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41182
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Drinking a glass of water before going to bed helps prevent stroke and heart attacks.
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There’s some evidence that keeping hydrated can help prevent coronary heart disease and help improve stroke outcomes. But we found no evidence specifying that drinking water before bed was particularly beneficial.
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unproven
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online
|
Drinking a glass of water 30 minutes before a meal helps digestion. Drinking water can help digestion, but we’ve not seen evidence that specifically drinking water 30 minutes before eating helps more than drinking water at other times. Drinking a glass of water before taking a bath helps lower blood pressure. There is no evidence for this. Drinking a glass of water before going to bed helps prevent stroke and heart attacks. There’s some evidence that keeping hydrated can help prevent coronary heart disease and help improve stroke outcomes. But we found no evidence specifying that drinking water before bed was particularly beneficial. Claim 1 of 4
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3742
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UW Hospital now has 14 cases of Legionnaires’ and 3 deaths.
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A Legionnaires’ disease outbreak linked to UW Hospital’s water system has infected 14 people with the pneumonia-like bacteria, and three have died.
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true
|
Wisconsin, Health, Legionnaires disease, Pneumonia, Disease outbreaks
|
Hospital spokeswoman Lisa Brunette tells the Wisconsin State Journal that the patients who died had other serious, life-limiting health conditions. One patient remains hospitalized. A hospital official has said the cases appear to be linked to a recent decision to reduce water flow at the hospital during low-demand times, which can make the system more vulnerable to bacteria. Regular flow has since resumed, and the hospital has chlorinated the water system. Legionnaires’ is named for a 1976 outbreak at an American Legion convention in Philadelphia that hospitalized more than 200 people and killed 34. ___ Information from: Wisconsin State Journal, http://www.madison.com/wsj
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5143
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Western Wisconsin clinics merge with Planned Parenthood.
|
Three health clinics in western Wisconsin will become Planned Parenthood locations Aug. 19 under a merger.
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true
|
La Crosse, Madison, Wisconsin, Health, General News, Abortion, Sheboygan, Milwaukee
|
None of the Essential Health Clinics in La Crosse, Sparta or Blair will offer abortions under the merger, but they could in the future. Of Planned Parenthood’s 21 existing clinics in Wisconsin, only those in Madison, Milwaukee and Sheboygan offer abortions. The La Crosse Tribune reports Friday that Planned Parenthood has been working with the three clinics for decades and talks of a merger began in recent months. The clinics will offer birth control by mail, online appointment scheduling, greater access to commercial insurance coverage, early pregnancy complication assessments and access to the HPV vaccine. Julaine Appling, president of the anti-abortion group Wisconsin Family Action, calls the merger regrettable because it strengthens Planned Parenthood in Wisconsin.
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33810
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An actress' stage performance as Anne Frank was so bad that audience members yelled 'She's in the attic! when Nazi soldiers arrived onstage.
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In the 1988 Jay McInerney’s novel Story of My Life, Allison’s acting teacher tells the urban legend of an unnamed actress who was being bankrolled by “a rich guy who wanted to make her a big star so he was basically buying her the starring roles in these plays.”
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false
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Entertainment, Actors
|
Just about every field of endeavor whose practioners are necessarily placed in the public eye (e.g., politics, entertainment, sports) has a common set of “denigration legends” — just pick the out-of-favor personality of the moment, slap his or her name into a familiar anecdote, and voilà… you have a ready-made, time-tested, believable “true story” guaranteed to make anyone sound like the one of the biggest boobs on the planet. That such anecdotes are usually fictitious (or at the very least don’t involve the people to whom they are later ascribed) doesn’t seem to detract from the fun. In the acting world, the legend about an actress whose performance in the lead role of a stage production of the The Diary of Anne Frank was so woefully bad that fed-up audience members gleefully shouted “She’s in the attic!” when Nazi soldier characters arrived on stage at the end of the play to haul off the hiding Frank family has been applied to any number of female thespians perceived by the public as talentless hacks who landed starring roles only through their looks and/or their connections, not because of their (marginal) acting abilities: Example: [Burns, 1996] In one of my films they had a young bit player who was very pretty, but a terrible actress. However, she was very ambitious and decided that if she got some experience in the theater, it would help her career. Fortunately, she had a wealthy boyfriend who backed a road company of The Diary of Anne Frank just so she could play the leading role — Anne Frank. Before the opening in Cleveland, Ohio, they had three weeks of intensive rehearsals, and every day was more and more frustrating for the director. The actress was impossible. She couldn’t remember her lines, her delivery was amateurish, and the more she rehearsed, the worse she got. The director was ready to quit the show, but she told him she was a poor rehearser. “Believe me,” she assured him, “when I face that opening-night audience, it’ll all come together.” She invited me to the opening night, but I was not all that anxious to see her perform, and I had even less desire to be in Cleveland in February. A friend of hers and mine did go, and later he told me what I’d missed. When the curtain went up she blew her opening lines, and her performance went downhill from then on. By the intermission the audience was totally fed up with her. Then, in the first scene in the second act, when the Nazi soldiers broke into the home, overturning furniture and shouting, “Where is she? Where’s Anne Frank? !” the whole audience yelled back, “She’s in the attic!” Throughtout the 1980s and 1990s, this anecdote was most persistently associated with actress/singer Pia Zadora (although for a brief period it was also attached to Vanna White, the letter-turning hostess of television’s Wheel of Fortune game show, who received scathing reviews when she tried her hand at acting by starring as Venus in the 1988 made-for-TV movie Goddess of Love). Why Pia Zadora? At the time, Ms. Zadora was a well known celebrity of modest talent who had achieved prominence through the efforts of a wealthy benefactor. Her acting career consisted mainly of small, unimportant parts in Broadway productions until she married Meshulam Riklis, a mega-millionaire thirty years her senior, in 1977. Through her well-to-do husband’s influence, Pia became a familiar face due to her appearances as the Dubonnet Girl in print ads and television commercials for the Dubonnet brand of apéritif wines (which were distributed by a company owned by Riklis) and eventually landed a role in the 1981 film Butterfly, a performance that won her a Golden Globe award as 1981’s “Best New Star of the Year.” However, rumors soon begin to circulate that Pia’s husband had “bought” her Golden Globe award by funding lavish junkets to Las Vegas for members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, and outside the Golden Globe community Pia’s Butterfly performance was somewhat less critically acclaimed, garnering her two Golden Raspberry awards (commonly known as “Razzies“) in 1982 for “Worst Actress” and “Worst New Star.” She then achieved even more notoriety by winning the “Worst Actress” award again the following year for her lead role in the film version of Harold Robbins’ The Lonely Lady, a movie that was nominated for a record eleven Golden Raspberry Awards (including “Worst Picture of the Decade”). That pair of dubious performances led to Ms. Zadora’s being named the Golden Raspberrys’ “Worst New Star of the Decade” for 1980-1989. Whatever one might think of Pia Zadora’s acting abilities (save for a few bit parts, her film career ended with 1984’s Voyage of the Rock Aliens), this tale doesn’t ring true about her: she never had a starring role in a stage version of The Diary of Anne Frank — on Broadway, off-Broadway, or anywhere else. Moreover, every telling of this anecdote we’ve encountered is either related in a vague, indefinite way (i.e., it involved some unnamed actress and took place sometime in the indefinite past) or was clearly a case of someone’s repeating a good story he heard as if it were an event he actually witnessed. Take, for example, the version of this legend cited at the head of this article, which appeared in a book written by comedian George Burns in 1996. It’s highly unlikely that, as he claimed, George Burns ever made a movie with an actress who was taunted by the audience while she was playing the lead in The Diary of Anne Frank, as Burns didn’t appear in a theatrical film between 1939 (before Anne Frank even started keeping a diary) and 1975 (by which time this legend was already well-traveled). Moreover, at no point in a standard staging of The Diary of Anne Frank do Nazi soldiers or German police characters appear on stage looking for Anne Frank and inquiring into her whereabouts — they’re simply an unseen presence heard pounding on the downstairs door of the annex in which the Frank family and other fugitives are hiding at the end of the play’s penultimate scene, and thus there’s no chance for the “She’s in the attic!” punchline to be delivered live as a jeering taunt. This legend is an amusing but apocryphal “bad actress” story. Sightings: In an episode of TV’s The Golden Girls, Dorothy Zbornak (Bea Arthur) delivers this legend as a standard put-down of an actress her roommates have engaged for the lead in a community theatre production:
|
36853
|
Chelsea Clinton’s apartment is a secret medical facility that Hillary Clinton visits to get treatment for conditions that she keeps hidden from the public.
|
Japan’s Tohoku Electric Power said on Wednesday it has won initial regulatory approval to restart a reactor at its Onagawa power plant, more than 8 years after it was damaged in the earthquake and tsunami that caused the Fukushima disaster.
|
unproven
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Politics
|
Tohoku Electric said in a statement it has received a first green light from Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority to restart the No. 2 reactor at Onagawa, subject to a public consultation period. Onagawa was the closest among Japan’s nuclear stations to the epicenter of the magnitude-9 quake in March 2011, which triggered a tsunami that killed nearly 20,000 people, as well as causing the worst atomic disaster since Chernobyl in 1986. The station was swamped by the tsunami, but survived with its cooling system intact, saving its reactors from the threat of meltdowns similar to those that occurred at Tokyo Electric Power’s Fukushima Daiichi station to the south. Further approvals will be required before the restart, along with the consent of local authorities, which is not guaranteed. The reactor is a boiling water reactor (BWR) with the same basic design as those that melted down in the Fukushima crisis. Tohoku Electric expects to spend 340 billion yen ($3.1 billion) on safety upgrades at the Onagawa plant, including for a wall stretching 800 meters (2,625-ft) in length and standing as tall as 29 meters above sea level to protect it from tsunamis. Restarting the No. 2 reactor will save the utility 35 billion yen each year in fuel costs, he said. The Fukushima disaster led to the eventual shutdown of the country’s then-54 operational reactors, which once provided nearly a third of Japan’s electricity. All had to be relicensed under new standards after the disaster highlighted operational and regulatory failings. While the approval will be a boost for Japan’s resurgent nuclear industry, the sector will still miss a government target of providing at least a fifth of the country’s electricity by 2030, an analysis by Reuters showed last year. Nine reactors have been restarted, all of them pressurized water reactors located far from Tokyo, while the stigma of Fukushima still hangs over use of the older BWR technology. The issue of nuclear safety in Japan was highlighted again earlier this week when Pope Francis - who met victims of the Fukushima nuclear disaster while in Japan over the weekend - said nuclear energy should not be used until there are ironclad guarantees that it is safe for people and the environment. For a graphic on status of Japan's reactor fleet: here
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9371
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Laughing gas makes a comeback for women in labor - like Kate Middleton
|
Is nitrous oxide (“laughing gas”) — which is frequently used to treat labor pain in other countries — gaining more acceptance in the U.S., where more aggressive pain management has traditionally been the norm? In answering this question this story draws on many sources to mostly tout the benefits of nitrous, but falls short in providing readers — many who would be interested mothers — in two areas: Research findings addressing these concerns should have been included. Or, if such research hasn’t been conducted, the story should have made this clear. The story is otherwise well-rounded and did a job particularly on costs, sourcing, and availability. The U.S. approach to labor and delivery is arguably one of the most expensive, high-tech, and medicalized in the world. According to a New York Times analysis, the charges for delivering babies in this country have tripled since 1996, and maternity and newborn expenses are now “the single biggest category of hospital payouts for most commercial insurers and state Medicaid programs.” Issues surrounding pain management during delivery are contentious, highly personal, and potentially both expensive and fraught with concerns about complications. This means that any interventions that offer affordable and safe options have the potential to improve patient satisfaction and patient outcomes. Stories about such interventions (like using nitrous for pain management) mean a great deal to mothers — and our health care system — and should include details about the strength of the evidence behind the claims.
|
true
|
birth
|
The cost of nitrous oxide for use during labor in one facility ($250) is included. It’s also mentioned that most insurance plans won’t cover it. A bonus that may have been appreciated by readers would have been comparing its price to the two most common approaches for managing labor pain (in the US): epidurals and IV narcotics. The story lists these benefits: But these benefits are presented anecdotally. This is unsatisfactory because — as the story rightly points out — there is extensive experience with the obstetric use of nitrous oxide in Great Britain, Finland, Canada, and Australia. Providing supportive evidence from this international experience is highly relevant. It’s mentioned: “Nitrous comes with some caveats. It can cause nausea and dizziness. It also interacts with vitamin B12, so women with a deficiency of the nutrient shouldn’t use the gas … but studies — and generations of use worldwide — have not found complications or long-term problems.” This is enough for a satisfactory rating. However, we’re left asking: where’s the evidence? Some research findings to support a midwife’s statement in a review that nitrous is “safe for the mother, fetus, and neonate” would be salient for many expecting mothers. It’s also important to point out that if you Google “nitrous oxide & harms” you will come across a much larger list of harms, some of them quite ominous. But most of these occur in the setting of the prolonged and extensive abuse of recreational nitrous oxide (aka “whippets”). But, presumably, the obstetric use of nitrous — which is a brief exposure to limited doses — would pose much less risk. Mentioning this would help clarify things. This story never cites a specific study (though it quickly mentions a literature review), nor does it provide links to several existing studies documenting benefits and harms. On the one hand, this article relies heavily on the anecdotal support of benefits (more so than harms); but on the other hand, we’re told that neither the American Society of Anesthesiologists nor the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have official positions on the use of nitrous. Why is that? Does it have something to do with the balance of benefits vs. harms? Not including evidence makes that question difficult for readers to answer. None. The story employs several independent sources. A minor point, but it would have been helpful to hear from a source from one of the countries where using nitrous oxide during labor is far more commonplace, and for an ACOG spokesperson to comment on the lack of guidance on using it during labor. Although not strictly conflict of interest issues, the article rightly points out two advocacy considerations. First, that many midwives are advocating for nitrous as a low-tech option at a time when labor and delivery are becoming increasingly medicalized. Second, that some hospitals are approaching nitrous as a marketing tool; presumably to position themselves as low-tech-friendly. The story does well to provide relevant historical and cultural context; namely, that the traditional approach to labor pain in the US is biased toward epidural anesthesia, despite the fact that nitrous oxide is a common alternative in other countries. Given the current opioid epidemic in this country, it may have been timely to mention the extensive use of narcotics in managing labor pain in the US. It’s mentioned that currently “an estimated 500 U.S. hospitals and birthing centers offer nitrous — up from a handful less than a decade ago.” It’s well established that obstetric nitrous oxide is widely used in several countries. The story doesn’t appear to rely upon a news release.
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9945
|
Ibuprofen May Help Stave Off Parkinson’s
|
"This kind of study can’t prove cause-and-effect. No such explanation was given in the story. This study isn’t published, isn’t peer-reviewed yet, and won’t even be presented in a talk at a meeting for two months yet. The story discusses a 40 percent risk reduction. 40 percent of what? From what to what? How you frame a story is so important. Putting ""may stave off Parkinson’s"" in the headline, and quoting a doctor who said he would ""definitely discuss ibuprofen use"" with his patients – without strong caveats – is troubling in this story."
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mixture
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"Not applicable. Costs not discussed but most people know that ibuprofen products are inexpensive. We also continue to be puzzled by the number of stories that use only relative risk reduction figures, not absolute risk reduction figures. We have a brief primer on this topic. The point is that when the story discusses ""40 percent lower risk,"" we need to know 40 percent of what? The story did at least mention that ""persistent use of ibuprofen can lead to gastritis, or inflammation of the stomach lining."" We continue to be puzzled by the number of stories – like this one – that don’t find a way to at least briefly mention the limitations of some studies. This story, for example, never mentioned that this was a a meta-analysis – a study of previously published studies. Look at how MedPageToday.com published caveats: No disease mongering of Parkinson’s Disease. One independent source was quoted. But we’re troubled by the story letting that source get away with saying he would ""definitely discuss ibuprofen use"" with his patients – because it would be very easy to find other sources who would say it’s far too early to discuss ibuprofen use with their patients. In fact, a MedPageToday.com story stated that the lead researcher himself said ""that it’s too early to make any clinical recommendations based on the observational data, which not only need confirmation in prospective trials but also cannot prove causality."" Although the story mentioned that levodopa is the current standard treatment for Parkinson’s, there was no discussion of any other research into prevention of Parkinson’s Disease. The story states that ibuprofen is a common anti-inflammatory drug. The story failed to put the new analysis into the context of existing research, as MedPageToday.com did, for example: One independent source was quoted, so it’s clear the story didn’t rely solely on a news release."
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10413
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Diabetes Drug Shown to Slow Plaque Buildup
|
"The Wall Street Journal often does such fine work; it is hard to understand why it sometimes turns to ""briefs"" like this 237-word story that falls short on many of our criteria. This story reports on a study presented at this week’s American College of Cardiology meeting showing that Actos stopped the progression of plague build up in diabetics with heart disease. These results are intriguing because diabetics are at very high risk of cardiovascular complications. This short story does not provide much in the way of useful information to the reader. The story does not quantify the benefits of Actos, nor does the story mention any harms or costs of treatment. The story does not quote any experts who could have provided some valuable perspective on the importance of the new findings. Although the study mentions glimepiride as an alternative to Actos, it does not mention other options nor does it discuss the pros and cons of the alternatives. The story could have emphasized that the study looked at surrogate outcomes, not actual cases of heart disease, which limits the conclusions that can be made from the study. Furthermore, the story does not comment on the fact that the story was presented at a meeting and not published in a peer-reviewed journal and appears to have been funded by the drug company that produces Actos. Not peer-reviewed and industry-funded should have been two red flags that the story should have pointed out to readers."
|
false
|
The story does not mention the costs of Actos or other diabetes drugs. The story does not quantify the benefits of treatment. Nor does the story mention that the clinical implications of plaque regression are unknown. The story does not mention any harms of the drug. The story gives some description of the design of the current study. However the story could have emphasized that the study looked at surrogate outcomes (or intermediate endpoints), not actual cases of heart disease, which limits the conclusions that can be made from the study. Furthermore, the story does not comment on the fact that the story was presented at a meeting and not published in a peer-reviewed journal and appears to have been funded by the drug company that produces Actos. We expect stories to explain the pitfalls of reporting on such conference presentations and offer a primer on this topic. The story does not exagerrate the seriousness or prevalence of diabetes or atherosclerosis. The story could have done more to distinguish the surrogate outcome of plague buildup from actual cardiovascular outcomes. The story does not quote any experts who could have provided some valuable perspective on the importance of the new findings. This is particularly important for industry sponsored trials. Although the study mentions glimepiride as an alternative to Actos, it does not mention other options nor does it discuss the pros and cons of the alternatives. In particular, it would have been nice to know if any of the other classes of medications used to control glycemia are associated with reductions in plaque formation. The story does not describe the availability of Actos. The story accurately represents the novelty of Actos, although this is not the only drug in this class of drugs. There is no way to know if the story relied on a press release as the sole source of information.
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4653
|
2019 Report: Arkansas’ cannabis shops rake in $28 million.
|
Arkansas dispensaries sold about $28 million worth of medical marijuana in the first calendar year of legal sales in the state, according to a state agency.
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true
|
Little Rock, Arkansas, Marijuana, Medical marijuana
|
More than 4,200 pounds (1905 kilograms) of marijuana was bought in the state this year, which accounts for more than $28.13 million in sales, the Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration reported. State regulators expect the industry to take off more early next year as the two remaining growing facilities begin full operations and the remaining dispensaries open to the public, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported. As of Friday, 14 of 32 licensed retailers had opened. Two others in Texarkana received final approval to open in the coming days. Marijuana commissioners have expressed frustration at how long it is taking the 32 dispensaries in the state to open since being licensed this year. Green Springs Medical Dispensary, in Hot Springs, has been a consistent sales leader. As of Thursday, it had sold more than 1000 pounds (453 kilograms) of cannabis, the finance department reported. Following it was the Releaf Center, in Bentonville, which had sold about 502 pounds (227 kilograms) as of Thursday. Dragan Vicentic, Green Springs’ owner, credited the dispensary’s success to being attentive to patients. The dispensary started selling one rotating marijuana product for $5 a gram (.04 ounces) about two months ago after Vicentic consistently heard patients complain that the drug was cheaper on the street. “That’s why we’re No. 1, bro!” Vicentic said. “Just like Walmart, you’ve got a loss leader. This is just one of those things where we say we’re going to sell one item at cost. We just say we’re going to give back to the people that got us here.” The Source, a dispensary in Bentonville, had sold more than 385 pounds (174 kilograms) as of Thursday, the department reported. Harvest, in Conway, had sold about 261 pounds (118 kilograms), and Fort Cannabis, in Fort Smith, had sold more than 15 pounds (6 kilograms) this year. Some parts of the state are without a dispensary, including Little Rock. Both of the dispensaries in the capital city have said they expect to open early next year, but neither had requested final inspection from state regulators as of Friday, said finance department spokesman Scott Hardin. Voters approved an amendment in 2016 to legalize medical marijuana.
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5198
|
Health officials: 1 dead, several sick from Legionnaires’.
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Health officials in western North Carolina say one person has died from Legionnaires’ disease and several others have been sickened.
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true
|
Health, General News, North Carolina, Legionnaires disease, Henderson
|
Kim Horton is a spokeswoman for the Henderson County Department of Public Health. She tells the Citizen Times one person has died from the airborne disease. The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services said in a news release earlier this week that it is working with the health departments in Buncombe and Henderson counties to investigate multiple cases of Legionnaires’ reported in individuals who attended a fair in Fletcher earlier in the month. State Epidemiologist Dr. Zack Moore said in the news release that officials don’t know whether people were exposed to Legionella bacteria at the fair. Legionnaires’ is a form of bacterial pneumonia. It’s a serious illness but can be treated effectively with antibiotics.
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28981
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Irena Sendler, credited with saving 2,500 Polish Jews from the Holocaust, was a candidate for the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize but lost out to Al Gore.
|
Irena Sendler, supposedly a candidate for the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, is credited with saving 2,500 Polish Jews from the Holocaust.
|
mixture
|
Politics War/Anti-War
|
On 12 May 2008, Irena Sendlerowa (commonly known as Irena Sendler) passed away of pneumonia at the age of 98 in Warsaw. Her death prompted the circulation of an online message aimed at informing the many people who remained unfamiliar with her heroic deeds during the Holocaust: There recently was a death of a 98 year old lady named Irena. During WWII, Iliana, got permission to work in the Warsaw Ghetto. She had an ulterior motive… She KNEW what the Nazi’s plans were for the Jews. Iliana smuggled infants out in the bottom of her tool box she carried, and she carried in the back of her truck a Burlap sack, (for larger kids). She also had a dog in the back, that she trained to bark when the Nazi soldiers let her in, and out of the ghetto. The soldiers of course wanted nothing to do with the dog, and the barking covered the kids/infants noises. During her time and course of doing this, she managed to smuggle out and save 2500 kids/infants. She was caught, and the Nazi’s broke both her legs, and arms, and beat her severely. Iliana kept a record of the names of all the kids she smuggled out, and kept them in a glass jar, buried under a tree in her back yard. After the war, she tried to locate any parents that may have survived it, and reunited the family. Most of course had been gassed. Those kids she helped got placed into foster family homes, or adopted. Last year Iliana was up for the Nobel Peace Prize…. She LOST. Al Gore won, for a slide show on Global Warming. Check it out: www.irenasendler.org Irena has often been referred to as “the female Oskar Schindler” in her native Poland for her daring and ingenuity in saving the lives of more than 2,500 Jews (most of them children) in German-occupied Poland during World War II. Unlike Oskar Schindler, whose story was the subject of the Academy Award-winning 1993 film Schindler’s List, Irena Sendler was a relatively unknown figure to the world at large until 1999, when four Kansas high school students wrote and performed “Life in a Jar,” a play about Irena’s life-saving efforts in the Warsaw Ghetto: A Los Angeles Times obituary for Irena described how the Polish social worker passed herself off as a nurse to sneak supplies and aid into (and children out of) the Warsaw Ghetto, and the punishment she endured when she was finally caught by the Nazis: She studied at Warsaw University and was a social worker in Warsaw when the German occupation of Poland began in 1939. In 1940, after the Nazis herded Jews into the ghetto and built a wall separating it from the rest of the city, disease, especially typhoid, ran rampant. Social workers were not allowed inside the ghetto, but Sendler, imagining “the horror of life behind the walls,” obtained fake identification and passed herself off as a nurse, allowed to bring in food, clothes and medicine. By 1942, when the deadly intentions of the Nazis had become clear, Sendler joined a Polish underground organization, Zegota. She recruited 10 close friends — a group that would eventually grow to 25, all but one of them women — and began rescuing Jewish children. She and her friends smuggled the children out in boxes, suitcases, sacks and coffins, sedating babies to quiet their cries. Some were spirited away through a network of basements and secret passages. Operations were timed to the second. One of Sendler’s children told of waiting by a gate in darkness as a German soldier patrolled nearby. When the soldier passed, the boy counted to 30, then made a mad dash to the middle of the street, where a manhole cover opened and he was taken down into the sewers and eventually to safety. Most of the children who left with Sendler’s group were taken into Roman Catholic convents, orphanages and homes and given non-Jewish aliases. Sendler recorded their true names on thin rolls of paper in the hope that she could reunite them with their families later. She preserved the precious scraps in jars and buried them in a friend’s garden. In 1943, she was captured by the Nazis and tortured but refused to tell her captors who her co-conspirators were or where the bottles were buried. She also resisted in other ways. According to Felt, when Sendler worked in the prison laundry, she and her co-workers made holes in the German soldiers’ underwear. When the officers discovered what they had done, they lined up all the women and shot every other one. It was just one of many close calls for Sendler. During one particularly brutal torture session, her captors broke her feet and legs, and she passed out. When she awoke, a Gestapo officer told her he had accepted a bribe from her comrades in the resistance to help her escape. The officer added her name to a list of executed prisoners. Sendler went into hiding but continued her rescue efforts. Felt said that Sendler had begun her rescue operation before she joined the organized resistance and helped a number of adults escape, including the man she later married. “We think she saved about 500 people before she joined Zegota,” Felt said, which would mean that Sendler ultimately helped rescue about 3,000 Polish Jews. When the war ended, Sendler unearthed the jars and began trying to return the children to their families. For the vast majority, there was no family left. Many of the children were adopted by Polish families; others were sent to Israel. Irena Sendler is often claimed to have been a candidate to receive the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, but that honor was not awarded to her. It’s not possible to state categorically that she was “nominated” for the award, since information about Nobel Prize “nominations, investigations, and opinions is kept secret for fifty years.” (Since 1974 the statutes of the Nobel Foundation have stated that “work produced by a person since deceased shall not be considered for an award,” so she presumably could not be subsequently honored.) In 2007, the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded jointly to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and former U.S. Vice-President Albert Arnold (Al) Gore Jr. “for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.” (Al Gore was also involved with another significant award in 2007, when An Inconvenient Truth, a documentary about his campaign to make the issue of global warming a recognized problem worldwide, claimed an Academy Award as “Best Documentary Feature.”) The International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW) expressed its disappointment that Irena Sendler had not yet been honored with a Nobel Prize: IFSW sends congratulations to Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on winning the Nobel Peace Prize 2007. The issue of climate change is affecting all individuals and societies and it is a more than worthy cause to help begin the change in our lifestyle to prevent destruction of our planet. Social workers know from daily experience that this is an immediate and pressing social and personal issue. ‘However IFSW is deeply saddened that the life work of Nobel nominee Irena Sendler, social worker, did not receive formal recognition’, said David N. Jones, IFSW President. ‘Irena Sendler and her helpers took personal risks day after day to prevent the destruction of individual lives — the lives of the children of the Warsaw ghetto. This work was done very quietly, without many words and at the risk of their lives. This is so typical of social work, an activity which changes and saves lives but is done out of the glare of publicity and often at personal risk. IFSW recognises her again and at the same time celebrates the commitment and dedication of thousands of social workers around the world who also bring hope and care to people often living on the edge of despair.’
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7974
|
Pentagon looking to provide up to 100,000 body bags for civilians in virus outbreak.
|
The Pentagon is looking to provide up to 100,000 body bags for use by civilian authorities as the coronavirus outbreak worsens in the United States with a high death toll expected in coming weeks.
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true
|
Health News
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The Federal Emergency Management Agency has requested 100,000 such bags to the U.S. Department of Defense, a Pentagon official told Reuters on Wednesday. The Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) is working with the current contractor on additional capacity, the official said. The initial delivery will come from DLA stocks as the contractor ramps up production, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The DLA does not yet have a specific delivery date request from FEMA, but the agency wants the bags as soon as they are ready. Bloomberg had reported earlier that the Pentagon was looking at buying more body bags and that it will draw some initially from a stockpile of 50,000 that it maintains. A FEMA spokesman cited by Bloomberg said that the agency was making “prudent” plans for future needs, which included preparations for “mortuary contingencies” from U.S. states. The Troop Support unit of DLA is responsible for managing the Pentagon’s stockpile of the green nylon, 94-inch by 38-inch body bags, which are normally used in war zones. The development comes as the United States is looking at an increasing number of deaths from the coronavirus outbreak, with Reuters’ tally showing more than 4,500 deaths and over 200,000 infections in the country. President Donald Trump and his top healthcare advisers urged Americans to follow strict social distancing measures ahead of a “tough two weeks” that could see at least 100,000 deaths from the coronavirus.
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10127
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Gene Therapy Shows Progress: Melanoma Is Halted in 2 Men, Cancer Researchers Report
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This story presents the results of an experimental approach to treating virulent forms of melanoma while tempering the enthusiasm that the results of this one study might generate. Although it is striking that the two patients who survived would have likely succumbed to the disease without the experimental intervention, it is important to remain aware that 15 of the 17 treated patients died. This article presented both of these important pieces of information. While this new experimental approach is of interest, it is important to be mindful that the majority of individuals diagnosed with melanoma are successfully treated using conventional methods. And the story did not mention that at least some of these treatments were used in conjunction with the experimental approach in this study. The article did not point out that this treatment was only for those melanomas which were not responsive to these conventional approaches. Although gene therapy continues to hold promise, the article provided a helpful framework for understanding that such promise will likely be slow and, to date, has not yet led to successful cancer treatments.
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false
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There was no estimate of the costs for this kind of individualized cancer treatment. It is appropriate that the story mentioned that although the two men who appear to have responded to the treatment were still alive, it was still too early to conclude that they could be categorized as ‘cured’. The article cautioned that even after 5 years, when the cancer might be considered cured, it could still reoccur. The article also pointed out that this success was seen in only 2 of the 17 individuals receiving this treatment; the other 15 had died. However, the article did not mention the success rate of currently available therapies for melanoma, nor the historic mortality rate. Without knowing the mortality rate with standard therapy for widely metastatic melanomas such as these, it is not possible to quantify the potential benefit of this therapy. There was no mention of harms or side-effects that have been experienced with this form of treatment. The article mentions that the results were published in a recent online issue of the journal Science. The article did mention that published results did not contain many details about the patients in whom this experimental approach appeared to be successful. But the paper could have found that information before publishing the story. The article did not mention that the results presented were actually part of a clinical trial which was not yet complete. Cancer has a scary connotation for most people. This story failed to inform the viewer about how common death from melanoma was. While they presented an estimate for the number of Americans that will be diagnosed with melanoma in 2006 (~ 60,000) there was no mention that it is estimated that there would be <8,000 deaths attributable to melanoma. This information is helpful for recognizing that melanoma is much less common and deadly than a number of other diseases. This article included helpful comments from clinicians familiar with the experimental approach but who were not directly involved with this particular study. They help to temper the enthusiasm of the principal investigator on this project and to balance the piece. There was no mention of the use of autologous tumor infiltrating lymphocyte treatment which, although effective in roughly half the patients for whom it is an option, is not a possibility for all patients. There was no mention of the surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and biologic therapy that are currently used in the treatment of melanoma. The story did not mention that at least some of these treatments were used in conjunction with the experimental treatment. The article states that for now only 17 patients have undergone the experimental approach as part of an ongoing and novel study and mentions that the researchers have recently applied to the FDA for approval to conduct a clinical trial in several hundred patients. If approval is obtained, then it is possible that patients without other treatment options might be able to participate in the trial. The article did not specifically state that the approach is not widely available yet, but this can be inferred. However it is important for patients to understand that participation in a trial is not the same as receiving treatment. The approach of using cells from a patient’s own immune system, engineered to recognize a specific marker protein on the surface of the tumor cells as part of a therapeutic approach to the treatment of cancer is an area of active investigation. This is a first report of success with this type of approach. This article does not appear to rely exclusively on a press release as its sole source of information
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8108
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Ireland tightens coronavirus restrictions, boosts rescue package.
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Ireland banned all non-essential travel within the country and shut non-essential retail on Tuesday to battle coronavirus as it significantly increased income support for those already left unemployed and workers at risk of joining them.
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true
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Health News
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The additional financial measures will cost an initial 3.7 billion euros over the next 12 weeks, on top of the 3 billion euros already committed to boost sick pay, fund the health service and offer assistance to businesses. Prime Minister Leo Varadkar asked people to stay at home “if at all possible” and only leave home to go to work, if they cannot work from home and attendance is essential. “You should only go to the shops for essential supplies, out for medical or dental appointments, or to care for others, or to take physical exercise,” Varadkar told a news conference. “I wouldn’t use the term lockdown and that’s for very good reasons. I think it’s a term that actually causes more confusion rather than clarity and is one I wouldn’t use and don’t intend to use in future.” The number of cases in Ireland rose to 1,329 on Tuesday from 1,125 a day earlier as a seventh person died. Over the open land border in British-run Northern Ireland, cases rose to 172 from 148 with five deaths. Ireland was among the first European countries to close schools, universities and childcare facilities almost two weeks ago but has resisted the kind of stricter measures neighbouring Britain announced on Monday, hoping it can get on top of the virus through social distancing and a ramping up of testing. With school closures extended to April 19, theatres, clubs, gyms, bookmakers and hairdressers were told to close, organised social events banned and gatherings outdoors limited to no more than four people, unless all are from the same household. While most restaurants have voluntarily shut their doors after the shutdown of pubs 10 days ago, Varadkar said cafes and restaurants can stay open, provided they limit their service to take away food. While the government has said most people are adhering to the advice to keep their distance from one another - as seen in deserted streets in major cities - the gathering of crowds in parks and beaches at the weekend means there will be an increased police presence in public parks. The financial package increased the weekly unemployment emergency payment announced two weeks ago to 350 euros from 203 euros. The state will also pay 70% of workers’ wages - up to a maximum of 410 euros per week - for firms who can show their income has fallen by 25% and can try pay the rest of the salary. Over 100,000 people have sought the payment for those who have lost jobs or had hours in the space of a week. Employment Affairs Minister Regina Doherty said her estimate offered just a week ago that 400,000 people - over 15% of the workforce - could lose their jobs “might have been conservative.” Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe said the projected budget surplus of 0.7% of gross domestic product achieved in 2019 had already been used up but that with strong cash balances, Ireland was well placed to significantly increase borrowing activity in the coming months and years to pay for the measures. Davy Stockbrokers chief economist Conall MacCoille estimated that unemployment could rocket to 10% from 4.8% currently but that Ireland could afford to run a budget deficit of between 4 and 7% without impacting its credit rating. The key issue, he said, was how long the squeeze on resources will last. The recently departed head of Ireland’s independent fiscal watchdog said the exchequer implications would be “massive”. “We’re going to have a massive deficit blow up in a very, very short period of time and government debt is going to increase significantly,” economics lecturer Seamus Coffey, whose term ended in December, told national broadcaster RTE.
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35230
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"The television show ""My Secret Terrius"" predicted the 2020 COVID-19 outbreak. "
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The fictional coronavirus in the show is also rather different from the strain of coronavirus (COVID-19) that was spreading around the globe in early 2020. In the show, someone “tweaked” the virus in order to make it more deadly. In reality, that simply isn’t possible. COVID-19 is not a human-made bioweapon. (You can read about that conspiracy theory’s origins and scientific failings here.)
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false
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Entertainment
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In March 2020, social media users started sharing clips from the 2018 South Korean television show “My Secret Terrius,” which supposedly showed characters using the word “coronavirus.” This is crazy . If you are home , go on Netflix now ……. Type “My Secret Terrius” and go to season -1 and episode 10 and move straight to 53 minutes point ! (P.S. this season was made in 2018 and we are in 2020) . This is shocking 😡😡😡 was it a plan ?? pic.twitter.com/KqTZwA1IO2 — Harbhajan Turbanator (@harbhajan_singh) March 26, 2020 This is a real scene from a 2018 show. But while many people may have only heard the word “coronavirus” for the first time in 2020, it has been around for decades. Scientists first identified human coronaviruses in humans in the 1960s. Since then, we’ve seen a few coronavirus outbreaks, such as the MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) outbreak in 2012 and the SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) outbreak in 2002. In a longer version of this clip, the TV doctor explains how these diseases all come from the same group of viruses: In the drama My Secret Terrius that was released in 2018 (UNIQ's sungjoo was among the cast) they talked in details about the corona virus…. I had goosebumps… pic.twitter.com/nuQ3UYZlMR — 아리🦄 (@eoeoes) March 18, 2020
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5470
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Zimbabwe’s capital runs dry as taps cut off for 2M people.
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Tempers flared on Tuesday as more than 2 million residents of Zimbabwe’s capital and surrounding towns found themselves without water after authorities shut down the main treatment plant, raising new fears about disease after a cholera outbreak while the economy crumbles even more.
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true
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AP Top News, Harare, International News, Cholera, General News, Africa, Health, Zimbabwe
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Officials in Harare have struggled to raise foreign currency to import water treatment chemicals; about $2.7 million is needed per month. Meanwhile, water levels in polluted reservoirs are dropping because of drought. For residents who have seen shortages of everything from medicines to bread to petrol in recent months, the latest indignity brought weariness and disgust. “The toilets at school are just too filthy, people continue using them yet there is no water,” said 12-year-old Dylan Kaitano, who was among many uniformed school children waiting in line at wells, some shoving in impatience. “I didn’t go to school today because I have to be here.” Everyone living in Harare is affected, City Council spokesman Michael Chideme said, as residents turned to other options such as bottled water. He called it a dangerous situation because of the risk of water-borne diseases. “It is a desperate situation,” Deputy Mayor Enock Mupamaonde told The Associated Press outside the closed treatment plant. And more people are affected than thought, he said, estimating that another 2 million non-residents enter the city each day to use its services and conduct business. At the Chivero reservoir, the city’s main water supply, plastic bottles, vehicle tires and algae floated in the shallow water which was green and emitted a choking, foul smell. Zimbabwe’s capital now frequently records cases of diseases such as typhoid due to water shortages and dilapidated sewer infrastructure. Some residents for months have been forced to get water from shallow, unsafe wells and defecate in the open, while children pick their way across fetid yards. The AP earlier this month watched some residents pump water then wait a half-hour for enough water to seep into a well to pump again. “We are suffering,” said Gladys Mupemhi, a resident of the low-income Kuwadzana suburb who said some people woke up at 4 a.m. on Tuesday to wait for hours in line. “We are only allowed a maximum of 20 liters of water per person, what can I do with 20 liters?” Claudius Madondo, chairman of the residents association controlling the line, said nearby wells were no longer functioning, forcing the rationing. Some of the people waiting heckled him. “Nothing is working in this country, how do we survive?” Hatineyi Kamwanda, another resident, said. “We can’t even use the toilets, the children are not going to school because of this and now we fear cholera is going to hit us again. “The president should treat us as human beings, we voted for him.” Twenty-six people died last year in a cholera outbreak, leading President Emmerson Mnangagwa to express dismay that Zimbabweans were suffering from a “medieval” disease. The economic and social pressures follow Mnangagwa as he attends the annual United Nations gathering of world leaders this week. Zimbabwe once was a bright spot in southern Africa and a regional breadbasket but the economy has collapsed in recent years, and foreign currency is hard to come by. Prices for many basic items continue to rise, and the public health care system falters as some doctors and others say they can hardly afford the commute to work. As services largely collapse, many Harare residents in recent months have found themselves lining up at wells in the middle of the night for water or lighting their homes by candle or mobile phone. The deepening frustrations have exploded more than once into protests that have swiftly been followed by sometimes violent government crackdowns. More than 50 government critics and activists have been abducted in Zimbabwe this year, at times tortured and warned by suspected state security agents to back off from anti-government actions. The government over the weekend warned against what it calls “fake” abductions it asserts are meant to make it look bad. One abducted woman was forced to drink raw sewage, Human Rights Watch said — a rare example of something that exasperated Harare residents now have in surplus. ___ Follow Africa news at https://twitter.com/AP_Africa
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34449
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"Planned Parenthood enforces ""abortion quotas"" and rewards well-performing employees for promoting abortion services."
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UPDATE: 18 February 2017 — Added notice that, contrary to Planned Parenthood’s statement, Sue Thayer’s lawsuit against the organization has not been completely dismissed.)
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unproven
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Politics, abortion, planned parenthood, zombie outrage
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In February 2017 multiple web outlets covered anti-abortion group Live Action’s claims that the Planned Parenthood organization enforces “abortion quotas” and distributes awards to staff members for achieving what amounts to abortion-related “sales goals.” The claims originated with a 7 February 2017 video clip published by Live Action, depicting an interview between the organization’s Lila Rose and a woman identified as former Planned Parenthood worker Sue Thayer: Thayer’s relationship to Planned Parenthood was not discussed in the video beyond a description of her as a former employee. But a Catholic World Report article reported that Thayer maintained anti-abortion views for the entirety of her 17-year employment with the Planned Parenthood organization: Sue Thayer worked for a Planned Parenthood clinic in Storm Lake, Iowa for 17 years. She began in 1991 as a family planning assistant, and soon became a manager. She joined Planned Parenthood because she was interested in women’s health care, the pay was good, and it was close to her home. Thayer was opposed to abortion, but since it was not performed at her particular clinic, she agreed to work there. However, she had to train at a Des Moines clinic watching a full day of abortions being performed. She said, “It made me want all the more to prevent unplanned pregnancies [through the distribution of contraceptives] … At nine weeks, the baby is fully formed. He has tiny fingernails and facial features. He’s a human being.” According to Planned Parenthood, Thayer unsuccessfully “led [an] effort” to prosecute the organization in Iowa in 2011, alleging Medicaid fraud with respect to the dispensing of birth control pills: Thayer led a failed effort in 2011 claiming Medicaid fraud at the Iowa affiliate related to birth control pills. In 2011, Thayer filed a lawsuit against Planned Parenthood’s Iowa affiliate “under both federal and Iowa False Claims Acts, alleging that Planned Parenthood knowingly committed Medicaid fraud from 2002 to 2009 by seeking improper and even illegal reimbursements from Iowa Medicaid Enterprise and the Iowa Family Planning Network.” The allegations included that Planned Parenthood submitted “repeated false, fraudulent, and/or ineligible [Medicaid] claims for reimbursements.” Thayer claimed that the affiliate “scammed American taxpayers by filing nearly 500,000 fraudulent Medicaid claims over 10 years, netting the organization an illicit $28 million.” A district court judge dismissed the lawsuit in 2012. In August 2014, U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit reinstated Thayer’s “lawsuit against Planned Parenthood of the Heartland.” Later in 2014, the Appeals Court dismissed the case, “finding that [Thayer] failed ‘to provide a single specific example of a particular fraudulent claim Planned Parenthood submitted to the government, let alone any representative examples.’” Although John Jarvey, chief federal judge for southern Iowa, dismissed Thayer’s whole case in 2012, a federal appeals court in 2014 upheld only a portion of his dismissal and sent the rest of the case back to district court, where Jarvey issued a new ruling rejecting some of her claims while allowing others to proceed: For example, the judge dismissed her claim that Planned Parenthood fraudulently billed Medicaid for services for which the agency also received private donations, and for medications for which there was no “valid patient-practitioner relationship.” But the judge declined to dismiss Thayer’s claim that Planned Parenthood defrauded Medicaid by billing for birth-control pills that were dispensed before a physician or nurse practitioner had written specific prescriptions for them. He also declined to dismiss Thayer’s claim that Planned Parenthood illegally billed Medicaid for abortion-related services, such as blood tests and office visits for women who had their pregnancies terminated. Federal law bans Medicaid payment for most abortions. Like Thayer, Anderson accepted a position at Planned Parenthood despite her reservations about the clinic’s operations: From early 2010 through July 2012, Anderson was a nurse who, among other duties, dispersed sedatives intravenously to clients at the Planned Parenthood abortion facility in Indianapolis. That center is the state’s largest provider of abortions. When she started working there, Anderson said she was “on the fence about abortion.” On 8 February 2017, Lila Rose shared a related item via Facebook (reproduced above) showing an award certificate given to a Colorado Planned Parenthood branch commending Aurora for “exceeding abortion visits” in early 2013 over the same period in 2012. The certificate suggests abortion visits are one metric used by Planned Parenthood to gauge clinics’ efficacy in dispensing care, but what other metrics Planned Parenthood uses are unknown, and the photograph doesn’t document any tangible reward given out beyond the certificate itself. Planned Parenthood’s archived response to the photograph when it first circulated in July 2014 was to say: First, and plainly, Planned Parenthood does not have “quotas” for any of our services. …, no, we don’t have quotas. And, yes, we absolutely do celebrate our progress in ensuring that more people have access to the full range of reproductive health care, including abortion. And we always will. We contacted Planned Parenthood about the claims, and a spokesperson reiterated that Planned Parenthood maintains no “quotas” for abortions or any of the other services they provide. Another longtime employee of Planned Parenthood whom we spoke had never heard of abortion quotas throughout the duration of her tenure with the organization.
