing the fetus did not have the disorder when, in fact, the condition was present).” It also provides that helpful parenthetical note, which was absent from the WebMD story. We wish the story also spoke about false positives. False positives are certainly part of the stress and harms from any screening test that need to be considered. In this case, it appears the false positives were low but not negligible. The story does not adequately evaluate the quality of the evidence. Unlike the WebMD story that we also reviewed, which provided many outside experts couching the findings in the appropriately cautious terms, this story does not provide any caveats. The study itselt noted some weaknesses in the study design that could have been included. For example, it says, that the study was limited only to women at high risk for Down syndrome, meaning that it might not be broadly applicable, and that the tests were conducted both on freshly collected blood and archived blood samples, making it potentially hard to replicate the study protocol exactly in a clinical setting. On this count better than the WebMD story that we also reviewed, this story makes it clear that Down syndrome is a rare condition. “Down syndrome occurs in about 1 in 800 births.” We appreciate, too, that the story notes that the invasive tests for Down syndrome “carry about a 1% risk of miscarriage.” That’s quite low, and it should have been mentioned in the WebMD story. It’s the third sentence in the study itself. The story uses no independent sources. When we review a blog piece, we try to consider the links they use in stories that allow readers to dig deeper if they wish, while getting a broad overview in the blog if that’s all they want. This was a blog piece and we would have liked to have at least seen some links to outside sources. The story does discuss alternatives to the blood test, but without all of the strong context provided in the WebMD story, and in the study itself, there are no meaningful comparisons made. There are multiple other tools being used at the screening level, and the study authors are not suggesting this is ready to replace diagnostic tests. Yet this blog piece ends with the suggestion that the new test “could be used after the combined test (blood test & ultrasound) or even as a first-tier test.” Unlike the WebMD story that we also reviewed, this story makes it clear that this is a test in development and not available to patients yet. Technically this type of screening is not “new technology,” as the piece implies. Multiplex analysis is not new, and use for fetal and maternal cell DNA analysis is not new. Why this study is news is because this is the largest and likely best study to date on this existing technology. As with the WebMD story that we also reviewed, the true novelty of the test is not established. The story indicates that only 5% of all women would even need such a test, a figure straight out of the press release (and the study), but the story also says that the test might “greatly reduce the number of cases requiring an invasive test.” This leads readers to believe that this test is a broadly applicable breakthrough when it looks to be, at most, a benefit to a small group of women. Because the method is not novel, the story should have explained that a study on a bigger population is not a breakthrough but instead a very important first step. The WebMD story did a better job in this regard. This is a diagnostic test very early in its evolution toward becoming a practical tool. Not applicable because we can’t be sure of the extent to which the story was influenced solely or largely by a news release. The story presented very few facts beyond the information presented in the BMJ press release. No experts were quoted.
5237	Region hit hard by opioids embraces jail-based treatment.	As western Massachusetts struggles with a dramatic spike in fatal overdoses, officials are embracing a controversial solution: sending men who have not committed any crimes to jails and prisons for court-ordered addiction treatment.	