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22236
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"Mike Ford Says the fluoride Austin is putting in its drinking water is ""toxic waste."
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"Austin resident says fluoride compound added to local water supply is ""toxic waste"""
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false
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Public Health, Texas, Mike Ford,
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"In a letter to the editor published in the March 18 Austin Chronicle, Mike Ford suggests Austin residents have reason to question whether fluoridated water is safe. ""How many would be comfortable if they knew that the fluoride Austin is putting into our drinking water is fluorosilicic acid (toxic waste from the fertilizer industry) that the city buys from Lucier Chemical Industries?"" his letter states. Eww. Ford, an Austin resident, is part of Fluoride Free Austin, which has urged the city to stop putting fluoride in drinking water. On March 22, a City Council committee took testimony on the practice--and at least one speaker referred to the chemical additive as an industrial toxic waste, according to video of the hearing placed online. Ford answered our request for backup by forwarding information from various sources including a November 2009 memo from an assistant city manager to Austin’s City Council stating that after voter approval, the Austin Water Utility began adding fluoride to the water supply Feb. 2, 1973; the council can change the practice by majority vote. Nationally in 2008, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 195.5 million people (72.4 percent) on public water systems had access to ""optimally fluoridated"" water, up from 69 percent of individuals on public water supplies in 2006. The Environmental Protection Agency regulates how much fluoride that drinking water should have. The current recommended range is 0.7 to 1.2 milligrams (parts per million) per liter of water, though the EPA and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced plans in January to consider setting the limit at the low end of the current standard, 0.7 milligrams. Peter Silva, an EPA water administrator, said: ""EPA’s new analysis will help us make sure that people benefit from tooth decay prevention while at the same time avoiding the unwanted health effects from too much fluoride."" One health effect is dental fluorosis, which the agency’s announcement says ""may occur with excess fluoride consumption during the tooth-forming years, age 8 and younger. Dental fluorosis in the United States appears mostly in the very mild or mild form – as barely visible lacy white markings or spots on the enamel. The severe form of dental fluorosis, with staining and pitting of the tooth surface, is rare in the United States."" (It’s not rare in the Texas Panhandle, where groundwater is naturally high in fluoride.) The city of Austin memo says the ""level of fluoride naturally occurring in the raw water supply for the City of Austin is 0.20 to 0.24 mg/l or parts per million. The Austin Water Utility adjusts the fluoride level to a range of 0.6 – 0.9 mg/l, averaging at about 0.75 mg/l. These values are well within the (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) guidelines for optimally fluoridated water as well as being within the recommended range from (the World Health Organization)."" And what of the chemical compound cited in Ford’s letter? The memo says the fluoride product used is hydrofluorosilicic acid, which fulfills a standard ensuring ""purity of products for the control of potential adverse human-health effects from products added directly to the water during treatment, storage and distribution."" There’s no mention of fertilizer in the 17-page memo. Next, spokeswoman Jill Mayfield of the water utility sent us a statement stating that the acid, also known as FSA, is supplied by Mosaic Chemicals, which she said has bought Lucier Chemical. Mosaic generally describes itself as the world’s leading producer and marketer of concentrated phosphate and potash, two primary fertilizers. Mayfield said hydrofluorosilic acid is ""derived from apatite which is a type of limestone deposit used in the production of fertilizers. The apatite is ground up and treated with sulfuric acid producing phosphoric acid (the main ingredient in the production of phosphate fertilizer) plus a solid and two gases. The two gases, hydrogen fluoride and silicon tetrafluoride, are captured in water to form hydrofluorosilicic acid."" An entry on Mosaic’s site aligns with Mayfield’s explanation. It says the vapor stream from the phosphoric acid reaction is scrubbed with water to form FSA from the naturally occurring silica and fluorine in the phosphoric acid."" We ran Ford’s description of the acid as ""toxic waste"" past the company. Spokesman Rob Litt replied by e-mail: ""Many fluoridation opponents will cite the toxicity of the chemical in its concentrated form. This is a fallacy as no one is ingesting this concentrated form. By this rationale, these same individuals should also be opposed to Vitamin D, B6, A & E, which are all considered toxic in concentrated form."" For more perspective, we contacted the CDC where Linda Orgain, a spokeswoman in its Division of Oral Health, said by e-mail that fluorosilicic acid ""is not toxic waste."" She pointed us to a CDC web page on water fluoridation with a section stating: ""All additives used at water treatment plants, including fluoride additives, must meet strict quality standards that assure the public’s safety. These additives are subject to a stringent system of standards, testing, and certificates by the American Water Works Association (AWWA) and the National Sanitation Foundation/American National Standards Institute (NSF/ANSI). Both of these entities are nonprofit, nongovernmental organizations."" Orgain added: ""There are no health implications for community water fluoridation – at the level used for community water fluoridation (currently 0.7-1.2 mg/L) fluoridation prevents and controls tooth decay – preventing about 25 percent of decay in children and adults, throughout the lifespan."" We filled Ford in on our research. He replied that the acid purchased by water providers cannot otherwise be dumped in the ocean, inland waterways or landfills unless it’s contained: ""It’s toxic until they sell it to the city and then magically the city puts it in our water."" Next, the CDC’s national water fluoridation engineer, Kip Duchon, said it’s ridiculous to call the water additive toxic waste. Duchon said the compound put in water comes from gypsum, a byproduct of phosphate-based fertilizer plants that often ends up piled in landfills. The compound results from a gas that’s isolated via vacuum extraction, he said, then quenched with water, making the acid. Per Ford’s point about pouring the acid into bodies of water, Duchon replied: ""It’s no different than any other acid (undiluted) that would kill everything in the lake. It would be irresponsible of anyone to capriciously or arbitrarily dump . any chemical in a water body."" Duchon said the acid becomes toxic at concentrations of more than 100 milligrams per liter, over 100 times the concentration in Austin’s water. He said he was aware of one episode involving such a toxic error involving a small community’s water well; an Alaska man died. Ford urged us to seek more on the compound’s toxicity from Neal Carman, also a participant in Fluoride Free Austin. Carman said a loophole in federal environmental law makes it possible to sell the compound so long as it’s going to be diluted. Then, he said, it’s no longer considered a hazardous waste. We were unable to confirm or disprove this claim; Mosaic’s description of the acid it ships to Austin says it’s corrosive but stable when stored properly. At the EPA, spokesman Richard Yost said by email that in ""water at levels used for fluoridation, hexafluorosilicic acid hydrolyzes essentially completely to fluoride ions and various forms of silica... Various forms of silica and silicates occur in nature as sand and do not represent any health hazard."" Yost said the fluoride compound put into Austin’s water is not on the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act list of ""hazardous constituents"" nor is it on the U.S. Department of Transportation’s hazardous materials transport list. Finally, we asked city officials to speak to Ford’s ""toxic waste"" reference. Philip Huang, medical director for the Austin/Travis County Health and Human Services Department, said it’s misleading and inflammatory to call the acid, which he calls a byproduct, toxic waste. Staff toxicologist Janet Pichette said the key issue for any substance is concentration. Even too much water ""could kill you,"" she said. Last gulp: Ford’s statement accurately notes that the water utility buys the acid that fluoridates Austin’s drinking water from a fertilizer maker. Yet there’s no reasonable support for calling the the same acid toxic waste; it’s not poisonous at its concentration in the water."
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30950
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Former President Barack Obama's stylist revealed to a conservative web site that he caught Obama in the middle of a gay tryst.
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However, the story has been republished verbatim on other dubious sites like Specialon, which contains no such disclaimer.
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false
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Junk News, barack obama, specialon, the last line of defense
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In September 2017, the misinformation web site The Last Line of Defense concocted a particularly coarse smear story concerning former United States President Barack Obama that further challenged even its own basement-level standards for “satire”: Barack Obama’s personal stylist has spoken out about something he witnessed when he was working in the White House. “What I saw will forever haunt my nightmares,” Rubio DesCartes told TheBlaze in an interview Thursday. DesCartes says that on July 8 2011, he went to do his job as normal, but when he found Barack Obama he wasn’t alone. “He was naked with another man, a White House intern, in the Reagan Bedroom,” DesCartes says. “The President was bent over a dresser and the intern was, well, you can guess what was happening. When they heard me come in, they both jumped.” The story also contained another regurgitation of a transphobic slur against former First Lady Michelle Obama, and closed with this line: We now know for sure: Barack Obama is a gay. The story is a fabrication. The site itself contains a disclaimer stating that this story — as well as everything else it publishes — is completely made up: DISCLAIMER: America’s Last Line of Defense is a satirical publication that may sometimes appear to be telling the truth. We assure you that’s not the case. We present fiction as fact and our sources don’t actually exist. Names that represent actual people and places are purely coincidental and all images should be considered altered and do not in any way depict reality. In other words, if you believe this crap you’re a real dumbass.
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37740
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Adolf Hitler invented blow up dolls.
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A viral July 2020 Facebook post urged users to Google “who invented blowup dolls,” a directive returning a highlighted-by-Google result indicating that person was “Adolf Hitler.” But sex dolls were in existence for centuries before World War II, and the claim in its original, heavily disputed form was not that Hitler invented blowup dolls. It was, in fact, that the Nazis tried to develop advanced sex dolls to prevent soldiers from visiting sex workers. Even that appeared to be false, hinging entirely on an early 2000s Bild article which again, did not claim that Hitler invented blowup dolls. The disappearance of source material was such that the claim became a “persistent urban legend,” but the underlying information contradicted it on every level.
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false
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Fact Checks, Viral Content
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On July 16 2020 the Facebook page Memes Republic commanded its followers stop whatever they were doing and “Google who invented blow up dolls” immediately:The post rapidly racked up shares, nearing 60,000 in under 24 hours. So what happened if you Googled “who invented blow up dolls”? This:In the screenshot, a highlight from Google provided the anticipated bizarre answer: Adolf Hitler. Under that was a then-recent news item about the search trend.So did Adolf Hitler himself really invent blow up dolls? Let’s unpack it.What is a Blow Up Doll?In the era of hyper-realistic “RealDolls,” some younger folks might not have a frame of reference for blow up dolls.Before RealDolls were introduced in 1996, people seeking a semi-realistic companionship proxy had fewer choices. Wikipedia explained the concept concisely on their “Sex doll” entry:A sex doll (also love doll or blowup doll) is a type of sex toy in the size and shape of a sexual partner for aid in masturbation. The sex doll may consist of an entire body with face, or just a head, pelvis or other partial body, with the accessories (vagina, anus, mouth, penis) for sexual stimulation. The parts are sometimes vibrating and may be removable or interchangeable. Sex dolls exist in many forms, but are distinguished from sex robots, which are anthropomorphic creations designed to be able to engage in more complex interactions.When Were Blowup Dolls Invented?Although sex dolls (and blowup dolls) have appeared in many forms, inflatable “blowup dolls” are among the most recognizable due to their occasional appearance in films and on television for comic relief. However, the history of sex dolls goes back much further than Adolf Hitler, according to a 2014 deep dive in The Atlantic:Throughout history, men without access to beautiful statues—but with an inclination to make love to women-shaped things—have made do in various ways. Sailors often used cloth to fashion fornicatory dolls known as dame de voyage in French, or dama de viaje in Spanish. In modern-day Japan, sex dolls are sometimes known as “Dutch wives”—a reference to the hand-sewn leather masturbation puppets made by the 17th-century Dutch sailors who traded with the Japanese.Though sailors’ dolls were just generic substitutes for the female form—any female form—there are some instances of men creating dolls as stand-ins for specific women. In 1916, after the Austro-Hungarian artist Oskar Kokoschka was jilted by his lover, the pianist and composer Alma Mahler, he wrote that he had “lost all desire to go through the ordeal of love again.” (This is a refrain that doll owners have repeated through the ages.) He still desired Mahler, though, so much so that he provided her dressmaker with incredibly detailed instructions for a life-sized replica of Mahler, specifying not only her appearance but everything down to how her skin should feel. Historians differ on what happened after Kokoschka received the doll. One thing is for sure—it was extremely furry, covered in “skin” more reminiscent of a plush stuffed animal than a human woman. One account says he was “enraptured” by it all the same; others say he was disappointed. He made several drawings of it, and, according to some reports, eventually destroyed it at a party, either burning it or burying it in his garden. […]But the most public prelude to the modern sex doll was the mannequin-based art created by Surrealists like Man Ray and Salvador Dalí. A work called “Mannequin Street,” featured at the Exposition International du Surréalisme at the Galerie des Beaux-Arts in 1938, included 16 mannequins outfitted by different artists, while Dalí’s “Rainy Taxi” centered on a female mannequin whose half-undressed body was crawling with live snails. Man Ray once claimed that the Surrealists not only infused these works with eroticism but personally “violated” their mannequins.Well? What About Hitler?Immediately thereafter, the article addresses the “persistent urban legend” that blowup dolls in particular originated in Nazi Germany:A persistent urban legend holds that Adolf Hitler charged one of his SS commanders to design sex dolls for German soldiers during World War II, to prevent them from slaking their lust with non-Aryan women. Whether or not this is true, the commercial sex doll does find its origins in Germany. The Bild Lilli doll—invented in the 1950s and modeled on a sexy, outspoken comic-strip character called Lilli—was an 11.5 inch plastic model, not a penetrable sex doll. In his book The Sex Doll: A History, Anthony Ferguson calls the Bild Lilli “a pornographic caricature.” Although it was marketed to adult men, the doll is widely cited as the inspiration for Barbie, so, you know, take that and run with it.It seems that the claim that Hitler or people working on his behalf “invented” blowup dolls had its origins in an undated German-language Bild article. There was no obvious date on the article, but archives of it dated back to 2003.Titled “The Borghild-project – a discreet matter of the [Third Reich],” that piece did not even say Adolf Hitler “invented” the blowup doll. In actuality, a rough translation asserted:The world’s first sexdoll – or ”gynoid” – was built in 1941 by a team of craftsmen from Germanys Hygiene Museum Dresden. The project was supervised by the famous preparator and technician Franz Tschakert. The ”Father of the woman of glass”, which happened to be the sensation in 1930’s II. International Hygiene-Exhibit, used his skills and experience in order to create a kind of doll the world had never seen before.The ”field-hygienic project” was an initiative of Reichsführer SS Heinrich Himmler, who regarded the doll as an ” counterbalance” (or regulating effect )for the sexual drive of his stormtropers. In one his letters, dated 20.11.1940 he mentions the ”unnessessary losses”, the Wehrmacht had suffered in France inflicted by street prostitutes.“The greatest danger in Paris are the wide-spread and uncontrolled whores, picking by clients in bars, dancehalls and other places . It is our duty to prevent soldiers from risking their health, just for the sake of a quick adventure.”The project – called Burghild in the first place – was considered ”Geheime Reichssache” , which was ”more secret than top secret” at the time. Himmler put his commander-in-chief SS-Dr. Joachim Mrurgowsky in charge, the highest ranking officer of Berlins notorious SS-institute.As established previously, sex dolls existed in one form or another well before Hitler. It remains possible that, if the claim was credible, the Nazis elevated sex dolls to the “blowup doll” form seen commonly before RealDolls were invented. However, as the same Bild piece explained:Between June 1940 – 1941 IG Farben had already developed a number of ”skin-friendly polymers” for the SS. Special characteristics : high tensile strength and elasticity. The cast of a suitable model proved to be more difficult.Nothing in the article’s lengthy discussion about the characteristics of the purported sex dolls suggested that they were inflatable. On the contrary, it described bronze molds and hairstyling, suggesting that if the project existed, the dolls were more of a precursor to RealDolls than the inexpensive blowup alternative.No Evidence the Borghild Project Was Real?In June 2005, BoingBoing.com published a post (“Nazi Sex Dolls”), about the rumor that Hitler’s men endeavored to supply soldiers with an alternative to sex workers during World War II. The site aggregated a post on the now-defunct Gawker Media site Fleshbot, reporting:If there were ever a perfect example of a blog post title that violates Godwin’s law, I reckon this is it. Anyway — Fleshbot rounds up links to reports of a Nazi “field-hygienic project” during WWII. Evidently, the idea was to provide soldiers with an inanimate alternative to “disease-spreading” prostitutes.“The doll has only one purpose and she should never become a substitute for the honourable mother at home… When the soldier makes love to Borghild, it has nothing to do with love. Therefore the face of our anthropomorphic sex machine should be exactly like the common wanton’s face.”BoingBoing followed up a couple of weeks after the initial 2005 post with a counterargument. In that post, “Nazi sex doll story: das ist bogus,” the site presents a rebuttal from a reader. It began:It appears that we must toss the previously-blogged tale of Nazi Sex Doll Borghild (Link) on the dungheap of internet hoaxdom.The first line of the letter yielded a clue about the rumor’s trajectory, and that the appearance and disappearance of various iterations buried the origins of the rumor:I came across the story about these dolls about a year ago [in 2004] after a Canadian researcher sent an email around asking whether anyone knew anything about this doll apart from what it said on the (now mostly defunct) site borghild.de.Subsequently, letter-writer Rochus Wolff explained:Independently of each other, Jens Baumeister and I have concluded from the information available to us, that the “Borghild” story is quite probably a fake. (The German posting on my research is here. Jens has posted his results here. Some of his findings are translated here: Link).The main problems with “Borghild” are:So in the end it seems like the Nazis were not, after all, planning to equip their soldiers with sex dolls. That hardly comes as a surprise.TL;DRA viral July 2020 Facebook post urged users to Google “who invented blowup dolls,” a directive returning a highlighted-by-Google result indicating that person was “Adolf Hitler.” But sex dolls were in existence for centuries before World War II, and the claim in its original, heavily disputed form was not that Hitler invented blowup dolls. It was, in fact, that the Nazis tried to develop advanced sex dolls to prevent soldiers from visiting sex workers. Even that appeared to be false, hinging entirely on an early 2000s Bild article which again, did not claim that Hitler invented blowup dolls. The disappearance of source material was such that the claim became a “persistent urban legend,” but the underlying information contradicted it on every level.Comments
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5552
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After cancer treatment, Ginsburg in NY for honorary degree.
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Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg gave University at Buffalo law students a memorable start to the new academic year Monday when she accepted an honorary degree on campus and talked about her dedication to equal rights and the “Notorious R.B.G” nickname.
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true
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Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Supreme courts, Radiation therapy, General News, U.S. Supreme Court, Health, Courts, Buffalo
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The 86-year-old justice recently completed radiation therapy for a cancerous tumor on her pancreas, but said she did not want her health problems to stop her from fulfilling a commitment she made last year to a fellow Cornell University alumnus and lawyer, Wayne Wisbaum, who has since died. “I didn’t know this day would be preceded by three weeks of daily radiation,” Ginsburg said later during an event for the area legal community, “but I said ‘I will not cancel Buffalo.’” The Supreme Court announced Friday that Ginsburg underwent outpatient radiation therapy beginning Aug. 5. It said there is no evidence of the disease remaining. Before a capacity crowd of about 1,700 at UB’s Center for the Arts, the court’s oldest member mused over her celebrity status, evident in “Saturday Night Live” parodies, T-shirts bearing her image, a CNN documentary and the movie, “On the Basis of Sex.” “It was beyond my wildest expectation that I would one day become the notorious R.B.G,” the justice said to applause and cheers while accepting an honorary law degree. She called her contributions to gender equality “exhilarating.” “The progress I have seen in my lifetime makes me optimistic for the future,” Ginsburg told the audience of mostly students and faculty. “Our communities, nation and world will be increasingly improved as women achieve their rightful place in all fields.” Final year law student Abisha Vijayashanthar said she came away inspired. “Are you kidding me? She’s a woman, a legend, the Notorious R.B.G.,” Vijayashanthar said. “I think she gives us hope and that’s exactly what we need today.” Ginsburg was appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1993. Her health is watched closely as the leader of its liberal wing. She has now been treated for cancer four times over the last two decades. Addressing about 2,200 members of the legal community at Kleinhans Music Hall, Ginsburg said she opposed proposals to expand the number of justices on the Supreme Court, referring to it as court-packing, and lamented the bipartisan atmosphere in which judges are confirmed. “I hope one day that there will be people who care about our country, both Democrats and Republicans, who come together and say enough of this dysfunctional legislature,” she said to applause.
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10827
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Women on bone drugs have less colon cancer: study
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Reuters Health quoted Eric Jacobs from the American Cancer Society saying, “The lower risk of colorectal cancer risk seen among bisphosphonate users in this study is intriguing….However, these results should be interpreted with caution and require confirmation by additional studies.” From that point on, the story took a cautious, objective look at the study’s findings. The HealthDay story, by contrast, quoted Dr. Gad Rennert, the study’s lead author, sounding effusive: “These [new] findings are meaningful because they point to a possible protective effect of this class of drugs being relevant to prevention of many different cancers. … This is [similar] to the effect that we and others have shown for [cholesterol-lowering] statins.” From there on, Rennert is allowed to pump up the benefits of these drugs and to sweep aside any concern about their risks or broad application to a large population. The HealthDay story did hit some of our marks, too, but, overall, Reuters Health did a better job putting this study in the proper context. In addition, you can’t judge the stories by their headlines. The Reuters headline, “Women on bone drugs have less colon cancer” is not an accurate overview of the study’s finding. The HealthDay story’s headline gets in right, “Popular bone drugs linked to reduced colon cancer risk.” As this story notes, colorectal cancer is the third leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States and affects roughly 1 out of every 20 people. If there is already a relatively inexpensive preventative measure on the market, this could prove beneficial to millions of people. Because cancer is such a complicated disease, though, reporters need to be extra careful in explaining a study’s findings and its limitations. Current colon cancer screening involves tests, like a colonoscopy, meant to identify pre-cursor lesions called polyps before they go on to cancer or cancers early in their course before they spread. The goal is to prevent future death due to the cancer. This story addresses a different way to prevent cancer – by using a treatment, in this case a medicine that is used to treat osteoporosis, to prevent the development of the precursor polyp and thus the future cancer. So instead of trying to remove things before they cause trouble, this form of prevention is designed to decrease the development of the precursor or cancer in the first place. While appealing conceptually, it isn’t really known whether this actually works. And even if it actually works, questions remain about whether adding it to current prevention efforts like colonoscopies result in fewer cancer deaths and at what cost. It is important to realize that no expert is currently saying that if you take this class of bone medicines, you can stop the colonoscopy or other screening test. The concept is that this is an addition to our current efforts. Taking all of that into considertaion, this story was written with an appropriately cautious tone.
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true
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Cancer,Reuters Health
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Unlike the HealthDay story, this one mentions cost. It says that the drug in question, Fosamax, “costs around $10 per month in the U.S.” Although, of course, the real cost effectiveness would be determining costs in a population that had routine current screening plus the medicine. Then one could determine the relative benefits in terms of decreased cancer and the attendant costs of treatment. The story only presented the benefits in relative percentage terms, saying, “Even after considering other factors tied to the disease — like aspirin or statin use and eating lots of vegetables — their risk was 59 percent lower than that of women who hadn’t taken the drugs.” Again, readers deserve to know the raw numbers here. The story should have said that 138 women in the non-cancer group took biophosphonates and 97 in the cancer group took them, meaning that 41 women appear to have benefited from taking the drugs. If the study had found that 97 women had taken these drugs in both groups, the study would not have made headlines. Also, it might have been helpful to show that there were actually larger differences in some of the other factors that were studied. For example, 120 women in the group of cancer patients had a history of colorectal cancer in the family compared to 75 women in the control group. Neither story quantified the potential harms or any of the side effects found in the study itself. But this story did say, “”The long-term effects are less well-known, however, and in rare cases it can cause bone death of the jaw, which would be important if healthy people were to take it.” It also was the only story to mention that an “earlier study from the UK had found no link between bisphosphonate and colon cancer. Indeed, it found a higher risk of throat cancer in patients on the medication.” The HealthDay story started out with effusive quotes from the lead researcher. The Reuters story right away established that the findings were being met with criticism. The story says in the second sentence, “The finding has them excited about the prospect of using the drugs — called bisphosphonates — to help prevent cancer in healthy people, but other experts are less enthusiastic.” The story then goes on to do a better job explaining the particulars of the study design. It says, “The new work looked at 933 women with colon cancer, whose average age was just over 70. The researchers then found a comparison group of women without the disease, who matched the first group in age, ethnicity and clinics where they received treatment.” Unlike the HealthDay story, this story made note of a similar study that did not show the same level of benefit. It says, “Jacobs of the American Cancer Society added that one earlier study from the UK had found no link between bisphosphonate and colon cancer. Indeed, it found a higher risk of throat cancer in patients on the medication.” The big problem with both stories, though, is that they both fail to point out that this study did not look at 933 women who took the drugs and 933 who did not. Of those 1,866 women, only 97 of the cancer patients took the drugs, and only 138 of the women without cancer had taken them. So, yes, the researchers were able to find what appears to be a statistically significant risk reduction, but they also found differences in physical activity, body mass index, vegetable intake and the use of statins and aspirin. The study highlights the biophosphonate connection, but the story should have explained why a difference of 41 women without cancer taking these drugs out of a total of nearly 2,000 would be enough evidence to get really excited about. Also, evaluating the quality of the evidence requires acknowledging this type of study can only assess relative risk. It cannot provide an assessment of the absolute benefit of using the medicine vs. not using it. This is a key limitation of the study design. This type of study can only identify if a relationship may exist between the medicine and colon cancer. It can’t say how big the effect is. That requires a different type of study. So evaluating the quality of the evidence involves acknowledging the relationship between the medicine and less cancer. This study cannot determine whether this relationship is “real” or truly measure the magnitude of the benefit. Here is where both stories fell flat by not discussing the huge limitations of trying to control for differences between women who took the medicine and those who didn’t. We know that people who engage in preventive behaviors such as taking a bisphosphonate may also engage in other healthy behaviors that may relate to lower risk of cancer. So it may not be the bisphosphonate but rather another factor not controlled for that distinguishes patients who took the medicine from those who didn’t. That is the real factor that influences the quality of the evidence. Clearly the Reuters story did a better job here, but it too missed this point. Neither story engaged in disesae mongering, but the Reuters story did a better job of explaining the scope of the disease. It said, “According to the American Cancer Society, one in 19 men develops colorectal cancer at some point, and slightly fewer women do. The disease is the third leading cause of cancer deaths in the U.S.” Both stories only quoted one outside source: Eric Jacobs of the American Cancer Society. But the Reuters Health story made better use of his comments and did not allow the lead author to go unchallenged with some of his more sweeping comments. Both this story and the HealthDay story ended with Jacobs from the American Cancer Society helping put the findings in context. In this story, he made a more forceful statement, saying “Based on current evidence, bisphosphonates should not be used for prevention of colorectal cancer.” Then, he said the same thing that he said in the HealthDay story: “Fortunately, there are proven ways to help prevent colorectal cancer. In particular, all Americans, 50 or older, should get a screening test so that precancerous polyps can be detected and removed before they turn into cancer.” This story is clear on the drugs’ availability. It says that the drug studied was “mainly the drug alendronate (Fosamax)”. This story made it clear that the findings are part of a series of findings, some of them contradictory, about the side benefits of different drugs for cancer prevention. The story didn’t rely on a news release.
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9554
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New day' in lung cancer as Merck drug shines, works with chemo
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lung cancer illustration Non-small cell lung cancer is a hard disease to treat. A newer immunotherapy drug developed by Merck & Co and called Keytruda—which activates a patient’s immune system to fight the disease—has been shown in a clinical trial to stop the disease’s progression for a longer period of time than does standard chemotherapy treatment, but only in a select group of patients with certain biomarkers. A smaller clinical trial that gave patients (without biomarkers) both drug and chemotherapy treatments and also shrank tumors and slowed disease progression is heralded as the first to demonstrate the relative efficacy of that combination. This Reuters story shares this good news but didn’t explain the specifics: That Keytruda halted cancer progression by only about four months compared to the chemo group. It also didn’t state how much those extra months will impact the patient–financially and in quality of life; adverse events in the trials are glossed over. Lastly, its “new day” headline and overall optimistic tone may mislead some people into thinking the drug offers lengthy survival (or even a cure) for anyone with this type of often-lethal cancer; instead this reference is to the fact that patients will now get tested for certain genetic biomarkers to see if immunotherapy is the better targeted therapy. How many people with this type of cancer have these biomarkers–and will therefore benefit–isn’t stated. [Editor’s note: Some of the concerns with this story are recurring ones we’ve seen in both news releases and news articles on immunotherapy drugs. They are discussed in more detail in our tips for writing accurately about cancer immunotherapy drugs.] The desperation of cancer patients with few treatment options makes them highly sensitive to any information that hints at possible treatments. These positive drug trials may be good news to someone measuring life in months, but they need as much context as a writer can provide to help patients and their doctors evaluate options.
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mixture
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immunotherapy,Keytruda
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Cost is not discussed, even though the FDA approved Keytruda for advanced, non-small cell lung cancer treatment in 2015. The story summarizes findings of clinical study results, all of them positive. But what is a reader to make of relative risk claims such as the treatment “halved the risk of disease progression and cut overall deaths by 40%” compared to standard chemotherapy treatment? What does this mean in actual terms? One story disseminated by Targeted Oncology and also apparently stemming from the Copenhagen oncology conference where these results were reported, noted that the “estimated 6-month overall survival (OS) rate was 80.2% with pembrolizumab (Keytruda) versus 72.4% with chemotherapy.” And when it came to risk of disease progression, the median “length of progression-free survival was 10.3 months with pembrolizumab versus 6.0 months with chemotherapy.” Both chemotherapy and immunotherapy carry risks. But the story doesn’t discuss the general potential harms of either, nor what was reported in the study. As the NEJM study offered up, “serious treatment-related adverse events occurred in a similar percentage of patients in the pembrolizumab (Keytruda) group and the chemotherapy group (21.4% and 20.7%, respectively).” And, “discontinuation of treatment because of treatment-related adverse events occurred in 7.1% of patients in the pembrolizumab group and in 10.7% of patients in the chemotherapy group.” These serious adverse events included diarrhea and pneumonitis in the Keytruda group, and anemia, fatigue, and decreased appetite in the chemo group (among other events). Some independent commentary on how these drugs impact quality of life–especially for very sick patients with advanced cancer–would have been very useful. The story does note that these results stem from clinical trials. But the text provides few details about the size of the trials or about their design or limitations. For example, study participants were pre-screened and had to meet the criteria of having previously untreated non-small cell lung cancer along with several very specific genetic characteristics, such as “PD-L1 expression on at least 50% of tumor cells.” What percentage of patients meet these criteria in general is not given. This story did not disease monger. Non-small cell lung cancer is an often lethal disease. This story just barely scores a Satisfactory rating on this one. It is clear that Merck & Co. is funding this research. A couple of sources are overtly linked to the company. A third, Dr. Stefan Zimmerman, appears to be independent, though he wasn’t quoted saying anything that helped illuminate the findings, instead he’s quoted as saying “Remember this day. It’s a new day for lung cancer treatment.” Some additional commentary from an oncologist or a patient advocate would likely have helped put the findings in perspective. The primary message of this story is that Keytruda is superior to standard chemotherapy, as well as to another immunotherapy drug, marketed by Bristol-Myers Squibb, which was also approved by the FDA in 2015. The story says: “U.S. regulators are expected to decide whether to approve Keytruda for first-line non-small cell lung cancer, the most common type, by Dec. 24.” But it doesn’t explain how that’s different from it’s already approved use for advanced non-small cell lung cancer. The story establishes that these findings reveal that immunotherapy works better when patients are prescreened for a specific genetic marker known as PD-L1, versus giving it to anyone with this type of cancer. It also explains that the smaller second trial, mixing Keytruda with chemotherapy, was “the first time that a combination of immunotherapy and chemotherapy has been shown to work in a randomized Phase II study.” This story apparently stems from a European oncology conference and a newly published study in the New England Journal of Medicine. The resources available to journalists at the conference–news release? press conference?–are not clear. But it’s clear from the quotes in the story that at least some original reporting went into the piece.
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6033
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Mozambique recovers from cyclone, fights threat of cholera.
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A battered notebook lists the people still alive in this village after a devastating cyclone. But sip by sip, a deadly threat remains.
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true
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Africa, Health, Mozambique, Cholera, International News
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Nearly a month after Cyclone Idai made landfall and unleashed flooding that reached the tops of trees, more than 1,300 people in Bopira have been drinking from the local pond and whatever the muddy waters left behind, including the contents of flooded latrines. The conditions are ripe for deadly disease. Already a cholera outbreak has been declared in the regional city of Beira, many of whose half-million residents live in slums, and in a few outlying communities where scores of thousands of people now huddle in displacement camps with few toilets and little clean water. Confirmed cases of the acute diarrheal disease quickly shot from five when it was declared on March 27 into the hundreds and currently is above 3,100, with six deaths. Now health workers are holding their breath, encouraged by a rapid response in Beira and the restoration of running water there, though it reaches only 60 percent of the city’s residents and some must defecate openly in slums. “I’m quite optimistic. Yes, honestly,” Julien Graveleau, a cholera specialist with the United Nations who coordinates the post-cyclone water and sanitation relief effort, told The Associated Press. “Of course, the numbers will be increasing but I believe we’re ready for it.” Plenty of challenges lie ahead. “We have seen one today,” Graveleau said of his visit to Bopira, where he demonstrated how to use a shipment of water filters. But in a week or so the effects of a huge cholera vaccination campaign should start to be seen, he said. Nearly 900,000 oral cholera vaccines arrived in Beira last week for a mass vaccination that Doctors Without Borders calls “the most ambitious campaign ever conducted using the one-dose oral cholera vaccine strategy.” The vaccine is normally given in two spaced-out doses but the aid group asserts that one dose is effective in emergencies where it can be difficult to find people for the second. A single dose offers six months of coverage. Now hundreds of vaccine promoters are said to be active in Beira and elsewhere, messaging with megaphones or handing out the doses in high-traffic areas. Cholera is endemic in Mozambique, a hotspot in Africa along with parts of Congo, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe, and many people are familiar with purification tablets and other precautions. At the popular Shoprite grocery, people knocked back the doses like shots in a bar and walked on. More than 70 percent of the vaccines had been administered as of Sunday morning, Mozambique’s health ministry said. “We were prepared really for the worst,” said Francisca Baptista da Silva, a project coordinator for Doctors Without Borders, which operates cholera treatment centers and oral rehydration centers. “But for the moment we are controlling it.” She spoke at a cholera treatment center in the worn-down Beira neighborhood of Pioneros, where fetid pools of water remained in the streets and a young woman balancing a bucket of water from a nearby tap stepped carefully around the gray mud. “It’s a big problem,” said Rosa Zimbane, who was selling bottled water outside the treatment center and reported herself healthy so far. An ambulance carrying two women with small children was parked at the entrance. Treatment for cholera can be simple rehydration but it must come quickly, as the disease can kill within hours. More severe cases need intravenous drips, and inside the center more than a dozen people lay on beds with strategically placed holes, with two buckets at the ready. One was for vomiting. This cholera outbreak is more complicated for people with HIV in a country where some 13 percent of people have the virus, a prevalence considered very high. The cholera treatment centers are not normally equipped for people with immune systems weakened by HIV, and many people stopped receiving regular care after the cyclone, da Silva said. Now the cholera treatment centers have basic stocks of antiretroviral drugs and basic testing for depressed immune systems, said Dr. Katrien Duquet at the Pioneros center. Overall the medical charity had been expecting more cholera cases, project coordinator da Silva said. “It never spiked to the level we thought.” Such spikes occur two to three weeks after an outbreak. The dry season that begins in the coming weeks is expected to help contain the disease across the region. And yet health workers are not relaxing. Outlying areas like the riverside town of Buzi, where disease surveillance is much weaker, remain a concern. “People are still afraid of cholera,” da Silva said. “We are not claiming this is over.” ___ Associated Press photographer Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi in Beira, Mozambique, contributed.
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10428
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Science working to create workable, safe blood substitutes
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"It does not delve as deeply into the evidence behind some of these blood substitutes as we would have liked. Nor does it always identify conflicts of interest where appropriate. Overall, though, it is a balanced and thoughtful look at the topic. As the story notes, blood shortages can magnify the effects of a disaster like the tsunami and volcano eruption in Indonesia this month. A recent study in Prehospital & Disaster Medicine found that if there were a major earthquake to hit Tehran — one of the largest cities in the world — ""a shortage of blood was estimated to surge the capacity of all blood transfusion posts around the country within first three days"". Researchers estimated that the demands for blood could outpace supply by as much as eight times. If a successful blood substitute were found it could have a huge impact on emergency medicine and in other areas. That’s why the topic needs the kind of attention to detail that this story brought to the descriptions of blood and its substitutes with some additional critical analysis of the evidence."
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true
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"This is a big omission in the story. Given the ongoing shortages of blood, the costs to healthcare delivery systems continue to escalate. A readily available alternative to what is in reality an organ transplant would be welcome especially if the costs of the product were competitive with blood. Especially in a low-resource setting, like Haiti or Indonesia, blood substitutes would need to make good financial sense to even be considered an option. Certainly these companies have some rough estimates on what a final product might cost. Given the stage of development, it is not likely that an exact market price could be identified, but some range of possible costs would have been importnat information to include. No benefits were quantifed in the story, which was disappointing given all the great descriptions of the way blood works and the way these products interact with the body. Instead phrases were used such as, ""The hemoglobin substitute appeared to do a better job of delivering oxygen, and there were no worrisome side effects, O’Callaghan says."" That’s not good enough for readers to understand whether these products truly have value and a future. The story does quantify some of the harms for some of the blood products discussed, but not all of them. For example, it says ""But 3% of the people treated with PolyHeme had heart attacks — three times as many as in the control group — and the Food and Drug Administration concluded that all hemoglobin-based carriers are dangerous."" When discussing PHER-O2, though, it only says ""breathing in too much oxygen can prompt the release of dangerous free radicals, which can damage cells throughout the body."" But, again, we appreciate how difficult it is to cover all of this for four different products, so we lean toward a satisfactory score on this criterion. The story notes that most of the studies that have examined blood substitutes are company-sponsored and small in scale. It also notes the drawbacks of each approach. We wish the story would have provided more details about the studies’ designs. Discussion of limitations are sparse. This is a tough task in a story that is trying to draw together four different products: PolyHeme, HemoTech, MP40X, and PHER-O2. A sidebar just breaking down the benefits and drawbacks of each might have been helpful. Nonethless, we lean toward a satisfactory score for the reasons we first listed. The story does a great job setting up the reasons for new options in blood transfusions without unduly scaring people — no small feat when a story is all about blood. The story says, ""Every year, 4.5 million Americans receive lifesaving transfusions, according to the New York Blood Center, and 1 in 3 people will need blood at some point in their lifetime. But real blood has many inconveniences. It requires refrigeration, which means ambulances can’t stock it and medics can’t administer it on the battlefield. It goes bad after 42 days. Donor blood must be compatible with the patient’s blood type. And some people refuse transfusions — Jehovah’s Witnesses, for instance, believe the Bible forbids them."" It also makes the critical point that the blood supply is mostly safe in the US but not everywhere else. The story leans a little too heavily on sources who either work for the companies involved or ran studies funded by the companies, and it does not always identify conflicts of interest. It does, though, make it clear which company is backing which product and when someone from a company is being quoted. It only quotes one completely independent outside expert: Dr. Ross Herron, chief medical officer of the Western Division of the American Red Cross in Pomona. We’ll give it the benefit of the doubt. The story does a great job of taking people inside the body to show them how exactly blood works and how these blood substitutes work. Some of the best parts of the story are where the reporter uses descriptive language to bring people right down to the cellular level. ""Red blood cells are basically little dimpled bags full of hemoglobin, the molecule that collects and releases oxygen. So researchers have attempted to build oxygen carriers out of hemoglobin itself. … But outside its little bag, pure hemoglobin is toxic. It tightens blood vessels, leading to high blood pressure and heart attacks. It also causes inflammation, including swelling and fevers."" The story makes it clear that all of these products are under development. All of the blood substitutes are described in a way that makes it clear that they are different from blood itself and from each other. This story goes far beyond any news release."
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18348
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"A law that mandates fingerprinting for gun purchasers is ""a requirement that's reduced gun crimes in the five states where it's the law."
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"The ad said that mandating the fingerprinting of those seeking to purchase a gun is ""a requirement that's reduced gun crimes in the five states where it's the law."" But that’s not a correct description of the statistics. Firearm homicide rates are lower in the five states that have such laws, but experts told us there are no before-and-after comparisons in those states to show that gun-crime rates were ""reduced"" after fingerprinting laws took effect. In addition, the ad refers to ""gun crimes,"" but the supporting data looks specifically at gun homicides, not robberies and assaults committed with guns. The differences in wording are subtle, but at PolitiFact, one of our core principles is that the words used to make political claims matter."
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false
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National, Guns, Marylanders to Prevent Gun Violence Education Fund,
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"With the debate over gun control still simmering, a reader asked us to fact-check an ad on Baltimore TV stations that promotes tough laws on gun purchases. The ad, was put together by Marylanders to Prevent Gun Violence, a group headed by Vincent DeMarco, an adjunct assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. (We have written previously about the Bloomberg School’s role in gun policy research.) The group, whose board is chock full of Maryland political leaders, supported the gun-control bill signed earlier this year by Democratic Gov. Martin O’Malley. The group is now trying to shore up public support as the law faces expected legal challenges from the National Rifle Association and others. The ad focuses on fingerprint licensing laws. Under those laws, a potential gun purchaser must first obtain a license from law enforcement, which includes being fingerprinted, before being able to purchase a handgun. This is currently the law in Connecticut, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York. Here’s the text of the ad, voiced by people identified on screen as a gun owner, a pastor and a mother: ""Something had to be done, and here in Maryland we stood up and joined the governor and the Legislature to pass real solutions that reduce gun violence by getting weapons out of the hands of criminals, with a fingerprint licensing law that 68 percent of gun owners like me support, a requirement that's reduced gun crimes in the five states where it's the law. It will work for Maryland, and it could work for the entire country."" We wondered if the fingerprint laws have ""reduced gun crimes in the five states where it's the law""? By using the term ""reduced,"" the ad is saying that gun crime was high before passage of these laws, and then dropped after they were enacted. But that’s not what the data shows. In fact, there's no data that shows the crimes declined, nor whether the fingerprint laws were the reason. We checked with Daniel W. Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research and a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, which the group has cited as a source. Webster agreed that the text of the ad could have been phrased more carefully. ""It would be more accurate to state that states with fingerprint-verified handgun purchaser licensing have much lower rates of gun homicide than states that do not,"" Webster said. He presented the following data for age-adjusted firearm homicide rates per 100,000 population between 1999 and 2010 for both the U.S. overall and for the five states with fingerprint-verified handgun purchaser licensing. The chart was compiled using data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Firearm homicide rates, 1999-2010 Total Population Non-Hispanic Whites Blacks Large Central Metro Counties United States 3.99 1.48 16.05 6.8 Connecticut 2.25 0.60 10.07 3.0 Hawaii 0.77 0.59 NA NA Massachusetts 1.50 0.40 9.10 6.0 New Jersey 2.74 0.60 12.31 7.8 New York 2.84 0.70 9.49 4.5 All this data shows is that states with the fingerprint law have lower firearm homicide rates, not that the rate fell after enactment of the fingerprint law. ""Most of the laws were passed many decades ago, and there have not been studies to estimate their impact on violent crime,"" Webster said. There is some backhanded support for the ad’s claim in the one state -- Missouri -- that did the reverse when it rescinded its licensing requirement for gun purchasers in 2007. Webster said that following the law’s repeal, gun homicide rates increased by 25 percent between 1999-2007 and 2008-2010. (The Missouri case is analyzed here and here.) There also another problem with the ad’s phrasing: It was imprecise in using the term ""gun crimes."" The supporting data Webster cited refers to firearm homicide rates, which is just one subset of gun crimes. The FBI tracks gun robberies and gun assaults in addition to gun homicides. At least two politicians, O’Malley and Maryland state Sen. Brian Frosh, have been quoted in news reports offering versions of the claim that are more accurate. So how did the ad’s narration get mangled? DeMarco, the group’s president, told PolitiFact that his group ""ran the script of the ad by Prof. Webster before running it and he approved it as accurate."" But Webster responded by telling us that he approved the following language: ""In the five states where fingerprint licensing is currently required for handgun purchases, gun death rates are among the lowest in the nation. According to experts at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, cities in states with handgun purchaser licensing laws have much lower rates of within-state illegal gun trafficking than those without licensing. According to the Center, ‘research suggests that, once implemented, Maryland’s handgun purchaser licensing law will reduce gun trafficking, gun crime, and gun homicides and can serve as a national model for other states.’"" Somewhere along the way, the more accurate language got lost in translation. Our ruling The ad said that mandating the fingerprinting of those seeking to purchase a gun is ""a requirement that's reduced gun crimes in the five states where it's the law."" But that’s not a correct description of the statistics. Firearm homicide rates are lower in the five states that have such laws, but experts told us there are no before-and-after comparisons in those states to show that gun-crime rates were ""reduced"" after fingerprinting laws took effect. In addition, the ad refers to ""gun crimes,"" but the supporting data looks specifically at gun homicides, not robberies and assaults committed with guns. The differences in wording are subtle, but at PolitiFact, one of our core principles is that the words used to make political claims matter."
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9219
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Anesthetic cream best for relieving vaccination pain in infants
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With this release, the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) teases one of its newly published studies that appears to be great news for babies and their parents: the promise of relieving pain from vaccination. Specifically, the news release promotes the idea of educational videos (i.e. for managing infant pain), giving a baby sugar water, and — most effectively, according to a study — spreading lidocaine cream on a baby’s skin before a round of injections. The release would have benefited from a clearer description of what type of lidocaine was used (over-the-counter or one only available with a prescription?) and a discussion of harms and some numbers to back up the benefit claim. Vaccines are easily a doctor’s most powerful tool in saving lives and preventing suffering, especially in young (and more susceptible) children. But they’re no fun for parents or their infants, because intense crying and pain is inevitable, and that might help explain why as many as 1 in 4 adults fear needles and 10% avoid vaccination out of that fear. The authors of the new CMAJ study, as well as those of previous studies, argue that there would be more compliance and better vaccination rates if this pain could be safely and reliably reduced. However, while lidocaine is most often used to numb sunburn, bug bites, and other skin pain, it also receives one of the FDA’s strongest warnings against its use on kids (though for teething pain, not topical skin creams).