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14091
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I believe we should have tax on carbon and deal aggressively with climate change. That is not (Hillary Clinton's) position.
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"Sanders said, ""I believe we should have tax on carbon and deal aggressively with climate change. That is not her position."" Unlike Sanders, Clinton doesn’t advocate for a carbon tax. And while Clinton doesn’t go as far as Sanders in her climate change plan, she does have one. The League of Conservation Voters supports her plan as realistic and achievable."
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true
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Environment, National, Cap and Trade, Climate Change, Energy, Bernie Sanders,
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"Bernie Sanders still doesn’t want to talk about Hillary Clinton’s damn emails. Asked for his reaction to the State Department report of Clinton’s use of a private email server, Sanders told Meet the Press’ Chuck Todd that he’d rather talk policy differences. ""Our campaign is about defeating Secretary Clinton on the real issues,"" he responded. ""I want to break up the Wall Street banks. She doesn’t. I want to raise the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour. She wants $12 an hour. I voted against the war in Iraq. She voted for the war in Iraq. I believe we should ban fracking. She does not. I believe we should have tax on carbon and deal aggressively with climate change. That is not her position. Those are some of the issues that I am campaigning on."" Sanders is right about Clinton’s Iraq war vote and where she stands on breaking up banks, a $15 minimum wage and fracking. (For more of their policy differences, read this.) But is he also right about their differences on carbon tax and climate change? There’s no doubt that Sanders’ rhetoric on climate change and his plan to deal with it are aggressive and, unlike Clinton, he has advocated for a carbon tax. Clinton does, however, have a climate change plan. While some environmentalists have said it isn’t tough enough, others have given it positive reviews. Both the Sanders and Clinton campaigns referred us to each candidate’s climate change plan. Sanders’ plan is long and comprehensive. Beyond a tax on carbon, it includes an array of proposals from banning certain drilling and mining practices to improving the national public transit system. Clinton’s plan is shorter and, though it doesn’t include a tax on carbon, contains similar provisions on renewables. Here’s an overview: Sanders’ plan Clinton’s plan Fossil fuel influence • Cut tax subsidies for oil and gas companies • Prohibit fossil fuel lobbyists from working in the White House • Investigate climate change deniers • Cut tax subsidies for oil and gas companies Environmental standards • Enact a tax on carbon • Ban fossil fuel leasing on public lands and promote conservation and habitat preservation • Ban Arctic oil drilling, offshore drilling, fracking, mountaintop removal coal mining and pipeline projects • Stop exports of natural gas and crude oil • Defend and close loopholes in the Clean Air Act • Increase fuel efficiency standards • Begin a moratorium on nuclear power • Create a national environmental and climate justice plan • Reform fossil fuel leasing and expand clean energy production on public lands • Defend and extend environmental standards like the Clean Power Plan • Eliminate lead poisoning, clean up brownfield sites, and create an Environmental Justice Task Force Renewables • Invest in clean energy infrastructure and modernize the energy grid • Invest in clean energy, alternative fuels and energy efficiency programs • Invest in clean energy infrastructure • Launch a $60 billion local-state-federal clean energy partnership As in her plan, Clinton prefers to focus on renewables on the stump. In a January Medium post responding to the Sanders camp, Clinton’s campaign manager highlighted her pledge to ""make America the clean energy superpower of the 21st century"" in her launch speech. Clinton, who played a role in negotiating the Paris climate change agreement, herself touted her goals for more solar panel and clean electricity as ""big"" and ""bold."" Clinton has gotten her best reviews from the League of Conservation Voters, who endorsed Clinton last fall (to some controversy). The green group considers Clinton’s plan strong and aggressive and, more importantly, achievable, Tiernan Sittenfeld, its senior vice president of government affairs, told PolitiFact. ""Hillary is focused on practical solutions,"" Sittenfeld said, pointing out that there are many lawmakers in Congress who still deny climate change science. ""So (a carbon tax) is pretty remote possibility."" But some are skeptical of Clinton’s ""boldness."" Pulitzer Prize-winning website InsideClimate News called Clinton’s plan ambitious but said it ""falls short of bold."" The Washington Post’s editorial board said her ideas are ""second best."" Environmental news magazine Grist summed up her positions as not bad but ""not quite the climate hawkishness we need."" Our ruling Sanders said, ""I believe we should have tax on carbon and deal aggressively with climate change. That is not her position."" Unlike Sanders, Clinton doesn’t advocate for a carbon tax. And while Clinton doesn’t go as far as Sanders in her climate change plan, she does have one. The League of Conservation Voters supports her plan as realistic and achievable."
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14632
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"In Virginia, ""people are going and getting marriage licenses who are 12 and 13, and 14 and 15 years old."
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"Vogel said that in Virginia, ""people are going and getting marriage licenses who are 12 and 13, and 14 and 15 years old."" There’s no dispute that there are children 13 to 15 who have gotten married. But the 12-year-olds are another story. Vogel relied on Department of Health information to say that 12-year-olds are getting married. That data, the department now says, is incorrect due to a database flaw. Bottom line: There are no records of 12-year-olds getting married from 2004 to 2014. We don’t fault Vogel for that glitch. Still, her statement requires a clarification. Editor's Note: This post has been updated to make clear that circuit court clerks are the ones that issue marriage licenses for minors under 16."
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true
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Children, Marriage, Virginia, Jill Vogel,
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"State Sen. Jill Holtzman Vogel recently surprised her colleagues while pushing for a bill to prevent underage marriages. ""People are going and getting marriage licenses who are 12 and 13, and 14 and 15 years old,"" Vogel, R-Fauquier, said during a Jan. 27 appearance before the Senate Courts of Justice Committee. We wondered if she was right. Virginia law now sets 16 as the minimum age for marriage, although exceptions are allowed in cases when a child is pregnant. Minors are required to get the consent of a parent or legal guardian before getting married. If they’re under 16, a marriage license is issued by a local circuit court clerk. Vogel co-sponsored a bill that would set the minimum marriage age at 18, unless a court has granted the minor the rights of an adult. Anyone seeking to go around the new age restriction by getting married out of state would face up to a $500 fine and up to six months in jail. She later amended the measure that lowered the allowed marriage age to 16 with no exceptions, even for pregnancy. Vogel said she was introducing the measure to stop situations in which young children are being coerced into marriage. ""We are failing children miserably in Virginia,"" she told the committee. We asked Vogel’s office for the senator’s evidence that Virginians as young as 12 are getting married. Tricia Stiles, Vogel’s legislative assistant, directed us to the Tahirih Justice Center, a nonprofit focusing on violence against immigrant women and girls that researches underage marriage. The group, based in Falls Church, supports Vogel’s bill. Jeanne Smoot, senior counsel for the center, said the information came from a chart the group received last year from Virginia Department of Health showing the age of the youngest person married in Virginia each year from 2004 to 2013. The chart shows: • In 2004, 2006 and 2007, the youngest bride was 12. • In 2007 and 2010, the youngest groom was 12. • Throughout the 2004-13 span, there were Virginia brides and grooms ages 13, 14 and 15. We contacted the Department of Health to see if it could quantify the number of brides and grooms younger than 16. Maribeth Brewster, spokeswoman for the department, sent us some updated data on the number of marriages of children ages 12 to 14 from 2004 to 2014. We also pulled additional data on marriages of 15-year-olds from the Department of Health website. Those figures show that, during the span, there were: • four 13-year-old brides; • twenty-four 14-year-old brides; • at least 170 brides who were 15 years olds; and • grooms who ranged in aged from 14 to 16. In a follow-up email, Brewster said that preliminary figures for 2015 show the youngest bride was 14 and the youngest groom was 15. You may have noticed that the latest figures don’t show any 12-year-olds getting married during that span. Brewster told us that the earlier information the department sent to the Tahirih Justice Center about 12-year-olds was wrong. The department’s registrar, Janet Rainey, wrote to us that some incorrect birthdays for brides and grooms had been entered into a database. That said, it’s still troubling that 13-, 14- and 15-year-olds are marrying in Virginia. Smoot said, ""I think that we can’t know what all the stories are behind those statistics, but I can tell you that when you have someone, an adolescent that young, there is a greater likelihood that the parents are coercing them to get married and it is not of their own free will."" She said Virginia is not unique in this regard; her group released a report in October citing instances of children younger than 15 being married in Texas, New Jersey and Maryland. A Department of Health chart shows than since 2010, most marriages of Virginia children younger than 16 have occurred in rural counties in the Southwest and Southside regions of the state. Vogel amended setting the the age limit at 16 with no exceptions has been passed by the Courts of Justice Committee and now is pending before the full Senate. Our ruling Vogel said that in Virginia, ""people are going and getting marriage licenses who are 12 and 13, and 14 and 15 years old."" There’s no dispute that there are children 13 to 15 who have gotten married. But the 12-year-olds are another story. Vogel relied on Department of Health information to say that 12-year-olds are getting married. That data, the department now says, is incorrect due to a database flaw. Bottom line: There are no records of 12-year-olds getting married from 2004 to 2014. We don’t fault Vogel for that glitch. Still, her statement requires a clarification. Editor's Note: This post has been updated to make clear that circuit court clerks are the ones that issue marriage licenses for minors under 16."
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7558
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Virgin Galactic posts loss, touts future potential revenue .
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Virgin Galactic on Tuesday reported a first-quarter net loss of $60 million but touted millions of dollars in potential future revenue as more people have put down deposits for the chance to reserve a ticket once the commercial space venture resumes sales.
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true
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General News, Earnings, New Mexico, Virus Outbreak, Science
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Company officials outlined earnings for the quarter during a webcast that came just days after Virgin Galactic celebrated the first glide flight of its spaceship over its new home at Spaceport America in southern New Mexico. The company is in the midst of final testing but has yet to offer a date for the start of commercial flights. Virgin Galactic CEO George Whitesides said the company is encouraged by the response to its “One Small Step” initiative, which allows people interested in the supersonic rides to make refundable deposits. Since the program was launched in February, more than 400 payments have been received from people in 44 countries. Whitesides said that beat expectations and represents more than $100 million of potential future revenue upon full ticket payment. Like other businesses, Virgin Galactic also has been adjusting to life amid the coronavirus outbreak. At Virgin Galactic’s terminal and hanger at the spaceport, new protocols have been adopted, including the use of masks, changes to work areas and new procedures for disinfecting surfaces and enforcing social distancing. A total of 579 employees and contractors have been tested as of May 1, officials said. “The COVID-19 outbreak led to an unprecedented situation for companies and individuals across the world, but I am encouraged by the commitment displayed by our team in helping to support relief efforts while making program progress,” Whitesides said in a statement. “We remain focused on our strategic goals and our path to commercial launch.” Virgin Galactic and its subsidiary The Spaceship Company also announced Tuesday the signing of an agreement with NASA to facilitate the development of technologies capable of Mach speed that could potentially be used for civil applications. The aim is to boost efforts in the U.S. to develop a vehicle for the next-generation of high speed air travel. Virgin Galactic marks a bright spot in British billionaire Richard Branson’s empire, as his Virgin travel and tourism companies have taken a big hit as a result of public health orders issued around the globe and the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic. Branson put it bluntly in a recent open letter to the tens of thousands of workers employed by the Virgin brand: “The challenge right now is that there is no money coming in and lots going out.” He vowed to continue investing to protect as many jobs as possible. Whitesides said despite the challenging times, Virgin Galactic has no debt and is in a strong position with cash and cash equivalents of $419 million. Virgin Galactic is the anchor tenant of the taxpayer-financed Spaceport America — the world’s first facility designed and built specifically for launching commercial passengers and payloads into suborbital space. The company now has close to 180 people working out of the desert outpost. The idea was first hatched some 15 years ago by Branson and former Gov. Bill Richardson to build a spaceport in New Mexico and launch paying customers into the lower fringes of space where they could experience weightlessness and get a view of the Earth below. The suborbital flights are designed to reach an altitude of at least 50 miles (80.5 kilometers) before gliding to a landing. The spaceship is the result of years of development and testing at Mojave Air & Space Port in Mojave, California. The craft is ferried to a high altitude by a much larger carrier aircraft before it’s released and its rocket engines are fired. More than 600 customers from around the world have purchased tickets. In addition to the 400 that have put down deposits, 9,160 have registered their interest online. Company officials expect the interest to surpass the company’s capacity for flights for a few years. The focus now, Whitesides said, is to complete the test flight program as soon as possible. He said Virgin Galactic has completed 24 of the 29 requirements laid out by the Federal Aviation Administration’s verification and validation program.
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10669
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New pill prevents strokes with less bleeding risk for atrial fib patients
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The story did a good job providing information about the study, the potential for benefit and the possible side effects associated with this medication. Good comparison with coumadin, the effective, though challenging, medication used to treat atrial fib. It also mentioned the newly FDA approved medication Pradaxa for this condition. The story ended with a terrific quote indicating that “we’re left with a question of cost versus convenience.” The ending quote goes right to the heart of the issue (pun intended). In reality, there was no signficant difference in outcomes between coumadin and rivaroxaban in the study. If approved, rivaroxaban will presumably be more convenient to use and may end up being less expensive when you include laboratory testing.
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true
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Stroke,USA Today
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The story mentioned that the price of rivaroxaban would likely be significantly greater than coumadin. But it could have been more specific, noting, at least, what Canadians pay for it already. There coumadin is about 50 cents a day and rivaroxaban is about $9 a day. It wouldn’t have taken long to do that extra research. The story mentioned that the study reported on found rivaroxaban to be equally effective as coumadin in reducing stroke and clot risk. This story provided more information about the adverse events from the drug than did other stories we reviewed. The story should have included at least a line about the limitations of drawing conclusions from a talk at a scientific meeting. It has not been published, has not undergone the kind of peer review a journal would employ, and not all data have been released. These are important caveats that take only a few words to explain. No disease mongering. The story made a point of calling one expert, Elaine Hylek of Boston University, “an independent expert.” However, MedPageToday wrote, in their story, that: “Hylek disclosed research grants from NIH/NINDS, Bristol-Myers Squibb, and Ortho-McNeil. She also said she serves on advisory boards at Bayer, Boehringer-Ingleheim, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Daiichi Sankyo, Genentech, Medtronic, Merck, Pfizer, and sanofi-aventis.” Perhaps the story should have explained how it defines “independent.” The drug reported on was compared with the old standard as well as some discussion about a newly approved medication for AF. The story makes it clear that rivaroxaban is not available in the US and that the companies co-producing the product will seek FDA approval. The story admirably resists the temptation to suggest approval is a foregone conclusion. Readers may have benefited by knowing the drug is approved in other countries including Canada. The story ended with a terrific quote indicating that “we’re left with a question of cost versus convenience.” The story also contained information about another drug used in this patient population which was recently FDA approved Does not appear to rely on a news release.
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9281
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Theranostic drug personalizes prostate cancer imaging and therapy: Combined PET imaging and radionuclide therapy offers new hope for advanced prostate cancer
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This news release reports on a paper presented at the 2015 Annual Meeting of the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging on a radionuclide drug that could be used both for imaging and therapy in advanced prostate cancer. The drug works by targeting cells that produce a protein called prostate-specific membrane antigen and varying dosages can either be used for radio imaging or to target cancer cells. An initial trial of this drug yielded a drop in prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels from 38.0 to 4.6 nanograms per milliliter. This result was verified by PET scan and computed tomography. These results could certainly warrant a news release calling attention to this novel research. However, we thought the execution could have been handled more carefully. Our main concern with this release is the disparity between the language used — for example, the headline touts “new hope for advanced prostate cancer” — and the actual research, which is based on treatment of a single person resulting in a drop in PSA levels. The release takes five paragraphs to tell us that the study involved only one person; it omits important details about his treatment; and it didn’t mention how long he lived or if, indeed, he is still alive. That’s a flimsy foundation for anyone with advanced prostate cancer to base their hopes. The radionuclide drug described in this release can potentially be used to identify and treat metastatic prostate cancer — for which currently there are no curative treatments.
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false
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PSA,radionuclides,Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging
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Nothing at all is said about the cost of this treatment either for imaging or treatment. Granted, the drug is in the very early stages of development, but that didn’t stop the release from claiming that the approach “personalizes cancer imaging and therapy,” “offers new hope for advanced prostate cancer,” and may have “a major impact.” If it’s not too early to make such bold statements, then it’s not too early, in our view, to give some idea of what this treatment might cost. We are told that PSA levels dropped from 38.0 to 4.6 nanograms per milliliter and that the result was verified by PET scan and computed tomography. But we have no information about the time period over which the PSA dropped, whether there were additional treatments, and whether PSA levels remained low (and for how long) — and whether the patient is still alive. In treating metastatic cancers, survival benefits are often quite short, e.g., the median survival benefit for sipuleucel (Provenge vaccine) was only 4 months. So we’d want some evidence that patients are living longer (and more than just one of them) before talking about “new hope” for this disease. We also disagree with the comment that “current clinical methods are not sensitive enough for detecting disease beyond the prostate.” Currently used radionuclide bone scans can readily detect metastatic disease. This is not really addressed — or addressable — given that only one patient has been treated. The release discusses previous drugs of this type that had problems, and mentions “adverse effects” associated with existing therapies. The suggestion is that this drug does not have those problems and would be a safer alternative to existing therapies. But there’s no way we can assess the safety of this approach based on results in only patient. So the release is incomplete and potentially misleading in its discussion on this point. The clinical study involved only one person, a detail which the release takes too long to tell us about. And as noted above under “Benefits,” the release is also short on details regarding other aspects of this patient’s treatment. There is no information at all about how the study was done with the mice, on the number of test subjects in either imaging or therapy. While the animal data are not necessarily translatable, it would also be interesting to know more about the diagnostic performance in mice — sensitivity and specificity. There is no disease mongering here. Prostate cancer is a reality and as more men are living longer, prostate cancer diagnoses increase. There is no mention of funding for this work, so it is difficult to determine if there is any conflict of interest. Funding is listed in the abstract and fairly clearly shows that there is no conflict of interest, but that is impossible to tell from the release. Other attempts at creating this type of imaging/therapy drug are mentioned, and the fact that metastatic prostate cancer is currently difficult to control and has a poor prognosis implies that there are few successful alternatives. We’ll award a Satisfactory, although the release could have made it clearer that targeted therapies are only a subset of treatments for metastatic cancer — which also includes various chemotherapies and the Provenge vaccine. This release does eventually make it clear that only one patient has been tested, that this is very preliminary work and that the drug is not available. The story mentions that while this is not the first time a drug of this nature has been attempted, it is the first time that one has been developed that hopefully does not have serious side effects or other problems. There is too much frothy language in this release based on a study that involved only one patient. For example: We also wish the release had defined the word “theranostics,” which would have made it easier for readers to tell if this is, indeed, a “watershed moment” in that field.
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26453
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“Go look at other countries that went through exactly this, started to reopen, and then they saw the infection rate go back up again.”
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Some countries in Asia that at one time appeared to have had the spread of Covid-19 under control have seen an uptick in cases after a relaxing of social distancing measures or an influx of travelers from elsewhere. In some places, authorities have had to reimpose social distancing measures to contain a second wave of cases.
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true
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New York, Coronavirus, Andrew Cuomo,
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"During a recent press briefing regarding Covid-19 in New York state, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the economy must be reopened and that people need to get back to work. But, he said the rate of infection is currently being kept down because people are staying in their homes. ""And if you start acting differently, you will see a corresponding increase in that rate of infection. And the worst scenario would be if we did all of this, we got that number down, everybody went to extraordinary means, and then we go to reopen and we reopen too fast or we reopen and there’s unanticipated consequences, and we see that number go up again,"" he said. He warned that people who think he is being ""hyper-cautious"" should look at what is happening in other countries and their responses to the new coronavirus. ""Go look at other countries that went through exactly this, started to reopen, and then they saw the infection rate go back up again,"" he said. Since talk of reopening, and the possible dangers of doing so, dominates headlines across the United States and around the world, we wondered about whether other countries have already experienced a second surge in infections after relaxing lockdown orders for people, schools, businesses, and borders. In Asia, authorities have been dealing with Covid-19 for more months than the United States has, and they have more experience in responding to the virus. In some cases, the number of infections in a city or country has increased after welcoming inbound travelers, or after a relaxing of social distancing measures. In Hong Kong, an early response seemed to contain the virus, and then life resumed as people returned to work and restaurants. ""With most everyone’s guard down, the predator lashed back last week. Cases of Covid-19 surged,"" STAT News reported on March 26. The government ordered people back home, and closed facilities that had been reopened. In Hong Kong, it ""soon became clear that while the majority were coming from overseas, quarantine measures in place were not sufficient, and local transmission had resumed,"" CNN reported on March 23. In Hokkaido, Japan, an island prefecture, social distancing measures were relaxed, and then there was a sudden increase in new coronavirus cases, according to news reports. ""Hokkaido declared a three-week state of emergency in February that was lifted on March 19,"" NPR reported. ""The prefecture had begun to reopen schools and was even allowing carefully orchestrated public gatherings. But the latest order reverses all that, asking residents once again to refrain from nonessential trips outside their homes and closing prefectural primary and secondary schools until May 6."" Unlike in some other Asian countries, there was no evidence that the uptick in Hokkaido was because the virus was re-imported from outside Japan, the BBC reported. A lack of testing also contributed to health authorities’ inability to track and contain the virus, according to the BBC. There is a surge in coronavirus cases in Singapore, which is concentrated in foreign worker dorms, where people live in close quarters. It's not clear whether the migrant workers arrived with the virus, or if it had been circulating among that population for some time, CNN reported. Singapore has had to impose stricter measures to contain the virus. We consulted with an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, on what is happening in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Hakkaido, Japan, and whether Cuomo’s statement is accurate. ""We are definitely seeing rises in cases in those places,"" said Stephen Kissler, Ph.D., a research fellow in the Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases. Kissler is a co-author of a paper that stated that ""prolonged or intermittent social distancing may be necessary into 2022."" He said he is hesitant to link the increase solely to lifting social distancing measures, because there are a lot of reasons cases could rise after a period of sustained low transmission. ""But on the whole I would say that the statement is correct,"" Kissler said. Cuomo didn’t say that all countries had increased infections after they reopened, and he also didn’t say explicitly that reopening caused the increase in the statement we fact-checked. He said that people who are anxious to reopen should be aware that there are cases where other countries reopened and then saw the infection rate increase. There have been reports of increased infection rates in some countries that reopened."
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And over the last six years, Chicago’s economy has grown faster than the economies of New York City, Washington, D.C., or the national average.
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Bristol-Myers Squibb Co said on Wednesday a late-stage trial testing a combination of its cancer drugs missed a main goal of preventing skin cancer from recurring in a certain group of patients, sending its shares down nearly 1%.
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false
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City Budget, Economy, Jobs, Illinois, Rahm Emanuel,
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The company said the trial will continue unchanged as per the recommendation of a data monitoring committee. The trial was testing Bristol-Myers’ drugs Opdivo and Yervoy, against Opdivo alone, in patients with advanced melanoma. The combination failed to show a statistically significant benefit in patients whose tumors had 1% or lower levels of the PD-L1 protein being targeted, the company said. The American Cancer Society estimates that about 96,480 melanoma cases will be diagnosed in the United States this year. Bristol-Myers shares were trading at $55.99 before the bell.
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11549
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Scientists reprogram adult cells’ function
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The lack of context in medical reporting is a key failing in many reports and this story is no exception. A great deal of research is underway in diabetes and other chronic diseases. By not placing the story in context, the uninitiated reader is left with an incorrect assumption that the approach is unique and perhaps available soon. The results of the study reported on have not been replicated. The study was conducted in mice without an intact immune system in a laboratory model of induced diabetes. These are two significant factors to consider when thinking about the applicability of the results to humans. Further – as this was a proof of concept experiment, there was no longer term analysis to determine whether there were significant side effects associated with the treatment or whether the treatment had durability. While viral vectors may hold promise, there are considerable difficulties in the application in humans. These points could not have been emphasized enough – and were not – not when references to cures and holy grails were included. The story clearly tried to achieve balance with some of the comments from some of the sources interviewed, but we don’t think balance was achieved.
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false
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There was no cost estimate because there has not actually been a treatment developed yet that makes use of the approach described in the research. Framing this approach as one that could someday cure not only diabetes, but also heart disease, stroke, and ‘many other ailments’ is troubling. This extrapolation to diseases other than diabetes was not supported by the data presented in the study reported on. There is a great gulf between proof of concept in an animal model and cinical application in a single disease. Suggesting the same approach could be applied to other diseases is pure speculation that is not supported by the data in the Nature study. There was no discussion of possible harms that might be associated with gene therapy even though there have been human deaths resulting from the use of viral vectors to alter gene expression. The results of the study reported on have not been replicated. The study was conducted in mice without an intact immune system in a laboratory model of induced diabetes. These are two significant factors to consider when thinking about the applicability of the results to humans. Further – as this was a proof of concept experiment, there was no longer term analysis to determine whether there were significant side effects associated with the treatment or whether the treatment had durability. While viral vectors may hold promise, there are considerable difficulties in the application in humans. These points could not have been emphasized enough – and were not – not when references to cures and holy grails were included. The story did not engage in disease mongering. The story did include interview material from individuals not directly connected with the study reported on. And the story did include a comment from a stem cell researcher indicating that it is likely not a quick, straight shot from these results to use in people. The other sources interviewed provided a modicum of balance. There was no discussion of treatment options; however this story was not actually about a treatment but a highly-experimental approach in mice. While the story was clear that this highly experimental approach in mice is currently not available for humans, it provided a wholly unrealistic estimate for its application to human disease. Although interesting from a number of perspectives, the story is about a novel but relatively untested approach to managing diabetes in mice. The story is somewhat excessive in its language related to the potential for this approach suggesting the line of research will indeed be transferable to humans in a relatively brief period of time. While some caveats are included, we don’t think balance was achieved. The approach described – while novel – is certainly not unique (viral vector for treatment of a chronic disease). Additional comments on the approach used by other reseachers would have added a needed balance. Does not appear to rely on a press release.
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Anthracycline drugs may increase heart disease risk in breast cancer survivors
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"This is a solid report on a controversy over potential risks of heart failure associated with a class of commonly used breast cancer chemotherapy drugs called anthracyclines. The reporter draws on a variety of sources and provides differing perspectives about risks and benefits. However, the story is really about new understanding of which subgroups benefit from anthracyclines, not that they ""work no better"" than other drugs. The article would have been stronger if it had included statistics about how effective the various cancer drugs were. The story is made weaker, not stronger, by the anecdote at the end. The woman interviewed was an overweight smoker at elevated risk for heart disease, and we don’t know enough about her treatment to know whether anthracyclines had anything to do with her heart problems or recovery. This is at best confusing, at worst misleading."
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true
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"The article does not report how much the drugs costs, but the price is not necessary or useful in this story. The issues with both treatment and side effects are literally life and death. The relative cost of the drugs is not an issue. While the report states that the controversy is triggered by new research suggesting anthracyclines ""work no better"" than less risky drugs, it does not compare efficacy of the treatments directly. The article does report that only around 8 percent of breast cancer patients would get unique benefit from the drug. This is useful, but it is not proof that anthracyclines ""work no better"" than the alternatives. The story is quite clear about the nature and size of the drugs’ risks. The reporter cites a credible source’s analysis of nine studies that shows only 20 percent of breast cancer patients with an overactive Her2 gene respond to anthracyclines, and only 8 percent of the group gets special benefit from the drugs. (Although the reporter could have noted that the source is NOT a disinterested party – since he is discussing the findings from some of his own research.) The report also cites a new Journal of Clinical Oncology study that shows people who had taken anthracyclines were 26 percent more likely to have developed heart failure in the following decade. The report provides sufficient detail about the study’s methodology. The article does nothing to exaggerate the seriousness of breast cancer or heart failure, nor does it exaggerate the benefits of chemotherapy with anthracyclines or other drugs. The report quotes three credible sources–two researchers and one clinician. They do not appear to have conflicts of interest. The recent study described is from a peer-reviewed journal. The article does a decent job of indicating that other chemo drugs are available. It would be useful to know a bit more about how many alternatives there are and how widely they are used. The article states that anthracyclines are a ""mainstay"" and a ""staple"" of chemotherapy for breast cancer. While this makes clear that the drugs are widely available, it would have been useful to know what percentage of chemo patients get these drugs compared to others. The story implies the side effect issue is novel, while in fact the heart-related side effects of these drugs are well-known. There is no evidence that the article draws on a press release."
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16064
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"Exposure to the electromagnetic fields from power lines ""has been associated with childhood leukemia and other diseases."
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India’s government has no plan to roll back a ban on electronic cigarettes, an official told Reuters on Saturday, as protests against the move by vapers in six cities drew scant support.
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false
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Rhode Island, Energy, Infrastructure, Public Health, Public Safety, Patrick Lynch,
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India banned the sale and import of e-cigarettes this month, warning of an “epidemic” of vaping among young people. The action has affected users nationwide and the plans of international companies including Juul Labs Inc and Philip Morris International, as well as triggering court challenges by local firms. Protesters convened on Saturday to call for vaping devices to be regulated rather than prohibited. But organizers Association of Vapers India said only about 400 people turned up across six cities, adding that some opponents of the ban feared being targeted by police. At one protest in the capital New Delhi, several people used vaping devices. Among them sat a child with a poster that read: “I don’t want my dad to be a smoker”. The government argues the ban is essential to protect people as vaping can lead to nicotine addiction and push users toward consuming tobacco. Vapers say the devices help them stay away from more harmful tobacco cigarettes. More than 900,000 people die each year due to tobacco-related illnesses in India, the government estimates. But the country has 106 million adult smokers, second only to China, making it a lucrative potential market for companies selling both tobacco and vaping products. An Indian health ministry official said the government was determined to stick by its ban, despite the protests and court challenges. “There is no question of a rollback or anything like that,” the official said. Two court challenges that could be pivotal for whether the ban can continue to be enforced are under way in the eastern city of Kolkata, including one by e-cigarette importer Plume Vapour. The company, in a court filing seen by Reuters, argues that the ban will allow cigarette companies to flourish while putting e-cigarette firms out of business. New Delhi protester Aryaman Chaudhary, 25, said he stocked up on vape refills ahead of the ban, but was worried he would eventually run out. “I just want this regulated, not banned ... Everybody has an addiction.”
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Florence Nightingale show presents nursing pioneer who told us to wash hands.
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Victorian Britain took Florence Nightingale into its heart as the “Lady with the Lamp” who tended wounded soldiers, but a new exhibition shows her as a tough pioneer whose principles on hygiene underpin nursing today as the world battles coronavirus.
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true
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Health News
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The show at the Florence Nightingale Museum within London’s St Thomas’ Hospital marks the bicentenary of Nightingale’s birth into a wealthy family, and tells the story of how she fought her family’s opposition and social constraints to become the world’s most famous nurse. “Florence Nightingale’s legacy is really, really important. Obviously, she was a forceful leader. And we need clear, visible, strong leadership today and certainly in modern nursing,” said Fiona Hibberts, from the Nightingale Academy, a nursing institution at the hospital. The exhibition “Nightingale in 200 Objects, People & Places” will run for a year. St Thomas’ is one of a handful of hospitals in Britain with a specialist ward for the treatment of coronavirus patients. “The emphasis on sanitation, good hygiene, fresh air exercise, good food... no matter how much we advance, those fundamental foundational principles of Florence are still very much the basis of modern nursing,” said Hibberts. “It’s the same old message. Wash your hands.” Nightingale became famous after she and a small team of nurses traveled to modern-day Istanbul to treat British soldiers wounded in the Crimean War, in which British, French and Ottoman forces fought the Russian Empire. In a filthy hospital set up in a barracks on the Asian shore of the Bosphorus, she saws thousands of soldiers die from infectious diseases rather than their wounds, prompting her to try and improve conditions. The lamp she used to tour the wards at night is on show at the exhibition, as is the nurses’ uniform she created. “If Florence Nightingale herself was here, she would be supporting all that’s being said at the moment. She was absolutely into infection control, hand washing, being very observant,” said Yvonne Moores, Chair of the Florence Nightingale Foundation and Britain’s former national Chief Nursing Officer. “She would also, bearing in mind her very, very long career, be encouraging people that have retired ... to think about the role that they might be able to play in coming back.” Many retired doctors and nurses have reacted with alarm to a suggestion by the British government that it would call on them to help battle coronavirus if necessary. Nightingale died at the age of 90 in 1910, continuing to work and to write late into her life. The exhibition also recreates her London bedroom, allows visitors to smell her perfume and hear a recording of her voice.
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2438
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U.S. Nobel laureates worry about future of basic science.
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The kind of basic science that helped Randy Schekman win the coveted Nobel medicine prize might never have been funded if he had applied today.
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true
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Health News
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Schekman, along with two other U.S.-based winners of the 2013 medicine prize, Thomas Suedhof and James Rothman, slammed recent spending cuts at the National Institutes of Health, the biggest funder of scientific research in the world. The budget curbs were undermining the chances of breakthroughs and the next generation of basic research, they said. The three scientists, who won the Nobel for research on how cells swap proteins, have all received NIH funding at some time during their careers. Across-the-board federal budget cuts, known as sequestration, which started in March, required the NIH to cut 5 percent or $1.55 billion of its 2013 budget. The cuts come on top of years of reductions in federal spending on research at the NIH. The cuts automatically went into effect after the White House and Republican-controlled House of Representatives failed to agree to a deficit reduction blueprint. The “federal paralysis is frankly imperiling our biomedical enterprise”, said Schekman of the University of California, Berkeley. More than 80 percent of the NIH’s budget goes to more than 300,000 research personnel at more than 2,500 universities and research institutions throughout the United States, according to the agency’s website. Schekman’s contribution towards the Nobel started with lowly baker’s yeast which he used as a simplified model to pick apart the basic genes and molecular pathways cells use to share proteins with other cells. It is a process that is fundamental not only to yeast but also the human brain, and it could only have been discovered through basic research, the type that illuminates the basic mechanics of nature and forms the foundation for future discoveries. At a press conference in New Haven, Connecticut, Nobel winner Rothman also criticized NIH spending cuts and said he probably would not have started his research had NIH funding not been available. He said over the past few years, NIH funding, which “has made America the great engine of biomedical discovery” and fueled the U.S. biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries, had fallen significantly, when accounting for inflation. University research made possible by federal grants has long been a major driver of scientific advancement, spurring innovations from cancer treatments to the seeds of technology companies like Google. The three scientists also expressed concern at the agency’s focus on research that can be quickly transferred into medical discoveries rather than “basic science”. In 2011 the NIH set up the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences as a way to speed the translation of medical advances into new therapies for patients. “Many of my colleagues, particularly young colleagues, feel they have to work on medically relevant things. For example, yeast, which I continue to view as a valuable model organism, is less popular now simply because people feel they can’t get NIH funding to work on yeast,” said Schekman. It was not immediately possible to seek reaction from the NIH to the scientists’ comments. It is one of the agencies hard hit by a partial U.S. government shutdown over a budget disagreement. Scarce funds have forced a focus on “translational science” - research that can be quickly “translated” into medical applications. Suedhof said the public in the United States “justifiably feels so much money has been spent that it’s time to actually get something out of it.” But, particularly in brain science, there is still much to learn as has been the experience of many drug companies that have attempted to test treatments for diseases such as Alzheimer’s. “In my view, we don’t have anything to ‘translate’ because we just don’t understand the fundamental diseases of the brain, like schizophrenia, like autism, like Alzheimer’s. It’s just as simple as that.”
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A muscular breed of “super cattle” is genetically engineered to provide as much meat as possible.
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"What's true: Muscular ""super cattle"" have been produced through genetic mutation and decades of selective breeding. What's false: Muscular ""super cattle"" are not technically the result of ""genetic engineering"" (i.e., the process of manually adding new DNA to an organism’s genome)."
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true
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Uncategorized, genetic engineering, genetic modification, selective breeding
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Photographs and videos like this one, showing shockingly muscled cows ambling in a field, has been used for years to demonstrate either the powers of selective engineering or the pitfalls of genetic modification, depending on whom you ask: The bovines featured in this video are real, and they belong to a breed of cattle known as Belgian Blues. Another breed, Piedmontese cattle, exhibit similarly sculpted muscles. Though their origins can be traced back over a century, the majority of viral posts about these buff livestock stem from a clip of a National Geographic documentary from 2008: These cows have been selectively bred to produce large, lean, protein-rich meat. A 1997 study in Genome Research describing Belgian Blue genetics described their characteristics this way: Compared with normal cattle, Belgian Blue and Piedmontese animals have an increased proficiency to convert feed into lean muscle and produce a higher percentage of the most desirable cuts of meat. These animals have less bone, less fat, and 20% more muscle on average. These traits occur because of a heritable condition known as “double muscling”, the result of a genetic mutation that disrupts the production of myostatin, a growth hormone. Typically, myostatin inhibits the production of muscle fibers, but Belgian Blues do not have this check on their muscle development. A 1997 paper published in Nature Genetics describes the result of that mutation: Double-muscled animals are characterized by an increase in muscle mass of about 20%, due to general skeletal-muscle hyperplasia — that is, an increase in the number of muscle fibers rather than in their individual diameter. In Belgian Blues, this genetic trait has been further exaggerated through decades of selective breeding — essentially a fast-tracked version of natural selection where breeders pick only the most muscular cows to mate with each other. According to the American Blue Cattle Association, this particular practice has been going on for decades: Following the Second World War, a liberated European economy quickly demanded an increased quality and quantity of meat, particularly those cuts of high retail value. This economic demand accelerated the development of Belgian Blue cattle in a more heavily muscled direction. Finally, in 1974, the breed was divided into two branches, one for continued use as a dual purpose animal and the other exclusively for meat production. The vast majority of breeders concentrated their efforts on breeding the Belgian Blue for beef production. Today we see the result of the 150 years of work in the modern Belgian Blue. It is important to note that the term “scientifically engineered”, which is attached to many posts sharing the video, has led some to conclude falsely that these cattle are genetically engineered. Genetic engineering is the process of manually adding new DNA to an organism’s genome, a technique not employed in Belgian Blue breeding. That does not mean, however, that this process doesn’t put a strain on the animals. A review of double muscling in cattle concluded that “double muscling is associated with some production problems such as reduced fertility, dystocia and reduced calf survival.”
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10494
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Macular degeneration fought with new drug
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The story describes one woman’s experience with a research study testing a new drug for a form of age-related macular degeneration. However, there is virtually no information about the new drug, including what class of drug, what type of study or studies have been conducted (the strength of the evidence), what the benefits are, or what the harms are. Readers have no context to determine whether this drug actually offers anything new in the treatment of macular degeneration and certainly have no idea how much better one might expect to get compared to conventional treatments. The story is anecdotal, which can be biasing, and also only obtains input from one doctor who happens to be involved with the research. This physician’s comment that this drug has a “wow” factor sounds like a marketing tactic and is allowed to stand without any evidence provided that this drug even works.
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false
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The story does not mention costs of treatment (either the new drug or the existing laser treatment). Lucentis is the same as Avastin, which is used to treat end stage colon cancer. The story provides no quantification of benefits whatsoever. The story doesn’t mention any harms of treatment. Importantly, this medication is injected directly into the eye and is not pleasant. The story does not provide any evidence whatsoever. It’s not clear if the new drug was studied through randomized trials or some other type of trial design. Readers have no context for the type or strength of the evidence. The story briefly discusses age-related macular degeneration, including “dry” and “wet” versions. The reality is that while many people over age 75 have signs of macular degeneration, only about 200,000 actually have a vision defect. While this condition is an important one, the story seems to overestimate the issue. The story describes the anecdotal experience of one woman and quotes her doctor, who is involved in the research. The doctor also describes the results in a very subjective manner, even describing a “wow” factor to the new drug without also providing any evidence that it works. The story does not obtain independent information from any other experts. The story does describe the conventional treatment for macular degeneration, which is laser treatment. The surrounding context around this treatment is minimal, however. Readers don’t know how much better their vision might get with the new drug treatment compared to laser treatment. The story mentions a new drug which might help improve vision problems related to “wet” macular degeneration, but the new drug is mentioned as part of an anecdotal story of one woman who investigated research studies and asked her doctor which one might be best for her. It’s not clear what the availability of this drug is currently or when it might be expected to gain FDA approval (it is currently FDA approved for the “wet” form). The story also fails to mention that another drug is commercially avaialable for the same disorder. The story doesn’t provide any information about the class of drug, although it implies this drug and its results are new in the treatment arena of macular degeneration. The story does mention laser treatment as a conventional form of treatment, implying this drug treatment is new in comparison to other treatment options. The story also doesn’t mention other, existing drugs used to treat the same condition. There is virtually no information about what this new drug is, how it works, or even what it does. We can’t be sure if the story relied solely or largely on a news release.