true	Opioids, Prisons, Health, General News, Addiction treatment, Crime, Massachusetts, U.S. News, Springfield	Hampden County Sheriff Nick Cocchi has designated a wing of his jail for the treatment of men civilly committed for substance abuse reasons. It’s the only facility in western Massachusetts housing the men, and just one of three in the entire state for men. While some are trying to end the practice, Cocchi and his supporters — including local mayors and lawmakers — say the jail’s year-old Stonybrook Stabilization and Treatment Centers is key to curbing the opioid problem in the county, which includes the former manufacturing cities of Springfield and Holyoke. Fatal overdoses surged more than 80% in Hampden County from 2017 to 2018 even as they declined statewide for the second straight year in 2018, according to state data. “People coming into our program are angry, violent and sick,” Cocchi said as he and other officials celebrated the program’s anniversary earlier this week. “They are at the end of the road, and their families have recognized that if they don’t intervene, they might not survive.” But the civil rights group Prisoners’ Legal Services of Massachusetts has sued the state in an effort to end the use of jails and prisons for forcibly treating men with addiction. The class action lawsuit was filed in March on behalf of 10 men who complained of poor conditions and mistreatment at another civil commitment program run out of a state Department of Corrections prison. A state commission has also recently recommended ending the practice of sending civilly committed men to jails and prisons, as the state did for women three years ago, following a similar lawsuit. Women are now sent to substance abuse treatment facilities run or contracted by public health agencies, as most civilly committed persons are in other states. “This should not be a choice between prison or nothing,” said Bonnie Tenneriello, a staff attorney with Prisoners’ Legal Services. “Why are we giving money to a sheriff to run treatment programs rather than funding civilian treatment?” Under state law, family members can ask a judge to order their relatives into treatment if they’re unwilling to go voluntarily and are deemed a danger to themselves or others. At least 35 states have such civil commitment laws, but Massachusetts is just one of a handful where it’s widely used, The Associated Press found last year. About 9,950 civil commitments requests were filed in state courts in the budget year that ended June 30. That’s down from more than 10,770 the prior year but up significantly from the 6,105 in fiscal year 2016 and the under 3,000 in fiscal year 2006, according to state data. Tenneriello and other opponents say forcing people into jails and prisons for treatment only reinforces the stigma around addiction. And studies, including the state’s own research , also suggest forced treatment largely doesn’t work and could raise the danger of overdose for those who relapse after treatment. Like the state corrections-run civil commitment facility, Hampden County’s program takes place, at least initially, behind the razor wire of its secure jail campus. Civilly committed men are also similarly segregated from the regular inmate population but required to wear corrections-issued uniforms and follow certain corrections protocols. But, in an effort to make the program feel less institutional, cell doors remain largely unlocked and program participants aren’t handcuffed, Cocchi and some recently released patients said. “Yes, it’s a jail setting. There are corrections officers walking around,” said Keith Molyneux, a 40-year-old recovering from heroin addiction who was among the first to complete the program last year. “But they’re more committed to helping you here than to actually being a correctional officer. You definitely feel like they’re there to help.” After a few weeks of detoxing at the jail, most are eventually transferred to a less secure facility located off-campus in a converted nursing home. There, the men can wear civilian clothes and are housed in rooms that are larger and more dorm-like. Early results of the approach — which also includes health care professionals administering addiction treatment medications and leading counselling sessions — are encouraging, Cocchi said. Since opening last May, more than 850 men have gone through the program, staying 47 days, on average — weeks longer than they do at the state’s other two facilities. The longer stays increase the odds that the men will stay sober, Cocchi said. So far, less than 5% have had to be recommitted, though two fatally overdosed after leaving the program. Lawmakers, meanwhile, have committed $1 million to the program in the current state budget, proving the effort has strong support, despite its detractors, he said. “Let us continue doing what we’re doing,” Cocchi said. “No one else is doing this work out here, but we’re doing it, and we’re doing it well. Why shouldn’t we be applauded and supported?” ___ Follow Philip Marcelo at twitter.com/philmarcelo. ___ This story has been corrected to identify the Hampden County sheriff as Nick Cocchi, not Thomas Cocchi.