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mixture
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Canadian Medical Association Journal,infant vaccination,lidocaine cream
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No dollar signs here, though an over-the-counter tube of lidocaine cream usually costs under $10. We’re not sure from the release if an OTC cream was used or one of the proprietary, prescription-only products. There were no absolute numbers included here, and that’s a big omission. The CMAJ study notes how, per a score of 1-10 on the Modified Behavioral Pain Scale (MBPS) — with 10 being the highest level of pain — an improvement of 0.6 is generally necessary for doctors to change their practice on a procedure. Yet the study showed that the absolute effect of lidocaine cream (plus an educational video and sugar water) on vaccination pain was less, at 0.5. There’s also this: As noted in the comments at a NEJM Journal Watch post, it can take more than an hour for lidocaine creams to make pain relief effective for tissues deeper than the skin (and vaccines are often injected into muscles). For the CMAJ study only about 20 minutes elapsed, since the cream was applied right before parents watched a 20-minute video and taken off immediately afterward. Potential harms weren’t addressed at all. While lidocaine is most often used to numb sunburn, bug bites, and other skin pain, the Mayo Clinic describes it as a last resort for relieving topical pain in kids under the age of 3. Lidocaine can be toxic when ingested by children when used for oral pain relief during teething. The FDA has tracked some cases of seizures and even death linked to use of the drug. The release provides a good summary of the study describing it as a randomized controlled trial of 352 healthy infants who were randomized into four groups. Although the study did not evaluate lidocaine cream alone as one of the four experiment groups, the release does note consistently that the lidocaine was given in combination with other treatment strategies. We didn’t see anything that would cause a reader distress or blow the problem of vaccine injection pain out of proportion. The release does note that Pfizer funded the research, but you’ll only see that listed on a sidebar of the EurekAlert!-hosted version of the news release. The disclosure isn’t included in the release text, meaning it probably won’t be noted in subsequent reprints of the release or many articles launched by the news release. Perhaps more importantly, the release — unlike the study itself — doesn’t disclose that the lead author received a research grant from Pfizer, which makes a lidocaine-containing line of products called Lignocaine. This is an important consideration not only in terms of sponsorship transparency; it also raises the question of whether Lignocaine results can be generalized to other lidocaine products. The release compares a range of methods for alleviating vaccination pain in infants — training parents on how to soothe a child, giving the child sugar water, and applying lidocaine cream. We’re not told the contents of the training video but presumably it focused on holding, verbal soothing and nursing. In its practice guidelines, the CMAJ recommends breastfeeding during a vaccine injection to mitigate pain in infants. Lidocaine creams come in many different over-the-counter products but it’s unclear whether the lidocaine formulation used in the study is the same as one might find over-the-counter, or if it’s EMLA (a cream using equal parts lidocaine and prilocaine) or another prescription product. A randomized controlled trial comparing different methods of pain relief (placebo control, the video, sugar water, and lidocaine in combination with the sugar water and video) appears to be a novel approach to studying pain relief in infants. The release could have done a better job explaining why researchers chose to combine some methods but not test lidocaine alone. There is other published research available on treating “procedural pain” in infants and children, but these are mostly focused on venipuncture. There are many studies on sucrose (but almost all in neonates), some on other soothing actions (presumably what was in the video), and some on topical anesthetics. However, the intramuscular aspect of immunizations may make them different. Nonetheless, many pediatricians already use a topical agent (usually EMLA) for immunizations. Nothing over-the-top here, though we feel the news release’s headline isn’t supported by the release itself, let alone the study.
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7401
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Gene therapy for rare form of blindness wins US approval.
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U.S. health officials on Tuesday approved the nation’s first gene therapy for an inherited disease, a treatment that improves the sight of patients with a rare form of blindness. It marks another major advance for the emerging field of genetic medicine.
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true
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Genetics, Health, Gene therapy, Genetic Frontiers, North America, Science, U.S. News
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The approval for Spark Therapeutics offers a life-changing intervention for a small group of patients with a vision-destroying genetic mutation and hope for many more people with other inherited diseases. The drugmaker said it will not disclose the price until next month, delaying debate about the affordability of a treatment that analysts predict will be priced around $1 million. The injection, called Luxturna, is the first gene therapy approved by the Food and Drug Administration in which a corrective gene is given directly to patients. The gene mutation interferes with the production of an enzyme needed for normal vision. Patients who got the treatment have described seeing snow, stars or the moon for the first time. “One of the best things I’ve ever seen since surgery are the stars. I never knew that they were little dots that twinkled,” said Mistie Lovelace of Kentucky, one of several patients who urged the FDA to approve the therapy at a public hearing in October. Patients with the condition generally start losing their sight before 18, almost always progressing to total blindness. The defective gene that causes the disease can be passed down for generations undetected before suddenly appearing when a child inherits a copy from both parents. Only a few thousand people in the U.S. are thought to have the condition. Luxturna is delivered via two injections — one for each eye — that replace the defective gene that prevents the retina, tissue at the back of the eye, from converting light into electronic signals sent to the brain. The FDA has approved three gene therapies since August, as decades of research into the genetic building blocks of life begin translating into marketable treatments. The previous two are custom-made treatments for forms of blood cancer. Novartis’ Kymriah is priced at $475,000 for a one-time infusion of genetically enhanced cells. Gilead Sciences’ similar treatment, Yescarta, costs $373,000 per treatment. The Philadelphia-based Spark Therapeutics said it will announce its price in early January, but suggested its own analysis put the value of the therapy in the $1-million-dollar range. Key to the company’s reasoning is the assumption that Luxturna will be given once, with lasting benefits. To date, the company has tracked patients enrolled in a key study for as long as four years and hasn’t seen their vision deteriorate. “All the data we have today suggests it’s long-lasting, if not lifelong,” said Spark CEO Jeffrey Marrazzo. Given Luxturna’s FDA approval and strong study results, many experts expect U.S. insurers, including both the federal government and private plans, to cover the treatment. The spate of new genetic therapies marks a boom for a field once plagued by safety concerns. Gene therapy research suffered a setback in 1999 with the death of a patient treated for a rare metabolic disorder at the University of Pennsylvania. In another case, patients treated for an immune disorder later developed leukemia. Dr. David Valle said initial excitement about the wide-ranging possibilities for genetic medicine has given way to a more deliberative approach focused on individual diseases. He applauded researchers at the University of Pennsylvania for decades of work that led to the treatment. “The hype for gene therapy has been without many successes and actually a few failures, so chalk this one up in the win column,” said Valle, a geneticist and pediatrician at Johns Hopkins University, who was not involved in Luxturna’s development. University of Pennsylvania researcher Dr. Jean Bennett said she and her husband, Dr. Albert Maguire, first imagined using genetic medicine to treat retinal blindness in the mid-1980s. But it took decades to develop the science and technology, with the first animal tests in 2000 and the first human trials in 2007. “We didn’t know what genes caused the disease, we didn’t have animal models with those genes, we didn’t have the ability to clone genes and deliver them to the retina — so it took time to develop all that,” said Bennett, an eye specialist. Bennett and Maguire tested the treatment by recording patients’ ability to complete an obstacle course at varying levels of light, simulating real-world conditions. A hallmark of the disorder is difficulty seeing at night. One year after treatment, patients who received the injection showed significant improvements in navigating the obstacle course at low light levels compared to those who did not receive the therapy. Goldman Sachs analyst Salveen Richter predicts Luxturna will cost $500,000 per injection, or $1 million for both eyes. She points out that many current drugs for ultra-rare diseases are priced at $250,000 per year or more, putting their long-term cost over $1 million after several years. But David Mitchell, a cancer patient and advocate for lower drug prices, worries that the cost of genetic therapies won’t be sustainable. “We don’t have unlimited dollars in this country,” said Mitchell, founder of Patients for Affordable Drugs. “You get 50 of these drugs in the system and I don’t know how we will handle it as a country.” ___ Follow Matthew Perrone @AP_FDAwriter ___ This Associated Press series was produced in partnership with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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5020
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More polio cases now caused by vaccine than by wild virus.
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Four African countries have reported new cases of polio linked to the oral vaccine, as global health numbers show there are now more children being paralyzed by viruses originating in vaccines than in the wild.
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true
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Pakistan, AP Top News, Angola, International News, General News, Asia, Africa, Health, United Nations, Central African Republic, Central Africa
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In a report late last week, the World Health Organization and partners noted nine new polio cases caused by the vaccine in Nigeria, Congo, Central African Republic and Angola. Seven countries elsewhere in Africa have similar outbreaks and cases have been reported in Asia. Of the two countries where polio remains endemic, Afghanistan and Pakistan, vaccine-linked cases have been identified in Pakistan. In rare cases, the live virus in oral polio vaccine can mutate into a form capable of sparking new outbreaks. All the current vaccine-derived polio cases have been sparked by a Type 2 virus contained in the vaccine. Type 2 wild virus was eliminated years ago. Polio is a highly infectious disease that spreads in contaminated water or food and usually strikes children under 5. About one in 200 infections results in paralysis. Among those, a small percentage die when their breathing muscles are crippled. Donors last week pledged $2.6 billion to combat polio as part of an eradication initiative that began in 1988 and hoped to wipe out polio by 2000. Since then, numerous such deadlines have been missed. To eradicate polio, more than 95% of a population needs to be immunized. WHO and partners have long relied on oral polio vaccines because they are cheap and can be easily administered, requiring only two drops per dose. Western countries use a more expensive injectable polio vaccine that contains an inactivated virus incapable of causing polio. The Independent Monitoring Board, a group set up by WHO to assess polio eradication, warned in a report this month that vaccine-derived polio virus is “spreading uncontrolled in West Africa, bursting geographical boundaries and raising fundamental questions and challenges for the whole eradication process.” The group said officials were already “failing badly” to meet a recently approved polio goal of stopping all vaccine-derived outbreaks within 120 days of detection. It described the initial attitude of WHO and its partners to stopping such vaccine-linked polio cases as “relaxed” and said “new thinking” on how to tackle the problem was needed. ___ This story has been corrected to show that of the two polio-endemic countries, Afghanistan and Pakistan, only Pakistan has reported vaccine-derived polio cases.
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106
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South Korean retailer drops flavored liquid e-cigarettes.
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South Korea’s top convenience store chain suspended the sale of flavored liquid e-cigarettes made by U.S. company Juul Labs on Thursday, a day after the government warned the public to stop using such products citing fatalities in the United States.
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true
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Health News
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The GS25 chain halted sales of three of Juul Labs’ products including “tropical” - the equivalent of mango in the United States - and one made by South Korean company KT&G, store parent company GS Retail said. The firm would consider dropping all liquid e-vaping products if an ongoing government investigation found them to be dangerous, it added. Juul Labs said it “considers user safety as the top priority in product development” and its products provide an alternative to traditional cigarettes. “Juul Labs is hoping to have dialogue with GS25 officials continuously and provide an alternative option for adult smokers in the country,” Juul Labs said in a statement. KT&G said it would follow the government’s policy direction. Countries around the world have been pulling electronic cigarette products from markets and restricting advertising as vaping faces increased scrutiny. South Korean Health Minister Park Neung-hoo cited cases of lung injuries associated with e-cigarettes in the United States as he warned of a “serious risk to public health” on Thursday. U.S. health officials have so far reported 33 deaths and 1,479 confirmed and probable cases from a mysterious respiratory illness tied to vaping.
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33406
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Leah Remini found out during a phone prank Ellen DeGeneres' show that her husband was cheating on her.
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Johnson & Johnson said on Thursday it will start adding the price of its medicines to television commercials by next month, becoming the first drugmaker to heed a call by U.S. President Donald Trump for price transparency of drugs advertised directly to consumers on TV.
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false
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Entertainment, ASP Article, Broadcast Legends, ellen degeneres
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The healthcare conglomerate said it will include both the list price of a product - the price before any rebates or discounts to insurers or pharmacy benefit managers - as well as potential out-of-pocket costs that patients will pay. The move, announced in a statement on J&J’s website, won swift praise from U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar. Last May, Azar’s office released a blueprint for reducing the cost of drug prices, which included a proposal to require disclosure of list prices in TV ads for drugs. “We commend Johnson & Johnson for recognizing the value of informing consumers about list prices and for doing so voluntarily. We call on other manufacturers to follow their lead,” Azar said in a statement. Trump made lowering the cost of prescription drugs for U.S. consumers a central issue of the 2016 presidential campaign and emphasized it again in his State of the Union Address this week. Ads for the blood thinner Xarelto, J&J’s most widely prescribed medicine, will be the first television spot to include pricing information, the company said. The treatment used to prevent blood clots costs about $450 to $540 a month. Congress has increased its scrutiny of U.S. drug pricing since Democrats took over control of the House of Representatives in January, while pressure is also coming from the Republican-led Senate. Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Democratic Senator Ron Wyden, ranking member of the committee, on Monday invited executives from seven pharmaceutical companies, including J&J, to testify at a Feb. 26 hearing on rising drug prices.
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26365
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“First volunteer in UK coronavirus vaccine trial has died.”
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Elisa Granato, the first volunteer to be injected in a COVID-19 vaccine trial in Europe, is “100% alive.”
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false
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Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Bloggers,
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"As scientists race to develop a vaccine against COVID-19, a screenshot of a frightening headline has been shared on social media. ""First volunteer in UK coronavirus vaccine trial has died,"" it says above an image of a woman smiling as a health care worker appears to place a small bandage on her upper arm. An April 25 Facebook post sharing the image was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) The screenshot comes from a WordPress blog called News NT. ""Elisa Granato, the first volunteer who availed herself in Oxford for a jab in the first Europe human trial of a vaccine to protect against the coronavirus pandemic has died,"" the story says. ""She died two days after the vaccine was administered, authorities have said and added that an investigation into the cause of the death has been initiated."" Elisa Granato is a real person. She is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford’s zoology department. But as her Twitter bio says, she’s ""100% alive."" The image in the Facebook post is authentic, and shows Granato after she was injected as part of a coronavirus vaccine at the University of Oxford. She was the first of more than 800 people who were recruited for the first human trial in Europe of a coronavirus vaccine, according to the BBC. Granato, who was the first volunteer to be injected, told the BBC: ""I’m a scientist, so I wanted to try to support the scientific process wherever I can."" The Department of Health and Social Care in the United Kingdom also used Twitter to dispel misinformation about Granato’s death. ""News circulating on social media that the first volunteer in a UK #coronavirus vaccine trial has died is completely untrue,"" the April 26 tweet says. That same day, Fergus Walsh, a medical correspondent for the BBC, tweeted that he spoke to Elisa Granato over Skype and that ""she is very much alive and she told me she is feeling ‘absolutely fine.’"" In a video clip Walsh tweeted of Granato, she says, ""I’m very much alive, thank you."" The University of Oxford has said that any updates about its COVID-19 vaccine trial will appear on its website. ""We are aware there have been and will be rumours and reports about the progress of the trial,"" an April 26 post on the site says. ""We urge people not to give these any credibility and to not circulate them."" Considering the attention paid to the fake news about her death, Granato’s actual passing would have certainly drawn media coverage. But as we prepared to publish this fact-check, the most recent report we could find about her was a May 5 story in the Oxford Student, a student newspaper at Oxford. It quotes Granato saying she was randomly chosen as the first person to be vaccinated, resulting in ""a lot of attention from the media, countless emails from all over the world and — sadly — some pretty vicious online attacks by individuals and groups opposed to vaccines."""
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3054
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Fake frogs in school dissections eliminate gross-out-factor.
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It’s a rite of passage in schools across the U.S.: frog dissection.
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true
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Animals, Frogs, General News, Florida, Tampa, Animal rights, Science
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Sometimes it happens in middle school, sometimes in high school. Feelings about the lesson are generally summed up in one word: gross. The frogs are slimy and greenish-grey, and they stink because they’re pickled in formaldehyde. One Florida high school recently tried to eliminate the gross-out factor by using fake, yet highly realistic, frogs. The school and the company that makes the synthetic frogs — not to mention animal rights groups like PETA — hope this will change how dissections are handled in classrooms across the country. “The experience is all about understanding the relationship between organs, what they look like, what they feel like,” said Chris Sakezles, the founder and CEO of Syndaver Labs, a Tampa company that also makes synthetic human cadavers and other life-like human and animal body parts. “We do that without the ethical concerns about having to kill an animal. Without exposing them to biohazards.” J.W. Mitchell High School in New Port Richey was, according to PETA and school officials, the first in the world to try out the new technology. The school sits about a half hour north of Tampa, where Syndaver’s labs are located, and the partnership started not with a frog, but a bunny. School Principal Jessica Schultz had brought her pet rabbit to a veterinarian who happened to also work with Syndaver. They got to talking about frog dissection and the company’s work with synthetic animals for veterinary students. Eventually, Schultz brought some of her students to Syndaver and they created lesson plans around the synthetic frogs. In late November, her students dissected the first of the fake frogs. They cut the skin and extracted the anatomically correct organs. “Kids went to town, to be quite honest,” said Schultz. “We had kids that literally deboned the fake frogs.” Said Miah Ulibarri, a 17-year-old junior: “I was actually scared to cut it because I kept thinking about cutting into a real frog.” Ulibarri started the year knowing she’d have to dissect something for her forensic science class, and she wasn’t looking forward to it. Students could opt out, Schultz said, and many often did during the dissection day. “Just let the animal be,” Ulibarri said. “Why kill them on purpose to dissect them?” Another student, 17-year-old senior Nail Koney-Laryea, said the frogs had a startlingly realistic look and feel to them. They were still slimy, and a squeeze of the leg yields a fragile bone inside. When kids cut inside the breastbone and stomach, they were able to see individual organs. Unlike real frogs, the delicate organ tissue didn’t dissolve and explode. “If you blindfolded me before I touched it, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference,” said Koney-Laryea, who noted that several students had opted out of dissecting fetal pigs, frogs, and rats in previous classes due to moral disagreements with cutting open an animal that was once alive. Schultz said no students opted out of the dissection unit with the fake frog. “We have to find ways to engage students with more interactive lessons and more relevant material,” she said. The barrier to widespread use of fake frogs could be the cost: Each frog is about $150, and PETA helped fund part of this project. But Syndaver’s Sakezles said they’re trying to whittle that price down through automated production and recycling of materials. If the kids don’t debone the frogs, the skeleton and body can be stuffed with new organs, sewn up and re-used. Real frogs cost about $10 each. “It’s a wonderful substitution for a student who would opt out of a real dissection,” said Beth Allan, a University of Central Oklahoma biology professor and president-elect of the National Science Teachers Association. She has concerns about the cost, saying only wealthier schools could afford to buy $150 frogs, and hopes the price tag will eventually come down. “A synthetic frog is one more step, and a positive step, to provide good high quality materials for students.” Sakezles says his company is developing fetal pigs, rats and other animals for classroom dissection. “The plan is to completely replace the use of real animals,” he said.
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4037
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Heath officials report first 2019 shellfish poisoning case.
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Alaska health officials are reporting the year’s first case of paralytic shellfish poisoning.
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true
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Health, Poisoning, General News, Alaska
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The Department of Health and Social Services reports a person experienced PSP symptoms after eating a clam harvested near Perryville on the Alaska Peninsula. The symptoms can include tingling of the lips and tongue within minutes of eating a toxic shellfish. Symptoms may progress to tingling of fingers and toes and the loss of muscle control in the arms and legs followed by difficulty breathing. The department says some people experience a sense of floating or nausea. If chest and abdomen muscles become paralyzed, death can occur within hours. In the past month, high PSP toxin levels have been detected in shellfish collected from Chignik Lagoon, Chignik Bay, King Cove and Sand Point.
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29476
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You should avoid eating green potatoes because they are poisonous.
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What's true: Green potatoes contain a natural toxin called solanine. What's false: You are unlikely to ingest enough solanine from eating green potatoes to do you any serious harm.
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false
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Food, Odd Ingredients, potatoes
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The potato, the ultimate comfort food in Western society, has a disturbing secret. This trustworthy old friend so often invited to our tables can, at times, slip us a little bit of poison. The potato — or, rather, green versions of it — contains a natural toxin called solanine. The greenish hue that should warn you away from such spuds is actually chlorophyll, but its presence indicates concentrations of solanine are present in the tuber. A glycoalkaloid poison found in species of the nightshade, solanine is a nerve toxin produced in the green part of the potato (the leaves, the stem, and any green spots on the skin). This bitter poisonous crystalline alkaloid is part of the plant’s defenses against insects, disease, and predators. Potato leaves and stems are naturally high in glycoalkaloids, so ingestion of these parts of the plant should be avoided. Solanine develops in potatoes when spuds are subjected to light or either very cold or very warm temperatures. The toxin interferes with the body’s ability to use a particular chemical that facilitates the transmission of impulses between cells. Ingested in large enough amounts, it can cause vomiting, diarrhea, headaches, and even paralysis of the central nervous system. However, unless you are deliberately seeking out green potatoes to eat, you are unlikely to ingest enough of the toxin to do harm. The potatoes we buy contain such a minute amount of the chemical that a healthy adult would have to eat about 4-1/2 pounds at one sitting to experience any neurological symptoms. Ergo, don’t worry about having the occasional green potato chip, but do discard any potatoes that have green eyes, sprouts, or greenish skins, rather than prepare and serve them, especially to children. (Children’s smaller body size makes them more susceptible to ill effects.) Contemporary lore contains a well-traveled tale that expounds on a different danger a green potato might pose: During the 1976 Soweto uprising, a bunch of township youths paint a potato green. As an armoured car rolls past them, with a soldier sitting in the turret, they lob the “grenade” into the car. All the soldiers inside scramble out, sans weapons, and the youths leap in and commandeer the vehicle. The story is, naturally, hushed up by the authorities. As to whether the preceding is a true story, as noted South African folklorist Arthur Goldstuck said of it: “This story is uniquely 1970s South African. Or 1960s Saigon. Or 1940s France.”
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15745
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"Not a single unarmed white person has been shot by the police"" in New York in about 45 years."
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"Lebowitz said, ""Not a single unarmed white person has been shot by the police"" since she has lived in New York. This was a bear of fact-check to wrestle to the ground, in part because of the lack of cooperation from the New York Police Department, in part because we were looking at a time period that spanned about 45 years, and in part because it is clear that African-Americans and Hispanics were clearly shot at by New York police much more than whites. All that said, an analysis of police data show police shot dozens of unarmed white people during the early 1970s, the early side of Lebowitz’s life in New York City. While we wish we had complete data on police shootings by each victim’s race and armed status for the 1980s on, we don’t necessarily need it to judge Lebowitz’s particular statement. It is very accurate to say blacks are shot at more often by police than whites. But that is not what Lebowitz said. She said ""not a single unarmed white person has been shot,"" and that is not true."
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false
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Crime, Public Safety, PunditFact, Fran Lebowitz,
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"Don’t get sardonic New York City writer Fran Lebowitz started on Rudy Giuliani. She is no fan of the former New York mayor and conservative pundit, especially after he loudly questioned President Barack Obama’s love for the United States. HBO host Bill Maher got an earful on the subject when he invited Lebowitz to appear in a panel about Giuliani’s rhetoric. Lebowitz said the explanation for Giuliani’s remarks is simple: His policies have been racist since his first election when he campaigned on a nostalgic 1950s-era platform, and this racism extended to longstanding disparate treatment of blacks and whites by the New York Police Department. ""When Giuliani was the mayor, every five minutes an unarmed black guy was shot in the back. Constantly, you know, and it was always a different excuse from the cops,"" she said. "" ‘He had something in his hand, I thought it was a gun.’ It was a candy bar. ‘He had something in his hand, I thought it was a gun.’ It was a keychain."" Maher said, ""Well, that hasn't changed, and that's not just New York."" ""In the entire time I've lived in New York, which has been many decades, not a single unarmed white person has been shot by the police,"" Lebowitz said. ""Not one. Not one. You think the odds would be? Not one. So that is the reason they're shot, period."" Lebowitz made two claims — that ""every five minutes an unarmed black guy was shot in the back,"" and ""not a single unarmed white person has been shot by the police"" in the entire time Lebowitz has lived in New York. A reader asked us to hone in on the second claim, brushing off the first as hyperbole. Contacting Lebowitz Lebowitz moved to New York City from New Jersey sometime in the late 1960s. Our rough math: She was born in 1950, and this New York Times profile says she moved there after high school. So, to Lebowitz, an unarmed white person has not been shot by New York police in at least about 45 years. We reached her through representatives at the Steven Barclay Agency. Sara Bixler told PunditFact, ""Fran Lebowitz tells me that to her knowledge, this is true — she meant it non-hyperbolically. She said that if she is wrong, she would like to know, of course."" No simple data The difficulty in judging Lebowitz's statement is that there is no comprehensive database that details police shootings across the country, much less New York City. That means there is no go-to source that shows shootings by race and whether those shot were unarmed or armed. Reporting to the FBI is optional, and most of the country’s 18,000 law enforcement agencies choose not to report. The gap in data gained prominence after last fall’s shooting of Michael Brown by officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Mo. The New York Police Department likely can prove Lebowitz right or wrong. But the agency ignored our calls and emails spread out over more than five weeks. Our request was ""under consideration"" six days after the first email we sent Feb. 25. NYPD did not respond to our March 26 query for information. An early 1970s study So what information is available? We located a study of NYPD officer shootings from 1971 to 1975 by James J. Fyfe. His study, ""Shots Fired,"" spans 700 pages and relies on access to detailed NYPD shooting incident records. Fyfe broke down the shootings by race and by weapon. More than half of the black residents who were shot by police were carrying a handgun, compared to 48 percent of Hispanics and 32 percent of whites. The white ""opponents,"" as Fyfe calls them, were more likely to be shot while not carrying a weapon or while using physical force. Crucially for this fact-check, Fyfe's data show 56 whites were unarmed when police shot at them during those years (1971-75), and another 34 whites were shot when using physical force. Of the more than 1,800 primary opponents of police shootings during those years, 19 percent were white, 58 percent were black, and 23 percent were Hispanic. ""She is simply wrong about unarmed whites ‘never’ being shot,"" said David Klinger, a University of Missouri St. Louis criminology professor who tracks police use of deadly force around the country. However, Fyfe’s report does include holes pivotal to our specific question. We can’t drill down on the circumstances in which the white residents ended up getting shot at by police. Racial categories are also very difficult to assess sometimes. And we can't ask Fyfe, who died in 2006. ""Is a Spanish-speaking white person ‘Hispanic’ and thus non-white? Are English-speaking biracial people from immigrant backgrounds non-white?"" said Candace McCoy, City University of New York criminology professor (McCoy and Fyfe were married). ""New York is so incredibly diverse. It's hard to find people who are unequivocally what we consider as ‘white’ sometimes."" What NYPD data says and doesn’t say NYPD has released an annual report outlining officers’ firearm discharges since 1971. That was a particularly brutal year for both shootings of cops (47 injured, 12 killed) as well as the number of people shot and killed by police (221 injured, 93 people killed). Those numbers have fallen substantially since the 1970s. In 2013, the latest year for which data is available, three officers were shot and none was killed, and officers shot 17 people and killed eight. We found several, but not all, reports online. And of the ones we found, many did not include critical racial data. The last chart in the appendix of recent reports outlines ""intentional discharges"" of firearms during adversarial conflicts, as well as the race and age of the person involved. Most often, this is when an officer shoots at a person armed with a gun in self-defense, though there are also categories for shootings of subjects with imitation firearms, threat or use of knives and other cutting objects, blunt instruments, or a final category called ""use/threaten the use of overwhelming physical force."" ""Overwhelming physical force"" covers times when an unarmed person physically attacks or threatens to attack an officer, such as gang assaults, pushing an officer from a roof or subway train platform, or trying to take the officer’s firearm. We compiled the following chart, filling in blanks for the number of whites shot each year and how many were unarmed if reports were available online. We could only go back to 1995. As you can see, many did not have the information we need. Year Number of whites shot Number whites unarmed 2013 2 0 2012 3 0 2011 7 0 2010 5 0 2009 0 0 2008 2 0 2007 2 unknown 2006 no race data kept 2005 no race data kept 2004 no race data kept 2003 no race data kept 2002 no race data kept 2001 no race data kept 2000 no race data kept 1999 no race data kept 1998 no race data kept 1997 26 unknown 1996 32 unknown Some observations after scouring the NYPD reports: • Whites are shot at less frequently than blacks and Hispanics. • The whites who were shot at by police were allegedly carrying a firearm, a blunt weapon, imitation gun, threatening others with weapons, or using their vehicles as weapons. • And most importantly in this quest, several years’ reports did not include information on the race of the victim. The last point was a bone of contention with the New York Civil Liberties Union, which in 2008 complained before the city council about the police not reporting the race of victims since 1998. The department was, however, reporting on the breed of dogs its officers shot. ""That the department is providing more information about the dogs it is shooting at than people who are its intended targets is deeply disturbing and must be connected,"" the NYCLU said. We will note that these years cover some of Giuliani’s mayoral tenure from 1994 to 2001. The department has offered more descriptive accounting of officer-involved shootings in recent years after pressure from the NYCLU and media coverage. Other ideas We searched news articles from New York and found no case that explicity fits Lebowitz's criteria. We also consulted several experts on criminology and police shooting statistics looking for additional information. James Acker, a University of Albany-SUNY College of Criminal Justice professor, pointed us to a New York Daily News investigation that found in 179 officer-involved shootings, 86 percent of victims when race was known were either black or Hispanic. But we still do not know what percentage were white with certainty and whether they were armed. Fewer than one-third of the people who died were unarmed, as examined by the Daily News. Acker also suggested New York's vital statistics reports for deaths caused by legal interventions and then sorting by race/ethnicity. Using that tool, we know 15 whites were shot by police in the city from 2000 (the earliest starting point for the database) to 2012. That’s an undercount from the chart above. But we do not know whether they were armed. Contrary to Lebowitz’s broader point, Klinger notes, police violence actually fell under Giuliani. Victims in police shootings by NYPD cops fell from 90 people (29 fatals) in 1994 to 30 people in 2001 (11 fatal), Klinger said, citing his own records. D. Brian Burghart, editor and publisher of the Reno News & Review, created his own website, Fatal Encounters, to document fatal police shooting. Using his database, we found about a dozen examples of former, off-duty and current New York City police officers fatally shooting white people or killing them with their cars in accidents from pursuits or driving while intoxicated and off-duty. But most were armed with knives, guns or other weapons, or were killed during vehicle pursuits. Many showed signs of mental illness. There were no examples of an unarmed person being shot by a cop. Our ruling Lebowitz said, ""Not a single unarmed white person has been shot by the police"" since she has lived in New York. This was a bear of fact-check to wrestle to the ground, in part because of the lack of cooperation from the New York Police Department, in part because we were looking at a time period that spanned about 45 years, and in part because it is clear that African-Americans and Hispanics were clearly shot at by New York police much more than whites. All that said, an analysis of police data show police shot dozens of unarmed white people during the early 1970s, the early side of Lebowitz’s life in New York City. While we wish we had complete data on police shootings by each victim’s race and armed status for the 1980s on, we don’t necessarily need it to judge Lebowitz’s particular statement. It is very accurate to say blacks are shot at more often by police than whites. But that is not what Lebowitz said. She said ""not a single unarmed white person has been shot,"" and that is not true. Note: This claim was fact-checked as part of a reward to our Kickstarter campaign to live fact-check the 2015 State of the Union. Thanks to all who contributed."
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26454
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There are “360,000 (deaths) a year from swimming pools. But we don’t shut the country down for that.”
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Phil “Dr. Phil” McGraw said there are 360,000 annual deaths in the U.S. from swimming pools. He’s since said he was citing the worldwide number and “misspoke.” According to the CDC, there were 3,709 U.S. deaths from accidental drowning or submersion in 2017. Not all drowning deaths occur in swimming pools. Drowning is not infectious or contagious, and deaths from it are spread over time.
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false
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Public Health, Public Safety, Pundits, PunditFact, Coronavirus, Phil McGraw,
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"Celebrity psychologist Phil McGraw, known to his TV viewers as ""Dr. Phil,"" argued for reopening the economy on Fox News, rattling off a string of statistics about other causes of death that don’t require statewide shutdowns. McGraw’s figures were not all accurate, however, and the comparisons he drew with the novel coronavirus weren't apples-to-apples. ""The fact of the matter is, we have people dying — 45,000 people a year die from automobile accidents, 480,000 from cigarettes, 360,000 a year from swimming pools,"" McGraw told Fox News host Laura Ingraham. ""But we don’t shut the country down for that."" It didn’t take long for us to see where McGraw was right, and where he was wrong. And McGraw later said he offered ""bad examples."" According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, cigarette use is responsible for over 480,000 U.S. deaths per year, as McGraw said. The talk show host slightly overstated the number of deaths due to motor vehicle crashes, which the CDC reported as 40,231 in 2017. But McGraw was wildly off when it came to deaths in swimming pools. The CDC tallied 3,709 deaths from accidental drowning or submersion in 2017, the most recent year with data available. Between 2005 and 2014, there were 3,536 unintentional deaths by drowning per year on average, plus an additional 332 from drowning in boat-related incidents. Not all drownings occur in swimming pools. According to the CDC, more than half of fatal and nonfatal drownings among people 15 years and older occur in natural water, such as lakes or the ocean. Drowning can also occur in bathtubs. In an April 17 video on Facebook and Instagram Live, McGraw said he ""misspoke"" about drowning deaths. He said he was citing the worldwide number, which is 320,000 deaths per year, according to the World Health Organization. That’s still 40,000 fewer deaths than what he originally said. And the problems go beyond the number. As we’ve reported, comparisons like McGraw’s can be misleading. The coronavirus, which had led to roughly 34,000 U.S. deaths as of April 17, is infectious and contagious. Drowning is not. ""That comparison is ridiculous, ill-grounded, and actually dangerous,"" Caplan said. ""The issue isn’t how many people die of car crashes or swimming pool accidents or strokes or whatever. The question is whether they all happen at once and overwhelm the health care system."" The Imperial College of London estimated in mid March that if the U.S. did absolutely nothing to slow the spread of the coronavirus, the country could see as many as 2.2 million deaths — a number President Donald Trump has pointed to as proof that his efforts have been successful. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has called comparisons between the coronavirus and traffic accidents a "" equivalency,"" noting that the coronavirus ""is emerging, and you really can’t predict totally the impact it’s going to have."" McGraw acknowledged that the comparison wasn’t perfect on Facebook and Instagram Live. A spokesperson for the ""Dr. Phil"" TV show pointed us to those remarks when we asked for a comment. ""Last night, I said we as a society have chosen to live with certain controllable deadly risks everyday — smoking, auto crashes, swimming,"" he said. ""And yes, I know that those are not contagious, so probably bad examples, probably bad examples."" McGraw said there are ""360,000 (deaths) a year from swimming pools, but we don’t shut the country down for that."" For one thing, that’s too many zeros. There were 3,709 U.S. deaths from accidental drowning or submersion in 2017. McGraw has since said he was citing the worldwide number for drowning deaths, and that his comparisons were ""probably bad examples."" The coronavirus is infectious and contagious, and the count of deaths from drowning is spread over a year."
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3787
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Setbacks for Trump’s drive to lower prescription drug costs.
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After two setbacks this week, President Donald Trump is now focusing his drive to curb drug costs on congressional efforts aimed at helping people on Medicare and younger generations covered by workplace plans.
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true
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AP Top News, Health, General News, Politics, Prescription drug costs, Business, Medication, Medicare, Prescription drugs, Donald Trump
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The White House on Thursday yanked its own regulation to ease the financial bite of costly medications for those on Medicare by letting them receive rebates that drugmakers now pay to insurers and middlemen. A congressional agency’s estimate that the plan would have cost taxpayers $177 billion over 10 years seemed to seal its fate. Earlier a federal judge ruled that the administration lacked the legal authority to require drugmakers to disclose list prices in their TV ads. The ruling Monday blocked a highly visible change expected to have started this week. Both price disclosure and the rebate idea were part of a strategy on drug costs that Trump announced at the White House with much fanfare last year. “This is a big setback,” said Peter Bach, director of the Center for Health Policy and Outcomes at New York’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. The rebate rule “was not good policy (since) it would have increased spending on prescription drugs even if it mildly reduced out-of-pocket costs in some cases. But nevertheless this was a cornerstone of the blueprint.” White House spokesman Judd Deere said the rebate proposal was withdrawn “based on careful analysis and thorough consideration.” Deere said Trump is not backing away from his promise to lower drug prices, and the administration is setting its sights on bipartisan legislation . One idea would cap drug copays for people with Medicare, which would produce savings for seniors taking costly drugs. That’s another way to achieve a similar goal as the rebate plan. “The Trump administration is encouraged by continuing bipartisan conversations about legislation to reduce outrageous drug costs imposed on the American people, and President Trump will consider using any and all tools to ensure that prescription drug costs will continue to decline,” Deere said in a statement. While agreeing it’s a setback for Trump, John Rother of the National Coalition on Health Care said that if legislation could be worked out, “that might actually lead to a better outcome.” His organization is an umbrella group that represents a cross section of business and consumer groups. The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Charles Grassley of Iowa, and the committee’s top Democrat, Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, are trying for a compromise centered on lowering drug costs for government programs such as Medicare and Medicaid. Top administration officials this week participated in a closed-door meeting between Grassley and Republican senators on his committee. Grassley said in a statement that he had concerns about the administration’s rebate rule, but was confident about the prospects for legislation. “While the final details are still being negotiated, we’re on track to report a bill out of committee very soon,” he said. Separately, Grassley and Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the chamber’s second-ranking Democrat, are pushing legislation that would grant the government the power to require drug companies to disclose their prices in consumer advertising. House committees are also working on legislation and Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., remains in contact with the White House on a drug cost compromise. Changes to Medicare often have an impact on employer insurance, but the main dividend for working families could come from legislation to promote pharmaceutical competition. The rebate plan was crafted by Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar but ran into opposition from White House budget officials. That pushback stiffened after the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated that the plan would have little effect on manufacturer prices and would cost Medicare $177 billion over 10 years by leading to higher premiums subsidized by taxpayers. Trump’s reversal on rebates was a win for insurers and middlemen called “pharmacy benefit managers” who administer prescription drug plans for large blocks of insured patients. It was a defeat for the pharmaceutical industry, which had lobbied to promote rebates. Drugmakers prefer that to other approaches lawmakers are considering. Those include “inflation rebates” that drugmakers would pay directly to Medicare if they raise prices beyond a yet-to-be-determined measure. “The administration has abandoned one of the only policy solutions that would have truly lowered what patients are forced to pay out of pocket for the medicines they need,” Jim Greenwood, head of the Biotechnology Innovation Organization, said in a statement. Shares of pharmaceutical companies dropped Thursday but drug store chains and insurers gained. Drugmaker Merck & Co. dropped 4.5% while UnitedHealth climbed 5.5% and CVS Health gained 4.7%. Rebates are a largely unseen part of the complex world of drug pricing. Under the administration’s plan, drugmaker rebates now paid to insurance companies and their middlemen would have gone directly to seniors in Medicare’s Part D program when they filled their prescriptions. But congressional analysts concluded that drug companies were unlikely to lower list prices across the board in response to the plan. Meanwhile, insurers would raise premiums to compensate for the loss of rebates. Labor Department data indicate that changes may be afoot with drug prices. Overall prescription drug inflation seems to have stabilized, with more monthly declines than increases recently. The White House credits Trump for that change, but independent experts say the trend isn’t totally clear yet. The administration’s rebate reversal was first reported by Axios. ___ AP Health Writer Tom Murphy in Indianapolis contributed to this report.
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4591
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Hospital, insurers fight putting Medicaid residents at risk.
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Thousands of southeastern New Mexico residents enrolled in Medicaid may soon not be able to access Lea Regional Medical Group and its physicians for non-emergencies.
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true
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Health, New Mexico, Hobbs, Medicaid
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The Hobbs News-Sun reports Lea Regional Medical Group recently alerted Medicaid patients in Lea County they may not be able to use the hospital for non-emergencies after this month because of an impasse in contract negotiations with health insurers. Lea Regional Medical Group, the only hospital in Lea County that provides obstetric services such as labor and delivery, is encouraging local Medicaid patients to contact state lawmakers for help. The New Mexico Department of Health says around 39 percent of Lea County residents, or 27,500 people, are enrolled in Medicaid. State Sen. Gay Kernan, a Hobbs Republican, says she’s hopeful both sides will come to an agreement.
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36228
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Children's bones and skulls were unearthed on a private island owned by Jeffrey Epstein.
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Were the Bones of Children Found on Epstein’s Island?
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false
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Disinformation, Fact Checks
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On August 20 2019, the Facebook page “The Trump Room” shared the following post (archived here), claiming that children’s bones were found on Jeffrey Epstein’s private island and questioning why this had not been reported:White text splashed across a red background asserted not only that bones of children were found on Epstein’s island, but also that major news outlets refused to report on . the alarming discovery:The bones of CHILDREN have been found on Epstein’s Island. MY QUESTION?? Why isn’t this headlines on EVERY major network?As noted in numerous other fact checks, Facebook’s text-based status update images are a highly efficient way to spread propaganda, falsehoods, half-truths, and other dubious information — all in the name of “engagement.” Not only are the graphics these status updates generate ideal for screenshotting and re-sharing (thus evading corrections in the comments), the format does not allow for the inclusion of news articles or other links, many of which would fail to gain traction when presented in their original form.Commenters largely appeared to accept the claim as truth despite its lack of citation, but its second half hinted at the legitimacy of the claim. Major news organizations have reported at length on Epstein’s known and alleged misdeeds, so surely such a salacious and gruesome finding would be everywhere.Since it wasn’t, one of two things were likely true: this one particular claim, guaranteed to garner massive engagement (as it did), was simply ignored by media outlets struggling to attract readers, or the claim was of extremely dubious veracity. A cursory search for news about bones on Epstein’s island was largely fruitless, suggesting the latter was likely correct.One of the sole results for content explicitly matching the claim itself (versus autopsy reports or unrelated news about Epstein’s jailhouse suicide) was a tweet published by a QAnon conspiracy theorist on August 15 2019:Children's bones were found under water by FBI divers next to Epstein's Pedo island.#PedoGate, #PizzaGate & #PedoWood are real. People need to wake the F up! These are children we are talking about! F a political party! https://t.co/O3u4qbGJ22— ♰🇺🇸🕵 A Anon ⭐⭐⭐ (@AAnon_QsArmy) August 15, 2019Another was to a conspiracy site, where the text of the post was clearly copied from another source. That post and the one in the tweet were credited to “Sorcha Faal,” a nom de plume associated with the well-known conspiracy site WhatDoesItMean.com. An August 13 2019 WhatDoesItMean.com post published there and copied by the two pages linked above began:FBI Divers Recover Human Bones In Waters Off Epstein “Orgy Island” As “Deep State” Meltdown AcceleratesBy: Sorcha Faal, and as reported to her Western SubscribersA beyond shocking highly classified “Of Special Importance” new Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) report circulating in the Kremlin today noting that the American prison system has sunk to third world status—as even Mexico provided video of drug lord El Chapo’s prison escape—states the fury and humiliation over the death of child sex slaver Jeffrey Epstein seething through a US Department of Justice (DoJ) responsible for his staying alive to stand trial, has now been met by an “appalled and angry” US Attorney General William Barr—who yesterday vowed “no one complicit in Epstein’s crimes will escape punishment”—crimes which now may include murder after an elite team of FBI investigators and divers invaded Epstein’s “Orgy Island” fortress in the Caribbean yesterday—whose most stunning discovery are believed to be human bones of young children found in the waters below Epstein’s satanic temple.According to the portions of this highly classified report we’re permitted to reveal, in mid-July the FBI requested a temporary export permit from the Foreign Ministry for an advanced underground radar system—a request granted under standard permit protocols stating that such goods and technology exported must always be controlled by a Russian entity—and in this case was a SVR expert technologist able to operate the world’s most advanced underground radar system used exclusively by the Russian military which can recognize ferrous metal and non-ferrous metals at depths up to 5 meters called the Deep-Earth Metal Detector MG-1—who after being directed by the FBI to probe the exterior grounds of Epstein’s satanic temple, saw this advanced underground radar system detecting an approximate 1 meter (about 3 feet) tubular metal pipe extending from the base of this satanic temple and disappearing into the waters below it—after which FBI divers began bringing up from these waters what appeared to be small human bones and skulls this SVR expert technologist likened to those one would see coming from the graves of young children.We are extremely familiar with the names Sorcha Faal and WhatDoesItMean.com, as we have frequently encountered the site’s fabrications over many years. WhatDoesItMean.com follows a formula of using existing fragments of news and common knowledge (like that Epstein owned an island, and that he was under investigation) to build upon with outlandish embellishments — in other words, disinformation.Debunking website RationalWiki.com maintains a page about Sorcha Faal and WhatDoesItMean.com:Sorcha Faal is the alleged author of an ongoing series of “reports” published at WhatDoesItMean.com, whose work is of such quality that even other conspiracy nutters don’t think much of it. There is a high chance that “Sorcha Faal” is actually David Booth, the owner/operator of the website, or someone collaborating with him. […]Each report resembles a news story in its style, but usually includes a sensational headline barely related to reality (e.g. “American Rebel Forces Attack Gas Pipelines, Explode Trains As US Civil War Nears”) and quotes authoritative high-level Russian sources (such as the Russian Federal Security Service in the same article) to support its most outrageous claims. Except for the stuff attributed to unverifiable sources, the reports don’t contain much original material. They are usually based on various news items from the mainstream media and/or whatever the clogosphere is currently hyperventilating about, with each item shoehorned into the conspiracy narrative the report is trying to establish. Cited sources range from the mainstream media and Wikipedia to Infowars and Richard Hoagland. The author also has the habit of adding unnecessary links to the websites of the various Russian institutions they mention.So the reason news about children’s bones found on Epstein’s island was not reported is now clear — it is completely untrue. As is often the case, a post was copied from WhatDoesItMean.com to a number of other questionable sources and repeated in YouTube videos, obscuring the original discredited source.Should there be such a horrible turn of events as the discovery of mass graves filled with the bones of children on Jeffrey Epstein’s island, we can all but guarantee that the story will not be broken by either WhatDoesItMean.com or “Sorcha Faal.”
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36169
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"Former U.S. President Ronald Reagan once said, ""Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempt to disarm the people must be stopped, by force if necessary."
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Did Ronald Reagan Say ‘Under No Pretext Should Arms and Ammunition Be Surrendered’?