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11133
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The Pain May Be Real, but the Scan Is Deceiving
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"We live in a society that is enamored by technology. That love affair has led us to view technology as always good and beneficial. It may help explain why the patient in this story was so focused on the need to have her MRI. The reality is that the technology is amazing, but that doesn’t automatically translate into always being helpful. The question isn’t whether the picture provides an almost magical view of the body’s structures. The question is whether that picture helps the doctor figure out how to get you better. The outcome can be quicker recovery, higher rates of absolute benefit, or both. This story delves into this simple but confusing issue. Just because these tests are readily available, do they help? When one gets past the technology fad and into how this is simply another piece of information that can help (or harm) the patient as he/she works with a doctor to arrive at a treatment plan, that’s when things get complex. The story does a great job of making this complexity easier for the reader to understand. Fundamentally, these amazing imaging tests pick up lots of imperfections that none of us are aware of, and that may have nothing to do with the pain in the first place. The key problem is that many of these abnormalities seen in imaging tests that can be a real source of pain can also be seen in individuals who have no symptoms at all. So the question is how can that be and how can one differentiate between imaging findings that cause pain and ones that don’t. The answer to the first question is that many of these abnormalities are natural processes of aging and that the body has developed ways to cope and perform its basic functions. The answer to the second question, how to figure out what imaging findings matter and which don’t is harder and gets back to the physical examination. The imaging findings must be seen in the larger context of the patient’s symptoms and physical findings. Unfortunately, sometimes one can’t be 100% sure, but in that case the issue is whether the use of this information, however imperfect, leads to better patient outcomes or not. And here, the data is getting pretty clear, sometimes less is the same or even more. Patient outcomes in studies that provided imaging results were no better than outcomes where the patient and physician did not have such information. But there are down sides to our love of the picture – higher costs are clear. The other one that is often overlooked is psychological. We want the test to show that we’re fine. However, back MRIs in older patients are almost always going to find something like degenerative arthritis. That knowledge doesn’t make us feel better, it makes us feel worse. Its not just a minor ache, it’s ""a meniscal tear"", it’s ""degenerative arthritis."" Yes, the picture is great, but no you don’t need it right now. That is a lesson that would lower the cost of care and make us feel better. We need a lot more stories that present complex messages in simple understandable ways. Congratulations!"
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true
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"The story adequately describes what insurers pay for the scans. The story does not say how many meniscal tears were found on MRI in the current study. The story could have also said that there have been no randomized trials of MRIs for knee pain that quantify the benefits and harms of such a management strategy. The story mentions unnecessary surgery as the most serious harm of scanning, as well as needless worry and potentially, feeling worse about the diagnosis. The story could have mentioned more common problems with MRI (claustrophobia) and CT scans (radiation exposure), but the real concern is that the imaging test makes the patient and physician more likely to chose an invasive treatment such as surgery. The story adequately describes the current study. The study brings in relevant scientific evidence to support the contention that imaging studies sometimes do not provide information that changes patient outcomes. As noted in the story, the evidence is more compelling for low back pain than for knee pain. However, it inaccurately claims that this is the first study to look at imaging of the knee. There have been several studies, albeit with smaller sample sizes, that have shown a high prevalence of knee abnormalities in asymptomatic individuals. The story does not engage in disease mongering. A strength of this story is that it puts common complaints (knee or back pain) and common abnormal findings (meniscal tear for the knee and disk degeneration for the back) into a larger more complete picture. However, the story inaccurately describes the meniscus as ""a ligament that stabilizes the knee"". In reality, the meniscus is a cartillage-like pad that cushions the knee joint . [Note: the NYT later corrected this error] The story quotes multiple experts. The story quotes Dr Jarvik but does not describe his speciality or institutional affiliation. [Note: the NYT later added this] The story did a good job of providing an alternative to routine early imaging tests – specifically, the old fashioned careful history and physical examination. The story could have focused more on the fact that these are increasingly becoming lost medical arts as imaging tests become more ubiquitous. Clearly MRIs, CT scans and other scans are widely available. Clearly scanning is not a new idea, but it is being increasingly used earlier in the diagnostic process. Because the story quotes multiple experts, the reader can assume the story did not rely on a press release as the sole source of information."
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8695
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Hong Kong to evacuate stranded residents from China's Hubei.
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Hong Kong has arranged four charter flights to bring back 533 of its residents from the Chinese province of Hubei, the center of the coronavirus outbreak, about a month after countries around the world began evacuating their citizens.
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true
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Health News
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Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam said the flights would return on Wednesday and Thursday and those coming back would be quarantined for 14 days upon arrival. Various countries including the United States, France, Germany and South Korea began evacuating hundreds of their citizens in late January or early February. More than 3,800 Hong Kong residents in more than 30 cities in Hubei, of which Wuhan is capital, had asked the government of the Chinese-ruled, semi-autonomous city for help, creating a logistics headache for the government. “We do not feel that we have delayed the return of Hong Kong people stranded in Hubei,” Lam told reporters at her weekly news conference. “As far as I understand, even up to this moment there are still very clear restrictions on exit arrangements ... from Hubei province. As soon as the conditions were ready for us to help Hong Kong residents to come back to Hong Kong we have immediately made arrangements to do so.” The health crisis comes on the heels of months of anti-government protests triggered by fears the former British colony’s special autonomy is being eroded by meddling by Beijing. The Chinese government denies interfering in Hong Kong. The coronavirus has killed two of the 100 people infected in the Asian financial hub. Lam’s government has come under criticism from pro-democracy activists and legislators, as well as some business and pro-establishment figures, for its handling of the outbreak. In particular, its decision not to fully close the border with mainland China was seen by many as a move to appease Beijing, leading to protests against plans to turn some buildings into quarantine centers, some of which turned violent. In the first week of February, 8,000 doctors, nurses and medical workers in the newly formed Hospital Authority Employees Alliance (HAEA) took part in a five-day strike, chanting: “Close the border, save Hong Kong.” Lam has maintained the government’s response had no political considerations and was evidence-based and according to scientific advice and World Health Organisation guidelines. She also said a full closure of the border would be inappropriate and discriminatory. The epidemic has reduced the flow of visitors to the city to a trickle and kept residents indoors, dealing a severe blow to the retail and tourism industries at a time when the city’s economy was already enduring its worse recession in a decade. The Hong Kong government announced last week its largest ever budget deficit to soften the economic blow.
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27761
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"Donald Trump mentioned ""seven eleven"" rather than ""nine eleven"" when referring to the September 11 terrorist attacks."
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“Well, I think after you’ve done several events over a short time period people misspeak all the time. Slip of the tongue.”
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true
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Politics, 7/11, 9/11, donald trump
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On 18 April 2016, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump spoke at a campaign rally in Buffalo, New York, and during his speech, Trump puzzled listeners by seemingly referring to the terrorist attacks against the U.S. that occurred on 11 September 2001 as “7/11” instead of “9/11”: Donald Trump, who has made his advocacy for New York City after the 9/11 attacks central to his candidacy, accidentally referred to it as 7/11 — the ubiquitous convenience store. “I wrote this out, and it’s very close to my heart,” he said at the outset of his remarks on Buffalo. “Because I was down there and I watched our police and our firemen down on 7/11, down at the World Trade Center right after it came down. And I saw the greatest people I’ve ever seen in action.” The businessman did not correct himself. While video of the event was widely circulated via social media and was published by several major media outlets such as CNN, some viewers were still skeptical about the footage, perplexed that someone who frequently invoked the 9/11 terrorist attacks during his campaign speeches could apparently mix up the date. While Twitter users, comedians, and political foes poked fun of Trump, some partisans maintained that the candidate didn’t misspeak; he was referring to the Greenville Fire District station located at 711 Central Park in Scarsdale, New York. However, that station has never been referred to as “7/11,” as the Greenville Fire District indicated in a message posted on the station’s web site: Others maintained that Trump was referring to Firestation #711 or Firemen’s Legion #711 (Engine 7, Ladder 1, Battalion 1), some of the first responders to the 9/11 attacks. However, a spokesman for the FDNY said that this station would never be referred to as “711,” noting that fire stations are occasionally referred to by their engine and ladder, but never by their battalion: It’s always referred to as Engine then Ladder so it’s Engine 7 Ladder 1. Battalion wouldn’t come into play. All of those options you listed are NOT used. And they are never referred to as 711. Also, as far as we know neither Trump nor his campaign has offered this alternative as an explanation, with Trump spokeswoman Katrina Pierson saying the candidate’s remark was a “slip of the tongue”:
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2598
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Space shuttle Endeavour rolls into new L.A. home at museum.
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The retired space shuttle Endeavour rolled into its retirement home at a museum early on Sunday, in the conclusion of a slow-motion parade through the narrow streets of Los Angeles.
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true
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Science News
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Endeavour arrived at about 10:45 a.m. at Exposition Park, the site of the California Science Center where the shuttle will go on permanent display on October 30 inside a pavilion “I’m so glad to be living to see this,” said Los Angeles native Shirley Green, 78, who was on hand, wearing an American flag scarf, to watch the shuttle arrive at its new home. Endeavour nosed out of Los Angeles International Airport before dawn on Friday for the 12-mile (19-km) trip to its retirement home. Organizers had expected the shuttle to complete its journey by Saturday evening but it fell behind schedule as crews had to make late adjustments to clear room for it. The shuttle, which prompted cheers and expressions of awe from spectators as it inched through the city’s streets, will become a tourist attraction at the center. Endeavour was largely built in southern California and was a workhorse of the U.S. space program, flying 25 missions. The trip was delayed in part due to maintenance needed for the massive, wheeled transporter that carried Endeavor and to trim some trees along the route, organizers said. Endeavour flew from 1992 to 2011 and was built to replace the Challenger, which exploded seconds into a 1986 launch in a mishap that killed all seven crew members on board. Endeavour was taken out of service at the end of the shuttle program. The shuttle is 122 feet long and 78 feet wide and stands 5 stories tall at the tail, which police said makes it the largest object ever to move through Los Angeles. Its combined weight with the transporter was 80 tons. Organizers say only a few inches separated Endeavour’s wings from structures along the route, and workers felled 400 trees along curbs to clear a path. The science center will plant more than 1,000 trees to make up for their loss. Some street lights, traffic signals, power poles and parking meters were temporarily removed. The budget to move Endeavour was over $10 million, said Shell Amega, a science center spokeswoman. Charitable foundations and corporations have donated money and services for the move. The delays and extra work added to the price tag of Endeavor’s last journey, said William Harris, a senior vice president at the Science Center. “This did cut into our costs,” Harris said. “As we always said, safety and security are our main concern. It was very dark last night, there were times that we were literally inches of clearance, at times the thickness of a credit card.” Endeavour has hop-scotched across the country from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on the back of a modified Boeing 747. It had been parked at the airport in Los Angeles since arriving on September 21 after a ceremonial piggyback flight around California. The shuttle will be displayed in a temporary hangar-style metal structure to protect it from the elements. In 2017, a 200-foot-tall (61-meter) structure will open in which Endeavour will stand vertically, said Ken Phillips, aerospace curator at the California Science Center. The other remaining shuttles also have found homes. The Smithsonian in Washington has Discovery at its Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center museum in Virginia. New York City has the prototype shuttle Enterprise at its Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum. And the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral has Atlantis, which the center will move to an on-site visitors complex next month.
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36285
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Fishing nets make up half the plastic in the ocean.
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Is the Straw Ban Misguided Because Half the Ocean’s Plastic Is From Fishing?
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mixture
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Fact Checks, Viral Content
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In July 2019 a Facebook user shared the following comic about plastic nets and ocean pollution:In four panels depicting a person with a plastic straw and a seal trapped in a plastic net, it read:Person: I NEED TO SAVE THE OCEAN FROM ALL THE PLASTIC!Seal: YES, THE NETS!Person: THIS STRAW IS SO EVIL!Seal: NO, THE NETS!FISHING NETS MAKE UP HALF OF THE PLASTIC IN THE OCEANIn June 2018, a Reddit user took a similar question to the subreddit r/IsItBullshit:IsItBullshit: That half the plastic in the ocean is from fishing nets from IsItBullshitThe comic referenced a number of “plastic straw bans” worldwide, actions widely explained as an effort to limit the presence of plastics in the ocean:On January 1, 2019, a ban on plastic straws in restaurants and other service businesses began in Washington, D.C. Read on for the reasons behind such bans, and how we got here. At the beginning of July 2018, Seattle became the largest U.S. city to ban plastic straws.They’re not alone.Starbucks plans to phase out plastic straws by 2020. McDonald’s recently announced it will ban plastic straws at its U.K. and Ireland restaurants. Bon Appétit Management, a food service company with 1,000 U.S. locations, announced last May it will phase out plastic straws. Alaska Airlines will be one of the first airlines to phase out plastic straws and stirrers, in part thanks to an environmentally conscious girl scout.These groups are responding to public outcry demanding action against a product that, on one hand, seems very simple—but which is harming the world’s oceans, experts warn.That National Geographic article from July 2018 went on to note that in terms of volume, plastic straws made up far less than one percent of the ocean’s plastic debris:Eight million tons of plastic flow into the ocean every year, and straws comprise just 0.025 percent of that.Plastic straw bans appeared to largely stem from an August 2015 viral video taken by a marine biologist that showed a turtle with a plastic straw jammed up its nose. In 2018, the woman who captured the footage said that she didn’t “want the corporations to feel like they’re getting off easily just by eliminating plastic straws,” referencing the larger issue of plastic pollution in the ocean.A statistic that fishing nets made up roughly half of all plastic in the ocean was widely repeated across blogs and on social media, but that claim seemed to be taken out of context from a single piece of research that didn’t exactly say that.Research published in the journal Nature in March 2018 (titled “Evidence that the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is rapidly accumulating plastic”) reported on analyses done on one specific accumulation of debris located between California and Hawaii:Ocean plastic can persist in sea surface waters, eventually accumulating in remote areas of the world’s oceans. Here we characterise and quantify a major ocean plastic accumulation zone formed in subtropical waters between California and Hawaii: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch (GPGP). Our model, calibrated with data from multi-vessel and aircraft surveys, predicted at least 79 (45–129) thousand tonnes of ocean plastic are floating inside an area of 1.6 million km2; a figure four to sixteen times higher than previously reported. We explain this difference through the use of more robust methods to quantify larger debris. Over three-quarters of the GPGP mass was carried by debris larger than 5 cm and at least 46% was comprised of fishing nets.Of particular note is that that research was highly localized, examining only the plastic accumulation known as the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch,” or GPGP. Presumably, the GPGP is influenced by ocean currents, traffic in those specific waters, and other factors that would impact the composition of its parts. And somehow it seemed one line from the research’s abstract had become a rallying point in all oppositions to straw bans.Another factor in the findings to hand was the individual behavior of various plastic particles in the ocean. Due to their rigidity and by their nature, fishing nets coalesced and failed to sink — but sinking did not mean an object was not polluting the ocean, just that it did not retain buoyancy to be detected in the GPGP. A portion of the study explained:The specific characteristics of the GPGP debris suggest that only certain types of plastic have the capacity to persist at the sea surface for extended periods of time and accumulate in oceanic plastic pollution hotspots. Firstly, the vast majority of the collected GPGP objects were made of PE and PP rigid plastics and bundled fishing nets and ropes. Plastic films however, representing around 37% of PE and PP waste generation were rarely found. We hypothesize that most buoyant plastic with insufficient volume-to-surface ratios such as films may never reach the surface waters of the GPGP as they may rapidly sink to the seafloor due to biofouling and/or fragment into microscopic pieces that are removed from surface layers.In the words of the same researchers responsible for the “46 percent of trash is fishing nets” statistic, fragmentation and density affected whether specific items were detected. Largely intact and buoyant fishing nets behaved in a manner enabling them to “persist at the sea surface for extended periods of time and accumulate in oceanic plastic pollution hotspots.” Other pollutants did not.Subsequently, researchers noted:Ghostnets, which were the main contributors to the total mass of GPGP plastic, generally have a draft of several metres, and therefore are unlikely to be influenced by wind transport. Our model also suggests that debris items with higher windage are transported over larger areas, with a higher likelihood of beaching, as well as exiting oceanic ‘garbage patches’. For instance, North Pacific particles with 1% wind forcing were spread over a large area around the GPGP that included the Hawaiian archipelago and the North American coastline.Nevertheless, researchers concluded that abandoned fishing nets “are a major contributor to oceanic plastic pollution levels and impacts.” Upon the study’s March 2018 release, lead author Laurent Lebreton told National Geographic that the findings of the research did not closely match estimates of marine debris composition:“I knew there would be a lot of fishing gear, but 46 percent was unexpectedly high … Initially, we thought fishing gear would be more in the 20 percent range. That is the accepted number [for marine debris] globally—20 percent from fishing sources and 80 percent from land.”Other experts noted that the findings were, again, specific to that debris accumulation and may not reflect the entirety of the Earth’s oceans:Marine debris expert Marcus Eriksen, co-founder of the 5 Gyres Institute, cautions that the new study is based on only limited surveys, making it difficult to accurately estimate the complete size of the patch. The data are significant in showing such a high accumulation of fishing gear, he notes.Lebreton’s estimate appeared in an August 2017 Greenpeace item about the composition of plastics in the ocean:While about a fifth of marine litter is made up of fishing gear and other materials lost at sea by accident, industrial losses, or illegal dumping, we know that roughly 80% of litter in the seas comes from land.Research into composition of plastics in the ocean seems to vary quite a bit. A 2015 study published in Marine Pollution Bulletin identified fishing nets as just two percent of its sample for that research:‘Fishing items’ represented only 2% of the abundance of total marine debris. It comprised a variety of 109 objects including rope and net fragments and plastic buoys, many of which were from trawl and long-line fisheries as well as fragments of net from FADs (Fish Aggregating Devices) used by tuna vessels. Also ubiquitous were polystyrene fragments, plastic bottles and pieces of flip-flops used as surface floats that we attributed to artisanal fisheries.Nets and other ghost fishing gear do present a unique threat to marine life, because unlike other plastics, they’re designed to withstand years of being submerged in the saltwater of the ocean without degrading:The problem of derelict gear and ghost fishing has become more pressing with the advancement of technology, which has led to the geographical expansion of fishing efforts and the use of synthetic, more durable and buoyant fishing materials. These materials may take decades to degrade, and their impact on the oceans is therefore long term and large scale. This is particularly problematic for gillnets, which trap fish by their gills. Gillnets and other passive gear that capture organisms swimming into them are generally made of nylon and therefore maintain high fishing efficiency for many years.The use of biodegradable nets has been proposed to ameliorate the risks posed by ghost fishing gear. Another factor in the risk posed to marine life by these items is that by design, they are intended to entrap fish and sea life. Even when discarded, they function in that manner:Abandoned fishing gear devours sea-life with insatiable hunger. To a number of conservationists, these derelict nets are darkly referred to as “ghost gear.” In more technical terms, it can be called Abandoned, Lost, or Discarded Fishing Gear (ALDFG).ALDFG functions in a number of ways. Floating nets wander around, collecting a plethora of organisms, and eventually sink under the weight. As this biomass breaks apart in the ocean’s benthic regions, the nets shake their load and lumber upwards again, ready to wreak more havoc. Some nets and lines wrap themselves on reefs, shipwrecks, or rocks, ensnaring marine animals, maiming, drowning or simply starving hundreds of thousands of them. Pots intended for crab, lobster, and shrimp see an eclectic range of visitors. Entire crab or lobster lineages, scavenging bottom dwellers that venture inside for a hapless predecessor’s remains, perish in these traps.Abandoned gear makes no distinctions, capturing marine mammals, fish, turtles, whales, birds, sharks, rays, and invertebrates.In terms of sourcing, two 2017 studies found that more than 80 percent of plastic debris entered the ocean from the same ten to twenty rivers, most of which are in Asia. Neither study mentioned ghost fishing nets.We were unable to track down any ocean-wide estimate of the proportion of fishing nets to other plastic debris in the ocean. The claim that half of the ocean’s plastic (46 percent) is comprised of fishing nets was taken out of context, however. Many sites and blogs reported on a specific study on the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, finding that that debris was made up of an unexpectedly large number of fishing nets. The same study noted that other plastics may behave differently, sinking to lower depths or degrading to unidentifiable pieces.Plastic straws do seem to make up a smaller amount of ocean plastic than fishing nets, but the research in question here only found the high proportion of nets in one particular area of accumulation between California and Hawaii, not the entire ocean. The study’s lead researcher went on to surmise that 20 percent of ocean plastic is made up of ghost fishing equipment — including (but not limited to) nets.
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10142
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No Cure For Morning Sickness Just Yet
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We wish more stories focused their coverage on the lack of good evidence supporting commonly used medical treatments, as this NPR story about remedies for morning sickness did. We also appreciate this story’s decision to cover a Cochrane Library systematic review–among the most authoritative evaluations of medical evidence available in the literature today. Still, a skeptical outlook cannot substitute for a thorough analysis of the evidence — something which this story came close to but ultimately did not provide to readers. In addition, high quality source material cannot make up for a story’s failure to provide an independent perspective. Overall this was a solid effort that met most of our criteria and communicated the key points well. A bit more detail in a few areas would have increased the story’s value to readers. Morning sickness is common and can range from a minor annoyance to a life-threatening condition. It takes a significant toll on women and our economy via lost work days, increased anxiety, physical symptoms and reduced overall quality of life. Women who experience morning sickness inevitably are going to receive conflicting recommendations from doctors, family, and friends about the best way to deal with the condition. This story delivers an important message about the lack of good evidence supporting any specific therapy.
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true
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"There wasn’t any discussion of costs of these treatments. The point of the story was tell readers that these treatments couldn’t be recommended on the basis of medical evidence. Even in an overview of available treatments, some cost information is important for readers, especially given the fact that regular acupuncture treatments are going to cost a lot more than vitamin B-6. How much money are people wasting on these treatments? A mixed bag here, but ultimately unsatisfactory in our view. The story does note that there ""wasn’t much hard data"" on psychological, social or economic outcomes — all of which are important to look at considering the lost work time, anxiety, and reduced quality of life that women may experience because of morning sickness. But then the story goes on to state that there was ""some evidence"" that ginger, vitamin B-6 and anti-vomiting drugs relieved nausea. Well, how much evidence was there and what exactly did it show? While the story states that the evidence for these treatments ""isn’t strong enough to make a recommendation,"" we feel the story should have tried to quantify this benefit in a way that would be meaningful for readers, whether as episodes of nausea/vomiting or some other ""real world"" outcome. The story noted that most of the studies included in the review didn’t include enough information about potential harms — ""something everyone would certainly want to know."" We’ll call this satisfactory, but we wish it had included at least some information about the harms that were mentioned, such as heartburn in patients taking ginger and drowsiness in patients taking anti-nausea medications. The Cochrane systematic review discussed in this article is actually a ""study of studies."" In this case, the story told us how many clinical trials were included in the review (27) and how many women participated in those studies (about 4,000). The story told us why the included studies, which at first glance might seem like an impressive volume of research, couldn’t provide reliable answers about the effectiveness of morning sickness treatments. The story noted that many of studies used different methods and had different ways of measuring outcomes, so the results couldn’t be pooled together to increase the statistical power of the analysis. The lead overstates the case a bit by saying that the review concluded that there was ""no reliable treatment to relieve vomiting and feelings of nausea in early-term pregnant women."" But, in the third paragraph, the story says, ""Dublin City University’s Anne Matthews, the review’s lead researcher, says it was disappointing not to find more studies that were consistent in testing the same approaches. Without enough data that could be pooled together, it wasn’t possible for the Cochrane folks to figure out if anything really works reliably and safely."" It would have been nice to see Cochrane’s methods evaluated as closely as those of any other type of research experiment. But it didn’t provide key information about how the researchers selected which studies to include in the review. We don’t know, for example, whether the included studies were randomized controlled trials or if uncontrolled trials were allowed. We also don’t know if the studies had to be of a certain size or quality to be included. This information is vital to understanding the strength of the review’s conclusions. This story didn’t exaggerate the effects of morning sickness. The only source quoted in the article was an author of the study being covered. As we discussed in our review of the competing LA Times piece, one could argue that this criterion should be ruled not applicable in this case since the Cochrane group authors are, by definition, an independent group of evaluators. Since other experts do sometimes dispute the way in which Cochrane authors analyze the evidence, however, we feel it would have added value to include the voice of another expert who wasn’t affiliated with the study. The story discusses many different treatments for morning sickness and reports that they all lack good-quality evidence to support their use. The whole point of the story was to discuss the most commonly used treatments for morning sickness: acupuncture, acupressure, ginger, vitamin B-6 and conventional anti-vomiting drugs. The novelty of the treatments analyzed in the review isn’t really in question, so we’ll call this not applicable. The story includes an interview with one of the authors of the study and doesn’t include any direct duplication of text from this press release. So we feel pretty confident that it didn’t rely exclusively on a release for its content."
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5077
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Committees propose school safety focus with $10M fund.
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County officials in Colorado heard proposals from two committees tasked with planning how to use $10 million for school safety.
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true
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Health, School safety, Mental health, Colorado
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The Denver Post reported Tuesday that the Douglas County committees for physical security and mental health are recommending more than a dozen ideas for standardizing safety plans and better supporting students dealing with mental illness. The committees say the county could fund programs on social-emotional learning, suicide prevention and mental health support. Douglas County commissioners voted in May to dedicate funding for school security. They also provided $3 million to fund school police officers and $300,000 for a mental health response team. The Douglas County School District is matching county funding for school police officers. ___ Information from: The Denver Post, http://www.denverpost.com
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23944
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The fact that Rick Scott is running for governor as a 'reformer' would be funny if it wasn't so outrageous. This is a man who barely escaped imprisonment.
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Rick Scott, former health care CEO, barely escaped prison, GOP opponent claims
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false
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Candidate Biography, Health Care, Florida, Bill McCollum,
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"After virtually ignoring millionaire Rick Scott and his unconventional campaign for governor, Attorney General Bill McCollum launched a full attack on May 18, 2010, criticizing Scott for his role as a former CEO of a national hospital chain that bilked state and federal health care programs.Scott, 57, has been running an unorthodox campaign, spending millions of dollars in television advertising three months before the Republican primary. He's casting himself as an outsider and a reformer.The descriptions get a chuckle from McCollum's campaign. ""The fact that Rick Scott is running for governor as a 'reformer' would be funny if it wasn't so outrageous,"" McCollum campaign manager Matt Williams said. ""This is a man who barely escaped imprisonment, whose failure in business has been portrayed on national news and around the world. He is an embarrassment. ""Democratic frontrunner Alex Sink issued a similar critique saying that Scott's company -- Columbia/HCA -- had pleaded guilty to 14 felonies as part of a federal fraud investigation and was forced to pay a record $1.7 billion in fines. You can see that analysis here.In this item, we wanted to see if the McCollum campaign is right to say Scott ""barely escaped imprisonment. ""First, some background about the Columbia/HCA saga.Scott started what was first Columbia in the spring of 1987, purchasing two El Paso, Texas, hospitals with a plan to brand hospitals -- like soft drinks or a clothes line -- through aggressive growth. The chain quickly grew, and in 1994, purchased the 100-hospital HCA chain. Over time, the publicly traded company swelled to become the nation's largest hospital chain, growing to more than 340 hospitals, 135 surgery centers and 550 home health locations in 37 states and two foreign countries.That's the good news.Now for the bad.In 1997, federal authorities went public with a massive multipronged investigation into Columbia/HCA and whether it was bilking state and federal health care programs, including Medicare and Medicaid.Specifically, authorities were investigating whether the hospital chain ordered unnecessary lab work and billed Medicare and Medicaid for the cost, whether it attached diagnosis codes to patient records in order to increase reimbursement to the hospitals and whether it billed the government for home health care visits for patients who did not qualify to receive them.Scott resigned as Columbia/HCA's CEO in the middle of the investigation in July 1997.The fraud cases ultimately were resolved as part of two federal settlements -- one in 2000 and another in 2002 -- where Columbia/HCA agreed to pay a record $1.7 billion in fines and also agreed to plead guilty to 14 felonies in five states. The U.S. Justice Department called the Columbia/HCA deal the largest government fraud settlement in U.S. history.How close was Scott to going to prison for his part in the fraud case?Not at all.Four Florida based Columbia/HCA excutives ultimately were indicted as part of the fraud investigation, but not Scott.Two executives, Jay Jarrell and Robert Whiteside, were convicted of defrauding Medicare in 1999 and were sentenced to prison. Jarrell was sentenced to 33 months in prison; Whiteside got 24 months. Those convictions, however, were overturned on appeal.Two other executives also were prosecuted in the case. A Tampa federal jury acquitted Michael Neeb and failed to reach a verdict on Carl Lynn Dick. ""With the reversal of the Whiteside and Jarrell convictions, not a single individual has been convicted as a result of this seemingly limitless cost-report investigation,'' Columbia/HCA's lawyers wrote in a March 2002 court filing.Walter P. Loughlin, HCA's lawyer during the investigation, said Whiteside and Jarrell were the only two executives ever convicted. And while Columbia/HCA did plead guilty to 14 felonies, those were corporate convictions -- meaning no one served prison time. We did find an ABC News transcript from August 1997 in which reporter Brian Ross said Scott was a target of federal investigators. On World News Tonight, Ross said: ""Columbia has denied the fraud allegations. But its chairman -- Rick Scott -- and five other top corporate executives have resigned. And federal investigators told ABC News today that Scott is now considered a prime target of the investigation."" But Scott campaign spokeswoman Jennifer Baker said Scott was never even interviewed as part of the case. She pointed us to a 2009 Fortune article. ""Scott's not Bernie Madoff or Leona Helmsley,"" the article said. ""He has never been charged with wrongdoing. He was never even personally contacted by investigators."" McCollum's statement was that Scott ""barely escaped imprisonment,"" but the fact is he was never indicted, and the only individuals convicted of wrongdoing associated with the Columbia/HCA ultimately had those convictions tossed out. The corporate convictions aren't tied to any individual and carry only fines, not prison time. While one ABC News report does say he was a target of an investigation, that doesn't translate to barely escaping a prison sentence."
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227
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In drought-hit Delhi, the haves get limitless water, the poor fight for every drop.
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In this teeming capital city of more than 20 million people, a worsening drought is amplifying the vast inequality between India’s rich and poor.
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true
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Environment
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The politicians, civil servants and corporate lobbyists who live in substantial houses and apartments in central Delhi pay very little to get limitless supplies of piped water – whether for their bathrooms, kitchens or to wash the car, dog, or spray a manicured lawn. They can do all that for as little as $10-$15 a month. But step into one of the slum areas in the inner city, or a giant disorganized housing estate on the outskirts and there is a daily struggle to get and pay for very limited supplies of water, which is delivered by tanker rather than pipe. And the price is soaring as supplies are fast depleting. India’s water crisis is far from even-handed - the elite in Delhi and most other parts of the country remain unaffected while the poor scramble for supplies every day. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s official residence and those of his cabinet are in central Delhi, as are those of most lawmakers. That may help to explain why it took until this week for Modi to call for a massive water conservation program, the first big initiative by the government despite years of warnings about dry reservoirs and depleted water tables, policy makers and water industry experts said. Telecom sales representative Amar Nath Shukla, who lives in a giant unauthorized housing sprawl on the south side of Delhi, says he is now paying 700 rupees ($10) for a small tanker to bring him, his wife and three school-age children 2,000 liters of water, their weekly quota. A year ago, Shukla would buy two of the rusty, oval-shaped tankers a week for 500 rupees each but he cut back to one as the price climbed 40 percent. “Why should a densely populated settlement get so little of water and why should the sparsely-populated central district of New Delhi receive so much of extra supply?” asked Shukla. More than 30 other residents Reuters spoke to in his Sangam Vihar district also complained about the quality of water. “Until last year I was drinking the water sold by a few local suppliers but then I fell ill and the doctor asked me to buy water bottles made by only big, reputed companies,” said Dilip Kumar Kamath, 46, waving a prescription which listed abdominal pain and stomach infection as his ailments. Delhi’s main government district and the army cantonment areas get about 375 liters of water per person per day but residents of Sangam Vihar on average receive only 40 liters for each resident per day. The water comes from boreholes and tankers under the jurisdiction of the Delhi water board, run by the city government. But residents say some of the boreholes have been taken over by private operators associated with criminal gangs and local politicians. These gangs also have a major role in providing private tankers, which are all illegal, making people liable to price gouging. And all this when temperatures, and demand, are soaring. Delhi was the second driest it has been in 26 years in June, and recorded its highest ever temperature for the month at 48 degrees Celsius on June 10. Monsoon rains reached the capital on Thursday, more than a week later than usual, with only a light drizzle. Most private tanker operators in Delhi either illegally pump out fast depleting ground water or steal the water from government supplies, various government studies show. In Delhi, nearly half of the supply from the Delhi water board either gets stolen with the connivance of lowly officials or simply seeps out via leaky pipes, several studies show. The board’s 1,033 tanker fleet is well short of the city’s requirements. Hundreds of private water tankers are operating this summer, though there are no official numbers. The water scarcity is even more acute in the Bhalswa Dairy locality of northwestern Delhi, more than 30 km (20 miles) from Sangam Vihar. The water from a couple of community taps and hand pumps are too toxic to use, forcing people to queue up for a government tanker that comes just once a day. As a result, fights frequently break out when people, mostly can-carrying women and children, sprint towards the arriving tanker. Last year, at least three people were killed in scuffles that broke out over water in Delhi. “Fights over water supplies have gone up since May and these fights now constitute almost 50% of our daily complaints,” said a police official at the Bhalswa Dairy Police station, who declined to be named. Some tanker operators have also started selling bottled water, underlining concerns over the quality of water in their tanks and how costs for ordinary people can mount, said the police official. Nearly 200,000 people living in the Bhalswa area are vulnerable to liver-related disease such as jaundice and hepatitis, said Kamlesh Bharti, president of non-governmental organization Kamakhya Lok Sewa Samiti, which works in the areas of health and education. The Bhalswa area is next to a big waste landfill, which has contaminated both surface and groundwater in the area. According to UK-based charity WaterAid, about 163 million people in India, roughly 12 percent of the population, do not have access to clean water close to their homes, the most of any country. Almost all middle-class residents in the city have either water purifiers at home or they buy big cans of water from Bisleri, India’s top bottled water brand, Coca-Cola Co (KO.N) or PepsiCo Inc (PEP.O). Bottled water suppliers reported a nearly three-fold jump in sales in India between 2012 and 2017, according to market research company Euromonitor. India’s dependence on groundwater and the country’s failure to replenish aquifers have exacerbated the crisis, said V.K. Madhavan chief executive of WaterAid. Both individual households and myriad industries mostly use fresh water and the reuse and recycling of water “is almost an alien concept” in the country, Madhavan said. Still, Delhi authorities said the plan to build three dams in the upper reaches of the Yamuna river, which passes through the city, would help Delhi overcome the shortage. It will take 3-4 years to construct them, said S. K. Haldar, a top official of the Central Water Commission. But issues such as land acquisition, resettlement and environmental clearances could make such an aggressive timetable untenable, Madhavan said. (Graphic: The forecast and actual onset of monsoon along India's Kerala's coast - tmsnrt.rs/2Yj64GG)
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34308
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Bones found on the remote Pacific Island of Nikumaroro belong to famed aviator Amelia Earhart.
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Therefore, we rank the claim as unproven. We don’t expect that to change any time soon, either.
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unproven
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History, amelia earhart, archeology, bones
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In the early morning hours of 2 July 1937, Amelia Earhart departed from Papua New Guinea’s Lae Airfield on a course for a tiny mound in the Pacific Ocean named Howland Island. Waiting for them in deeper waters nearby was a United States Coast Guard Cutter named the Itasca, which was there to provide navigational support for what was intended to be Earhart’s most risky refuel in the middle of the ocean. In a mystery that continues to provoke impassioned debate to this day, Earhart never arrived at Howland Island, and the wreckage of her plane, and the remains of both Earhart and her navigator Fred Noonan have never conclusively been located, despite a large-scale search in the area of Howland Island by the Itasca and others in the weeks following her disappearance. Earhart was declared dead in absentia two years later. Howland or Nikumaroro Island? The most straightforward and, according to many experts, most likely explanation for her death is that Earhart ran out of fuel during an ultimately unsuccessful search for Howland Island. Fuel analysis performed by historians and scientists suggest that Earhart probably would have had very little extra fuel in the event of navigational problems by the time she was to have arrived at Howland Island, and the few radio transmissions between the Itasca and Earhart that went through suggest she was approaching its general location, as described by Smithsonian Magazine: The Itasca’s operators heard her transmissions, growing stronger as she approached Howland Island shortly after sunrise. At one point her signal was so strong the ship’s radio operator ran to the deck to look for her overhead. But he saw only empty sky, and she, it seems, just clouds and empty ocean. Near the end, her voice was becoming strained; she sounded “frantic,” according to the Itasca’s commanding officer. “We must be on you but cannot see you,” she radioed. “Gas is running low.” Competing theories with varying degrees of plausibility (some of which, such as her being captured and held by the Japanese as a POW, are already conclusively debunked) have been offered ever since. One group in particular has been remarkably successful in promoting their own theory of the incident to the mystery-loving public — The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR), led by aviation accident investigator Ric Gillespie. The group is single-handedly responsible for the bulk of viral Amelia Earhart headlines over the past decade. TIGHAR’s hypothesis rests on the assumption that bones recovered from an island about 350 nautical miles south of Howland named Nikumaroro Island (but known at the time as Gardner Island), belong to Earhart. Throughout the years, a steady stream of artifacts found by TIGHAR and potentially associated with those human remains on the island have provided tantalizing suggestions for people invested in the theory that Earhart ended up somewhere else on land. Two of the main hurdles undermining widespread support for the TIGHAR explanation, however, are the fact that bones found on this island — discovered around 1940 — were originally described by a medical investigator as belonging to a stocky Polynesian male (not a tallish slim female of European descent like Earhart), and that nobody knows, presently, where the Nikumaroro Bones are. This means that everyone and anyone discussing those bones is relying on the same 1941 notes of two doctors’ examination of the find to make arguments about who they may belong to. This context is important when considering the most recent headlines inspired by TIGHAR’s work, such as this from the Daily Mail: Is this the final resting place of Amelia Earhart? Bones discovered on Pacific island are ‘99% certain to be hers’ says scientist. The Nikumaroro Bones In early 1940, a local on the island of Nikumaroro came across a skull and a bottle. By September 1940, word of the find had made its way to Gerald “Irish” Gallagher, the first officer-in-charge of the Phoenix Islands Settlement Scheme — a failed British effort to colonize a series of largely uninhabited islands, including that of Nikumaroro, where he was stationed. Gallagher sent a telegram to his superiors regarding the find, suggesting that they could be the bones of Amelia Earhart and that they should keep the find quiet. Gallagher noted in this telegram that additional bones had been located, along with a women’s size 10 shoe and a sextant box. After a prolonged back and forth between British officials, the bones were shipped to Suva, Fiji and analyzed by two individuals — Lindsay Isaac and D.W. Hoodless. Isaac, a British medical officer, performed the first inspection on route to Fiji in the port of Tarawa on 11 February 1941. Following his analysis, Isaac sent Gallagher a telegram informing him that it was his view that the bones likely belonged to an elderly man of Polynesian descent — information that Gallagher described as anticlimactic. Hoodless, the principal of the Central Medical School in Suva, Fiji, performed a second inspection. Much of our information about the Nikumaroro Bones comes from a 4 April 1941 report from Hoodless to an officer of the British Western Pacific Territories. Hoodless, using an analysis of the bone’s lengths, concluded that the bones likely belonged to a 45- to 55-year-old male with a height of around five and a half feet. Hoodless speculated the bones could have belonged either a Polynesian or a European person; he could not be sure. As a result of these conclusions, the bones (which were lost after Hoodless’ analysis) were largely forgotten until 1998, when TIGHAR-associated researchers presented their theory at a meeting of the American Anthropological Association that the bones had been described incorrectly by Hoodless. The conclusion, made by forensic anthropologists Karen Burns and Richard Jantz using a reinterpretation of the information contained in the telegram, was that the bones could actually have belonged to someone who fits the Amelia Earhart profile: Based on the information now in hand, [forensic anthropologists Richard] Jantz and [Karen] Burns both concluded that the remains found on Nikumaroro in 1939-40 represented an individual who was: (1) More likely female than male (2) More likely white than Polynesian or other Pacific Islander (3) Most likely between 5’5″ and 5’9″ in height. This finding, which remains controversial, renewed interest in the Nikumaroro theory and has been the basis for numerous expeditions to the island to search for other artifacts that could bolster their interpretation. The group has gained exposure through press releases and from documentary film crews from media outlets that support their work. The 2018 paper that generated the viral claims that a scientist is “99% certain” that the Nikumaroro bones belonged to Earhart was written by Jantz, an author of the original 1998 paper. His 2018 paper is primarily a response to a 2015 critique of their work which argued that their reasons for questioning the 1941 analysis of the bones were insufficient. Scientists are “99% Certain” the Nikumaroro Bones Belong to Earhart In his 2018 paper, which like many of their finds came with a TIGHAR press release describing the find as essentially conclusive, Jantz reiterated his argument from the 1998 presentation that Hoodless could not (and did not) adequately analyze the bones. In this most recent paper, Jantz appears even more confident than his 1998 presentation, arguing that modern methods produce results that suggest a 99 percent certainty that the bones belonged to Earhart: When Hoodless conducted his analysis, forensic osteology was not yet a well-developed discipline. Evaluating his methods with reference to modern data and methods suggests that they were inadequate to his task; this is particularly the case with his sexing method. Therefore his sex assessment of the Nikumaroro bones cannot be assumed to be correct. To address the question of whether the Nikumaroro bones match estimates of Amelia Earhart’s bone lengths, I compare Earhart’s bone lengths with the Nikumaroro bones using Mahalanobis distance. This analysis reveals that Earhart is more similar to the Nikumaroro bones than 99% of individuals in a large reference sample. This strongly supports the conclusion that the Nikumaroro bones belonged to Amelia Earhart. That nearly-complete certainty refers specifically to the kind of analysis Jantz performed, in which he compared the dimensions of the Nikumaroro bones to a pool of data which contained a random assortment of 2776 Euro-American individual’s skeletal measurements. “If the bones do not belong to Amelia Earhart,” he wrote, “then they are from someone very similar to her. And, as we have seen, a random individual has a very low probability of possessing that degree of similarity.” He reviewed photos of Amelia Earhart that allowed for estimates of the actual length of Earhart’s skeletal features, and he reviewed the methods employed by Hoodless, suggesting they were out of date and not a reasonable basis for Hoodless’s conclusions about them. His analysis determined that Amelia Earhart is a better fit for the Nikumaroro Bones than 99 percent of the 2776 individuals contained in his dataset of Euro-American skeletal measurements. In an e-mail, Jantz told us: It comes down to the fact the Earhart’s measurements are more similar to the [Nikumaroro] bones than 99% of the general population, as defined by my reference sample of Euro-Americans. Other forensic anthropologists believe Jantz’s methods make sense. In an e-mail, Bruce Anderson, an adjunct professor of forensic anthropology at the University of Arizona who also works for the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner, described Jantz as “the pre-eminent physical/forensic anthropologist in the US in terms of measurements of the human body,” adding: Sex assessment from skeletal remains is one, if not the most common, error that has been routinely made by non-physical/forensic anthropologists. […] If I were a betting man, I’d put my money on the interpretation forwarded by Richard Jantz. Kristina Killgrove, a biological anthropologist at the University of West Florida, told the BBC the methods are an interesting solution to a hard scientific problem, but that the certainty of the findings has been oversold: Dr. Jantz has done a great job with the information at hand, in an attempt to go further in solving this case. But I disagree with the conclusion that we should necessarily assume that these bones are Earhart’s. […] I think that he has tried to correlate these measurements very well, which is an interesting approach, but to me it’s a lot of what-iffing. It’s essentially gaming out the logical conclusion of a whole lot of different variables. So this isn’t a positive identification as Jantz notes as well in his article. While Jantz’s work may suggest a higher similarity between the Nikumaroro Bones and Earhart’s dimensions than was previously assumed, it does not explain away any of the other significant challenges to the Nikumaroro hypothesis. Jantz acknowledged that there was a limit on how much information the 1941 notes could tell a researcher, but that he hoped his research would demonstrate that there are still avenues available to scientists hoping to shed light on the mystery: What I hope my paper does is show that scientific methods can be used to examine this mystery. I understand there is only so much that can be done with the meager evidence left by Dr. Hoodless, but more can be done, and I hope will be. No one knows whether the bones will ever be found. If so, the matter could be put to rest in short order. If not, then we should bring as much evidence to bear on the question as we possibly can. Problems with the Nikumaroro Conclusion The TIGHAR hypothesis provides few specifics on how Earhart would have ended up 400 miles south of her intended target. A common approach for aviation navigators during this era, in the event that they were unable to get a visual on the island (which was the case), or to receive their bearing from the Itasca (which was also the case), is to intentionally fly toward the north or south of the the expected target before flying a north-south line that would presumably intersect with the target. Historians on all sides of the debate generally agree that Earhart was likely trying to communicate this plan in the final undisputed transmissions received by the Itasca between 8:43 and 8:55 A.M., in which she stated, “We are on the line 157 337” (a compass bearing) and then a garbled transmission that many have interpreted as “we are running on line north and south.” In TIGHAR’s view, Earhart would have been south of the island, attempting to find it by going northward briefly, before pointing south, hoping that they would find Howland, but committed to south because their 157 337 line could, in a worst case scenario, intersect with either Baker Island (a bit south of Howland) or the more distant Nikumaroro: She knows that Howland Island is somewhere on this 157/337 line, close enough for the Itasca to hear her radio calls, but that could be several hundred miles. What to do now? Turn left? Turn right? By happy coincidence, Howland is not the only island on the 157/337 line. […] Of course, the island they want to reach, and hope to reach, is Howland – the only place in the entire Central Pacific where there is an airfield – but the fate to be avoided at all costs is running out of gas over the open ocean. The most reasonable course of action is obvious: fly northwestward (337°) along the line for a short way to see if Howland is nearby in that direction. If it is not, turn around and proceed southeastward (157°) until you come to an island. Critics of the theory, like science writer and Skeptoid podcast host Brian Dunning, argue that 1.) the clear radio transmissions received by the Itasca make it apparent she was quite close to Howland and 2.) that if she was close to Howland she would not have had anywhere near enough fuel to make it to Nikumaroro. Earhart had a 50 W radio transmitter and utilized the 3105 khz HF radio frequency to communicate voice messages to the Itasca. The distance such a signal could travel varies based on large number of variables including time of day, weather, altitude, atmospheric conditions, and even celestial factors. The clearest transmission received by the Itasca came in at 7:42 A.M., and it stated Earhart’s belief she was where she expected the island to be: “We must be on you but cannot see you but gas is running low. Been unable to reach you by radio. We are flying at 1000 feet.” Her voice at this point was quite clear, according to the Itasca’s chief radioman Leo G. Bellarts: We could hear her voice just as easy as I’m hearing yours right now and I’m deaf in one ear now. But I’ll tell you, you could hear her voice all over the shack and even outside the shack. You know, real loud and clear. Theodore Rappaport is an expert in wireless communication and an engineering professor at New York University and is also an active amateur radio operator who communicates around the world using high frequencies (HF) close to those used by Earhart. He told us: “It is possible that her transmission could have traveled for 1,000 to 2,000 miles or even more into darkness, or along the sunlight/darkness boundary, but the distance into the daylight direction would have been much smaller, on the order of 100-200 miles.” If she was transmitting using voice modulation, he says, the distances would be only slightly smaller than if she was transmitting Morse code. This would suggest she was within 200 miles, probably closer, to Howland when their gas was “running low.” Indeed, the Coast Guard assumed based on their radio communication with her that she went down in a sector between 40 miles and 200 miles from Howland Island. Given the 7:42 A.M. time of her clearest transmission, however, it is possible that these transmissions could have traveled further, thanks to some funky day-night interactions in the ionosphere that can — under certain circumstances — happen along the “grey line” between night and day. “Shortwave radio communications for 400 miles on a path either north or south of her plane could be doable at that time of day,” Rappaport told us. Putting Earhart more than 200 miles south of Howland would be a huge error for two experienced aviators, and it runs contrary to the initial Coast Guard/Navy assumption she went down north west of the island. If she was that far off course, however, you would then have to argue they had enough fuel to make it close to Nikumaroro. TIGHAR suggests that she would have had hours of fuel (contrary to Earhart’s 7:42 A.M. statement of running low) after abandoning their hypothesized northward search for Howland. Marie K. and Elgen Long, in their famous book Amelia Earhart: The Mystery Solved, argued — based on a number of technical factors — that such a scenario would be unlikely, as they would have been perilously low on fuel once they arrived at what they felt was their intended target based on their reconstruction of her flight (a scenario that TIGHAR disputes). And then, there are those supporting artifacts collected near the Nikumaroro Bones and by later TIGHAR expeditions. Despite numerous proclamations of certainty regarding their link to Earhart, many of the finds have later been called into question. The island itself sits near currents that would likely transport trash and other artifacts to the island, and there is evidence of earlier habitation in the region. Additionally, a shipwreck occurred there on 29 November 1929 in which eleven people died. The bones themselves, in addition to being described as belonging to a short male, were assumed by Isaac in 1941 to be so weathered as to have been exposed for 20 years (long before Earhart’s disappearance), an assertion that cannot be addressed or challenged by modern techniques without the bones themselves. A lot of variables would have to line up all at once for the TIGHAR hypothesis to work with the Coast Guard/Navy data, and it also bears mentioning that Naval aircraft searched Nikumaroro island for Earhart and Noonan on July 9th and found no signs of Earhart, her plane, or Noonan. Due to these complicating factors, Jerry Adler argued in Smithsonian Magazine that Earhart running out of fuel near Howland “remains the simplest explanation, but for that very reason, has attracted derision from those who prefer their history complicated.” The historical record provides far less conclusive evidence than TIGHAR suggests, and arguing that notes provided by a deceased doctor about bones lost since 1941 offer 99 percent certainty is something of an oversell.