5068	Greta Thunberg’s sailing adventure no pleasure cruise.	Greta Thunberg’s two-week voyage to the United States will be no pleasure cruise.	true	Climate, AP Top News, England, Sailing, International News, General News, Grace Kelly, Environment, Science, Prince Rainier III, Greta Thunberg, Europe, United States	The 16-year-old climate change activist who has inspired student protests around the world will leave Plymouth, England, later this week bound for New York in a high-tech but decidedly low-comfort sailboat. Highlighting the urgency of cutting carbon emissions, the young Swede last month announced that while she would not fly to environmental conferences, she’d found a way to get there without hurting the planet. Pierre Casiraghi, the grandson of Monaco’s late Prince Rainier III and American actress Grace Kelly, and fellow yachtsman Boris Herrmann offered her passage on a racing yacht as she travels to U.N. climate summits next month in New York and in Santiago, Chile, in December. “It’s not very luxurious, it’s not very fancy but I don’t need that. I need only a bed and just the basic things,” Thunberg told The Associated Press. “So I think it will be fun, and I also think it will be fun to be isolated and not be so limited.” Sailing on the 60-foot (18-meter) Malizia II, outfitted with solar panels and underwater turbines to generate electricity, Thunberg will make a zero-carbon trans-Atlantic journey. But to call it a no-frills passage would be an understatement. The sailboat is built for high-speed, offshore racing, with weight kept to a minimum. The only alterations for the voyage are fitting curtains in front of the bunk and adding mattresses for comfort. There is no toilet or fixed shower. There’s a small gas cooker and the food will be freeze dried. Inside, the yacht resembles the interior of a tin can. It is dark and gray, with no windows below deck. Herrmann, who is skippering the boat, will take turns with Casiraghi steering the craft. He described life on board as a mixture of camping and sailing, with a thin mattress and sleeping bag the only comforts. “It’s a very simple life and then the rest of the day depends on the wind,” Herrmann told the AP. “It can be calm and smooth and going along and you can read a book, or it can be really rough and you hold on and try to fight seasickness and can be really hard.” Casiraghi and Herrmann’s Team Malizia was founded to sail the biggest ocean races — the Vendee Globe 2020 and The Ocean Race 2021. They also developed the Malizia Ocean challenge, a science and education project aimed at teaching children about climate change and the ocean. Their vessel has an onboard sensor that measures CO2 levels in seawater, a measure of how atmospheric carbon is changing the oceans. Thunberg became a global celebrity last year when she refused to go to school in the weeks before Sweden’s general election to highlight the impact of climate change and to put pressure on politicians to do something about it. She continued her school strike on Fridays after the election, spurring thousands of young people around the world to follow suit. Since then, she’s met the pope, spoken at Davos and attended anti-coal protests in Germany. She is now taking a year off school to attend the events in North and South America and meet with some of the people most affected by climate change. She decided not to fly to New York because of the emissions caused by air travel and plans to use the least carbon-intensive methods of travel available as she continues her trip. “By this journey I hope to increase awareness among people, to spread information and communicate the science about what is really going on so people can understand what is really going on with the climate and ecological crisis,” she said. “That is what I am hoping to achieve with everything and that will also lead to international opinions so that people come together and put pressure on the people in power so that they will have to do something.” Rising levels of greenhouse gases, primarily carbon dioxide, are already increasing global temperatures, according to the UN. This will lead to shifting weather patterns that threaten food production and rising sea levels, though scientists hope that by curbing emissions catastrophic consequences can be avoided. Thunberg will be accompanied on her trans-Atlantic voyage by her father, Svante, and filmmaker Nathan Grossman of B-Reel Films, who will document the journey. She’s brought audiobooks and has notebooks to fill. Beyond that, everything depends on the wind. The Atlantic Ocean in hurricane season can be a rocky place. Herrmann plans a southern route since three of the five sailors on board have no experience. During a trial run in the Bay of Plymouth on Monday, Thunberg said she was seasick for “five minutes” when the boat stood still. “Of course, I will be a little bit seasick,” she said. “But I don’t think I will be very seasick.”