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false
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Disinformation, Fact Checks
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Admirers of Republican Party stalwart Ronald Reagan may be disappointed to know that a graphic spreading online falsely credits him with a distorted version of a statement by two men who were not in idealogical alignment with the former United States president.The meme features a photograph of Reagan alongside the statement, “Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempt to disarm the people must be stopped, by force if necessary”:However, there is no evidence of Reagan saying that. The quote was actually taken (and changed slightly but meaningfully) from an 1850 speech written by philosophers Karl Marx and Frederick Engels for the Communist League in London.The key difference here is that Marx and Engels were discussing the right to bear arms as related to workers’ rights to organize. The section in full (emphasis ours) reads:To be able forcefully and threateningly to oppose this party, whose betrayal of the workers will begin with the very first hour of victory, the workers must be armed and organized. The whole proletariat must be armed at once with muskets, rifles, cannon and ammunition, and the revival of the old-style citizens’ militia, directed against the workers, must be opposed. Where the formation of this militia cannot be prevented, the workers must try to organize themselves independently as a proletarian guard, with elected leaders and with their own elected general staff; they must try to place themselves not under the orders of the state authority but of the revolutionary local councils set up by the workers. Where the workers are employed by the state, they must arm and organize themselves into special corps with elected leaders, or as a part of the proletarian guard. Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempt to disarm the workers must be frustrated, by force if necessary. The destruction of the bourgeois democrats’ influence over the workers, and the enforcement of conditions which will compromise the rule of bourgeois democracy, which is for the moment inevitable, and make it as difficult as possible – these are the main points which the proletariat and therefore the League must keep in mind during and after the approaching uprising.The graphic also ignores that, while he opposed gun safety legislation during his presidency, Reagan shifted after leaving office; in March 1991 — ten years after John Hinckley, Jr. shot him and several others during an assassination attempt — he wrote an op-ed for the New York Times supporting the passage of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, named after his former press secretary James Brady, who was partially paralyzed by the shooting and suffered permanent brain damage, which required background checks for firearm purchases involving licensed dealers. The bill was passed in 1993.In May 1994, Reagan joined fellow ex-presidents Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford in sending a joint letter to members of the House of Representatives urging them to pass the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act and implementing a ban on the manufacture, sale, and purchase of assault weapons. They wrote:During the past five years, more than 40 law enforcement officers have been killed or wounded in the line of duty by an assault weapon.While we recognize that assault weapon legislation will not stop all assault weapon crime, statistics prove that we can dry up the supply of these guns, making them less accessible to criminals. We urge you to listen to the American public and to the law enforcement community and support a ban on the further manufacture of these weapons.The bill passed on September 13, 1994, but was allowed to expire on the same date ten years later, in an effort pushed by the National Rifle Association during the Bush administration.
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41309
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Beta-Propiolactone is in vaccines and is known to cause cancer, suspected gastrointestinal, liver, nerve and respiratory, skin and sense organ poison.
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It may be present in trace amounts of some vaccines. It is potentially carcinogenic, but only in much larger amounts than would be in a vaccine.
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unproven
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online
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Beta-Propiolactone is in vaccines and is known to cause cancer, suspected gastrointestinal, liver, nerve and respiratory, skin and sense organ poison. It may be present in trace amounts of some vaccines. It is potentially carcinogenic, but only in much larger amounts than would be in a vaccine. The antibiotics gentamicin sulfate and polymyxin b are in vaccines and can cause allergic reactions ranging from mild to life-threatening. Traces of these antibiotics can end up in certain vaccines, but would only cause a reaction in someone severely allergic. Genetically modified yeast, animal, bacterial and viral DNA in vaccines can be incorporated into the recipient’s DNA causing unknown genetic mutations. Modified DNA can be used in the production of some vaccines, but is very unlikely to end up in the final product. Even if it did, there’s no evidence it can cause mutations. Glutaraldehyde is in vaccines and is poisonous if ingested and causes birth defects in animals. There are trace amounts in some vaccines from manufacturing, and not enough to cause harm. Formaldehyde is in vaccines and causes cancer in humans among other issues and is banned from vaccines in most European countries. It’s not banned in Europe. There are only trace amounts in certain vaccines and not enough to be carcinogenic. Latex rubber is in vaccines and causes life-threatening allergic reactions. Latex is used in the packaging of some vaccines, which could potentially cause harm if someone’s strongly allergic to it. Human and animal cells from sources like aborted foetuses are in vaccines and are linked to childhood leukaemia and diabetes. They may be used in certain vaccines’ production, but are unlikely to make it to the final product. Mercury (aka thimerosal or thiomersal) is in vaccines and can damage brain, gut, liver, bone marrow, nervous system and kidneys, is linked to autoimmune disorder, autism. Thiomersal isn’t in any UK vaccines any more. This is down to concern around a slightly different mercury-based chemical. MSG is in vaccines and is linked to birth defects, developmental delays, infertility and is banned in Europe. It’s not banned in Europe. It’s used in some vaccines to stabilise them. There’s no strong evidence it causes these problems in humans. Neomycin sulphate, an antibiotic, is in vaccines and can lead to epilepsy, brain damage and allergic reactions. Trace amounts of this antibiotic may end up in certain vaccines. If you are allergic to it could cause an allergic reaction. Phenol / phenoxyethanol is in vaccines and is used as antifreeze. It is toxic to all cells and can destroy the immune system. These chemicals have been used in vaccines as preservatives. They are not in antifreeze. Polysorbate 80 and 20 are in vaccines and cause cancer in animals and are linked to autoimmune issues and infertility. Tiny amounts of Polysorbate 80 is in a type of flu vaccine. There isn’t evidence ingesting it is linked to these issues in humans. Tri(n) butylphosphate is in vaccines and is potentially damaging to the kidneys and the nervous system. We can find no evidence of this being used in vaccines in the UK. Claim 1 of 14
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7348
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Outside US, top scientists steer debate away from politics.
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President Donald Trump is never far from a public spat with his government’s top expert on the pandemic, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the most recent flare-up occurring this week over the pace of reopening schools.
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true
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AP Top News, Understanding the Outbreak, International News, Anthony Fauci, General News, Health, Science, Greece, Donald Trump, Virus Outbreak, Europe, Pandemics
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Among U.S. allies, however, many leaders are happy to step away from the spotlight to leverage experts’ ability to counter misleading information and appeal across political boundaries to gain public compliance for health restrictions. “The particular features of a pandemic give new dimensions to questions of trust,” said Terry Flew, a professor of communication at Queensland University of Technology. “Experts who understand the subject and politicians prepared to listen to them, become vitally important. In most countries, this is happening. Hopefully, it marks a return of confidence in experts.” Here’s a look at some other scientists around the world leading national public safety efforts. ___ GREECE: SOTIRIOS TSIODRAS Announcing the news of a deadly disaster isn’t a job many public figures look forward to. Sotirios Tsiodras has done it on some 50 occasions, updating Greeks on the progression of the pandemic in live televised briefings. A Harvard-trained scientist and father of seven, Tsiodras spends some Sunday mornings as a cantor in the Orthodox Church and is the soft-spoken chief Health Ministry virologist. Added to the daily death toll are tips on how to maintain a healthy diet, explanations of how some countries are better-positioned to carry out mass testing, and warnings on the dangers of domestic abuse when living in prolonged confinement. It’s made Tsiodras Greece’s most popular person: One opinion poll gave a 94.5% approval rating to the 55-year-old professor of medicine and infectious diseases. His appeal is helping lockdown enforcement and keeping infection rates low. ___ CANADA: THERESA TAM The Hong Kong-born Chief Public Health Officer of Canada delivers straight-to-camera, no-nonsense advice in a series of government TV ads, as well as heading public briefings. She has been joined in the public health ad campaign by Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, and Hayley Wickenheiser, the ice hockey star who is in her final year of medical school. Tam, 55, is credited with helping maintain high compliance levels with stay-at-home orders. National politicians rushed to her defense after criticism from Alberta Premier Jason Kenney of the speed of approval for testing methods. Tam’s popularity recently inspired a limited-edition line of T-shirts that include a portrait of the scientist. ___ SPAIN: FERNANDO SIMON With its high death toll and fiercely politically charged environment, Spain has turned to veteran epidemiologist Fernando Simon to head the national response. The 57-year-old quickly won praise for his easygoing style at daily news conferences, his preference for open-necked shirts, and sweaters over dark suits endearing him to many. Internet memes poke fun at his bushy eyebrows, and he is parodied on comedy shows. Spanish media report that he is stopped on the street for his autograph. But that folksy approach has backfired among more conservative sections of society, some of whom view him as flippant and note statements he made in the early stages of the pandemic when he appeared to play down the risk to the public. ___ GERMANY: LOTHAR WIELER The head of the Robert Koch Institute, Germany’s federal disease control agency, is a professor of microbiology and epidemiology and has led a campaign praised by European colleagues for rapid testing rollout and early introduction of restrictions. The 59-year-old career scientist has also helped Germans take a partial break from their defense of fiercely protected civil liberties and participate in a data-sharing program that will help policymakers study the pandemic and target resources. The program was adapted to address concerns over centralized data storage ___ SWEDEN: ANDERS TEGNELL The 64-year-old Tegnell worked with World Health Organization programs to fight outbreaks of Ebola and other diseases. Now, he is an outlier among his elite fellow virologists, having challenged the conventional view on how to contain the pandemic. He has steered a Swedish public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic that has been markedly different to other European countries, relying primarily on voluntary social distancing instead of strict state-imposed lockdown measures. Defenders of Tegnell argue that his approach has been misunderstood and it shares the social distancing goal of other countries but has been adapted to the local health care conditions and legal system. Sweden’s alternative view has done little to dent Tegnell’s popularity: the bespectacled scientist has recently appeared as a tattoo design. ___ IRELAND: TONY HOLOHAN Ireland’s Chief Medical Officer for the past 12 years, Tony Holohan, is also seen as a calming presence. Holohan has appeared on popular late-night talk shows to explain the need for lockdown measures, favoring a cautious approach to easing tied to meeting virus-suppression milestones. His down-to-earth style has made Holohan a popular figure in Ireland. Irish caricature artist Niall O’Loughlin, who gave the balding Holohan a superman appearance, says he been flooded by email requests for free prints. “I still find it utterly bizarre why so many people would want a picture of Tony Holohan on their wall,” O’Loughlin wrote on Twitter. “No offense Tony (-:” ___ Barry Hatton in Lisbon, Frances D’Emilio in Rome, and Menelaos Hadjicostis in Nicosia contributed. ___ Follow Gatopoulos at http://www.twitter.com/dgatopoulos
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22564
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Lyme disease is one of the fastest growing infectious diseases in the United States, and Rhode Island has the second-highest incidence of this disease in the country.
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Sen. Sosnowski says Rhode Island ranks second in U.S. for Lyme disease
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mixture
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Rhode Island, Public Health, Public Safety, Susan Sosnowski,
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"Remember when you could roll around in the grass and not have to worry that a tick bite would leave you with aching joints that make you feel like you’re 80 years old? Lyme disease changed that. Now we have to worry that a tick the size of a poppy seed might cause an infection that mimics the flu and can cause muscle and joint pain. It can also lead to serious long-term health problems. To help combat Lyme disease, state Sen. Susan Sosnowski of South Kingstown proposed legislation that would authorize the Rhode Island Lottery to sell ""Scratch-A-Tick"" scratch tickets, with the proceeds going toward prevention and research. What caught our eye was the assertions in her news release that ""Lyme disease is one of the fastest growing infectious diseases in the United States, and Rhode Island has the second-highest incidence of this disease in the country."" The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, which tracks diseases in the United States, doesn't rank infectious diseases by growth rate. But the CDC does release annual reports on the number of cases. We took their numbers and did some additional math. We picked 2008 -- the most recent online report -- and looked at growth rate of infectious diseases from 2004. While there were higher growth rates for much rarer diseases, such as measles, in terms of the actual number of additional cases, Lyme ranked third. Because she couched her language, the first part of Sosnowski’s statement was true. The second question is whether Rhode Island really ranks second in incidence of Lyme cases nationwide. We were intrigued by that figure because we had heard that the disease has become very common in other parts of the country. (Lyme was first identified in 1975 in Lyme, Conn., but scientists believe it has been around for at least a century -- and maybe since the last Ice Age.) The CDC gave us state statistics from 2005 to 2009, and we found earlier numbers, showing that Rhode Island isn't even near the top among states where Lyme is common. The numbers showed that Rhode Island was number two in the country in 2002 (behind Connecticut) and number one in 2003. But since then, our ranking has declined. Six states -- Delaware, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York and Massachusetts -- beat us out in 2004. We went back up to fourth in 2006, but in the other years after 2004, we ranked 13th or lower. In 2009, the CDC numbers showed, a dozen states had a higher rate of confirmed cases of Lyme than Rhode Island. Nine states had rates that were double our rate of 142 cases per million people. In other words, these days we're not even close to being second. So we contacted Sosnowski. She said her statement was based on a July 2003 news release from the Lyme Disease Association of Rhode Island. ""It might be out of date,"" she acknowledged. Thomas Mather, director of the University of Rhode Island’s TickEncounter Resource Center, who asked Sosnowski to submit the legislation, contended that the CDC numbers are not accurate. He believes Sosnowski, if not correct, is close. The problem: Rhode Island, which supplies the numbers to the CDC, stopped making a rigorous count years ago for budget reasons. That's why, he said, in 2004 the number of Rhode Island cases reported to the CDC plummeted from 736 to 249, even though there was no evidence that the problem had diminished. (The numbers have since rebounded, but most years they are far below pre-2004 levels.) Just based on the tick population in Rhode Island, he said, the state’s infection rate must be extraordinarily high. And, he said, it’s widely believed by people in the field that for every case reported, there are probably five other people who have been infected. ""We are certainly in the top five"" for Lyme disease cases, said Mather. ""Before 2004, we sort of were second. Then in 2004, states like Rhode Island and Connecticut suspended new case surveillance because we couldn't afford to do it."" And in the intervening years, ""nothing has changed in Rhode Island to take away our ticks or our human exposure to ticks,"" he said. ""I'm fairly certain Rhode Island is right near the top of the list, if not at the top of the list, in the real number of cases of Lyme disease, if we could only count them."" Annemarie Beardsworth, a spokeswoman for the Rhode Island Department of Health, said the state’s Lyme disease numbers dropped from 2005 to 2007 because the Health Department didn’t have anyone to evaluate the data. That subsequently changed, she said, and the numbers have been reliable since 2008. ""Our sense is it is now fair to compare from state to state,"" she said. ""Doctor Mather may be looking at ticks, but we're looking at diagnosed, laboratory-confirmed cases."" We found that for 2009, even if you took all 85 ""probable"" cases of Lyme in Rhode Island and added them to the 150 ""confirmed"" cases (and only do it for Rhode Island), we would be ranked 11th in the nation, not second. From a broader perspective, Dr. Paul Mead, a chief of epidemiology and surveillance activity at the CDC, discourages people from focusing on state rankings because such numbers aren't as precise as you might expect. He said the uncertainty varies from disease to disease, and there may be more uncertainty in the numbers from some states than others. ""Lyme disease advocates will often push the idea of counting every case and surveillance is terrible,"" said Mead. ""I think much of that is borne from the notion that if you get your case count up, people will take it seriously and the disease will get more recognition."" In the end, CDC data confirm that, even though Sosnowski was citing outdated information, it's still fair to say that Lyme is ""one of"" the nation’s fastest growing infections. But when she says that Rhode Island ranks second when it comes to the incidence of Lyme, she is giving a very precise statistic, citing it with authority, and using the present tense to make it sound current. Yet there's no data to support her claim. Both Sosnowski and Mather expressed fear that, when people hear what the latest numbers are, they will falsely conclude that Lyme disease is no longer a big deal. In fact, it is."
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9675
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A Vaginal Ring Could Prevent HIV, Two Huge Studies Just Found
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Vaginal ring. Credit: International Partnership for Microbicides This article discusses two studies surrounding a new device for preventing HIV infection. The device is a vaginal ring that dispenses an antiviral compound called dapivirine which can prevent the spread of HIV in women, according to scientists presenting their research at a medical conference. The device must be worn daily and replaced monthly in order to be effective. One of the studies described was published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) and the other was an unpublished abstract. The ring contains an antiviral agent that works against the virus, but experts caution this method only seems to curb about 27 percent of transmissions from one sexual partner to the other. This story does a good job of providing context, although we would have liked a more cautious headline (and less use of the word “huge,” in general, in the text) and a better definition of pre-exposure prophylaxis since previous efforts have mainly focused on treating those who already contracted the virus. We applaud the careful way the story gave details of the two research studies, including their size and length and where they were conducted. Because sub-Saharan Africa is hardest hit by HIV, and has few health resources, we wish the story had included discussion of how much the ring will cost. Women and men worldwide are at risk of catching the HIV virus from sexual partners. While there are precautions that might limit the spread, they are often not under the control of women. This vaginal ring, with a compound that interferes with the virus, could be worn discreetly by women to protect themselves. While the 27 percent effectiveness may seem modest, these two studies being reported raise a new hope for putting control of limiting the spread of the virus into more women’s hands.
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mixture
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Africa,global health,HIV/AIDS,NEJM,New England Journal of Medicine,prevention,public health,sexually transmitted,vaginal ring
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The story would have benefited by spending even one sentence on cost, since HIV is especially prevalent in countries with few resources. Will the ring be cheaper or more expensive than the pill? If the ring must be replaced monthly, what does that mean for the cost, and will people be more likely to fail to buy the replacements because of cost? There was a lost opportunity here to compare the cost of the vaginal ring versus Truvada, the currently available option for pre-exposure prophylaxis. The story gives numbers supporting the benefits claim in both of the studies mentioned, but they’re relative, presented in terms of a percentage, not absolute which relates to the actual numbers of patients, which are more definitive and useful for readers. The study published in the NEJM showed that the ring, used by volunteers, cut infections by 27 percent over a control group. The absolute numbers were included right in the studyabstract (but not the story) and were reported this way: Among the 2629 women who were enrolled, 168 HIV-1 infections occurred: 71 in the dapivirine group and 97 in the placebo group (incidence, 3.3 and 4.5 per 100 person-years, respectively). For another — unpublished study — the story reported a difference in effectiveness by age. The ring showed no impact on those age 21 and younger, but reduced new HIV cases by 37 percent in women over 21. We were glad to see the quote from a scientist explaining that how carefully the device is used may explain the difference in outcomes by age and warrants more study. We would have liked to see some mention of whether there might be any harms associated with this. It is possible that long-term use might pose risks that don’t show up in shorter studies. The story does not even say, “We don’t know of any harms.” The story explains the size of the studies — each including at least 2,000 women. One study was already published in the NEJM and the other is not yet published. Some of the details given help establish the credibility of the results, although we are not given much detail about study protocols. It would have been helpful to link to the conference abstract, similar in the way it linked to the NEJM study, for readers that wanted a bit more detail. There was no disease mongering. The story doesn’t mention the makers of the device or any potential conflicts of interest. However, one of the authors of the study presented in abstract form (the “SPIRE” study) is affiliated with the International Partnership for Microbicides, Silver Spring, MD, which is involved with product development, partnerships with pharmaceutical companies, and marketing of this and related devices. The device is licensed from Janssen Sciences, a large pharmaceutical company. The International Partnership for Microbes describes itself this way: “As a nonprofit product developer, IPM partners with a variety of organizations to facilitate strategic planning from the earliest stages of product design to ensure future access to products.” There are two people quoted in the story, the lead author of the study and the head of AVAC, a global HIV-prevention advocacy group. (AVAC issued a news release on the two studies.) While the story includes insightful comments from these two sources, both have some investment (even if only on an intellectual level) in the project. The story would have been been stronger if it had included an expert with no relationship at all to the device studies, ideally someone active in providing health care in sub-Saharan Africa, who might have provided insights into adherence, product acceptance or any practical obstacles (such as costs) in the way. A discussion of the alternatives is a real strength in the article. It mentions other rings in development as well as the Truvada pill which offers some protection against HIV, and examines some pros and cons of the different methods. The story says that the dapivirine ring “has been in development for more than a decade,” suggesting that it is not yet available. Some comment on when the device might become available would have been useful. The story tells us that vaginal rings already exist and are in widespread use but that the addition of the dapivirine antiviral agent makes this device novel. It also states that the well-known Nuvaring used to prevent pregnancy uses the same delivery method. Since the article uses quotes not found in a news release on the studies, we are confident the story does not rely solely on a PR release.
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41672
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The UK has the highest death rate in the EU from drugs.
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Estonia had the highest rate of drug-related deaths per million people aged 15 to 64 in the EU, based on research using data from 2015 and 2016. The UK placed joint-third alongside Ireland.
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true
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health
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There were nearly 1,000 drug-related deaths in Scotland last year. Correct, there were 934 registered in 2017. The UK has the highest death rate in the EU from drugs. Estonia had the highest rate of drug-related deaths per million people aged 15 to 64 in the EU, based on research using data from 2015 and 2016. The UK placed joint-third alongside Ireland. Scotland’s drug-related death rate is the highest in the EU. Correct if you compare Scotland to a league table of EU sovereign countries. This is based on a comparison of the drug-related death rate per million people aged 15 to 64 in 2015 and 2016. Claim 1 of 4
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363
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Value of China's metal e-waste to double to $24 billion by 2030: Greenpeace.
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The potential value of recyclable metals in discarded mobile phones, laptops and desktop computers in China will more than double to around $24 billion by 2030, environmental group Greenpeace forecast on Thursday.
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true
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Environment
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China, the world’s largest mobile phone market, is trying to promote recycling of electronic waste, or e-waste, to improve its environment, cut costs and ease its dependence on foreign resource imports. In a report carried out with the China Association of Electronics for Technology Development, Greenpeace said rising consumption levels would take the potential economic value of recyclable metals in mobile phone and computer motherboards to 160 billion yuan ($23.96 billion) by 2030. That compares to 66.4 billion yuan in 2018 and a projected 81 billion yuan in 2020. If other electronic waste products are taken into account, the potential value would be higher, according to the report, which looked at a range of metals such as gold, silver, copper and iron. In tonnage terms, China’s e-waste is seen rising from 13 million tonnes in 2018 to 15.4 million tonnes in 2020 and 27.2 million tonnes in 2030, at an average annual growth rate of 10.4 percent. Industry research shows a tonne of discarded mobile phones - excluding the battery - contains more than 270 grams of gold, the report noted, illustrating that the gold content of this “sleeping mine” is much higher than in an average high-grade gold mine.
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33991
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"In 2006, an abortion-clinic owner cut the umbilical cord of a baby born alive before ""throwing"" her in a biohazard bag and putting her remains in ""the trash."
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What's true: The co-owner of an abortion clinic in Florida did cut the umbilical cord of a baby who had been born alive before the evacuation stage of an abortion and did dispose of the baby in a biohazard bag. What's false: However, the descriptions of the incidents in question failed to mention the fact that, according to medical experts, the baby was non-viable when delivered and could not have survived longer than a few moments, regardless of the clinic owner's actions. Thus, those descriptions gave readers a misleading impression of the implications of that owner's actions.
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mixture
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Politics
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We received multiple inquiries from readers in September 2019 about the veracity of widely shared reports that claimed an abortion provider in Florida had disposed of a baby “born alive at 23 weeks” by “throwing her in the trash.” On Sept. 23, the pro-life website LifeNews reported on U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), writing: “This week, at a hearing on Capitol Hill on the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, Congressman Chris Smith, chair of the Pro-Life Caucus, issued the following statement …” The article’s headline claimed: “Baby Born Alive at 23 Weeks Was Gasping for Air. Abortion Clinic Put Baby in a Bag, Threw Her in the Trash.” Smith’s statement came on Sept. 10, during a House minority hearing in Washington, D.C., on the subject of the Born Alive Abortion Survivors Protection bill, a piece of legislation that would, according to its supporters, enhance the requirements placed upon medical professionals to provide medical care for babies who survive failed abortions and are born alive. Critics say the legislation is legally unnecessary and intended to vilify abortion providers and subject them to unwarranted additional scrutiny. Smith, who represents the 4th congressional district of New Jersey and is chair of the Congressional pro-life caucus, used some of his time to raise the case of Sycloria Williams, a Florida woman who underwent a failed abortion and whose baby died shortly after being born alive. His remarks can be watched in full below. The most relevant portion was as follows: “In a Florida abortion clinic, Sycloria Williams delivered a live baby at 23 weeks gestation. The clinic owner took the baby, who was gasping for air, cut her umbilical cord, threw her into a biohazard bag and put the bag in the trash. Heartbroken, Sycloria later had a funeral for her baby girl who she named Shanice.” Overall, Smith’s description of the events in question, as well as that contained in LifeNews’s headline, contained a mixture of accurate and misleading elements. The following exposition of the facts, and analysis, contains some rather graphic details of a late-term abortion, which some readers may find upsetting. In July 2006, 18-year-old Sycloria Williams engaged the services of an abortion clinic in Hialeah, Florida. According to reports, she was around 23 weeks pregnant when Dr. Pierre Jean-Jacque Renelique performed the first part of the two-part dilation and evacuation abortion procedure. The next day, Williams returned to the clinic in order to have the pregnancy terminated and the fetus removed from her uterus. Reportedly, Renelique was late in arriving, and Williams went into labor. The baby was delivered alive, so the clinic’s co-owner, Belkis Gonzalez, cut the baby’s umbilical cord and disposed of the baby in a biohazard bag. In an interview with the Florida Catholic newspaper, Williams said of the baby: “She wasn’t moving much. Twitching, gasping for air. She wasn’t crying though, just hissing. Hissing sounds only.” Three years later, prosecutors in Miami-Dade County filed two charges against Gonzalez: practicing as a medical professional without a license, resulting in serious bodily injury (for the act of cutting the umbilical cord), a felony that can carry a sentence of up to 15 years in prison; and tampering with evidence for the purpose of making it unavailable in a criminal investigation (for the alleged act of hiding the biozhard bag containing the baby’s remains), a felony that could carry a sentence of up to five years in prison. In charging the clinic’s co-owner, prosecutors alleged she had caused the baby to suffer “brain or spinal damage and/or limitation of neurological, physical or sensory function” when she severed the umbilical cord. Of the second charge, prosecutors provided the following details, claiming Gonzalez had: “… Unlawfully and feloniously, knowing that a criminal trial or proceeding or an investigation … was pending …, alter, destroy, conceal or remove evidence, to wit: biohazard bags and/or their contents, including the body of S.D.O., a female infant, and/or fetal remains and/or placenta and/or umbilical cord remnants, … with the purpose to impair the verity or availability of said evidence …” In court filings, Gonzalez did not reject the claim that she had disposed of the baby’s remains in a biohazard bag, only that she had deliberately hidden those remains from police searches, in an effort to thwart their investigations. There does not appear to be a substantive dispute over her having disposed of the remains, though we did not find any evidence that she had, specifically, “thrown” the remains into a biohazard bag. That description appears to be an example of poetic license on the part of Rep. Smith, though ultimately the evidence is lacking. In court filings, Gonzalez accepted that the baby had been delivered prematurely in the clinic, and that she had personally cut the umbilical cord after that delivery, so this component of the claim made by Smith and LifeNews was accurate. However, Gonzalez denied the charge of causing serious bodily injury by practicing medicine while unlicensed, in part on the basis that the baby was non-viable — an important principle in good-faith ethical and medical debates over late-term abortion and an important factual element that Smith and others later omitted from their accounts of the Williams case. In early 2011, Gonzalez filed a motion to dismiss the charges against her. In that motion, her attorneys cited testimony provided by two medical experts for the prosecution, both of whom agreed that the baby, which one estimated to have a gestational age of 21.5 weeks, was non-viable when she was delivered, meaning she could never have survived outside the womb for more than mere moments, no matter what attempts were made to save her life. The motion quoted Dr. William Smalling, a neonatologist and medical expert for the prosecution, as saying in deposition: “After reviewing the charts [presented by law enforcement], it was deemed that the fetus was about twenty-one and a half weeks. And based on estimation by the pathology report and the ultrasound, a fetus of that age would not be — would be considered non-viable, which means it wasn’t mature enough to survive outside of the uterus regardless of whatever intervention was done. So I felt that cutting the umbilical cord played no role on [sic] the survival of the infant, because the baby was deemed to be not able to survive.” The second prosecution expert, obstetrician and gynecologist Dr. Glenn Salkind, wrote in an affidavit that “the fetus was not viable at the time of the termination of pregnancy.” Gonzalez also quoted from the death certificate produced for the infant, which wrote that “the medical examiner concluded the cause of death was extreme prematurity and the manner of death to be natural.” Whatever one’s subjective moral viewpoint, a non-trivial difference does exist between a set of circumstances in which a fetus, intended for abortion, is instead delivered alive and breathing and has a chance of surviving with the help of medical intervention, as compared to a fetus that perhaps momentarily struggles to gain breath or twitches but has no realistic prospect of surviving beyond a couple of minutes, regardless of what life-saving efforts take place. This is not to defend or condemn one course of action over another, including the decisions made by clinic staff including Gonzalez, but rather to simply point out that a difference does exist where fetal viability comes into question. From an ethical point of view, it is worth noting that, at the time she cut the umbilical cord and disposed of the baby, Gonzalez may or may not have been aware of the fact that, as medical professionals later attested, the fetus was non-viable and had no realistic hope of survival. Even if her own experience and knowledge reliably informed her that the fetus could not survive, cutting the umbilical cord and disposing of the remains was not the only course of action immediately available to her. She could, for example, have endeavored to provide as much comfort as possible to the baby in the circumstances, or sought a second opinion from a licensed medical professional, and so on. In the context of this fact check, and the claims made by Smith, LifeNews, and others, it is important to note that their description of the incident — the baby was “born alive” and “gasping for air” before being disposed of by clinic staff — likely gave many readers the impression that the baby had a chance of survival and may well have lived had Gonzalez not taken the actions she did. That was not the case, as attested by medical experts hired by prosecutors against Gonzalez, and therefore this element of those descriptions had a tendency to be misleading. In 2011, prosecutors accepted Gonzalez’ motion to dismiss the charges against her, writing that the evidence available was not sufficient to refute the defendant’s claims. Eleventh Circuit Court Judge John Thornton dismissed the charges against Gonzalez in March 2011. Williams also took a civil case against the clinic and several of its staff (including Gonzalez and Renelique, the doctor who was schedule to perform the second part of the abortion procedure in July 2006). She sued them for professional malpractice in 2009, but the case was dismissed in 2012.
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A forwarded email with examples of untimely deaths of people who mocked God. The email quotes Galatians 6:7 and lists a group of people who all mocked God and died. The first example is of former Beatle John Lennon who said that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus. Also included in the list are Marilyn Monroe, a rock singer who sang that he was on a “Highway to Hell”, a Brazilian president elect, a Brazilian singer and the man who built the RMS Titanic.
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Untimely Deaths of Famous People Who Mocked God
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mixture
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Celebrities, Religious
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This eRumor suggests that God wiped out certain people for statements they made about him. Whether that is true is known only to God, but we can explore whether they really made the statements attributed to them. John Lennon (1940-1980) did say in 1966, “Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn’t argue about that. I’m right and I will be proved right. We’re more popular than Jesus now. I don’t know which will go first – rock n’ roll or Christianity.” Fourteen years later, Lennon was shot dead by Mark David Chapman in New York City on December 8, 1980. The American teen magazine “Datebook” reprinted the “We’re more popular than Jesus” interview which caused a stir of protests and a rash of Beatle record and memorabilia burnings on the streets in the US. Beatles manager, Brian Epstein released a statement saying that the words of John Lennon had been taken out of context and while in Chicago Lennon and the Beatles called a press conference and apologized to the world for his comment. The band heard of threats from the Ku Klux Klan, predictions that they would all die in a plane crash or a hurricane. This was about 2 years after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the band made a decision to stop touring and focus their attention to work in the recording studio. YouTube Video of the John Lennon Comment about Jesus John Lennon was a Rock and Roll musician who co-founded the popular British Invasion Band called the Beatles in the 1960’s. Lennon and co-writer Paul McCartney wrote hundreds of songs together along with George Harrison and Ringo Star and together they remained at the top of the charts for nearly a decade. Lennon was notorious for his little quips and often answered reporter’s questions off answers the top of his head. One of the earliest remarks like these was when asked how the Beatles found America, Lennon responded, “Turn left at Greenland.” The Fab Four might have began in England but they gained European popularity in the rock and roll school of hard knocks working the taverns of Hamburg Germany. The band returned to England where they were discovered playing at a nightclub by Brian Epstein who landed them a record deal and there first hits “Please Please Me” and “Love Me Do” skyrocketed them to fame. Their 1963 US tour the U.S. included a Sunday Night live performance on the Ed Sullivan Show which introduced the for mop tops to the nearly every American family. The band had a long run on the hit parade and in 1969 broke up and each Beatle pursued their individual solo careers. In the Beatles Anthology documentary , George Harrison said, “They gave their money and they gave their screams, but the Beatles kind of gave their nervous systems. Which is, you know, much more difficult thing to give.” In his book, “Skywriting By Word of Mouth”, Lennon wrote that he and the group had grown weary of touring and thanked Jesus for the comment that drove the band from the road and into the studio where they recorded their most creative projects. After the breakup of the band, John Lennon wrote a couple of songs about God. In his first solo album Lennon wrote, “God is a concept, by which we can measure, our pain.” This was a song where John list Beatles, Bible, Jesus, Zimmerman (Bob Dylan), kings, yoga, Kennedy, and mantra as things that he does not believe in and says he just believes in himself and his wife Yoko. Seven years before his death, in 1973, Lennon’s biggest solo hit entitled “Imagine” included the lyrics, Imagine there’s no Heaven, it’s easy if you try. No Hell below us, above us only sky.” Many interpreted the song to be a message against religion but this was John Lennon vision of the world living in peace and not fighting over spiritual ideals or materialism. The question is, why would God wait so long to smite John Lennon? Tancredo Neves (1910-1985) He was elected president of Brazil in January 1985. Neves underwent surgery before his inauguration and was unable to take office. Vice president elect José Sarney Costa temporarily assumed the presidency. Neves never recovered and died from complications following his surgery. We have not found any evidence that he made the statement about God. Cazuza (4 April 1958 – 7 July 1990) was a Brazilian composer, singer and poet who was noted for mixing the Bosse Nova with British and American Popular music styles. According to his obituary in the July 8, 1990 New York Times, the openly bisexual Cazuza died of aids at the age of 32, not lung cancer. We have not found any evidence that he mocked God. Click for obit. Marilyn Monroe (1926 – 1962) was married at the age to 21 to her first husband, Jimmy Dougherty. According to the bio on Monroe’s official web site, Dougherty, said of his wife, “She was a sweet, generous and religious girl.” Monroe was reared as a foster child in a devoutly Christian family in Hawthorne, California but there is not much information about what her spiritual beliefs were before she died. Monroe’s death was ruled to be “acute barbiturate poisoning” by Los Angeles County Coroner, Dr. Thomas Noguchi. A spokesperson for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association told TruthOrFiction.com that there was no discussion between Marilyn Monroe and Billy Graham. Bonn Scott (July 9th, 1946 – February 19, 1980) was the co-writer of the ACDC 1979 popular song “Highway to Hell” and at the age of 33 was pronounced dead on arrival at Kings College in London, England. The cause of death was asphyxiation as a result of vomiting after passing out after a night of heavy alcohol consumption. The song Highway to Hell lyrics referred to the self destructive lifestyle of the rock and roll artist with the lyrics: “Hey Satan, payin’ my dues. Playing in a rocking band. Hey Momma, look at me I’m on my way to the promised land. I’m on the highway to hell.” The RMS Titanic was built in 1911 for the White Star Line at the the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast in the United Kingdom. According to the archives.gov web site an unknown White Star Line employee at the time of Titanic’s launch on May 31, 1911 said, “Not even God himself could sink this ship.” It is not known who this person was or if in fact he built the Titanic. TruthorFiction.com is still investigating the other stories in this eRumor. The Bible quotation in the eRumor taken from Galatians 6:7 but was used out context to the text surrounding it. The Apostle Paul’s letter to the Galatians is about Grace, Christian living and the sixth chapter warns against being condescending and instructs on helping others who fall into sin. updated 07/02/09 Comments
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33015
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Muslims were banned from immigrating to the United States in 1952 under the provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act.
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Muslims are not barred from entering or immigrating to the United States under the provisions of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, or U.S. Code § 1182.
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false
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Politics Immigration, immigration and nationality act, islam, jimmy carter
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In late 2015 a claim spreading on social media under the heading “ISLAM WAS BANNED FROM THE USA IN 1952,” holding that Muslims has been banned from entering or immigrating to the United States back in the early 1950s: ISLAM WAS BANNED FROM THE USA IN 1952, but Obama & the media don’t want you to know that. The Immigration and Nationality Act that passed June 27, 1952 revised the laws relating to immigration, naturalization, and nationality for the United States. That act, which became Public Law 414, established both the law and the intent of Congress regarding the immigration of Aliens to the US and remains in effect today. Among the many issues it covers, one in particular, found in Chapter 2 Section 212, is the prohibition of entry to the US if the Alien belongs to an organization seeking to overthrow the government of the United States by “force, violence, or other unconstitutional means.” This, by its very definition, rules out Islamic immigration to the United States. This law is being ignored by the White House. Islamic immigration to the U.S. is prohibited under this law because the Koran, Sharia Law and the Hadith all require complete submission to Islam, which is antithetical to the US government, the Constitution, and to the Republic. All Muslims who believe that the Koran is life’s guiding principal also believe in total submission to islam & sharia law. To all who claim that Islam is a religion, read the law again … the law states that Aliens who are affiliated with ANY “organization” that advocates the overthrow of the U.S. government are prohibited. It’s a law, 8 US CODE 1182 WAS Used By Carter in 1979. Trump Wasn’t Just Blathering Again. He has some SHARP PEOPLE working for him. Very interesting. Law of the Land…did you know this? Here is number 8 US Code 1182, inadmissible aliens. This law was written in 1952. It was passed by a Democrat controlled Congress, House and Senate, and signed by a Democrat president. “Suspension of entry or imposition of restrictions by president. Whenever the president finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, the president may, by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or non-immigrants or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.” All of the pundits that are claiming that what Trump said is dumb, stupid, reckless, dangerous, and/or unconstitutional, need to educate themselves. It is already the law of the land. And it was utilized by Jimmy Carter, no less, in 1979 to keep Iranians out of the United States, but he actually did more. He made all Iranian students already here check in, and then he deported a bunch. Seven thousand were found in violation of their visas, 15,000 Iranians were forced to leave the United States, 1979. You probably won’t hear of this from our mainstream media, nor from our “Imam-in-Chief”. But those are the facts. ISLAM WAS BANNED FROM THE USA IN 1952, but Obama doesn’t want you to know that nor does he respect or uphold US… https://t.co/CzddJYISvu — Doug Parks (@LDougParks) November 30, 2015 The image sharply escalated in popularity following an unprecedented statement from Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who on 7 December 2015 (in the wake of a mass shooting in San Bernardino that had occurred five days earlier) suggested the United States should bar all Muslims from entering the country until such time as lawmakers could “figure out what [was] going on” Simply put, the rumor maintained that Muslims as a group were ineligible for admission to the United States based upon a law that prohibited entry to any alien who “belongs to an organization seeking to overthrow the government of the United States by ‘force, violence, or other unconstitutional means. '” The law referenced was the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, also known as the McCarran–Walter Act. Its text is available in full at the U.S. Citizenship and Naturalization Services (USCIS) web site, where a preface indicates that the law has “been amended many times over the years but is still the basic body of immigration law.” The claim typically cited “Chapter 2 Section 212” of the Act, which excludes as ineligible for admission the following persons: In general any alien who a consular officer or the Attorney General knows, or has reasonable ground to believe, seeks to enter the United States to engage solely, principally, or incidentally in any activity a purpose of which is the opposition to, or the control or overthrow of, the Government of the United States by force, violence, or other unlawful means. That law, originally aimed at Communists, could be used now to exclude persons (both Muslims and non-Muslims) who have demonstrated an affiliation or sympathy with violent extremist groups professing Islamist motivations and goals (e.g., ISIS, al-Qaeda, Al-Shabaab, Boko Haram) from entering the U.S., but asserting that it enables a de facto ban on all Muslims is inaccurate. Most major religions involve basic, agreed-upon sets of tenets by which their faithful live, and no widely-accepted understanding of Islam encompasses a prohibition on following the laws of any country or advocates the overthrow of government. The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 was not without critics, among them President Harry S. Truman, who vetoed the bill on 25 June 1952. In a letter titled “Veto of Bill to Revise the Laws Relating to Immigration, Naturalization, and Nationality” and addressed to the House of Representatives, President Truman described the bill’s provisions as both antithetical to American values and discriminatory: The greatest vice of the present quota system, however, is that it discriminates, deliberately and intentionally, against many of the peoples of the world … The desired effect [of selective admission of immigrants] was obtained … People from such countries as Greece, or Spain, or Latvia were virtually deprived of any opportunity to come here at all, simply because Greeks or Spaniards or Latvians had not come here before 1920 in any substantial numbers. The idea behind this discriminatory policy was, to put it baldly, that Americans with English or Irish names were better people and better citizens than Americans with Italian or Greek or Polish names. It was thought that people of West European origin made better citizens than Rumanians or Yugoslavs or Ukrainians or Hungarians or Baits or Austrians. Such a concept is utterly unworthy of our traditions and our ideals. It violates the great political doctrine of the Declaration of Independence that “all men are created equal.” It denies the humanitarian creed inscribed beneath the Statue of Liberty proclaiming to all nations, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” It repudiates our basic religious concepts, our belief in the brotherhood of man, and in the words of St. Paul that “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free …. for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.” In that letter President Truman further maintained the act’s provisions were out of alignment with foreign policy goals, inhibiting immigrants who needed it most from seeking safe harbor in America: The basis of this quota system was false and unworthy in 1924. It is even worse now. At the present time, this quota system keeps out the very people we want to bring in. It is incredible to me that, in this year of 1952, we should again be enacting into law such a slur on the patriotism, the capacity, and the decency of a large part of our citizenry. Today, we have entered into an alliance, the North Atlantic Treaty, with Italy, Greece, and Turkey against one of the most terrible threats mankind has ever faced. We are asking them to join with us in protecting the peace of the world. We are helping them to build their defenses, and train their men, in the common cause. But, through this bill we say to their people: You are less worthy to come to this country than Englishmen or Irishmen; you Italians, who need to find homes abroad in the hundreds of thousands — you shall have a quota of 5,645; you Greeks, struggling to assist the helpless victims of a communist civil war — you shall have a quota of 308; and you Turks, you are brave defenders of the Eastern flank, but you shall have a quota of only 225! Truman’s words seemed exceptionally prescient when he spoke of citizens in countries that had in recent years fallen behind the Iron Curtain: Today, we are “protecting” ourselves, as we were in 1924, against being flooded by immigrants from Eastern Europe. This is fantastic. The countries of Eastern Europe have fallen under the communist yoke — they are silenced, fenced off by barbed wire and minefields — no one passes their borders but at the risk of his life. We do not need to be protected against immigrants from these countries — on the contrary we want to stretch out a helping hand, to save those who have managed to flee into Western Europe, to succor those who are brave enough to escape from barbarism, to welcome and restore them against the day when their countries will, as we hope, be free again … some 30,000 Rumanians, who have managed to escape the labor camps and the mass deportations of their Soviet masters, have asked our help. These are only a few examples of the absurdity, the cruelty of carrying over into this year of 1952 the isolationist limitations of our 1924 law. In that letter, President Truman spoke specifically of immigration quotas arranged deliberately to exclude specific nationalities. A large portion of the letter directly addressed Truman’s belief that the American way of life ought to be extended to those living under the same totalitarian regimes the U.S. hoped to vanquish. Truman lamented that in “no other realm of our national life are we so hampered and stultified by the dead hand of the past, as we are in this field of immigration.” The “ISLAM WAS BANNED FROM THE USA IN 1952” claim proved popular following a period of increasing rhetoric similar to that which Truman decried as discriminatory and outdated in 1952. The basic claim hinged on the tautological assertion that adherence to Islam alone constitutes participation in an “organization seeking to overthrow the government of the United States by ‘force, violence, or other unconstitutional means. '”
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21764
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There are 30,000 people that have been killed with seat belts.