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3832
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Impeachment dominates, but much other work awaits Congress.
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Impeachment may have leapfrogged to the top of the national agenda, but members of Congress still have their day jobs as legislators, and they’re returning to Washington this coming week with mixed hopes of success.
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true
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Global trade, AP Top News, General News, Politics, Impeachments, Business, Prescription drugs, Nancy Pelosi, Trump impeachment inquiry, Trade agreements, Donald Trump
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It’s a volatile, difficult-to-predict time in Washington as lawmakers end a two-week break. The notion that President Donald Trump could do much significant dealmaking with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, his impeachment antagonist, could be fanciful, given Trump’s impulsiveness and demands for border wall money. An important trade agreement pact has a pulse. An effort to deal with high prescription drug prices seems stuck. Pelosi, D-Calif., is aware of the political imperative to avoid looking tied up in impeachment while leaving the rest of the nation’s business hanging. At a recent news conference she solicited questions on topics such as trade before turning to impeachment, reminding that the Democratic-controlled House has sent bill after bill to the GOP-led Senate, which has done little else but vote on presidential nominations for months. Divided government has produced scant results thus far, except for a small-scale budget deal that lawmakers are struggling to put in place. The next few months could prove make or break for high-profile agenda items such as an updated trade agreement with Canada and Mexico, a full slate of spending bills and prescription drug legislation. Pelosi insists impeachment doesn’t have to harm the legislative agenda in Washington. “They have nothing to do with each other,” Pelosi said earlier this month. “We have a responsibility to uphold our oath of office, to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. We also have a responsibility to get the job done for the American people.” The atmosphere isn’t exactly brimming with optimism. Hopes for a near-term breakthrough on trade, one of the few items on which Pelosi and Republicans are in general alignment, faded after AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka issued a combative warning against a speedy vote on the new North American pact. On spending, negotiators are trying push through a $1.4 trillion package of agency spending bills to fill in the details of this summer’s budget-and-debt accord. Experienced bargainers such as GOP Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, are taking the lead on that but lingering bitterness over the U.S.-Mexico wall fight threatens to again delay a resolution. That’s particularly so after Trump’s attacked lawmakers’ traditional power of the purse by raiding military construction projects to finance wall construction. Given the uncertainty, lawmakers may end up doing what they do best: Kicking the can down the road. Months-late enactment of the annual agency appropriations bills is increasingly common in Washington, and it’s clear that another temporary government-wide funding bill will be needed when the current one expires in six weeks. Likewise, there’s no hard and fast deadline for ratifying an important trade pact with Mexico and Canada that an administration priority. Pelosi supported the original North American Free Trade Agreement in 1994, as did the current House Ways and Means Committee chairman, Rep. Richard Neal, who has forged a good relationship with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer. Pelosi and Neal, D-Mass., had been making cautious but optimistic assurances about the long-delayed trade pact, which is being held up in large part over Mexico’s efforts to toughen labor standards and limit U.S. job losses. A green light from labor would make Pelosi’s job much easier, so the outlook for the trade agreement soured considerably when Trumka warned that labor would work to kill it if House Democrats tried to rush a vote. “If there was a vote before Thanksgiving, the agreement would be defeated,” Trumka told The Washington Post. Steve Elmendorf, a lobbyist who cultivates close ties to Democratic leaders, said that before Trumka’s remarks, there seemed to be a sense of progress and that lawmakers would have liked to hold a vote before the holiday. He said that if Pelosi “can get a good deal, she is completely capable of compartmentalizing this and a bunch of other issues in a different lane than impeachment.” What does need to pass before Thanksgiving is another short-term measure to prevent a government shutdown. That would buy more time for lawmakers to try to negotiate a full package of spending bills. Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., have a proven track record as negotiators who can deliver. But Trump could upend the situation at any time. He’s at least given negotiators the green light to try to find a way to an agreement. The glass half-full take is that both Trump and Pelosi need legislative victories heading into next year’s elections. Pelosi has a slew of freshmen Democrats from swing districts with lots of middle-of-the-road voters, while Trump hasn’t delivered on many bread-and-butter issues since his 2017 tax cut bill. Talks on prescription drugs face considerable obstacles, however. McConnell has promised to stop Pelosi’s bill is its tracks, but a bipartisan Senate bill has divided Republicans and faces big hurdles of its own. There’s another factor that tilts the playing field toward delay: There is plenty of time. Unlike the burst of legislating that occurred on the cusp of President Bill Clinton’s impeachment in the fall of 1998, Congress can still wrap up its work next year.
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11481
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Brain’s Electrical Activity May Help Spot Infants at High Risk for Autism
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This story, though, did a particularly poor job in large part because it allowed the lead author of the study to promote the idea that this might lead to a scan to be used on all children. The story did this despite the fact that it did very little to evaluate the quality of the evidence behind the study, presented no quantification of the potential harms associated with screening and tossed aside the issue of cost by claiming that scans — even for every kid in the country — would be “relatively inexpensive”. Autism spectrum disorders are increasingly being diagnosed, yet the causes remain elusive and the treatments are far from a cure for most kids. Parents are hungry for solutions. Early detection for autism spectrum disorders is felt to be important because early interventions are one of the few treatments that are effective. Moving the window for detection from age 3 or older, when many of the behaviors develop, to the infant stage could provide additional time for early intervention strategies. The fact that the story does not talk about what these might be for infants is one of many missing elements that made this story a missed opportunity.
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false
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Autism,HealthDay
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By saying that EEGs are “relatively inexpensive, painless and safe” the story skirts the entire issue of screening costs both at the individual level and at the population level. Even basic genetic screenings for couples considering having children are not covered by many insurance plans unless the couple is in a very high risk group for a particular disorder. The assumption that people might be able to just stop into a clinic and have their child scanned for very little money is naive and misleading. The story provides a lot of percentages but very little in terms of absolute differences or clear, hard numbers. It says that “Prior research has shown that about 20 percent of siblings of children with autism will also develop autism and another 40 to 50 percent will have some characteristics of the disorder, such as repetitive behaviors or problems with social interaction, language or communication, but not the full-blown disorder.” That’s a great piece of context and should have guided the rest of the reporting. Instead, the story says that “When the babies were nine months old, researchers could predict who was in the high-risk autism group — that is, they had a sibling with autism — with nearly 80 percent accuracy.” It goes on to say, “When broken out by gender, researchers found other differences. For example, at nine months they were able to predict which boys were in the high-risk group with near 100 percent accuracy. But accuracy for girls at that age was only 60 percent, not statistically significant.” Are readers to take this to mean that the statistically significant predictions for boys were averaged with the statistically insignificant predictions for girls to arrive at the “nearly 80 percent” figure? If so, this seems problematic. Regardless, readers deserved absolute numbers. No harms were quantified. Instead, readers were told that the EEG is “painless and safe.” The story presses the idea that “early intervention is extremely important” even though the study did not detect autism in any way that would warrant treatment. What would be the next step for these children? Should they be put into behavioral therapy, put on a restrictive diet, given drugs of some kind? All of these options have potential consequences that could, indeed, prove harmful to the children, especially if they are falsely diagnosed as having autism. And, like most screening tests, there is the additional potential harm of unnecessary worry for some parents, as it is likely that at least some kids will ‘screen positive’ and then develop normally. Screening tests have harms. It is a common journalistic pitfall to overlook this fact. Nowhere does the story address the idea that the main benefit of this test appears to be that it detected with 80% accuracy during a very small timeframe that a child had an older sibling with autism. This means that the study correctly identified most of the time a risk factor that was already known to the parents of the chlid and to the researchers. So, in effect, the study had no actual benefit for the kids or the parents. As the only independent source in the story noted, “Also, the study predicted who was at high risk of autism, but it’s unknown if those babies actually went on to develop autism”. This seems like a giant hole that should have been explored – not tossed away at the end of the story. The story takes a fairly straightforward approach at first, but it gradual builds up a head of steam before blowing its top when lead author Dr. William Bosl says, “My hope is we would have a simple way of measuring brain activity in every child and see the patterns emerging that might track autism characteristics. … That would be tremendously useful. We know early intervention is extremely important. Right now, for a lot of children, that means 3 years old. What we don’t know yet is if you can intervene at 9 or 12 months and how effective that could be.” Every single child should be hooked up to an EEG? Based on a study that looked at 79 kids, only 46 of whom were in the high risk pool? This seems like an overstatement that should have been challenged in the story. Unchallenged, it contributes to an atmosphere of fear and paranoia around autism spectrum disorders, very real and serious conditions that have led to some very unfortunate hysteria in some quarters. The story spent the most time quoting the lead author, William Bosl from Children’s Hospital Boston. It also quoted Dr. Joshua Ewen, a neurologist and director of the clinical neurophysiology laboratory at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore. We wish the story had made better use of Ewen and allowed him to help readers make sense of the study. His comments come too late to dampen the boosterism of Bosl hoping for every child to be hooked up to an EEG at nine months of age. Nonetheless, in citing an independent source, the story barely meets the criterion. When reading this story, one starts to think that doctors have no idea how to diagnose autism, and yet autism diagnoses clearly are on the rise. (Prevalence being on the rise is a matter of debate.) How this diagnostic approach compares to existing methods or emerging methods, such as the MRI scan described in the December study, remain a mystery. Even a brief mention of MRI or behaviors that parents and pediatricians might observe and refer for additional testing would have been helpful. The story does a good job setting up the study by explaining that researchers already know that having a sibling with autism can be a risk factor for developing autism and goes on to explain that this method of reading an electroencephalogram (EEG) is experimental. The story accurately states that EEGs are not new, but have been used for detecting seizures for many years. The story accurately states that EEG is an old test, and that the novel piece is applying new technology to interpret patterns. We do wish that the story had mentioned some of the similar research that has been published in recent months. The study comes on the heels of a very similar study released in December that claimed that a 10-minute MRI scan could find six physical differences in the brain that could correctly identify autism. Doesn’t that seem like an even better, more definitive screening system, assuming that brain scans or EEGs are the route to take? No evidence that the story relied on a news release.
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34135
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Health officials warned that a new STD superbug could be deadlier than AIDS.
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"What's true: Health officials are working on ways to treat antibiotic-resistant strains of gonorrhea. What's false: The claim that there is an ""STD Superbug"" that is deadlier than AIDS can be traced back to a single quote from a 2013 article and has proved to be a bit of an overstatement."
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mixture
|
Medical
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In November 2019, the website MyColumbusPower published an article claiming that a “new STD superbug” had the capacity to kill people within days and that health officials were worried that the incoming epidemic would be worse than AIDS: STD Superbug May Be Deadlier Than AIDS; Kills Within Days There is a new STD superbug that experts say may be more deadly than AIDS and could cause an epidemic. According to a report, an antibiotic-resistant strain of gonorrhea is more aggressive than AIDS, which means the potential to infect the public will be exponentially greater. This article stirred up a considerable amount of concern on social media. However, this article was already several years old. Furthermore, the claim that there is an “STD superbug” that is “worse than AIDs” can be traced back to a single quote from a single doctor and has been disputed by other medical professionals. Archived pages from the Internet Wayback Machine show that while the date on this MyColumbusPower article currently reads Nov. 7, 2019, this article has actually been on the site since at least September 2014. Furthermore, the information contained within is based on a CNBC report that was originally published in April 2013. CNBC quoted Alan Christianson, a doctor of naturopathic medicine, who was concerned about an antibiotic-resistant strain of gonorrhea called “HO41” that had been discovered in a woman in Japan. The news outlet reported: An antibiotic-resistant strain of gonorrhea—now considered a superbug—has some analysts saying that the bacteria’s effects could match those of AIDS. “This might be a lot worse than AIDS in the short run because the bacteria is more aggressive and will affect more people quickly,” said Alan Christianson, a doctor of naturopathic medicine. Even though nearly 30 million people have died from AIDS related causes worldwide, Christianson believes the effect of the gonorrhea bacteria is more direct. “Getting gonorrhea from this strain might put someone into septic shock and death in a matter of days,” Christianson said. “This is very dangerous.” “It’s an emergency situation,” said William Smith, executive director of the National Coalition of STD Directors. “As time moves on, it’s getting more hazardous.” While the above-quoted text did originate with a genuine news source, there are a few problems worth noting about this report. For one, as of this writing, six years after the CNBC article was originally published, there has not been an AIDS-level epidemic due to this gonorrhea strain. While health officials may have been concerned at the time, the claim that this strain was “worse than AIDS” has proved to be overstated. The CNBC article was also updated to note that “there have been no treatment failures reported in the U.S.for gonorrhea treated with currently-recommended first-line regimens.” Furthermore, although CNBC quoted a doctor of naturopathic medicine saying that this strain of gonorrhea could be “worse than AIDS,” other medical professionals weighed in at the time to dispute this classification. Dr. Bruce Hirsch, an attending physician in infectious diseases at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, N.Y., told Live Science that this was not a fair comparison: A recent CNBC article with the headline “Sex Superbug Could Be ‘Worse Than AIDS'” quoted Alan Christianson, a naturopathic doctor, as saying that an antibiotic-resistant strain of the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea “might be a lot worse than AIDS in the short run because the bacteria is more aggressive and will affect more people quickly.” However, some experts called the comparison hyperbolic. “I disagree with the general comparison,” said Dr. Bruce Hirsch, an attending physician in infectious diseases at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, N.Y. “The rate of complications from gonorrhea in terms of systemic problems is so much lower than the rate of complications from untreated AIDS infection,” Hirsch said. Although this strain of gonorrhea has not proven to be “worse than AIDS” and has not spurred any sort of epidemic, antibiotic-resistant strains of gonorrhea are a real and serious problem. Health officials have developed several ways to treat gonorrhea, but this disease has adapted over the years and is now resistant to many of them. The CDC told us in an email that gonorrhea has developed resistance to most treatments over the years. As of this writing, however, the disease can still be treated with antibiotics: Is the CDC worried about a new STD superbug epidemic? Over time, gonorrhea has developed resistance to all but one class of antibiotics. Half of all infections are resistant or demonstrate signs of emerging resistance to at least one antibiotic. Unfortunately tests for antibiotic resistance are not currently available to healthcare providers at the time of treatment. History shows us that it is only a matter of time before resistance outsmarts our last treatment – ceftriaxone. Based on laboratory and surveillance data, ceftriaxone remains an effective treatment in the U.S. There has not been a confirmed treatment failure in the U.S. using the recommended regimen. However, we are concerned as treatment failures have been identified outside the U.S., including in Canada. CDC estimates that over 1 million cases of gonorrhea occur each year. Reducing the overall number of gonorrhea cases might prevent or delay the development of resistance to ceftriaxone, and is a critical component. ·Can gonorrhea still be treated with antibiotics? Yes, gonorrhea can be treated with antibiotics. CDC recommends using a regimen of dual therapy for the treatment of gonorrhea – the injectable ceftriaxone, plus oral azithromycin. This video from the CDC explains how health officials are racing to find new drugs to treat gonorrhea as this disease becomes more resistant to antibiotics: Lastly, it should be noted that when this MyColumbusPower article was shared on social media it was accompanied by a misleading image: This is not an image of gonorrhea or an STD superbug. This image actually shows the back of a man with AIDS and syphilis.
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34159
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"Fart rape"" is an authentic feminist concept earnestly promoted by certain activists at a 2013 conference in Toronto, Canada."
|
Taking all these facts into account, it is clear that “fart rape” is not an authentic feminist principle, presented or promoted by Ingle, Guthrie, or other feminist activists during an event at the University of Toronto in 2013. Rather, a website with a demonstrable anti-feminist agenda invented the concept and falsely attributed fabricated statements to Ingle and Guthrie, apparently in an effort to discredit and attack the feminist movement in general, and certain high-profile feminists in Toronto, in particular.
|
false
|
Junk News
|
In November 2019, we received multiple inquiries from readers about the concept of “fart rape,” which is widely purported to be an authentic feminist principle. The concept, such as it is, has existed since 2013, and it’s not clear what prompted the wave of inquiries in late 2019 about the authenticity of several memes and online posts. The most widely shared iteration of the claim came in the form of a meme that featured a photograph of a woman identified as “Ashleigh Ingle, feminist” and contained the following text: FART RAPE: HOW CRAZY ARE FEMINISTS? “By farting louder the man is using passive aggressive violence to position himself as dominant, this intimidates the woman to subconsciously not release as much flatulence and thus the woman fearing for her safety doesn’t fart as loud as a sign of submissiveness, this in turn contributes to rape culture and women being oppressed.” Variations of that meme, containing the same quote, could be found on Facebook and Twitter. On Instagram, Gary Holt, guitarist for the metal band Slayer, was so bemused or outraged by the concept of “fart rape” that he launched a line of T-shirts bearing the words “Fart Rapist,” which he sold on eBay. The stand-up comedian Chris d’Elia was so taken by the purported quotation that he tweeted out the same meme, along with his resistance to the concept, and he earnestly discussed “fart rape” on his podcast, musing, “It’s just farting. Why does everything have to be a global issue?” In reality, these individuals were taken in by a hoax. “Fart rape” is not an authentic feminist concept, and the quotation attributed to Ashleigh Ingle was bogus. The fake concept of “fart rape” has its origins in a December 2013 post on a relatively obscure blog called The Water Pipe, whose other posts clearly demonstrate a broader, rather aggressive anti-feminist agenda. For example, in a subsequent post on the same blog, the anonymous author asked “Are chimps smarter than feminist [sic]?” adding: “The chimps have demonstrated an ability to conduct their parasitical relationship with termites in a sustainable manner as to not exhaust the termite nest and thus increase chances of survival, this survival instinct is not present in feminist [sic]. Feminism a social movement for white women believe that men are the perpetual oppressors of women and that violence against women, rape, aggressive behavior, are all symptoms of masculinity, thus the feminist movement has made it its primary objective to eradicate masculinity. Ironically women in their 30s who are childless, unmarried and on a steady supply of anti-depressants are now questioning ‘Did we overdo it? '” In a Dec. 22, 2013, post entitled “Can a fart be misogynist?” the author wrote: Top feminist academics that have respectable diverse doctorates from medieval art, 6th century English to Women’s Studies gathered at the University of Toronto meeting center to discuss if human flatulence could be sexist. Ashleigh Ingle a proud feminist and an anarchist argued that because of patriarchal gender norms women were not allowed to release gas in public because of men’s unreal expectations of women to be clean and feminine. Furthermore she articulated that if a woman was to fart in the presence of a man and the man responded by farting louder than the woman, than that would be rape. “By farting louder the man is using passive aggressive violence to position himself as dominant, this intimidates the woman to subconsciously not release as much flatulence and thus the woman fearing for her safety doesn’t fart as loud as a sign of submissiveness, this in turn contributes to rape culture and women being oppressed.” The article also asserted that a feminist activist named Steph Guthrie had started an online campaign to raise awareness about “fart rape,” claiming: “Guthrie’s Twitter hash tag #FartRape has started to trend …” Both Ingle and Guthrie are real, feminist activists who lived in Toronto in 2013. As reported by Rebecca Watson, in September of that year Ingle and Guthrie took part in the same panel discussion at a University of Toronto conference called “Disorientation Week.” The topic of their panel was, “What’s Wrong With the MRA [Men’s Rights Activism]? The Problem of Men’s Rights Organizing.” A Voice for Men, a website affiliated with the broader Men’s Rights Movement, happened to secretly record the panel discussion. That audio file is available here. It clearly shows that neither Guthrie nor Ingle nor any other speaker made any mention whatsoever of flatulence, or any other bodily function, as a weapon of patriarchal oppression. Ingle never made the remarks attributed to her in the Water Pipe’s post and in multiple subsequent memes. Furthermore, the claim that the hashtag “#FartRape,” purportedly devised by Guthrie, had begun trending on Twitter by December 2013, was false. A basic Twitter search clearly shows that, in fact, that hashtag only emerged in February 2014, two months after the Water Pipe blog post and was often accompanied by a link to that article. Further red flags exist, underlining the bogusness of “fart rape” and the fabricated nature of the Water Pipe’s claims. For example, the article offers conspicuously few details about the fictional event at which Ingle supposedly set out the principle of “fart rape” — writing only that the discussion took place “at the University of Toronto meeting center.” The blog post did not specify the date on which the event purportedly took place nor its title nor the names of any organizing groups or bodies. Finally, neither Ingle nor Guthrie nor any other feminist activists have earnestly promoted or described “fart rape” as an authentic feminist principle before the Water Pipe’s December 2013 blog post, nor since then.
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34377
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In 2012, Usher paid $1.1 million to settle a lawsuit brought by a woman claiming he had knowingly infected her with herpes.
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What's undetermined: Almost everything — but in particular, whether Usher has ever been sued by women claiming he knowingly infected them with herpes.
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unproven
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Entertainment, Entertainment, radar online, sex scandal
|
On 19 July 2017, entertainment and gossip web site Radar Online reported that musician and singer Usher had paid $1.1 million to a woman who had sued him, accusing him of knowingly infecting her with herpes: An exclusive RadarOnline.com probe has blown the lid off the explosive revelation that a high-profile A-lister has settled a million-dollar lawsuit after infecting a sex partner with the incurable herpes virus! As part of the shocking exposé, Radar obtained a lawsuit between a celebrity stylist and 38-year-old singer Usher. Legal documents detailed how the eight-time Grammy winner — whose real name is Usher Raymond IV — had rigorous unprotected sex without disclosing he was stricken with the rabid virus. The article was cited in subsequent reports by Fox News, the New York Daily News and People magazine, among others. The original stories link to what are presented as excerpts from court documents concerning a case that the web site claims was filed in the Los Angeles Superior Court. The article does not specify what kinds of documents the excerpts are from, although they are presented in the manner of a civil complaint. We were also unable to find any civil lawsuit of this kind involving Usher, whose full legal name is Usher Raymond IV, despite a search of the Los Angeles Superior Court’s online database and despite consulting with court staff. We were, however, able to find other (unrelated) cases involving the singer. Furthermore, the purported excerpts do not include a case number, jurisdiction, the names of attorneys, or the name of the presiding judge. We contacted Radar Online and asked them to provide the case number of the lawsuit against Usher, which their article claims was settled with a $1.1 million payment in December 2012. We did not receive any response. Two days after Radar Online’s article appeared, the entertainment and gossip web site TMZ published its own story, claiming that Usher was being sued by a second woman alleging negligence, battery and emotional distress. According to a second report, this woman also claims to have contracted herpes after having sex with Usher and is demanding payment of $20 million. TMZ claimed to have seen legal documents related to the case, but their articles do not mention the jurisdiction or court before which the lawsuit has purportedly been filed. We asked the web site for the case number, jurisdiction and court in question, but — as with Radar Online — we did not receive a response. According to TMZ’s first article, the woman’s lawsuit claims that she and Usher had sex in Atlanta, Georgia and New Orleans, Louisiana. We could not find any relevant lawsuit in the database of the Fulton County, Georgia Superior Court, and no one from the Orleans Parish Civil District Court was able to find any such lawsuit relating to New Orleans. We also sent a list of questions to Usher’s record label, his agents at William Morris Endeavor Entertainment, and an attorney who has represented the singer in other legal matters over the years, including earlier in 2017. We did not receive a response from any of them. We could not find a civil case of the type described by Radar Online involving Usher and before the California Superior Court in Los Angeles. The purported excerpts from court documents they have published lack important details and are so scant that we cannot verify their authenticity. Nor could we find a civil case of the kind described by TMZ in the databases of the two most likely courts to be hearing such a case. And despite our best efforts, we have not heard Usher’s side of the story; we are, therefore, unable to say whether or not the claims published by Radar Online and TMZ are true.
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18206
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"Jason Conger Says ""the mandate is 71 times that a child’s body will be injected with a disease"" for immunizations."
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Are Oregon children subjected to 71 immunization shots, each?
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false
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Oregon, Children, Public Health, Jason Conger,
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"The Oregon Legislature just made it harder for parents to exempt children from vaccinations required for school. This does not sit well with people -- including some lawmakers -- who say parents know best when or if their children should receive shots to protect them from whooping cough and measles. Rep. Jason Conger, R-Bend, voted no on Senate Bill 132. He spoke on the floor about the number of mandatory shots a child must receive in the course of his or her time in school: 71 times. ""So there’s 17 at preschool, child care or Head Start enrollment. There are 19 at K through 5 grade, there are 17 in 6th grade and there are 18 in high school, well, 7th grade through high school,"" he said. ""That’s not the number of immunizations, that’s the number of actual shots."" He went on to say: ""Understand that the mandate is 71 times that a child’s body will be injected with a disease. It is not, clearly, something we should take lightly when balancing the parent’s opinion about what is good for the child and the fact that the mandate is for 71 injections into their child’s body."" Yeah, we did a double take, too, when we heard that. Three score and 11 shots? We wanted to know if this was true. It turns out that in citing this fantastic number Conger relied on a fact sheet, detailing which immunizations are required for the 2013-14 school year, based on the student’s grade. Unfortunately for Conger, this is the same fact sheet relied on by a spokeswoman for the Oregon Health Authority, in showing why the representative’s statement is not accurate. The sheet lists the immunizations needed for a child 18 months or older entering preschool, child care or Head Start. The child would need four doses for diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis; three doses for polio; one for chickenpox; one for measles, mumps, rubella; three doses for Hepatitis B; two doses for Hepatitis A; and three or four doses against Hib disease. We count at most 18 shots. Now, when the student enters kindergarten, or any grades 1 through 5, the child needs another immunization shot against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis; one more shot against polio; and one more shot against the measles. We count 21 shots total. Because, you see, the categories of immunization shots are cumulative. It’s not that the child has to receive three shots to ward off Hepatitis B in preschool, and then again in kindergarten. Let’s continue. There are no new shots needed for the vaccinated child who enters grade 6. A student entering grades 7 to 12 needs to get one booster shot against tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis. We count 22 vaccination shots, at most. These vaccinations apply to children in public school and private schools, Head Start, preschools and certified child care programs. Home-schooled students are subject to immunization requirements in certain situations. Separately, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that children receive two influenza shots in the first year and a shot once a year, thereafter, wrote Susan Wickstrom, a spokeswoman with the Oregon Health Authority. There are also vaccines for pneumococcal, meningococcal conjugate, and HPV. ""But even with annual flu shots, the total of immunization injections that a child receives before high school graduation would be less than 71,"" Wickstrom wrote to PolitiFact Oregon. She said it for us: Nowhere near 71 shots. The state requirements total, at most, 22 shots, including the Hib shots. We caught up with Conger and asked him to confirm our understanding. He did and immediately owned up to his mistake. He said he just counted up the number of shots before making his floor speech. ""I was wrong about that,"" Conger said. ""I certainly wasn’t trying to distort the truth. But I was wrong about that."" Conger said his larger point remains: Government should be careful when curbing parental rights, he said. ""In my view, the debate around SB 132 was about the need for legislative restraint and deference to parents generally in decisions about the welfare of their children."""
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8989
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BCG vaccine leads to long-term blood sugar improvement in type 1 diabetes patients
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This release summarizes a phase I clinical trial that looks at the effect of bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine on hemoglobin levels (HbA1c) in 52 adults with type I diabetes and 230 people who received no treatment but contributed blood samples. HbA1c is a measure of average blood sugar levels over the preceding three months. The study documented moderate reductions in HbA1c during the last 5 years of this 8-year study. The release would have been improved had it included absolute rather than relative numbers and a clarification of whether study participants were on insulin at the time of the study. Other factors could have contributed to the reduction of HbA1c levels over an 8-year period. The STAT story on this same research, which we also reviewed, focused on a smaller group of 9 patients who’ve been followed for more than 5 years. Type I diabetes accounts for about 5-10% of all diabetes and can occur in both adults and children. It’s believed to be caused primarily by the auto-immune destruction of the insulin-producing (beta) cells of the pancreas, making people who have it dependent on injected insulin.There is currently no cure for type 1 diabetes aside from pancreatic transplant. It’s important to bear in mind that HbA1c levels are commonly used as a surrogate marker in diabetes research. Reductions in this marker don’t necessarily equate with less complications or better outcomes in people with either type I or type 2 diabetes and studies using HbA1c as an intermediate outcome have been limited by their short follow-up and linkage to long-term, clinically meaningful, outcomes.
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mixture
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bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine,Massachusetts General Hospital,Type 1 diabetes treatment
|
The cost of the bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine is not mentioned. Although the wholesale price is usually less than $1 US dollar, the cost in the United States usually runs between $100 to $200. The news release mentions only relative, not absolute numbers when describing the results in just 52 type 1 patients: It’s stated that an average HbA1c level of 6.65 was achieved (normal is below 6.0, with many doctors shooting for below 6.5 in people with type 1 diabetes) and the reduction was maintained over the last 5 years of the 8-year-long trial. No harms of the vaccine are mentioned. It’s been given to humans since the 1920s and side effects, including allergic reaction to this live vaccine, have been well documented. It should be avoided in anyone with decreased immune function. Of note, a point is made that in those study subjects who received the vaccine, there were “no reports of severe hypoglycemia.” This trial was an extension of a short-term (20 week trial) published in 2012 that showed only a modest, temporary increase in insulin production. This much longer term trial analyzed data from 282 study volunteers (52 with type 1 diabetes) and 230 who contributed blood samples. The adults with type 1 were treated with BCG and had their HbA1c levels followed for 8 years, presumably while still on insulin (although the news release does not make this clear). We’re given the percent change in their HbA1c levels between years 3 and 8 — a reduction of nearly 20% — a moderate improvement over a long-term. A second arm of this study was a laboratory analysis looking for what might account for the effect of BCG on blood sugar. The authors speculate that their data suggest a metabolic shift in glucose metabolism from oxidative (the most common pathway by which cells convert glucose into energy) to an aerobic metabolism characterized by greater glucose utilization by cells called aerobic glycolysis. None. Type I diabetes is common and can be difficult to treat. According to the news release the study “is entirely funded by private philanthropy from individuals and family foundations.” No conflicts of interest are reported in the published study. There are no known alternatives to insulin so we’ll rate this Not Applicable. People with type I diabetes are dependent on insulin to manage their disease because their bodies to not produce insulin. It is the only established treatment other than pancreas transplant with other interventions — like diet and exercise — being secondary to the insulin replacement. To date, their are no established forms of therapy based solely on an autoimmune mechanism to lower blood sugars as BCG is claimed to do by the study authors. It’s mentioned that BCG has been used for “almost a century” to prevent tuberculosis. (Of note, it’s also been used for non-invasive bladder cancer.) The release suggests that the study is “clinical validation” of the vaccine’s ability to lower blood sugars to “near normal levels.” But can a small phase 1 trial be used to claim validity? Phase 2 and 3 trials are also needed. The news release also notes that the lead author published a 20-week, phase I trial in 2012 which showed only temporary HbA1c reduction. There is no blatant sensationalism. However, claiming “clinical validation of the potential” of the vaccine to do something seems like weasel words, particularly in the context of a phase 1 trial.
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8548
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Caffeinated conservation: Colombian farmers switch coca for coffee to protect wildlife.
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In a clearing around his modest smallholding, farmer Arcadio Barajas stands before a sea of coffee plants, cloaked in the shadow cast by a wall of verdant forest that covers the San Lucas mountains of northern Colombia.
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true
|
Environment
|
The San Lucas range is one of the most unexplored places in this South American nation, which is the world’s second most biodiverse country after neighboring Brazil. From its towering Andean peaks to its tropical islands and dense Amazon rainforest, Colombia is home to over 50,000 recorded species of animals and plants. Deforestation spiked after Colombia signed a peace deal in 2016 with its largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), as swathes of land became more accessible. Government data shows that in 2017, almost 220,000 hectares (543,620 acres) of forest were destroyed, compared with around 124,000 hectares (306,400 acres)in 2015. The dense forests of San Lucas are a haven for rare predators like ocelots, pumas and spectacled bears - one of the region’s most endangered species - and serve as a crossroads in migratory corridors used by jaguars, whose range stretches from Argentina to Mexico. Yet this ecosystem is threatened by mining and drug cultivation. Not long ago, crops of coca, the chief ingredient in cocaine, were rooted where Barajas’ coffee plants grow. Now, Colombian environmental group WebConserva is leading a first-of-its kind project bringing together farmers in San Lucas and roasters across Colombia to produce coffee from plantations that build protective borders around forests to shield the biodiversity within. So far the project includes 10 families farming some 400 hectares (988 acres) of coffee, which the environmental group covers at a cost of around $77,000 a year. WebConserva hopes eventually to include 200 families, which could protect 20,000 hectares (49,420 acres) or more of virgin forest. In San Lucas, where Barajas is among the participants, newly planted coffee fields establish a barrier between wild predators and cattle farms, lessening the chance for conflict over cattle. A religious man, Barajas says tearing down the forest to plant coca and killing wildlife went against his faith but he - like his neighbors - was desperate for money. Now, he feels that growing coffee lets him be a good steward of his land. “I’m taking care of the environment, the forest and the animals, so that I don’t end up ruined as well,” he said. Globally more than 31,000 species are threatened with extinction, according to the Red List by the Switzerland-based International Union for Conservation of Nature, whose members include government and civil society. Of these, some 1,050 species are in Colombia, including 187 considered critically endangered. In San Lucas, the families pledge not to fell trees to expand their crops or to hunt the animals that depend on the forests for survival. Depending on the quality of the product, they receive around $250 to $300 per 125 kilos (275 pounds) of coffee, an enviable return in a country where prices regularly dip below production costs. While profitability has improved as the peso has fallen against the dollar in recent months, the government doled out $77 million in aid to coffee farmers last year to help them deal with low prices. As of 2018, the San Lucas area was still carpeted with thousands of hectares of coca crops, according to the most recent government figures. Gold mining - which drifts between illegality and informality - and farming continue to drive slash-and-burn practices in the region. Plumes of smoke rise lazily into the sky from multiple points across the mountain range, signaling fires started to clear more space. At the forest edge, patches of scorched earth serve as ugly reminders of human activity. For the farmers, the switch to coffee from coca or mining is less profitable. Coca could fetch some $760 per kilo, at a time when low coffee prices caused thousands to abandon the industry. Many families came to rely on illicit activities to support their children, said Arnobis Romero, a former coca grower and miner. Like many people here, he turned to coffee amid aerial anti-coca spraying campaigns carried out by the government, which were halted in 2015 under then-President Juan Manuel Santos. But the idea of helping to protect the ecosystem and support from WebConserva boosts morale, Romero said. “We feel really proud to look after this biodiversity and to leave it... for future generations,” he said. The South American country has designated some 16% of its land territory - some 18.6 million hectares (46 million acres), an area roughly the size of Washington state - as protected areas, but hundreds of thousands of hectares of land are destroyed each year. Though activists are campaigning for San Lucas to be protected with a national park designation, the process is slow. In the meantime, WebConserva director Carlos Valderrama hopes the group’s project can build a new system of sustainable production. “It protects forests, biodiversity and ecosystems at the same time as (improving) coffee growers’ quality of life,” he said. WebConserva, which acts as a go-between for the farmers and roasters, keeps tabs on the wildlife living in the forests with camera traps that take images when motion sensors are triggered. Coffee farmer Liseth Alfonso, 28, whose kitchen looks out over the forests below, said seeing photos and videos makes her proud. “Many are close to extinction,” Alfonso said. “It helps us remember we are taking care of these animals.”