6601	US screens more staff in China over mystery health issues.	A U.S. medical team was screening more Americans who work at the consulate in southern China as the State Department confirmed evacuating a number of government employees who experienced unexplained health issues like those that have hurt U.S. personnel in Cuba and China.	true	Heather Nauert, AP Top News, Cuba, International News, Guangzhou, Politics, North America, Health, China, Asia Pacific	The evacuations of workers in Guangzhou followed medical testing that revealed they might have been affected. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said “a number of individuals” had been brought to the U.S. but didn’t say how many were affected or evacuated. A previous case in Guangzhou, disclosed last month, prompted the tests. Nauert also said that remaining U.S. government personnel and their families in Guangzhou would also be able to request testing if they “noted concerning symptoms or wanted baseline screening.” The incidents have raised fears the unexplained issues that started in Cuba in 2016 have expanded. The U.S. government has deemed those incidents “specific attacks” on American workers but hasn’t publicly identified a cause or culprit. Most of the incidents were accompanied by bizarre, unexplained sounds that initially led U.S. investigators to suspect a sonic attack. Symptoms have included dizziness, headaches and an inability to concentrate. The American government worker who previously was removed from China reported “subtle and vague, but abnormal, sensations of sound and pressure,” the Guangzhou consulate reported last month Security guards outside the Guangzhou consulate on Thursday told reporters to leave the area and not attempt to talk to consulate staff. Asked about the latest incidents, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said the U.S. had not formally raised the matter with Beijing. “If the U.S. makes formal contact with us, China will continue necessary investigations in an earnest and responsible manner and maintain close communication and cooperation with the U.S.,” Hua said at a regularly scheduled news conference. China earlier said it had looked into the case announced last month but came up with no clues about the cause of the symptoms. The New York Times identified the latest American employee evacuated as Mark A. Lenzi, a security engineering officer at the consulate who left Wednesday night with his wife and two children. Lenzi told the Times he resided in the same apartment tower as the officer evacuated in April and suffered in recent months from what he called “neurological symptoms.” Lenzi’s apartment was in one of several high-rise buildings in The Canton Place featuring restaurants and galleries spaced around a central plaza. Another diplomat who reported symptoms was at a different upscale building near the consulate, the paper said. A U.S. official, who wasn’t authorized to discuss the situation publicly and requested anonymity, said the evacuated American government workers were being brought from China for testing to the University of Pennsylvania. That’s where doctors have been treating and studying patients previously evacuated from the U.S. Embassy in Havana. The preliminary findings of the medical reports on the 24 personnel affected in Cuba showed they had sensory and memory problems similar to the brain dysfunction seen with concussions. The Penn team said the patients from Cuba experienced persistent disability though rehabilitation therapy customized for them seemed to help. Canada in April also ordered families of diplomatic staff in Cuba to return home after mysterious health symptoms were detected in 10 Canadians stationed on the island. Canada said the 10 continued to show unexplained brain symptoms and that “medical information raised concerns for a new type of a possible acquired brain injury.” In testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last month about the first case in China, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said China had “said all the right things and have demonstrated their willingness to help us identify the vector which led to this medical incident.” The China incidents affect one of the most important of the seven U.S. diplomatic outposts in the country. The Guangzhou consulate opened months after the establishment of diplomatic relations between Beijing and Washington in 1979 and moved to its new purpose-built facility in 2013. It serves four southern provinces with a combined population of more than 204 million and processes more than 1 million visa applications of all types annually. It is also the only U.S. diplomatic installation in China authorized to process immigrant visas and handle adoptions. People working in The Canton Place complex, a few kilometers (miles) from the consulate, said they were just hearing about the incidents, reflecting a lack of coverage in China’s entirely state-controlled media. Aled Williams, a British teacher at a kindergarten said Thursday that the reports sounded “sci-fi-ish.” “Hard to get my head around how it works,” he said. “Better watch myself.” Linda Chen, who runs a coffee shop in the area, said she was mystified as to why only certain people seemed to have been affected in an area known for its comfort and safety. “For me I feel it’s very strange. But I don’t feel that there’s something to be very afraid of because it’s probably a very special case,” Chen said. ___ Associated Press writer Josh Lederman in Washington, D.C. contributed to this report.