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R.I. Rep. Trillo says 30,000 people have died because they used seat belts
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false
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Rhode Island, Government Regulation, Public Safety, Regulation, Joseph Trillo,
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"During the June 29, 2011, Rhode Island House debate over legislation to allow the police to stop motorists who are not wearing seat belts -- a bill that has now become law -- supporters said it would encourage more people to belt themselves in. Critics countered that the proposal was one more attempt to chip away at our personal freedoms and could encourage racial profiling. Few will disagree that seat belts save lives. But this was one instance where House Minority Whip Joseph Trillo, who said he regularly uses his seat belt, couldn't restrain himself. ""There are 30,000 people that have been killed with seat belts, where they've gotten into accidents, the cars were on fire, they've been knocked out, they haven't been able to get out of the vehicle,"" he said. ""My point is, even if the majority of people are saved, why do we keep forcing people to do things that they feel it's their own individual right to make a decision?"" When we saw him make that comment on Capitol TV, we were intrigued. Thirty thousand people have lost their lives because they wore their seat belts? We were driven to call him that evening to ask him for the source of that statistic. A few emails and another phone call later, he reported that he couldn't find the source. ""I know that I got it in an email. It brought me to a credible site. I don't remember what it was though,"" he said. ""I'm not sure whether it's cumulative or on a yearly basis."" Undaunted, he cited a page on the website of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration -- which we checked -- saying that in 2002, 2004 and 2006, the number of people who died while wearing a seat belt was 12,000, 13,000 and 12,500, respectively. When we pointed out that being killed while wearing a seat belt doesn't mean they would have survived if they had been unbelted, Trillo argued that ""if 12,000 to 13,000 are dying with seat belts every year on a national level, even if 2,000 couldn't get out of the car, it still could cumulatively add up to 30,000."" We tried to find the source of Trillo's statement. A Google search came up blank. But we did find a website that talked about ""23,000 people who run the risk of being trapped and fatally killed by a seat belt each year!"" It also warned against seat belt use because ""psychiatrists say that exposing young children to practices such as bondage from an early age can cause confusion during puberty."" Needless to say, it was a humor website. So we decided to go the extra mile to look for some real data. Both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Consumer Product Safety Commission sent us to the NHTSA. Its most recent estimate is that 12,713 lives were saved in 2009 by people wearing seat belts, and another 3,688 fatalities would have been prevented if every driver had used one. (In Rhode Island, 11 lives were saved because of seat belt use and 10 died because they were not belted in, according to that report.) When we asked them for the number of deaths in which the use of seat belts was a contributing factor, they came up empty. NHTSA's Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) database of motor vehicle fatalities logs lots of causes of death, listed as ""most harmful event."" Wearing a seat belt isn't one of them. After Trillo's comment about being trapped in a burning car, we searched the database and found there were 157 fire- or explosion-related fatalities in passenger vehicles in 2009 where the victims were using their seat belts. If you add people who died by immersion in water, the number jumps to 243. Even if seat belts trapped the occupants in every case, that would represent less than one percent of fatalities and it would take 123 years (at the 2009 rate) to match Trillo's 30,000 figure. (Lap belts have only been mandatory in U.S. cars since the 1960s.) We even put out a message to the 32,000 people who follow PolitiFact National on Twitter, asking people to email us if anyone had any reliable information on the question. One response led us to Sgt. William Mahoney, an accident scene investigator for about seven years with the Kansas City, Mo., Police Department, which handles about 65 to 75 traffic fatalities per year. ""I've never seen a death that's been classified as having been caused by a seat belt,"" he said. ""I'm not saying they don't exist. I've never seen one."" When we asked Lt. Col. Raymond White of the Rhode Island State Police if, in his 28 years in law enforcement, he has ever seen an instance where someone probably would have survived a crash if they hadn't been wearing their seat belt, he said, ""That's never been the case."" And William Hall, who manages the occupant protection program at the University of North Carolina's Highway Safety Center, said that in the 30 years he's been with the center he hasn't seen any estimate comparable to Trillo's. ""I have no clue as to where he may have gotten it,"" he said, noting that it's ""quite likely"" that, if the number was real, he would be aware of it. Hall said that ""less than one half of one percent of all crashes involve a post-crash fire or going in the water. So that's a very low probability event. There are probably some extremely rare, rare circumstances where someone might have not been killed if they had been unbelted, but that's very, very hard to substantiate. It could mean it's just a non-survival crash and you're not going to make it, seat belt or no seat belt."" In summary, when Trillo asserted that 30,000 people ""have been killed with seat belts,"" the context of his statement made it clear that he was saying that seat belts contributed to their deaths, not simply that 30,000 people who died happened to be wearing seat belts. When we asked him for the source of his information, he couldn't produce it. ""When we're doing all those bills, I'm trying to assimilate a lot of information. I'm not taking notes on it. I'm just reading stuff,"" said Trillo. In fact, when we suggested it might be wise to take note of his sources in case someone -- like PolitiFact, for example -- wanted to know where his facts came from, his response was, ""I could care less."" But we care because, if seat belts are really that dangerous, we want to know. And if a politician is exercising his right to be fooled by an email, we want to know that as well. With more than 30,000 fatal traffic accidents in the United States each year, we suspect there must be at least a few in which victims might have survived had they not been wearing a seat belt. But a search of Google, a question to the 32,000 readers who get our Twitter feed and queries to three federal agencies, two law enforcement agencies and others with an interest in tracking the dangers of seat belts produced no evidence that 30,000 people have died from wearing seat belts. Ever. Trillo's statement deserves to be strapped in for a one-way ride to Ridiculousville. We award his inflammatory claim a (Get updates from PolitiFactRI on Twitter. To comment or offer your ruling, visit us on our PolitiFact Rhode Island Facebook page.)
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11512
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Nivolumab immunotherapy helps patients with advanced bladder cancer
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The release offers an overview of clinical trial results that were presented June 5 at the annual meeting of the American Society for Clinical Oncology (ASCO). The release notes that the drug nivolumab (which is marketed as Opdivo) shrunk the tumors of 24 percent (19 of 78) of patients with metastatic bladder cancer who received the drug. Like a number of other drugs that have been significant advances in cancer treatment, the drug is an antibody that stimulates the immune system to attack cancer cells. It is already approved to treat a number of other cancers (advanced melanoma, lung, kidney, and Hodgkin’s lymphoma). Also of significance: Most of the patients had undergone at least two other courses of treatment. According to the quoted researcher, the 45% survival rate at one year is better than seen with other treatments for this cancer. The release addresses many factors, but does not offer much detail about the study itself and doesn’t address cost — which is likely to be significant — or the fact the lead researcher served on an advisory board to the drug maker. HealthNewsReview.org reviewed a release about a different immunotherapy drug and bladder cancer in May 2016, but some of the points made in that review also apply here. The National Cancer Institute (NCI) estimates 76,960 new cases of bladder cancer and 16,390 deaths from this disease in 2016. This approval of a new drug for treating bladder cancer is part of a wider area of research into immunotherapy, in which drugs target mechanisms of the human immune response. This drug is an example of targeted chemotherapy which is becoming more important as treatments can be fine-tuned to the cancers of individual patients. In patients with intractable cancers, immunotherapy appears to offer some new hope while also bringing sobering questions about affordability and disparity of access by income. These drugs can be extremely expensive — nivolumab was actually called out in an NEJM piece last year because of its cost. And the aggressive marketing of Opdivo directly to consumers also raises questions. Immunotherapy drugs hold promise, but they have limitations — including cost — and it’s important to highlight those limitations for both patients and healthcare providers.
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mixture
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Academic medical center news release,Cancer
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The release doesn’t address costs at all, which is particularly problematic given that Opdivo is already on the market for use in treating other forms of cancer. In an NEJM piece published last year, one doctor that, when used for treating metastatic renal-cell cancer, nivolumab costs, “by my estimate, around $65,000 for Medicare beneficiaries and up to twice that for commercially insured patients.” Other estimates are that nivolumab treatment — again, for cancers other than bladder cancer — could cost more than $100,000 per patient. That is a huge factor in making treatment decisions, and needs to be addressed. The release does a pretty good job here, explaining that: “This Phase I/II clinical trial treated 78 patients: five (6.4 percent) had complete responses, 14 (18 percent) had partial responses, in which tumor burden shrinks by at least 30 percent, and 22 (28.2 percent) had stable disease. Thirty (38 percent) patients had disease progression.” Later, the release states that “At a median follow up of 213 days, 33.3 percent remained on treatment, and 45.6 percent of patients survived for at least one year, which [one doctor] noted ‘is better than anything we’ve seen in the past. '” The release also places analysis of survival in context by noting that “Overall survival will be analyzed in conjunction with the Phase II portion of this clinical trial, which provides nivolumab or a combination of nivolumab plus the immune checkpoint inhibitor ipilimumab.” The release states that “Treatment-related side effects included mainly low-grade fatigue, itching, elevated lipase, rash, nausea, joint pain and anemia. Grade 3 or 4 side effects occurred in 20.5 percent of patients. Two patients discontinued therapy because of adverse events related to the drug.” That’s enough to earn a satisfactory rating. However, it could have been better. The release says adverse effects “included mainly” manageable problems. But more than 20 percent of patients had “grade 3 or 4” side effects — and that is not trivial. The release would have been much stronger if it had offered some insight into those more severe effects, or even explained what “grade 3 or 4” effects means. Grade 3 effects, according to the National Cancer Institute, are “severe” — while grade 4 effects are “life-threatening or disabling.” That merits more discussion than it got. The release tells readers that 78 patients with metastatic bladder cancer were treated, and that the study has a “Phase II” component involving potential treatment with a second drug (ipilimumab). It doesn’t tell us anything about the patients — for instance their age or what previous treatments they’d received (information that can be found in the study abstract). We also don’t learn how often they were treated with nivolumab, how long the trial lasted, or what limitations should be considered when interpreting the study. In short, readers have more questions than answers about the study itself. No disease mongering here. The release might have added value by including a larger context on bladder cancer such as overall survival rates for it and how many people have to undergo treatment with one or more chemo regimens. The release notes that the clinical trial was funded by Bristol-Myers Squibb, which developed and markets both nivolumab and ipilimumab. However, the release doesn’t note that the lead author has served as a consultant to the Bristol-Myers Squibb Immuno-Oncology Network, among several others. The release notes that the only drug currently approved “for second-line treatment of metastatic bladder cancer” is a competing drug: atezolizumab. This would have been better if it had explained what “second-line treatment” means — since many readers are not going to know. The main reason that this is not satisfactory is that it is pretty confusing for non-expert readers. Nivolumab has not been approved by the FDA for use in treating metastatic bladder cancer. However, the release tells readers that nivolumab has been approved by the FDA for use in treating a variety of other cancers — and goes on to discuss survival rates for patients who take the drug (alone or in combination with ipilimumab). What does the FDA approval for treating other cancers have to do with the likelihood of nivolumab’s future availability for treating bladder cancer? That’s not clear, because the release doesn’t tell us. The release makes clear that nivolumab works by targeting so-called PD-1 proteins, allowing a patient’s immune system to target cancer cells — and that the drug appears to work on patients regardless of the presence of related PD-L1 ligands in the cancer. That’s enough to earn a satisfactory. It also sets this therapy apart from others in its claim that: “The response rate is better than we’ve seen for other potential second-line treatments and nivolumab is really well tolerated, which is important because bladder cancer patients are a fragile group after frontline treatment with platinum chemotherapy,” according to the lead investigator. The headline says “Nivolumab immunotherapy helps patients with advanced bladder cancer.” It would have been much more accurate to say “Nivolumab immunotherapy helps some patients with advanced bladder cancer” — many patients saw no benefit at all. The release also says that nivolumab is “really well-tolerated” — but goes on to note that more than 20 percent of patients had severe, life-threatening or disabling side effects. Perhaps what they meant to say was that nivolumab is “really well-tolerated compared to other treatment options.” But we can only go by the language that is actually used in the release, and it reached just a bit too far.
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35290
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U.S. citizens married to immigrants will not receive stimulus checks via the March 2020 Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act.
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What's true: Only U.S. citizens and immigrants with Social Security Numbers (SSN) are eligible for stimulus checks from the federal government's COVID-19 economic relief package. The legislation's guidelines exclude the remainder of the country's immigrant population from receiving the one-time payments — and, in effect, their spouses won't get the money either if the couple filed a joint tax return (and are not in the military). What's false: However, married couples who filed joint tax returns and consist of a U.S. citizen and an immigrant who has a SSN are eligible for the checks. Additionally, spouses who are U.S. citizens and filed single tax returns — regardless of the partner's immigration status — qualify for the payments.
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mixture
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Politics, COVID-19
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In the weeks that followed the U.S. federal government’s March 2020 approval of a $2.2 trillion stimulus package — the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act — to jumpstart a pandemic-broken economy, journalists and economists combed through the legislation’s 247-page PDF document outlining who would receive the financial help. Early news reports on the bill had highlighted its funding boosts to help newly unemployed Americans, small businesses facing diminished profits, health care facilities on the frontlines of fighting the COVID-19 coronavirus disease, and qualifying taxpayers by giving them one-time checks of about $1,200 (or more depending on how they filed taxes and their number of children). Then, in mid-April, more headlines focused on the intricacies of the multi-faceted policy package — including the claim that U.S. citizens married to immigrants wouldn’t qualify for the one-time payments like other taxpayers. The implication was that if spouses of immigrants had different marriages, they’d be richer with the federal government’s help. Numerous readers contacted Snopes to investigate the truth behind the claim. For our examination, we first looked at where the claim originated. On April 20, the Los Angeles Times published a news story headlined, “These U.S. citizens won’t get coronavirus stimulus checks — because their spouses are immigrants,” featuring stories of four couples, each of which includes an immigrant and will not be receiving the payments, as well as commentary from immigrant-rights advocates. The following day, CBS News published a story that cited the LA Times’ reporting. Then, on April 22, Yahoo!’s lifestyle section republished an article from the so-called ScaryMommy website, a self-proclaimed source of “entertainment and information for millennial moms online.” The post included editorialized phrasing, such as: “They just hate immigrants, and now, by default, American citizens who associate with them,” the Scary Mommy post read, referring to the federal administration under U.S. President Donald Trump. “The government is leaving those people (and their families) out of help, and it’s heartbreaking.” A rush of tweets, some lacking important context, followed. Among sharers of the LA Times story was U.S. Sen. Claire Celsi, a Democrat from Iowa, who said on Twitter: Responding to her tweet, however, one user wrote: “I’m an immigrant. My wife is a US citizen. We got $2,400 as a direct deposit on April 15th. This is no less misleading than posting ‘immigrants commit crimes.’ It’s technically true, but there is no causal link.” Cue this fact check on who is and isn’t eligible for the stimulus checks, called “Economic Impact Payments,” based on 2019 or 2018 tax returns. For those who are eligible, the CARES Act authorized the federal government to send: Additionally, for single tax filers with higher annual salaries — but less than $99,000 — the federal government is reducing the payments by $5 for each $100 above the $75,000 threshold (similar math goes for payments to families). But to qualify, a recipient must be a “U.S. citizen, permanent resident or qualifying resident alien” under guidelines established by the Internal Revenue Service. The latter two categorizations cover foreign-born residents who have obtained green cards to prove their legal status to work and live in the country and Social Security Numbers (SSN). The provision in the CARES Act outlining the payments states:
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31812
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Adam Sandler was found dead of an apparent suicide in January 2017.
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Like many long-running fake news outfits, the page renders first as “LinkBeef” before reloading to display “Interesting Things Daily.”
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false
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Junk News, linkbeef
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On 13 January 2017 LinkBeef published an item asserting that comedian Adam Sandler had been found dead of an apparent suicide: US actor and comedian Adam Sandler has been found dead, aged 49, in an apparent suicide. Marin County Police in California said he was pronounced dead at his home shortly after officials responded to an emergency call around noon local time … His publicist said he had been “battling severe depression”. The local Sheriff’s office said Sandler was found unconscious and not breathing at his home near Tiburon, north of San Francisco. “At this time, the Sheriff’s Office Coroner Division suspects the death to be a suicide due to asphyxia, but a comprehensive investigation must be completed before a final determination is made,” police said in a statement. In a statement, Adam’s wife, Jackie Sandler, said she was “utterly heartbroken” and asked that he be remembered for the joy he brought to the world. This report was nothing more than another celebrity death hoax from fake news purveyor LinkBeef, whose previously published falsehoods include claims that a gang member died after gold plating his genitals, that a “lab-grown” baby had been born, that the pilot of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 was found alive in Taiwan, and that a wealthy man attempted to recruit many women to be the prospective mothers of his children.
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26564
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“They’re furloughing nurses in hospitals in western New York state.”
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Hospitals in Buffalo and Rochester said they were preparing for a surge of patients, not furloughing nurses. Some health care workers have been furloughed elsewhere as elective surgeries have been canceled to stop the spread of the coronavirus.
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false
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New York, Coronavirus, Jerome Adams,
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"U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams made a startling claim about hospital nurses in Western New York when talking about the importance of properly deploying resources in the fight against the new coronavirus. In an interview with CBS This Morning, Adams was asked if there are enough ventilators to treat severely ill patients in places such as New York City, which has become the center of the pandemic in the United States. ""We sent a team, a FEMA team, to help New York City make sure the resources are getting to where they need. I talked to people in western New York who said they’re furloughing nurses in hospitals in western New York state, while people in New York City are suffering. We need to make sure we get the right resources to the right people, and that’s what we’re committed to doing."" We wondered whether his statement that Western New York hospitals are furloughing nurses is true. A spokesperson for Dr. Adams said the surgeon general heard about furloughs from a doctor in the Rochester area. ""The surgeon general spoke with a Rochester-area physician earlier this week, who shared that information,"" said Jennifer Sherman, director of public affairs in the Office of the Surgeon General. ""The point Dr. Adams was making is that in some states we are seeing a mismatch of resources, where one city may have more resources but fewer cases, and another city may have few resources but an abundance of cases. It's important states are coordinating with local jurisdictions and providers so they have the resources they need, and that is something the federal government is helping facilitate - in addition to deploying resources from the Strategic National Stockpile and FEMA."" We reached out to the doctor, who declined to speak with us on the record. We reached out to hospitals to see if they know of any nursing furloughs in Western New York hospitals. None knew of any. Rochester’s two major health systems, which operate most hospitals in the Rochester region, said they are not furloughing nurses. Rochester Regional Health, which operates Rochester General Hospital and four others in surrounding communities, has not furloughed any nurses. ""We are in the process of redeploying resources which includes nurses,"" said Public Information Officer Veronica Chiesi Brown. ""This means they are taken from one area and moved to another based on need. Nurses are a critical resource right now and we need more, not less."" University of Rochester Medicine, which operates Strong Memorial Hospital and six others in the Rochester region, may have nurses at home because they could be infected, but none are on furlough. ""A small number of staff members who are symptomatic are staying home pending test results, but no furloughs are taking place in UR Medicine’s hospitals or ambulatory practices,"" said Chip Partner, assistant vice president for communications. In addition, Monroe County government and Rochester’s two major hospital systems on Friday unveiled a plan to double its hospital capacity. The plan includes hiring more clinicians, including doctors and nurses. The Genesee Valley Nurses Association, a professional organization for registered nurses in seven counties in the Rochester area, had not heard of any furloughs, said Nancy Iafrati, who is on the organization’s board of directors. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, which operates medical centers in Buffalo, Batavia, and Canandaigua, are not furloughing nurses, and are looking to re-hire VA nurses who have retired, said Christina Mandreucci, press secretary for the department. In Buffalo, major hospitals are hiring nurses, preparing for a surge of Covid-19 patients. Kaleida Health, which operates Buffalo General Medical Center and Millard Fillmore Suburban Hospital, among others health care facilities, said it is hiring nurses. So is Erie County Medical Center. Catholic Health, which operates hospitals in Buffalo and recently opened a facility solely dedicated to treating coronavirus patients, has posted ""a call to service"" on its employment web page, seeking nurses, respiratory therapists and others. A statewide professional organization said it is aware of furloughs of nurse anesthetists in New York State, because elective procedures have been canceled in an effort to slow the spread of the virus. The organization has sent a survey to its members to find out how many of those furloughs have occurred, said Stephanie Grolemund, president of the New York State Association of Nurse Anesthetists. Elsewhere in the country, there have been reports of furloughed health care workers, either because of exposure to the virus or because the organizations they work for depend on income from elective procedures and office visits, which have been postponed in an effort to stop the spread of the virus. We couldn’t find any evidence of furloughs of nurses in Western New York. On the contrary, hospitals in Buffalo and Rochester are hiring nurses and are preparing plans for an anticipated surge in patients."
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9643
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"This new device claims to be the ""off switch for menstrual pain."" And it might actually work."
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This is a story about a new device coming to market for menstrual pain. The story is a great example of how the media should deal with claims made about new devices. With a dose of healthy skepticism, the story provides the reader with a complete discourse on the merits of the device and of TENS (transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation) in general. We welcomed that skepticism across the board and appreciated the grounding comments of an independent source. Bravo. Perimenstrual pain is a common problem affecting most premenopausal women. So, the availability of a device that is safe and effective in relieving symptoms would be welcomed.
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true
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livia,menstrual pain,pain relief
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We were pleased to see cost discussed in the story. The story points out that the projected retail cost of the Livia device ($149) and the pre-order price ($85) is more than similar devices (as low as $30 on Amazon). The story provides quantified benefits via an unsubstantiated quote from the company’s CEO: “So far, Nachum said they have tested the device on 163 women in two different trials — and more than 80 percent experienced relief with the device. The company is currently working on another study, which will include about 60 women.” That normally would generate a Not Satisfactory rating, as we’d want to see a more specific description of the benefit than “experiencing relief.” But the story makes it clear that this was the only data available owing to the lack of published research. It also provides provides comments from an ob-gyn specialist with a good deal of experience with the use of TENS, who counters the CEO’s claims. For these reasons, we rule this one Satisfactory. We would normally look for some statement about potential harms but in this case we don’t think the requirement is applicable: TENS, when used according to directions, have a low harm profile. The story makes it clear that there is essentially no published information available on how the device manufacturer tested the device in women (eg, randomized/ blinded or not, what pain measures were used, etc). And it comments critically on this lack of published data. The story does not overstate the problem. The comments from an independent expert help ground the claims made by the company CEO. The outside source is the key to balance in this article. The story notes that oral contraceptives and analgesics are also used, and that traditional TENS units are also widely available. The story makes it clear that the device is not available at the present time, and it makes it clear that there are available TENS units now that are not as expensive. The story makes it clear that the Livia device has as yet to be characterized fully by the company, but at face value appears to be equivalent to a TENS unit, which have been used for menstrual pain for many years. The story clearly does not rely on a press release.
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2057
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Indonesia tackles rabies on resort island of Bali.
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Indonesian authorities aim to vaccinate hundreds of thousands of dogs on the resort island of Bali in an effort to stem an outbreak of rabies that has killed 100 people since 2008, a government official said on Thursday.
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true
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Health News
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Thousands of feral dogs have been infected since a 2008 outbreak on the previously rabies-free island, which attracts hordes of tourists and is the setting for part of the recently released film “Eat, Pray, Love.” Authorities have begun a mass dog vaccination program in recent weeks, with the aim of inoculating 70 percent of a targeted 450,000 dogs by March. “Sixteen teams have been working and we will develop at least 10 teams in every regency,” Putu Sumantra, head of the Bali Animal Husbandry Department, told Reuters by telephone. Arie Rukmantara, a disease expert at the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF, said that when the outbreak started in 2008, Bali faced a shortage of vaccines and rabies had spread to livestock. “Cattle cannot spread rabies, they just die,” he said. The outbreak is thought to have originated from an infected dog introduced to the island in 2008. Each year, more than 55,000 people die of rabies in Asia and Africa with rabid dogs being the source of 99 percent of human deaths from the disease, according to the World Health Organization. The rabies virus spreads through the central nervous system and causes inflammation of the brain and spinal cord. The most cost effective way to prevent the disease in people is by eliminating it in dogs through vaccination. “Bali is taking the most effective route to protecting the health of its citizens, as well as the thousands of tourists who visit the island every year,” said Mike Baker of the World Society for the Protection of Animals, which has financed Bali’s vaccination program. The Bali Animal Welfare Association, which is helping with the vaccination, adopted the slogan “Feed, Spay, Love” for a pilot round of inoculations — a play on the title of the movie starring Julia Roberts that was partly filmed in Bali.
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4953
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Official: Mental health crisis center set to launch in Omaha.
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A Nebraska hospital system will build a psychiatric emergency center on its Omaha campus, officials said, dashing the hopes of Sarpy County officials who had pitched building the center in Bellevue.
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true
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Bellevue, Mental health, General News, Nebraska, Omaha
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Dr. Howard Liu, psychiatry chairman of the University of Nebraska Medical Center, said the health system’s board of directors approved the project in concept on Monday, the Omaha World-Herald reported. Liu said they aim to open the center next spring or summer. In early June, Nebraska Medicine was in “very preliminary” discussions with Sarpy County about adding such a facility to its Bellevue campus. Officials also said at the time that they were considering a similar facility at the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha. Liu noted that the discussions with Sarpy ended a few months ago. A planning group of leaders in psychiatry and emergency medicine concluded that the health system should prioritize Douglas County due to its larger volume of patients. Sarpy County has earmarked $1.25 million in its 2020 budget for a mental health crisis facility, and Nebraska Medicine officials said they remained involved in discussions with the county. “It’s a significant amount of money that we’re willing to commit to partner with other (organizations) to really find a solution to improve mental health care,” said Megan Stubenhofer-Barrett, the county’s spokeswoman. “We’d love to have Nebraska Medicine at the table with us.” Sarpy has been pursuing a temporary crisis center to address a lack of mental health services in the area. County leaders have complained that the county jail, which is frequently overcrowded, has become a de facto holding area for those in crisis, but that it isn’t prepared to treat such people. The crisis center would keep people out of jail who don’t belong there, instead connecting them with long-term treatment possibilities. Nebraska Medicine already offers telehealth services in Sarpy County, Liu noted. Moving forward, the health system wants to explore creating more ambulatory services there. Health system officials intend to learn from the Omaha center, hoping that it could serve as a potential model for future facilities. ___ Information from: Omaha World-Herald, http://www.omaha.com
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8300
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U.S. coronavirus deaths increase by record amount for second straight day: Reuters tally.
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U.S. coronavirus deaths increased by a record number for the second day in a row, rising by at least 2,371 on Wednesday to top 30,800, according to a Reuters tally, as states spared the worst of the pandemic mulled a partial lifting of restrictions on business and social life by May 1.
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true
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Health News
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The United States recorded its first coronavirus fatality on Feb. 29. It took 38 days to reach 10,000 deaths and just nine more days to go from 10,000 fatalities to 30,000. The previous high single-day death toll was 2,364 on Tuesday. U.S. confirmed cases topped 635,000 in the United States and 2 million globally. Despite the spike in deaths, there were tentative signs in some parts of the country that the outbreak was beginning to ebb. Governors of about 20 states with few coronavirus cases believe they may be ready to start the process of reopening their economies by President Donald Trump’s May 1 target date, a top U.S. health official said on Wednesday. Governors in harder-hit states - New York, California, Louisiana, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Michigan - said there was a need for more widespread testing before starting to end the coronavirus shutdown, which has thrown millions out of work with the closing of restaurants, businesses and schools. Health officials have noted that death figures are a lagging indicator of the outbreak, coming after the most severely ill patients fall sick, and do not mean stay-at-home restrictions are failing to curb transmissions. New York state and some other hard-hit areas continue to report sharp decreases in hospitalizations and numbers of patients on ventilators, although front-line healthcare workers and resources remained under extraordinary stress. Officials have also cautioned that coronavirus-related death figures are likely an undercount due to people dying at home or in nursing homes who were never tested for the virus.
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US government weakens application of Endangered Species Act.
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The Trump administration moved on Monday to weaken how it applies the 45-year-old Endangered Species Act, ordering changes that critics said will speed the loss of animals and plants at a time of record global extinctions .
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true
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AP Top News, Animals, David Bernhardt, General News, Politics, Environment, Donald Trump
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The action, which expands the administration’s rewrite of U.S. environmental laws, is the latest that targets protections, including for water, air and public lands. Two states — California and Massachusetts, frequent foes of President Donald Trump’s environmental rollbacks — promised lawsuits to try to block the changes in the law. So did some conservation groups. Pushing back against the criticism, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and other administration officials contend the changes improve efficiency of oversight while continuing to protect rare species. “The best way to uphold the Endangered Species Act is to do everything we can to ensure it remains effective in achieving its ultimate goal — recovery of our rarest species,” he said in a statement. “An effectively administered Act ensures more resources can go where they will do the most good: on-the-ground conservation.” Under the enforcement changes, officials for the first time will be able to publicly attach a cost to saving an animal or plant. Blanket protections for creatures newly listed as threatened will be removed. Among several other changes, the action could allow the government to disregard the possible impact of climate change, which conservation groups call a major and growing threat to wildlife. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said the revisions “fit squarely within the president’s mandate of easing the regulatory burden on the American public, without sacrificing our species’ protection and recovery goals.” The Endangered Species Act is credited with helping save the bald eagle, California condor and scores of other animals and plants from extinction since President Richard Nixon signed it into law in 1973. The act currently protects more than 1,600 species in the United States and its territories. While the nearly half-century-old act has been overwhelmingly successful in saving animals and plants that are listed as endangered, battles over some of the listings have been yearslong and legendary. They have pitted northern spotted owls, snail darters and other creatures and their protectors against industries, local opponents and others in court and political fights. Republican lawmakers have pushed for years to change the law itself. John Barrasso, a Wyoming Republican who leads the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said Monday’s changes in enforcement were “a good start” but he would continue working to change the act. Previous Trump administration actions have proposed changes to other bedrock environmental laws — the clean water and clean air acts. The efforts include repeal of an Obama-era act meant to fight climate change by getting dirtier-burning coal-fired power plants out of the country’s electrical grid, rolling back tough Obama administration mileage standards for cars and light trucks, and lifting federal protections for millions of miles of waterways and wetlands. Monday’s changes “take a wrecking ball to one of our oldest and most effective environmental laws, the Endangered Species Act,” Sen. Tom Udall, a New Mexico Democrat, said in a statement. “As we have seen time and time again, no environmental protection - no matter how effective or popular - is safe from this administration.” One of Monday’s changes includes allowing the federal government to raise in the decision-making process the possible economic cost of listing a species. That’s even though Congress has stipulated that economic costs not be a factor in deciding whether to protect an animal. The prohibition was meant to ensure that the logging industry, for example, would not be able to push to block protections for a forest-dwelling animal on economic grounds. Gary Frazer, an assistant director at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, told reporters that the government would adhere to that stipulation by disclosing the costs to the public without it being a factor for the officials as they consider the protections. Price tag or no, Frazer said, federal officials would keep selecting and rejecting creatures from the endangered species list as Congress required, “solely on the basis of the best available scientific information and without consideration for the economic impacts.” “Nothing in here in my view is a radical change for how we have been consulting and listing species for the last decade or so,” Frazer added. But Brett Hartl, a government affairs director for the Center for Biological Diversity conservation group, contended any such price tag would be inflated, and “an invitation for political interference” in the decision whether to save a species. “You have to be really naive and cynical and disingenuous to pretend” otherwise, Hartl said. “That’s the reason that Congress way back ... prohibited the Service from doing that,” he said. “It’s a science question: Is a species going extinct, yes or no?” A United Nations report warned in May that more than 1 million plants and animals globally face extinction, some within decades, owing to human influence, climate change and other threats. The report called the rate of species loss a record. In Washington state, Ray Entz, wildlife director for the Kalispel tribe, spoke of losing the struggle to save the last wild mountain caribou in the lower 48 states, despite the creature’s three decades on the Endangered Species List. With logging and other human activities and predators driving down the numbers of the south Selkirk caribou, Canadian officials captured and penned the last surviving members of the species over the winter for their protection. “There were some tears shed,” Entz said, of the moment when tribal officials realized the animal had dwindled in the wild past the point of saving. “It was a tough pill to swallow.” Despite the disappearance of the protected caribou species from the contiguous United States, Entz said, “We don’t want to see a weakening of the law.” “There’s times where hope is something you don’t even want to talk about,” he said. But, “having the Endangered Species Act gives us the opportunity to participate in that recovery.” In Idaho on Monday, meanwhile, officials reported that the state’s sage grouse population has dropped 52% since the federal government decided not to list the birds under the Endangered Species Act in the fall of 2015. Wildfires, as well as oil and gas exploration and farming, have cut into the grouses’ habitat, so that as few as 200,000 are believed to remain out of as many as 16 million a century ago.
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3329
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5 whales dead after mass stranding on Maui beach.
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Five whales died, including four that were euthanized, after a mass stranding Thursday on a beach on the Hawaii island of Maui.
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true
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Wildlife, Animals, Whales, General News, Hawaii, Wildlife management, Travel, Science
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Ten melon-headed whales were found stranded alive early in the morning on Sugar Beach in the coastal resort community of Kihei. Hours later, a whale calf believed to belong to the same social group was found dead on the beach about a mile to the north, said David Schofield, the regional marine mammal response coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA veterinarians determined four of the whales were in grave condition and nothing more could be done to save them, Jeffrey Walters, NOAA’s wildlife management and conservation branch, said in a statement. The animals were made comfortable with a sedative and then humanely euthanized to relieve their suffering, he said. The remaining six whales were refloated to the ocean but stranded again, Schofield said. NOAA initially said the prognosis for two of the six wasn’t good, but they eventually made it out. Officials plan to monitor the area on Friday just in case they return. One or two of the six is likely debilitated, he said. “The last time we saw them they seemed to be moving in a healthy manner to deeper waters. So it’s our hope that they got their bearings about them and were able to head out to sea,” Schofield said. Walters said NOAA and University of Hawaii scientists will examine the whales to determine what caused the stranding. Kealoha Pisciotta, a Native Hawaiian cultural practitioner, objected to the euthanizing of the whales, animals she said are a manifestation of the sea god Kanaloa. She and others wanted to hold up the whales in the water so they could recover and swim away or die dignified deaths. But she said NOAA officials wouldn’t let them near the whales. “All we’re seeking to do is have a relationship with our Kanaloa,” she said. Walters said NOAA worked closely with Hawaiian cultural practitioners, who prayed before and after the whales were euthanized. “We will continue to work with practitioners and other community members to the maximum extent possible, while we fulfill our mandate to conduct stranding response and post-mortem exams under the Marine Mammal Protection Act,” Walters said. Pisciotta said nine practitioners were at the scene and performed a death rite, in which they called to the ancestors and akua or gods, so the whales could be taken quickly. She said they only performed the rite because the animals were being killed. She said the practitioners never agreed to the euthanizing. “We’re not saying you cannot do a necropsy, we’re just saying just give them a chance to die normally,” she said. Melon-headed whales are found in deep, tropical waters worldwide. They grow to be about 9 feet (3 meters) long and are named for the bulge in their foreheads. There are an estimated 400 of the animals in the Hawaiian Islands. The last time this many marine mammals stranded together in Hawaii was two years ago, when five pilot whales died in Kauai’s Nawiliwili Harbor. The cause of this stranding is still being investigated. Before that, about 150 melon-headed whales nearly stranded at Kauai’s Hanalei Bay in 2004. One whale died. NOAA’s report on that incident said Navy sonar may have contributed to the near-stranding, but officials lacked evidence to conclusively show the technology triggered it. The report, which was published in 2006, said nearby predators or other factors may have also contributed to the incident. The Navy was hosting its biennial Rim of the Pacific military exercises in Hawaii water at the time.
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9324
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Depression often goes undiagnosed. Researchers are turning to Facebook to change that.
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This Philadelphia Inquirer story focuses on the early development of a computer model that uses Facebook posts to identify people with depression. It makes clear that the technology is in its preliminary stages and is not close to being used in a clinical setting. The article did not oversell the technology and discussed the limitations to the research. Still, it would have been helpful if the story had explored who would pay for this kind of screening, and what we know about depression screening in general: Is it effective? Depression affects quality of life for millions of people around the world. This story is appropriately cautious about how far this technology is from real-world application, though a number of questions remain unanswered.
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true
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depression,screening
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This work is early in its development and the story makes that clear. However, it would still be worthwhile to raise some questions: Who would pay for the development of future modeling tools? Who would pay for the training necessary to make these tools useful to health care providers? Who would pay for the time that health care providers would have to put into the work? None of these things would happen in a vacuum, and it would be useful to raise these issues. The story does not include specific numbers on specificity and sensitivity (see harms, below), only stating that the Facebook model was “moderately accurate.” Also, we think it would have been helpful to point out that the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommends depression screening, giving the evidence a B rating, meaning that there is moderate certainty that screening will be beneficial. The story did not address potential harms, which include not only the failure to identify someone who has depression, but also the “false positive” misdiagnosis of people who do not have depression. This is the difference between “sensitivity” and “specificity” — and it’s important. Being told that one has a medical problem that one does not actually have can have implications in people’s personal and professional lives. We did like that the story addressed privacy concerns, which can certainly lead to anxiety and other problems. The story does a good job of articulating the limitations of the research, other than addressing issues regarding specificity and sensitivity (which we addressed above). No disease mongering here. The story cites two researchers, each of which discusses the field at large as well as their own work. That’s enough to earn a satisfactory rating here, though it would have been valuable to garner input from a mental health expert, given that the two people quoted — while actively involved in the field — specialize in issues related to emergency medicine (internal medicine) and computer science. There do not appear to be conflicts of interest, though the story doesn’t explicitly state that (or where the funding came from). A look at the relevant paper shows that funding came from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the John Templeton Foundation. The story does a good job of articulating how the social media model might differ from conventional depression diagnostic tools, as well as how these approaches could potentially be used to support each other (rather than using one in place of the other). The story makes clear that the social media diagnostic model is not close to being viable for clinical use. The story does mention an earlier study that demonstrated how Twitter could be used to evaluate depression risk, and provides some good background (with supporting links) on the body of work addressing social media and depression. All of that is sufficient to garner a satisfactory rating here. However, the story would have been stronger if it had addressed a straightforward question: Is this the first model that can be used to diagnose depression based on someone’s Facebook activity? One assumes the answer is yes, but it’s not clear whether that’s the case. The story goes well beyond the news release issued by the University of Pennsylvania.
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33364
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The fashion of sagging one's pants was born of a prison mode of signaling sexual availability.
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While sagging is embraced by a number of young people, it is far removed from being the subject of widespread approval outside that demographic. Various communities have attempted to ban this form of fashion statement. In February 2005, for example, the Virginia House of Delegates passed the so-called droopy drawers bill, legislation that would have imposed a $50 fine on people who wore their pants so that their underwear was visible in a “lewd or indecent manner.” That bill was killed by a senate committee two days later. In May 2004, Louisiana lawmakers attempted to say no to plumber’s crack by passing House Bill 1626, legislation that would have made it a crime to wear clothing in public that “intentionally exposes undergarments or intentionally exposes any portion of the pubic hair, cleft of the buttocks or genitals.” That bill was also rejected by the state’s senate.
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false
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Risqué Business, homosexuality
|
Sagging, the fashion of wearing pants with their waistbands around the hips (or lower) rather than snugged to the midriff, has been and continues to be a controversial style of dress. Although this sartorial fad is overwhelmingly favored by young males, it is not limited to them — young women have at times likewise indulged in the urge to sag. The practice, which did begin in prisons, worked its way from the hoosegow into hip hop culture. It was adopted by a variety of rap artists, such as Ice-T and Too Short, which enhanced its perceived tough-guy cachet. Sagging can even be taken a step further by wearing the droopy breeches backwards. (Totally Krossed Out, the 1992 debut album of Kriss Kross, shows the pair of 13-year-old rappers doing this.) By 1995 the style had seeped into mainstream teen culture — one no longer needed to be a wannabe “gangsta” to sling ’em low. Pants worn this way are kept up by constant hitching, an act that becomes an integral part of the walking style of the wearer. Sagging did gain its start in the U.S. prison system and is now frequently claimed to have originated as a clothes-wearing style authored by imprisoned homosexuals intent upon advertising their interest in casual flings: [Collected on the Internet, 2003] We were talking about how the kids are wearing the pants way down on their body with the crotch at their knees. One guy said he was told that this started in prison with the gay prisoner doing that to show that they are ready for a sexual relationship with whoever is interested. [Collected on the Internet, 2003] A friend told me recently that the “gang” style of baggy pants showing your underwear (called “jailin”) was originally a prison code signifying that the man wearing them was willing to be, er, the “girlfriend” of some other man/men. [Collected on the Internet, August 2011] To all you guys who “sag” your pants and show your butt and underwear …did you know it originated in prison? It was a signal to the other MEN that you are “available”. So if you wanna keep going around looking like you’re “available” for another dude to “tap that” then keep thinking your cool while I think you look like a Fool!!! BTW it’s called – PBS (Prison B*tch Syndrome).LOL Pass this on to the droopy pants that you know. Sagging pants became the behind-the-bars thing thanks to ill-fitting prison-issue garb: some of those incarcerated were provided with clothing a few sizes too large. That oversizing, coupled with the lack of belts in the big house, led to a great number of jailbirds whose pants were falling off their arses. (Belts are not permitted in most correctional facilities because all too often the lifeless bodies of their inmate owners have been found hanging from them.) Sagging has another rumored origin (also false), one less well-traveled than the “gay inmates advertising for sex” postulation: [Collected on the Internet, 2003] What’s the origin of Gang-banger pants? You know, worn really low and baggy? Before they became a fashion statement, and/or MADE that way by assorted clothing companies, I heard it originated in a prison: An inmate was on suicide watch and couldn’t have his belt, which the other inmates were either outraged by or thought was ridiculous given the inmate in question. So they started wearing theirs really low in protest/solidarity. Anyway, that’s what I heard. Another discredited theory says ghetto hoodlums adopted the fashion of wearing their pants in the sagging style to better conceal weapons from rival gang members and police. While it is true a gun or knife can be effectively stashed out of sight in droopy pants, it can also be hidden in more form-fitting bottoms, especially when the pants-wearer tops his cache with an untucked sports jersey, pullover, or sweatshirt. The most intriguing aspect of the “trolling for gay sex” rumor lies not in its veracity, but in its acceptance as gospel by those who encounter it and who are then moved to pass it along to others. While the combination of two facts (homosexuality in prison and falling-down pants worn by inmates) accounts for the origin of the belief that links the one to the other, its spread is attributable to the prevailing dislike of the fashion. Those who choose to wear their pants this way cite comfort as their motive and so find justification for this imitation of rap stars and felons, two groups perceived as toughly self-sufficient and therefore worthy of emulation; those who do not follow this fashion see only the crotches of jeans hanging at or above the knee, hobbling their wearers in a goofy manner. (One can walk in sagging pants. But one can’t run in them.) The rumor becomes a way of passing along one group’s disdain for another’s sartorial practice. Communicating that the saggers are unwittingly offering their backsides to all takers when they think they are mimicking admired rappers and identifying with tough guys no sensible person would mess with becomes a way of saying “The joke is really on them.” This same sense of surreptitious delight over being in on a prank someone looked down upon is unknowingly playing on himself fuels another urban legend that involves medallions flaunted by society matrons or Chinese character-emblazoned sweaters proudly worn by their knitters and even some of the “misunderstood souvenir” tales told about globe-trotting tourists.
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41047
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You should also gargle as a prevention. A simple solution of salt in warm water will suffice.
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There’s no evidence that this works as a preventative or a cure for the virus.
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unproven
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online
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If the new coronavirus gets into your mouth, drinking water or other liquids will wash them down through the oesophagus. Once they’re in the stomach, the acid will kill the virus. If you don't drink enough water more regularly, the virus can enter your windpipes and into the lungs. If you have a runny nose and sputum, you have a common cold, not Covid-19. These are the symptoms for the common cold, but they don’t rule out Covid-19. Coronavirus pneumonia is a dry cough with no runny nose. Some Covid-19 patients do get pneumonia, and one of the symptoms is a dry cough. A runny nose doesn’t rule out Covid-19. This new virus is not heat-resistant and will be killed by a temperature of just 26/27 degrees. It hates the Sun. There’s no evidence for this. There’s evidence that similar viruses transmit less well in the heat, but many countries with reported Covid-19 cases are experiencing temperatures higher than this. If someone with the new coronavirus sneezes, it travels about 10 feet before it drops to the ground and is no longer airborne. How far the droplets spread from a sneeze depends on environmental factors, but it is likely to be several metres. If it drops on a metal surface it will live for at least 12 hours - so if you come into contact with any metal surface - wash your hands as soon as you can with a bacterial soap. We don’t know how long the virus survives on surfaces yet—it may be between hours and days. On fabric it can survive for 6-12 hours. normal laundry detergent will kill it. There’s no evidence yet that the virus can survive in clothing and be transmitted this way. Any soiled clothing should be thoroughly washed. Drinking warm water is effective for all viruses. Try not to drink liquids with ice. There’s no evidence that the temperature of liquids consumed can either protect you from or cure diseases caused by viruses. Wash your hands frequently as the virus can only live on your hands for 5-10 minutes. We don’t know how long the virus can last on the skin, especially not down to the minute. But you should regularly wash your hands. You should also gargle as a prevention. A simple solution of salt in warm water will suffice. There’s no evidence that this works as a preventative or a cure for the virus. The symptoms of Covid-19 are a sore throat lasting 3 or 4 days. The virus then blends into nasal fluid, enters the trachea and then the lungs causing pneumonia. With pneumonia comes high fever and difficulty breathing. The nasal congestion feels like you're drowning This is a roughly accurate description of the most common symptoms, although not everyone with Covid-19 gets pneumonia, and the symptoms may not come in this exact order or at these times. The NHS does not mention nasal congestion that ‘feels like drowning’ as a specific symptom for Covid-19. Claim 1 of 12
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28957
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" Dr. Ben Carson said the ""disintegration of the family unit and the welfare state are enslaving African-Americans and ruining their futures"" but received help from such programs in his youth."