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37756
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"Ghislaine Maxwell looked similar to Madeleine McCann's ""female abductor."
|
A viral Facebook post compares a sketch of “Madeleine McCann’s female abductor” with Epstein’s alleged co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell, but the claim lacks a significant amount of context. The sketch in question was indeed associated with the McCann abduction, but depicts a woman sought for questioning after a potential witness came forward in August 2009 to describe his encounter with the woman in a bar in Portugal. The woman was described as younger than Maxwell (and as Australian, not British), and no one made the connection until Maxwell’s July 2020 arrest. Photographs indicated Maxwell was in New York City for much of April and May 2007, and we were unable to verify her location on May 7 2007 — the day the woman in the sketch was encountered. Ultimately, other than a passing resemblance Maxwell shared with hundreds of Australian women, there is no strong indication she was the woman in the sketch.
|
mixture
|
Disinformation, Fact Checks
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On July 3 2020, just after British socialite Ghislane Maxwell was arrested, the Facebook page “NightMerica Podcast” shared the following post, comparing her photograph with a purported sketch of “Madeleine McCann’s female abductor”:On the left of the image was a sketch of a woman with a dark, short haircut. On the right was Maxwell. Text with hashtags read:Ghislaine Maxwell was arrested by the FBI today, BUT can we talk about how similar she looks to Madeline McCann’s female abductor sketch? ?.#ghislainemaxwell #ghislanemaxwell #ghislaine #ghislainemaxwelldidntkillherself #ghislainemaxwellarrested #ghislainemaxwelldidnotkillherself #ghislainemaxwell🤔 #madelinemccann #madelinemccannconspiracy #madelinemccannnetflix #madelinemccanneye #truecrime #truecrimeaddict #truecrimepodcast #truecrimecommunity #truecrimejunkie #truecrimememes #truecrimenews #jeffreyepstein #jeffreyepsteindidntkillhimself #abduction #abductors #conspiracytheory #conspiracytheoriesThere’s a lot to unpack here.Who is Ghislaine Maxwell?Ghislaine Maxwell is the former romantic partner of Jeffrey Epstein, a convicted sex offender whose jailhouse suicide in 2019 was fodder for myriad conspiracy theories. Maxwell was arrested on July 2 2020, at which point CNN reported:The British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell has been arrested in connection with an investigation into her ex-boyfriend, the convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.Maxwell, 58, has been named in multiple lawsuits by women who said they were abused by the disgraced US financier, who killed himself last August [2019].She was arrested Thursday morning [July 2 2020] in New Hampshire, said Nicholas Biase, a spokesman for the US attorney’s office.Maxwell, whose whereabouts have been unclear since the arrest last summer [2019] of Epstein, has been under investigation for allegedly facilitating Epstein’s recruitment of young girls and women.In the wake of Epstein’s suicide in August 2019, public pressure has mounted to hold those who might have assisted him — perhaps including Maxwell and a coterie of young women who allegedly worked under her — accountable not only for his actions, but also for their own roles.As CNN noted, Maxwell is British.Who is Madeleine McCann?Madeleine McCann, a three-year-old girl from the UK, was kidnapped on May 3 2007 during a family vacation in Portugal.A June 2020 BBC timeline provided the following initial account of the girl’s disappearance:On 3 May [2007] Madeleine, from Rothley, Leicestershire, is on holiday with her family at the Ocean Club in Praia da Luz, Portugal. […]Portuguese police say they believe Madeleine was abducted but is still alive and in Portugal.On 26 May [2007], police issue a description of a man seen on the night of Madeleine’s disappearance, possibly carrying a child.The BBC timeline concluded with the status of the investigation as of June 2020:… in June 2020, police reveal that a 43-year-old German prisoner – named by German media as Christian B – has been identified as a suspect. The McCanns thank police, saying: “All we have ever wanted is to find her, uncover the truth and bring those responsible to justice.“We will never give up hope of finding Madeleine alive, but whatever the outcome may be, we need to know as we need to find peace.”German investigators have classed it as a murder inquiry and say they are assuming that Madeleine is dead.As of July 8 2020, McCann had not been found; no further updates on the named suspect had been added to the timeline.Why Would Social Media Users Suspect Ghislaine Maxwell of Abducting Madeleine McCann?Shortly after Epstein’s August 2019 death, Maxwell was described as his “protector” and “procurer”:Ghislaine Maxwell was, according to her accusers, Jeffrey Epstein’s protector and procurer, his girlfriend and his madam. She was, by all accounts, a soul mate and a mirror image. He grew up in Brooklyn with no money to speak of and never finished college. She is Paris-born, Oxford-educated, a jet-setter who partied with princes and billionaires.Together, Epstein and Maxwell allegedly built what prosecutors, police and a growing number of women described as a sex-trafficking operation that crisscrossed the nation to provide Epstein with three young girls a day.The death of Epstein, the convicted sex offender who authorities said hanged himself in a federal detention center cell in New York on Saturday, leaves those who seek to hold someone responsible for the alleged abuse of dozens of girls with one prime target: Maxwell.The U.S. attorney in New York, Geoff Berman, assured the “brave young women who have already come forward and . . . the many others who have yet to do so” that “our investigation of the conduct charged in the indictment — which included a conspiracy count — remains ongoing.”Maxwell’s involvement with Epstein’s activities was part of the above-quoted Washington Post article. A civil suit filed by Virginia Roberts Giuffre hinged in part on allegations that Maxwell had helped groom Giuffre:Giuffre said Maxwell recruited her in 2000, when she was 16 or 17 and working at Donald Trump’s Palm Beach club, Mar-a-Lago.As Giuffre recalled it in her lawsuit, Maxwell told her, “I know somebody. We can train you. We can get you educated. You know, we can help you along the way if you pass the interview. If the guy likes you, then, you know, it will work out for you. You’ll travel. You’ll make good money.”But at her first meeting with Epstein, Giuffre said in a deposition, Maxwell “instructed me to take off my clothes and to give oral sex to Jeffrey Epstein.”An NPR segment after Maxwell was arrested in July 2020 described the charges she faced:[Maxwell] faces six counts in all, including conspiracy to entice minors to travel, to engage in sexual acts and conspiracy to transport minors to engage in criminal sexual activity. She also faces perjury charges for allegedly lying about her role in Epstein’s activities when she was asked about it under oath during a deposition a couple of years ago … the events detailed in the indictment took place between 1994 and 1997. And they relate to three underage girls who were allegedly abused by Epstein.Maxwell is often described as a “socialite,” but most people know her name due to accusations that she procured young women for Epstein to prey upon. McCann’s unsolved abduction remained an enduring mystery, and it stood to reason those following the case might speculate Epstein and/or Maxwell were involved with her disappearance.A Sketch of ‘Madeleine McCann’s Female Abductor’Back to the BBC timeline of McCann’s abduction and the years-long search for her. In the 2013 section, a police sketch known as an “e-fit” (electronic facial identification technique) appears; neither sketch showed a woman:The next line of the text explained:A BBC Crimewatch appeal features e-fit images of a man seen carrying a blond-haired child of three or four in Praia da Luz at about the time Madeleine went missing.As for the sketch seen in the Facebook post, it is connected to the search for Madeleine McCann. It appeared in an August 2009 Sydney Morning Herald article about a woman sought for questioning following a suspicious conversation around the time McCann was abducted — on May 7 2007:AN AUSTRALIAN woman sought over the missing British child Madeleine McCann approached a man and asked: ”Are you here to deliver my new daughter?” London newspapers reported [on August 7 2009].The conversation is said to have taken place at a bar in the Port Olimpic Marina area of Barcelona, Spain, three days after the three-year-old girl vanished in Portugal [on May 3 2007]. [In August 2009] the McCann family made public a sketch and description of a woman with an Australian, or possibly New Zealand, accent who also spoke excellent Spanish and some Catalan. The woman was described as looking like Victoria Beckham.According to the British newspapers, the woman, who apparently thought the man was a courier, asked him: ”Have you got my daughter?”When he just stood, bemused, the woman became agitated and asked: ”Have you got her? Have you got the child?”Realising the man had no idea what she was talking about, she walked away.Citing the 2006 Australian census, the Sydney Morning Herald went on to report that “only 83 women in Australia said they spoke Catalan at home, and just over 51,000 spoke Spanish” at the time of the incident. Maxwell is fluent in Spanish and speaks four languages total, but a 2015 report described her diction as a “cut-glass English accent” (not easily mistaken for Australian).CNN also covered the release of the sketch in August 2007, describing the woman sought for questioning as a “Victoria Beckham lookalike,” who was “in her 30s and about 5 feet 2 inches tall.” Maxwell, born in 1961, was 45 at the time of the incident.Below is an image with Victoria Beckham on the left, and Ghislaine Maxwell on the right:However, the woman in the sketch was never described as “Madeleine McCann’s abductor.” Initially, she was sought due to a conversation in a bar on May 7 2007, which seemed suspicious to the man involved.On August 9 2009, a woman named Judith Aron was questioned about the report, and denied having recently left Australia. A July 2020 blog post about the Maxwell/McCann rumors inaccurately stated that the woman was identified as Aron in 2009; it’s unclear whether the sketch was helpful to the investigation.An August 8 2009 report mentioned the initial identification of Aron, adding that police at the time were pursuing leads and tips about the sketch. Investigators said in August 2007 that they’d received “more than 600 emails after issuing the Posh Spice lookalike appeal,” mostly from Australia — indication, if anything, that a significant number of women in May 2007 resembled the unknown woman in the sketch:Detectives maintain they still have “a number of viable leads” for an Australian woman believed to hold vital clues to the disappearance of Madeleine McCann, a family spokesman says.Clarence Mitchell says there are several tips worth pursuing out of the hundreds of leads sent in from the public about the woman wanted in connection with the British child’s disappearance in Portugal in 2007.“An awful lot of these tip-offs and bits of information are well-meaning, but ultimately come to nothing,” he told the Nine Network this morning.“But out of all this we have had dozens of names for the woman we’re looking for given to us … and out of that, the detectives have a number of viable leads.”That’s their description: a number of viable leads that they are pursuing as a priority.”The potential local link emerged after two British men said a woman with an Australian accent implicated herself to them in a bar in Barcelona.In a separate August 2009 report in a British outlet, Mitchell emphasized that the woman was “formally not accused of anything.” Moreover, the only sketches of “suspects” in McCann’s disappearance were of men.Lawyers for Ghislaine Maxwell Issued a Vague Statement in 2011A March 10 2011 statement on behalf of Maxwell, unrelated to the McCann case and issued by her lawyers, made vague reference to news reports involving Maxwell:LONDON, March 10, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Ghislaine Maxwell denies the various allegations about her that have appeared recently in the media. These allegations are all entirely false. It is unacceptable that letters sent by Ms Maxwell’s legal representatives to certain newspapers pointing out the truth and asking for the allegations to be withdrawn have simply been ignored. In the circumstances, Ms Maxwell is now proceeding to take legal action against those newspapers.“I understand newspapers need stories to sell copies. It is well known that certain newspapers live by the adage, “why let the truth get in the way of a good story.” However, the allegations made against me are abhorrent and entirely untrue and I ask that they stop,” said Ghislaine Maxwell.“A number of newspapers have shown a complete lack of accuracy in their reporting of this story and a failure to carry out the most elementary investigation or any real due diligence. I am now taking action to clear my name,” she said.A March 6 2011 report in The Guardian mentioned Maxwell as Epstein’s former girlfriend and companion, as Epstein faced charges of sexual abuse:Maxwell seemed well integrated into the life of US plutocracy – in 2000 she went to the infamous 60th birthday party of another former press mogul, Lord Black, where she shared a table with dress designer Oscar de la Renta.But Epstein became a source of social embarrassment for Ghislaine and the Duke of York after the financier was jailed for sex offences including soliciting teenage girls into prostitution.Ghislaine is in the background of the recently-released picture showing Andrew in 2001 with his arm around the waist of Virginia Roberts, then 17, who claims she worked for Epstein as an erotic masseuse. Ghislaine is reported to have said she has never been contacted by any law enforcement agency in connection with any allegations against Epstein.Was Ghislaine Maxwell Even in Portugal in May 2007? What Was Her Involvement with Epstein Then?McCann was abducted on May 3 2007, and the woman in the sketch was spotted in a bar in Portugal on May 7 2007.We were unable to find any information about Ghislaine Maxwell’s activities in early May 2007, but Getty Images hosted several images of her in New York City in the spring of 2007. Maxwell was photographed on April 24 2007, a little over a week before McCann was kidnapped, and again on May 30 2007.As for her involvement with Epstein at the time, Vanity Fair mentioned her repeatedly in a 2003 article about Epstein; police in Florida began investigating him in 2005. A few uncomfortable passages of that coverage mention Epstein’s predilection for young girls, as well as Maxwell’s apparent role in recruiting girls:There are many women in his life, mostly young, but there is no one of them to whom he has been able to commit. He describes his most public companion of the last decade, Ghislaine Maxwell, 41, the daughter of the late, disgraced media baron Robert Maxwell, as simply his “best friend.” He says she is not on his payroll, but she seems to organize much of his life — recently she was making telephone inquiries to find a California-based yoga instructor for him. (Epstein is still close to his two other long-term girlfriends, Paula Heil Fisher, a former associate of his at the brokerage firm Bear Stearns and now an opera producer, and Eva Andersson Dubin, a doctor and onetime model. He tells people that when a relationship is over the girlfriend “moves up, not down,” to friendship status. )[…]Epstein is known about town as a man who loves women — lots of them, mostly young. Model types have been heard saying they are full of gratitude to Epstein for flying them around, and he is a familiar face to many of the Victoria’s Secret girls. One young woman recalls being summoned by Ghislaine Maxwell to a concert at Epstein’s town house, where the women seemed to outnumber the men by far. “These were not women you’d see at Upper East Side dinners,” the woman recalls. “Many seemed foreign and dressed a little bizarrely.” This same guest also attended a cocktail party thrown by Maxwell that Prince Andrew attended, which was filled, she says, with young Russian models. “Some of the guests were horrified,” the woman says.“He’s reckless,” says a former business associate, “and he’s gotten more so. Money does that to you. He’s breaking the oath he made to himself—that he would never do anything that would expose him in the media. Right now, in the wake of the publicity following his trip with Clinton, he must be in a very difficult place.”TL;DRA viral Facebook post compares a sketch of “Madeleine McCann’s female abductor” with Epstein’s alleged co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell, but the claim lacks a significant amount of context. The sketch in question was indeed associated with the McCann abduction, but depicts a woman sought for questioning after a potential witness came forward in August 2009 to describe his encounter with the woman in a bar in Portugal. The woman was described as younger than Maxwell (and as Australian, not British), and no one made the connection until Maxwell’s July 2020 arrest. Photographs indicated Maxwell was in New York City for much of April and May 2007, and we were unable to verify her location on May 7 2007 — the day the woman in the sketch was encountered. Ultimately, other than a passing resemblance Maxwell shared with hundreds of Australian women, there is no strong indication she was the woman in the sketch.Comments
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29478
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The FDA said Frosted Flakes are healthier than avocados.
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"What's true: Food and Drug Administration guidelines could be construed to suggest that sugary cereals are ""healthier"" than avocados, almonds, or salmon. What's false: The FDA never specifically compared avocados to Frosted Flakes or recommended one over the other."
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false
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Food, avocados, FDA, food warnings
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On 9 August 2016, the web site True Activist published an article suggesting that the influence of “Big Food” led the Food and Drug Administration to categorize Frosted Flakes over avocados as a “healthy” food: According To The FDA, Frosted Flakes Are “Healthier” Than Avocados The Food and Drug Administration is an organization whose motives and influences have long been questioned by American citizens. Many speculate that the organization has been bribed by Big Food companies who want a hold on what the FDA deems as healthy so that adults and children can be misguided about what to eat. Based on a rudimentary system of saying that any food that’s low in fat, sodium, and cholesterol, as well as full of some “beneficial nutrients,” many processed foods are healthier than wholesome produce in the eyes of the FDA. Alternative health sites Natural News and Complete Health & Happiness published versions of the same article, adding: According to the FDA’s definition, avocados are not considered healthy because 1 ounce contains 4.5 grams of fat. It doesn’t matter to them that it is the “good” type of fat. Likewise, almonds, with their 14 grams of fat per ounce, and salmon, with its 11 grams of fat per 3-ounce serving, are also considered unhealthy foods despite their well-documented health benefits. Pop Tarts, Spaghetti-Os and Frosted Flakes are better than salmon and almonds? On the other hand, some of the foods that make the cut according to their criteria are absolutely laughable. We’ve already discussed Frosted Flakes, which the agency deems healthy because it has 0 grams of fat per serving, is low in cholesterol and sodium, and has some “beneficial ingredients.” Somehow the fact that it has 10 grams of sugar per serving doesn’t matter. Spaghetti-Os with calcium do not even remotely resemble anything found in nature, yet they are considered healthy because they only contain 1 gram of fat per serving. The highly artificial Low-fat Pop Tarts are also considered healthy because they are low in fat. All articles pointed to a May 2016 Wall Street Journal video that used sugary foods such as Frosted Flakes and Pop Tarts contrasted with salmon, nuts, and avocados to critique FDA guidelines: An article published in the paper was largely overlooked in repetitions of the “Frosted Flakes versus avocado” claim, but the piece provided context about possibly dated agency guidelines (issued during a time when fat was targeted as less healthy than sugar by nutrition experts) subject to ongoing overhauls: The FDA said in a statement to The Wall Street Journal that in light of evolving nutrition research and other forthcoming food-labeling rules, “we believe now is an opportune time to re-evaluate regulations concerning nutrient content claims, generally, including the term ‘healthy.’” The agency also noted a petition filed by Kind LLC. The maker of fruit-and-nut bars started campaigning for change after being sent a warning letter by the agency last year ordering it to stop using the term “healthy” on its packaging. The FDA rescinded that demand last month, though Kind made other tweaks to its labels based on the FDA’s missive. Food can only be marketed as healthy if it meets five criteria: fat, saturated fat, sodium, cholesterol and beneficial nutrients, such as vitamin C or Calcium. The levels differ by food category, but snacks generally can’t have more than 3 grams of fat. When the term “healthy” was first officially defined in 1994, low fat content was the main focus of health professionals. Sugar wasn’t on the FDA’s, or most nutritionists,’ radar. The comparison subsequently used by alternative health sites came from the Wall Street Journal video, not any explicit guidance from the FDA advising Americans to opt for Frosted Flakes over avocados. True Activist linked to the FDA’s “rudimentary system” purportedly ranking processed foods over “wholesome” foodstuffs, but the page was about to labeling guidelines, and had no direct connection to sugary cereal or avocados: N49. What are the requirements to use the word “Healthy”? Answer: You may use the term “healthy” or related terms as an implied nutrient content claim on the label or in labeling of a food that is useful in creating a diet that is consistent with dietary recommendations if the food meets the conditions for total fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, and other nutrients (See table in Appendix B of this guidance). In addition, the food must comply with definitions and declaration requirements for any specific NCCs. 21 CFR 101.65(d)(2) The linked regulation involved “implied nutrient content claims and related label statements,” holding: You may use the term “healthy” or related terms (e.g., “health,” “healthful,” “healthfully,” “healthfulness,” “healthier,” “healthiest,” “healthily,” and “healthiness”) as an implied nutrient content claim on the label or in labeling of a food that is useful in creating a diet that is consistent with dietary recommendations if: (i) The food meets the following conditions for fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, and other nutrients: The regulatory standards cited in the table mandated: The food contains no added ingredient that is a fat or is generally understood by consumers to contain fat unless the listing of the ingredient in the ingredient statement is followed by an asterisk that refers to the statement below the list of ingredients, which states “adds a trivial amount of fat,” “adds a negligible amount of fat,” or “adds a dietarily insignificant amount of fat[. ]” The food contains no ingredient that is generally understood by consumers to contain saturated fat unless the listing of the ingredient in the ingredient statement is followed by an asterisk that refers to the statement below the list of ingredients which states, “adds a trivial amount of saturated fat,” “adds a negligible amount of saturated fat,” or “adds a dietarily insignificant amount of saturated fat[. ]” FDA standards for food labeling can be extensive and confusing, and occasionally appear to arbitrarily rank foods based on singular attributes (fat content, for example) versus their comprehensive nutritional profile. A direct comparison of low-fat sugary cereal and high-fat avocados was a popular example of those directives followed to the letter without further consideration of a varied diet. But the comparison between avocados and Frosted Flakes appeared in a Wall Street Journal video, not in a direct guideline issued by the FDA. FDA guidelines could be semantically construed to imply that sugary cereals are healthier than foods like almonds or avocados, but the agency made no such direct judgement (and it took significant twisting of the guidelines to wring such a conclusion out of them). Further, the video accompanied an article about the FDA’s stated goal of overhauling guidelines based on outdated nutrition standards.
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38177
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U.S. Virgin Islands Governor Kenneth E. Mapp signed an order allowing the National Guard to seize weapons and ammo from citizens as Hurricane Irma bore down on the island in early September 2017.
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U.S. Virgin Islands Governor Signs Order to Seize Guns Ahead of Hurricane Irma
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true
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Hurricanes, Natural Disasters
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The governor of the U.S. Virgin Island signed an order allowing the National Guard to seize guns, ammo and explosive if needed in Hurricane Irma disaster recovery efforts — but the governor later said the emergency order had been misconstrued and he simply meant to authorize the National Guard to “procure” weapons and ammo. And, after initial reports about U.S. Virgin Islands Governor Kenneth E. Mapp’s emergency order, a number of websites and media outlets falsely reported that the U.S. Virgin Islands National Guard had begun seizing guns from private citizens. That’s not true. The story first appeared at the Daily Caller, a website founded by conservative pundit Tucker Carlson, on September 5, 2017. The article, which appeared under the headline, “Virgin Island Allows National Guard to Seize Guns, Ammo Ahead of Hurricane Irma,” correctly reported that Mapp signed the emergency order: Mapp signed the order Monday in preparation for Hurricane Irma. The order allows the Adjutant General of the Virgin Islands to seize private property they believe necessary to protect the islands, subject to approval by the territory’s Justice Department. In signing the emergency declaration, Mapp evoked Title 23, Section 1520 of Virgin Islands Code, which orders the National guard into “Territorial Active Military services.” That gives the Adjutant General broad power to take whatever action deemed necessary to complete the mission, according to a PDF obtained by the Daily Caller: Within days, the story had been picked up and re-reported by countless websites. Again, many reported that weapons were already being seized, which wasn’t accurate. The New Orleans Times-Picayune, for example, filed a story under the headline, “U.S. Virgin Islands Seizing Guns, Ammo in Anticipation of Irma.” And that’s where the story jumped the rails from truth to fiction. We couldn’t find any evidence that seizures had begun, or that citizens had been ordered to turnover their weapons. By the morning of September 8th, Hurricane Irma had plowed through the U.S. Virgin Islands, leaving a trail of destruction and at least three deaths. There was no indication that the National Guard had seized guns, or was planning to seize guns, in the immediate aftermath. Moving patients from a damaged hospital and restoring power were listed as top priorities, NPR reports: In the U.S. Virgin Islands, the government in the territory reported three fatalities on the main island of St. Thomas. Gov. Kenneth Mapp said the U.S. territory had sustained “significant devastation.” “Sustained winds of 150 mph, gusts higher than that, for three or four hours is devastating,” he said in a statement Thursday. Mapp said a number of fire and police stations were wiped out and hospitals and medical facilities were damaged. In a statement, the government in the capital, Charlotte Amalie, said, “The evacuation of patients from the heavily damaged Roy Lester Schneider Hospital of St. Thomas continues. Critical patients are being relocated to the Juan F. Louis Hospital on St. Croix, while others will be evacuated to hospitals nearby in Puerto Rico. U.S. military aircraft are being used to provide transport.” “A major priority continues to be the restoration of power,” the statement said, adding that Mapp plans an overflight of St. Thomas and St. John to assess damage. So, while it’s true that U.S. Virgin Islands Governor Kenneth Mapp signed an emergency order that could potentially allow for weapons, ammunition, explosives and personal property to be seized to help in disaster recovery efforts — reports that gun seizures had already begun are false. Comments
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28492
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We fact-check a series of claims about the damage caused by Colorado's legalization of recreational cannabis.
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Interestingly, the rate of teen usage has gone down in Colorado since 2012-2013, when recreational use was legalized in the state. Then,11.16 percent of 12-17 year-olds said they had tried marijuana that month, and 18.76 percent that year.
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mixture
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Medical, cannabis, colorado, marijuana
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When Colorado voters passed Amendment 64 on Election Day 2012, the state joined Washington in becoming one of the first in the country to legalize the personal, recreational use of cannabis. Since then, observers and activists on every side of the wider drug-legalization debate have closely monitored the effects and consequences of Colorado and Washington’s choice. Opponents to legalization alleged an increase in crime, traffic accidents, and other problems ahead of the vote. To mark the fifth anniversary of Amendment 64 in November 2017, the Colorado Springs Gazette published an editorial highlighting what it claimed was the “embarrassing cautionary tale” of the policy: an increase in homelessness, a doubling of fatal traffic collisions involving weed-intoxicated drivers, and a rise in drug violations in Colorado’s schools. The article was later republished by the Oklahoman newspaper, and we received enquiries from readers about the accuracy of its claims. Homelessness “Five years of retail pot,” the editorial claimed, “coincide with five years of a homelessness growth rate that ranks among the highest rates in the country.” Directors of homeless shelters, and people who live on the streets, tell us homeless substance abusers migrate here for easy access to pot. The statistical element of this claim is somewhat complicated, but largely accurate. According to figures published by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the number of people in homelessness in Colorado actually fell by 34.8 percent between January 2012 (before the law changed) and January 2017. That’s the ninth biggest decrease in homelessness in the country during that period. However, if you measure from January 2013 (a month after personal cannabis use became legal) to January 2017, there was a 12.2 percent increase, the sixth-highest in-state increase in homelessness in the nation, but this is largely due to an unusually low base in 2013, caused by an extraordinary 42 percent decline between 2012 and 2013. On average, the number of homeless people in Colorado fell by six percent each year between 2012 and 2017, which gives Colorado the 17th-highest average annual rate of decline in homelessness during those six years. However, between January 2013 and January 2017, there was an average annual increase of 2.94 percent, among the 10 worst records in the country. From January 2014 (six months before retail sales of cannabis became legal) and January 2017, there was a 9.1 percent increase in homelessness in Colorado, the seventh-highest increase in the nation during that period. And the average annual increase in those three years was 2.98 percent, also among the 10 highest annual increases in the country. The statistics present a mixed picture but generally give support to the claim that homelessness has increased in Colorado since the legalization of cannabis, and that this increase has been among the highest seen nationwide. However, there is significant doubt over whether the legalization of cannabis caused or contributed to that increase in homelessness. Statistics can rise simultaneously without being linked. Cathy Alderman, Vice President of Communications at the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, rejects the notion of a causal connection. Speaking by phone, she told us “there’s no actual data that shows that.” We don’t necessarily believe that people are moving to Colorado, becoming homeless because of legalized marijuana…We know that, among the people experiencing homelessness, marijuana use is more visible because, unlike people who can go to the dispensary, buy their product, take it home and use it, these people don’t have a home to take it to…but we haven’t really heard that because of marijuana, people are becoming homeless. Alderman says there “absolutely” has been an increase in homelessness in the state since 2012/2013, and that Housing and Urban Development statistics are known to be underestimations. However, she told us the main causes of the increase (among which she does not count marijuana legalization) include: A lack of affordable housing options, increasing rent…and the fact that wages are not keeping up with the cost of living and inflation. Fatal traffic collisions The op-ed claims: Five years of Big Marijuana ushered in a doubling in the number of drivers involved in fatal crashes who tested positive for marijuana, based on research by the pro-legalization Denver Post. This claim appears to be taken from an August 2017 report by the Denver Post, which read: The number of drivers involved in fatal crashes in Colorado who tested positive for marijuana has risen sharply each year since 2013, more than doubling in that time, federal and state data show. The article pointed to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) statistics which show that the number of drivers in fatal accidents who tested positive for marijuana had risen by 145 percent between 2013 and 2016. Similarly, the percentage of drivers involved in fatal crashes who tested positive for marijuana grew, from 10 percent in 2013 to 20 percent in 2016, the article said. However, the Denver Post report highlights one important disclaimer. THC (the key component of cannabis) can stay in a person’s bloodstream for weeks after usage, meaning a positive test does not mean a driver was impaired at the time of a fatal accident, or that cannabis use caused the collision. In general, marijuana use has significantly increased in Colorado since its legalization. According to figures from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, adults in the state who had consumed marijuana in the month before being surveyed went from being 12.86 percent of the adult population in 2012/13 to 16.62 percent in 2015/16. That’s a rise of 29 percent, as compared to the 100 percent increase in the percentage of drivers in fatal accidents testing positive for cannabis (up from 10 percent to 20 percent.) This suggests that the general increase in cannabis consumption in Colorado could account for some of that rise in positive marijuana testing—but it remains a suggestion, without more effective testing for pot intoxication. Increase in school drug violations The op-ed reads: Five years of commercial pot have been five years of more marijuana in schools than teachers and administrators ever feared. As evidence for this, the Gazette points to what it calls a “late 2016” report by the Rocky Mountain affiliate of PBS. That report vaguely refers to “the past four years” as a period in which “the number of drug violations reported by Colorado’s K-12 schools have [sic] increased 45 percent.” According to the Gazette, the PBS investigation also discovered “an increase in high school drug violations of 71 percent since legalization.” This summary of the Rocky Mountain PBS report is extremely misleading. While the online version of the report was updated in October 2016, it was originally published in February 2012. The “four years” in question were from 2007-08 to 2010-11. In other words, the increase in school drug violations and drug-related suspensions which the Gazette blamed on the legalization of recreational cannabis happened 18 months before recreational cannabis was legalized. Medical marijuana has been legal in Colorado since 2000. What’s more, the 2012 PBS report stipulated that the 71 percent rise in high school drug violations was specific to the city of Denver, a detail that the Gazette editorial left out. And as the 2012 report pointed out, the 45 percent increase in drug violations at K-12 schools was not specific to marijuana, although the report’s authors added that “interviews with school and district officials, health care workers and students across Colorado depict marijuana as the overwhelming cause of the increase.” Colorado authorities only began separating out marijuana-related incidents from incidents involving other drugs in 2015-16. That year, there were 3,704 marijuana violations and 2,047 violations involving other drugs. The Gazette editorial also falsely claimed that Colorado’s teenagers had the highest rate of cannabis use in the country: The National Survey on Drug Use and Health found Colorado ranks first in the country for marijuana use among teens, scoring well above the national average. In 2015-16, some 9.08 percent of 12-17 year-olds in Colorado said they had used marijuana in the month before they took the survey. That’s the seventh-highest (not the highest) rate of monthly use in the country. When it comes to using marijuana in the year before the survey, Colorado’s teens have the sixth-highest rate in the nation, with 16.21 percent saying they had dabbled in the preceding 12 months.
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33482
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A recent study disproved a link between sun exposure and skin cancer.
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Some dubious websites published misleading summaries of a single study's findings.
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false
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Medical, Medical Myths
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In May 2014 the popular press reported on an article that had recently been published in the Journal of Internal Medicine entitled “Avoidance of sun exposure is a risk factor for all-cause mortality.” The common reporting on that article generally mentioned that a study conducted by Swedish researchers had found that women who avoided sunbathing actually had twice the mortality rate of women who had significant exposure to the sun: Health bosses are investigating the results of a study which shows that women who avoid sunbathing during the summer are twice as likely to die than those who sunbathe every day. The study, conducted by researchers at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, followed nearly 30,000 women over 20 years. They found that the results “showed that mortality was about double in women who avoided sun exposure compared to the highest exposure group”. The results of this study were then summarized by some medical-related websites of dubious validity with misleading headlines such as “Scientists Blow the Lid on Cancer and Sunscreen Myth” and assertions that “The link between melanoma and sun exposure is unproven. There’s no conclusive evidence that sunburns lead to cancer. There is no real proof that sunscreens protect against melanoma. There’s no proof that increased exposure to the sun increases the risk of melanoma.” In fact, the referenced study came nowhere close to proving that the link between skin cancer and sun exposure is a “myth.” The researchers who performed the study tracked a group of 29,518 women in Sweden across twenty years and charted their typical exposure to sunlight and other potentially related factors. At the end of the study period, they found that women who avoided exposure to the sun had a mortality rate approximately twice that of women who had the most exposure to the sun: We assessed the avoidance of sun exposure as a risk factor for all-cause mortality for 29,518 Swedish women in a prospective 20-year follow-up of the Melanoma in Southern Sweden (MISS) cohort. Women were recruited from 1990 to 1992 and were aged 25 to 64 years at the start of the study. We obtained detailed information at base-line on their sun exposure habits and potential confounders. Multivariable flexible parametric survival analysis was applied to the data. There were 2545 deaths amongst the 29,518 women who responded to the initial questionnaire. We found that all-cause mortality was inversely related to sun exposure habits. The mortality rate amongst avoiders of sun exposure was approximately twofold higher compared with the highest sun exposure group, resulting in excess mortality with a population attributable risk of 3%. However, those results cannot be summarized in any reasonable way as proving that — contrary to previous medical wisdom — high exposure to sunlight is beneficial, exposure to sunlight is not related to the development of skin cancer, or that the use of sunscreen is pointless or actually increases the chances of contracting skin cancer. The strongest conclusion that might have been drawn from the study was the rather narrow one that people with characteristics of the study group — that is, light-skinned Caucasian women living in parts of the world with limited sunshine and a low UV index — would probably be better off with some sun exposure rather than no sun exposure because the human body needs some sunlight in order to produce vitamin D, which is essential to good health: Prof Dorothy Bennett, Professor of Cell Biology at St. George’s, University of London, said: “The findings support the consensus that the ideal amount of sun exposure for Northern Europeans is ‘a little’, rather than zero. “As the authors comment, our bodies need sunlight to make essential vitamin D, which can help us resist some cancer types. Those who normally avoid the sun and/or cover most of their skin are advised to take vitamin D supplements.” Dr Andrea Darling, Post-doctoral Research Fellow from the University of Surrey, said there was still strong evidence that skin cancer is caused by sunbathing. “The findings from Dr Lindqvist’s team are interesting, but it is possible that the women in the study who had high sun exposure differed from the women who had low sun exposure in ways that may explain their reduced cancer risk.” Yinka Ebo, senior health information officer at Cancer Research UK, said striking a balance was important. “The reasons behind higher death rates in women with lower sun exposure are still unexplained, as unhealthy lifestyle choices could have played a part,” she added. “Overexposure to UV radiation from the sun or sunbeds is the main cause of skin cancer.” As the researchers noted in their own conclusions, avoidance of sun exposure may have more widespread deleterious effects among other groups of women: Over the last 30-40 years, Sweden and other western countries have produced national guidelines and provided restrictive advice on sun exposure habits to lower the risk of skin cancer. These recommendations are based on Australian/English guidelines known as SunSmart, which may be appropriate in a country with a high UV index such as Northern Australia, where dense pigmentation would be an advantage. However, following generally restrictive guidelines in Sweden, a country located at the northern latitude of between 55° and 67° with limited sunshine and a low UV index, might not be optimal. In fact, our findings indicate that these guidelines may indeed be harmful in terms of overall health of the population. The Southern Australia (Tasmania) Cancer Council recommendations including daily short sun exposure might be more suitable in regions with low sun intensity levels. Our study population of women born in Sweden before 1966, that is, before widespread immigration took place, consisted almost entirely of light-skinned Caucasian women. If avoidance of sun exposure is a major risk factor for all-cause mortality in the case of Caucasian women, the problem may even be more serious amongst women who traditionally cover their skin or women more densely pigmented. In the USA, black women were reported to have a 26% excess all-cause mortality, as compared to Caucasian women. Such data should direct our attention to a risk group whose health we may be in a position to improve.
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9245
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Even partial steroid treatment can benefit extremely preterm infants, NIH study suggests
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This news release by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) covers research findings on antenatal steroid (ANS) treatment in pregnant women expecting preterm delivery, as published in JAMA Pediatrics. Although women likely to deliver before 34 weeks are routinely given steroid treatment to reduce the chance of complications, physicians weren’t sure whether a partial course of treatment would provide the same — or any — benefits. In this new study, researchers concluded that ANS therapy was dose-dependent in providing protective effects against death or neurodevelopmental impairment in extremely preterm infants. The release claims that even partial steroid treatment can benefit those born between 22 and 27 weeks of pregnancy. Details on funding sources and treatment’s context are given high up in the news release. It also starts out well by providing some relevant figures, such as the number of subjects in the study, their gestational ages and follow-up times. However, other important quantitative data aren’t disclosed at all, such as the extent of the treatment’s benefits in the three groups, as well as the costs associated with steroid therapy. Instead, only sweeping, vague comparative language is used to illustrate complications and other outcomes, which leaves the reader wondering how beneficial steroid treatment really is. Another major point that was not mentioned was the study’s limitations — namely that this was an observational cohort study that cannot establish cause and effect. Patients were not blinded to their treatments and were not randomized, which led to an unequal distribution of patients in the 3 groups in terms of socioeconomic status and other infant variables. In the end, the complete ANS treatment group already had distinct advantages from these factors in achieving better outcomes. Although studies on antenatal steroid (ANS) treatment already exist in the body of literature, there hasn’t been much research looking at dose-dependent effects of ANS on extremely premature infants, especially in regard to early neurodevelopmental outcomes. Other studies have looked into partial ANS courses and rates of respiratory distress syndrome and chronic lung disease among infants. Steroids are routinely given to pregnant women likely to deliver before 34 weeks and are considered to be standard treatment. However, there is no clear protocol on administering ANS treatment when premature delivery is approaching, since completing the entire course takes at least 48 hours. If the latest research shows that even partial ANS treatment provides benefits to preterm infants, this should be reported to empower patients and to guide clinical practice.
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mixture
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antenatal steroid treatment,NIH,preterm infants
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The two antenatal steroids (ANS) used in this study included betamethasone and dexamethasone, but their costs were never mentioned. A complete course of ANS was defined as 2 intramuscular doses of betamethasone administered 24 hours apart or 4 doses of dexamethasone administered 12 hours apart. According to drugs.com, 500 mL of dexamethasone costs $23.94. Our online search didn’t uncover any price estimates for liquid Betamethasone. Drugs.com only lists topical Betamethasone prices. We always like to see a ballpark range of costs in news releases, so consumers can estimate their therapy costs. Since costs are not discussed in the news release, we give it a Not Satisfactory rating here. It’s worth noting here that the actual costs of the steroids pale in comparison to the cost of the overall treatment of these infants. If the partial treatment is even partially effective, that could lower future medical care costs. Although the news release gives figures for the number of study participants and their gestational ages, it doesn’t provide any quantitative data on the benefits of steroid therapy. Instead, it uses broad, vague language, such as “significant differences in rates of death.” It also states, “Infants in the complete treatment group fared best,” and “infants in the partial treatment group fared better than untreated infants.” As we have pointed out in previous reviews, the word “significant” is confusing and ambiguous, since it could mean “statistically significant” or “remarkable/substantial,” the colloquial use of the term. Without any numbers to put “best” and “better” into perspective, readers are left wondering just how well each group fared. The original journal article gives the rates of various complications in percentages. Since the study’s primary objective was to compare the rates of death or neurodevelopmental impairment in infants born between 22-27 weeks, it would have been sufficient to disclose only these figures for the three groups. Researchers wrote, “Death or neurodevelopmental impairment occurred in 68.1%, 54.4% and 48.1% of patients in the no, partial and complete ANS (antenatal steroids) groups, respectively.” Since the news release does not quantify the benefits for its readers, we give it a Not Satisfactory rating here. Every intervention carries risks, and antenatal steroid therapy is no exception. Although this therapy is generally deemed to be safe, some studies have reported undesired effects on the mother’s immune system and metabolism, as well as reduction of fetal heart rate and breathing movements. A multiple course of antenatal steroids might even slow fetal intrauterine growth and lower neonatal birth weight. Since harms were not addressed, we give the news release a Not Satisfactory rating. The news release does an appropriate job disclosing the number of participants and follow-up times and listing treatment groups and outcome measurements (although not quantitatively). However, it doesn’t detail any of the study’s limitations. This was an observational cohort study, which means it’s difficult to determine causation, since patients weren’t randomized and blinded to their treatments. Researchers also acknowledged that there was an unequal distribution of patients in the three groups because of the observational design. The complete antenatal steroid (ANS) treatment group had distinct socioeconomic advantages compared to the partial treatment and no treatment groups. For example, the complete ANS group were comprised of individuals more likely to have a high school education, be white and married, and less likely to be on public insurance, compared to the other two groups. The infants of the ANS group were also more likely to have a higher mean birth weight and a higher mean gestational age, compared to the other two groups. Since none of these points were addressed, we give the news release a Not Satisfactory rating here. There is no disease mongering in the news release. The news release identifies the funding source in its headline and first sentence – the National Institutes of Health. It later adds that NIH’s National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences also provided funding for the study. There was no mention of conflicts of interest, since there were none reported in the original journal article. Alternative therapies are not discussed in the news release. For women who are more likely to deliver prematurely, they may receive a progesterone shot — the most common being the 17-OHPC shot — to prevent preterm birth. Other medications, such as tocolytics, which include ritodrine, magnesium sulfate, calcium channel blockers and indomethacin, can be administered to delay delivery. Additionally, women in preterm labor usually are given antibiotics, as some studies have suggested that antibiotics may prolong pregnancy and reduce problems in the newborn. Since none of these alternatives are mentioned, we give the news release a Not Satisfactory rating. The news release reveals high up in the article that steroids are a standard treatment for pregnant women expecting preterm delivery, or before 34 weeks. “These drugs are known to reduce the chance of complications and heath among premature infants,” it states. Since the release makes it clear that steroids are nothing new, we give it a Satisfactory rating here. As implied by the news release, the main objective of the research was to look at the varying levels of treatment — in this case, no, partial and complete antenatal courses. Previously, physicians may have opted to forgo treatment when premature delivery is on the horizon, since an entire treatment course takes at least 48 hours. But according to the release, the new study gives “strong evidence” that even a partial course can provide some benefit. The release might better have characterized the study as yielding minimally statistically significant results rather than “strong evidence.” But overall, the news release merits a Satisfactory rating for novelty. The news release does not use unjustifiable, sensational language.
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5547
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Dutch Supreme Court asked to clarify euthanasia case.
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Prosecutors have asked the Netherlands’ Supreme Court to clarify legal matters in a landmark euthanasia case, saying Thursday they want to lay down unambiguous jurisprudence for the future.
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true
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Netherlands, Supreme courts, International News, General News, Legislation, Health, The Hague, Courts, Euthanasia, Dementia, Europe
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The Public Prosecution Service said by instituting “cassation in the interest of the law” proceedings they aim to clarify how doctors deal with euthanasia on “incapacitated patients” without subjecting a doctor acquitted at a trial to a new legal battle. Prosecutors said in a statement they want “legal certainty to be created for doctors and patients about this important issue in euthanasia legislation and medical practice.” The retired nursing home doctor was cleared earlier this month by judges in The Hague who ruled that she adhered to all criteria for carrying out legal euthanasia when she administered a fatal dose of drugs to a 74-year-old woman with severe dementia. The cassation proceedings mean that the doctor’s acquittal will not be called into question. The doctor carried out euthanasia on the woman in 2016, acting on a written directive the patient had drawn up earlier. The woman later gave mixed signals about her desire to die, but the doctor, in close consultation with the woman’s family, decided to go ahead with the mercy killing. The Hague District Court ruled that in rare cases of euthanasia on patients with severe dementia — and who had earlier made a written request for euthanasia — the doctor “did not have to verify the current desire to die.” Prosecutors said they disagreed with the Hague court and want the Supreme Court to rule on legal issues in the case. Pending the outcome of the Supreme Court case, prosecutors said they are suspending consideration of other euthanasia cases that deal with the same issues. Under Dutch law, people are eligible for euthanasia if they make a considered, voluntary request and if their suffering is hopelessly “unbearable.” Patients can draw up a written request for euthanasia to be performed sometime in the future, in an advance directive, which should specify the conditions determining when they want to be euthanized. Doctors must also seek the advice of at least one other independent physician before killing the patient. Euthanasia cases among people with advanced dementia are extremely rare in the Netherlands. There have been fewer than 20 cases since the procedure was legalized in 2002. The Netherlands is one of five countries that allow doctors to kill patients at their request, and one of two, along with Belgium, that grant the procedure for people with mental illness.
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British nurse who recovered from Ebola back in hospital.
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A Scottish nurse, who recovered from Ebola but then suffered life-threatening complications from the virus persisting in her brain, has been admitted to hospital for a third time, officials said on Tuesday.