26264	“Almost 75 percent of the deaths from COVID-19 in the state of Texas are a result of people contracting COVID-19 who are age 65 and older.”	Texas health officials publish daily coronavirus numbers, including some details about deaths by age, race and gender — but only for cases where the death has been investigated. When Abbott made this statement, the death toll in Texas was 948, but less than half of those deaths had been investigated. Of the deaths where age breakdowns are available, roughly 71% are people aged 65 or older. Age information is not available for the deaths still under investigation.	true	Texas, Coronavirus, Greg Abbott,	"In a press conference on May 5 in which Gov. Greg Abbott updated his reopening plan to add businesses such as hair salons and gyms, he recommended that at-risk populations ""remain at home if at all possible"" and avoid in-person gatherings, such as a church service, funeral or wedding. ""We strongly encourage at-risk populations to try to watch or participate remotely, remembering this very important point, and that is almost 75 percent of the deaths from COVID-19 in the state of Texas are a result of people contracting COVID-19 who are age 65 and older,"" Abbott said. Texas was among the first states to start reopening businesses and lifting restrictions put in place to curb the spread of the coronavirus, allowing retail stores and restaurants to open May 1 at 25 percent capacity. Abbott announced the latest set of reopenings Monday, expanding restaurant capacity to 50 percent and granting bars the ability to open at 25 percent capacity within the next couple weeks. This comes as the state continues to see its number of infections and deaths rise and clusters form mostly in rural parts of the state where meatpacking plants are located. Hospitalizations, however, have decreased since mid-April. With that in mind, we had to ask: Is Abbott right that almost 75% of coronavirus deaths in Texas are people older than 65? Looking at the numbers Abbott’s spokesman John Wittman said Abbott’s claim is based on figures from the Texas Department of Health Services, which publishes daily numbers on the state’s COVID-19 testing and cases. The data includes a breakdown of coronavirus deaths by age, race and gender, but only for those cases where the deaths have been investigated by the local and regional health departments. As of Wednesday, the majority, or 489, were still under investigation. ""The demographic data on cases and fatalities come from the case investigation forms submitted by local health departments and our regional offices,"" said DSHS spokesman Chris Van Deusen. The purpose of the investigation is to confirm that the person had COVID-19 but also to collect other details about them and the circumstances around their death, Van Deusen said. Wittman said the data showed that 75% of investigated deaths were people 65 and older when Abbott made this statement. ""It alternates almost daily, but it’s generally around that range,"" Wittman said. As of May 6, the day after the press conference, the death toll in Texas was 948. Fewer than half, or 433, had been investigated. Of those, about 71 percent were Texans 65 and older. It was still about 71 percent, or 345 out of 489 investigated cases, as of Wednesday. The age groups broke down like so: Ages 10 to 19 years old: 2 deaths, or 0.4% Ages 20-29: 10 deaths, or 2.04 % Ages 30-39: 9 deaths, or 1.8% Ages 40-49: 21 deaths, or 4.29% Ages 50-59: 54 deaths, or 11.04% Ages 60-64: 45 deaths, or 9.2% Ages 65-69: 59 deaths, or 12.06% Ages 70-74: 45 deaths, or 9.2% Ages 75-79: 45 deaths, or 9.2% Ages 80+: 196 deaths, or 40.08% Across the United States, about 79% of coronavirus deaths have been people 65 years and older, according to the National Center for Health Statistics data submitted between the beginning of February to the beginning of May. Like Texas’ statistics, the national numbers are also incomplete. The number of deaths represent only those entered between those dates and only include people with confirmed or presumed COVID-19. ""While 80% of deaths are electronically processed and coded by NCHS within minutes, most deaths from COVID-19 must be coded by a person, which takes an average of 7 days,"" the NCHS states on its website. The data is also always somewhat behind because of the lag time between when a death occurred and when a death certificate is completed, submitted to NCHS and processed for reporting purposes. The delay can last anywhere from one week to eight or more. Our ruling Abbott said almost ""75 percent of the deaths from COVID-19 in the state of Texas are a result of people contracting COVID-19 who are age 65 and older."" Of confirmed coronavirus deaths, close to 75% were people within the age group Abbott provided, but he failed to include the caveat that this statistic leaves out more than half of the total deaths that have not yet been investigated."
206	AstraZeneca lupus drug shows promise after set-back last year.	AstraZeneca Plc said on Thursday its experimental drug to treat moderate-to-severe lupus met the main goal in a late-stage study, an encouraging sign after it failed to meet its main target in the final stage of another trial last year.	true	Health News	The British drugmaker said anifrolumab under the TULIP 2 program helped patients with systemic lupus erythematosus, commonly known as SLE. The drug had failed to meet its main goal in the final stage of one of the two clinical trials under the TULIP program last year here “These are important results and we will now review the full data set and explore pathways to bring this potential new treatment to patients,” said Mene Pangalos, executive vice president BioPharmaceuticals R&D, adding that only one new treatment has been approved for the disease in the last 60 years. SLE is an autoimmune disease in which the immune system attacks healthy tissue in the body, with about five million people affected globally, according to the Lupus Foundation of America. AstraZeneca has been in a race with GlaxoSmithKline and French biotech company Neovacs to create new treatments for lupus. GSK received here U.S. approval for Benlysta, the first new treatment for lupus in more than half a century, for intravenous use in children with lupus aged five years and above in April. Anifrolumab, which is also given intravenously, is designed for patients with moderate-to-severe lupus and works by targeting interferon, a protein involved in inflammation.