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"What's true: Ben Carson experienced periods of poverty in his youth, and his family intermittently relied on government assistance (primarily food stamps). What's false: Ben Carson did not say the ""disintegration of the family unit and the welfare state are enslaving African-Americans and ruining their futures."""
|
mixture
|
Politics, ben carson, stop the world the teabaggers want off
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An initially unlikely but clearly formidable contender for the 2016 Republican nomination has been Dr. Ben Carson, a former neurosurgeon and relative newcomer in the race to the White House. Unlike Chris Christie, Rand Paul, Mike Huckabee, or Donald Trump, Carson was neither a career politician nor a nationally known name. Carson became somewhat of an overnight sensation following an appearance at the National Prayer Breakfast in February 2013. Prior to that point he was not widely recognized as a political force, but he quickly gained traction among conservatives and was soon short-listed as a top pick for 2016. A strength of Carson’s campaign was often been described as a sort of ideological purity, espoused in a quote attributed to him (which is almost always included as the conclusion to the meme shown below): “The disintegration of the family unit and the welfare state are enslaving African-Americans and ruining their futures.” The earliest versions of the meme date to at least December 2014 and include that remark. Many of the users sharing the meme cited a 23 May 2014 Wonkette post titled “Ben Carson So Glad His Welfare Mom Wasn’t Dependent on Government” as a source, but the sentence in question appeared nowhere on that page. What was included was a transcribed comment from Carson made during an episode of The View in May 2014, but it was markedly different than the version attributed to him in versions of the above-reproduced meme. In that TV segment, a pre-candidacy Carson addressed the issue of health care and stated: When you rob someone of their incentive to go out there and improve themselves, you are not doing them any favors. When you take somebody and pat them on the head and say, ‘There, there, you poor little thing … Let me give you housing subsidies, let me give you free health care because you can’t do that.’ What would be much more empowering is to use our intellect and our resources to give those people a way up and out. Around the same time, Carson was quoted by Politico on then-simmering criticism of his ostensible policies on welfare and social programs. Carson was not a candidate (as he had stated on The View a few weeks later) when he proclaimed: Many people are critical of me because they say, ‘Carson wants to get rid of all the safety nets and welfare programs even though he must have benefited from them. This is a blatant lie. I have no desire to get rid of safety nets for people who need them. I have a strong desire to get rid of programs that create dependency in able-bodied people. It’s important to bear in mind the quote was attributed to Carson in mid-to-late 2014, but many of his positions were revealed after he announced his candidacy in May 2015. We were unable to find any instances in which Carson was recording as asserting that the “disintegration of the family unit and the welfare state are enslaving African-Americans and ruining their futures.” The legitimacy of the quote was important in the context of the meme: overall, the claims presented Carson as someone who was more than happy to reap the benefits of social programs while later pulling that ladder up for generations of impoverished children who might otherwise be the next successful neurosurgeons. Moreover (as Carson initially pointed out), the quotation itself harbored some racially charged implications, suggesting that Carson’s political positions on social programs were inherently less credible than those of his more privileged peers. As for the claims about Carson’s youth, not all were substantiated (and again, several made leaps of logic based on class and race). Carson’s mother left his father when he was eight, though he described his parents as “divorced” (implying they were once married). A 2011 profile on the candidate before his entry into politics vaguely covered points asserted in the meme, but whether Carson ever lived in subsidized housing in his youth was unclear. The profile mentioned “projects,” but it also seemed to suggest Carson’s mother endeavored to avoid government assistance save for food stamps: When Sonya Carson moved her sons from their modest house in Detroit to live with her brother and his wife in Boston, she scrimped and sacrificed so they could return. When they did, they had to settle for Detroit’s downtown housing projects — but at least they were home. Sonya Carson knew the world held more hope for her boys than the ghetto offered. She struggled to support the family without relying on government assistance. Carson wrote about his family’s shame over receiving food stamps in his autobiography Gifted Hands (validating the meme’s assertion that his family received them), but the relevant passage also described his family’s distaste for accepting help: I knew [my mother] was trying to keep us off public assistance. By the time I went into ninth grade, Mother had made such strides that she received nothing except food stamps. She couldn’t have provided for us and kept up the house without that subsidy. Carson’s tune didn’t dramatically change from earlier accounts he had provided. In a 2002 interview (well before the start of his political career) he said of his family’s approach to assistance that: My mother worked as a domestic, two, sometimes three jobs at a time because she didn’t want to be on welfare. She felt very strongly that if she gave up and went on welfare, that she would give up control of her life and of our lives, and I think she was probably correct about that. And, so she worked very hard … She would go to the Goodwill, she’d get a shirt that had a hole and put a patch on it and put another one on the other side to make it look symmetrical, and she sewed her own clothes. She would take us out in the country on a Sunday and knock on a farmer’s door and say, “Can we pick four bushels of corn, three for you and one for us?” and they were always glad at that deal. And she’d come home and she’d can the stuff, so that we would have food. She was just extremely thrifty and managed to get by that way. No one ever could quite figure out how she was able to do what she did. The claim about eyeglasses also appeared in Gifted Hands, where Carson explained that his school provided them to him no cost. But the assertion he was therefore “supported by welfare” is difficult to substantiate, as “welfare” typically describes programs such as SNAP (food stamps), Section 8 (housing subsidies), and Medicaid (health care). According to the meme, Carson was “kept healthy with Medicaid.” But that program wasn’t mentioned by name in any extant biographical material that we could find pertaining to Carson, who was born in 1951. Medicaid was established in 1965, so Carson was well into his later youth before the program even existed (much less possibly extended to his family). We were also unable to substantiate the claim Carson “benefited from affirmative action.” Much like Medicaid, “affirmative action” with respect to university admissions didn’t exist as it’s understood today until after the adoption of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It’s possible that Carson was helped by those social changes just a few years later, but it’s also possible that the effects of such initiatives had no impact on his admission to institutions of higher learning. The meme also claims that Carson’s medical school was paid for by a grant from the United States Public Health Service (USPHS), but that assertion appears unique to the meme. Carson made no mention of such a grant in a February 2014 article about his education, and a 2012 Physicians Practice profile suggested Carson had received merit-based scholarships and grants: Thus began a life of accomplishment — reaching the highest rank in junior ROTC in high school, a full scholarship to Yale, medical school, Johns Hopkins. Yet he credits much of it to his mother, who would tell him, when he complained about a seemingly impossible problem, that if he had a brain he could think his way out of it. “She cleaned other people’s houses, but she never developed a victim mentality and she didn’t let her kids develop one, either,” he said. “When people stop accepting your excuses, something happens pretty fast: You stop looking for excuses, and you start looking for solutions.” A 1992 profile of Carson in Fortune similarly referenced merit-based “scholarships and grants”: Graduating third in his class at Detroit’s Southwestern High, Carson had only $10 to spend on college application fees. He decided to apply to whichever school won that year’s College Bowl, then a popular TV quiz show. Yale’s ouster of Harvard determined his next move. Scholarships and grants helped pay the aspiring doctor’s way through Yale and the University of Michigan School of Medicine. (Incidentally, Carson told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos during an October 2015 interview that medical school should be paid for by the government.) Carson’s late-in-life entry into politics made it easier for misconceptions about his life to proliferate, but the quote that closes this meme (and establishes its conclusions) doesn’t appear to be anything more than an amalgam of what folks believe Ben Carson might have said. While Carson wasn’t always a politician, he was a well known neurosurgeon with some accumulated press attention at the time he entered politics. Throughout the years Carson was candid about his disadvantaged childhood but never claimed to have benefited from more than food stamps and a free pair of glasses on Uncle Sam’s dime. The claims in the meme encompass most programs to which impoverished youth might be eligible to receive today, retroactively implying Carson’s path was paved by all of them. But in addition to the apparently fabricated quote which forms the meme’s basis, a variety of the points upon which it leans are unproven or chronologically questionable. Carson’s critics might judge his approach to government assistance as incongruent with his prior poverty, but the meme seemingly exaggerates the degree to which his family benefited from welfare programs. On 9 November 2015, the satirical Facebook page “Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off” published the image of Ben Carson reproduced below purportedly quoting Ben Carson as saying “My mother raised me with no help from the government. We had food stamps and welfare and Section 8 housing, but we made it on our own. – Dr. Ben Carson, 11/7/15”: Carson said no such thing, and the “Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off” page featured a disclaimer marking its content as political satire: “This page is for entertainment purposes. It is NOT meant to be taken seriously. It is primarily satire and parody with a mix of political memes and messages.”
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4525
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Tennessee Medicaid block grant plan heads for federal review.
|
Tennessee officials committed not to halt or limit coverages under a revised plan submitted to the federal government Wednesday requesting to become the first state to receive funding in a lump sum for its Medicaid program, TennCare.
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true
|
Health care reform, General News, Tennessee, Medicaid
|
The TennCare block grant plan was amended to say the state “would not be permitted to use this authority to make reductions to its benefits package,” and would be “limited to benefit changes that are additive in nature.” The first draft of the proposal faced a deluge of criticism during public meetings and submitted comments, with advocates, health care groups and others worrying that the plan could compromise care for the state’s most vulnerable low-income and disabled citizens. Republican Gov. Bill Lee long contended patients wouldn’t risk losing benefits or eligibility under the plan, and the original draft included less explicit assurances. “Some of the concerns we got were that if we get this flexibility, then we could just unilaterally decide to stop covering things or limit certain things that we cover,” TennCare Director Gabe Roberts said in a conference call with reporters Wednesday. “And we want to be clear that that wasn’t our intent and we are committing ourselves not to do that.” The plan also spells out what Lee has hinted at previously — that possible savings could go toward adding a yet-to-be-determined number of people for coverage on the TennCare rolls. Lee has batted away suggestions to expand Medicaid under former President Barack Obama’s health care law, saying that would expand a broken system. His predecessor, Republican former Gov. Bill Haslam, failed to convince GOP lawmakers to pass a Medicaid expansion plan. Lee argued that his plan could expand coverage in “not a way that comes at great risk to our state.” “It’s a good, innovative, creative way to provide more coverage,” Lee said in the conference call. The federal government will now consider the $7.9 billion plan, still a far shot from being put into practice. Another public comment period will be underway. And if the state and federal government negotiate an agreement, Tennessee lawmakers get a final vote. Legal challenges likely will follow. President Donald Trump’s administration has encouraged states to submit block grant proposals like Tennessee’s, which would cover core medical services for the disabled and blind, children, adults and elderly — or about 1.2 million Tennesseans. This means administrative costs, prescription drugs, uncompensated hospital payments and individuals dually eligible for Medicaid and Medicare would not be part of the block grant plan, which would cover a much smaller segment of TennCare. The federal government would increase Tennessee’s block grant funding if enrollment grows beyond the original calculation. Roberts, the TennCare director, has described the plan as a “hybrid” approach to block grants because the state has designed its proposal to allow Tennessee to keep 50% of any unspent block grant funds. In addition to possibly expanding enrollment, the plan also spells out using possible savings to extend post-partum coverage from two to 12 months, provide pre-natal and post-partum dental coverage, expand eligibility, clear the waiting list of 5,000 people with intellectual or developmental disabilities, and address health crises ranging from the opioid epidemic to maternal and infant mortality rates. The new version of the plan doesn’t change a controversial component that could limit some prescriptions for those on TennCare to one drug covered per therapeutic class. But it does adjust to include an exceptions process to cover other drugs and would not limit use of off-label drugs for children under age 21. State lawmakers passed legislation earlier this year requiring the plan to be filed by Wednesday.
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32253
|
A video captures a large spider that survived inside a banana until it burst out of the peel by its own power.
|
There’s no doubt Lechowski has a promising career ahead of him in cinema and animation, as long as he doesn’t get overrun by the apparent virtual insect farm in his apartment.
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false
|
Entertainment, animals, animation, Bugs
|
On 12 June 2015, a computer graphics wunderkind by the name of Kaleb Lechowski uploaded a video to YouTube that seeming showed a rather large spider breaking out of a banana skin in the same manner that a chick fights its way out of an egg shell: In September 2016, that video began making the rounds online and left many viewers wondering whether it was real. That was easily determined by noting that the end of the video included a copyright notice crediting Lechowski, who first drew public attention with the 2013 dystopian animated short film “R’ha.” That film was so convincingly animated that Lechowski captured the attention of Hollywood: Despite being the work of a student, R’ha is so good it’s already attracted the attention of Hollywood executives. After seeing Lechowski’s creation online, Scott Glassgold, of the managing company IAM Sports & Entertainment, was impressed. “His work is not only professional, it’s extraordinary,” Glassgold [said]. “There are shots in there that look like they are from a 150-million-dollar movie.” Glassgold has experience with science fiction, [and] he sold the shorts Rosa and True Skin to studios last year. Lechowski is currently in the process of turning “R’ha” into a full-length film. The short, which was shared widely across the Internet, tells a dark, futuristic story of a planet inhabited by machines enslaved by lizard-like aliens who rebel against their captors. In the film, a machine interrogates an alien using electrical shock as a mechanism of torture. Aside from his background as a CGI artist, Lechowski’s YouTube page seems to indicate that he either has a penchant for creating animated insects, or he has a major infestation problem in his apartment. One video shows a very large centipede-like insect crawling out of a speaker, while another depicts a spider roughly the size of his hand hanging out on his wall. In yet another video, he throws an object at his wall to scatter a virtual colony of spiders. Lechowski is a resident of Berlin, Germany, and according to Mashable, was educated at Berlin’s Mediadesign Hochschule. When the banana video was released in 2015, Lechowski acknowledged it was fake: I used a chopstick to pierce the banana from behind. Then I removed the stick from the image and inserted a spider that I created, using Blender, the 3D software.
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37594
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"On Neil Cavuto's Fox News show, House Majority Whip James Clyburn said that Black unemployment under Trump was not the lowest when compared with the rate ""during slavery."
|
Rep. James Clyburn: Black People Were ‘Fully Employed During Slavery’ Controversy
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mixture
|
Fact Checks, Politics
|
"In February 2020, a number of social media and blog posts claimed that House Majority Whip James Clyburn “refused to give credit” to United States President Donald Trump for low Black unemployment numbers, because Black Americans were “fully employed during slavery”:WOW:This is how House Majority Whip James Clyburn responded to lowest ever black unemployment:""We were fully employed during slavery, so it all depends""Democrats refuse to accept that this president is delivering for black AmericaWhat a shameful statement, @WhipClyburn— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) February 21, 2020In the second post above, a February 19 2020 post on the site Chicks On The Right is linked, and it read in part:This is how badly the left refuses to give ANY credit to Trump.Really? Slavery was your best selling point?On a scale of 1- EVEN… I can’t.I JUST CAN’T EVEN.That blog sourced all content from an article on the same day published by the right-wing blog DailyWire.com. It began:Majority Whip Rep. James Clyburn (D-SC) refused to give President Donald Trump any credit during an interview on [February 18 2020] for delivering record low unemployment rates for the black community, and instead argued that blacks had more jobs when they were slaves.That article concluded with a video clip and the following exchange. In it, Cavuto claimed that Trump had “delivered the goods” for Black Americans, citing “record low” unemployment levels in particular.Cavuto moved on from the assertion with an implication it was necessarily accurate, and asked if Clyburn believed the claim was “something that’s constructive.”Clyburn disputed the veracity of Cavuto’s claim unemployment hit a record low under Trump, and Cavuto asked what Clyburn meant. At that point, Clyburn made a terse and sarcastic remark that Black Americans were “fully employed during slavery, so it all depends about how you measure this up”:“Well let’s leave the words aside, alright congressman? Let’s leave the words aside. Whether you like his style or not, or tweets or not, or comments or not, [President Trump] delivered the goods for a lot of African Americans, has he not?” Cavuto asked. “With record low unemployment levels, one group after another, mostly with African Americans. You don’t think that’s something that’s constructive?”“No, no, because it’s not true,” Clyburn falsely claimed.“What do you mean it’s not true?” Cavuto pressed.“I’m saying African American unemployment is not the lowest it’s ever been, unless you count slavery,” Clyburn responded. “We were fully employed during slavery, so it all depends about how you measure this up.”Immediately thereafter, the Daily Wire article invited readers to “WATCH” a clip of the exchange in the form of a one-minute and eleven-seconds-long video on Twitter. That tweet’s clip ended with Clyburn saying “it all depends about how you measure this up”:. @WhipClyburn dismisses the record low black unemployment rate: ""I’m saying that the African-American unemployment is not the lowest it has ever been unless you count slavery. We were fully employed during slavery."" pic.twitter.com/avMkpS6A9J— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) February 19, 2020A top result on Google for Cavuto’s interview of Clyburn led to FoxNews.com, the same network on which Clyburn appeared. However, that article appeared to have been both published and deleted on February 19 2020, and the link led to a “page not found” error (although various affiliates continued to carry links to the story.) We archived the 404 page here.An archived version of the Fox News article saved an hour after it was published was headlined “Top House Democrat slams Trump economy: ‘We were fully employed during slavery. '” Three versions of the page were archived on February 19 2020.Like Daily Wire, Fox News concluded its reporting on the exchange with the “during slavery” comment. In the excerpt below, Cavuto and Clyburn discussed the latter’s willingness to support former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s presidential candidacy should he win the Democratic nomination in 2020.Cavuto referred, in Fox News’ description, “to a series of controversial comments made in recent years by Bloomberg about ethnic minorities that have resurfaced during the campaign,” and asked if those comments “bother” Clyburn. The article concluded first with Clyburn answering that question and then indicating that Trump’s comments on race and ethnicity bothered him more than Bloomberg’s.At that point, the exchange over a purported record low for unemployment occurred. It was unclear why Fox News deleted the article entirely:“Well, not as much as what Trump has said about African-Americans,” Clyburn responded. “Any time … that I go to the polls, I’m considering positives and negatives on all candidates. And I try to go with the one whose positives outweigh the negatives.”Cavuto then brought up the president’s economic record, saying that he had “delivered the goods for a lot of African-Americans … with record-low unemployment levels,” prompting Clyburn to interject, “Come on, Neil” before claiming that the numbers were “not true.”“I’m saying that the African-American unemployment is not the lowest it’s ever been unless you count slavery,” Clyburn said, later crediting Democrats and former President Obama for the economic numbers. “We were fully employed during slavery. So it all depends how you measure this up.”Clyburn said he disagreed that African-American voters were content with how things were under Trump, “Because I go to church with African-Americans. I live with African-Americans. I’m the father of African-Americans.”The congressman predicted that Trump would not match the support he had from African-American voters in 2016, when eight percent of black voters backed the president.Videos and transcribed remarks attributed to Clyburn and Cavuto typically terminated with the “slavery” remark, leading viewers and readings to conclude Clyburn’s overarching point was that Black unemployment was “not the lowest … unless you count slavery,” and Black people were “fully employed” as slaves. Although a brief half-sentence in Fox News’ deleted article indicated otherwise, that coverage was not available to anyone researching the accuracy of the claim.Moreover, an undeleted clip available via FoxNews.com also concluded with the “slavery” statement from Clyburn. YouTube was largely devoid of complete clips, and virtually all coverage we located featured the incomplete exchange.One outlier was the conservative website Daily Caller, which included a slightly different portion of the segment in a February 19 2020 tweet. At the 0:32 second mark Clyburn made the “slavery” remark, but the video continued, showing the context of the conversation between Cavuto and Clyburn:Rep. James Clyburn dismisses the record low unemployment rate for African-Americans under President Trump by saying it ""is not the lowest it has ever been unless you count slavery. We were fully employed during slavery so it all depends on how you measure this up."" pic.twitter.com/v7WfEn0vAA— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) February 19, 2020Finally, we located an actual transcript of the entire conversation between Clyburn and Cavuto on FoxNews.com, under a transcript headlined, “Lung biopsy of deceased coronavirus patient shows SARS-like damage.” Anyone looking for a transcript might not think to scroll down far enough to see the transcribed remarks.That transcript began with Cavuto’s questions about Clyburn’s feelings on Bloomberg’s candidacy:CAVUTO: So, let me ask you, Congressman. I don’t know how it’s going to go and who the eventual nominee will be. But, as you have been seeing with Michael Bloomberg, he’s been jumping in the polls, on the heels of his very expensive, pricey ad buys, now likely to total $400 million by the end of next month, if you include $125 million slated for Super Tuesday ads. If he were the nominee, could you, would you back him?CLYBURN: Oh, I’m going to back whoever our nominee is, absolutely, very enthusiastically.CAVUTO: Even with the things he has said about African-Americans, or does that bother you?CLYBURN: Well, not as much as what Trump has said about African-Americans. Any time that I go to the polls, I’m considering positives and negatives on all candidates. And I try to go with the one whose positives outweigh the negatives. In my mind, Donald Trump…Cavuto interrupted, segueing to black unemployment under Trump:CAVUTO: Well, let’s leave the words aside, then, right, Congressman. Let’s leave the words decide.Whether you like his style or not, or tweets or not, or comments or not, he’s delivered the goods for a lot of African-Americans, has he not, with record low unemployment levels for one group after another…CLYBURN: Come on.CAVUTO: … mostly with African-Americans.CLYBURN: Come on, Neil.CAVUTO: You don’t think that’s something that’s constructive?CLYBURN: No. No, because it’s not true.CAVUTO: What do you mean it’s not true?CLYBURN: I’m 78 years…CAVUTO: Go ahead.CLYBURN: I’m saying that the African-American unemployment is not the lowest it has ever been, unless you count slavery. We were fully employed during slavery. So, it all depends on how you measure this up. So, it is not the lowest it’s ever been.Nearly all shared clips and transcriptions ended there, which appeared to be a deliberate effort to lead readers and viewers to believe that Clyburn had argued that Trump ought to be denied credit for purportedly low unemployment numbers for Black Americans during his administration. But the conversation went on from there, beginning with crosstalk between Cavuto and Clyburn.Incidentally, looking closely at the exchange, it appeared Cavuto was bargaining — or even haggling — with Clyburn, ending each exchange with a modified question about Trump’s assumed economic accomplishments.Cavuto claimed that Black employment was at its lowest rate in 52 years, and Clyburn maintained that Trump claimed credit for a trend started during President Barack Obama’s administration. Cavuto redirected his point, and asserted that Black unemployment had, to that point, been “trending down under Democrat and Republican administrations,” including President Obama’s two terms.Cavuto asked Clyburn to “hear him out” and once again asked Clyburn if he gave Trump “any credit” for that for the downward trend:CAVUTO: Well, it’s at 52 — it’s at 52-year…CLYBURN: In the Obama…CAVUTO: No, I’m sorry, sir. It’s at 52-year lows. It has been trending down under Democrat and Republican administrations. So…CLYBURN: Absolutely.CAVUTO: So, happens to be the lowest — no, no, hear me out. It’s the lowest in this cycle with this president. Do you give him any credit for that?To the question of whether he credited Trump for better unemployment numbers, Clyburn explained:CLYBURN: I give [Trump] credit for continuing what we laid the foundation for back in 2009. Remember, I was there. I was a part of the leadership. I was around that table every day. I’m the one that put into the 10-20-30 funding formula for rural communities. That was my proposal. It’s now been spread by the Republicans. And I give Speaker Ryan credit for moving it from four accounts up to 17 accounts. That is what we did back in 2009. And Trump is building on that.Cavuto pressed the point, then asking whether there was “nothing” that the Trump administration did to improve the numbers in question. Cavuto himself said that the Obama administration had created “a steadily improving employment picture [for] African- Americans, [and] all groups,” which he redirected to claim that Trump had then “accelerated” those gains, yet again asking Clyburn if he agreed:CAVUTO: So, there’s nothing this president has done — there’s nothing this president has done to help improve that process? Because it is a pace that has improved under this president. You’re quite right to say a steadily improving employment picture [for] African- Americans, all groups under Barack Obama. Many economists of all political stripes, sir, say the president took that and accelerated it. You disagree?CLYBURN: He continued it. I don’t think it’s been accelerated at all. If you look at where we were in 2009, and where we were when Trump became president, the movement from 2009 to that point was much greater than the movement has been from the time he took over until now. He continued it. He did not accelerate it.Cavuto did not dispute Clyburn’s claims, instead suggesting that the purported gains made during Barack Obama’s presidency were attributable in part to previous recession and an economic downturn. Cavuto agreed that Clyburn accurately characterized that economic growth, in turn asking if it meant anything that Trump inherited economic growth and “made them even better” in a “startling and unusual” fashion:CAVUTO: But, obviously, we were coming from a financial meltdown — we were coming from a financial meltdown at that time. And, obviously, the marked improvement is noteworthy. But it — doesn’t that actually foster the argument, sir, that, under this president, who took good times, he’s made them even better, which is a little startling and unusual, right?CLYBURN: Well — well, it’s not startling to me. If you look at the tax cuts, I mean, record tax cuts…CAVUTO: Right.CLYBURN: And we are having an economy that’s built on tax cuts, not job creation. Job creation, to me, means not having to do two and three menial jobs in order to make a living.Cavuto tacitly acknowledged Clyburn’s dissatisfaction with job growth, calling improvement in employment statistics “a tough sell in a year like [2020. ]” He then returned to the subject of giving credit to President Trump, from a position of musing about the thoughts of Americans on a whole before once again trying to get Clyburn to agree that Black Americans are “happy” with the way the Trump administration is progressing. And once again, Clyburn refused:CAVUTO: Well, [an economy stimulated by new jobs versus tax cuts] is going to be a tough sell in a year like this right, sir? I mean, I just wonder. People are going to step back. You have heard about the 90 percent of Americans who are feeling pretty good about where things are. Whether they credit the president for that is anyone’s guess. But they’re happy with the way things are going, including African- Americans. You don’t agree with that?CLYBURN: No, I don’t.Finally, Cavuto says “okay,” leading Clyburn to elaborate on the basis of his repeated assertion that overall, Black Americans are dissatisfied with the economy under Trump’s administration in 2020:CAVUTO: OK.CLYBURN: … because I go to church with African-Americans. I live with African-Americans. I’m the father of African-Americans. I know…CAVUTO: You don’t think more of them will vote, more African-Americans will vote for the president than he’s generally given credit?CLYBURN: Absolutely not. That 13 percent that he got of male voters before, 8 percent of African- Americans before, he will never get to that point this year, absolutely not.CAVUTO: All right, we shall see.CLYBURN: Yes, we will.Cavuto then concludes the interview, perhaps sarcastically saying he’d count Clyburn (who had repeatedly said that he would support the Democratic nominee) as a “maybe, then, on the president,” presumably in terms of willingness to vote for him in 2020:CAVUTO: All right, I put you as a maybe, then, on the president. All right, I tell you, Congressman, always enjoy having you. Thank you very much for taking the time.CLYBURN: Thank you, sir.CAVUTO: All right, jump ball on that and how you feel about that.Although Fox News did not make it easy to find a transcript and only made the misleading abbreviated clip available on its website, the characterization was deeply faulty and misleading. Clyburn repeatedly and at length cited his personal reasons for disagreeing with Cavuto’s fixation on giving Trump “credit” for low Black unemployment rates, points with which Cavuto consistently appeared to agree and accept. Cavuto made several different attempts to elicit “credit” from Clyburn for the economy under Trump, each time being met with a different and detailed reason Clyburn disagreed with him. None of the actual sincere points made by Clyburn involved slavery, but all coverage of the segment focused solely on that quip and wholly mischaracterized his remarks in their entirety.Ultimately, social media users, blogs, and even Fox News (the airing network) attempted to characterize the above exchange as Clyburn claiming United States President Donald Trump’s effect on Black unemployment was poor when contrasted with slavery, a time during which Black Americans were “fully unemployed.” It was unclear why Fox News deleted the written article from FoxNews.com, leaving only a misleading video available for anyone interested in the content of Clyburn’s appearance.Update, 2/25/2020, 3:22pm: Fox News responded that they had not deleted the article; the link is now once again live. -bb"
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26467
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Facebook post Says all Vegas hotels but Trump’s have donated food, rooms in COVID response.
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Some Las Vegas hotels have given free hotel rooms to emergency responders working through the coronavirus outbreak. Trump’s Las Vegas hotel has not. But it is not the only exception.
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false
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Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Facebook posts,
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"Amid the pain of the coronavirus pandemic, one of the luxury hotels that bears President Donald Trump’s name was attacked as lacking compassion. ""All Las Vegas hotels have donated food and rooms for emergency personnel except for one: Trump International Hotel Las Vegas,"" a Facebook post claimed. The post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) Unlike some other hotel groups operating in Las Vegas, Trump’s hotel did not donate rooms, food or supplies, according to reporting by us and other media. But there’s no reason to believe Trump’s hotel was the only exception. Las Vegas is the nation’s largest hotel market, with roughly 150,000 rooms and thousands more under construction, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority lists 277 lodging establishments in the city as of December 2019, not including time-shares. The American Hotel & Lodging Association says more than 16,000 U.S. hotels have signed up to participate in its initiative to link hotels offering rooms with first responders and health care workers seeking lodging. As of April 6, three days before the Facebook post, 36 Las Vegas hotels were participating, the association told the Review-Journal. The association didn’t respond to our requests for details. Neither did the Las Vegas Hospitality Association, which counts 260 companies among its members. The 64-story, 1,282-room Trump International Hotel Las Vegas opened just off on The Strip in 2008. It’s one of eight hotels and resorts that the Trump Organization owns in North America. Trump still owns the company. But after becoming president, he gave up his position as an officer and day-to-day control, and the company’s assets were put into a trust that is managed by his sons, Donald Jr. and Eric. Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak ordered a statewide shutdown of hotels, casinos and other non-essential businesses on March 17. Since then, several hotel groups operating in Las Vegas have announced donations of hotel rooms, food and supplies for workers dealing with the health crisis. Polo Towers, Cancun Resort and Desert Paradise Resort are among Diamond Resorts properties offering complimentary accommodations to medical personnel and first responders, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. Wynn Resorts told the newspaper it is offering financial aid, food and personal protective equipment to local medical facilities and nonprofits in Las Vegas. Nationally, Marriott announced it has committed to provide $10 million worth of free hotel stays for health care professionals in cities hard hit by COVID-19, including Las Vegas. The Trump Organization did not reply to our requests for information for this fact check. Trump has saluted hotels and other businesses for their role in helping Americans cope with the coronavirus crisis. But media reports say that his own company hasn’t played much of a role. ProPublica reported April 2 that in its review of Trump Organization properties, it ""couldn’t find any sign they were joining the effort to fight the coronavirus, even as the president urges other companies to do so."" The article said many Las Vegas hotels and casinos that closed because of the governor’s order — including MGM, Wynn, Boyd Gaming, Station Casinos and Caesars — ""provided huge quantities of unused food"" and cash to a local food bank. The food bank director said nothing had been donated by the Trump hotel. Politico reported April 9 that local and state officials around the country were asking hotels to volunteer to house patients or first responders. In the seven U.S. cities with Trump luxury hotels, including Las Vegas, no local officials said the Trump properties were in discussions to house overflow patients or medical personnel. In response to the pandemic, the Trump Organization laid off or furloughed about 1,500 employees at Trump hotels in the United States and Canada, including in Las Vegas, the Washington Post reported on April 3. The company employs about 4,000 people. Las Vegas-based Caesars Entertainment Corp. said April 2 it expects to furlough about 90% of its employees. The Wall Street Journal previously reported that Marriott, Hilton and Hyatt are among hotel owners furloughing tens of thousands of workers or slashing staff. A Facebook post attacks Trump’s Las Vegas hotel as being the only one in the city that didn’t offer food or rooms for emergency personnel. The Trump Organization hasn’t provided any information, and searches by PolitiFact and other news organizations didn’t turn up any evidence that Trump’s properties have made such donations. Several other hotels in Las Vegas have made donations, but the Trump hotel does not appear to be the only exception. The city has hundreds of hotels, motels and inns, and a hotel industry trade group says 36 Las Vegas hotels were participating in its national initiative to offer rooms to first responders and health care workers. For a statement that contains an element of truth, but leaves a misleading impression."
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4073
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Quebec officials confirm first illness related to vaping.
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Canadian health officials are confirming another case of severe pulmonary illness linked to vaping.
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true
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Health, General News, Lung disease, Quebec, Vaping, Canada, Public health
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Details about the age and condition of victim in Quebec were not included in Friday’s release announcing the case. Canada’s chief public health officer said last week at least three reports of potential vaping-related illnesses were being investigated in the country. That followed a report from the Middlesex-London Health Unit that a teen from London, Ontario, who was using e-cigarettes daily suffered a severe case of pulmonary illness. Officials said the youth was initially on life support but was recovering at home, saying it was believed to be the first confirmed case of vaping-related lung disease in Canada. Quebec’s director of public health advised the practice is not without risks.
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2708
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Indonesia steps up race to find survivors as quake toll passes 1,200.
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Indonesia is in a race against time to save victims of a devastating earthquake and tsunami on Sulawesi island, the government said on Tuesday, as the official death toll rose to more than 1,200 and looting fueled fears of lawlessness.
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true
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Environment
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Four days after the double disaster struck, officials feared the toll could soar, as most of the confirmed dead had come from Palu, a small city 1,500 km (930 miles) northeast of Jakarta. Some remote areas have been largely cut off after Friday’s 7.5 magnitude quake triggered tsunami waves, destroying roads and bridges, and their losses have yet to be determined. “The team is racing against time because it’s already D+four,” Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman of National Disaster Mitigation Agency, told a briefing in Jakarta, referring to four days since the quake. He said rescuers had reached all four of the badly affected districts, which together have a population of 1.4 million, but he declined to give an estimate of casualties. He gave few details of the conditions rescuers had found, saying they were similar to those in Palu. Earlier, President Joko Widodo called for reinforcements in the search for survivors saying everyone had to be found. The official death toll surged to 1,234 with 800 people seriously injured. There has been particular concern about Donggala, a district of 300,000 people north of Palu and close to the epicenter of the quake, which only a few aid workers have managed to reach. Nugroho said it had been “devastated” by the tsunami. A video from the district, broadcast by the Antara state news agency, showed widespread destruction, including flattened buildings and a ship hurled into port buildings by the tsunami. “What we need is food, water, medicine, but to up now we’ve got nothing,” said an unidentified man standing in ruins. In Palu, tsunami waves as high as six meters (20 feet) smashed into the beachfront, while hotels and shopping malls collapsed in ruins. About 1,700 houses in one neighborhood were swallowed up by ground liquefaction, which happens when soil shaken by an earthquake behaves like a liquid, and hundreds of people are believed to have perished, the disaster agency said. Before-and-after satellite pictures showed a largely built-up neighborhood just south of Palu’s airport seemingly wiped clean of all signs of life by liquefaction. Nugroho said Sigi district was “flattened” by liquefaction. Among the dead were 34 children killed at a Christian bible study camp. More than 65,000 homes were damaged and more than 60,000 people have been displaced and are in need of emergency help. Thousands of people have been streaming out of stricken areas. Commercial airlines have struggled to restore operations at Palu’s damaged airport but military aircraft have taken some survivors out. Many more want to leave. The government has ordered that aid be airlifted in but there’s little sign of help on Palu’s shattered streets and survivors appeared increasingly desperate. A Reuters news team saw a shop cleared by about 100 people, shouting, scrambling and fighting each other for items including clothes, toiletries, blankets and water. Many people grabbed diapers while one man clutched a rice cooker as he headed for the door. Non-essential goods were scattered on the floor amid shards of broken glass. Police were at the scene but did not intervene. The government has played down looting saying victims could take essentials and shops would be compensated. Indonesia is all too familiar with earthquakes and tsunamis. A quake in 2004 triggered a tsunami across the Indian Ocean that killed 226,000 people in 13 countries, including more than 120,000 in Indonesia. It has said it would accept offers of international aid, after shunning outside help this year when an earthquake struck Lombok island. A spokesman for the main U.N. aid coordinating agency, OCHA, said humanitarian agencies were in contact with the government and ready to help. “There is an immediate need for food, clean water, shelter, medical care and psycho-social support,” the spokesman, Jens Laerke, told a briefing in Geneva. State port operator Pelindo IV said a ship carrying 50 tonnes of supplies including rice and baby milk had arrived in Palu on Monday. It was unclear if the aid had been distributed. Power has yet to be restored and aftershocks have rattled nerves but rescuers in Palu held out hope they could still save lives. “We suspect there are still some survivors trapped inside,” the head of one rescue team, Agus Haryono, told Reuters at the collapsed Hotel Roa Roa as he pored over its blueprints. About 50 people were believed to have been caught inside the hotel when it was brought down. About nine bodies have been recovered and three rescued alive. Elsewhere, on the outskirts of Palu, lorries brought 54 bodies to a mass grave. Most had not been claimed, a policeman said, but some relatives came to pay respects to loved ones at the 50-meter (165 ft) trench. Rosmawati Binti Yahya, 52, was still looking for her missing daughter. But her husband was among the victims laid in the grave. “It’s OK if he’s buried in the mass grave, it’s better to have him buried fast,” she said.
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6369
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Public health emergency declared over Hepatitis A outbreak.
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Officials in Philadelphia have declared a public health emergency due to an ongoing outbreak of Hepatitis A.
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true
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Health, General News, Philadelphia, Hepatitis, Liver disease, Public health
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Health care providers have been directed to help vaccinate those most at risk for infection to stop the outbreak. The health department says the city usually sees between two to six cases of Hepatitis A per year. Since January, the department has been notified of 154 cases. Hepatitis Type A is an infection of the liver caused by a virus that is spread by the fecal-oral route, either through personal contact or consumption of contaminated food or water. It’s particularly dangerous for older people and those with underlying liver disease. WHYY reports that public bathrooms and hand-washing stations will be deployed in the Kensington neighborhood to combat the outbreak. The spread has been traced in part to human feces on the streets and parks in the area.
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908
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Colombia court upholds conditions for restarting aerial coca fumigation.
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Colombia’s constitutional court on Thursday upheld its own restrictions on the aerial spraying of the herbicide glyphosate to eliminate coca, the base ingredient in cocaine, but said its use could be reinstated if the government meets certain conditions.
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true
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Environment
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Colombia suspended aerial fumigation with the Monsanto Co herbicide in 2015 after the World Health Organization linked glyphosate to cancer. The decision was later backed by the court, but President Ivan Duque has sought to overturn the decision because of increasing coca crops. In a unanimous ruling, eight of the court’s judges said it will be up to the national narcotics council to decide whether spraying can restart based on conditions set out in its 2017 ruling. The government said in a statement it respected the court’s decision and would ask the narcotics council to review its proposal to restart aerial fumigation. In order for spraying to be renewed it is not necessary to prove with absolute certainty that the herbicide does no harm, the court said, but the council should consider all the available scientific evidence about minimizing risks to health and the environment. Duque testified before the court in March that conditions should be modified because expansion of the crop since the restrictions began threatens efforts to consolidate peace in Colombia. Last month a U.S. report showed cocaine output slowed for the first time since 2012. The report from the White House said the number of hectares planted with coca fell slightly in 2018 to 208,000, from 209,000, while cocaine production fell to 887 tonnes from 900. Washington spends about $400 million annually in military and economic aid to Colombia but U.S. President Donald Trump has questioned Bogota’s ability to reduce coca cultivation, leading Duque to defend eradication efforts. It will be “nearly impossible” for the government to meet the court’s conditions, which include continuous monitoring of health and environmental effects, and restart fumigation, said political analyst Sergio Guzman. “This will likely be unacceptable to the U.S., and especially President Trump,” he said. Duque has said manual eradication is more expensive and less effective than aerial fumigation and puts security forces at risk of landmines and sniper shootings. The government says more than 66,500 hectares of coca have been eradicated and more than 330 tonnes of cocaine confiscated since he took office just under a year ago. A 2016 peace deal between Colombia and one group of leftist rebels includes funding meant to encourage farmers to replace coca with other crops.
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796
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U.S. to pay for thousands of doses of HIV drugs for Venezuelan migrants.
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The United States said on Wednesday it will provide thousands of doses of HIV medication to treat Venezuelans in Colombia as part of regional efforts to manage care for millions of migrants fleeing the crisis-hit nation.
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true
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Health News
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U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar told Reuters about the decision in a phone interview following a meeting this week of health officials from 10 countries in the Colombian border city of Cucuta. The officials agreed to various measures meant to help the more than 4 million Venezuelans who have left home amid widespread shortages of food and medicine. “When I was there I actually signed a letter of intent with minister of health Juan Pablo Uribe for the United States to be providing HIV antiretrovirals to Colombia for the use with Venezuelan refugees,” Azar said. The United States will provide 12,000 doses, an HHS spokeswoman said, enough for a year’s medication for 1,000 migrants. “We believe that its vital to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS and to treat those who have it because with appropriate treatment individuals who have HIV/AIDS can live healthy, long, productive lives,” Azar said. Antiretrovirals are not a cure for HIV, but can help keep the virus at bay and lower the chance of transmitting the disease. Many Venezuelans living with the virus that causes AIDS once received free medication. Supplies dried up as the economy unraveled, leaving patients to seek treatment abroad or resort to questionable home remedies. The crisis presents a range of health challenges for countries taking in migrants, from patients with chronic conditions who have long lacked care to those needing emergency assistance. In many hospitals along Colombia’s border, a majority of births are now to Venezuelan mothers, many of whom lacked pre-natal care. Plans are also being made for rebuilding Venezuela’s healthcare system once President Nicolas Maduro is no longer in power, Azar said. The United States is among more than 50 countries that recognize Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido as his country’s legitimate leader rather than Maduro. Guaido invoked the constitution in January to assume a rival presidency, saying Maduro’s 2018 re-election was fraudulent. Maduro alleges that Guaido is a puppet of the United States. Unlike its neighbors, Colombia has not put in place stringent immigration requirements for Venezuelan migrants. Colombia is home to some 1.4 million Venezuelans. Hundreds of thousands of others reside in Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Brazil and other countries. (This story has been refiled to fix spelling of “States” in paragraph 5)
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9323
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New Nerve Stimulation Technique Might Relieve Back Pain
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This story reports on an study of 67 people with chronic back pain, most of whom reported feeling at least a little better after they had a dorsal root ganglion (DRG) stimulator implanted in their spine. An abstract of the study was presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Anesthesiologists. The story did a good job of reporting on the cost and availability of this procedure. However, it didn’t acknowledge that the study’s findings are unreliable because there was no comparison with a control arm of patients who didn’t get the device. The story also played up an unsupported claim that this therapy could reduce opioid use and didn’t disclose that one source has significant conflicts of interest. Back pain is common and aggravating, and patients are often willing to try anything for relief. News stories should offer plenty of cautions about potential treatments that don’t have solid evidence of a benefit, particularly if they are risky and invasive procedures. Moreover, journalists should flag conflicted doctors who make money off of implanting devices and resist the temptation to report unsubstantiated claims that an intervention can reduce opioid use.
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mixture
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back pain,medical devices
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The story did great on this criterion. It said the cost of spine stimulation devices “can range from $15,000 to $50,000 or more, according to a 2008 report funded by the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries.” It also mentioned the procedure “isn’t covered by all insurance companies, so out-of-pocket costs to patients can be very high.” One quibble we did have is that it isn’t clear whether the device to stimulate the dorsal root ganglion is different in cost than the other types of spinal cord stimulation. The story makes this claim high up: The [DRG] therapy, which targets the root ganglion nerves, is more effective than other spine stimulation procedures because it places tiny leads precisely at the area where pain originates, unlike other devices that provide more generalized stimulation, the researchers said. While there are theoretical reasons why DRG stimulation may be better than spinal cord stimulation, only studies directly comparing these treatments can determine this, and there is no mention of such studies in this piece. Based on the study findings that are discussed, it may have helped some patients, but the story needed to make it clear that we can’t know from this one study if it’s better than alternatives. It’s also unfounded to speculate that it may reduce the use of opioid drugs. The story said the procedure “was not without complications. Five patients needed to have the wires implanted again, two patients had them removed because they were infected, and one had the device removed because of a complication.” The story didn’t describe the complication, which was a foot drop. It could have also gone a step further by cautioning that the FDA often does not require new medical devices to prove that they are safe or effective in order to be used in people. The story includes some details of the study, such as that the device was implanted in 67 people with chronic back pain who were followed for three to 18 months, and just 17 had the device for more than a year. It also noted that the the findings were presented at the American Society of Anesthesiologists meeting, and that research presented at meetings “is considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.” However, as we discussed in the benefits criterion, the story should have cautioned that this study didn’t have a comparison group of patients that didn’t get the treatment. As a result, it’s impossible to know whether the reported improvements are the result of a placebo effect or if these patients would have seen their intense pain ease up as a natural course of their condition, regardless of any treatment. The story also reported one researcher’s assertion that the therapy “has the potential to allow patients to stop taking opioids to control their pain” yet offers no data to support that. The story didn’t exaggerate the incidence of chronic back pain, though some numbers would have been helpful. Low back pain is a common problem – almost everyone will have it at some point. However, only a small number, 7-12%, go on to develop chronic, disabling pain. That said, this still represents millions of adults in the US, and is well known to be a contributor to the opioid epidemic of physician prescribing for chronic musculoskeletal pain. The authors of this study reported no conflicts of interest in the abstract. However, the story didn’t mention that a doctor who’s quoted, Kiran Patel, MD, received nearly $12,000 in 2017 from Abbott Laboratories, which makes a DRG device. Kiran is also listed as a “DRG specialist” on Abbott’s web site. Further, the story didn’t say who funded this study. The story said DRG stimulation may help “patients who have not gotten relief from other treatments.” We would have liked a sentence or two about other ways to deal with back pain. There are many treatments for chronic low back pain, but none are known to offer a cure with a reasonable degree of certainty. Treatments often focus on medicines to control pain, but there is increasing interest in non-pharmacological treatments to control pain and improve function, such as exercise, physical therapy, yoga, Tai chi, acupuncture, spinal manipulation, mind-body techniques, cognitive behavioral therapy, along with others. Invasive treatments may include injectable medicines, but they have limited duration of benefit for a chronic problem. The story reported that the device was approved by the FDA in 2016 and its use is confined to “more advanced medical centers where doctors have been trained in how to implant and regulate the device.” Also, it said the procedure “isn’t covered by all insurance companies, so out-of-pocket costs to patients can be very high,” though it is covered by Medicare. The story did not establish novelty–what other studies have been done on this type of therapy for chronic back pain? Is this the first? The new device mentioned here, that stimulates the dorsal root ganglion, is argued to be more specific than the older stimulation devices. A number of issues not raised in this piece make the potential value of DRG stimulation less clear. First, is that being more precise, doctors need to identify the pain generator site (the source of the pain). For many patients this can be hard to find. Moreover, there may be more than one pain source, arguing that multiple DRG’s may need to be targeted. This may explain why pain is not eliminated, but only decreased, for this study population. The story doesn’t appear to rely on a news release.
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6079
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7 patients at new Ohio hospital diagnosed with Legionnaires’.
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Ohio’s health authority on Friday ordered a newly opened hospital outside Columbus to immediately flush and disinfect its water lines and take other steps to protect the public’s health after seven patients were diagnosed with potentially fatal Legionnaires’ disease.
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true
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Columbus, Health, General News, Legionnaires disease, Ohio
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The Ohio Department of Health said in a statement that the first Mount Carmel Grove City patient diagnosed with Legionnaires’, a severe form of pneumonia, was admitted to the 200-bed hospital April 29, the day after it opened. The statement described state Health Director Amy Acton’s adjudication order as a rare event. The hospital also has been ordered to test and clean its ice machines, clean and service its on-site cooling towers, and provide all test results and a water management plan to the Health Department. If Mount Carmel fails to follow Acton’s directives, she will order the hospital to stop accepting patients, the statement said. State and Franklin County health officials were conducting an environmental assessment at Mount Carmel on Saturday morning. Mount Carmel spokeswoman Samantha Irons said in a statement late Friday that the hospital is running additional tests on its water sources and that its water supply is receiving “supplemental” disinfection. She said hospital officials are confident Mount Carmel can maintain full services “while we study this situation.” The Mount Carmel statement said anyone who has been hospitalized at the facility and develops a cough, muscle aches, headaches or shortness of breath should contact their primary care physician. The Centers for Disease Control and Infection website says people are infected with Legionnaires’ by inhaling airborne water droplets containing the Legionella bacteria. Cooling towers containing water and a fan as part of a centralized cooling system are a potential source for Legionella, the CDC says. While most healthy people are unaffected, those over 50, smokers and others with weakened immune systems and chronic lung disease are most at risk of being infected, the CDC says. The Mount Carmel system has been under intense scrutiny after discovering that a doctor had prescribed excessive doses of painkillers to 29 patients who died at its other hospitals.
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7375
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World Rugby announces postponement of July tests.
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World Rugby has postponed July test matches involving southern and northern hemisphere nations because of ongoing restrictions on international travel during the coronavirus pandemic.