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Health News
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Pauline Cafferkey contracted Ebola in December 2014 when she was working in a treatment facility in Sierra Leone at the height of an epidemic of the disease which swept through three countries in West Africa. Cafferkey was being transferred on Tuesday from the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow to the Royal Free Hospital in London, which has a unit that was specially set up to deal with any Ebola cases in Britain. “We can confirm that Pauline Cafferkey is being transferred to the Royal Free Hospital due to a late complication from her previous infection by the Ebola virus,” the hospital said in a statement. “She will now be treated by the hospital’s infectious diseases team under nationally agreed guidelines.” After being transferred from Sierra Leone to Britain, Cafferkey initially recovered from the Ebola hemorrhagic fever and was sent home in January last year. But in October she fell ill again and doctors found the virus was persisting in tissues in her brain. They later said she had developed meningitis caused by the Ebola virus - the first known such case. She was treated with an experimental antiviral drug known as GS5734 being developed by U.S. drugmaker Gilead Sciences, although doctors did not disclose whether they thought the drug had improved her condition. She was last discharged from the Royal Free Hospital in November. The two-year Ebola epidemic in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia killed more than 11,300 people, according to the World Health Organisation.
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18883
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In 2010, 2,694 young people were killed by gunfire. 1,773 were victims of homicide; 67 were elementary school-age children.
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College presidents weigh in on gun deaths of young people
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true
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Georgia, Children, Guns, College presidents,
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"Five days after shootings in Newtown, Conn., left 28 people dead -- including 20 children at Sandy Hook Elementary -- leaders at two of Georgia’s higher education institutions weighed in on the gun safety debate. Leaders of Oglethorpe University and Agnes Scott College -- both are in DeKalb County -- released an open letter pushing for stricter gun safety legislation. It was initially co-signed by more than 160 other college and university presidents nationwide, including Atlanta’s Morehouse and Spelman colleges and Clark Atlanta University. Oglethorpe President Lawrence M. Schall said he was moved to draft the letter after watching a televised memorial service for Newtown victims. ""For many years now, our nation’s leaders have engaged in fevered debates on higher education, yet lawmakers shy away from taking action on one issue that prevents thousands of young people from living lives of promise, let alone realizing their college dreams. That issue is gun safety,"" the letter reads. "" … In 2010, 2,694 young people were killed by gunfire. 1,773 were victims of homicide; 67 were elementary school-age children. If those children and teens were alive today, they would fill 108 classrooms of 25 each."" Since the Connecticut shooting, the gun safety debate has come front and center at all levels of government. The White House has rolled out a $500 million gun safety package. State lawmakers are pushing for armed officers in schools. Metro Atlanta school districts have conducted ""active shooter"" lockdown drills for staff and students. A multitude of statistics has been tossed about by advocates on both sides of the issue to make their points. We wondered if the data used by higher education leaders was accurate. And we were curious how it was compiled. By the time President Barack Obama unveiled his gun-violence reduction plan this week, the list of higher education co-signers of the gun safety letter had risen to more than 300. The letter has received national attention, with coverage on news outlets including CNN, The Huffington Post, NPR and The Wall Street Journal. A spokesman for Oglethorpe University said the gun death statistics used in the letter were taken directly from data also used by the Children’s Defense Fund, the Washington, D.C., child-advocacy organization led by Marian Wright Edelman. The data includes figures for children and youths through age 19. In one of her weekly ""Child Watch"" columns last month, Edelman used the same statistics to also implore action on gun violence. The figures cited by the Children’s Defense Fund are actually data compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and available in its WONDER (Wide-ranging Online Data for Epidemiologic Research) online database research system. For its various data, the CDC WONDER system uses information collected from its agency affiliates. The mortality data used in the gun safety letter is compiled from death certificates issued in each state and recorded by the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics. That information is then included in the WONDER database. Of note are the types of gun deaths included in the numbers cited. The list of 2,694 young people reportedly killed by gunfire includes those who died of suicide, as well as accidental discharge of a firearm and discharge of a firearm with an undetermined intent. The CDC’s homicide figure varies slightly from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports for 2010. The FBI crime statistics are produced from data provided by 17,000 law enforcement agencies across the United States. For children and youths through age 19, 1,402 were victims of homicide (it does not include suicide) by gunfire in 2010, according to the FBI crime report. That is similar to the CDC’s figure of 1,773 homicide victims of the same age during the same year. The FBI and CDC data sets are the two main sources of these types of statistics, said James Fox, a professor of criminology at Northeastern University in Boston. The CDC numbers can be slightly higher because the FBI figures do not include data from every police department in the country (about 92 percent of the departments submit information to the FBI). But the FBI data, which is published annually, is more up to date, Fox said. The lag time for reporting CDC data is about a year longer. So, are the numbers of child gun deaths cited in the letter from the college and university presidents accurate? It depends on who collects, compiles and publishes the data, as well as what is included in the numbers. In the case of the CDC data, it is virtually impossible to track down each death certificate from 2010 to verify the cause of death. Based on an examination of the WONDER data, the numbers appear accurate. It is important to note that the figure for the number of children and youths killed by guns three years ago includes causes such as suicides and unintentional discharges."
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9776
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A blood test for pancreatic cancer may re-stack the odds in patients' favor
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This article describes the discovery of a molecule that points to the presence of glypican-1, a protein that is expressed in pancreatic and breast cancer, and how the protein might serve as a marker for earlier diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. It presents a clear overview of the method researchers used to detect the protein and includes an independent expert which gives the story balance. The story would have been stronger with a nod to the potential cost and harms of screening tools, and with a more aggressive challenge to the claim that the test has “perfect accuracy.” We also reviewed stories published by NBCNews.com the Houston Chronicle on this same discovery. By the time it is diagnosed, pancreatic cancer is often too far advanced to respond to treatment. A screening tool that would allow earlier detection and treatment could potentially save lives. There currently is no specific screening test that can reliably detect early-stage pancreatic cancer in people who have no symptoms, according to the American Society of Clinical Oncology.
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mixture
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pancreatic cancer
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The story doesn’t mention costs of the screening tool, should one be developed. Costs for screening tests vary widely. The description of benefits could have been stronger. The article states that researchers have found a way to identify the presence of a protein that indicates pancreatic cancer “with perfect accuracy and no false positives.” That’s technically true in this study, but it’s only part of the story. As the story notes, the main benefit of the test would be its ability to detect cancer at an early, treatable stage. But the study included only 5 patients with such early stage cancers — something the story didn’t explicitly tell us. While experts quoted in the article urge caution in reading too much into a small study, the claim of “perfect accuracy,” based on such a tiny sample, deserved a more aggressive and immediate challenge. It isn’t until the very end of the story that any caveats are introduced. In addition, while patients who are able to undergo early treatment might be cured of the disease, the NCI cancer summary points out that the 5-year survival rate for patients who underwent complete resection for small tumors that were confined to the pancreas (the target for screening) was still only 18 to 24%. So, patients may still face long odds even when their tumors are caught early — context the story could have provided. This article, like others covering the study that we reviewed, ignored the potential harms from screening tests. In the real world, all screening tests carry the risk of false negatives, false positives and inconclusive results that could lead to more invasive tests and over-aggressive treatments. The article provides a clear explanation of how researchers identified the protein and the methods they used to measure it. The story also defines the number of volunteers (251 with pancreatic cancer, 32 with chronic pancreatitis and 120 health controls). While we’re concerned with the story’s assertion that the presence of the protein provides “perfect accuracy and no false positives” in diagnosing pancreatic cancer, we’ve already addressed that issue above under Benefits. We’ll give credit here for the story’s inclusion of cautionary statements, such as that that this was a small cohort and that the study should be repeated in a larger group of volunteers. The problem here isn’t egregious, but the story does refer to pancreatic cancer as one of the “common cancers” in the United States, which is not accurate. Pancreatic cancer isn’t in the Top 10. The most common cancers in the U.S. are breast, cervical, colorectal, HPV-associated, lung, ovarian prostate, skin, uterine and vaginal and vulvar, according to the Centers for Disease Control. As we noted in a review of an NBCNews.com article on this research, it’s important to present statistics in context. That story was lauded for including an important caveat: “For perspective, over the course of a lifetime, 1.5 percent of Americans will develop pancreatic cancer.” In addition to quoting from the study in Nature and an editorial published alongside it, the article includes an independent expert who provides a measured and objective assessment of the finding which helps put the study in better context. While stating that the research is “a cool observation,” he added that “this is not a biomarker yet” since the study was too small to draw a conclusion. The story doesn’t mention how pancreatic cancer is currently diagnosed. Tests to identify pancreatic cancer in patients include, but aren’t limited to, physical exams to look for the presence of jaundice, blood tests, imaging tests and biopsy. The article gives no indication when the discovery could be translated into a clinical screening tool but reviewers don’t see that as a drawback in this story. The article is cautious about the implications of the finding and highlights experts calling for additional research so we can assume the tool is some years off. The story establishes what is novel about the test — the fact that it has the potential to detect cancer at an early, more treatable stage. The story could have done more to establish whether there has been other research into tests for pancreatic cancer and how the new test builds upon those previous efforts. The story includes comments obtained from an interview with an independent expert, and statements from a published editorial about the significance of the research.
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10912
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Surgical probe seeks out where cancer ends and healthy tissue begins
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The experimental light probe. Credit University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.This news release describes the results of a small clinical “proof of concept” trial designed to blind-test the reliability and accuracy (i.e. sensitivity and specificity) of a hand-held light-only probe that surgeons might use to accurately determine how much tissue beyond a visible tumor should be removed during cancer surgery to help contain the disease. The release does a praiseworthy job of pointing out right away that the goal of the study was to measure the performance of the instrument, called an optical coherence tomography (OCT) device, against the “gold standard” practice of surgically collecting tissue from both the tumor and the “margins” around the tumor cavity, and sending both to a pathology lab for definitive diagnosis and evidence that surgeons “got it all.” The release would have benefited from more information about the sensitivity and specificity of the results among the patient groups. And it didn’t describe what it is, exactly, that OCT identifies — i.e. the mixed and disorganized microscopic tissue structures that are the markers of malignancy. But overall, the release does make clear the potential of the technology without over-promising a timetable for clinical use. And it does an admirable job of disclosing the financial interest in commercialization of the device by one of the investigators. Readers will be mostly well informed by this release. During surgery to remove a solid tumor, some tissue around the tumor is also removed. A pathologist takes the tumor with surrounding tissue and stains it with ink so that the outer edges, or margins, can be seen under a microscope. “Negative margins” means the outer edge is free of cancer cells, whereas “positive margins” indicates that there were cancer cells at that outer edge. To reduce the chances of recurrence, surgeons seek “negative margins” when removing a tumor. However, such “gold standard” pathology analyses cannot usually be done definitively while a patient is still on the operating table, so if margins are not determined to be clean or clear or wide enough, repeat trips to the operating room may be necessary, with all of their attendant risks and complications. Thus, devices that may help surgeons in real time assess the outer margins by accurately measuring the cellular structures of a tumor would likely be welcomed not only by patients and their surgeons, but possibly also by payers, by reducing the probability of repeat procedures and complications.
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true
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Breast cancer,Cancer,medical devices,University news release
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Although the study was not designed to assess relative costs of gold standard histology and OCT. the release would have helped both the news value of the study and the reader’s understanding of technological innovation if it had included some estimate of costs associated with use of the device. Operating room time is incredibly expensive, and any procedure that adds significant time will also add significant cost. In addition, prolonging any surgical procedure will extend the amount of time that the patient is under general anesthesia. We suspect (based on experience with the Dune Medical device, which is similar) that the procedure doesn’t take more than about 5-10 minutes, but the release could have made this clear. Another issue could be the cost of the device to the facility. There is no CPT (billing) code for this procedure, so when commercially available, the cost likely cannot be passed along to the patient. Hospitals may not be interested in purchasing this equipment as they may not be able to get reimbursed for the cost of the device. The release describes the accuracy of the device as follows: The study found that the OCT device analysis identified the differences between normal and cancerous tissue with 92 percent sensitivity and 92 percent specificity. They also found that the way that OCT spotted cancer in the removed tissue was closely correlated with the results from the postoperative pathology reports, which often came days later. It also quotes the study author who says: “For the first time, this study demonstrates the use of OCT for imaging tumor margins within the tumor cavity, in the patient, during surgery,” Boppart said. “It is likely better to check to see if any residual tumor cells might be left behind, rather than checking the tissue mass that was taken out. Then, the surgeon can intervene immediately.” We’re inclined to give the benefit of the doubt given the story’s good-faith attempt to use some numbers to describe the device’s accuracy. However, we think the study itself had many details, not communicated in the release, that would have added to the release’s credibility, understandability, and potential impact. It would have been very useful to know more about how many of the 35 women participating in the study had mastectomies, for example, how many had invasive cancers, in situ cancers, or ductal cancers; and how large a range the tumors covered. For the sake of background, we’d add that breast cancer surgeons used to go after wider margins (i.e. more healthy tissue at the edge of the removed tumor) than they do today. There is a large body of evidence that demonstrates that wider margins do not translate to better outcomes, and the SSO-ASTRO margin guideline statement is now fairly well accepted, noting that “no ink on tumor” is sufficient in many cases of invasive cancer; of course this may not apply to all cases. As more physicians adopt the 2014 guidelines, the utility of these devices may be called into question. The release did make clear that the OCT device was a light-only probe that carried no need for dyes or invasive procedures; it was “swept” across the tissue so that the microscopic tissue structures could be captured on video and analyzed or compared with the gold standard analyses in the path lab. But the release probably should have said whether the use of OCT added to time under anesthesia or was associated with little or no harm at all to patients. In addition, there is the potential for harm in terms of an impact on cosmetic results if tissue is removed based on a positive reading that was found to be a false positive. One of the cases described in the study was a false positive. The release did a pretty good job of noting what the study was designed to do, that ongoing clinical studies will be done, and quoting the investigators as saying the study demonstrates specificity and sensitivity, not that it is ready to replace standard practice at this time. No mongering here, but instead a quite clear explanation of why assessing margins is important in the surgical treatment of cancer. The release discloses financial and commercialization interests of the principal investigator. The news release goes into some detail about the current methods used by surgeons and pathologists to assess the extent of a tumor and the likely outer border of margins. We’ll rate this Satisfactory, although there is no discussion of an existing device — the Dune Medical Margin Probe — that uses different technology but is used for the same purpose. The new device is meant to be used in-vivo (on the lumpectomy or mastectomy bed) versus on the tumor specimen removed during surgery. The release says the device “could soon enable reliable, real-time guidance for surgeons,” which may be a bit optimistic, but at least suggests that the device is not available yet. Toward the end of the release it is stated that “The researchers will continue clinical studies with the OCT device, looking at other types of solid-state tumors,” which arguably suggests the same. Ideally the text would have been more explicit about whether and/or when the device would be commercialized, but we’ll give the benefit of the doubt. As noted above, the release could have mentioned a competing device that has already been found able to distinguish pretty well between normal and cancerous tissue, but not in real time with a portable device in the operating room. However, the release does quote one of the researchers who establishes what is new here: “For the first time, this study demonstrates the use of OCT for imaging tumor margins within the tumor cavity, in the patient, during surgery.” We’ll rate this Satisfactory. Pretty careful narrative prose.
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7240
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Michigan governor signs overhaul to cut high auto premiums.
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Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Thursday signed a “historic” overhaul of Michigan’s car insurance system that, beginning in 13 months, will let drivers choose their medical coverage instead of them being required to buy unlimited benefits.
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true
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Legislature, Auto insurance, Health, General News, Gretchen Whitmer, Detroit, Bills, Michigan
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Her signature, delivered at the Detroit Regional Chamber’s Mackinac Policy Conference, capped an intense three-week period in which the Republican-led Legislature proposed bills, the Democratic governor threatened a veto and a compromise was reached. Starting in July 2020, motorists will be able to pick among levels of personal injury protection — which on average accounts for half of premiums in a state with the country’s most expensive auto insurance. PIP rates will be cut entirely for those who fully forgo the coverage and instead use qualifying health insurance for crash injuries. Insurers will be required, for eight years, to reduce — on average— the PIP portion of policies by 10% (unlimited benefit), 20% ($50,000), 35% ($250,000) and 45% ($500,000). They will be prohibited from using non-driving factors such as home ownership, educational level, occupation, ZIP code or credit scores in setting rates. And health providers, beginning in 2021, will charge auto insurers less than they have been for treating and rehabilitating injured drivers. “Today truly is a historic day for Michiganders. These are important improvements as we move forward in the state,” said Whitmer, who was joined by lawmakers and Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan. “They’ll help Michiganders from Detroit all the way to the Upper Peninsula, because people across our state are sick and tired of paying these outrageous rates.” Duggan estimated that most people will save $500 a year, while Detroiters will save at least $1,000 with many saving “a lot more than that, in significant part because we will no longer have to double pay for medical insurance.” The legislation cleared the House and Senate with overwhelming support but has come under criticism from insurance companies, patient advocates, hospitals, brain injury facilities and others. The negligence law section of the State Bar of Michigan this week laid out several concerns. It called the bill a trade-off between quality care and premiums, predicted a negative impact on long-term care and rehabilitation providers, and said the measure will shift risk to drivers, health insurers and taxpayers in the form of Medicaid spending. “The likelihood is that this bill will result in negligible savings to the average driver, and it comes at the cost of being a devastating blow to severely injured accident victims and the caregivers that currently treat them,” said section chairman Robert Raitt, a personal injury lawyer at a Farmington Hills firm that specializes in serious car accidents. “We could have done so much better.” Michigan is the only state to require unlimited PIP coverage. And unlike several other no-fault states, providers treating crash victims are able to charge auto insurers far more than they do for other patients covered by private or government health plans. The average premium in Michigan is $2,693, according to the most recent report from insurance comparison website The Zebra — 83% higher than the national average of $1,470. Detroit’s premium on average is $5,464, far surpassing any other U.S. city. House Speaker Lee Chatfield, a Levering Republican, defended the new law, saying critics “have built their entire business model around auto no-fault, and there’s going to have to be an adjustment made.” Republican Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey of Clarklake said the current system provides “unbelievable services and unbelieveable costs,” and “was unsustainable.” “To have actual real, measurable reform, we had to break that up,” he said. “Forty-nine other states to one degree or another have figured this out. I don’t see a lot of people on gurneys in the streets because they aren’t being treated as a result of an auto accident. So we shouldn’t expect anything different.” ___ Senate Bill 1: http://bit.ly/30SAbXs ___ Follow David Eggert on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DavidEggert00
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35052
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The first cases of COVID-19 were reported in the United States and South Korea on the same day.
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While the Trump administration did take action to combat the spread of COVID-19 shortly after the first patient was diagnosed in the U.S., the country did not, as South Korea did, immediately ramp up diagnostic testing. According to Reuters, South Korea conducted nearly 300,000 tests within two months of diagnosing their first COVID-19 patient. By contrast, the U.S. only conducted about 60,000 tests in that same time period.
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true
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Medical
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In March 2020, as the daily rate of new cases of the COVID-19 coronavirus disease was increasing in the United States and decreasing in South Korea, a message started to circulate on social media claiming that these two countries had seen their first confirmed cases of infection by the novel coronavirus on the same day: South Korea and the United States did indeed confirm their first cases of COVID-19 on the same day, Jan. 20, 2020. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the first South Korean case of COVID-19 was detected in a 35-year-old woman who had been living in Wuhan, China: On 20 January 2020, National IHR Focal Point (NFP) for Republic of Korea reported the first case of novel coronavirus in the Republic of Korea. The case is a 35-year-old female, Chinese national, residing in Wuhan, Hubei province in China. That same day, a 35-year-old man who had recently returned to the United States from Wuhan, China, was also diagnosed with the disease. The New England Journal of Medicine reported: On January 20, 2020, the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] confirmed that the patient’s nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal swabs tested positive for 2019-nCoV by real-time reverse-transcriptase–polymerase-chain-reaction (rRT-PCR) assay. In coordination with CDC subject-matter experts, state and local health officials, emergency medical services, and hospital leadership and staff, the patient was admitted to an airborne-isolation unit at Providence Regional Medical Center for clinical observation, with health care workers following CDC recommendations for contact, droplet, and airborne precautions with eye protection. The CDC announced that it had confirmed the first U.S. case of COVID-19 in a press release the following day, and a CDC spokesperson told Snopes.com that the patient tested positive for the novel coronavirus on the evening of Jan. 20. The press release came the following morning to give health officials time to notify the patient and discuss the special circumstances of the case. While these countries both detected their first cases of COVID-19 on the same day, they took different approaches to treating the disease and have so far seen vastly different results. At the time of this writing on March 23, 2020, the number of cases in the U.S. had topped 35,000. South Korea had less than 9,000 cases and reported its lowest number of new cases since rates peaked at the end of February. One possible explanation as to why South Korea was relatively successful in combating the disease, while the United States struggled to keep it contained during its initial weeks, may have to do with how each country reacted in the earliest days of the impending pandemic. In brief, South Korea’s first action to fight the spread of COVID-19 was to aggressively start testing people for the disease and quarantine those who tested positive. The United States’ first actions were aimed at restricting travel from China. A special report from Reuters noted that South Korean health officials gathered in late January 2020 and decided that the need for testing was urgent. South Korea’s CDC approved its first diagnostic test the following week, and by the end of February, drive-thru testing facilities that screened thousands of people a day were in operation. The United States took a different approach. When the first patient was diagnosed with COVID-19 in the United States in January 2020, President Donald Trump announced a set of travel restrictions on Jan. 31, 2020, that prohibited travelers from arriving from China, the epicenter of the outbreak. The restrictions also required American citizens returning home from China to be screened at airports and monitored for 14 days after their arrival.
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New treatment gives hope to children with resistant leukemia.
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As a doctor injected cloudy fluid into Makena Eighmy’s intravenous line, it looked like the 13-year-old animal lover from near Watertown was getting a standard procedure for her cancer.
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true
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Madison, Wisconsin, Cancer, Health, Gene therapy, Leukemia, Watertown, Animals, Chemotherapy, United States
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But the infusion this month at UW Health’s American Family Children’s Hospital was far from routine. It was a $475,000 treatment, the first gene therapy approved in the United States, a “living drug” made by shipping Makena’s T cells to a lab in New Jersey. There, the immune cells were genetically modified to better recognize her acute lymphoblastic leukemia, or ALL, a blood cancer that had relapsed twice after chemotherapy. In receiving two teaspoons of her souped-up cells on May 11, Makena was getting CAR T-cell therapy, one of the most promising new immunotherapies for cancer. She was just the second patient to get the customized treatment in Wisconsin since it was approved last year. UW Health is the only place providing it in the state. For more than 80 percent of children with ALL, the most common childhood cancer, chemo provides a cure. But for those like Makena, whose leukemia persists despite chemo and other treatments, the odds of survival are slim. So for the seventh-grader and her family, the syringe containing her engineered cells, which had been frozen in liquid nitrogen, thawed in water and delivered swiftly in a cooler to her room, offered a potential lifeline. “It went from, ‘There’s nothing we can do,’ to, ‘Oh my god, there’s so much hope now,’” said Tricia Eighmy, Makena’s mother. The treatment, called Kymriah, is “a paradigm-shifting game changer,” Dr. Christian Capitini, a pediatric oncologist at UW Health, told the Wisconsin State Journal . In the study leading to approval, 83 percent of patients were in remission after three months and 76 percent were still alive after a year. But like many encouraging medical developments, this one is not a sure thing. Sebastian Gusman, 15, of Beaver Dam, was the first patient to get Kymriah at UW Health after approval, in late January. Three months later, as he and his family were about to celebrate his recovery by traveling to Orlando, Florida, his leukemia returned. They canceled the trip, and he is getting more chemo. His leukemia mutated in response to the CAR T-cell therapy, and no longer carries the marker targeted by the treatment, Capitini said. “When it works, it’s really exciting and remarkable,” Capitini said. “When it doesn’t work, it shows that cancer cells are smart. Targeting just one molecule might not be sufficient.” Cancer can elude the immune system, which attacks foreign invaders, because it is an abnormal growth of the body’s own cells. But in recent years, scientists have developed immunotherapies that stimulate parts of the immune system to home in on cancer or block cancer cell signals that suppress immune cells. Several drugs have been approved, helping people with lymphoma, lung cancer, skin cancer and other tumors who didn’t respond well to surgery, chemo or radiation. One of the most celebrated immunotherapies is the type used on Makena and Sebastian: chimeric antigen receptor, or CAR, T-cell therapy. Using a disarmed, HIV-like virus, lab workers insert a gene into the patient’s T cells, the work horses of the immune system. That allows the cells to recognize a specific protein on leukemia cells — with Kymriah, a protein called CD19. The treatment was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in August for children and young adults with B-cell ALL. A similar treatment was approved in October for adults with lymphoma, another blood cancer. The first patient to receive the lymphoma treatment at UW Health got it the same week Makena had her infusion. One CAR T-cell therapy success story is Austin Schuetz, 9, of Fall River, who received an experimental form of the treatment in Philadelphia in 2013. His leukemia had relapsed after chemo and other treatments, giving him a life expectancy of three to six months. Today, the third-grader’s cancer remains in remission. He’s swimming, playing basketball, jumping on the trampoline and preparing to go to Jamaica with his family in October to celebrate five years free of cancer. “He’s gearing up for summer and playing with his friends,” said Kim Schuetz, Austin’s mother. In February 2017, a 17-year-old from Wisconsin got experimental CAR T-cell therapy at UW Health through a clinical trial. Now 18, she is in remission, Capitini said. She and her family declined to be identified. Even when CAR T-cell therapy works, it can cause side effects, some of them potentially fatal. The modified T cells release chemical messengers called cytokines into the blood, often leading to high fevers and low blood pressure, which can cause organ failure. The brain can swell or otherwise become altered, resulting in seizures or confusion. If the CAR T cells wipe out leukemia cells marked by CD19, as is hoped, they will typically kill off other immune cells that carry the same marker, reducing the body’s ability to fight infection. Patients who lose those cells, known as B cells, require monthly antibody therapy for life, Capitini said. Kymriah’s $475,000 cost, stemming from its tailor-made process, can be a hurdle if insurance doesn’t cover it. To address concerns about the cost, drug-maker Novartis said it will charge only if patients respond within a month. “Many questions must be addressed before we can herald immunotherapeutic approaches to cancer an unqualified success,” Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, wrote when Kymriah was approved. “There are still too many severe reactions, too many non-responses or relapses, and, potentially, a very high price tag for their widespread use, which will be truly challenging to scale up,” Collins said. “But we’re off to a promising start.” Sebastian Gusman, a 10th-grader who is a fan of computer games and Star Wars, started feeling pain in his knees and hips just before Christmas 2016. Two months later, he was diagnosed with ALL. After two rounds of chemotherapy, involving long stays at UW Health’s children’s hospital and many day trips from his home in Beaver Dam, tests showed more leukemia than before. His back hurt so much, the only way he could sleep was to recline on his gaming chair and prop up his legs on a table. “I was crying in pain,” he said. Kymriah had been approved, and UW Health was one of 20 sites allowed to offer it initially. The list has now grown to more than 40 sites, with Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin near Milwaukee expected to be approved soon. On Jan. 26, Sebastian became the first patient to get Kymriah, post-approval, in the state. A few days later, he had a severe reaction. He developed dangerously low blood pressure, a fever of 106 degrees, fluid around his heart and kidney failure, requiring him to be hooked up to oxygen in intensive care. He also had hallucinations — seeing “fish people,” a “pickle juice river” and a wall clock ordering him to do things, he said — and for several days didn’t recognize family members or medical staff. With rescue drugs, he recovered. His back pain went away, and tests suggested the CAR T-cell therapy was working. Doctors believed his prognosis was particularly good because side effects from Kymriah are thought to be a sign the treatment is doing its job. Sebastian, his brother and parents planned to go to Walt Disney World and Universal Studios in early May through the Make-A-Wish Foundation. But on April 25, while getting his monthly antibody infusion, he learned the cancer had relapsed. A few days later, his back pain returned. “It was a complete shock,” said his mother, Beckie Gusman. “But we’ve accepted it, and we’ll just keep fighting.” If the chemo Sebastian is now taking works, he might get a stem cell transplant, Capitini said. Another possibility is enrolling in a study of another CAR T-cell therapy, targeting a different marker, CD22. Makena Eighmy, who wants to be a veterinarian or a horse trainer, helps take care of her family’s three cats, two horses, two dogs, two rabbits and two fish. She was an energetic child until three years ago, when her arms and legs began to hurt and she started sleeping up to 16 hours. When she refused to go shopping one day, saying she was too tired, her parents knew something was wrong. In June 2015 came the diagnosis: ALL. Makena was 10, between fourth and fifth grade. After her first round of chemo, her cancer returned in March 2017, in her spinal fluid. She had chemo again last year, along with radiation to her brain. In early April of this year, a test showed the cancer was back, in her bone marrow. The outlook looked grim until the family heard about Kymriah. Days later, Makena lay on an infusion bed at UW Hospital, tubes snaking out of both arms. Blood from her left arm flowed into a centrifuge, which collected her T cells and other white blood cells before returning platelets, red cells and plasma to her right arm. “It just stings a little bit,” she said during the procedure, through which adult patients often complain, nurses said. More than a half-cup of her blood, containing her T cells, was shipped to a Novartis lab in Morris Plains, New Jersey. The gene was inserted to enable the cells to recognize the protein, and the volume of modified cells was expanded. But when the mixture returned to Madison a month later, it measured only two teaspoons, as most other types of cells had been removed. As she waited for her CAR T-cell infusion, Makena received more chemo to get rid of her remaining T cells and make room for the new ones. For her parents, the days dragged on. “We’re praying this is a cure,” said her father, Jason Eighmy, from their home between Watertown and Johnson Creek. “I just want to see the day when she doesn’t have to worry.” Makena focused on Lacey, a quarter horse she got in December through Make-A-Wish. Lacey was due to deliver a foal at the same time Makena was scheduled for her treatment. Makena’s infusion came first. With her 15-year-old brother, Hayden, who has autism, beside her, she sat on a bed at the children’s hospital as nurses prepared her IV line. Capitini guided the plunger down the syringe and delivered 50 million of her CAR T cells, armed to kill her leukemia. To counteract the sulfur taste of the cells, Makena chewed gum. A lavender knit hat covering her pixie hairdo, she seemed puzzled by the many doctors, nurses and visitors assembled in her room. She didn’t understand what all the fuss was about, she said. “It was so set up, like, everyone was so excited,” Makena said. “Now, I’m just kind of feeling like, OK.” Three days later, she developed a fever of 101 degrees and slightly low blood pressure, and was admitted to the hospital. She was recently in the ICU, her fever having approached 104 degrees. It appeared the CAR T-cell therapy was working. ___ Information from: Wisconsin State Journal, http://www.madison.com/wsj
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15887
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200,000 students attempt suicide every year on college campuses.
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"Sanfilippo said ""200,000 students attempt suicide every year on college campuses."" That statistic is extrapolated from the American College Health Association’s most recent annual survey, which found that 1.2 percent of college and university students had attempted suicide within the past year. There are approximately 20 million students overall, which translates to about 200,000 suicide attempts. But the study’s author says there are two important caveats: their data is self-reported and the schools self-select to participate. In addition, a different type of survey conducted by the CDC -- one that looked at emergency data -- found a lower rate of suicide in similar age groups, but experts said that’s to be expected because emergency data doesn’t capture attempts that don’t lead to a hospital visit."
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mixture
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Education, Health Care, Public Health, Florida, Guns, Marjorie Sanfilippo,
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"A shooting incident at Florida State University late last year has re-opened a debate in the Florida Legislature about whether to allow guns on college campuses. Gunman Myron May, a former FSU student, wounded two students and a library employee before he was killed by police on Nov. 20, 2014. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, Florida is one of 20 states that specifically ban firearms on campuses; seven others specifically allow them under state law. The rest leave the decision up to the university. In January, a Florida House panel voted to advance a bill that would allow concealed-weapon permit holders to carry their guns on campuses. Then, on Feb. 16, a Senate panel approved the bill. Both votes broke along party lines, with Republicans in support and Democrats in opposition. The bill in question would allow concealed carry permit holders, who must be 21, to carry their firearms into any college or university facility. About 1.3 million people have Florida concealed-carry permits, including about 250,000 between the ages of 21 to 35. During the Senate hearing, college professors and students were among those who testified -- and they came armed with loads of statistics. Marjorie Sanfilippo, an Eckerd College psychology professor who has researched youth access to firearms, expressed concern about allowing guns on campuses. One issue, she said, is that some college students have mental health issues, including depression and anxiety. In fact, college is sometimes the time of life when major illnesses, such as bipolar mood disorder and schizophrenia, first appear. (May, a 31-year-old lawyer who returned to the FSU campus with a gun, suffered from mental health problems.) ""What proponents of this bill won’t tell you is that 200,000 students attempt suicide every year on college campuses -- an all too common event. Is it a stretch to speculate that more of these suicide attempts would be lethal if students had firearms?"" Are suicide attempts that widespread on college campuses? We took a closer look at the available statistics. Statistics on attempted suicide and colleges Sanfilippo told PolitiFact Florida that she took her data from an assessment by the American College Health Association, an advocacy organization for colleges and universities. The association has been collecting health data about college students since 2000. About 76,000 students at 157 colleges and universities took part in the spring of 2012. (The survey included Florida institutions but the association doesn’t release the names of those who participated.) The survey published in 2014 found that about 1.2 percent of college students reported attempting suicide within the past 12 months. There are approximately 20 million college and university students; doing the arithmetic, this translates into about 200,000 suicide attempts. (The association has found similar rates in other years.) Mary Hoban, who oversees the assessment, told PolitiFact Florida there are two caveats. First, the data is self-reported from studies, and second, the schools self-select to participate, ""so our data are not truly generalizable."" We searched for additional data on suicide attempts by college students. Researchers at the University of Texas found that 1 percent of undergraduates had attempted suicide within the past year. That data, from a paper published in 2009, came from a survey of students at 70 colleges and universities. Meanwhile, the Center for Collegiate Mental Health at Penn State University released a study based on data from 140 colleges and universities and 100,000 students for the 2013-14 year. Unlike other studies which reflect the overall student body, the Penn State study is based on data provided by students when they receive mental health services. It also reflects students who have made a suicide attempt within their lifetime -- not just the past year. Over this longer period, the study found, 9 percent of students had made a suicide attempt. Because this survey looked at a specific population that has received mental-health care, the rates will naturally be higher, said Ben Locke, executive director for the center. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has not collected data on suicide attempts by colleges students specifically. However it does have emergency-department data on nonfatal suicide attempts by age. The rate for 20- to 24-year-olds in 2010 was about 300 per 100,000, while the rate for 15- to 19-year-olds was 381 per 100,000. That rate is a lot lower than the one Sanfilippo relied on. However, the use of emergency department visits doesn’t capture people who attempted suicide but didn’t then go to the hospital. ""The actual number presented for care -- especially in an emergency department -- is going to be dramatically lower than people who self-disclose if they had an attempt in the last year,"" said Bill Schmitz, president of the American Association of Suicidology. For example, someone might have tried to overdose on Tylenol but then woke up without serious ill effects. Our ruling Sanfilippo said ""200,000 students attempt suicide every year on college campuses."" That statistic is extrapolated from the American College Health Association’s most recent annual survey, which found that 1.2 percent of college and university students had attempted suicide within the past year. There are approximately 20 million students overall, which translates to about 200,000 suicide attempts. But the study’s author says there are two important caveats: their data is self-reported and the schools self-select to participate. In addition, a different type of survey conducted by the CDC -- one that looked at emergency data -- found a lower rate of suicide in similar age groups, but experts said that’s to be expected because emergency data doesn’t capture attempts that don’t lead to a hospital visit."
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37934
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"A controversy over Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion's WAP sidesteps the fact that classical composer Mozart penned a song called ""Lick My Ass."
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Amidst controversy over Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s “WAP” (or “wet ass pussy”), a viral tweet asserted Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart “wrote a song” for which the title translated to “Lick My Ass.” Although Mozart’s papers and unpublished works are believed to have been sanitized in the immediate aftermath of his death at the age of 35, letters and other writings indicated he was known to have written the occasional ribald or filthy song.As the Facebook poster noted, Mozart’s canon “Leck mich im Arsch” was more closely translated as “Lick me in the ass.” It was censored in or around 1799, but eventually located and added to his known works.
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true
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Fact Checks, Viral Content
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"In August 2020 a Facebook screenshot of a tweet contrasted a moral panic over Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s “WAP” with a claim that classical composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote a song called “Lick My Ass”:A screenshot showed the following tweet:people are clutching their pearls over WAP like Mozart didn't write a song called ""Lick My Ass""— a failed opera singer 🎵🎶 (@sopranohsnap) August 11, 2020In the above tweet from August 11 2020, Twitter user @sopranosnap wrote:people are clutching their pearls over WAP like Mozart didn’t write a song called “Lick My Ass”Alongside the Facebook post, the user wrote:To be fair the direct translation was lick me in the assBackground of the Controversy and Ben Shapiro’s InvolvementWith respect to “pearl clutching” over “WAP,” Cardi B herself tweeted a remix of pundit Ben Shapiro’s viral reading of the song’s lyrics:😩😂😂😂 https://t.co/BoMFEkk0IG— iamcardib (@iamcardib) August 10, 2020As is often the case, Know Your Meme published a robust timeline of the controversy:WAP, an acronym for “Wet Ass Pussy,” is a rap song by Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion. The song quickly gained mass notoriety for its very sexually explicit lyrics and music video, which features a cameo from Kylie Jenner, leading to condemnations from some critics and politicians as well as defenses from critics and fans.Not long after the release, Shapiro’s reaction to the video and lyrics became a meme of its own:On August 10th [2020], Ben Shapiro read the lyrics mockingly on his show, censoring words like “pussy” as “P-word.” The video was reposted by @JasonSCampbell, gaining over 4,800 retweets and 8,000 likes in less than two hours (shown below).Shapiro’s reaction near-instantly became the centerpiece of Twitter mocking; later on August 10 2020, he re-entered the conversation with input from his wife:As I also discussed on the show, my only real concern is that the women involved — who apparently require a ""bucket and a mop"" — get the medical care they require. My doctor wife's differential diagnosis: bacterial vaginosis, yeast infection, or trichomonis.— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) August 10, 2020Predictably, his additional commentary was widely interpreted as his admission he was unable to arouse his wife:Ben, does your doctor wife tell you she can't get wet because she doesn't have these medical issues?— Cody Johnston (@drmistercody) August 10, 2020Imagining ben showing a doctor's note explaining why his wife never gets wet around him like he's trying to get out gym class— Head A.S.S. Overseer ⬅️ 🆒️ (@ShyReplyGuy) August 10, 2020BOTH ME AND MY WIFE AGREE THAT VAGINAS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE DRY.— Ben Shapiro— Waffle ""Tankie Terminator"" Wokyleeks (@wokyleeks) August 10, 2020Shapiro’s viral comments and subsequent commentary subsequently became representative of “pearl clutching” over “WAP” and its lyrics.Mozart’s Lesser-Known WorksBut did Mozart really write a song called “Lick My Ass” or “Lick Me in the Ass?”The claim itself wasn’t new, appearing on Reddit’s r/music in September 2017:Mozart wrote a piece called: ""Leck mist im Arsch,"" which translates to: ""Lick my Ass."" from MusicA 2014 article in Mental Floss specifically about Mozart’s dirty works explains that the song’s title has a slightly less bawdy connotation in context than its direct translation in 2020:Mozart wrote this six-voice canon in 1782. It was likely a party piece for his friends. The title translates to “Lick me in the ass,” an old German idiom akin to the modern “Kiss my ass.” When Mozart’s publisher received the piece, he was shocked to see such bawdy language and bowdlerized the text to read, “Let us be glad!” (Which, I think, is the complete opposite of what this tune means. )On music annotation site Genius.com, an entry for “Canon for 6 Voices in B-Flat Major: Leck mich im Arsch (Lick me in the ass)” reads:Leck mich im Arsch g’schwindi, g’schwindi! Leck im Arsch mich g’schwindi. Leck mich, leck mich, g’schwindi …English translation:Lick me in the ass quickly, quickly! Lick me in the ass quickly. Lick me, lick me quicklyThe page includes a sanitized version of the composition, before moving to the more ribald iteration:Leck mich im Arsch! Goethe, Goethe! Götz von Berlichingen! Zweiter Akt; Die Szene kennt ihr ja! Rufen wir nur ganz summarisch: Hier wird Mozart literarisch!EnglishKiss my arse! Goethe, Goethe! Götz von Berlichingen! Second act; You know the scene too well! Let us now shout the summary: Mozart here gets literary!An undated, archived page on the site MozartForum.com delved into attempts to authenticate the works as those of Mozart. Two of three compositions were considered likelier to have been composed by Wenzel Trnka, leaving the composition here as the one Mozart’s widow described as “unruly”:In 1799 Constanze Mozart sent Breitkopf & Härtel several manuscripts including a list of “songs”. Among this list of songs Item 21 reads “Three Canons Lek mich im Arsch”. Constanze included a note saying she would be sending the Canons later and that their texts would have to be altered because they were “unruly”. It is uncertain which canons she referred to but two were most likely–K231/382c, known by its incipit “Leck mich im Arsch” (Kiss my Ass) and K233/382e “Leck mir den Arsch fein recht schon sauber” (Kiss my ever so nice clean ass). The third was probably K234/384e “Bei der Hitz im Sommer ess ich” (In the heat of summer I eat). B & H published the 3 Canons with new texts: “Lasst froh uns seyn” (Lets be joyous), “Nichts labt mich mehr als Wien” (Nothing pleases me more than wine) and “Essen, Trinken, das erhalt den Leib” (Eating, drinking support love), only citing the first line of Mozart’s original text. Not only these three, but also six other canons were published by B & H with new suitable texts. However the other six texts are known to us from Mozart autographs, these first 3 canon texts have been lost to us. However a recently found set of the “Oeuvres Complettes” of Mozart’s from ca. 1804 gives all 9 original canon texts that B & H suppressed. The original texts are entered just below B & H’s printed words.Albert Dunning in the Mozart-Jahrbuch and again in his NMA volume has questioned the authenticity of these 3 “Leck mich im Arsch” canons. Then in 1988 Wolfgang Plath established the music of K233 and K234 is most likely to be attributed to Wenzel Trnka (1739-1791), having been published before 1800 in “XII Canons for 3 Voices Composer Sig. Wenceslao Trnka”, and again later by Aloys Fuchs under Trnka’s name. Michael Ochs in a 1991 Mozart-Jahrbuch article hypothesized that Breitkopf & Härtel received the Mozart canon autographs from Constanze Mozart and made in-house copies of them; then on these copies were written the substitute texts, with a few modifications in the music to accommodate B & H’s new words. Even though this is very plausible, unfortunately there is no evidence of any in-house copies and no clue where the autographs went. Ochs reproduces the original text of Mozart’s for the canons as follows:K233 “Leck mire den A..recht schon, fein sauber lecke ihn, fein sauber lecke, leck mire den A…Das ist ein fettigs Begehren, nur gut mit Butter geschmiert, den das Lecken der Braten mein tagliches Thun. Drei lecken mehr als Zweie, nur her, machet die Prob’ und leckt, leckt, leckt. Jeder leckt sein A…fur sich”. […]Köchel [a catalog of Mozart’s compositions] had placed the “Leck mir Arsch” canons K231, 233 ,234 with the 1775 compositions, believing they fit well with Mozart’s letters from his Salzburg years that used toilet language. In K3 Einstein moved them to Mozart’s early Vienna years because of the “humorous social intercourse” which the texts reflect, renumbering them K382c,d and e. William Cowdery (1991) believes they might fit well with the similar obscene lyrics of the 1788 Canons. However Dunning pointed out that the earlier dated canons differ in their melodic flow from the Vienna Canons” of 1787 and 1788, even placing a slight doubt on their authenticity. Regarding the Canons K559 and K560a Dunn believes they may have been written as early as 1786, as Peyerl was still in Salzburg to at least mid December 1785; so the earliest Mozart could have met him in Vienna was at the very end of December 1785 and most likely 1786. Mozart then batch entered the 9 canons at one time in his work catalogue on September 2, 1788. However Alan Tyson’s NMA volume of watermarks places the Peyerl canon on a type of paper Mozart purchased after his return from Prague in December 1787 and predominately used in 1788, including all pages of K550 and K551, Symphonies #40 and #41.A separate catalogue from 2006 mentions “Leck mich im Arsch” by name.Finally, here’s the song:TL;DRAmidst controversy over Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s “WAP” (or “wet ass pussy”), a viral tweet asserted Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart “wrote a song” for which the title translated to “Lick My Ass.” Although Mozart’s papers and unpublished works are believed to have been sanitized in the immediate aftermath of his death at the age of 35, letters and other writings indicated he was known to have written the occasional ribald or filthy song.As the Facebook poster noted, Mozart’s canon “Leck mich im Arsch” was more closely translated as “Lick me in the ass.” It was censored in or around 1799, but eventually located and added to his known works.Comments"
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25868
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Michael Schraa Says wearing masks has been “proven ineffective.”