35229	"Joseph Maldonado-Passage, better known as Joe Exotic of ""Tiger King,"" has COVID-19 coronavirus disease."	What's true: Joe Exotic was put into isolation after another prisoner tested positive for COVID-19. What's false: As of this writing, Exotic has not tested positive for COVID-19.	false	Entertainment, COVID-19	On April 2, 2020, reports circulated on social media that Joseph Maldonado-Passage, better known as Joe Exotic from the Netflix documentary “Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness,” had contracted COVID-19 coronavirus disease while in prison. The Mirror, for instance, published an article entitled: “Netflix’s Tiger King star Joe Exotic hospitalised after contracting coronavirus in prison.” This report was not accurate. The Mirror later updated its headline so it made a less definitive claim, writing that Exotic could have contracted the virus, but was not officially diagnosed with disease. This rumor started after Exotic was moved to the Fort Worth Federal Medical Center. Dillon Passage, Exotic’s husband, told radio host Andy Cohen that Exotic had been put into isolation at the new facility after someone at the jail where he was previously held had tested positive for COVID-19. Passage said, “We speak like three to five times every day, but [not] since he’s been moved to this new facility; they are putting him on a COVID-19 isolation because of the previous jail he was at, there were cases.” Passage did not say that Exotic himself had tested positive for the disease, only that he was put into quarantine after another prisoner had contracted the disease. You can watch Passage’s interview below:
17293	"John Bolton Says Vladimir Putin once said, ""The breakup of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century."	"Bolton told a Fox News host that Putin once said, ""The breakup of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century."" Putin did say those words, or at least words close to that, in a 2005 address to Russian political leaders. Bolton went on to tell a Fox News host those words are evidence Putin wants to expand Russia’s influence to where it was in the Soviet days. The record there is not as clear. We found some experts who agree with Bolton’s interpretation, while others who say Bolton is extracting a quote that does not quite mean what he says it does. Bolton’s statement is accurate but needs clarification."	true	History, Foreign Policy, PunditFact, John Bolton,	"Russian President Vladimir Putin’s handling of the uprising in Ukraine is not surprising if you look at telling comments he made years ago, says former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations turned conservative television pundit John Bolton. A Fox News host asked Bolton if he agreed with Ukraine’s prime minister who said the country is ""on the brink of disaster."" Bolton, who served at the U.N. during George W. Bush’s time in the White House, said it seemed pretty accurate. ""I think Putin knows that he has the high cards, militarily, economically and politically, and he’s prepared to use them,"" Bolton said. ""He gave us notice of his strategy seven or eight years ago when he said, in what is now one of the most frequently repeated quotes from his leadership in Russia, when he said, ‘The breakup of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century.’ ""It’s clear he wants to re-establish Russian hegemony within the space of the former Soviet Union. Ukraine is the biggest prize, that’s what he’s after. The occupation of the Crimea is a step in that direction."" We wanted to know if Bolton correctly characterized Putin’s comments. We reached out to Bolton through his political action committee and the American Enterprise Institute, where he is a senior fellow, but did not hear back. Putin’s 2005 speech to Russians Putin, a veteran of the Soviet spy agency called the KGB, made the comments Bolton cites in an April 2005 state of the nation address to the country’s top politicians and parliament. A version is available in English from the Kremlin archives. Putin’s words vary depending on the translation, but the idea remains the same. From the Kremlin: ""Above all, we should acknowledge that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical disaster of the century. As for the Russian nation, it became a genuine drama. Tens of millions of our co-citizens and co-patriots found themselves outside Russian territory. Moreover, the epidemic of disintegration infected Russia itself."" The Associated Press translation is a little differently, subbing ""catastrophe"" for ""disaster,"" and calling the breakup the ""greateast geopolitical catastrophe of the century."" That language is a little more in line with what Bolton said. Whatever the word choice, it’s clear Putin believed there were problems created by the breakup of the Soviet Union. Putin, who had revived some Soviet iconography as president, focused the rest of his speech