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true
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Australia, Rugby, Health, Scotland, Sports - Asia, Sports - Europe, Wellington, New Zealand, Africa, England, South Africa, Travel, Wales, Virus Outbreak, Sports - General, Sports - Africa
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The sport’s international governing body issued a statement Friday saying the mid-year test window will be rescheduled when cross-border travel and quarantine regulations are relaxed. New Zealand had been scheduled to play Wales and Scotland, Australia was set to play Ireland and Fiji and Rugby World Cup champion South Africa had planned to host Scotland and Georgia. Japan was set to play a test against Wales and two against England in its first internationals since hosting the World Cup last year. World Rugby said the decision to shutter the July international window was made because of “ongoing government and health agency COVID-19 directives.” “Extended travel and quarantine restrictions that apply to numerous countries and concerns over adequate player preparation time mean that any sort of cross-border international rugby competition cannot be hosted in July,” World Rugby said. The Super Rugby season was suspended in March, but participating countries are planning domestic tournaments to off-set the lost provincial games. New Zealand’s Super Rugby teams will play a 10-week competition starting next month, and Australia’s Super Rugby clubs are aiming for a July re-start. In terms of test matches, World Rugby said it will continue to monitor the potential impact on the remaining 2020 international windows. It said consultation would take place with member unions, professional clubs and the International Rugby Players Association “with a view to achieving an aligned calendar for the remainder of the year.” October is a shaping as a potential time to stage the postponed matches. Strict lock down measures are being gradually eased in New Zealand and Australia from this week, and there’s been talk of resuming travel between the neighboring countries in a so-called “Tasman bubble.” South Africa Rugby Union chief executive Jurie Roux said any rescheduling of the tests “will have player health, welfare and appropriate return-to-play protocols at heart.” As for the future timing, Roux said it would be “inappropriate to comment of potential solutions during a fluid and important consultation process.” The New Zealand All Blacks had been scheduled play Wales at Auckland on July 4, at Wellington on July 11 and Scotland at Dunedin on July 18. “With so much uncertainty around international travel because of the Covid-19 pandemic, the decision was really taken out of our hands,” NZ Rugby chief executive Mark Robinson said. “From a New Zealand point of view, we are taking a pragmatic approach to the international test program. “We are working hard to explore any and every opportunity to play All Blacks tests as well as Black Ferns (women’s) tests this year and watching with keen interest any government discussions on a possible trans-Tasman (travel) bubble with Australia.” The June or July test window is an established part of the international rugby season, when European nations travel south for test series and when tournaments such as the Pacific Nations Cup are played, involving Pacific Island nations and Japan, Canada and the United States. ___ More AP sports: https://apnews.com/apf-sports and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports
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3786
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GOP, Dems offer compromise to reduce drug costs for seniors.
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Two veteran senators — a Republican and a Democrat — unveiled compromise legislation Tuesday to reduce prescription drug costs for millions of Medicare recipients, while saving money for federal and state health care programs serving seniors and low-income people.
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true
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Medicare, Seniors, Medication, Ron Wyden, Health, General News, Legislation, Politics, Prescription drug costs, Business, AP Top News, Prescription drugs, Chuck Grassley, Prices, Inflation, Bills
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Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley and Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden said the bill would for the first time limit drug copays for people with Medicare’s “Part D” prescription plan , by capping patients’ out-of-pocket costs at $3,100 a year starting in 2022. They’re hoping to have it ready soon for votes on the Senate floor. The legislation would also require drugmakers to pay a price-hike penalty to Medicare if the cost of their medications goes up faster than inflation. Drugs purchased through a pharmacy as well as those administered in doctors’ offices would be covered by the new inflation rebates. Political compromises over health care are rare these days. The bill reflects efforts by lawmakers of both parties to move beyond the rancorous debates over the Obama-era Affordable Care Act and focus on ways to lower costs for people with health insurance. Separate legislation to address “surprise medical bills” has already cleared the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee. The senators said preliminary estimates from the Congressional Budget Office show that the Medicare program would save $85 billion over 10 years, while seniors would save $27 billion in out-of-pocket costs over the same period, and $5 billion from slightly lower premiums. The government would save $15 billion from projected Medicaid costs. CBO also projected that Medicare’s inflation rebate would have ripple effects, leading to prescription drug savings for private insurance plans sponsored by employers or purchased directly by consumers. The senators announced a Thursday vote on the package by the Finance Committee, which oversees Medicare and Medicaid. Grassley is the panel’s chairman, while Wyden serves as the senior Democrat. “Pharmaceutical companies play a vital role in creating new and innovative medicines that save and improve the quality of millions of American lives, but that doesn’t help Americans who can’t afford them,” Grassley and Wyden said in a joint statement. “This legislation shows that no industry is above accountability.” The White House encouraged the Senate negotiations, and spokesman Judd Deere said the Trump administration stands ready to “work with senators to ensure this proposal moves forward and advances the president’s priority of lowering drug prices.” Democrats controlling the House want to go farther by granting Medicare legal authority to directly negotiate prices with pharmaceutical companies. Direct negotiations are seen as a nonstarter in the Republican-controlled Senate, but the bill’s drug price inflation penalty may yet find support among Democrats in the House. Grassley’s office said the bill will force drugmakers and insurers to take greater responsibility for keeping Medicare prescription prices in line, instead of foisting increases on taxpayers and beneficiaries. The lack of a cap on out-of-pocket costs for Medicare’s popular prescription benefit has left some beneficiaries with bills rivaling a mortgage payment. That’s because with Medicare’s current protection for catastrophic costs, patients taking very expensive drugs are still responsible for 5% of the cost, with no dollar limit on what they pay. For example, 5% of a drug that costs $200,000 a year works out to $10,000. The Grassley-Wyden bill does not directly address the problem of high launch prices for new medications, but its inflation rebates could put the brakes on price hikes for mainstay drugs such as insulin. The bill drew a rebuke from the pharmaceutical industry, while AARP praised Grassley and Wyden. Other provisions of the legislation would: — Change an arcane Medicaid payment formula through which drugmakers can avoid paying rebates on certain drugs, depending on fluctuations in prices. — Allow state Medicaid programs to pay for expensive gene therapy treatments on the installment plan, spreading out the costs over several years. — Require drugmakers to provide public justification for new high cost drugs or steep hikes in the prices of existing medications. — Require middlemen known as pharmacy benefit managers to disclose details of the discounts they are negotiating and how much they are passing on to consumers. The benefit managers negotiate with pharmaceutical companies on behalf of insurers and consumers. — Provide doctors with new computer tools they can use to estimate out-of-pocket medication costs for patients with Medicare.
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26099
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Significantly more people died of Covid-19 in two months than died of overdoses all of last year or the year before.
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Nationally, more than 96,000 Americans died of the coronavirus in April and May 2020. That exceeds the 70,000 Americans who died of drug overdoses in the higher of the two most recent years, 2017.
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true
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Drugs, Public Health, New York, Coronavirus, Monica Wallace,
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"A federal prosecutor and a state lawmaker from western New York sparred recently over the scale of coronavirus deaths in their state. In a May 30 op-ed in the Buffalo News, James P. Kennedy Jr., the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of New York, urged a quicker reopening of the economy, in part because he said that a failure to do so would cause psychological harm and spur deaths from drug abuse. In the op-ed, Kennedy said he has seen a ""roughly three-fold increase in the number of drug overdose deaths"" during the pandemic. As the country is struggling economically, he wrote, ""such measures come at a cost that goes well beyond the adverse impact they have had on our economy."" This argument drew a response from Monica P. Wallace, a Democratic assemblywoman for the 143rd District of New York. She told the Buffalo News that Kennedy glossed over the reality that significantly more people died due to the coronavirus in two months than died of overdoses all of last year. The Buffalo News paraphrased Wallace’s remark this way: ""Wallace said Kennedy failed to mention that significantly more people died of Covid-19 in two months than died of overdoses all of last year or the year before."" When we reached her, Wallace confirmed that the paraphrase was accurate. We found that her assertion is correct. For the number of coronavirus deaths, Wallace referred us to a count by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that found from the beginning of April until the end of May, approximately 96,647 people died in the United States. The total number of deaths through mid-June was 103,339, according to the CDC. However, this may be an underestimate due to difficulties in collecting the full data. For the number of overdoses, Wallace referred us to CDC data. The CDC’s most recent full-year data is for 2018. That year, there were 67,367 drug overdose deaths. In 2017, there were 70,237 overdose deaths. So the national figures show that the two-month toll of coronavirus deaths exceeded the year-long number of drug overdose deaths in both 2017 and 2018. The same was for New York state. There were 21,964 coronavirus deaths in New York state between the start of April and the end of May, according to the COVID Tracking Project. That compares to 3,697 drug overdose deaths for all of 2018 in New York state and 3,921 in 2017. Wallace said that significantly more people died of Covid-19 in two months than died of overdoses all of last year or the year before. She’s correct. Nationally, more than 96,000 Americans died of the coronavirus in April and May 2020, compared to a bit more than 70,000 Americans who died of drug overdoses in the higher of the two most recent years, 2017."
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27732
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Steven Hildreth Jr. was stopped by police officers for a broken headlight, but was let go with a verbal warning.
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While Hildreth’s story is true, it is only one man’s experience during a single traffic stop, and does not represent the experience of each person who is pulled over throughout the United States every day.
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true
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Crime, black lives matter, blue lives matter, crime
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On 27 October 2015, Facebook user Steven Hildreth shared a story on Facebook about an encounter he had with Tucson police officers, in which he was pulled over and then peacefully released without incident: So, I’m driving to my office to turn in my weekly paperwork. A headlight is out. I see a Tucson Police Department squad vehicle turn around and follow me. I’m already preparing for the stop. The lights go on and I pull over. The officer asks me how I’m doing, and then asks if I have any weapons. “Yes, sir. I’m a concealed carry permit holder and my weapon is located on my right hip. My wallet is in my back-right pocket.” The officer explains for his safety and mine, he needs to disarm me for the stop. I understand, and I unlock the vehicle. I explain that I’m running a 7TS ALS holster but from the angle, the second officer can’t unholster it. Lead officer asks me to step out, and I do so slowly. Officer relieves me of my Glock and compliments the X300U I’m running on it. He also sees my military ID and I tell him I’m with the National Guard. Lead officer points out my registration card is out of date but he knows my registration is up to date. He goes back to run my license. I know he’s got me on at least two infractions. I’m thinking of how to pay them. Officers return with my Glock in an evidence back, locked and cleared. “Because you were cool with us and didn’t give us grief, I’m just going to leave it at a verbal warning. Get that headlight fixed as soon as possible.” I smile. “Thank you, sir.” I’m a black man wearing a hoodie and strapped. According to certain social movements, I shouldn’t be alive right now because the police are allegedly out to kill minorities. Maybe…just maybe…that notion is bunk. Maybe if you treat police officers with respect, they will do the same to you. Police officers are people, too. By far and large, most are good people and they’re not out to get you. I’d like to thank those two officers and TPD in general for another professional contact. We talk so much about the bad apples who shouldn’t be wearing a badge. I’d like to spread the word about an example of men who earned their badges and exemplify what that badge stands for. #BlueLivesMatter #AllLivesMatter [EDIT: In my rush to post, I accidentally omitted that my wallet was in the back-right pocket, near my firearm. This was the primary motivation for temporary disarmament. The post has been modified to reflect that. Again, I’d like to thank the TPD and their officers for their consistent professionalism, courtesy, and the good work that they do, both in this particular contact and every day.] While Hildreth put up the post in October 2015, it often shows up again when controversial altercations with police officers are in the headlines. The message recirculated on social media shortly after Philando Castile was shot and killed during a traffic stop in July 2016. While we were unable to confirm the every detail of Hildreth’s story, the general premise of his viral Facebook post (that he had a respectful and safe interaction with two Tuscon Police Department officers despite being black, having a gun on his person, and wearing a hoodie) appears to be accurate. A few days after posting his story on Facebook, Hildreth was invited to meet Officer Rodriguez and Officer Ammond: A report published by Washington, D.C., television station WJLA further corroborated the account: “It’s just kind of surprising, because our officers do this every day,” said Sgt. Pete Dugan, “we had nothing to do with it going viral.” Sgt. Dugan said he believed the two officers were patrolling from separate cars, and didn’t treat the stop any differently than the many others they perform on a daily basis. “We appreciate that someone is coming forward with something positive, due to what we’ve seen nationally,” said Sgt. Dugan.
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23885
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"Rick Scott's former health care company, Columbia/HCA, committed ""fraud."
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With Rick Scott leading in polls, opponents pull out 'fraud' line
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true
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Candidate Biography, Health Care, Florida, Bill McCollum,
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Rick Scott’s opponents for governor are telling reporters to essentially brush off a June 2010 poll that shows the former Columbia/HCA hospital CEO beating both Attorney General Bill McCollum in the Republican primary and Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink in a hypothetical November match-up. Focus on the fraud, they say. The fraud. The fraud. “Rick Scott has spent $15 million in half as many weeks to fund his public image repair squad’s pricey and misleading paid media campaign,” McCollum spokesman Kristy Campbell said June 10, 2010. “It’s no surprise he has skyrocketed in the polls since Floridians are just beginning to learn about his questionable past. His lead will evaporate when Floridians learn Rick Scott oversaw the most massive Medicare fraud scheme in American history.” Democrats added their own e-mail titled “Fraud is not a mistake,” and a 2-minute, 40-second web video called “Slick Rick.” “Rick Scott may think that his millions of dollars will allow him to avoid answering hard questions about his record as CEO of Columbia/HCA ... but with your help we will make sure he is held accountable,” said the Florida Democratic Party’s Eric Jotkoff. The fraud. The fraud. PolitiFact Florida had to bite. Here we’ll focus on whether Scott’s old company, Columbia/HCA, committed fraud, and also explain Scott’s role with the company, his part in a federal investigation and the outcomes of the federal probe. To borrow a line from Scott’s television ads — Let’s get to work. Columbia/HCA history Scott started what was first Columbia in the spring of 1987, purchasing two El Paso, Texas, hospitals. He quickly grew the company by purchasing more hospitals. A hospital network created efficiencies. Efficiencies created profits. In 1994, Scott’s Columbia purchased Tennessee-headquartered HCA and its 100 hospitals, and merged the companies. When Scott resigned as CEO in 1997, Columbia/HCA had grown to more than 340 hospitals, 135 surgery centers and 550 home health locations in 37 states and two foreign countries, Scott’s campaign says. The company employed more than 285,000 people. Now about Scott’s departure in 1997. That year, federal agents went public with an investigation into the company, first seizing records from four El Paso-area hospitals and then expanding across the country. In time it became apparent that the investigation focused on whether Columbia/HCA bilked Medicare and Medicaid. Scott resigned as CEO in July 1997, less than four months after the inquiry became public and before the depth of the investigation became clear. Company executives said had Scott remained CEO, the entire chain could have been in jeopardy. At issue, Scott says, is that he wanted to fight the federal government accusations. The corporate board of the publicly traded company wanted to settle. And settle, Columbia/HCA did. In December 2000, the U.S. Justice Department announced what it called the largest government fraud settlement in U.S. history when Columbia/HCA agreed to pay $840 million in criminal fines and civil damages and penalties. Among the revelations from the 2000 settlement, which all apply to when Scott was CEO: The government settled a second series of similar claims with Columbia/HCA in 2002 for an additional $881 million. The total fine: $1.7 billion. Plea deals, fraud As part of the 2000 settlement, Columbia/HCA agreed to plead guilty to at least 14 corporate felonies. A corporate felony comes with financial penalties but not jail time, since a corporation can’t be sent to prison. Among the 14 felonies, Columbia/HCA pleaded guilty to three counts of conspiracy to defraud the United States. Also, four Florida-based Columbia/HCA executives were indicted. Two were convicted of defrauding Medicare in 1999 and were sentenced to prison, only to have those convictions overturned on appeal. A third executive was acquitted and a jury failed to reach a verdict on the fourth. Was Scott close to going to prison for his part in the case? It appears not at all. The former CEO was never indicted and was never questioned in the case, he says. He may have been a target of the investigation — an ABC News report from 1997 says he was — but that never translated into charges. Sorting it out Let’s boil this down. Was Scott running Columbia/HCA when it found itself at the center of a massive federal investigation? Yes. Did the company pay a record $1.7 billion in government penalties and fines? Yes, Columbia/HCA paid. And as we checked in this item, did his former company commit fraud? Yes, it pleaded guilty to fraud charges as part of a settlement. Of course, the million-dollar question is how much of the blame ultimately falls on Scott? And that’s an answer we can’t provide. Scott was in charge so he bears some responsibility and has said so. But there has yet to come to light any detail of how much he knew, and when he knew it. Though that won’t keep us from looking. McCollum's campaign, in a statement, said Rick Scott's former company Columbia/HCA committed fraud.
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9760
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Lilly’s Alzheimer’s Drug May Slow Patients’ Decline, Study Shows Separate study shows experimental Biogen drug also holds promise
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The story looks at the status of two drugs that are being evaluated as treatments for delaying the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. One drug, solanezumab, has been in the news off and on for years. Early trials failed to show positive benefits for the drug, but now the manufacturer is poised to release findings that it says will show a benefit for patients with so-called “mild” Alzheimer’s. The second drug, aducanumab, was recently the subject of a small, early-stage clinical trial. Its manufacturer is poised to announce that the drug appears to slow cognitive decline. Both drugs are designed to lower levels of amyloid in the brain, which is thought by many scientists to play a causal role in the development of Alzheimer’s disease. However, as the story itself notes, neither of the new findings tell us whether these drugs will actually work. A more definitive, large-scale study of solanezumab is not expected to report findings until late 2016 (at the earliest). And the wait for definitive results on aducanumab will be even longer. Drug development is a big business; new drugs for treating Alzheimer’s disease would generate billions of dollars in revenue for pharmaceutical manufacturers. Here we see that these companies are promoting interim findings that, one suspects, they hope will positively affect their stock price. And this story will likely help them accomplish that goal. But it may also stir up false hopes in Alzheimer’s patients and their loved ones, when it’s clear that neither of these drugs has yet demonstrated any clinically meaningful benefit — and that neither will be available to consumers for years, if ever. We recognize that these results have business implications and that this story is targeted at a business and investing crowd, Nevertheless, the piece will inevitably be read by many general readers conducting searches on the Internet — which is how we found it. And for those readers, we think it’s vitally important for stories like this to include a clear explanation of potential benefits and harms as well as a discussion of the evidence on offer. We suspect that business readers would also profit from that information.
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mixture
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Biogen,Eli Lilly
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While the story tells readers that solanezumab and aducanumab could generate annual sales of $3 billion and $10 billion respectively, it says nothing about the potential cost of the drugs to consumers or insurance companies. Those billions would likely come largely from Medicare. These drugs are still far removed from the marketplace, but presumably the experts they spoke to were basing their annual sales estimates on more than guesswork. That makes it particularly problematic that the story doesn’t touch on cost at all. The story describes the benefits of these drugs in broad, qualitative terms. E.g., a drug appeared to slow down cognitive decline. That makes it difficult or impossible to tell how well either of these drugs performed in the relevant trials. Were these marginal benefits? In other coverage of these studies, an Eli Lilly consultant noted that the results “do not have a direct relationship to clinically apparent benefit.” So it seems premature for anyone other than investors to be getting too excited about these findings just yet. The story doesn’t address harms at all. One of the most important aspects of clinical trials is determining whether an experimental drug causes significant side effects. And at least one of these drugs is associated with brain swelling associated with headache and confusion. To be clear, this is not about asking reporters to paint a grisly picture of potential harms. If a drug had no adverse side effects, that’s great — but tell readers that. And if a drug does have adverse side effects, tell readers that too. [Editor’s note: An updated version of the story now includes the following line: “Some patients receiving solanezumab experienced swelling in the brain and other adverse events, but researchers said the drug was generally well tolerated.” This line was not in the version of the story that we originally reviewed. We applaud any effort to get better, more complete information to readers. But such updates do miss readers like us who only saw the original version of the story.] The story gets credit for making clear that previous studies of solanezumab did not have promising results, and that a separate, ongoing trial scheduled to end in late 2016 will have more definitive results on the drug. However, the story tells readers very little about the solanezumab trial it is reporting on. How large was the trial? What was the study design? Who conducted it? What were its limitations? The portion of the story on aducanumab is equally vague. All readers are told is that the relevant results stem from a “early-stage clinical trial” in which varying doses of the drug were given to “a very small group of participants with mild memory problems.” How small is “very small”? How long was the trial? What do they mean by “mild memory problems” — were any of the study participants diagnosed with early-stage Alzheimer’s? We understand that not every story can provide an exhaustive overview of a clinical trial’s study design, but the limited information offered here provides more questions than answers. No disease mongering here. Two clearly independent sources are quoted, but both are market analysts who offered only global, annual sales estimates for the drugs. There seem to be no independent sources cited in regard to how promising the drugs are, what the clinical trial findings might mean, how far the drugs might be from reaching the market, etc. That’s a significant oversight. Even if readers are interested in this solely as a business story, expert evaluations from independent sources on those issues would be enormously valuable. The conflicts of interest seem clear, with one exception. The story quotes Paul Aisen, director of the Alzheimer’s Therapeutic Research Institute at the University of Southern California, “who presented the results” on solanezumab. Aisen is also a consultant to Eli Lilly and many other drug companies, which should have been mentioned. The story does note that existing medications on the market “can alleviate symptoms but don’t slow underlying disease progression.” We’ll rate this Satisfactory, although these medications are really only marginally effective in a minority of patients. The story clearly notes that solanezumab is the subject of a more definitive trial that won’t end until at least 2016, and that aducanumab is still in early-stage clinical trials. That’s sufficient for a Satisfactory rating. However, we wish that the story had explained that it will be years — at least — before either drug is on the market. And it’s entirely possible that neither will come to market. On a health issue like this one, when people are often willing to grasp at straws to help a loved one, it’s important to be as clear as possible when it comes to availability. The story discusses these drugs in the context of other drugs seeking to do similar things, and offers a concise background on the history of the development process for both drugs. While it seems clear that the story was driven by news releases from both manufacturers, the reporters clearly offered background that went beyond the news release material.
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8627
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UAE to boost strategic stockpile, waive visa fines over coronavirus.
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The United Arab Emirates will reinforce its stockpile of strategic goods and waive residency visa fines for the rest of the year in response to the coronavirus outbreak, its vice president said on Sunday.
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true
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Health News
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Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, who is also the UAE prime minister and ruler of Dubai, the region’s tourism and business hub, did not say what goods were included in the stockpile or give further details on the visa fine waiver. Tweeting after a cabinet meeting, he also said authorities had directed factories to support the health sector’s needs in the country, which has recorded 1,505 infections and 10 deaths. Dubai imposed a two-week lockdown on Saturday night, tightening an overnight curfew that the whole of the UAE has been under for 10 days. Reported daily new cases in the UAE have increased recently as testing has been stepped up. The UAE central bank also announced new measures on Sunday to guarantee liquidity in the banking system, boosting its stimulus package to a total of $70 billion from a previously announced $27 billion. Elsewhere the UAE’s embassy in the United Kingdom announced two charter flights this week to return more than 80 Emiratis home. It also said an Emirates Airline plane had flown 345 British citizens back to the UK, after being unable to return home after the closure of UAE airports to international traffic. Countries of the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have recorded 6,757 cases of infection and 54 deaths. Saudi Arabia on Sunday reported five more deaths from the virus, bringing the total death toll to 34. The number of confirmed coronavirus cases rose by 206 in the past 24 hours to 2,385, the highest among Gulf Arab states. The kingdom’s foreign ministry said it would register requests this week from citizens abroad who want to return home, with priority given to the elderly and pregnant women and those in countries most affected. The tourism ministry has prepared some 11,000 hotel rooms for returning nationals, who are subject to a 14-day quarantine. Saudi authorities said separately that 366 Turkish pilgrims had returned home after testing negative for coronavirus. The kingdom has suspended the year-long umrah pilgrimage and told Muslims to wait to make plans for the annual haj pilgrimage, which begins this year in July. Elsewhere in the Gulf, Qatar Development Bank launched a programme to provide guarantees to local banks to grant interest-free loans to companies affected by the outbreak, state news agency QNA said. The move came under the direction of Qatar’s emir and is in cooperation with its ministry of finance, the central bank and all banks operating in the country.
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29200
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"The medical term ""vagina"" has been replaced with the phrase ""front hole."
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"What's true: A LGBTQIA safe sex guide published by Healthline used both the terms ""vagina"" and ""front hole."" What's false: Neither that guide, nor the larger medical community, has eliminated use of the word ""vagina"" in favor of the term ""front hole."""
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false
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Politics Sexuality
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A LGBTQIA safe sex guide published by Healthline, a California health information provider, stirred up controversy in August 2018 when a number of conservative web sites took issue with Healthline’s use of the term “front hole” to describe the genitalia of some transgender individuals. Those web sites presented Healthine’s LGBTQIA Safe Sex Guide as if that organization had entirely replaced the term “vagina” with the term “front hole.” The Daily Caller, for example, employed the inaccurate and misleading headline “San Fran Health Org Gets Rid of ‘Vagina’ in Favor of ‘More Inclusive Front Hole. '” NewsPressed filed a similar report incorrectly stating that “Gender Fluid Nutcases” were “demanding” that the vagina be called “front hole.” The Global Dispatch also wrongly asserted that “QUILT BAG” (a derogatory term for the LGBTQIA community) activists had won, as Healthline “rename(d) vagina as ‘front hole’” [to] appease transgender men”: None of these headlines accurately reflected how the terms “front hole” and “vagina” were used in Healthline’s safe sex guide, and they left readers with the false impression that the word “vagina” was being replaced throughout the guide — and perhaps among the larger medical community — in favor of “front hole.” That wasn’t the case. Many of the web sites that took issue with the use of the term “front hole” pointed to a section in Healthline’s safe sex guide about gender-inclusive language: For the purposes of this guide, we’ll refer to the vagina as the “front hole” instead of solely using the medical term “vagina.” This is gender-inclusive language that’s considerate of the fact that some trans people don’t identify with the labels the medical community attaches to their genitals. Although this passage, presented in isolation, may have fostered the impression that Healthline was “replacing” the word ‘vagina’ with ‘front hole,’ that wasn’t what the organization wrote. Healthline stated that instead of solely using the medical term ‘vagina,’ they would also employ the term ‘front hole.’ The truth of that latter statement is evidenced by the fact that the word “vagina” appeared in the Healthline document 17 times (while “front hole” was used 16 times). Still, Healthline decided that their original explanation was poorly worded and eventually edited the section to better explicate when and why they used the term “front hole”: For the purposes of this guide, we’ve chosen to include alternative words for readers to use for their genitals. For example, some trans men choose to use the words “front hole” or “internal genital” instead of “vagina.” Alternatively, some trans women may say “strapless” or “girl dick” for penis. This usage is meant for one-on-one communication with trusted persons, such as your doctor or partner, not for broad discussion. In this guide, whenever we use the medical term “vagina,” we’ll also include “front hole” as clinically recommended by researchers in the BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth journal. Both an archived version of the Healthline guide (captured before the above passage was edited) and the version available at the time of this writing included repeated use of the word “vagina.” Clearly then, Healthline did not “get rid of” or “replace” that word in favor or some other terminology. In addition to clarifying their explanation, Healthline also published an article titled “We’re Not Renaming the Vagina” in response to the controversy that noted the additional usage of “front whole” by other health organizations and publications as well: Some people are under the impression that Healthline is now using the term “front hole” instead of vagina. This is simply not true. As one of the world’s leading health websites, we place a huge emphasis on standards of accuracy, integrity, and balance. Every article we publish undergoes a rigorous editorial process and extensive medical review. In the LGBTQIA Safe Sex Guide, we use both front hole and vagina. “Front hole” is one of the numerous, accepted terms for genitalia we use specifically for certain members of the trans community who identify with it. In no instance in this guide are we saying we want to replace the word vagina. “Front hole,” as another term for vagina, is also used by the National Institutes of Health, Human Rights Campaign, BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth journal, and Fenway Health in collaboration with Harvard Medical School, the National LGBT Health Education Center, and the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers. In short, this “controversy” stemmed from a single health information provider’s decision to use term “front hole” in addition to — not in place of — the word “vagina” in a safe sex guide created for the LGBTQIA community.
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25847
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A study from the CDC and the WHO “proves face masks do not prevent the spread of a virus.”
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The study was done on influenza, which spreads in ways similar to COVID-19, but it makes no mention of COVID-19. The study was published by the CDC and supported by WHO, but it was done by the University of Hong Kong. One of the study’s authors told us the claim is incorrect.
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false
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Fake news, Public Health, Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Facebook posts,
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"As Americans argue over whether face coverings stop the spread of COVID-19, a video shared on Facebook makes a stark claim about masks and viruses generally. A 2020 study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization, the video declares, ""proves face masks do not prevent the spread of a virus."" The video was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) One of the study’s authors, University of Hong Kong public health professor Ben Cowling, told PolitiFact that the claim amounts to an ""incorrect interpretation"" of the study, ""confusing absence of evidence with evidence of absence."" Virologist Angela Rasmussen, a research scientist at Columbia University, said of the study cited in the video: ""The bottom line is that this paper doesn’t prove that face masks don’t prevent transmission, but that the available data didn’t show a statistically significant effect. ""The available data is incomplete and more studies need to be done to better understand whether masks are effective at reducing community transmission or not. That is why I continue to wear a mask in public places."" As we’ve reported, facial coverings are not in themselves totally effective in fighting the coronavirus, and there is a need for more study. But health officials largely agree that wearing any kind of face mask, coupled with social distancing and frequent hand-washing, is more protective than going unmasked. The CDC generally recommends wearing masks in public settings where other social distancing measures are difficult to maintain, such as grocery stores, pharmacies, and gas stations. As the CDC puts it: ""Your cloth face covering may protect them. Their cloth face covering may protect you."" The 15-minute video was narrated and posted by Ben Swann, who describes himself as a ""journalist who speaks truth to power!"" Swann, who has 486,000 Facebook followers, runs TruthInMedia.com, which says it provides ""content focusing on issues that impact humanity."" The video was also shared the same day on YouTube by RT, a news network formerly known as Russia Today that is funded by the Russian Federation. In February 2018, YouTube began labeling state-funded posts and videos promoting conspiracy theories. The step was significant, the Wall Street Journal reported at the time, in part because YouTube has been a major conduit for RT, ""which U.S. intelligence officials called ‘the Kremlin’s principal international propaganda outlet.’"" The study cited in the video was conducted by researchers at the University of Hong Kong — not by the CDC and WHO, as the video claims — although there are affiliations. First published in February, the study appears in the May edition of Emerging Infectious Diseases, a peer-reviewed journal published by the CDC. The study says it was ""conducted in preparation for the development of guidelines by the World Health Organization on the use of nonpharmaceutical interventions for pandemic influenza in nonmedical settings,"" and was supported by the WHO. The CDC confirmed it did not participate in the study and would not comment on it, but a spokesman cited a separate CDC study published in July. It looked at clients exposed to two hair stylists who were symptomatic with confirmed COVID-19. Among 139 clients who wore face masks while the stylists also wore face masks, there were no symptomatic secondary cases reported. Among 67 clients who tested for COVID-19, all test results were negative. ""Adherence to the community’s and company’s face-covering policy likely mitigated spread of COVID-19,"" the study said. WHO did not provide comment before we published. The study cited in Swann’s video amounts to a review of research on personal protective equipment and influenza spread. It does not mention coronavirus or COVID-19. After reviewing 10 studies on randomized and controlled trials that were published from 1946 to 2018, the study determined there was ""no significant reduction in influenza transmission with the use of face masks."" That was regarding masks worn by infected persons or by persons in the general community. ""We did not find evidence that surgical-type face masks are effective in reducing laboratory-confirmed influenza transmission, either when worn by infected persons or by persons in the general community to reduce their susceptibility,"" the researchers wrote. ""However, as with hand hygiene, face masks might be able to reduce the transmission of other infections and therefore have value in an influenza pandemic when healthcare resources are stretched."" Cowling, one of the study’s authors, told us that because COVID-19 spreads in similar ways as to influenza, the study findings should apply to COVID-19. But University of San Francisco research scientist Jeremy Howard cautioned that influenza and COVID-19 are different diseases, ""and we do not know whether evidence from influenza trials are relevant to COVID-19."" The ""we did not find evidence"" phrase doesn't prove either that masks are effective or ineffective, Howard said. He added that it’s important to note that none of the 10 trials reviewed was done during a pandemic. Rasmussen reiterated that ""this was a systematic review of other published studies and it tells us much of what we already know: there’s not a good evidence base for masks outside of a healthcare setting, but there are still many knowledge gaps, especially regarding mechanisms of transmission."" Texas A&M University-Texarkana virologist Ben Neuman said the study reflects the understanding of masks in the early phase of the pandemic, but scientific opinion has shifted because of several important papers published since then. ""The kicker is,"" he added, ""just weeks later, a group with the same senior author, plus some coronavirus specialists, produced a paper demonstrating that masks are indeed highly effective in stopping infected people from releasing airborne viruses."" The post claims a CDC study proved that masks do not prevent COVID-19. But it wasn’t a CDC study, and it didn’t ""prove"" that masks were ineffective. Scientists are still studying masks and the prevention of COVID-19."
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14246
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Before taking executive action on immigration, President Obama stated 22 times that he does not have the authority to change immigration laws on his own.
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"Goodlatte said, ""Before taking executive action on immigration, President Obama stated 22 times that he does not have the authority to change immigration laws on his own."" Records offered by Goodlatte and other Republicans show Obama repeatedly has made such statements. But the congressman goes a little off course in trying to quantify the times the president has said so. In a handful of the instances, the president was talking in general terms about executive authority that he did not relate to immigration. So in the interest of precision."
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true
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Immigration, Virginia, Bob Goodlatte,
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"U.S. Rep. Bob Goodlatte says it should be a no-brainer for the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down President Barack Obama’s stalled program to shield millions of immigrants from deportation and allow them to work in the country legally. The high court heard arguments April 19 on whether Obama exceeded his authority in late 2014 by going around Congress and launching the program via executive order. Goodlatte, in a statement issued the day of the hearing, said the court should be guided by the past words of the president himself. ""Before taking executive action on immigration, President Obama stated 22 times that he does not have the authority to change immigration laws on his own,"" said Goodlatte, R-6th. Obama’s program would delay deportation of immigrants who have lived illegally in the U.S. for more than five years but have children who are citizens or have green cards. If applicants pass background checks and pay a fee, they could qualify for a work permit and avoid deportation for at least three years. More than 4 million people could qualify for the program. The president announced the program Nov. 20, 2014, after House Republicans didn’t act on a comprehensive immigration reform bill. Twenty-six states, not including Virginia, have sued to stop the program and have won before a federal district court judge in Texas and the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. We decided to examine Goodlatte’s claim that Obama said 22 times that he lacked the power to change immigration laws by himself. It’s a claim that’s been made by many Republicans. The source, according to Goodlatte’s statement, is a list blogged on Nov. 19, 2014, by then-House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio. Let’s first discuss the problems with Boehner’s list. Four of the quotes Boehner cited do not mention immigration but were general statements Obama made as a candidate for president about limiting the use of executive orders - a power he accused his predecessor, Republican George W. Bush, of abusing. In another quote flagged by Boehner, Obama actually was talking about his inability to end the military’s now-defunct ""don’t ask, don’t tell"" policies on homosexuality. That leaves, by our count, 17 Obama statements on the list that go to the heart of Goodlatte’s claim. Here’s a sampling: March 28, 2011 During a town hall meeting at Bell Multicultural High School in the District of Columbia, Obama was asked if he could issue an executive order to stop deportation of undocumented high school students. The president dismissed the idea. Obama said, ""With respect to the notion that I can just suspend deportations through executive orders, that’s just not the case, because there are laws on the books that Congress has passed - and I know that everybody here at Bell is studying hard, so you know that we’ve got three branches of government. Congress passes the law. The executive branch’s job is to enforce and implement those laws. And then the judiciary has to interpret the laws. ""There are enough laws on the books that are very clear in terms of how we enforce our immigration system that for me to, simply through executive order, ignore these constitutional mandates would not conform with my appropriate role as president. That does not mean, though, that we can’t make decisions, for example, to emphasize enforcement on those who’ve engaged in criminal activity."" Jan. 30, 2013 During an interview with Univision, a Spanish-language television network, Obama was asked if he would consider a moratorium on deportations of non-criminal immigrants. The president said, ""Well, I think it is important to remind everybody that, as I said, I think, previously, I’m not a king. I am the head of the executive branch of government. I’m required to follow the law. And that’s what we’ve done. But what I’ve also said is, let’s make sure that we’re applying the law in a way that takes into account people’s humanity. That’s the reason that we’ve moved forward on deferred action. Within the confines of the law, we said we have some discretion in terms of how we apply this law. The same is true with respect to the kinds of the length of time that people have to spend outside of the country when their spouses are already here, for example."" Feb. 14, 2013 Obama was asked during a Google+ Hangout, by a woman named Jackie, if he would be willing to take executive action on immigration to ensure ""families are not split apart."" Obama said, ""Well look Jackie, this is something I’ve struggled with throughout my presidency. The problem is that I’m the president of the United States. I’m not the emperor of the United States. My job is to execute laws that are passed, and Congress, right now, has not changed what I consider to be a broken immigration system, and what that means is we have certain obligations to enforce the laws that are in place, even if we think in many cases the results may be tragic. ""And what we have been able to do is to make sure that we are focusing our enforcement resources on criminals as opposed to someone who is just here and trying to work and look after their families. What we have tried to do is administratively reduce the burdens and hardships on families being separated, and what we’ve done is obviously passed a deferred action which made sure the dreamers - young people who were brought here and think of themselves as American are American, except for their papers - that they are not deported. Having said all that, we’ve kind of stretched our administrative flexibility as much as we can. That’s why making sure we get comprehensive immigration reform done is so important."" Sept. 17, 2013 Obama was interviewed by Jose Diaz-Balart, anchor for Noticias Telemundo. The broadcaster asked the president if he would ""consider unilaterally freezing deportations for the parents of deferred-action kids"" - a term that generally refers to people who came to the U.S. when they were younger than 16, attend school or have graduated, and have not committed criminal offenses. Obama said, ""Here’s the problem that I have, Jose, and I’ve said this consistently. My job in the executive branch is supposed to be to carry out the laws that are passed. Congress has said, ‘Here’s the law when it comes to those who are undocumented,’ and they allocate a whole bunch of money for enforcement, and what I have been able to do is make a legal argument, that I think is absolutely right, that given the resources that we have, we can’t do everything that Congress has asked us to do. ""What we can do is then carve out the DREAM Act folks, saying young people who have basically grown up here are Americans that we should welcome. We’re not going to have them grow up under a cloud, under a shadow. But if we start broadening that, then essentially I would be ignoring the law in a way that I feel would be very difficult to defend legally."" On Nov. 18, 2014 - two days before Obama announced his immigration program - White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the president altered his view on his executive power after conferring with the attorney general and the secretary of homeland security on ""what, if any, authority he could use to try to fix some of the problems that House Republicans have refused to address."" The White House argued before the Supreme Court that the 26 states contesting Obama’s program have no legal standing to sue, because immigration policy is the domain of the federal government and that no laws have been broken. The Obama administration also argued that it merely is setting policies - not establishing laws - on whom to deport. Congress, it said, provides only enough money annually to deport about 400,000 of the nation’s estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants. The White House says it has focused on using those funds to deport those with criminal violations. Our ruling Goodlatte said, ""Before taking executive action on immigration, President Obama stated 22 times that he does not have the authority to change immigration laws on his own."" Records offered by Goodlatte and other Republicans show Obama repeatedly has made such statements. But the congressman goes a little off course in trying to quantify the times the president has said so. In a handful of the instances, the president was talking in general terms about executive authority that he did not relate to immigration. So in the interest of precision."
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3630
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Person bitten by rabid bat in Breitenbush area.
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Public health officials are warning residents to be careful after a person was bitten by a rabid bat in southeast of Salem in the Breitenbush area.
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true
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Rabies, Health, Oregon, Public health, Salem, Bats, Archive
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The Statesman Journal reports health officials said the person was bitten on Saturday, but declined to say exactly where the incident happened, or whether the out-of-state visitor was an adult or child. The victim captured the bat and brought it to the Marion County Health Department, according to program supervisor Alisa Zastoupil. The bat was sent to Oregon State University for testing, which confirmed it was infected with rabies. Breitenbush, an unincorporated community about 10 miles (16 kilometers) east of Detroit, includes the Breitenbush Hot Springs Retreat and Conference Center, and a group of privately owned vacation homes. This year, three other bats have tested positive for rabies in Oregon — in Linn, Jackson and Washington counties. ___ Information from: Statesman Journal, http://www.statesmanjournal.com
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29626
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A leprosy outbreak was looming in Los Angeles in September 2019 due to rising homelessness.
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Siegel could not be reached for comment by the time of publication.
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false
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Politics, leprosy
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Fear of pending outbreaks of biblical diseases may make for lots of story clicks, but that doesn’t mean the underlying claims are credible. One such rumor floated online in September 2019, driven by a backlash against homeless people. Amid intense political and media focus on an ongoing housing crisis causing increased homelessness in major cities like Los Angeles, fear started to spread about a biblical disease. The rumor stemmed from a September 2019 opinion piece penned by Dr. Marc Siegel, a doctor of internal medicine at New York University’s Langone medical center. In the piece published by The Hill, Siegel wrote that he feared immigration and a rising homeless population in Los Angeles could be the epicenter of a new leprosy epidemic. That bit of sensationalism proved tantalizing for many media outlets, which ran with the claim despite the lack of supporting evidence. But if the idea of the dreaded New Testament disease making a resurgence in Hollywood sounds like the plot of a bad movie about End Times, that’s because the claim is false. The only piece of evidence cited by Siegel was a paper about leprosy cases in Los Angeles. But Dr. Maria Teresa Ochoa, an associate professor of clinical dermatology at the University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine and a co-author of that paper, told us Siegel’s piece is inaccurate and also appears to exploit two political wedge issues: immigration and homelessness. Ochoa called the furor over a non-existent leprosy outbreak in Los Angeles “the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen.” Although Siegel claims that most patients cited by the paper are Latinos “originating from Mexico,” and that therefore raises the specter of immigration driving a rise in cases, Ochoa said that’s simply baseless. “We don’t talk about immigration or the homeless at all” in the paper, she told us. “I don’t have one patient [with the disease] who is homeless.” The reason most of the cases of leprosy cited in the paper were Latino patients was because of demographics: The area of Los Angeles where the clinic is located has a large Latino population. Ochoa added that Mexico doesn’t have a major public health issue with leprosy. The countries with the biggest infection problems are India, Brazil, and Indonesia. Ochoa’s paper is a summary of 187 case files from L.A.’s leprosy clinic between 1973 and 2018. It does not warn of a looming epidemic nor posit an increase in cases. Instead, it notes that although the disease is rare in the United States, leprosy (also known as Hansen’s Disease) still occurs. Thus, medical professionals must be prepared to treat it. Ochoa said the biggest risk factor for contracting Hansen’s Disease is prolonged exposure to a patient who is contagious with it. Leprosy is also difficult to catch. In 95 percent of incidents in which people come in contact with leprosy patients, those people do not contract the disease. According to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, “no evidence [exists] of local transmission, [and] there is no risk for an outbreak.” In an email, an L.A. public health official said no cases of the disease have been diagnosed among the homeless. Over the last decade, the county has seen between zero and four cases per year, averaging two cases per year. Health officials further specified that leprosy is “not highly infectious, but rather requires prolonged and close contact for transmission to occur. Patients under treatment are not at risk for spreading disease to others.” Those with leprosy were a source of fear and scorn in the Bible, but now the disease is treatable with antibiotics. Experts now understand it’s caused by a bacteria called Mycobacterium leprae that causes nerve damage if left untreated. “We keep stigmatizing this diseases with false information,” Ochoa said.
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10595
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Pill shows a drop of up to 70% in HIV infection risk
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We could hear the champagne glasses clinking when we read the headline and the top of this story about the potential for a drug to prevent HIV infections. The rest of the story, though, strikes the appropriate cautionary notes and, for the most part, provides solid information about the strength of the findings about this drug combination. We wish that costs and potential harms had been included. And we also wish the story had made better use of independent experts. The world has been promised a cure for AIDS for almost as long as the disease has been with us, and yet scientists have not been able to crack the code. They have, however, made dramatic progress in helping people control the HIV virus and prevent its transmission, leading to people who are HIV-positive leading longer, healthier lives than they did 20 years ago. The promise of a silver bullet to prevent HIV is tantalizing – including for journalists. That is why reporters need to be especially careful when piecing together the evidence for yet another AIDS “breakthrough.”
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true
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Los Angeles Times
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The lack of cost information was disappointing because the best results in the study came from people who consistently took the drug every day for 14 months. That would have cost them at least $5,000, according to a Bloomberg story on the same study. That story also included this important idea. “The study raises questions about whether governments and insurers will pay for AIDS drugs to prevent infections. Truvada costs between $5,000 and $7,000 a year in the U.S. when bought through the health-care system, and more if bought privately”. The story might also have mentioned the trivial cost of condoms, which are known to be effective preventive measures. The study quantifies the benefits in both relative and absolute terms. “The researchers observed 36 HIV infections in the group taking Truvada, compared to 64 in the control group taking placebo, a reduction of 43.8%. The reduction in risk, however, was very sensitive to how regularly the subjects took the medication. For those who took it on more than 50% of the days, as determined by pill counts and other measures, the risk fell by 50.2%. For those who took it 90% or more of the days, the risk fell by 72.8%.” The fact that the absolute difference in infections was just 28 should have been higher in the story and should have prompted some outside commentary. With 1,125 people receiving the drug over 14 months at a minimum cost of $5,000 a year, this means you would have to spend $6.5 million to prevent 28 infections. HIV/AIDS itself is a costly disease, so this may make good financial sense, but there’s a reason the Bloomberg story raises the issue of whether insurers will pay for it. This story should have been factored into the benefits analysis. Look at the difference in framing between this story and a Bloomberg story. This story only noted: “Side effects of the drug were mild, and included nausea in the first month, small increases in serum creatinine and unintentional weight loss.” What about concerns over long-term risk? But the Bloomberg story notes, “Men on Truvada had more nausea in the first four weeks of the study, and more of them lost weight unintentionally. “The number one message that must go out is, don’t try this at home,” Warren said. “This is not the pill you take and all is well. For those people who think, ‘I’m at risk, I want this pill,’ they have to have a conversation with their health provider.”” The writer makes clear this is a large randomized, placebo controlled trial, sponsored by the U.S. government. The story does a decent job evaluating the quality of the evidence and even quoting the study’s sponsor in a cautionary way. “Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which was the major sponsor of the study, cautioned, however, that “No single prevention strategy is going to be effective for everyone, and it is important to note that the new findings pertain only to … men who have sex with men.”” The story does not engage in disease mongering. Given the top of the story, this is notable because the story could have easily painted a doomsday picture of the AIDS crisis in some countries and portrayed this drug as a savior. Instead, the story does a nice job distinguishing the population that was studied in this case and explaining that no one drug is a cure for all populations. The story did use independent experts, but we wish it had spent more time having someone outside of the study evaluate the strength of the evidence. Again, 28 infections prevented is not a public health victory just yet. The story could have done a better job explaining how this approach matches up against other approaches. One big hole in the story is no mention of whether men in the study were using condoms, too. The story says, “Subjects were followed for an average of 14 months, and given counseling about using condoms and safe sex practices.” We know condoms can prevent HIV infections, so maybe condoms were doing all the work here. Maybe the men who were adherent to the medication were also more likely to accept recommendations and adhere to condom use. The story should have spent more time on condoms and education about safer sex as prevention measures. Instead, there is a big question that is never answered. The story says that the drug “Truvada was chosen because it is effective, has few side effects and is already used by more than 1.5 million people worldwide.” It does not make clear, though, where those people are. This story is aimed at a US audience and should have made clear whether this drug is available here. One of our journalist-reviewers had someone ask him today where the drug could be purchased. No doubt thousands of people nationwide have the same question. The story makes it clear that this is a novel approach that is gradually building evidence alongside other prevention options. “The findings, reported online Tuesday in the New England Journal of Medicine, come only a few months after an African study showed that a microbicidal gel can help protect women from contracting the virus and a little more than a year after a vaccine trial suggested that it may eventually be possible to raise antibodies against the virus.” The story did not rely on a news release.