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A growing body of evidence shows that wearing a mask, even a cloth mask, can reduce transmission of COVID-19 Schraa shared links to unreputable sources that found masks ineffective, while leading medical journals, federal and world health officials, research universities and President Donald Trump have said masks do work to cut down transmission
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false
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Public Health, Wisconsin, Coronavirus, Michael Schraa,
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"As coronavirus cases climb in Wisconsin, more and more face mask policies have been put into effect. Some apply to specific settings, such as stores or government-owned buildings, others more universally, such as in Dane County and the cities of Milwaukee and Green Bay. Indeed, on July 30, 2020, Gov. Tony Evers issued a statewide mask order. Most mask mandates have come with exceptions, such as for young children and people whose medical conditions may make it unsafe to wear one. Opponents argue mask mandates endanger personal freedoms, that wearing a mask can cause carbon dioxide poisoning (an idea that has been debunked by scientists) and that some types of face coverings won’t do anything to stop transmission of the coronavirus. State Rep. Michael Schraa, R-Oshkosh, voiced that theory in an interview with the Oshkosh Northwestern on July 24, 2020, after sharing links to sources on Facebook that suggest masks do not work as they are intended. His comments come as the city of Oshkosh weighs a mandate on masks in public spaces. ""If you think the government should be mandating us wearing masks that are proven ineffective just for the sake of giving a sense of security for people, what else are you going to agree to?"" Schraa told the Northwestern. Is Schraa correct when he claims that wearing masks has been ""proven ineffective""? No. Let’s take a look. When asked for backup, spokeswoman Linda Palmer said the comment was aimed at whether governments should be allowed to mandate masks, and that ""he did not make a direct statement that all masks are always totally ineffective."" But Schraa did say — here and in other forums — that he believed masks weren’t effective. In conversations on his Facebook page, he linked to articles stating that masks do not prevent transmission of viruses. It’s important to note that, at one point, federal health officials were not recommending that everyone wear masks, although the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention began advising widespread mask use in April and hasn’t changed its stance since. Critics often use that reversal to argue against the effectiveness of masks. But because this is a novel virus, the CDC, the medical community and everyday Americans alike are learning about it at the same time — and as more evidence emerged about how many asymptomatic people could be spreading the virus, guidance on who should wear masks shifted with it. (The CDC now estimates that 40% of infections could be among people who feel perfectly healthy.) If you’re not a health care worker, you’re likely wearing a cloth mask instead of an N95 respirator, which filters the large majority of airborne particles and thus protects the wearer and the people around them. The role of the cloth mask is largely that of source control — that is, to prevent you from transmitting the virus to others if you are infected. A growing body of evidence supports the idea that a cloth face covering will cut down on COVID-19 transmission. This includes: A review of 172 studies worldwide from the medical journal The Lancet found that face mask use could result in ""a large reduction"" in risk of infection A study of Mass General Brigham, the largest health care system in Massachusetts, found that rates of positivity among workers dropped after a universal mask policy was implemented Researchers at Texas A&M University compared trends in China, Italy and New York City and found that wearing a face mask reduced the number of infections by tens of thousands in Italy and New York A laboratory study that visualized droplets with laser lighting as people spoke found that the trajectory of the droplets nearly disappeared when the person wore a face covering A CDC study that found two Missouri hairdressers who wore masks while working with clients and diagnosed with COVID-19 shortly after did not pass the virus on to any of the clients who had been exposed What about the other way around? Do masks protect you from others? For cloth mask wearers, research is less clear on this front, but evidence is growing here, too. For example, a new paper led by a professor at the University of California, San Francisco and set to be published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine asserts that people wearing a mask will take in fewer coronavirus particles, making it easier for their immune systems to seek out and stamp out the ones that do get in. As evidence about masks reducing infections has grown, leaders who previously decried their use have now shifted their tone. In Texas, for example, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott instituted a statewide mask mandate as cases spiked after previously resisting such an order. Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, issued a similar mandate in July, after saying in May that a statewide order wouldn’t work. And President Donald Trump, another Republican, endorsed masks on July 21 after months of critiquing their use. The sources Schraa has linked to in online conversations about mask usage include stories from SOTT.net, which has landed on a list of sites found to be publishing misinformation about the coronavirus, and a video featuring an Infowars host on the website banned.video. The sources that back up claims of mask effectiveness, stem from large research universities, prominent labs and medical journals, and the CDC. In a critique of local governments’ ability to require people to wear masks, Schraa said that masks are ""proven ineffective"" at cutting down transmission of the coronavirus. But a growing number of studies — and a growing consensus among leaders, including President Trump — have shown the opposite to be true.
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24586
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"Pregnant women trying to buy health insurance on their own are barred from maternity coverage because they have a ""pre-existing condition."
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AMA president says pregnant women are barred from buying individual health policies
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true
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National, Health Care, J. James Rohack,
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"You've probably heard of ""pre-existing conditions,"" which provide an escape clause for health insurance companies. If you have a pre-existing condition, an insurance company typically won't pay for treatment. J. James Rohack, president of the American Medical Association, cited them when he was asked during an appearance on Fox News Sunday on Aug. 16, 2009, whether the Democratic health plan would lead to rationing for older patients. ""Well, there's a myth that rationing doesn't occur right now,"" Rohack said. ""In the United States, if a woman's pregnant and on the individual market (and) tries to get health insurance, that's called a pre-existing condition and it's not paid for. That's why this bill's important. It gets rid of some of the rationing that's occurring right now."" The AMA endorsed the House version of health care reform legislation in July. First, we should emphasize that he's only talking about the relatively small number of women who buy their coverage through what insurers call the individual market. About two-thirds of women have health insurance through their employer or their spouse's employer, and about 13 percent have public coverage such as Medicaid or military health care. So the people affected by these limitations include the 19 percent now uninsured and the 6 percent that have coverage purchased on the individual market. These policies are sold directly to an individual by a private insurer, and the purchaser doesn't get the same consumer protections routinely given to those who have coverage through an employer. For example, people in employer-based health plans have benefited from requirements for maternity coverage that date back to the federal Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978. But individual plans are not included under that umbrella and are regulated state by state. In 39 states, listed here , insurers can turn down anyone for virtually any reason. It can be because you have a pre-existing condition, like cancer or diabetes. And pregnancy almost always counts too, according to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, which represents the state government officials who regulate insurance sold within their borders. So if you're pregnant and living in one of these 39 states, you're very likely out of luck in securing individual health coverage. You'll have to pay for your care out of your own pocket or seek out charitable assistance. And the coverage isn't much better in the remaining 11 states. These states have ""guaranteed issue"" laws that say insurers cannot turn applicants down based on their health or risk status. But there's a caveat: Even if an insurer must offer you a plan, it can place exclusions on what the plan covers. Typically, the NAIC says, these exclusions last from six to 12 months, which rules out most or all maternity coverage. (After the exclusion expires, the insurer does have to cover those conditions, meaning that a subsequent pregnancy could be covered.) One category of individual policyholders has it slightly better ? those who leave an employer's plan that had given them uninterrupted coverage for the pre-existing condition in question. Under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, or HIPAA, people in this category can obtain a plan that covers their pre-existing condition once they have exhausted their old employer's coverage under the law known as COBRA. However, a state only has to provide a minimum of one ""HIPAA plan"" within its borders, rather than requiring that every insurer operating in the state offer one. Such plans may have unfavorable terms and high premiums. So back to Rohack's claim. Health care reform legislation now under consideration in Congress would, if enacted, improve the situation for pregnant women seeking health insurance by prohibiting restrictions based on pre-existing conditions. But for now, Rohack is correct that pregnancy is considered a pre-existing condition and prevents many women from getting coverage if they seek insurance on the individual market. We find his statement ."
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4968
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Big study casts doubt on need for many heart procedures.
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People with severe but stable heart disease from clogged arteries may have less chest pain if they get a procedure to improve blood flow rather than just giving medicines a chance to help, but it won’t cut their risk of having a heart attack or dying over the following few years, a big federally funded study found.
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true
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Heart disease, AP Top News, Health, General News, Philadelphia, Heart attack, U.S. News
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The results challenge medical dogma and call into question some of the most common practices in heart care. They are the strongest evidence yet that tens of thousands of costly stent procedures and bypass operations each year are unnecessary or premature for people with stable disease. That’s a different situation than a heart attack, when a procedure is needed right away to restore blood flow. For non-emergency cases, the study shows “there’s no need to rush” into invasive tests and procedures, said New York University’s Dr. Judith Hochman. There might even be harm: To doctors’ surprise, study participants who had a procedure were more likely to suffer a heart problem or die over the next year than those treated with medicines alone. Hochman co-led the study and gave results Saturday at an American Heart Association conference in Philadelphia. “This study clearly goes against what has been the common wisdom for the last 30, 40 years” and may lead to less testing and invasive treatment for such patients in the future, said Dr. Glenn Levine, a Baylor College of Medicine cardiologist with no role in the research. Some doctors still may quibble with the study, but it was very well done “and I think the results are extremely believable,” he said. About 17 million Americans have clogged arteries that crimp the heart’s blood supply, which can cause periodic chest pain. Cheap and generic aspirin, cholesterol-lowering drugs and blood pressure medicines are known to cut the risk of a heart attack for these folks, but many doctors also recommend a procedure to improve blood flow. That’s either a bypass — open-heart surgery to detour around blockages — or angioplasty, in which doctors push a tube through an artery to the clog, inflate a tiny balloon and place a stent, or mesh scaffold, to prop the artery open. Twelve years ago, a big study found that angioplasty was no better than medicines for preventing heart attacks and deaths in non-emergency heart patients, but many doctors balked at the results and quarreled with the methods. So the federal government spent $100 million for the new study, which is twice as large, spanned 37 countries and included people with more severe disease — a group most likely to benefit from stents or a bypass. All 5,179 participants had stress tests, usually done on a treadmill, that suggested blood flow was crimped. All were given lifestyle advice and medicines that improve heart health. Half also were given CT scans to rule out dangerous blockages, then continued on their medicines. The others were treated as many people with abnormal stress tests are now: They were taken to cardiac catheterization labs for angiograms. The procedure involves placing a tube into a major artery and using special dyes to image the heart’s blood vessels. Blockages were treated right away, with angioplasty in three-fourths of cases and a bypass in the rest. Doctors then tracked how many in each group suffered a heart attack, heart-related death, cardiac arrest or hospitalization for worsening chest pain or heart failure. After one year, 7% in the invasively treated group had one of those events versus 5% of those on medicines alone. At four years, the trend reversed — 13% of the procedures group and 15% of the medicines group had suffered a problem. Averaged across the entire study period, the rates were similar regardless of treatment. If stents and bypasses did not carry risks of their own, “I think the results would have shown an overall benefit” from them, said another study leader, Dr. David Maron of Stanford University. “But that’s not what we found. We found an early harm and later benefit, and they canceled each other out.” Why might medicines have proved just as effective at reducing risks? Bypasses and stents fix only a small area. Medicines affect all the arteries, including other spots that might be starting to clog, experts said. Drugs also have improved a lot in recent years. Having a procedure did prove better at reducing chest pain, though. Of those who had pain daily or weekly when they entered the study, half in the stent-or-bypass group were free of it within a year versus 20% of those on medicines alone. A placebo effect may have swayed these results — people who know they had a procedure tend to credit it with any improvement they perceive in symptoms. Dr. Alice Jacobs, a Boston University cardiologist who led a treatment-guidelines panel a few years ago, said any placebo effect fades with time, and people with a lot of chest pain that’s unrelieved by medicines still may want a procedure. “It’s intuitive that if you take the blockage away you’re going to do better, you’re going to feel better,” but the decision is up to the patient and doctor, she said. The bottom line: There’s no harm in trying medicines first, especially for people with no or little chest pain, doctors said. When told they have a problem that can be fixed with a stent, “the grand majority of patients in my experience will opt to undergo that procedure” to get improvement right away, said Dr. Jay Giri, a cardiologist at the University of Pennsylvania with no role in the study. Maryann Byrnes-Alvarado is not among them. The 66-year-old New York City woman said she joined the study six years ago after having trouble walking, which “scared me to death,” but so did the idea of a heart procedure. She was relieved when she was assigned to the medication treatment group. Her doctor altered her blood pressure medicine, added a cholesterol drug and aspirin, and adjusted her diet. Now her risk factor numbers are better and she can walk again without difficulty. “I believe I got the best care that I could get” and avoided an operation, she said. ___ Marilynn Marchione can be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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9136
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Prebiotics reduce body fat in overweight children
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This news release from the American Gastroenterological Association describes results of a clinical trial in 42 children with overweight or obesity and claims that a prebiotic powder that alters gut microbes can reduce body fat. It inappropriately claims that weight changes seen after four months will continue on the same trajectory for a full year, and only reports the weight differences that researchers predict will occur after a year — while omitting the actual results observed in the study after four months. That’s highly misleading. Prebiotics are non-digestible food ingredients, including fiber. The prebiotics used in the study were oligofructose-enriched inulin. The intervention may have slowed the acquisition of body fat in some children, but the release doesn’t tell us how that benefit is related to alterations in gut microbes or why it would reduce future risk factors in adulthood. The release acknowledges the need for a “larger clinical trial,” but the lede suggesting there may “soon” be a new tool in the fight against childhood obesity may be as far as some readers get. As the AGA release correctly points out, overweight in childhood tends to persist into adulthood and is an early risk factor for adult disease and death from obesity-related diseases. The study also is likely to be instantly newsworthy given the promise of an inexpensive dietary supplement that anyone can buy. The two quotes in the release — from an AGA advisory board member and one of the researchers, are appropriately cautious and a bit hyped, respectively. So the release could have been greatly strengthened if there had been more quantitative and qualitative information, and at least a nod to previous research and still unanswered questions about the safety, efficacy and use of prebiotic and probiotic products.
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false
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American Gastroenterological Association,childhood obesity,prebiotics
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The release notes only that prebiotic supplements are “inexpensive.” A search of Amazon reveals a number of products with the same ingredients, in a wide range of costs. To show a benefit, the release should have provided actual weight gain in each group, not the annual projected weight gain based on a 16-week study. According to the tables in the published study, both groups gained weight — as well as height. The treatment group gained 1.1 kg, and the placebo group gained 2.6 kg, a statistically significant finding. The release would have been improved also with some context on what is the expected healthy range of weight gain in children 7 to 12 years olds and how much supplemental prebiotic was used. A quote indirectly suggests that the prebiotics are “non-invasive” but that doesn’t tell us a lot. Bloating and gas are often at least a temporary problem. It would have been useful to know how well children in the study tolerated the supplement. And if the parents of children with obesity are not changing their diet (avoiding high fructose corn syrup, excessive prepared foods, and overfeeding), and letting the supplement do the work, that’s not teaching kids to eat healthily, which is an unintended consequence. The release tells us that the study enrolled 42 children with greater than the 85th percentile of body mass index and that the study lasted 16 weeks, with daily dosing, but there was much more to the study that could have been easily included. The amount of supplement given to each child is a key omission. We’d also like to see more description on what in their microbiomes shifted, how rigorously those shifts were measured and how those shifts are thought to directly affect weight. The release should have cautioned about the limitations of a short-term weight study. In most weight loss studies, initial rapid changes will gradually reverse with longer-term follow-up, and there’s no guarantee that weight in these children will follow the same trajectory observed after only 4 months. No disease mongering here; childhood obesity is widespread and a real threat to public health. The release would have benefited from inclusion of a note about the role of healthy diets, exercise and parent/child education in preventing childhood obesity as well as a caution that supplements may not be an antidote to poor adherence to a healthy lifestyle. Funding sources were listed. The release didn’t mention any other alternatives for reducing childhood obesity such as diets, exercise and nutrition education. We also aren’t told whether any of the volunteers engaged in any of these alternative strategies during the time of the study and, if so, what impact they might have had on the results. The release doesn’t address availability. The supplement used in the trial is from Germany and was not easy to find online, but as noted, similar products appear to be easily available. The release says this is the “first randomized controlled study to assess comprehensive changes” in gut microbial composition with prebiotics in overweight kids, but gives so little supporting information it’s hard to accept that claim. There have been other studies that cover at least some of the same territory in adults. PubMed contains a number of studies (including those in adults) relating to prebiotics, gut microbiomes and weight loss, including some showing no difference from placebo. The language is mostly justifiable. A quote from the researcher calling the results “fantastic” is a bit over-the-top.
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35327
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"On May 4, 2020, U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she wants the federal government's next economic relief bill during the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic to establish ""guaranteed minimum incomes"" for ""illegal aliens."
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"What's true: In spring 2020, Pelosi said she wanted federal leaders to consider ""guaranteed incomes"" to help Americans survive the COVID-19 economic crisis. One of the references was during a call with journalists to discuss ways for the federal government to boost aid for foreign-born people without Social Security numbers, which includes immigrants who don't have legal status. What's false: Pelosi did not say she wants the federal government to definitely implement ""guaranteed minimum incomes"" but rather that it should consider the option. Additionally, an aid to the House Speaker said Pelosi used the phrase ""guaranteed incomes"" to mean that workers should be guaranteed paychecks — not that the country should implement universal basic income."
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false
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Politics, COVID-19
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On May 4, 2020 — as federal leaders debated how to respond to an unprecedented interruption to the U.S. economy due to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic — a conservative provocateur tweeted that U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she wanted the country’s next economic relief package to establish “guaranteed minimum incomes” for “illegal aliens.” Suggesting that only legal U.S. residents should benefit from federal stimulus packages, Charlie Kirk — who’s the founder of the conservative political group Turning Point USA and social media ally of U.S. President Donald Trump — said in the tweet to his roughly 1.7 million followers: To investigate the validity of his claim, we examined Pelosi’s public statements and media appearances to determine if, or when, she used the phrased “guaranteed income” — and under what circumstances. While Kirk provides no explanation for where or when or to whom Pelosi made the remarks in the above-displayed tweet — aside from the tweet’s indication with the word “BREAKING” that the House Speaker had made the comments shortly before he composed the post — we considered statements by Pelosi since the beginning of the COVID-19 U.S. outbreak in early 2020 for our investigation. Within that timeframe, she used or referenced the phrase “guaranteed income” in three public statements, two of which were televised interviews. First, the House Speaker spoke the words on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” on April 24. In light of the federal government’s approval of the $2.2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act in March 2020 (and stimulus bills totaling about $500 billion since then), Maher asked Pelosi if the federal government could afford similar economic relief packages for Americans should the pandemic keep businesses closed and systems locked down in the coming months. She responded: I think that it should be clear that this (COVID-19 stimulus spending so far) is not doing the job that it is set out to do completely, that we may have to consider some other options. Others have proposed a sovereign fund – profits of which go to these unemployed people – or guaranteed income, other things that may not even be as costly as continuing down this path. She provided no further details on the so-called proposals for “guaranteed income,” which generally refers to a government-imposed system so that every citizen receives a minimum income — a central idea of the 2020 presidential campaign by former Democratic candidate Andrew Yang. Also in the conversation with Maher, Pelosi did not explicitly state that she wanted the system implemented via Congressional legislation. Three days later, however, the House Speaker again said the words “guaranteed income” in a televised interview, this time with more specificity on her openness to the social welfare system. In the April 27 segment of MSNBC‘s “Live with Stephanie Ruhle,” while explaining federal leaders’ next steps to help small businesses survive the financial crisis, Pelosi said: As we go forward, let’s see what works: what is operational and what needs other attention. Others have suggested a minimum income for — a guaranteed income for — people. Is that worthy of attention now? Perhaps so, because there are many more people than just in small business and hired by small business, as important as that is to the vitality of our economy. And other people who are not in the public sector, you know, meeting our needs in so many ways, that may need some assistance as well. Soon after she made the statement on live TV, news outlets including CBS News and CNBC published stories with headlines such as, “Pelosi says ‘guaranteed income’ for Americans is worth considering for coronavirus recovery.” In a story by Business Insider about the televised comments, an aid to Pelosi said the House Speaker was referring to proposals that would guarantee worker paychecks — not a sweeping system for universal basic income. Then, on May 1, the House Speaker and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus made themselves available to journalists via a conference call to discuss provisions within the CARES Act that exclude immigrants without Social Security numbers from receiving one-time stimulus checks. In the call, Pelosi expressed support for legislation that would guarantee COVID-19 economic relief to not only people with Social Security numbers but also immigrants and their families who use Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers (ITINs), which the IRS assigns to workers without Social Security numbers, to pay annual taxes. According to the IRS, the federal agency issues the numbers “regardless of immigration status, because both resident and nonresident aliens may have a U.S. filing or reporting requirement under the Internal Revenue Code.” In other words, some immigrants who use the identification numbers (ITINs) — not social security numbers — to pay taxes may be “undocumented.” According to a transcript of the May 1 call, at one point a reporter asked Pelosi: Pretty recently you said that Congress should consider adding some form of guaranteed monthly income into the next coronavirus relief package. So I was wondering if you would extend that form of guaranteed income to undocumented immigrants and non-citizens who file taxes with tax ID numbers, ITINs, instead of Social Security numbers? In her response, Pelosi reiterated that she thinks federal leaders should consider guaranteed income and that she would talk to chairs of House committees about exploring the idea further. Additionally, as they consider future economic benefits for Americans during the pandemic, she said: Any way we go down the path that [ITINs] should apply, whether it’s direct payments, whether it’s participation in PPP (the federal Paycheck Protection Plan loan program)… I said it [guaranteed income] should be considered. And, why it should be considered, in my view, is because there is a lot of money, federal taxpayer dollars, going out the door. Whether it’s PPP, whether it’s Unemployment Insurance, whether it’s direct payments …
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41007
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Cleveland Clinic developed a Covid-19 test that gives results in hours, not days.
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This is incorrect. The clinic announced that it is able to speed up Covid-19 testing after developing the ability to test on-site, but it had not developed a new test.
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true
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online
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Doctors in India have been successful in treating coronavirus with a combination of drugs (Lopinavir, Retonovir, Oseltamivir along with Chlorphenamine) and are going to suggest the same medicine globally. India’s ministry of health has advised that the anti-HIV drugs, Lopinavir and Retonovir, are used in some groups of Covid-19 patients. But it is unclear how successful this treatment has been. The other two drugs from the claim are not mentioned in their guidance. Researchers at the Erasmus Medical Center claim to have found an antibody against coronavirus. Researchers in the Netherlands have released research, which has not yet been peer-reviewed, on an antibody against the new coronavirus. A 103 year-old Chinese grandmother has made a full recovery from Covid-19 after being treated for 6 days in Wuhan, China This has been widely reported in the media. Apple has reopened all 42 China stores. Correct. On 13 March 2020, Apple announced that it had reopened all 42 stores in mainland China after a closure of almost six weeks. Cleveland Clinic developed a Covid-19 test that gives results in hours, not days. The number of new cases in South Korea is declining. Italy is hit hard, experts say, only because they have the oldest population in Europe. Whilst it is true that an older population has contributed to a high number of deaths in Italy, it may not be the sole reason. Scientists in Israel are likely to announce the development of a coronavirus vaccine. Scientists in Israel and elsewhere are working on developing a vaccination to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus, but it won’t be ready for the public for over a year. Three Maryland coronavirus patients fully recovered and are able to return to everyday life. Correct. On 13 March 2020, Montgomery County, Maryland confirmed that three residents who previously had the virus no longer tested positive. A network of Canadian scientists are making excellent progress in Covid-19 research. At least one group of Canadian scientists has recently announced some progress in understanding Covid-19. A San Diego biotech company is developing a Covid-19 vaccine in collaboration with Duke University and National University of Singapore. Tulsa County's first positive Covid-19 case has recovered. This individual has had two negative tests, which is the indicator of recovery. Correct, this patient has recovered according to official Tulsa County sources. Two negative tests is one of three official indicators of recovery among people with Covid-19 (who showed symptoms). All seven patients who were getting treated for Covid-19 at Safdarjung hospital in New Delhi have recovered. There is a news story reporting that seven patients in this hospital in New Delhi had recovered. However, these were not the only Covid-19 patients in the city. Plasma from newly recovered patients from Covid -19 can treat others infected by Covid-19. This is being used as a treatment in some countries, but clinical trials have not yet proved that this is effective. Claim 1 of 15
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7140
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Testing wearable sensors as ‘check engine’ light for health.
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A next step for smart watches and fitness trackers? Wearable gadgets gave a Stanford University professor an early warning that he was getting sick before he ever felt any symptoms of Lyme disease.
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true
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Technology, Health, AP Top News, Science, Stanford University
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Geneticist Michael Snyder never had Lyme’s characteristic bulls-eye rash. But a smart watch and other sensors charted changes in Snyder’s heart rate and oxygen levels during a family vacation. Eventually a fever struck that led to his diagnosis. Say “wearables,” and step-counting fitness trackers spring to mind. It’s not clear if they really make a difference in users’ health. Now Snyder’s team at Stanford is starting to find out, tracking the everyday lives of several dozen volunteers wearing devices that monitor more than mere activity. He envisions one day having wearables that act as a sort of “check engine” light indicating it’s time to see the doctor. “One way to look at this is, these are the equivalent of oral thermometers but you’re measuring yourself all the time,” said Snyder, senior author of a report released Thursday on the project. Among the earliest hints: Changes in people’s day-to-day physiology may flag when certain ailments are brewing, from colds to Lyme to Type 2 diabetes, researchers reported in the journal PLOS Biology. Interest in wearable sensors is growing along with efforts to personalize medicine, as scientists learn how to tailor treatments and preventive care to people’s genes, environment and lifestyle. The sensors are expected to be a part of the National Institutes of Health’s huge “precision medicine” study, planned to begin later this year. But a first step is learning what’s normal for different people under different conditions. The Stanford team is collecting reams of data — as many as 250,000 daily measurements — from volunteers who wear up to eight activity monitors or other sensors of varying sizes that measure heart rate, blood oxygen, skin temperature, sleep, calories expended, exercise and even exposure to radiation. That’s paired with occasional laboratory tests to measure blood chemistry and some genetic information. An initial finding: Blood oxygen levels decrease with rising altitudes during plane flights, in turn triggering fatigue. But toward the end of long flights, oxygen begins rising again, possibly as bodies adapt, the researchers reported. It was that phenomenon that alerted Snyder, the longest-tested participant, “that something wasn’t quite right” on one of his frequent long flights. Landing in Norway for a family vacation, Snyder noticed his oxygen levels didn’t return to normal like they always had before. Plus his heart rate was much higher than normal, which sometimes signals infection. Sure enough, soon a low-grade fever left him dragging. He feared Lyme because two weeks before going abroad, Snyder had helped his brother build a fence in a tick-infested rural area in Massachusetts. He persuaded a Norwegian doctor to prescribe the appropriate antibiotic, and post-vacation testing back home confirmed the diagnosis. Also during the study’s first two years, Snyder and several other volunteers had minor cold-like illnesses that began with higher-than-normal readings for heart rate and skin temperature — and correlated with blood tests showing inflammation was on the rise before any sniffling. In addition, the Stanford team detected variations in heart rate patterns that could tell the difference between study participants with what’s called insulin resistance — a risk factor for Type 2 diabetes — and healthy people. No, don’t try to self-diagnose with your fitness tracker any time soon. The findings in Thursday’s report are intriguing but the study is highly experimental, cautioned medical technology specialist Dr. Atul Butte of the University of California, San Francisco, who wasn’t involved with the research. “This kind of approach is going to help science more than the general public” until there’s better data about what’s normal or not, Butte said. “Remember, the baseline is always in motion. We’re always getting older. We’re always exposed to things. Just because there’s a deviation doesn’t mean it’s abnormal.”
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2760
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FDA proposes rule to prevent food contamination during transport.
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Food transportation companies will be required to adhere to certain sanitation standards to prevent food from becoming contaminated during transit under a new rule proposed by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
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true
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Health News
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The rule would require shippers and carriers to properly refrigerate food, clean vehicles between loads and protect food during transportation. The rule is the seventh and final plank of the 2011 Food Safety Modernization Act, a sweeping initiative designed to reduce food-borne illnesses by giving the FDA greater powers to intervene before an outbreak occurs. It would establish standards for vehicles and transportation equipment, transportation operations, information exchange, training and records. “This proposed rule will help reduce the likelihood of conditions during transportation that can lead to human or animal illness or injury,” said Michael Taylor, the FDA’s deputy commissioner for foods and veterinary medicine. Excluded from coverage will be shippers, receivers or carriers whose operations generate less than $500,000 in annual sales. The rule also excludes food that is fully packaged and stable, and live food animals and raw agricultural commodities transported by farms. The FDA proposes staggering the implementation of the rule based on the size of a business, ranging from one to two years after publication of the final rule. The proposed rule is open for public comment through May 31.
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11452
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Cognitive behavior therapy can help overcome fear of the dentist
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The release focuses on a paper published in the British Dental Journal that evaluated the effect of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) on patients with dental phobia or related fears concerning dentistry. The release reports that CBT allowed many patients with dental phobia to receive dental care without relying on sedation, and that CBT and sedation complement each other as ways of helping patients with dental phobia address their dental health needs. The release did a good job describing benefits but was very vague on what researchers meant by the term “sedation” and the types of procedures most feared by those with phobias. In addition, the release didn’t delve into any of the limitations of this study, which was essentially a case series — considered a very low level of evidence. A lot of research has been done on dental anxiety — and it’s very common. Most such studies find that at least 10 percent (and as many as 20 percent) of people have dental anxiety or dental phobia. These fears make people less likely to see a dentist, and put them at greater risk of oral health problems — which can, in turn, have significant impacts on an individual’s quality of life. (Anyone who has ever had a toothache will agree with us.) In short, identifying ways to help people deal with dental anxiety and phobias has the potential to improve the quality of life for a great many people. In addition, there have been many studies (reported in a meta-analysis and systematic review) that have demonstrated the usefulness of CBT in preventing the need for sedation in these patients. As sedation carries certain risks and does not address any underlying issues leading to dental phobia, CBT could be a positive alternative for many patients.
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mixture
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Academic medical center news release,mental health
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The release does not address cost at all. This is not entirely surprising, since the study was done in the United Kingdom, which has a universal health care system. However, the journal article on which the release is based does address cost, at least in terms of the cost to the health care system itself. The article says that the CBT sessions to address dental fears had “an average cost of £810 per patient.” (The cost in British pounds converts to about $1,212.) The article also says, “While initially expensive the evidence suggests that patients can then receive dental treatment without sedation thus potentially reducing long-term costs.” For patients in the United States, the cost would likely be significant — particularly since the researchers report that patients needed an average of five CBT sessions before being able to receive dental care without sedation (and it’s not clear whether health insurance would cover such sessions). The benefit here is the ability of a patient to receive dental care without sedation — which carries its own costs and health risks. The release states that 79% of patients who participated in the study “went on to have dental treatment without the need for sedation.” Only 6% of patients had treatment under sedation. The remaining 15% either dropped out of CBT or were removed from the study because they were identified as having other psychological problems that required treatment. Of the patients who completed the CBT (i.e., didn’t drop out and weren’t removed from the study), 93% went on to have dental treatment without sedation. The release does not address risks, but CBT carries few risks (if any). In addition, the release states that in this study, patients who needed additional therapy beyond CBT for mental health issues were referred for more assistance. The release does a relatively thorough job of describing the study itself — the number of patients (130), the degree of dental fear, the methods used to test and score dental phobia. etc. What’s missing in the release (but not in the published study results) is that the most common fear among patients with dental phobias are fear of dental injections and the dental drill. In addition, an important limitation to the research not mentioned in the release is that this was essentially a case series — a very low level of evidence. There was no comparison or control group, which would’ve made the findings more robust. And the study only looked at patients with dental fears who are willing to take advantage of CBT services. Do the results apply to the community of people with dental phobias so severe that they would not take part in a study that required them to follow-up with dental treatment? For severe phobias, avoidance is key. A final issue is that the patient outcomes were gathered post-therapy via patient questionnaires. Service evaluations are not as reliable as actual clinical trials. No disease mongering here. The release does not explicitly name the funding source for the research, only that the clinic where CBT was provided is run by the King’s College London Dental Institute Health Psychology Service at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust. The primary alternative to CBT is sedation, which the release addresses. But we expected the news release to go into more detail about the types of sedation and dental procedures the study authors were referring to. For example, prior to dental treatment — which can range from a basic cleaning or filling for a cavity, to more involved surgical procedures — patients might be given an anti-anxiety medication to make them more relaxed. In some cases, patients require intravenous sedation. Since the release doesn’t describe what the authors mean by sedation, it’s a very imprecise comparison. The release makes clear that CBT and sedation are both available to patients with dental fears in the U.K. The release would have been stronger if it had noted, as the journal article does, that: “Some barriers to the broader dissemination of CBT for people with dental phobia seem to remain, e.g. there is a lack of training and a skilled workforce to deliver the techniques.” This study is not the first to address CBT as a treatment for dental anxiety. A quick search identified related research dating back at least as far as 1992, and as recent as 2013. The release would have been stronger if it had explained how the new U.K. study fit into the broader body of work on this subject. The release is cautious in its use of language, and is very careful to acknowledge the limitations of CBT in addressing dental phobia. For example, the first sentence of the release states that CBT “could help many people with dental phobia.” It does not say that CBT will help or that it could help all people with dental phobia.
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25726
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“The fact is that in terms of the risk to schoolkids, this is lower risk than seasonal influenza.”
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COVID-related rates of hospitalization and death for children are lower than those of seasonal influenza. The risk of complications for healthy children is also higher for flu than for COVID-19, but infants and children with underlying medical conditions are at increased risk for both flu and COVID-19. Though the number of coronavirus cases among children has been relatively low, experts caution this could be because they have been at home and not in school. Experts also caution that children could be spreaders of the virus, and many unknowns remain.
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true
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Florida, Health Check, Coronavirus, Ron DeSantis,
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"Even as his state is a hotbed for COVID-19, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been pushing schools to reopen so parents have the choice of sending children back to the classroom or keeping them home to learn virtually. The Republican governor has said children without any underlying health conditions would benefit from in-person learning and the stimulation and companionship of being among other young people. He has also made clear that he thinks these benefits far outweigh what he considers to be minimal risks. ""The fact is, in terms of the risk to school kids, this is lower risk than seasonal influenza,"" DeSantis said, during an Aug. 10 televised roundtable discussion on education. DeSantis’ assertion got us wondering, so we asked the governor’s office what evidence it had to back up the claim. A spokesperson responded with data from the Florida Department of Health showing the state’s COVID-19 mortality rate is 0.02% for people 24 and younger. That’s the same as the influenza mortality rate for this age group. But for children 14 and younger, the spokesperson said, Florida’s COVID-19 mortality rate is 0.009%, far below the 0.01% for flu for that age group. And the risk of death is not the only concern children face if infected by the COVID-19 virus. They can develop complications that require hospitalization. ""The risk of complications for healthy children is higher for flu compared to COVID-19,"" according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. ""However, infants and children with underlying medical conditions are at increased risk for both flu and COVID-19."" The CDC estimates there were 480 deaths among U.S. children due to flu in the 2018-19 season, including 136 cases where the virus was confirmed by laboratory testing. As of mid-August, 90 children died of COVID-19 in the United States, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. More than 46,000 children were hospitalized for flu in that 2018-19 period. The hospitalization rate among children 5 to 17 was 39.2 children per 100,000 children. The hospitalization rate for COVID-19 is 6 per 100,000 children for those ages 5 to 17, according to the CDC. The number and rate of COVID cases in children in the United States steadily increased from March to July. ""The true incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection in children is not known due to lack of widespread testing and the prioritization of testing for adults and those with severe illness,"" the CDC wrote recently. While children have lower rates of using a ventilator than adults, 1 in 3 children hospitalized with COVID-19 in the United States were admitted to the intensive care unit, the same rate as for adults, the CDC said. Dr. Chad Vercio, chair of pediatrics at Riverside University Health System in California, said DeSantis’ statement is partly true, with many caveats. Children’s risk from COVID-19 ""entirely depends on how widespread COVID is in any area,"" he said. U.S. hospitalization rates for children with COVID are lower than for those with flu, Vercio said. But that could be due to parents keeping children home and schools being closed since March, he added. ""It is unknown if these COVID hospitalization rates would rise when we open schools,"" he said. About two-thirds of Florida school districts have opened in the past two weeks with the rest planning to resume by Aug. 31. Most districts are offering in person classes while giving parents the option to keep students home for virtual learning. In South Florida, where the pandemic has hit hardest, districts are planning to at least initially only offer virtual teaching. Hillsborough County, which includes Tampa, had initially planned to reopen classrooms but reversed itself after doctors warned that school closures were likely to ensue. The county revised its plan to limit classes to only online instruction, but the state’s Education Commissioner rejected that approach, saying it denies parents the option of sending their children back to school. Fearing loss of millions in state funding, the district now plans to begin virtual learning for all students on August 24; and, on August 31, begin offering students the option to return to the classroom. ""The direct impact of COVID-19 on children is currently small in comparison with other risks and that the main reason we are keeping children at home is to protect adults,"" concluded a report in the British Medical Journal published in June. Still, health authorities say parents should make sure children practice good hygiene and limit playtime with other children. Based on data from February through mid-May, the report found 44 deaths from COVID-19 for people 19 and younger in France, Germany, Italy, Korea, Spain, England and the United States. In a typical three-month period, there would be 308 deaths from lower respiratory tract infections, including flu, in those countries. ""At this stage of the pandemic, COVID appears to be less dangerous for children than influenza,"" said Sunil Bhopal, a co-author of the report and an academic clinical lecturer at Newcastle University in England. ""We don't need to wait for a whole season because, even at its peak in most countries, COVID killed a smaller number of children than estimated influenza deaths averaged from across a year,"" Bhopal said. ""While flu is likely to have caused more deaths than COVID, this may change as the pandemic progresses and major caution is necessary to ensure this doesn't change,"" said Bhopal, an honorary assistant professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Dr. Sean O’Leary, professor of pediatrics at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, said the growing number of U.S. deaths could be another reason to think about COVID-19 and children. ""We do know for sure that schoolchildren are major drivers of influenza epidemics in the community and, though that is not as much the case with COVID, it doesn’t mean they can’t spread it,"" he said. DeSantis also maintained that kids are less likely to spread COVID-19 than they are the influenza virus. However, experts cautioned that there’s still a lot that is unknown about children’s ability to transmit the virus to the people they interact with — parents, grandparents and even their teachers. The perceived risk for teachers, for instance, is at the root of a lawsuit between the state’s largest teacher’s union and the DeSantis administration. The Florida Education Association wants a Leon County judge to stop the state’s order forcing school districts to open classrooms for in-person learning by the end of August. Dr. Gabriela Andujar Vazquez, an infectious disease specialist at Tufts Medical Center in Boston, said children are more likely to have zero or mild symptoms from COVID-19 compared with adults. ""The bottom line is kids can get infected and they tend to have less severe disease,"" she said. But the concern over reopening school is that children could spread the disease to others, including adults who are more likely to develop complications. ""Because schools are tied to the community — they are not in a bubble — and if community spread is not controlled in the community, it’s likely the school will reflect that,"" she said. One factor that can determine if disease is out of control is if positivity rates for people getting tested for COVID are over 5%. Many Florida counties have been well above that mark since June, although the rates have been dropping this month. Back-to-school risks will be handicapped based on the ability of the school to adopt physical distancing measures and enforce wearing of face masks, said Dr. Andrew Pavia, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at the University of Utah Health and Intermountain Primary Children’s Hospital. ""This fall, we may see a lot of kids get infected as schools reopen, and those could be just the tip of the iceberg,"" he said. ""Even though most kids have mild or asymptomatic cases, what I worry about is just how big is the tip of the iceberg,"" Pavia said. He also noted there is a vaccine for flu — which about 50% to 70% of children receive. ""The vaccine is not perfect but does reduce the impact of the disease, and with COVID everyone is at risk and susceptible,"" Pavia said. Dr. Vidya Mony, an infectious disease expert with Santa Clara Valley Medical Center in San Jose, California, said data suggests COVID-19 is not as bad for children as flu and that children are not the main driver of the pandemic. But, she said, there isn’t enough data yet to say indisputably that the COVID-19 risk is lower. ""We are learning something every day with this."" DeSantis said that COVID-19 is a lower risk for schoolchildren than is seasonal influenza. Studies show the number of COVID-related deaths and hospitalizations among children is lower than flu averages. Still, it’s uncertain if these lower rates among children were partly because schools were closed since March and whether those rates will rise as classrooms reopen this fall. It’s also unclear whether opening schools — particularly in communities with a high number of people testing positive — will lead to more spread of the disease."
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4420
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Utah biologists work to save boreal toads from extinction.
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Biologists in Utah are working to save native boreal toads from extinction in the face of the destruction of its habitat by humans and competition from invasive species like bullfrogs.