on developing Russia as a free and democratic country, though he promised to be tough on popular uprisings inspired by surrounding countries. His speech came as President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice offered public skepticism of the country’s ""managed democracy,"" leading Putin to declare Russia would ""independently determine"" its definition of democracy. Still, it was his lament for the dissolved Soviet Union that dominated news coverage. The remark was alarming to westerners, illustrating a deep contrast in perspectives of an event that many consider a glorious moment in time, said Dina Spechler, an Indiana University associate professor of political science who teaches Soviet and Russian foreign policy. Spechler said she did not find a problem with Bolton’s characterization, though she added Putin does not want a return of Soviet-era economic centralization. ""I think it’s quite legitimate and fair, and it’s been true for some time now that Putin wants to re-establish Russian hegemony,"" Spechler said. ""He calls it an area of primary Russian interest -- making sure that these countries remain loyal."" Spechler does not predict a full-scale escalation of force by Russia in Ukraine, she said, but she would not rule it out given the crisis between Russia and Georgia in 2008. Ukraine is a large country with strong cultural links to Russia looked upon as a Slavic brother, she said. ""What we’re seeing today is the most significant step Russia has taken, and it is likely to take a while, to fulfill the agenda that was heralded when he called the breakup a tragedy,"" she said. The ""upshot"" of the speech was that if the greatest geopolitical tragedy was the breakup of the USSR, the greatest geopolitical achievement should be the reformulation of a Russian superstate, said Ariel Cohen, a senior research fellow in Russian and Eurasian studies at the Heritage Foundation. He wasn’t pining for a new USSR That’s not the only view of Putin’s remarks, however. Other scholars we consulted say there is more nuance in the meaning of Putin’s words. Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin, a 2013 book by Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy of the Brookings Institution, addresses the ""often misquoted line"" about the demise of the USSR: ""Most references to this line have suggested that Putin was bemoaning the loss of the communist economic and political system,"" the book reads, ""but Putin has since frequently underscored that he was talking about the collapse of the Russian state itself."" Gaddy elaborated in an interview with PunditFact, saying Putin is not eager to re-establish the USSR, partly because it would be costly for Russia, which subsidized many Soviet countries during that era. He does, however, want to make sure surrounding countries are not used against Russia. Gaddy said Putin does not see Ukraine as a prize, as Bolton suggested, but as a potential liability and realm for anti-Russian activity. ""His nightmare has long been that Ukrainian instability would be used to sap Russia’s attention and strength, or worse — that it would be used to entrap Russia into intervening militarily and getting bogged down,"" Gaddy said. ""The nightmare is coming real."" Lance Janda, chairman of Cameron University’s history and government department, challenged Bolton’s assertion that Putin’s remarks in years past foreshadowed the modern events in Ukraine. It’s more complicated, he said. Yes, Russia moved aggressively into Chechnya, South Ossetia and Crimea, but it was not on a whim -- it was to prevent instability along the border after years of NATO expansions, Janda said. Plus, Russia would not have worked in recent years to stabilize its dealings and cooperation with Western countries if it had planned to invade Ukraine all along, he said. ""All Putin meant when he said in 2005 that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a catastrophe was that it launched protests and uprisings and sectarian violence, which is true,"" Janda said. ""Those of us in the West are okay with that because we saw in those uprisings the birth of new nations and greater freedom, but that doesn’t mean it came without cost or that the Russians were thrilled by it."" Our ruling Bolton told a Fox News host that Putin once said, ""The breakup of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century."" Putin did say those words, or at least words close to that, in a 2005 address to Russian political leaders. Bolton went on to tell a Fox News host those words are evidence Putin wants to expand Russia’s influence to where it was in the Soviet days. The record there is not as clear. We found some experts who agree with Bolton’s interpretation, while others who say Bolton is extracting a quote that does not quite mean what he says it does. Bolton’s statement is accurate but needs clarification."

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