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22296
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"Said Planned Parenthood’s early objective was to ""help kill black babies before they came into the world."
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"Cain claims Planned Parenthood founded for ""planned genocide"""
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false
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Abortion, Georgia, Herman Cain,
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"This presidential election season, Georgia’s homegrown prospect Herman Cain is talking about race. Cain, a black, conservative Republican, recently said the media is ""scared that a real black man may run against Barack Obama."" And there’s this one about pro-abortion rights group Planned Parenthood: ""When Margaret Sanger - check my history - started Planned Parenthood, the objective was to put these centers in primarily black communities so they could help kill black babies before they came into the world,"" Cain said during a talk in Washington, D.C., at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative group. ""It's planned genocide,"" Cain added. He wants the U.S. Congress to yank funding for Planned Parenthood, which receives about $75 million a year to provide non-abortion health services. Was Planned Parenthood founded to help kill unborn black babies? Cain asked his audience to check his history. So, we did. First, a disclaimer. Cain, who has launched a presidential exploratory committee, was a talk show host on AM 750 and now 95.5 FM WSB, which, like The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, is part of Cox Media Group. Cain has more political heft than your average talking head. The former CEO of Godfather Pizza beat a six-term U.S. congressman to finish second in Georgia’s 2004 U.S. Senate Republican primary. The Morehouse grad has eight honorary doctorate degrees and has authored four books, and he serves on several corporate boards. Now some history. Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger is credited with making birth control legal and widely available. Born 1879, Sanger, who was white, blamed her mother’s death on her frequent pregnancies. At the time, speaking about birth control could lead to arrest. She thought that if women could legally control the number of children they bore, their health and economic conditions would improve. We consulted with scholarship, Cain’s camp, anti-abortion groups, Sanger’s biographer, and multiple experts on Cain’s claim. The supposed evidence that Sanger supported black genocide is a loose collection of her most objectionable statements, her ties to the disgraced eugenics movement, and her work on what was called the Negro Project. That effort, started in 1939, brought birth control services (but not abortion) to black communities in the South. These facts don’t come close to supporting Cain’s claim. Eugenics was once a wildly popular theory that the human race can be improved through better breeding and genetics. It drew together backers as diverse as President Theodore Roosevelt and black intellectual W.E.B. DuBois. At its best, the U.S. movement pushed for better prenatal care. At its worst, it enabled forced sterilization laws and let claims that blacks and immigrants were inferior to masquerade as science. Sanger welcomed some of the movement’s more notorious leaders onto the board of a predecessor to Planned Parenthood. She also endorsed paying pensions to women of low intelligence who agreed to be sterilized. But we found no evidence that Sanger advocated - privately or publicly - for anything even resembling the ""genocide"" of blacks, or that she thought blacks are genetically inferior. Every academic PolitiFact Georgia consulted said that Cain’s claim is wrong. ""I have never run into any serious academic reference of Sanger or others wanting to ‘kill black babies,’"" Indiana University professor Ruth Engs, a eugenics movement expert, told PolitiFact Georgia in an e-mail. What’s worse, Cain got his facts mixed up. Sanger’s first birth control clinic opened in 1916 in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn, N.Y., which was mostly Irish and Jewish. When she did open a Harlem clinic in the early 1930s, about half of its patients were white. Members of the black establishment, including DuBois and black newspaper the Amsterdam News, supported it. This was hardly the pro-genocide camp. None of these centers performed abortions. Those who think Sanger wanted black genocide cite the Negro Project. But even their strongest evidence, a passage from a letter she wrote advocating that organizers recruit black ministers for the project, does not come close to proving a genocidal plot. Sanger wrote that ""We don’t want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs."" But her correspondence shows this sentence advocates for black doctors and ministers to play leadership roles in the Negro Project to avoid misunderstandings. Lynchings and Jim Crow laws gave blacks good reason to be wary of attempts to limit the number of children they bore. In Harlem, she hired a black doctor and social worker to quell those fears. The facts of the Negro Project suggest nothing more genocidal than a public health project. Black leaders DuBois and Mary McLeod Bethune, founder of the National Council of Negro Women, and the pastor of the influential black Abyssinian Baptist Church were members of its advisory council. First lady Eleanor Roosevelt was supportive. For Sanger to launch a genocidal plot behind their backs and leave no true evidence in her numerous writings would require powers just shy of witchcraft. Really, calling the Negro Project a genocidal plot defies common sense. Why would Sanger try to destroy a race of people by giving them access to the very thing she thought could make life better? Planned Parenthood’s early objective was not to ""help kill black babies before they came into the world."" Sanger failed to rise above the ethnic and racial paternalism of her time, but that’s a far cry from being genocidal. Cain’s claim is a ridiculous, cynical play of the race card."
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32122
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"Hillary Clinton revealed a classified response window of ""four minutes"" for a U.S. president to launch nuclear weapons."
|
During a presidential debate Hillary Clinton mentioned a four-minute response window for launching missiles during a nuclear attack, but that information wasn't secret.
|
false
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Politics Ballot Box, classified information, clinton nuclear response time, leaks
|
During the third and final presidential debate on 19 October 2016, social media users began tweeting up a storm claiming Hillary Clinton “leaked” classified information by revealing details about the United States’ nuclear response protocols, specifically that the timeframe between a presidential order and a launch of nuclear weapons was four minutes: This is actually true, @StateDept @TheJusticeDept @DeptofDefense, @CENTCOM, do you job, she just slipped #DebateNight pic.twitter.com/7qu3qPSpW7 — MicroSpookyLeaks™ (@WDFx2EU7) October 20, 2016 The exchange in question occurred during a debate over diplomatic relations with Russia and allegations that the Russian government had attempted to interfere in the 2016 election. Moderator Chris Wallace asked Donald Trump whether he “condemn[ed] any interference by Russia in the American election,” to which Trump answered in the affirmative. The discussion then turned to nuclear weapons (at the 33-minute mark in the clip below), a subject which Hillary Clinton contended showed her opponent to be unsuitable for the presidency: CLINTON: I — I find it ironic that he’s raising nuclear weapons. This is a person who has been very cavalier, even casual about the use of nuclear weapons. He’s… TRUMP: Wrong. CLINTON: … advocated more countries getting them, Japan, Korea, even Saudi Arabia. He said, well, if we have them, why don’t we use them, which I think is terrifying … But here’s the deal. The bottom line on nuclear weapons is that when the president gives the order, it must be followed. There’s about four minutes between the order being given and the people responsible for launching nuclear weapons to do so. And that’s why 10 people who have had that awesome responsibility have come out and, in an unprecedented way, said they would not trust Donald Trump with the nuclear codes or to have his finger on the nuclear button. At 8:35 PM on 19 October 2016, Clinton published a tweet on the same subject, stating that a president’s decision to use nuclear weapons “can take as little as four minutes” (from order to launch) suggesting that the window she referenced was somewhat fluid: When the president gives the order to launch a nuclear weapon, that’s it. The officer has to launch. It can take as little as four minutes. — Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) October 20, 2016 Most of the people tweeting that Clinton had “leaked” classified information by mentioning this window cited no specific information substantiating that to be true (or explaining how they themselves could know and openly discuss information that was supposedly classified). If the information were indeed classified, confirming it with any government agency would prove difficult, for obvious reasons. An alternative method of determining whether Clinton inadvertently disclosed classified information about nuclear protocols would be to verify if that information was already publicly known and open discussed. Indeed, on 5 August 2016 Foreign Policy magazine published an article about that very subject with a subhead that openly proclaimed it: The piece had been inspired by (an unsubstantiated) rumor spread by MSNBC host Joe Scarborough suggesting that Donald Trump appeared interested in having the United States use nuclear weapons. The article’s author cited a book “Walter Slocombe wrote nearly 30 years ago” as well as a contemporaneous “nuclear timeline” examining whether nuclear “launch under attack” was “feasible.” Based on discussion that occurred during the MSNBC segment about the steps leading up to the use of nukes, the article focused on the “timeline” of nuclear events based on an anecdote from 1979: All those steps leave something like eight minutes from the first call to the White House to the last moment at which the president can act. Much of those eight minutes is lost to the task of informing the president. The first call to the White House isn’t to the president, of course. It is to a person designated by the president for this task. (Well, probably the military assistant to that person — another minute ticks off the clock.) In November 1979, that person was Zbigniew Brzezinski — then-President Jimmy Carter’s national security advisor and father to Mika, who was sitting next to Scarborough, solemnly shaking her head at the idea of Trump with the bomb. You should really watch Zbig tell the story, though the bottom line is that he recalled having only three minutes to decide whether or not to inform the president, after which the president had four minutes to decide whether or not to retaliate. At the end of his three minutes, Brzezinski’s military assistant called back to tell him it was a false alarm — someone had left a training tape running. Brzezinski went back to bed. He never woke his wife, by the way. He decided that if it was a Soviet nuclear attack, it was better to let her die in her sleep. (At this point the substance of the claim diverges slightly, from holding that it takes four minutes to launch nuclear weapons once the President has given the order to do so, to holding that the President has four minutes to decide whether to launch nuclear weapons once he’s been informed that a nuclear attack on the U.S. is imminent.) Internet chatter from 2015 also described “four minutes” as an old Cold War rule of thumb for the timeframe between first detection of incoming nuclear missiles and those missiles’ hitting their targets. Most articles on the subject published prior to the debate referenced (as Clinton’s tweet appeared to do) a windows of roughly between four to 12 minutes in which a sitting President must decide to launch a nuclear attack: Although [nuclear response protocol] remains shrouded in secrecy, we actually know a great deal about it, beginning with the president’s first task of opening the “nuclear suitcase” in an emergency to review his nuclear attack options … Let us say the president is awakened in the middle of the night (the proverbial 3 a.m. phone call) by his or her top nuclear adviser and told of an incoming nuclear strike. Since the flight time of missiles fired from launch stations in Russia or China to the White House is 30 minutes, and 12 minutes or less for missiles fired from submarines lurking in the Western Atlantic Ocean (Russian subs historically favor a patrol area to the west of Bermuda), the steadiness and brainpower of the commander in chief in such circumstances are serious questions indeed. This call has never happened, but if it ever does, the situation would be as stressful and dangerous as things ever get inside the Oval Office. The closest we came to such a call occurred in 1979, when the consoles at our early warning hub in Colorado lit up with indications of a large-scale Soviet missile attack. President Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, received back-to-back calls in the middle of the night informing him of the imminent nuclear destruction of the United States … Just before he picked up the phone to call Carter, Brzezinski received a third call, this time canceling the alarm. It was a mistake caused by human and technical error. A training tape simulating an all-out Soviet attack had inadvertently slipped into the actual real-time attack early warning network. The impending nuclear holocaust was a mirage that confused the duty crew. (They were fired for taking eight minutes instead of the required three minutes to declare their degree of confidence that an attack against North America was underway.) How would a President Trump behave under such duress, informed of the attack and the imminent destruction of the nation’s capital and himself? He would have only a few minutes to consider the reliability of the attack report and decide whether and how to retaliate. If the attack is real, and he hesitates, a president will likely be killed and the chain of command decapitated, perhaps permanently. Among the people weighing in after the debate were who were able to assess the rumor and rate it was nuclear security expert Joe Cirincione, who issued two tweets about the controversy — one explicitly stating that Clinton did not disclose classified information and another reiterating that the information was already widely known and often cited: No, @HillaryClinton did not reveal any secret about how quickly we can launch ?. This is widely known, often cited. https://t.co/3z2VQEUlDm — Joe Cirincione (@Cirincione) October 20, 2016 Another example of public expert citation of the dangerously fast, 4-5 minute launch times of our nuclear missiles. https://t.co/y1xTTu6K4X — Joe Cirincione (@Cirincione) October 20, 2016
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6540
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Uruguay is betting on exports of medical marijuana.
|
When he was younger, the only thing that Enrique Morales knew about marijuana was that you smoked it to get high.
|
true
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Global trade, Medical marijuana, Uruguay, Marijuana, Latin America, Caribbean
|
Today, the former driver for a dairy company is a horticulturist on a cannabis plantation about 80 miles (130 kilometers) west of the Uruguayan capital of Montevideo and he says drops of marijuana oil have been key to treating his mother’s osteoarthritis. “My perception has now changed. It is a plant that has a lot of properties!” he said. The company that owns the plantation, Fotmer SA, is now part of a flourishing and growing medical cannabis industry in Uruguay. The country got a head start on competitors in December 2013 when it became the first in the world to regulate the cannabis market from growing to purchase, a move that has brought a wave of investment. For Uruguayan citizens or legal residents over 18 years old, the law allows the recreational use, personal cultivation and sale in pharmacies of marijuana through a government-run permit system, and officials later legalized the use and export of medical marijuana to countries where it is legal. No company has yet begun large-scale export operations, but many say selling medical cannabis oil beyond the local market of 3.3 million inhabitants is key to staying ahead of the tide and transforming Uruguay into a medical cannabis leader along with the Netherlands, Canada and Israel. “The Latin American market is poorly supplied and is growing,” said Chuck Smith, chief operating officer of Denver, Colorado-based Dixie Brands, which recently formed a partnership with Khiron Life Sciences, a Toronto company that has agreed to acquire Dormul SA, which has a Uruguayan license to produce medical cannabis. “Uruguay is taking a leadership position in growing high CBD, high value hemp products. So we see that as a great opportunity from a supply chain perspective,” he said, referring to the non-psychoactive cannabidiols that are used in medical products. Khiron has said it should be able to export medical marijuana from Uruguay to southern Brazil under regulations of the Mercosur trade bloc, marking a milestone for Uruguayan marijuana companies focused on exports. Fotmer, based in the small town of Nueva Helvecia, also currently employs 80 people and is investing $7 million in laboratories and 10 tons of crops that it hopes to ship to countries including Germany and Canada, which is struggling to overcome supply shortages in its cannabis market. Fotmer*s 35,000 marijuana plants are sheltered in 18 large greenhouses measuring 12.5 meters by 100 meters (41 feet by 328 feet), where workers such as Morales change into special clothing, wash their hands with alcohol and wear gloves and surgical masks to avoid any contamination. Helena Gonzalez, head of quality control, research and development for Fotmer, said the precautions are important in producing a quality product that can be used in medical research into the effects of cannabis products. “Aiding that research is another of our objectives,” she said. The first crop of prized flowers will be harvested for their cannabis oil in March. The oil containing THC and CBD will be extracted in its labs to eventually manufacture pills, creams, ointments, patches and other treatments for cases of epilepsy and chronic pain, among other ills. Competition is arriving as well. In December, Uruguayan President Tabare Vazquez inaugurated a $12 million laboratory owned by Canada*s International Cannabis Corp., which aims to produce and export medicine from hemp, a variety of cannabis that contains CBDs but has no psychoactive effects. Despite the momentum, experts say there is one key problem: Countries including Ecuador, Cuba, Panama, El Salvador and Guatemala continue to prohibit both the recreational and medicinal use of marijuana and exports of cannabis products are subject to a complex web of international regulations that is still being developed. Marcos Baudean, a member of Monitor Cannabis at the University of the Republic of Uruguay, says another difficulty is that the South American country is competing for market share. He said cannabis exports give the country a chance to expand beyond its traditional exports of raw materials into more sophisticated products involving science and biology. Diego Olivera, head of Uruguay*s National Drug Secretariat, said Uruguay*s comprehensive cannabis law, along with its strong rule of law and transparent institutions, gives it a head start. “Uruguay today has a dynamism in the cannabis industry that is very difficult to find in other sectors,” he said. ___ Associated Press writer Luis Andres Henao in Buenos Aires contributed to this report. ___ Follow AP’s complete marijuana coverage: https://apnews.com/Marijuana
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17024
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"Americans ""bought into climate change"" in 2004-06, but then most ""began wandering away from this issue."
|
"Scarborough said Americans have ""have wandered away"" from the issue of climate change since 2004. They certainly did, as polls consistently show dips through 2010. However, support has inched back in recent years. While the recent gains remain below the 2004 levels, the overall drop isn't as dramatic as Scarborough makes it sound."
|
mixture
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Environment, Climate Change, Polls and Public Opinion, PunditFact, Joe Scarborough,
|
"As Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio edges closer to a 2016 presidential bid, he wants Republican primary voters to know where he stands on litmus test issues like climate change. ""I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate,"" Rubio said on ABC's This Week. ""I do not believe that the laws that they propose we pass will do anything about it, except it will destroy our economy."" Many Republican voters would nod in agreement, but the question is, how well does this view sit with the public at large? Joe Scarborough, host of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, said Rubio might be on relatively safe ground with the public. ""From 2004, 2005, 2006, Americans were bought in to the concept of climate change and that we need to move aggressively on it,"" Scarborough said. But since then, the public shifted, he said. ""Check the polling: Most Americans began wandering away from this issue,"" Scarborough said. From Scarborough’s lips to our ears. In this fact-check, we review the polls on climate change and global warming (terms that are used interchangeably) to see if Americans care less than they did half a dozen years ago. Pollsters get at this question in a few ways. We’ll look at each one. Is it happening? For nearly 15 years, the Gallup organization has been asking people if they think global warming is underway. In 2002, 71 percent of the public said it is happening or will happen in their lifetime. That percentage peaked at 75 percent in 2008 and then fell. It reached a low of 62 percent in 2011 and since then has risen slightly. As of March 2014, it stood at 65 percent. With a margin of error of 4 percent, the result is modestly less than what Gallup reported in 2002. We find similar but slightly larger swings of opinion in the Pew Research Center data, although the Pew survey only goes back to 2006. Pew asks if people see solid evidence that the earth is warming. In 2006, 77 percent said yes. That fell to 57 percent in 2009, then rose to 67 percent in 2013. The trends don't exactly match the pattern Scarborough described. He suggested a simple slide down. In reality, there’s more of an up-down-up. Still, the public seems a little less certain about climate change today than in the mid 2000s. Is it something you worry about? Even if you believe the climate is changing, it might not cause you great concern. A group of university researchers from Drexel, McGill and Ohio State blended the results from a number of surveys to derive what they called the Climate Change Threat Index. Basically, the index captures whether people take the issue seriously. Robert Brulle, a sociologist at Drexel University, is part of the team. From 2002 to 2005, the value of the index fluctuated between 40 and 45. (These are abstract units and should not be confused with the percentage of people who care.) Then it gained about 10 points. ""The big shift started in 2006 and coincided with the release of Al Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth,"" Brulle said. ""It dropped off in the fall of 2008 after the big recession and the Wall Street meltdown."" Today, the index is about where is was in 2004. Again, up-down-up. Interestingly, Brulle and his colleagues Jason Carmichael and J. Craig Jenkins found that two factors primarily drive public concern about climate change. First, people worry more about it so long as more pressing problems like the economy don’t loom larger. Second, Republicans effectively can dial concern up or down. The partisan split on this issue shows up in every survey. The more Republican the voter, the less likely they are to say climate change is real or that it will make a difference. When Republican leaders are more vocal in their rejection of climate change (such as voting against a particular bill), public concern falls, at least among Republican leaning voters. When those leaders treat it more seriously, concern rises. But do you worry about it a lot? Gallup gets at the level of concern by asking people if they think global warming will pose a serious threat to them or their way of life in their lifetime. In 2004, about 34 percent answered yes. That rose to 40 percent in 2008, then fell to a low of 32 percent in 2010. It then rose to 38 percent and slid a bit to 36 percent where it stands today. When you account for the margin of error, public opinion has yo-yoed a bit but hasn’t changed all that much. Gallup finds that few American list climate change as a top concern. It ranked near the bottom out of 15 issues polled. Asked how much they worry, 51 percent said little or not at all about climate change, compared to just 11 percent who said they were unconcerned about the economy. Are humans causing it? In 2006, Pew found that 41 percent of public thought the Earth was getting warmer mainly due to human activity such as burning fossil fuels. In keeping with the pattern we saw for other questions, that number dropped to 34 percent in 2010, and then rose to 44 percent by the end of 2013. On this point, the partisan divide is pronounced. Just 24 percent of Republicans thought humans were driving climate change, compared to 43 percent of independents and 66 percent of Democrats. The Gallup polls show a similar pattern. In 2004, 61 percent thought humans were making the planet warmer. That fell to 50 percent in 2010, followed by a rise to 57 percent today. Again, the polling shows a slight decline in public buy-in on climate change since 2004, but it has risen from a low point a few years ago. Our ruling Scarborough said Americans have ""have wandered away"" from the issue of climate change since 2004. They certainly did, as polls consistently show dips through 2010. However, support has inched back in recent years. While the recent gains remain below the 2004 levels, the overall drop isn't as dramatic as Scarborough makes it sound."
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8869
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Novartis Sued in Calif. Over Kids' Cough Medicine.
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A California mother has sued drug maker Novartis AG NOVN.VX in what the company believes to be the first proposed class action involving its Triaminic children’s cough and cold medicines since overdose fears prompted a recall of the drugs.
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true
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Health News
|
The lawsuit, filed on Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, said several studies have shown deaths and serious injuries linked to over-the-counter children’s cold remedies. As a result, Novartis “either knew ... or reasonably should have known that their cough and cold products were ineffective and dangerous when used by children under the age of six,” the lawsuit said. A Novartis spokeswoman said the company had not seen the lawsuit and had no comment on it. The company, which recalled Triaminic oral infant cough and cold medicines late last year, said it believed the lawsuit is the first to bring claims involving the drugs. The lawsuit was brought by Kelly Carter, who dosed her 4-year-old son with Triaminic Daytime Cough & Cold in 2007. It was not immediately clear from the lawsuit whether or how the drug harmed Carter’s son. Her attorney could not be reached for comment. Novartis sells a number of products under the Triaminic brand. The lawsuit alleges that Americans spend more than $2 billion annually on over-the counter cough and cold remedies for children. In October, the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, a trade group representing makers of over-the-counter medicines, said overdoses of oral infant cough and cold medicines have led to death and serious injury in rare instances. The group stressed that the medications are safe when used as directed. U.S. Food and Drug Administration reviewers have recommended that over-the-counter cough and cold medicines that contain decongestants and antihistamines should come with new instructions saying they are not for very young children. According to a recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, over-the-counter cough and cold drugs send an estimated 7,000 U.S. children under the age of 12 to emergency rooms every year, mostly for overdoses.
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41067
|
Humans kill 1,300 fellow humans every day.
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This is broadly correct if just considering homicides and not including war or terrorism.
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true
|
online
|
26,383 people die of cancer each day. 24,641 die of heart disease every day. This is an underestimate for all cardiovascular disease deaths, but close to the daily figure of those who die from coronary heart disease specifically. 4,300 people die of diabetes every day. Suicide is the cause of death for around 3,000 people per day Suicide is the cause of death for around 2,000 people per day. Mosquitoes kill 2,740 people every day. This appears to be an overestimate. Mosquitoes are responsible for no more than around 700,000 deaths per year, or 1,900 a day. Humans kill 1,300 fellow humans every day. Snakes kill 137 people every day This is an underestimate. Snakes kill around 378 people per day. Claim 1 of 8
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36025
|
A dystopian image shows a Hong Kong protester with a bow and arrow and a gas mask in November 2019.
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‘Hong Kong Protester Looks Like a Post Apocalyptic Survivor’
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true
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Fact Checks, Viral Content
|
On November 17 2019, the following image was shared to Reddit’s r/pics, titled: “Hong Kong Protester looks like a post apocalyptic survivor. May HK have the strength it needs to survive”:Hong Kong Protester looks like a post apocalyptic survivor. May HK have the strength it needs to survive. from picsEither r/pics mods or the user tagged the submission “Politics,” and it received over 100,000 upvotes in under 24 hours and quickly went viral across social media platforms. The submission also received seven Reddit awards, and was gilded three times by fellow users.No information accompanied the image-based submission, such as a source for the photograph, a date, or linked news coverage. Readers expressed feelings of solidarity for protesters in Hong Kong:The big question. How far is the police and your government allowed to fuck you before it’s okay to defend yourself? Half the people on here seem to think it’s okay for police to just straight kill you and you thank them afterwards.Others referenced long-running memes about being shot in the knee with an arrow.In separate comments, users speculated about the vials visibly strapped to the young man’s chest, and a self-identified nurse surmised they were saline to be used as tear gas eye wash.The original poster did not link to an article about or including the image in the thread’s comments. A separate account linked to a BBC article mentioning the use of arrows, but not featuring the image in particular:A stand-off at a Hong Kong university campus has led to fiery clashes overnight [from November 17-18 2019], as hundreds of protesters tried to repel a police advance.Large fires broke out at entrances to the Polytechnic University (PolyU), where protesters hurled petrol bombs and shot arrows from behind barricades.Officers earlier warned they could use live ammunition if protesters did not stop attacking them using such weapons.A reverse image search showed that the image was largely published outside the United States, and that it was buried within a larger gallery. The image was taken by Associated Press photographer Kin Cheung, and it was widely republished on November 17 2019 with the caption:Hong Kong protests By KIN CHEUNG / AP A protestor prepares to fire a bow and arrow during a confrontation with police at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University in Hong Kong on Nov. 17, 2019. (Kin Cheung / AP)An accompanying AP article that was widely reprinted by affiliates reported:Police launched a late-night operation Sunday to try to flush about 200 protesters out of a university campus on a day of clashes in which an officer was hit in the leg with an arrow and massive barrages of tear gas and water cannons were fired.Riot police began moving in on one group of protesters outside the campus after issuing an ultimatum for people to leave area. They used tear gas and water cannons on a resistant crowd wearing raincoats and carrying umbrellas.Protesters used bows and arrows earlier in the day, and one arrow struck a media liaison officer in the calf. Photos on the department’s Facebook page show the arrow sticking out of the back of the officer’s leg through his pants.As riot police moved in from all sides, some protesters retreated inside Hong Kong Polytechnic University while others set fires on bridges leading to it.The photograph is both undoctored and current, captured on November 17 2019 during clashes between protesters and police at Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
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543
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Samoa measles outbreak kills 20, mostly children.
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Deaths related to measles, mostly among small children, have more than tripled to 20 in the past week on the Pacific island of Samoa, the government has said eight days after declaring a state of emergency over the outbreak.
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true
|
Health News
|
The island state of just 200,000, located south of the equator and half way between Hawaii and New Zealand, declared a measles epidemic late in October after the first deaths. The government has identified 1,644 suspected cases of measles, more than doubling over the past week, with deaths rising to 20 from six, it said on Friday. Children younger than five accounted for all but one of the deaths. Staff of U.N. agency UNICEF have delivered 110,500 doses of measles containing vaccines this week as they fanned out across Samoa to boost its mandatory immunization effort, the agency said in a statement. It has also worked with governments of other tiny Pacific nations to run immunization campaigns and develop preparedness plans to combat a regional outbreak, it added. Australia is sending a specialist team of doctors, nurses and public health experts to Samoa, along with equipment and supplies, the foreign ministry said in a statement.
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9522
|
Starting school later might really help sleep-deprived teens
|
It is clear that too little sleep is bad for humans, and health officials have long recommended that teenagers get eight to nine hours of sleep a night, a suggestion made difficult by early start times (often before 8 a.m.) in America’s schools. But how good is the evidence for the effects of later high school start times on students? A group of researchers conducted a meta-analysis and concluded that the evidence is not very strong. Among the 287 relevant studies found, only 18 (6%) were of good enough to quality for inclusion, and while those studies yielded some evidence for beneficial effects (later start times do seem to result in longer periods of sleep, for example), the researchers had a hard time finding links between later start times and both academic performance and behavioral issues. The overall evidence, they concluded, is just too weak. Initially, the Vox story seems to ignore this take-away, especially with the headline that starting school later “might really help.” Later, the story does go on to explain some of the limitations of existing studies and includes the researchers’ call for more rigorous data. Whether those cautionary comments, sitting at the end of the story, will help readers evaluate these results is hard to say. America’s schools are under pressure to establish later start times, a change that will be complex and potentially expensive to implement. Such a modification needs to be grounded in good evidence that teenagers will, in fact, benefit from it. News stories must be clear on how conclusive the evidence really is.
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true
|
sleep problems,teens
|
Although specific, numerical costs are not mentioned, the story does a good job of reflecting on the kinds of costs that school districts would incur if they went to a later start time. The story is specific about the average sleep advantages of a later start time among teenage participants in the 18 studies evaluated. For this reason, it rates satisfactory. However, its discussion of other benefits—including fewer accidents involving teens behind the wheels of cars, mental health indices and actual school performance—is general and, with respect to school performance, more optimistic than the meta-analysis that is the centerpiece of the story. There are some drawbacks associated with delaying school start times, and the story does a good job of discussing them. The story does a good job describing the meta-analysis of studies on later school start times, listing some of the limitations. It also lets us know more work needs to be done on the subject. Sleep deprivation, while not a disease per se, makes it hard to function and may have long-term impacts, as well. No sources appear to have been interviewed for this story, though it contains a lot of citations to studies and quotes used in past stories. There are alternative public health measures that might get teens to sleep more (for example, a public education campaign). This context would have been helpful: What are the other options, and how effective might they be? The story is clear that few schools have modified their start times in response to this issue. A map is a great addition in this regard. The reader will learn that the effects of eight or nine hours of sleep a night on teenagers have been demonstrated in other studies. What is novel is the meta-analysis’ reflections on the big picture, which suggests caution in making school policy changes on the basis of extant studies. The story does not rely on the news release.
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42031
|
A meme claims that a recording of a New York Democrat contains a quote about euthanizing elderly Americans.
|
A popular meme attributes an ageist and inflammatory remark to a supposed Democrat from New York, but there is no trace of any elected officials by the name Jenna Tull.
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false
|
Memes,
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A popular meme attributes an ageist and inflammatory remark to a supposed Democrat from New York, but there is no trace of any elected officials by the name Jenna Tull.We’ve debunked a number of viral memes that have attempted to tie erroneous quotes to well-known political figures.But the latest example to gain traction on Facebook takes aim at a woman who doesn’t appear to exist.The meme claims that a “recording has been found of Democrat, Jenna Tull, of New York” that contains an inflammatory quote: “Americans should be euthanized when they hit 70. They just become too dumb…and think of the money we’d save!”Including a photo of a smiling, blonde-haired woman, the meme implores people to share “so people know and we can get rid of her!”The meme implies the individual is an elected official or at least a Democrat of some degree of prominence, and such a quote would no doubt be perilous to one’s career. But there is no Jenna Tull from New York in Congress or in the state Legislature, and we could find no trace of local Democratic elected officials by that name, either. (The name may be a play on words. )Instead, reverse image searches show that the image used in the meme is of a businesswoman whose Ireland-based company, THEYA Healthcare, makes bras for breast cancer patients and other health care garments.Christopher Blair, the founder of a self-described satirical publication known as America’s Last Line of Defense, confirmed in an email to FactCheck.org that his publication produced the meme. It’s far from the first time his work was erroneously spread as if real.The publication recently changed how it distributes its content. A March 10 post on the publication’s Facebook page indicated that “everything that comes from this page will be branded and 100 percent transparent.” Old content — including the Tull meme — was removed, and the page began applying a “satire” mark on its new content.“The fact that it’s still circulating illustrates why. No matter how ridiculous we think something is, there’s a potato out there willing to believe it,” Blair said. “The meme was, obviously, meant to be a fairly puerile joke.”The meme confused and deceived some. A number of readers asked us about the meme’s veracity, and several users who came across it contacted an actual woman named Jenna Tull from Indianapolis on Facebook.Tull, a 34-year-old self-described socialist who makes podcasts, told FactCheck.org that her Facebook posts are public in part because she wants to publicly show her support for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2020 presidential campaign. But she was confused when several individuals she didn’t know began commenting on her posts and sending her messages referencing the supposed quote from the meme.“People started saying that I said this…totally ridiculous thing,” she said.“Are you the same Jenna Tull that said that all people should be euthanized when they turn 70 because they start getting too dumb? And who decides what is dumb, a mind numbingly stupid person like you?” one user commented. “This is the socialist/communist mindset to remove anyone including babies that they consider an inconvenience. Of course those in charge never take the time to examine how useless they are.”Tull said she and a friend tracked down the meme and eventually traced the image back to THEYA; she was relieved to learn that the meme invoking her name did not also use her image.Still, the episode left Tull “disheartened for our country and society,” she said.“I just don’t understand. We have unlimited resources and people still can’t Google something,” Tull added. Instead, “people are continuing to misuse the Internet to spread hate and to troll.”Editor’s note: FactCheck.org is one of several organizations working with Facebook to debunk misinformation shared on the social media network.Update, March 25: We added a response from Blair confirming that the meme originated with America’s Last Line of Defense.Blair, Christopher. Founder, America’s Last Line of Defense. Email to FactCheck.org. 23 Mar 2019.“Our Story.” THEYA Healthcare. Accessed 21 Mar 2019.Tull, Jenna. Phone interview with FactCheck.org. 21 Mar 2019.
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10556
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A lighter, defter touch: Laser eye surgery is better than ever
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"The story provides an excellent overview of some of the newer procedures and techniques for laser eye surgeries used to correct vision problems related to the size and shape of the cornea; however, it may have been improved with quantification of benefit and discussion of available evidence on Lasik and PRK. The story mentions that photorefractive keratectomy (PRK), a procedure where a laser is used to reshape the cornea after the top layer of cells are removed, is now more being performed more than laser-assisted in situ keratomileusis (LASIK) surgery. PRK may have fewer long-term side effects and may provide greater improvement in vision than LASIK surgery; however data on the side effects is inconclusive. The story notes that more surgeons are tailoring techniques and procedures as laser eye surgery grows in popularity, and corrective eye surgery is not a ""one size fits all"". The story lists some of the potential pros and cons of LASIK and PRK surgery, and how a surgeon and a patient might decide which procedure is right, if appropriate at all. The story provides an excellent service by encouraging people to be educated consumers when making a decision about this heavily promoted eye surgery. The story also mentions that the surgery may not be covered by health insurance and does a good job noting the variation in cost for different laser eye surgeries. The story provides multiple balanced perspectives on current trends in laser eye surgery. The story provides incomplete evidence about the success rates (i.e. how many people report 20/40 or 20/20 vision following either LASIK or PRK), or the incidence of lasting negative outcomes from the surgery. The story mentions that ""90% of patients who have laser eye surgery achieve 20/40 vision, and 10% of patients need corrective enhancement surgery"". Is this 90% of the 1.14 million laser surgeries performed this year? We are not given context for these statistics, which is important if patients are to make an informed choice about this surgical procedure We are also not told how many procedures go wrong or result in permanent benign or more serious side effects. The story does note the potential harms of treatment, such as dry and irritated eyes and blurry vision, but we are not told how often these happen. The story provides only one patient's anecdote that the surgery did not work well for him due to lasting uncomfortable side effects."
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true
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"The story provides the variation in cost for different laser eye surgeries. The story also mentions that the surgery may not be covered by insurance. The story mentions that ""90% of patients who have laser eye surgery achieve 20/40 vision, and 10% of patients need corrective enhancement surgery"". This data is provided by the American Academy of Ophthalmology. We are not given context for these statistics, which is important. Is this 90% of the 1.14 million laser surgeries performed this year? We are not told how many procedures go wrong or result in permanent benign or more serious side effects. There are available data in the literature, and this story would have been improved to include more rigorous details on quantification of benefit. The story does note the potential harms of treatment, such as dry and irritated eyes and blurry vision, but we are not told how often these happens. The story only provides one patient's anecdotal evidence that the surgery did not work well for him due to lasting uncomfortable side effects. The story provides little evidence about the success rate (i.e. how many people report 20/40 or 20/20 vision following either LASIK or PRK), or what is the incidence of lasting negative outcomes from the surgery? After 10+ years of the procedures being performed, there is published data examining the efficacy and safety of Lasik vs PRK for correction of myopia. (Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2006 Apr 19;(2):CD005135) of clinical trials The story would have been improved with inclusion of some of the available data. The story does not engage in disease mongering. Instead, the story provides appropriate caveats that not everyone is a suitable candidate for eye surgery. Eye surgeons, ophthalmology researchers and patients interviewed elaborate on this point by providing clear information about laser eye surgery and noting some of the pros and cons. The story does an excellent job providing multiple balanced perspectives on current trends in laser eye surgery. The story includes perspectives from ophthalmologist researchers, laser eye surgeons and patients who have had the procedures. The story provides an excellent overview of some of the newer procedures and techniques for laser eye surgery to correct vision problems related to the size and shape of the cornea. The story mentions the potential pros and cons of LASIK and PRK surgery, and how a surgeon and a patient might decide which procedure is right, if appropriate at all. The story provides an excellent service by encouraging people to be educated consumers when making a decision about this heavily promoted eye surgery The story mentions LASIK is a common surgery, accounting for 87% of all laser eye surgeries last year. The story notes that more surgeons are tailoring techniques and procedures as laser eye surgery grows in popularity, but the story also notes that corrective eye surgery is not a ""one size fits all"". The story mentions newer tools to improve the LASIK and PRK procedures, but it does not mention if these are widely available. The story mentions that LASIK (laser-assisted in situ keratomileusis) surgery has been available for 10+ years. The story includes information that these are not new therapies but rather have had FDA approval for long time. The story mentions that photorefractive keratectomy (PRK), a procedure where a laser is used to reshape the cornea after the top layer of cells are removed, is now being performed more in lieu of, or in conjunction with LASIK surgery. The PRK procedure was approved by the FDA in 1995, a few years prior to LASIK. The story included several independent perspectives, so it is reasonable to assume that it did not rely solely or largely on a news release."
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10141
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Chemo damages brain, study finds
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This story presented some recent research results that in one case documents cognitive effects of chemotherapy and in the other pathologic changes in an animal model following exposure to chemotherapy. The information in these studies provides evidence of a previously under-appreciated side effect of chemotherapy. Importantly, however, the story does not provide adequate balance of these harms by including background about the beneficial role that chemotherapy often plays, not uncommonly resulting in years of living. Reporting scientific evidence on a problem reported by patients that is dismissed by clinicians may be useful to patients and their families. This information may improve patient management of the situation by allowing them to plan more appropriately for the period after chemotherapy with the particular drugs studied. An important omission from this story was a cautionary note that this side effect was observed following treatment with particular chemotherapy. It is not known at this time whether the use of other chemotherapy agents also results in this side effect. The opening sentences are a bit inflammatory and not supported by the information presented. The Inagaki study suggested a temporary issue with cognition and brain structure. The Noble experiment was done in a test tube and in mice and may or may not relate to humans – a point that was not emphasized. The dose of drugs used was not well described in the Noble article relative to those achieved during standard chemotherapy. It would be easy for a reader to walk away with the impression that chemotherapy kills brain cells more than tumor cells based on this reporting. This story serves as useful information about a potential side effect, which has value to patients as they work to make informed treatment decisions.
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mixture
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"This was not a story comparing treatments or about a new treatment so a discussion of costs is not applicable in this case. Although the purpose of this story was to present the evidence documenting a harm from the treatment, the story did not include any statement about the fact that for several forms of cancer, chemotherapy may be the most effective means of treatment. Without chemotherapy, there are many types of cancer that are lethal. Thus, although the side effects reported in this story are significant, they need to be balanced against possible death. A broader context or perspective on the reported side effects would have been helpful. This story is about a harm previously talked about by patients for which there is now supporting data. The harm may have been overstated, but we'll give the story the benefit of the doubt. This story presented observations from two research papers published in the last month – one in humans, one in the test tube and in mice. The story reflected the study of human patients accurately, although highlighting the observation that the effects on mental processes improved over time would have been appropriate. However, the discussion of the in vitro and in vivo studies of mouse cells and tissues should have included reminders that the findings were laboratory observations rather than clinical work conducted with humans. This information was present, but easy to miss. And while results from the laboratory are interesting, in this case they represent observations of cells out of their natural environment and effects in another species and therefore their bearing on people is speculative at this time. The opening sentences are a bit inflammatory and not supported by the material presented. The Inagaki study suggested a temporary issue with cognition and brain structure. The Noble experiment was done in a test tube and in mice and may or may not relate to humans – a point that was not emphasized. The dose of drugs used was not well described in the Noble article relative to those achieved during standard chemotherapy. It would be easy for a reader to walk away with the impression that chemotherapy kills brain cells more than tumor cells based on this reporting. The story included information about two recently published, peer reviewed pieces of research. It also included comments from a clinician, not involved in the research described in the story. One of the studies the story discussed compared women with breast cancer that had treated it with different approaches, only one of which included chemotherapy. However, as this story was not describing a new treatment or comparing treatments, it is difficult to rate it on this criteria. The story didn't need to address the availability of chemotherapy; its widespread use is well known. The use of chemotherapy for the treatment of cancer is common. However the story should have made clear that the studies reported on did not look at all chemotherapy but rather only some agents. It is not known whether these findings are generalizable or are novel aspects of the particular drugs studied. The concept of ""chemobrain"" is not new but the information that supports the patient's symptoms is new. Does not appear to rely solely or largely on a press release."
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27223
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"Cardinal George Pell, who has been charged with sexual abuse, once said that abortion was ""a worse moral scandal than priests sexually abusing young people."
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Coverage of the trial in Australia was suppressed under a court-imposed order, but on 11 December 2018 Pell was reportedly convicted of abusing two choir boys in the country during his tenure as archbishop of Melbourne in the 1990s. In 2019, Pell will be tried for separate accusations of sexual abuse.
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true
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Politics, abortion, child molestation
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In 2018 an apparently defunct Instagram page highlighted the criminal charges against Cardinal George Pell, as contrasted with a controversial remark he made years earlier. A graphic showed Pell, described as “the third-highest ranking official in the Vatican and currently charged with multiple counts of child sex abuse,” above a statement attributed to him holding that “Abortion is a worse moral scandal than priests sexually abusing young people”: In this case, the graphic is accurate on all counts. Pell made the infamous statement during a World Youth Day event in July 2002, in reply to an American youth minister’s asking him how Catholics should respond to questions regarding the findings of systematic sexual abuse committed by church officials. When asked to explain his rationale, Pell (who at the time was the Archbishop of Sydney) said, “Because [abortion] is always a destruction of human life.” The following month, Pell maintained that while the original reporting on his comment did not mention his condemnation of sexual abuse, he would not backtrack on the original statement: I … mentioned that the church is being attacked for [sex abuse] sometimes by elements that are a bit anti-Christian … I said there are other scandals, such as abortion which are under-reported and because abortion destroys innocent life you could say it’s a worse scandal. On 24 February 2014, Pell (who was by that point a cardinal) was appointed by Pope Francis to oversee the newly-created Secretariat for the Economy, granting Pell “authority over all economic and administrative activities” in the Vatican. Since then he has been described by multiple news outlets as being the Vatican’s third-highest ranking official. Allegations of sexual abuse against Pell date to 2002, when he was accused of having molested a 12-year-old boy in 1961. An inquiry commissioned by the National Committee for Professional Standards, a group overseen by the Catholic Church of Australia, determined that the allegations were “unsubstantiated.” But in June 2017, Pell was charged with historical sexual assault, a term used to an identify alleged offense that took place in the non-recent past. While some of those charges have been dismissed, on 1 May 2018 Pell was ordered to stand trial on other counts. He pleaded not guilty.
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18511
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Mike Villarreal Says Texas lawmakers in 2011 ordered school districts to test every student on their respiratory system and weight.
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Villarreal said the 2011 Legislature ordered Texas students to take fitness tests including checks of weight and respiratory systems. The mandated tests can involve checking each student’s weight and the aerobic tests relate to respiration. But lawmakers launched the program a few years earlier, in 2007, though they approved changes in 2011.
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true
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Children, Education, Public Health, Recreation, Texas, Mike Villarreal,
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"The 2011 Legislature might best be remembered for cuts in spending, including changes to education aid. Lawmakers also directed schools to check the physical fitness of students, state Rep. Mike Villarreal, D-San Antonio, told House colleagues during April 4, 2013, consideration of proposed amendments to the pending 2014-15 state budget. ""During the last legislative session in 2011, there was a program that was created that requires all of our public schools to collect health information on students, to test them on their respiratory system, on their weight,"" he said. ""It’s called FitnessGram. Every school district, every school, implements this program, collects the data, sends it to"" the Texas Education Agency. We looked into the accuracy of his flashback after inquiring into why he mentioned the mandate. The day he spoke, Villarreal won House approval of an amendment to that body’s version of the next budget. Villarreal described his amendment as enabling state researchers to access and analyze results of the fitness tests collected by the agency. Asked if researchers are restricted from getting such results now, Villarreal’s chief of staff, Peter Clark, said by email the agency ""has been slow to provide this data to researchers, so we wanted to communicate legislative direction."" So, did the 2011 Legislature set the fitness tests in motion? Nope. It turns out state law has required students in grades three through 12 to take fitness tests since the 2007-08 school year, though the 2011 Legislature tweaked the law to limit the aerobic, abdominal, flexibility and upper body tests to students enrolled in physical education classes, Texas Education Agency spokeswoman DeEtta Culbertson told us by phone. The 2007 Legislature established the mandate that students be tested for fitness, which came along with a fresh requirement that middle school students take physical education classes. At the time, advocates included state Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, who told the Austin American-Statesman in June 2007 that she was troubled by studies showing some fifth-graders were overweight. ""Anyone who has taught public school knows the old adage of 'sound body, sound mind' really is true,"" Nelson said. ""This generation of young people will live shorter lives than their parents unless we change the status quo. We've got to do this."" The Statesman reported that the FitnessGram software had been developed by Kenneth Cooper, the well-known Dallas exercise researcher. Under the law, each district must annually assess the physical fitness of students in PE classes, with a state-ordered ""assessment instrument"" considering factors including aerobic capacity, body composition and muscular strength, endurance and flexibility, the law says. Also, the law requires the exam to include standards specific to each student’s age and gender and to be based on the ""physical fitness level required for good health."" A FitnessGram manual suggests that students run or walk and have their percentage of body fat gauged, either through a skin-fold test using calipers or by measuring height and weight. Other suggested tests include curl-ups (or sit-ups) and push-ups. (Parents of students in the Austin school district may request their child’s FitnessGram report from the school’s PE teacher, the district’s PE supervisor, Michele Rusnak, said by phone. She added that in instances where ""anything really glaring"" emerges in a test, the teacher talks to the school nurse, who reaches out to the student’s parents.) By email, Culbertson said aggregated school-by-school or district-by-district results, which do not identify individual students, are available online. How’s it been going for the kids? Unevenly, it appears. Statewide through 2009-10, the vast majority of Texas students had failed to pass all six Fitnessgram tests, according to an April 18, 2011, Statesman news article. More recently, nearly 46 percent of more than two million Texas children who participated in the 2012 tests were found to be at risk for obesity, according to the Reshaping Texas web site, which was created at legislative direction by State Comptroller Susan Combs. Some 54 percent of the tested students achieved a ""healthy fitness zone"" rating, according to the site, which features an interactive map for checking particular districts. In the Austin district, according to the map, 32 percent of students who were tested came out at high risk of obesity, 12 percent were at some risk and 55 percent landed in the ""healthy fitness zone."" Finally, we hop-skipped to asking why Villarreal, a House member since 2000, traced the origin of the fitness tests to 2011. By email, Clark said the representative was reflecting on a 2011 proposal tightening what school districts report to the state about how students fare on the tests. Previously, the law said districts should report summary data from the tests, broken out by grade level and other sifts as ordered by the state education commissioner. Members in 2011 changed the law to require districts to report each student’s performance, though the law continued to bar any student from being identified in the reports by name or otherwise. Clark later said Villarreal mistakenly said the tests were mandated by the 2011 Legislature. Our ruling Villarreal said the 2011 Legislature ordered Texas students to take fitness tests including checks of weight and respiratory systems. The mandated tests can involve checking each student’s weight and the aerobic tests relate to respiration. But lawmakers launched the program a few years earlier, in 2007, though they approved changes in 2011.s ."
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23217
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John Kitzhaber is the only pro-choice candidate in the race for governor.
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Planned Parenthood PAC of Oregon says Chris Dudley is anti-choice
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false
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Abortion, Oregon, Planned Parenthood PAC,
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"Oregon is liberal when it comes to access to abortion. It’s among 16 states that do not require parental notification or consent for teen abortions. Oregon does not mandate counseling or limit when an abortion can be performed. Planned Parenthood PAC of Oregon sent out a letter this month claiming that Democrat John Kitzhaber is the only pro-choice candidate in the race for governor. That means Chris Dudley, the Republican in the race, is anti-choice. The campaign letter reads: ""In contrast, Chris Dudley wants to roll back a woman's right to choose. He supports restrictions that Oregon voters have rejected multiple times, and that threaten women's health. And Chris Dudley has singled out ‘abstinence’ education as a way to address unintended pregnancy. He is out of step with Oregon values and cares more about catering to extreme positions than providing real education and access to birth control."" Two questions came to mind. Does Dudley really want to ""roll back"" a woman’s right to choose? And if he is open to restrictions -- such as notifying parents before a minor opts for an abortion -- does that automatically mean he is not pro-choice? PolitiFact Oregon asked Planned Parenthood to share the goods. Roey Thorpe, executive director of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Oregon, provided a letter that Dudley sent June 2. In it, he declines to answer the group’s questionnaire and explains his position on abortion. ""I believe that abortion should remain legal -- but limited. I do not support the public funding of abortion. As governor, I will not propose new legal restrictions on abortion, but I would be open to proposals for parental notification for minors who seek abortions, limits on late-term abortions and efforts to reduce abortion through education and abstinence."" He added that he would not use a single-issue litmus test when nominating judges, appointing board members or approving legislation. OK, that sounds clear, but not crystal. For example, does that mean he would spearhead legislation if it’s regarding parental notification, or just entertain the idea if it comes from elsewhere? We followed up with the Dudley campaign. Spokesman Jake Suski said Dudley would not propose any legislation related to abortion or reproductive rights. But if legislation landed on his desk related to parental notification or late-term abortions, Dudley would be ""open to signing it. It doesn’t guarantee he would sign it."" Suski also said Dudley identifies himself as ""pro-choice."" Thorpe says any effort to restrict access or curb the law means a person is not pro-choice. ""Rolling back the rights that women already have in Oregon is not a centrist position,"" she said. ""Safe and legal abortion is a right that people have."" Thorpe also cited Dudley’s singling out of abstinence education as a sign that he’s on the wrong side of the issue. But Sharon Kitzhaber, the former first lady, was a founder and board member of the STARS Foundation in Oregon. That stands for Students Today Aren’t Ready for Sex, and its mission, according to this archived press release, was to ""help reduce teenage pregnancies by postponing teenage sexual involvement."" In any case, the Oregon Right to Life people aren’t happy with Dudley, either. He didn’t fill out their questionnaire and the group declined to recommend -- much less endorse -- him in the general election. ""He wrote them a letter,"" sniffed Gayle Atteberry, director of Oregon Right to Life, referring to Planned Parenthood. ""He didn't even write us a letter."" Dudley believes -- and we think many people concur -- that he is pro-choice because he believes abortion should be legal. We recognize, though, that there isn’t universal agreement on the definition of pro-choice. Some abortion rights supporters are against any restrictions. Others who define themselves as pro-choice do support limitations, on late term abortions, for example. Dudley admittedly has not said much on this issue, and that’s part of what’s driving Thorpe and Planned Parenthood. He said he’s open to restrictions but doesn’t have an agenda to roll back reproductive rights. Dudley mentioned abstinence in his letter to Planned Parenthood, but Kitzhaber’s former wife championed abstinence education and nobody marked her as anti-choice. Certainly, Kitzhaber is more adamant about his stance on abortion and reproductive rights. He has the endorsement of Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice Oregon, which traditionally endorses Democrats. And when he was governor, he vetoed a 1999 bill that would have required physicians to notify parents before providing abortion care to minors. Planned Parenthood PAC’s statement ignores critical facts."
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40829
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More than 2,000 more fully qualified staff working in mental health trusts since 2013.
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Working for a mental health trust doesn’t mean you work on mental health. This figure hides the detail: mental health nurse numbers in England are down, while staff in the scientific, therapeutic and technical group has gone up.
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mixture
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mental-health
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4,300 more staff employed in mental health trusts since 2013. This is not how many mental health specialist staff there are. It is the increase in all staff in English trusts with over half their outpatient activity in mental health specialities. Some of the staff were effectively re-categorised into the mental health category during this time, rather than being newly hired. There are fewer doctors and nurses employed in mental health. There are around 5,000 fewer nurses specialising mental health between August 2010 and 2017. The number of fully trained doctors specialising in psychiatry and psychotherapy has also gone down by 105 over the same time, but if you count junior doctors the number has increased. Claim 1 of 3
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9102
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Clinical study shows that retinal imaging may detect signs of Alzheimer's disease
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Claims are made all the time in news releases without a lot of clarity on how novel the findings of a study really are. This release clearly articulates the new elements being reported — retinal imaging in this case — in detection of Alzheimer’s. It also does a nice job explaining not only how the work was funded but also who supplied the material to do the experiments. What’s missing are important explanations about costs — especially given that cost comparison is a central selling point for this diagnostic tool in the release — and details about risks, details about benefits, and a fuller explanation of clinical applicability now versus in the future. The release describes an early study of scans of the retina that identify the hallmark sign of Alzheimer’s disease brains in living patients. The hope is that patients with disease can be identified early and their disease progression followed as treatments are tested. The retina is an outgrowth of the brain, so it makes sense that it would also contain the hallmark amyloid plaques found in the brains in large amounts in people with Alzheimers. A non-invasive scan like this would be advantageous over more invasive tests such as positron emission tomography (PET) scans and spinal taps. There’s a popular idea that identifying people with Alzheimer’s pathology early would allow early and more successful treatment, although there is as yet no treatment available. In addition, most dementias are a mix of Alzheimer’s pathology (amyloid plaques, neurofibrillary tangles, and nerve cell loss), blood vessel disease, and other degenerative changes that occur with age, so thinking that identifying amyloid plaques early, as described in this release, is going to do any good has become increasingly controversial as trial after trial of drugs targeting amyloid have failed. Regardless, a goal of many researchers and companies is to find biomarkers to identify people early and also to follow disease progress with treatment, preferably with tests that are noninvasive and inexpensive.
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mixture
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Alzheimer's disease,NeuroVision Imaging LLC,retinal imaging
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High up in the release it says: “Accumulations of neurotoxic beta-amyloid protein can be detected with positron emission tomography, or PET scans, and analysis of cerebrospinal fluid, but these are invasive, inconvenient and costly, making them impractical for routine screening and follow-up evaluation.” We love this kind of comparison but we expect those comparisons to be backed up. What makes these other diagnostic tools “invasive, inconvenient, and costly”? How much do they cost? How much does this type of diagnostic cost? Remember, the study was done on deceased people’s brains and retinas. So you can’t get much more invasive than that. In a news release of more than 1,000 words, we would expect some data to back things up. Instead, this release offers just two numbers by way of quantification, and both of them are couched in relative terms that, to any reader other than the authors of the study, may be meaningless. The release says: “Among key findings, the researchers report a 4.7-fold increase in retinal plaque burden in patients with Alzheimer’s, compared to controls, and they provide observations regarding geometric distribution and layer location of amyloid pathology in the retina. … The demonstration of a fully automated calculation quantifying retinal autofluorescence that showed a 2.1-fold increase in patients with Alzheimer’s, compared with controls.” In a study that compared the brains of 23 deceased people with Alzheimer’s to 13 people without, what do these numbers mean? Because the research is very preliminary, and given there is no treatment for Alzheimer’s pathology and most people with dementia who are in their 80s have multiple cognitive issues, it’s difficult to see how identifying amyloid — or even multiple types of pathology — is going to benefit patients. There is a reference to how other ways of detecting Alzheimer’s are “invasive” but there is nothing in the release about the possible harms associated with this diagnostic tool. A false-positive diagnosis of dementia or Alzheimer’s would be one such harm. The release explains how the study was conducted with a good amount of detail. We would have liked to have seen a better explanation, though, of how this type of lab study on dead tissue has been extrapolated to indicate any sort of findings — positive or negative — about a diagnostic tool for living patients. To fully understand the presence of retinal plaque researchers would also need to test people with other diseases that are also known to have amyloid, such as Parkinson’s and Lewy body dementia, and also people with various eye disease such as glaucoma, which might change the results. The release states researchers also did a feasibility trial in 16 patients to test the ability to identify beta-amyloid in the eye using autofluorescence imaging, but we’re given none of the results from this part of the study. There is no disease mongering in the release. Everyone quoted in the release is affiliated with the company that makes the diagnostic tool that is being tested, and that is made clear. The funding sources are also made very clear. And we were also happy to see this level of detail about the study: Clinical trials were approved by Quorum Review, Seattle, Washington, (IRB00003226) and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (FWA00019841). Human tissues were obtained from the USC Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center (ADRC) Neuropathology Core, Los Angeles, CA (IRB protocol: HS-042071). Animal studies were approved by the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) and the Division on Laboratory Animal Medicine (DLAM) at UCLA. As noted, there is a passing reference to other types of diagnostic tools but no true comparisons. Although not as clearly stated as it could be, it does come across in one of the quotes that this is a technology that is not yet available for use. “It’s exciting to see these studies demonstrating the power of the technology applied to the Alzheimer’s field. Our goal is to develop a product that is easy to use, affordable and widely accessible. We look forward to the potential of retinal imaging playing a vital role in solving the problem of Alzheimer’s, both in identifying and monitoring those who may be affected by the disease. Our next step is to continue with clinical trials, building upon the existing pharmaceutical company collaborations, to ensure our technology is ready for the medical community to help manage this disease.” The release establishes the novelty of the findings in several areas, noting: The article provides new insights into the disease’s manifestations in the retina and information on the optical imaging system. Here are several highlights: We did not see any unjustifiable language in the release.
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7347
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VIRUS DIARY: Navigating a flu-like illness in the corona age.
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For those of us from a region where outbursts of violence are an occupational hazard, coping with coronavirus seemed simple enough: Stay at home and you’ll be fine.
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true
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Israel, International News, General News, Flu, Lifestyle, Health, Tel Aviv, Pandemics, Virus Outbreak, Middle East
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For the most part it has been. Other than taking the dog out for walks, I’ve been homebound, working remotely and waiting for the plague to pass. On April 6, I finally headed out to report on Israeli volunteers aiding those on the pandemic’s front lines. Then I started to develop a sore throat. And an irksome cough. And some shortness of breath. I reasoned it was a just a cold I had picked up from one of my daughters or a “regular” flu. Still, a panicky climate amid a surge in coronavirus cases left that lingering doubt following my lone sojourn into the outside world. A brief call to Israel’s national coronavirus hotline made it clear I was a low-priority case. I hadn’t been out of the country recently, hadn’t come in contact with a confirmed coronavirus case and didn’t have a temperature over 38 degrees (100.4 Fahrenheit). With Israel’s Health Ministry under fire for delivering far less than their promised availability of tests, I was swiftly rejected. With the country in virtual lockdown, people were also being discouraged from physically visiting doctors for fear of contagion. So, after a phone consultation I started taking an antihistamine and a steroid inhaler for breathing difficulties, while continuing to take cold and flu medication. For the next week it mostly did the trick. But the symptoms simply wouldn’t go away. Finally, after two weeks, I went to the local clinic. The physician checked me out and suggested I also use an allergy nasal spray. I asked about a COVID-19 test but was referred to a specialist instead. A nurse added to my confusion by suggesting I get checked for the coronavirus. “But I don’t have a fever,” I explained. Irrelevant, she responded, saying many younger people were asymptomatic and my cough and shortness of breath made me a prime candidate. I was steadily feeling worse with full-body aches and chest pains. Making matters worse, my 1-year-old daughter started running a high fever. I raged at my vacillation, fearing I had not only neglected my own health but exposed my family as well. With a pounding head, I called the coronavirus hotline again to demand a test. After a long exchange, I was rejected once again. The next day, I visited an ear, nose and throat specialist, where a thorough examination seemed to solve the mystery. It was a bad case of sinusitis. The diagnosis — any diagnosis! — gave me a sense of relief. But after several days of antibiotics, I was just feeling worse. I was breaking out into alternating fits of sweating and shivering cold. My fever spiked and the aches kept me bed-bound for hours. I didn’t know what was going on. Could I really be having sinusitis and the worst flu of my life at the same time? I quarantined myself in one of the girls’ rooms and feared something more ominous was going on. I called the corona hotline a third time. Finally, they relented. The following day, a young woman in a full-body protective suit and a menacing visor arrived at my door, swabbed my throat and nostril and said I’d get a result in three to five days. Thankfully, the baby’s fever had broken and no one else in the family was ill. Slowly, I began to recover, waking up pain-free for the first time on April 29. Rolling out of bed, I peeked at my phone. There was a text message from the Health Ministry. “The corona test performed on you,” it read, “is negative.” ___ Virus Diary, an occasional feature, showcases the coronavirus saga through the eyes of Associated Press journalists around the world. Follow AP Jerusalem Correspondent Aron Heller at www.twitter.com/aronhellerap
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4839
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Sparks police seize dozens of firearms from home by school.
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Sparks police seized dozens of firearms from a house in a suburban neighborhood a half-block away from an elementary school Thursday after responding to a report about mental health concerns.
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true
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Sparks, Health, Mental health
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An evidence team took inventory Thursday of at least three dozen weapons stacked in a driveway outside the home on Del Rosa Way across the street from Diedrichsen Elementary School in east Sparks. The cache of guns included black assault-style weapons, rifles, shotguns and handguns. No arrests have been made but an investigation is continuing. Sparks police Sgt. Ben Russell said in an email to The Associated Press the active investigation “is in regard to a mental health issue.” He says no further details will be released at this time. The school is on summer break.
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8895
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Glaxo's Tykerb goes head-to-head with Herceptin.
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GlaxoSmithKline Plc’s new breast cancer drug Tykerb is to go head-to-head with Genentech Inc’s blockbuster Herceptin to see whether one is better or if patients should get both.
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true
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Health News
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The U.S. National Cancer Institute said 8,000 participants in 50 countries would be given either Herceptin or Tykerb, or Herceptin followed by Tykerb, or the two treatments in combination. Glaxo is providing financial support for the trial. Both Herceptin and Tykerb, known generically as trastuzumab and lapatinib, have been approved for treating HER2-positive breast cancer, an aggressive form of the disease found in 20 to 30 percent of patients with a particular gene mutation. The new study, expected to end in 2011, will provide oncologists with the first direct comparison of the drugs in the earliest, most treatable stages of cancer. “It may be that using two treatments that work in different ways against HER2-positive breast cancer offers a complementary strategy that is more powerful than either drug alone,” Dr Edith Perez of the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida, who is leading the study, said in a statement. HER2-positive breast cancer is caused by an excess of HER2 genes or by over-production of its protein, the HER2 cell surface receptor. Herceptin consists of large antibodies that latch on to the portion of the HER2 protein on the outer surface of the cancer cell, while Tykerb acts by entering a cancer cell and binding to part of the protein lying beneath the cell surface. The new study has two different designs depending on whether patients with stage I or stage II breast cancer have already been treated with chemotherapy. It will therefore compare four different regimens of targeted therapy administered over a 52-week period. Herceptin is sold outside the United States by Genentech’s partner Roche Holding AG.
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15280
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"On allowing abortion in cases of rape or incest, ""I have never said that or advocated that."
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"Rubio said during the debate about exceptions for rape and incest on abortion: ""I have never said that or advocated that."" Recently, Rubio has supported a bill that would have banned abortion after 20 weeks, and the bill did include exceptions for rape or incest. So Rubio has supported legislation with exceptions. However, we could find no evidence that Rubio has generally favored those types of exceptions, and we couldn’t find him specifically advocating for them. Rubio’s claim has an element of truth, but it leaves out important details."
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false
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Abortion, Florida, Marco Rubio,
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"In the wake of the Planned Parenthood video controversy, several of the Republican presidential candidates weighed in about abortion during the first GOP primary debate on Fox News. Here was the exchange between U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio and moderator Megyn Kelly on Aug. 6: Kelly: ""You favor a rape and incest exception to abortion bans. Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York just said yesterday those exceptions are preposterous. He said they discriminate against an entire class of human beings. If you believe that life begins at conception, as you say you do, how do you justify ending a life just because it begins violently, through no fault of the baby?"" Rubio: ""Well, Megyn, first of all, I'm not sure that that's a correct assessment of my record. I would go on to add that I believe all --"" Kelly: ""You don't favor a rape and incest exception?"" Rubio: ""I have never said that. And I have never advocated that. What I have advocated is that we pass law in this country that says all human life at every stage of its development is worthy of protection. In fact, I think that law already exists. It is called the Constitution of the United States."" PolitiFact readers asked us to fact-check Rubio’s claim that he never advocated for a rape and incest exception. Rubio’s record on abortion We soon found two Senate bills Rubio supported that includes exceptions for rape and incest. In November 2013, Rubio was one of 40 cosponsors of a Senate bill entitled ""Pain-capable unborn child protection act."" Several GOP presidential candidates backed the bill, including main sponsor Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and co-sponsors Ted Cruz of Texas and Rand Paul of Kentucky. The bill bans abortions at 20 weeks or greater but includes exceptions, including rape and incest: ""(1) where necessary to save the life of a pregnant woman whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, illness, or injury, excluding psychological or emotional conditions; or (2) where the pregnancy is the result of rape, or the result of incest against a minor, if the rape has been reported at any time prior to the abortion to an appropriate law enforcement agency, or if the incest has been reported at any time prior to the abortion to an appropriate law enforcement agency or to a government agency legally authorized to act on reports of child abuse or neglect. …"" The 2013 bill stalled in committee; Graham sponsored a similar version in 2015 -- and again Rubio is listed as one of dozens of co-sponsors. This version also has a rape exception, although the language differs. It requires for adult women to obtain counseling or medical treatment for the rape 48 hours before the abortion, with separate criteria for minors about reporting the rape to law enforcement. We asked a Rubio spokesman about his claim in light of the 2013 bill. ""Marco has supported pro-life legislation with and without exceptions because they enhance protections for innocent life,"" Alex Conant told PolitiFact. ""Pro-life groups supported that legislation -- Marco has a 100 percent rating from National Right to Life in the 112th and 113th Congresses, and a 100 percent rating from the Family Research Council in the 113th Congress."" Rubio has long been an opponent of abortion rights, and his record bears that out. National Right to Life gave him a 100 percent rating for the 112th and 113th congresses. In both sessions, the ratings were based on five votes, such as cutting off funding for Planned Parenthood, repealing or defunding the Affordable Care Act and protecting free speech. The Family Research Council also gave Rubio a 100 percent rating for 13 votes in 2013-14. And NARAL, a group that supports abortion rights, gave Rubio a zero every year between 2011 and 2014. We found two examples of bills that Rubio voted for that did not appear to obtain a rape exception. In 2000, then state Rep. Rubio voted for a ban on late-term abortions, according to an article in the Miami Herald. The original version of that bill didn’t contain a rape exception, though it allowed a doctor to take steps to save the life of the mother. The Senate version of the bill had no rape exception, but it did have the exception about saving the mother’s life. That was signed into law by then Gov. Jeb Bush in May 2000. But within a couple of months, state officials gave up on enforcing the ban due to court decisions including a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court. The other example is a 2013 U.S. Senate bill that is similar to Graham’s proposal to ban abortion at 20 weeks or later; however, it only pertains to the District of Columbia. That bill, sponsored by Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, has dozens of co-sponsors including Rubio. The bill makes an exception to save the life of the mother but not for rape or incest. In an interview after the debate, Rubio told CNN’s Chris Cuomo, ""I'm in favor of a 20-week abortion ban. Does that mean I'm in favor of abortions at 19 weeks? No. Any bill that reduces the number of abortions is a bill that I'm going to support."" Our ruling Rubio said during the debate about exceptions for rape and incest on abortion: ""I have never said that or advocated that."" Recently, Rubio has supported a bill that would have banned abortion after 20 weeks, and the bill did include exceptions for rape or incest. So Rubio has supported legislation with exceptions. However, we could find no evidence that Rubio has generally favored those types of exceptions, and we couldn’t find him specifically advocating for them. Rubio’s claim has an element of truth, but it leaves out important details. So"
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4576
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Groups fear proposal may weaken Ohio River water protections.
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A commission that watches over the Ohio River’s health across six states may give up setting pollution standards for the waterway, raising concerns it would weaken protections for a source of drinking water for 5 million people.
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true
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Environment, Water utilities, Utilities, Water quality, Toledo, Ohio, Pollution
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The Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission is expected to decide this year whether to leave the responsibility of setting water quality standards up to the individual states along the 980-mile river. That would allow each state to set its own guidelines for pollutants and waste water discharges from factories and sewer systems as long as they meet the minimums set by the federal Clean Water Act. Some drinking water utilities are against the idea while environmental groups worry it will create confusing and disjointed regulations up and down the river. “How do you have two sets of standards for two states on opposite sides of the river,” said Gail Hesse, director of the National Wildlife Federation’s Great Lakes water program. The 27-member commission, which has representatives from the six states next to the river as well as from New York and Virginia, has said this is one of several possibilities being considered and nothing has been decided. However, it also said most of its members now are in favor of ending its role of setting pollution control standards. “We won’t move forward with a change that would weaken water quality,” said Richard Harrison, the commission’s executive director. Those within the commission who back the idea believe that its role setting pollution standards is redundant because states already are setting and enforcing their own rules for waterways and because the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has its own guidelines, too. A group of commissioners opposed to the move points out that there are some regulations the agency has that aren’t within the state and EPA standards. They said that state and EPA standards “may not be adequate to protect the aquatic life and uses of the Ohio River.” Shifting the role of setting pollution standards to the states, supporters say, would allow the agency to concentrate on existing efforts that include monitoring water quality and aquatic life, responding to spills and river cleanup. An advisory group representing chemical and manufacturing plants along the river backs giving pollution oversight to the states, saying that the commission’s current standards are an “increased burden on the regulated community with little or no added value.” But another advisory group made up of drinking water utilities is opposed because it says the commission’s standards includes water quality protections that aren’t covered by state and federal rules. The commission is expected to decide in June whether to move forward with the proposal and then would make a final decision in the fall.
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38894
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Tina Griego, a journalist for the Denver Rocky Mountain News, wrote a column titled “Mexican Visitor’s Lament” that talks about the benefits of 20 million illegal aliens immediately leaving the country.
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"Journalist Tina Griego Penned a Column Titled ""Mexican Visitor's Lament""-Incorrect Attribution!"
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false
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Immigration
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Tina Griego didn’t write the “Mexican Visitor’s Lament” column. The Mexican Visitor’s Lament column first appeared online in 2007. The column attempts to explain what would happen if 20 million illegal aliens immediately vacated America: That’s a good question. . . it deserves an answer. Over 80 percent of Americans demand secured borders and illegal migration stopped. But what would happen if all 20 million or more vacated America? The answers may surprise you! In California, if 3.5 million illegal aliens moved back to Mexico it would leave an extra 10.2 billion to spend on overloaded school systems, bankrupt hospitals and overrun prisons. It would leave highways cleaner, safer and less congested. Everyone could understand one another as English became the dominant language again. In Colorado, 500,000 illegal migrants, plus their 300,000 kids and grand-kids . . . would move back home, mostly to Mexico. That would save Coloradans an estimated 2 billion (other experts say 7 billion) annually in taxes that pay for schooling, medical, social-services and incarceration costs. It means 12,000 gang members would vanish out of Denver alone. Colorado would save more than 20 million in prison costs, and the terror those 7,300 alien criminals set upon local citizens. Denver Officer Don Young and hundreds of Colorado victims would not have suffered death, accidents, rapes and other crimes by illegals. Denver Public Schools would not suffer a 67 percent drop-out/flunk out rate because of thousands of illegal alien students speaking 41 different languages. At least 200,000 vehicles would vanish from out gridlocked cities in Colorado. Denver’s four percent unemployment rate would vanish as our working poor would gain jobs at a living wage. The confusion continues years after the fake column appeared because Tina Griego actually did write a column that looked at the impact of 20 million illegal aliens leaving the U.S. in 2007. Griego explained the situation in yet another column that appeared in the Denver Post: So, here’s a funny thing. A few years ago, a local man wrote an Internet column. You can find his name on your own if you’re so inclined. He called it, “What if 20 Million Illegal Aliens Vacated America.” He referenced a column I wrote about a conversation with a visiting Mexican journalist. She asked what would happen if 20 million illegal immigrants returned to Mexico. She was talking about their economic contribution here, the taxes paid, the purchases of goods and services. This question provoked our local man, prompting him to pen the aforementioned cyber-column. The parody column claimed that the mass exodus of 20 million illegal aliens would lead to drops in crime rates, prison bookings, gang activity, infectious diseases and even greenhouse gas emissions. Tina Griego responded to a number of those claims in her follow-up column: Last year, the Denver city/county jail saw 46,884 “book-ins.” A person can be booked-in more than once. I’d like to provide you with an unduplicated head count, but the city doesn’t keep track that way. Dulacki can say that by year’s end, 1,853 jail inmates had been reported to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement as foreign-born. She also can say that from July to December, when the city started keeping track, ICE came for 410 inmates. (Caveat: ICE doesn’t pick up every jailed illegal immigrant for various reasons — higher priorities, resources. It’s been a sore spot.) The Colorado Department of Corrections website provides a handy monthly inmate report. As of January, 22,910 people were incarcerated in the adult and juvenile systems. Of those, 1,783 were foreign born, and of those, 1,270 had an ICE hold on them. It was a typical month. I tell you this knowing the argument isn’t really about the numbers. It’s not about the stats or the stories, which we can bend and twist and, if not bound by ethics, fictionalize, to lend credence to our own points of view. We are biased creatures, all too willing to accept that which reinforces our beliefs, and so a man from Arizona forwards the e-mail column with the words: “Somebody really did their homework on this one. Best on the subject to present date.” Comments
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41312
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Glutaraldehyde is in vaccines and is poisonous if ingested and causes birth defects in animals.
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There are trace amounts in some vaccines from manufacturing, and not enough to cause harm.
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unproven
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online
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Beta-Propiolactone is in vaccines and is known to cause cancer, suspected gastrointestinal, liver, nerve and respiratory, skin and sense organ poison. It may be present in trace amounts of some vaccines. It is potentially carcinogenic, but only in much larger amounts than would be in a vaccine. The antibiotics gentamicin sulfate and polymyxin b are in vaccines and can cause allergic reactions ranging from mild to life-threatening. Traces of these antibiotics can end up in certain vaccines, but would only cause a reaction in someone severely allergic. Genetically modified yeast, animal, bacterial and viral DNA in vaccines can be incorporated into the recipient’s DNA causing unknown genetic mutations. Modified DNA can be used in the production of some vaccines, but is very unlikely to end up in the final product. Even if it did, there’s no evidence it can cause mutations. Glutaraldehyde is in vaccines and is poisonous if ingested and causes birth defects in animals. There are trace amounts in some vaccines from manufacturing, and not enough to cause harm. Formaldehyde is in vaccines and causes cancer in humans among other issues and is banned from vaccines in most European countries. It’s not banned in Europe. There are only trace amounts in certain vaccines and not enough to be carcinogenic. Latex rubber is in vaccines and causes life-threatening allergic reactions. Latex is used in the packaging of some vaccines, which could potentially cause harm if someone’s strongly allergic to it. Human and animal cells from sources like aborted foetuses are in vaccines and are linked to childhood leukaemia and diabetes. They may be used in certain vaccines’ production, but are unlikely to make it to the final product. Mercury (aka thimerosal or thiomersal) is in vaccines and can damage brain, gut, liver, bone marrow, nervous system and kidneys, is linked to autoimmune disorder, autism. Thiomersal isn’t in any UK vaccines any more. This is down to concern around a slightly different mercury-based chemical. MSG is in vaccines and is linked to birth defects, developmental delays, infertility and is banned in Europe. It’s not banned in Europe. It’s used in some vaccines to stabilise them. There’s no strong evidence it causes these problems in humans. Neomycin sulphate, an antibiotic, is in vaccines and can lead to epilepsy, brain damage and allergic reactions. Trace amounts of this antibiotic may end up in certain vaccines. If you are allergic to it could cause an allergic reaction. Phenol / phenoxyethanol is in vaccines and is used as antifreeze. It is toxic to all cells and can destroy the immune system. These chemicals have been used in vaccines as preservatives. They are not in antifreeze. Polysorbate 80 and 20 are in vaccines and cause cancer in animals and are linked to autoimmune issues and infertility. Tiny amounts of Polysorbate 80 is in a type of flu vaccine. There isn’t evidence ingesting it is linked to these issues in humans. Tri(n) butylphosphate is in vaccines and is potentially damaging to the kidneys and the nervous system. We can find no evidence of this being used in vaccines in the UK. Claim 1 of 14
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5406
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Celebrities bring awareness to mental health issues.
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Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson has discussed his battle with depression. Mariah Carey recently revealed she has bipolar disorder. Prince Harry said he needed counseling to deal with years of grief and anger following the death of his mother, Princess Diana. And “Deadpool” star Ryan Reynolds has acknowledged dealing with anxiety disorder.
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true
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Anxiety, Mental health, Health, Mariah Carey, Ryan Reynolds, Entertainment, North America, Prince Harry, Celebrities, Depression
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As the stigma surrounding mental illness has declined in recent years, so has the reluctance many have had to discuss their own mental health issues, including celebrities. It’s become the new norm for stars to divulge vulnerabilities once kept closely guarded. “I think anybody talking about it will help de-stigmatize it over time, but I think in particular celebrities or sports celebrities, if they have a platform and they’ve gone through any kind of issue with mental health, it’s good for them to share their stories, if they’re comfortable with it,” Johnson said in a recent interview. “For me as a guy, you know, I struggled a long time with not only my bouts of depression that I’ve had, but also things that have happened to me early on when I was a teenager, that colored me as an adult. But I struggled a long time just to express myself,” he said. Reynolds echoed that sentiment at the Monday premiere of “Deadpool 2,” where he explained to The Associated Press why he went public about having anxiety disorder. “Talking about it for me has helped in some ways,” Reynolds said. “In this age of toxic masculinity, there’s a lot of dudes out there that have a tendency to sort of bottle it up and keep it in, and think that they just sort of — they’ve got to be a tough guy and soldier on. But that’s not necessarily true.” Last year, Prince Harry was lauded for revealing he sought help to deal with his emotions following his mother’s death when he was a child. He struggled with anxiety, grief and rage and said he was close to a breakdown several times. Diane Hughes is a professor of Applied Psychology at New York University, specializing in adolescent development. She sees great value in celebrities and sports figures talking about their struggles, past and present. “I think there is a benefit to it because it helps de-stigmatize it and to normalize it a little bit,” Hughes said. She added: “There’s a lot of stigma attached to mental health issues, especially among teenagers because adolescents are constantly comparing themselves to their peers and are very self-conscious and worrying, (thus) creating a stigma to mental illness and help seeking.” That’s why the Child Mind Institute, which provides mental health services to children and families, enlisted the help of dozens of celebrities for its new campaign called #MyYoungerSelf for May, which is Mental Health Awareness Month. It asks celebrities what they would tell the younger version of themselves. Actress Kristen Bell would warn herself not to be fooled by the idea of perfection. Grammy-winning DJ Mark Ronson talks of being overtaken by panic attacks as a teen. And Sarah Silverman says there should be no part of your body that you should be ashamed of, and that includes your brain. Each participant contributed a childhood photo and a homemade video. “We know that when famous people basically stand up and say, ‘I suffered and I got better,’ it has a dramatic effect on all of us, but particularly on young people who are so susceptible to the imagery they see when people wear certain clothes or people like certain music,” said CMI President Dr. Harold Koplewicz. Actress Mayim Bialik of “The Big Bang Theory” remembers feeling isolated when dealing with depression. She looks forward to seeing the shame around mental health issues fall away — and if talking about it publicly helps, she’s willing to do it. “I’m not looking to vomit my entire life onto the internet,” she said in a recent interview. “But I do feel it’s very appropriate, especially for so many young people who feel alone, the way I felt alone, to talk about anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder and panic disorder and depression and all the other things that many of us deal with, you know, when we’re teenagers and even when we’re adults.” Tony Award winner John Leguizamo agrees that famous people speaking out can help to de-stigmatize mental health issues, but it’s also something that needs to be taught at home. “We have to have a little more compassion. First of all, it starts with how you talk to your kids about how to show compassion and empathy to anybody who is different than you or is experiencing any sort of difficulty,” Leguizamo said. He added: “I think that’s where it starts, then you have to have legislation to help them get the help they deserve.” ___ This story has been corrected to show the hashtag is #MyYoungerSelf not #YourYoungerSelf. ___ AP Entertainment Writers Alicia Rancilio and Ryan Pearson contributed to this report.
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10815
|
Magnet device aims to treat depression patients
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"For people suffering from severe depression who have not responded to medical treatment, the idea that a non-invasive procedure is now available is welcome news. On October 8, 2008, the FDA announced that they had cleared transcranial magnetic stimulation, or TMS, for patients who had not responded to antidepressant therapy. However, because TMS is not an implantable device, the FDA was merely required to clear the device on the basis that it was ""safe and equivalent"" to electro-shock therapy. The ruling does not claim that TMS is effective, and many questions remain about just how much benefit TMS provides compared to existing treatments. This story does not exaggerate the seriousness or prevalence of depression and thereby avoids disease mongering. The story is also clear to point out that the FDA approval is specifically for people who have failed first-line treatment with medication. The story could have done more to explain that TMS is not for people who have mild depression or who have not attempted other forms of treatment first. The story does a good job of describing the costs of TMS, which are significantly higher than medication, and of describing the novelty of TMS. Although TMS itself is not new, it has only recently been studied as a possible treatment, rather than just a research tool. The story does provide some quantification of benefits of TMS, describing what percentage of subjects scored significantly better on standard depression scores after treatment with TMS compared to sham. However, it was not clear from the story what ""significantly better"" meant and if that translates into real clinical differences for the patient. The story mentions antidepressants and shock therapy but does not mention other very effective treatments for depression, including psychotherapy, either in combination with medication or by itself, and self-help techniques. Nor does the story explain that there are many different antidepressants and if a patient does not respond to one drug, other drugs can be tried before resorting to TMS. In addition, the story misrepresents shock therapy as a ""last resort"" treatment. While shock therapy isn’t the first choice for many people, it could be a reasonable choice in certain clinical situation. Describing shock therapy in this way may be harmful to patients and families who are considering shock therapy at a time when it is likely to help. Furthermore, while the story describes the study and points out that the FDA had many concerns about it, the story does not describe what those concerns were. The story does explain that a new study should provide better data, but does not mention that this approval comes after a prior panel found insufficient evidence to support TMS. That the story focused only on the current study and FDA decision without putting it into context of the whole body of literature on the subject is problematic. Also, the story mentions that TMS was recently approved. However, the story should have emphasized that it is still considered experimental in spite of the approval and its availability is limited to a few research centers. Finally, the story quotes two experts who are both involved in the research on TMS in depression. The story should have quoted additional experts who do not have a stake in the outcome to provide some much needed balance. The story did not explicitly address whether the researchers had any financial conflict of interest."
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mixture
|
"The story does a good job of describing the costs of TMS. The story does provide some quantification of benefits of TMS. Specifically, it describes what percentage of subjects scored significantly better on standard depression scores after treatment with TMS compared to sham. However, it was not clear from the story what ""significantly better"" meant and if that translates into real clinical differences for the patient. The story describes TMS as ""very safe"" and lacking the harms of shock therapy, such as seizures or memory problems. While this may be true, the story does not explain that there is a lot we don’t know about the long-term effects of this treatment. Since this treatment is so new and has not been studied in a large number of patients, we don’t know what adverse effects will be revealed when it is used in more people and for longer durations. The story mentions headaches as a side effect of therapy, but does not describe if they were severe or mild or how common they were. While the story describes the study and points out that the FDA had many concerns about it, the story does not describe what those concerns were. The story does explain that a new study should provide better data, but does not mention that this approval comes after a prior panel found insufficient evidence to support TMS. That the story focused only on the current study and FDA decision without putting it into context of the whole body of literature on the subject is problematic. The story does not exaggerate the seriousness or prevalence of depression. The story is also clear to point out that the FDA approval is specifically for people who have failed first-line treatment with medication. The story could have done more to explain that TMS is not for people who have mild depression or who have not attempted other forms of treatment first. The story quotes two experts who are both involved in the research on TMS in depression. The story should have quoted additional experts who do not have a stake in the outcome to provide some much needed balance. The story mentions antidepressants and shock therapy but does not mention other very effective treatments for depression, including psychotherapy, either in combination with medication or by itself, and self-help techniques. Nor does the story explain that there are many different antidepressants and if a patient does not respond to one drug, other drugs can be tried before resorting to TMS. Further, the story misrepresents shock therapy as a ""last resort"" treatment. While shock therapy isn’t the first choice for many people, it could be a reasonable choice in certain clinical situations. Describing shock therapy in this way may be harmful to patients and families who are considering shock therapy at a time when it is likely to help. The story mentions that transcranial magnetic stimulation was recently approved. However, the story should have emphasized that it is still considered experimental in spite of the approval and has availability limited to a few research centers. The story does a good job of describing the novelty of TMS. Although TMS itself is not new, it has only recently been studied as a possible treatment, rather than just a research tool. We can’t be sure if the story relied on a press release as the sole source of information."
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14554
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Malawi has just 300 doctors for 16 million people.
|
ActionAid UK said that Malawi has 300 doctors to treat 16 million people. A current estimate puts that figure closer to 600. And as experts note, the statistic overlooks the clinical officers and medical assistant who play at least as important a role as physicians, especially in Malawi’s rural areas. That said, relative to the size of the population, Malawi suffers from a critical shortage of health care workers -- of any sort. The numbers ActionAid offered might not be perfect. But the broader point the group is making is largely accurate.
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true
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Global News Service, Public Health, ActionAid UK,
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"Anger over the tax strategies of American multinational corporations isn’t confined to America. Activists and lawmakers in the United Kingdom want to revamp the corporate tax law there, too. They argue, it wouldn’t just benefit British taxpayers, but it also would help some of the poorest nations. Thanks to treaties in the United Kingdom they say, multinational companies do a dandy job of avoiding taxes on their operations in developing countries. This makes it even harder for these nations to meet the basic needs of their people. ActionAid UK, an international anti-poverty group, drove home the point with a tweet that said ""Malawi has just 300 doctors for 16 million people."" For the record, the tweet appears to slightly undercount the population of Malawi -- a country surrounded by Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique. The World Bank estimated the nation's population at 16.7 million in 2014. The CIA World Factbook estimates a 2015 population nearing 18 million. The heart of this claim, however, is the number of doctors in the country. That’s worthy of a deeper look. The doctor tally We contacted ActionAid UK but did not hear back. The most likely source behind the group’s statement is the World Health Organization’s Global Health Observatory. But the WHO’s most recent data for Malawi comes from 2008. The Medical Council of Malawi has lists of every person licensed to practice in Malawi. They include doctors, nurses, physician assistants, dentists and more. You can see a list of new registrations here, and a longer list that goes back many years. Taken at face value, there are more than 620 doctors, surgeons, pediatricians and other specialists in Malawi. (This includes some foreign doctors, and excludes physicians who applied solely on a temporary basis.) But that’s at least a little bit off. Some of the names have been on the list for over 20 years. While those people might still be practicing in Malawi, there’s no guarantee that they are and research shows that after about five years of working in the country, some doctors decide to leave, or shift into work that doesn’t involve treating patients. Still, Adamson Mulla, a professor of epidemiology and public health at the University of Malawi, told us while the list has its flaws, it’s more accurate than ActionAid UK’s estimate. ""The wisdom that there are 300 doctors in Malawi looks silly,"" Mulla said. Now whether the number is 300 or closer to 600, the count pales relative to the country’s 16.7 million people. But the claim further ignores trained medical professionals who are not doctors. Malawi’s clinical officers and medical assistants Helen de Pinho, an assistant professor of public health at Columbia University, has studied Malawi’s health care system. De Pinho takes issue with the simplicity of the ActionAid message. ""If you are trying to assess availability of clinical skills then just looking at doctors is misleading,"" de Pinho said. ""We should also look at the number of medical assistants and clinical officers trained and deployed."" Medical assistants provide basic primary care in clinics. Clinical officers have at least four years of training in internal medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynaecology and surgery. ""They are able to do basic and emergency surgery including caesarean sections, and in rural districts, perform over 95 percent of the c-sections,"" de Pinho said. ""The clinical officers really are the backbone of the clinical services, especially in the more rural district hospitals."" The Medical Council rolls show 925 clinical officers. If we add their ranks to the number of doctors, there would be about 1,400 doctors and clinical officers. If we include the 836 medical assistants, the number rises to over 2,000. Another researcher of Malawi’s health care system, Kate Mandeville at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, told us that unlike physicians, clinical officers and medical assistant are far more likely to stay and work in Malawi. So the Medical Council roster is more accurate for these health care providers. A shortage remains The ActionAid tally of doctors overlooks the bulk of the health care workforce in Malawi, but to be sure, at the end of the day, the country still lags far behind other nations. In round figures, Malawi has 0.12 health care workers for every 1,000 people ( totalling doctors, clinical officers and medical assistants.) Roughly speaking and relying on WHO data, Kenya has about 10 times as many skilled professionals as Malawi (about 1.1 health care workers for every 1,000.) Nigeria, the continent’s largest economy, has about 2.1 workers for every 1,000. South Africa, the second largest economy, has 7.6. Mandeville told us that the number of doctors, along with other clinicians, is ""far too low."" Yet she urged caution in putting too much stock in that yardstick. ""The 300 figure has the most shock value, but scaling up the number of doctors alone is unlikely to have much impact on population health outcomes,"" Mandeville said. Our ruling ActionAid UK said that Malawi has 300 doctors to treat 16 million people. A current estimate puts that figure closer to 600. And as experts note, the statistic overlooks the clinical officers and medical assistant who play at least as important a role as physicians, especially in Malawi’s rural areas. That said, relative to the size of the population, Malawi suffers from a critical shortage of health care workers -- of any sort. The numbers ActionAid offered might not be perfect. But the broader point the group is making is largely accurate."
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Officials: Multistate hepatitis A cases traced to berries.
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A hepatitis A outbreak in Nebraska, Indiana and Wisconsin has been traced to blackberries sold in Fresh Thyme grocery stores and federal authorities on Wednesday warned consumers in 11 states against eating some berries bought from that chain.
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true
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Health, General News, Hepatitis, Nebraska
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The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services said in a news release that the outbreak began several weeks ago in Nebraska. The department said it, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are investigating and have confirmed 11 cases of the virus, including six in Nebraska. Fresh Thyme said in a written statement that it’s cooperating with the investigation, working to identify its suppliers and isolate the source of the contamination. “At this time, there is no reason to believe that any of the product was contaminated via handling in our stores,” the company said. The FDA urged consumers in Nebraska, Indiana, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, Minnesota, Ohio and Pennsylvania to not to eat any fresh blackberries bought from Fresh Thyme between Sept. 9 and Sept. 30. Anyone who froze the berries for later use should throw them out, the FDA said. Hepatitis A is a virus that infects the liver and can cause mild, flu-like symptoms for several weeks.
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