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true
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Frogs, Utah, Amphibians, Environment, Science, Invasive species, Ogden
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Boreal toads are tough to track. They blend in well with their environment, they’re mostly active at night and they’re not vocal. The only sound they make is a little squeak males use to keep other males away, the Standard-Examiner reports (http://bit.ly/2w9ECNj ). That makes it hard for biologists to pin down how many toads live in Utah — but their yearly surveys indicate populations have taken a massive hit. “It’s clear they are declining,” said Kayleigh Mullen, citizen science biologist with Utah’s Hogle Zoo. “That decline is widespread. It’s happening here. Something has to be done.” Part of the problem causing amphibian declines, including boreal toads, is a fungus-caused disease — chytridiomycosis, or “chytrid.” It thickens amphibians’ skin so they can’t absorb water or nutrients, and they dry out and die. The toads’ biggest challenge, however, comes from people. “The number one most common threat is simple habitat destruction,” said Jenny Loda, reptile and amphibian staff attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. In the southern Rocky Mountain region, which includes Utah, the center estimates boreal toads have been reduced to one percent of their historic breeding range. The animals require a unique blend of habitat to thrive — ponds with sloping bottoms so they can lay eggs in the shallows, land vegetation to hide from predators, and burrows to hibernate. Grazing and recreation are altering that habitat in big ways. In south-central Utah, state biologists found a handful of boreal toads for the first time in years. They had deposited eggs in a water-filled tire rut. Elsewhere in the state, invasive, water-sucking plant species have moved in. Humans have brought several other species to the West that are wreaking havoc for the boreal toad as well, including bullfrogs. Bullfrogs are also more resistant to chytrid, but they carry the disease and spread it to native populations. Then there are water diversions and human-caused climate change that have drastically altered the wet environments where toads thrive. Still, toads in Utah’s northern regions are doing better than populations elsewhere in the state. “We’re starting to see some stability with our populations,” said Cody Edwards, native aquatics biologist for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources Northern Region. “They’re not growing, but they’ve declined and now they’re somewhat holding at where their lower numbers are at.” One population in the Grouse Creek Range seems to be adapting to its environmental demands. Those boreal toads are breeding at human-made ponds for livestock, around 2,000 feet below their normal elevation range. Some biologists theorize the Grouse Creek toads might be fighting off chytrid, too, because they’re in a hotter and drier climate than most boreal toad populations. While much of the boreal toad’s life cycle and habits remain a mystery, scientists are getting a better sense of their movements through tagging and monitoring efforts like those DWR has done. And those efforts were largely fueled by efforts to keep the toads off the endangered species list. Environmental groups like the Center for Biological Diversity have long-fought for an endangered species listing since the 1990s. After reaching a settlement, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will likely issue a listing decision on the boreal toad by the end of September.
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26715
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Blogger Says Nancy Pelosi delayed coronavirus funding so “Dems could campaign on it.”
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President Donald Trump signed an $8.3 billion emergency spending bill to address the coronavirus on March 6. The bill was held up as both Republicans and Democrats negotiated over controlling the cost of vaccines and treatments. There is no evidence House Speaker Nancy Pelosi delayed the bill solely to run political ads.
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false
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Congress, Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Bloggers,
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"On March 6, 2020, President Donald Trump signed an $8.3 billion spending package to combat the spread of the novel coronavirus. The package sailed through the House and Senate with bipartisan support, but not without some partisan sniping. Some stories — like this one — are going around claiming Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi delayed the bill in order to use the crisis as a political weapon against Republicans. The claim surfaced as Republicans and Democrats were still negotiating details of the spending package, such as where the money would come from and provisions on treatment costs. The story was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) The article cites a recent report by conservative website Red State. That report, based on comments made by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., says Pelosi held up the bill so that the campaign arm of House Democrats could run ads against Republicans on Super Tuesday about their lack of action regarding the virus. In a March 2 interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham, McCarthy claimed Pelosi ""withheld the bill last week. You know why? So the DCCC could run ads against seven Republicans."" He repeated the statement in a press conference the following day. It’s true that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the official campaign arm of House Democrats, released ads related to the coronavirus in seven Republican districts. But when McCarthy made the comments, he and other Republicans were participating in negotiations about the package. There is no indication that Pelosi deliberately held up the bill for the sake of the ad campaign. The DCCC announced on March 2 that the ads would run on Facebook in seven Republican congressional districts to call on their representatives to ""stand up"" to the Trump administration for an affordable coronavirus vaccine. The ads target comments made by Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar, who said during a hearing that the administration ""can’t control that price because we need the private sector."" ""The Trump administration would rather pad the pockets of drug manufacturers than provide access to an affordable coronavirus vaccine,"" the ads say. The clip ends with the Republican representative’s name, asking if they agree. Reports indicate the bill stalled because of Democrats’ attempts to limit the cost of vaccines and other treatments that are developed in response to the outbreak. Pelosi has been consistent about those provisions in multiple statements. In a joint statement on Feb. 27, Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said that any package Congress approves must be ""entirely new funding — not stolen from other accounts"" and must include provisions ensuring that: ""The president cannot transfer these new funds to anything other than the coronavirus and fighting infectious diseases; vaccines are affordable and available to all the need it; interest-free loans are made available for small businesses impacted by the outbreak; and state and local governments are reimbursed for costs incurred while assisting the federal response to the coronavirus outbreak."" Pelosi called for the same provisions in another statement on Feb. 29, after the first coronavirus-related death was reported in the U.S. The Democrats’ requests did make it into the final bill. Drew Hammill, Pelosi’s deputy chief of staff, pointed us to a response he made to McCarthy on Twitter, in which he called the accusation ""disgusting and false."" ""[email protected], call your office. The bipartisan negotiations on the coronavirus funding supplemental are still underway. Your staff have been participating in those talks. This is a disgusting and false accusation."" . @GOPLeader, call your office. The bipartisan negotiations on the coronavirus funding supplemental are still underway. Your staff have been participating in those talks. This is a disgusting and false accusation. https://t.co/F9tvdk2XPo ""It was a particularly outrageous statement,"" Hammill added in an email, ""because McCarthy’s own staff was participating in ongoing negotiations that had not concluded when he said this."" We reached out to McCarthy’s office for a response but did not hear back in time of publication. The bill, which dwarfed the $2.5 billion in funding that the Trump administration initially proposed, was introduced in the House on March 4 and swiftly passed that day, 415-2. The two nays were from Republican Reps. Andy Biggs of Arizona and Ken Buck of Colorado. It passed the Senate the following day, with only Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., voting against it. The funding includes more than $3 billion for research and vaccine development and $2.2 billion for prevention, preparedness and response efforts. It also allocates $1 billion for state and local response. Stories claim Pelosi held up coronavirus emergency funds so that Democrats could campaign on the issue. During negotiations with Republicans on the funding package, Pelosi pushed for language on how the aid would be paid for and on the cost of treatments. Meanwhile, the House Democrats’ campaign arm ran ads targeting a Trump administration official’s comments about vaccine costs. The stories make unsupported claims about Pelosi’s motives and omit the role Republicans played in the bill’s negotiations."
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28980
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Fisherman on Réunion Island employ live dogs as bait for shark-fishing.
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Are fisherman on Réunion Island employing live dogs as bait for shark-fishing?
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mixture
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Critter Country, Crusader Habit, dogs, sharks
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Examples: [Hepburn, 2005] Stray dogs are being skewered on hooks and dragged behind boats as live shark bait. The cruel practice takes place on French-controlled Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean, where Prince William spent two holidays. A six-month-old labrador pup was recently found ALIVE with a huge double hook through its snout — like the dog above — and another through a leg. The pup was found in a coastal creek and is thought to have somehow freed itself from a fishing line. But other dogs and kittens have been chomped up and swallowed by sharks. The RSPCA plans to petition the French government, demanding an end to the hideous torture. [Collected on the Internet, September 2012] PETITION: Please help stop French Islander and Mexican fishermen using live dogs and kittens as shark bait To: The French and Mexican Governments We have to stop this PLEASE help! French Islanders using live puppies and kittens as shark bait?? Please stop this senseless abuse to innocent puppies and kittens. French Islander and Mexican fishermen are using LIVE puppies and kittens as shark bait!! No living being should have to undergo this torture and insurmountable fear! This is inhumane and must stop NOW. Together we can make a difference and let our voice be heard as ONE. Please sign this petition and please pass this along. Thank you for caring. Blessed be Currently the penalty is only 2 years and $36,000 that is far too little for such a heinous crime. We urge that you raise the penalty to 10 years in prison with NO parole and a fine of $100,000. This will hopefully act as a deterrent and will stop these horrendous acts against innocent animals. Please do the right thing and help us stop these people. Islanders on the French controlled Reunion Island have been using live dogs as shark bait. The Sun claims that “a six-month-old labrador pup was recently found alive with a huge double hook through its snout – like the dog above – and another through a leg.” It is also claimed that local fisherman have also been using kittens! Reunion Island is an overseas départements of France and an official region of France, giving it the same status as a province or state in other countries. The claim that live dogs (and cats) were being used as bait by shark fisherman on Réunion Island (a French-controlled territory just off the coast of Southern Africa in the Indian Ocean, east of Madagascar) started hitting the world press in August 2005 and picked up steam in early October 2005, when it was reported by publications such as the UK’s Sun (an excerpt from which is quoted at the head of this page) and Sweden’s Aftonbladet, complete with a heart-rending picture of a purported “bait dog” with a large hook through its muzzle. Animal rights groups such as the RSPCA have taken up the cause of putting a stop to the horrible practice. Many observers remain skeptical of such claims, however, positing theories that range from media and animal rights groups having been taken in by a hoax to a deliberate disinformation campaign being waged by activists who seek to end the slaughter of sharks for their fins and cartilage by Indian Ocean fisherman. Arguments have flown back and forth over the practicality and plausibility (or lack thereof) of Réunion Islanders fishing for sharks in the manner described. A 2006 Réunion newspaper article acknowledged the practice and reported the recent prosecution of a deliveryman (and amateur fisherman) on that island over animal cruelty charges associated with the described activity, suggesting that although there may be some truth to the shark-fishing claim, the practice does not appear to be as widespread or horrific (or tolerated) as implied by news reports in the foreign press. Rather than describing hordes of shark fisherman impaling live dogs on hooks and dragging them behind boats as shark bait, the article noted that employing dogs in shark-fishing was largely the province of a small group of amateur fisherman rather than large numbers of professionals, that the dogs used were generally dead animals picked up from roadsides or culled from the island’s large population of unwanted strays (estimated at 150,000), and that the no-longer-alive animals were attached to unattended buoyed “shark trap” platforms rather than dragged alive behind boats. The French embassy in Washington, D.C., also maintained that although the practice was not unknown, its occurrence and acceptance was not nearly as prevalent as recent news reports had made it seem: Dear Sir/Madam,Thank you for writing to us with your concerns. We too denounce the barbaric practices you refer to. Such acts are obviously illegal and will not be tolerated on French territory. But while we share your revulsion, we would like to emphasize that the practice of using live dogs or cats as shark bait is in fact exceptional and isolated. It was never widespread nor traditional, but introduced by ruthless individuals, and has been strictly banned for decades now. TV reports that raised initial indignation when they were aired in France and abroad in 2005 were filmed locally in 2003 following the discovery of a mutilated dog. The last few months have seen two identical events which received heavy media coverage (one of these events was soon determined to be a false alarm). But can these vile occurrences lead us to conclude that there is an ongoing tradition of barbarism on Reunion Island? Reunion Island, a French territory and a European region, obeys the laws and regulations of the French Republic and the European Union. It respects the rule of law and does not practice inhumane ancestral practices. The facts that elicited your complaint are the act of a few isolated, irresponsible parties who are being sought by the police and will be brought to justice. The authorities on the island are closely monitoring the situation; one person is in custody and appeared in court on Friday September 30, 2005. All suspicions of such acts will be investigated, and animal protection organizations that have any specific information on these matters are strongly encouraged to inform French police authorities. The French minister for agriculture and fisheries, Dominique Bussereau, is fully aware of the media and public outcry regarding this issue, and has written to the French National Assembly to emphasize that several measures have been taken to strengthen already existing laws. Veterinarians have been directed to immediately report any suspicious wounds to authorities, and the police will increase their inspections of fishing and pleasure vessels. Meanwhile, a sterilization campaign, launched in 2001 to reduce the number of stray dogs and cats on the island, continues. Animal rights are an important issue in France: over half of French households have at least one pet, and France has some of the world’s most stringent animal rights legislation. French law provides for the prosecution of those who are cruel to animals. Voluntary cruelty to animals is punishable by a sentence of two years in prison and a 30,000 euro fine (equivalent to about $36,000). Sincerely, Press Office. Cordialement / Regards Service de Presse et d’Information / Press & Information Service Ambassade de France / Embassy of France Washington, D.C. The photo displayed at the top of this page, which has adorned several news articles and humane society-related web pages on this topic, is a frame from a 2005 video produced by the 30 Million Friends Foundation. The video purportedly documents the case of a dog that had escaped from fishermen who planned to use it as shark bait; skeptics have questioned the authenticity of the video, maintaining that it merely shows the aftermath of an accidental entanglement that has been mistakenly or deceptively misused for publicity’s sake. A similar video purporting to document the practice using kittens as shark bait appears to be a hoax, intercutting shots of kittens’ being dunked in water and dangled from wires with unrelated footage of ocean fishing activity:
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4606
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Health paradox: New US diabetes cases fall as obesity rises.
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The number of new diabetes cases among U.S. adults keeps falling, even as obesity rates climb, and health officials aren’t sure why.
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true
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AP Top News, Health, North America, Obesity, U.S. News, Diabetes
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New federal data released Tuesday found the number of new diabetes diagnoses fell to about 1.3 million in 2017, down from 1.7 million in 2009. Earlier research had spotted a decline, and the new report shows it’s been going on for close to a decade. But health officials are not celebrating. “The bottom line is we don’t know for sure what’s driving these trends,” said the lead author of the new report, Dr. Stephen Benoit of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Among the possibilities: Changes in testing and getting people to improve their health before becoming diabetic. The report was published by the journal BMJ Open Diabetes Research & Care. The statistics run through 2017. Last year’s numbers are not yet available, Benoit said. Diabetes is a disease in which sugar builds up in the blood. The most common form is tied to obesity, and the number of diabetics ballooned as U.S. obesity rates increased. But other factors also might have pushed up annual diabetes diagnoses from 2000 to 2010, and they may partly explain why the numbers have been going down since, some experts said. First, the diagnostic threshold was lowered in the late 1990s. That caused more people to be counted as diabetics, but the impact of that may have played out. “We might have mined out a lot of the previously unrecognized cases” and so new diagnoses in the last several years are more likely to be actual new illnesses, said Dr. John Buse, a University of North Carolina diabetes expert. Meanwhile, doctors have increasingly used a newer blood test to diagnoses diabetes. It’s much easier than tests that required patients to fast for 12 hours or to undergo repeated blood draws over two hours. The American Diabetes Association recommended the new test, known as the hemoglobin A1C blood test, for routine screening in 2010. Because it’s easier to do, it would be expected to lead to more diagnoses. But some experts say it may miss a large proportion of early cases in which people aren’t showing symptoms. “You may be missing people that would have been diagnosed” with older tests, Benoit said. Another possibility: Increasingly, more doctors have been diagnosing “prediabetes,” a health condition in which blood sugar levels are high but not high enough to hit the diabetes threshold. Physicians typically push such patients into exercise programs and urge them to change their diet. “Prediabetes is becoming a more accepted diagnosis” and may be causing an increasing number of patients to improve their health before becoming diabetic, said Dr. Tannaz Moin, a UCLA expert. The new report is based on a large national survey conducted by the government every year. Participants were asked if they had been diagnosed with diabetes, and also if the diagnosis was made in the previous year. It found the rate of new diabetes cases fell to 6 per 1,000 U.S. adults in 2017, from 9.2 per 1,000 in 2009. That’s a 35 percent drop, and marks the longest decline since the government started tracking the statistic nearly 40 years ago, according to the CDC. The decrease was mainly seen among white adults, the researchers said. Meanwhile, the overall estimate of how many Americans have diabetes — whether the diagnosis is recent or not — has been holding steady at 80 per 1,000 U.S. adults. That translates to about 21 million Americans. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content. ___ This story has been corrected to show that the new report didn’t find that diabetes has become more common among young adults and people who are black and Hispanic.
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7081
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Brazilian scientists ID common mosquito as a Zika source.
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Brazilian researchers said Thursday that they have found that another species of mosquito is able to transmit the Zika virus to humans.
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true
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Brazil, Rio de Janeiro, Health, Latin America, Zika virus, Science, Recife
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Fiocruz institute said that additional studies will be needed to determine what role the widespread Culex quinquefasciatus mosquito has played in the Zika epidemic. The research was done at Recife, a city in the Zika epicenter of northeastern Brazil where the Culex is 20 times more common than the Aedes aegypti mosquito. The researchers collected hundreds of the Culex from the city and found Zika in some. The Aedes aegypti has been seen as the main spreader of Zika. Most of Brazil’s anti-Zika initiatives are aimed at that bug, which also transmits dengue fever and Chikungunya. A related mosquito, Aedes albopictus, has also been found to be capable of spreading Zika. But health officials say it has not been a significant source of Zika transmission. The latest finding could complicate efforts to limit the Zika epidemic. However, Fiocruz chairman Paulo Gadelha said he is still cautious about the findings since another study of Zika virus presence in Culex mosquitoes made in Rio de Janeiro has not indicated contamination so far. One of the possible reasons why is that Culex mosquitoes in Recife may have a genetic variation that makes them different from those in Rio or elsewhere, the institute said. Other studies have suggested Culex may not be good at spreading Zika. Zika has been identified as a cause of severe brain-related birth defects. It has spread rapidly in Brazil and other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. Culex quinquefasciatus is a medium-sized brown insect. It is found in the southern United States, where it is commonly known as the southern house mosquito. U.S. health officials say it has been found to transmit West Nile virus and St. Louis encephalitis virus. Fiocruz researcher Constanca Ayres said at a news conference in Rio that the new study was the first to find evidence of Zika virus in Culex mosquitoes collected outdoors. Ayres explained that almost 500 those collected mosquitoes, 85 percent being Culex, were fed with a mixture of blood and virus, which allowed researchers to follow the replication of the virus in the insect. The mosquitoes were then split into 80 pools with one to 10 mosquitoes, according to the regions where they were collected. Three of those pools ended up showing contamination by the Zika virus, Ayres said. More research will be needed to understand the impact of Culex in the spread of the virus, Ayres said. ___ Associated Press writer Mauricio Savarese reported this story in Rio de Janeiro and AP Medical Writer Mike Stobbe reported from New York.
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2736
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New China bird flu a reminder of mutant virus risk.
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The death of a woman in China from a strain of bird flu previously unknown in humans is a reminder of the ever-present potential pandemic threat from mutating animal viruses, scientists said on Wednesday.
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true
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Health News
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The new strain, called H10N8, has so far infected only two people - a fatal case in a 73-year-old and another in a woman who is critically ill in hospital. But the fact it has jumped from birds to humans is an important warning, they said. “We should always be worried when viruses cross the species barrier from birds or animals to humans, as it is very unlikely that we will have prior immunity to protect us,” said Jeremy Farrar, director of Wellcome Trust and an expert on flu. “We should be especially worried when those viruses show characteristics that suggest they have the capacity to replicate easily or to be virulent or resistant to drugs. This virus ticks several of these boxes and therefore is a cause for concern.” Chinese authorities last week confirmed a second human case of H10N8 which was reported for the first known time in humans in December 2013. It has emerged as another new and often fatal strain of bird flu, called H7N9, has infected at least 286 people in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong, killing around 60 of them. Chinese scientists writing in The Lancet medical journal who conducted a genetic analysis on samples of the H10N8 virus from the woman who died said it was a new genetic reassortment of other strains of bird flu viruses, including one called H9N2 that is relatively well known in poultry in China. Somewhat worryingly, the virus - like H7N9 - has also evolved “some genetic characteristics that may allow it to replicate efficiently in humans”, said Yuelong Shu of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Beijing. According to the scientists’ study of her case, the 73-year-old victim, from Nanchang City in eastern China, was admitted to hospital with fever and severe pneumonia on November 30, 2013. Despite being treated with antibiotic and antivirals, she deteriorated rapidly, developed multiple organ failure and died nine days after her symptoms first started. Investigations found the woman had been at a live poultry market a few days before becoming infected. But no H10N8 virus was found in samples collected from the market, the scientists said, so the source of the infection remains unknown. Mingbin Liu from Nanchang City Center for Disease Control and Prevention added that the emergence of a second human case of H10N8 in a 55-year-old woman “is of great concern because it reveals that the H10N8 virus has continued to circulate and may cause more human infections in future”. John McCauley, head of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Influenza at Britain’s National Institute for Medical Research said the emergence of H10N8, and of H7N9 “reminds us to be aware of human infections from animal influenza viruses. “Previously we did not think that H7N9 infections might be so lethal. Now we also must consider H10N8 infections as well,” he said in an emailed comment. He added, however, that the risk of this virus spreading from person to person “seems low since the H10N8 virus is not expected to be transmitted well between humans”. Other flu experts not directly involved in the study on H10N8 agreed it was an important reminder of the potential threat from circulating and mutating flu viruses, but said it did not appear to be a particular concern for the moment. Ben Neuman, a virologist at Britain’s University of Reading said while the fatal H10N8 case was a “personal tragedy for the family and friends of the victim” and needed to be watched closely, “there is no cause for alarm at this time”.
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31517
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A stuntman was killed during the filming of the chariot race scene in the 1959 version of 'Ben-Hur' and that his death was left in the final cut.
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Rumor holds that a stuntman was killed during the filming of the chariot race scene in the 1959 version of 'Ben-Hur,' and that his death was left in the movie's final cut.
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false
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Entertainment, ben-hur, Films, Movies
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It is frequently claimed that a stuntman was killed during the filming of the chariot scene in the 1959 epic Ben-Hur (from MGM, directed by William Wyler). Versions of the rumor include Wyler’s leaving the fatal accident in the final cut (against the wishes of the stuntman’s widow), yet no published discussions of the film mention the accident, and Charlton Heston’s 1995 autobiography In the Arena specifically states that no one was seriously injured during the filming of the scene. The Internet Movie Database labels as false the rumor that the stunt double for Stephen Boyd (the villain Mesalla) was killed during the chariot race. This rumor has been attached to practically every human injury faked by stuntmen for the race scenes. (See the end of this article for a listing and analysis of the individual stunts.) In John Baxter’s Stunt: The Story of the Great Movie Stunt Men (1974), much is made of the care that went into the filming of this climactic race. The scene was managed by veteran stuntman Yakima Canutt, who included his two sons in the stunt team. Joe Canutt, doubling for Heston, received the only injury when he was flipped out of chariot, catching himself on the center hitching rail before pulling himself back in place. His only injury was a gash on his chin requiring four stitches. The scene was used in the final print. But there was an earlier, silent version of Ben Hur, also produced by MGM and released in 1926 (this date varies with sources). Kevin Brownlow gives a thorough discussion of the trials and tribulations involved in the seemingly jinxed 1925 production in The Parade’s Gone By… (1969). The intention was to shoot the chariot race in a recreation of the Circus Maximus on location in Rome. The second-unit director in charge of the chariot race was B. Reeves “Breezy” Eason, known for his genius with action scenes involving horses. He was also known for being ruthless. Vets were seldom consulted: if a horse limped, they shot it. Some suggested he was not much more caring with stuntmen. The set in Rome proved to be unsuitable due to problems with shadows and the racetrack surface. Francis X. Bushman (Mesalla) relates the following: “During one take, we went around the curve and the wheel broke on the other fellow’s chariot. The hub hit the ground and the guy shot up in the air about thirty feet. I turned and saw him up there — it was like a slow-motion film. He fell on a pile of lumber and died of internal injuries.” It was decided to give up the Rome location. Another set was built in Culver City and filled with both extras and the Hollywood elite on a festive Saturday in October. To ensure a good race, Eason offered a bonus to the winning driver. One spectacular unplanned pile-up was left in the final cut, 42 cameras were used that day, and a total of 50,000 feet of film was shot. The final, choreographed pile-up, in which Mesalla meets his end, was shot later at the cost of five horses. No human was seriously injured in the U.S. filming. Most film histories concentrate on this fact, and neglect the death in Rome. Another impressive and controversial scene in the 1926 version is the sea battle. Filmed at Livorno, Italy, it used hundreds of local extras, many of whom apparently lied about being able to swim. Friction was evident between the fascist and anti-fascist camps of the Italian cast. According to Brownlow, director Fred Niblo found a pile of sharpened swords on the deck of the pirate flagship — apparently the man casting the extras had separated the crews along political lines in hopes of getting a real naval engagement. During filming, the staged fire on one of the triremes got out of control, sending armor-clad extras overboard. Whether any died is debatable. Bosely Crowther (The Lion’s Share, 1957) reports that no one died, although three men dressed as Roman soldiers showed up after being missing for three days. Others maintained that some deaths did occur but were covered-up by the studio. Brownlow again quotes Bushman as saying to Niblo, “My God, Fred, they’re drowning, I tell you!” as they watched the catastrophe. Niblo supposedly answered, “I can’t help it, those ships cost me $40,000 apiece.” Baxter accuses Crowther of falsifying the bloodier facts of Ben-Hur. The problems associated with the 1926 version and rumors of cover-ups prompted similar rumors in the press regarding the later film. Andrew Marton, director of the chariot scene in the 1959 version, exploded at a press conference, telling reporters that 20 men and 100 horses had died while filming the race, adding “That’s what you want to hear, isn’t it?” This outburst apparently help feed the gossip. The early days of the film industry was particularly hard on stunt people. Baxter lists 55 deaths, mostly stunt people, as occurring in California film productions during the years 1925-30. Most of these deaths were hushed up. Although later years saw fewer deaths, and less secrecy, the legacy of studio spin-doctors and confusion between the two movies helped create a movie legend. The following is a chronological listing of the stunts in the chariot race scene of the 1959 version of Ben-Hur:
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22445
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Carol Alvarado Says women who need a sonogram in the eighth to 10th week of pregnancy have to get a transvaginal sonogram.
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State Rep. Carol Alvarado says women who are eight to 10 weeks pregnant and need a sonogram require a transvaginal one
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true
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Abortion, Health Care, Women, Texas, Carol Alvarado,
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"In a Texas House debate March 2, Democratic state Rep. Carol Alvarado of Houston pressed the author of a proposal requiring women seeking an abortion to get a sonogram on whether he was aware that a sonogram is intrusive early in a woman’s pregnancy. ""There are two different kinds of sonograms,"" she said. ""The abdominal, which I think most of our colleagues may think ‘jelly on the belly’ that would be done there, but that’s not the case. A woman that is eight to 10 weeks pregnant would have to go (to get) a transvaginal sonogram."" House Bill 15, which cleared the House March 7, requires women getting an abortion to first allow a medical professional to perform a sonogram, ""display the live, real-time obstetric sonogram images in a quality consistent with current medical practice in a manner that the pregnant women may view them"" and ""make audible the live, real-time"" heart beat. The Senate approved a different version of the proposal in February. We decided to check at what stage in their pregnancy women who need a sonogram would require the transvaginal kind. Alvarado told us that she meant to say that women who are up to eight to 12 weeks pregnant need a transvaginal sonogram because the better-known abdominal ultrasound doesn’t always produce a clear enough image. According to a medical encyclopedia on the University of Maryland Medical Center website, the transvaginal ultrasound looks at a woman’s reproductive organs by placing a probe into the vagina. The internal probe ""sends out sound waves, which reflect off body structures. A computer receives these waves and uses them to create a picture."" An abdominal ultrasound is performed externally, the site says. A water-based gel is spread over the woman’s pelvic area, which helps the probe transmit sound waves, generating an image. Alvarado’s office referred us to seven physicians to support her statement. Six responded, all saying transvaginal sonograms are usually preferred in the early weeks of pregnancy. Comments ranged from calling Alvarado’s statement ""100 percent correct"" to describing the transvaginal sonogram as ""the best evaluation"" that early in pregnancy. Other highlights: — Lisa Hollier, one of Alvarado’s recommended doctors, chairs the Texas district of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. She told us that if a sonogram is needed up to 10 weeks into a pregnancy, a transvaginal is necessary to attain a clear image and pick up the heartbeat. Hollier, who opposes the sonogram proposals, said that at eight to 10 weeks’ of pregnancy, the heart is hard to visualize using an abdominal ultrasound, particularly on obese women. — Matt Romberg, a Round Rock ob-gyn who also opposes the proposals, told us that he performs a sonogram to verify the location of the fetus, its viability and the stage of the pregnancy on women who are up to 10 weeks pregnant before performing the abortion. Ninety-nine percent of the time, he said, ""I have to do a transvaginal"" sonogram. — G. Sealy Massingill, a Fort Worth ob-gyn, told us that ""at eight weeks or less, it’s almost impossible to see anything"" without using a transvaginal sonogram. For other perspectives, we contacted the Washington-based Association of Reproductive Health Professionals, which seeks to improve reproductive health care through education. Beth Jordan, the association’s medical director, told us that in the early weeks of pregnancy, fetuses are easier to see on vaginal ultrasounds, though she said ""there are cases when it’s difficult to (perform) a vaginal ultrasound and we have to use the abdominal devices."" According to current clinical management guidelines produced by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, a sonogram in the first trimester may be performed using either an abdominal ultrasound or a transvaginal one. If the abdominal examination ""is not definitive, a transvaginal scan or transperineal scan should be performed whenever possible."" For a transperineal scan, the external probe is placed between the vulva and the rectum. Vicki Saporta, president of the National Abortion Federation, an association of abortion providers, told us it’s ""possible to do an abdominal ultrasound early in pregnancy, but based on a woman’s weight, the position of the uterus, the size of the pregnancy, a transvaginal ultrasound can be more accurate."" The federation opposes the Texas sonogram proposals, which Saporta said ""put another obstacle in the way of women receiving abortion care."" Eugene Toy, president of the Texas Association of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, told us that the medical standard of care for a patient seeking an abortion is to have a sonogram that allows the doctor to determine the stage of the pregnancy and identify problems. At less than eight weeks, ""a vaginal probe would be necessary almost all the time,"" he said, though from the eighth to 10th week, it’s necessary one-third of the time. Kyleen Wright, president of Texans for Life, pointed us to Ralph Wiegman, a Grand Prairie ob-gyn who supports the sonogram legislation. Wiegman told us that the only time a transvaginal sonogram is needed is less than seven weeks into the pregnancy, or if the woman is obese. ""At our pregnancy resource center, a vaginal ultrasound is reserved for those cases when you can’t get a good picture abdominal, or very early in the gestation,"" he said. Where does that leave us? Given that lawmakers were weighing whether to mandate sonograms in advance of abortions, we find reasonable Alvarado’s post-debate clarification that she intended to characterize sonograms through the first 10 weeks of pregnancy and not just a two-week segment. Most of the experts we reached agreed that to produce a clear image, a transvaginal sonogram is best, if not the only choice, up to about the seventh week of pregnancy. But between seven and 10 weeks, another type of sonogram may produce a viewable image, according to some doctors."
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10757
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Study finds steroids don’t prevent asthma
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This article reported on the results of two recent studies that found that inhaled corticosteroid treatment of infants or pre-school aged children did not have any affect on future asthma severity. It did a good job of informing readers of this observation and was careful to include mention of drug company funding of the studies but could have done a better job of summarizing information for consumers about treatment costs, benefits that might be obtained during treatment, potential harms of the treatment as well as other approaches to asthma management in small children.
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mixture
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Although both drugs mentioned in this article are currently available as prescription medications, the article did not include estimates for their cost. This article did a good job of pointing out that treatment of either pre-school aged children or one-month old infants with symptoms of asthma did not result in any benefit in terms of asthma severity as compared with children who were given a placebo. However, it did mention the observation from the study of pre-school aged, that during active treatment, inhaled corticosteroid did result in fewer and less-severe symptoms than those receiving the placebo without providing any sort of quantification of this benefit. Nonetheless we give a satisfactory score here. This article did not include mention of any side effects or harms associated with the use of inhaled corticosteroids in young children. This article reported on two recent studies that examined the impact of inhaled corticosteroid treatment in treatment of symptoms of asthma and prevention of chronic asthma in young children. It explained that the children treated were compared with children who received a placebo and included reference to where the studies were published so that a reader could track down more information if they were interested. This article did not disease monger but rather reported on two studies examining the ability for inhaled corticosteroid treatment to provide long term benefit to young children with asthma. It neither inflated the seriousness of asthma nor exaggerated the benefit that could be obtained from corticosteroid treatment. This article reported on results from two studies that appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine and included a quote from an editorial (by authors having no connection with either study) in the same issue of this journal that commented on the results of these studies. Comments from other authorities on the treatment of childhood asthma might have been useful. Nonetheless we give this a satisfactory score. This article failed to mention other approaches to management or treatment of asthmatic symptoms in young children. The article mentioned that inhaled steroids are often used to help control symptoms of asthma with the underlying assumption that these medications are readily available. However, it failed to note that the medications used in the two studies described do not currently have FDA approval for use in the age groups that were studied. As of 3/26/2006 Flovent received FDA approval for use in children 4-11, while the study reported on use in children 2-3 years of age. The second study involved infants one month of age given Pulmicort, which is currently FDA approved for use in children one year of age and older. This article reported on the results from two recent studies in young children. Rather than being a new or novel treatment, the studies were careful examinations of what this treatment can and cannot do for young children. We can’t be sure if the story relied solely or largely on a news release.
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31129
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The FBI has warned all Americans to be cautious of produce at grocery stores that might have been sprayed with poison.
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What's true: In May 2016, the FBI investigated reports of a man who had possibly contaminated food in a Michigan market. What's false: The FBI has did not issue a general warning to Americans about possibly poisoned produce in grocery stores.
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false
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Food, fbi, Food Contamination, food warnings
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On 18 July 2016 the web site Q Political published an article whose alarming headline (“FBI Issues Horrifying Warning to Frequent Grocery Shoppers”) and opening paragraphs suggested that federal investigators had issued a general warning to Americans about the United States’ food supply: The FBI issued a horrifying warning to frequent grocery shoppers, I can’t believe this! Every American needs to see this! After one young man’s unthinkable actions, washing your fresh fruits and vegetables has never been more important. Reports have now confirmed our worst fears, as cameras captured one young man visiting several grocery stores with the sole intent of spraying a poisonous mixture on open food throughout their produce sections. The FBI has issued a warning about going to the grocery store, and advises consumers to dispose all foods recently purchased from salad bars. Q Political linked to a Detroit Free Press article as a source for their claims, but the linked article (orignially published in May 2016) specified that concerns about affected grocery stores were limited to those in the area around Ann Arbor, Michigan, and that the FBI had investigated the alleged food contamination and linked it to a single individual there: In a potential food poisoning scare, the FBI says it has arrested a man suspected of contaminating produce at open food bars at several Ann Arbor-area grocery stores with a liquid spray containing mice poison, hand cleaner and water. State health officials say no one has yet reported getting sick from the potentially contaminated food, and it is not yet known if there is any threat to the public. But they are recommending that consumers throw out any salad bar, hot bar and ready-to-eat items that were purchased at potentially affected stores in Ann Arbor, Saline, Midland and Birch Run. The newspaper didn’t say the FBI issued a general warning about grocery store produce in the affected area (or anywhere else), just that the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development [MDARD] had advised residents of the Ann Arbor region to discard foods that had been “purchased from salad bars, olive bars and ready-to-eat hot and cold food areas from these stores between mid-March and the end of April”: The investigation has prompted the the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development to issue a public advisory, urging consumers to throw away any potentially contaminated food. State health officials said based on what they know about the ingredients in the mixture at this time, they do not anticipate any adverse health effects on individuals who may have eaten the potentially contaminated products. “Out of an abundance of caution and to protect public health and food safety, I encourage consumers to dispose of any foods purchased from salad bars, olive bars and ready-to-eat hot and cold food areas from these stores between mid-March and the end of April,” said Jamie Clover Adams, MDARD director. “Although most of these types of foods may have already been eaten or disposed of, some may still be in refrigerators or freezers.” We contacted MDARD to determine whether the July 2016 article was accurate, or whether it represented a continuation of events that occurred in March and April of 2016. An MDARD representative told us that the agency had issued the original salad bar warning “in an abundance of caution,” that no one (to their knowledge) had been sickened by the reported incidents, and that a suspect in the case had been arrested in early May 2016. The MDARD representative double-checked with the FBI to ensure that no such general warning had been issued. The original cautionary statement referred only to food from open hot or cold food bars or the produce aisle in one particular store, and only to items purchased between late April and early May 2016; the FBI did not (and has not) urged shoppers to avoid grocery stores in general+. (That remained the case when the already misleading claim was republished by Q Political on 12 May 2017.)
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8026
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'Just one case': fears coronavirus may spread like wildfire in world's refugee camps.
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In the world’s largest refugee settlement in Bangladesh, filmmaker Mohammed Arafat has been making public safety videos to warn about the dangers of coronavirus.
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true
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Health News
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The 25-year-old is worried that the disease will devastate the vast, crowded camps that house more than one million Rohingya, members of a mostly Muslim minority who fled a brutal military crackdown in Myanmar. “We are living in tiny, crowded shelters, we are sharing toilets,” he told Reuters. “It is very difficult to protect ourselves, it’s too crowded, people can’t breathe well.” Bangladesh, which has reported 48 cases of the virus and five deaths, imposed a lockdown on Tuesday, the same day it confirmed the first case in Cox’s Bazar, the coastal district where the Rohingya camps are located. A family of four Rohingya have been quarantined after returning from India. As the coronavirus forces the world’s big cities and wealthiest countries into lockdown, a potential humanitarian catastrophe threatens tens of millions of people crowded into refugee camps and makeshift settlements for displaced people from Bangladesh to Syria and across Africa, where healthcare and clean water is often scarce, sanitation is poor, illnesses are rife and social distancing is almost impossible. “God forbid, if the virus gets into the camps, it would have a catastrophic effect,” Mahbub Alam Talukder, Bangladesh’s refugee relief and repatriation commissioner, told Reuters. The United Nations says almost 70 million people uprooted by war and persecution around the world are in acute danger. “We must come to the aid of the ultra-vulnerable – millions upon millions of people who are least able to protect themselves,” said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres this week. UNHCR, the U.N. agency charged with protecting refugees, is looking to raise $255 million from member states to tackle the problem, part of a wider U.N. response plan seeking $2.01 billion. To be sure, camps in Bangladesh and elsewhere have experienced outbreaks of measles, diphtheria and other respiratory infections, and the SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and Ebola epidemics did not lead to large-scale infections or mass deaths of refugees. However, the latest coronavirus has exceeded all previous outbreaks, infecting almost 600,000 people globally and killing more than 27,000, according to a Reuters tally. For an interactive graphic tracking the global spread, open tmsnrt.rs/3aIRuz7 in an external browser. The mazy hills around Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh are more densely populated than the most crowded cities on earth, with 60,000 to 90,000 people jammed into each square kilometer where as many as a dozen people share single small shelters and many more use the same water well and toilet. Arafat, who fled violence in Myanmar eight years ago, urges people in his short videos to wash their hands and keep their distance from one another. But he cannot share the videos as mobile networks in the area have been curtailed by the government since last year on unspecified security grounds. As a result, both he and aid workers are struggling to educate the population about the spread of the virus. In recent days volunteers have been blasting public health messages from radios and loudspeakers, but Arafat said rumors and misinformation persist, with some pinning their hopes on prayer, eating leaves and exposure to heat to ward off the virus. “It needs just one case and it would be really critical,” said Haiko Magtrayo, a Cox’s Bazar-based aid worker from the International Committee of the Red Cross. Further spread would be “uncontrollable,” he added. The closest hospital with an intensive care unit is in the town of Cox’s Bazar. The U.N. refugee agency says it is trying to expand the capacity to 10 beds and to improve healthcare services inside the camps, but as rumors spread, some are panicking. “What is happening!” Mohammed Junaid, 21, said in a message to Reuters. “If something happens, where will we go for treatment?” Similar fears are spreading in regions torn by war and natural disasters in the Middle East and Africa. In Syria, where nearly a decade of war has uprooted 6.1 million people and forced some 5.3 million to flee to neighboring states, the coronavirus is a new threat for communities ill-equipped to deal with it. “We don’t wash our hands much because water is in short supply,” said Nayef al-Ahmad, 33, who has lived for five years in a camp for displaced people on muddy ground near the town of Azaz, which houses about 150 families in grimy tents. “Gloves and masks are not available and if they are available they are very expensive,” said al-Ahmad, who lives with his wife and seven children. At another camp in nearby Idlib province, families have been moved from several large communal tents into individual tents, an effort to pre-empt the spread of the virus, though no cases have been recorded in the rebel-held northwest yet. “We’ve split them up as much as we can,” said Ibrahim Sahhari, an administrator at the camp near Maarat Misrin. Idlib has received around 1,500 coronavirus testing kits in the last few days. Its population is close to 3 million. “Isolation is so difficult,” said Mohamed Tennari, a doctor and medical coordinator in the Idlib region. “Some people are still living in schools or in mosques. So all of this, if we have corona patients, will help the virus to spread very widely.” Similar overcrowding worries rage in neighboring countries hosting Syrian refugees. Lebanon has recorded around 350 cases so far, though none in refugee camps. “Whenever someone breathes, their neighbor can feel it,” said Syrian refugee Hamda Hassan, describing her camp in northern Lebanon. In Burkina Faso in western Africa, the Barsalogho camp houses about 75,000 people fleeing a jihadist insurgency, many in wood-framed tents covered with straw mats and white tarpaulin, pitched close together. Medical charities warn residents of the dangers of coronavirus, which has already spread across the capital Ouagadougou, infecting over 150 and killing eight. But shortages of water and sanitary supplies are making it difficult. Families of up to 10 people share about 20 liters of water a day, or about five gallons, said Manenji Mangundu, who leads operations for the Norwegian Refugee Council in Burkina Faso, well below the 35 liters per person that the NRC says is enough for a proper response to the coronavirus. “The situation in densely populated camps such as Barsalogho with poor healthcare is the perfect storm for a devastating outbreak. Facilities are shared, shelters are shared. If one case is reported in the site, it can spread like wildfire,” Mangundu said. Wendkouni Sawadogo, 27, lives at the camp with his family and shares a tent with 10 people. “I know we should wash our hands all the time and not greet people in the normal way,” he said, adding that he was aware of the growing number of cases from television news reports, but sometimes he has no water. In central Mozambique, where more than 90,000 victims of last year’s Cyclone Idai are still living in resettlement camps, large families of more than 10 people cram into one tent, with shared water sources and latrines, often open air with only plastic sheets for privacy. In some cases thousands of people share one water source, or they have to walk hours to one used by nearby communities. Espinola Caribe, the World Food Programme’s head of sub-office in Beira, the port city where the cyclone made landfall and displaced tens of thousands of people, said any virus outbreak would be a disaster for those with immune systems weakened by the effects of extreme poverty. Hand-washing sites are being installed in the camps and posters printed to raise awareness as aid workers try to spread the message face to face. Many camp residents do not have phones, and when they do, there is no guarantee they have power. Even when the message gets across, Caribe said conditions make it very difficult for people to comply: tents become unbearably hot in the daytime and families are forced to mix at water points, where there might be a shared bucket for collection, and conditions can be unsanitary. In Somalia, where violence and natural disasters have displaced 2.6 million of the country’s 15 million people, tens of thousands of families are dotted around the capital Mogadishu under makeshift tents of rags stretched over a frame of sticks. Lucky ones may have a plastic tarpaulin. The seasonal rains have just begun. Somali telecom companies are sending text messages about the importance of washing hands. But many have no soap and very little water, so simply use sand and ashes. Many do not have vessels to store water: several families might share one 20-litre container. “We are already living in bad conditions and if coronavirus visits us, then there is no hope for life,” said Hawa Ali Ibrahim, a 50-year-old mother. She lives with her husband, three children and grandchildren in the capital’s Alafuuto Camp, where there is no soap. “We use sand and ashes to wash our hands.” Neighboring Kenya is home to nearly half a million registered refugees, about 217,000 of those living in one sprawling camp called Dadaab, near the Somali border, according to the U.N. UNHCR is training health workers – some of whom are refugee community leaders – and running a multilingual hotline for refugees to report symptoms. They are increasing the distribution of soap and creating more hand-washing stations. There have been no reported coronavirus cases in East Africa camps, said UNHCR East Africa spokeswoman Dana Hughes. “These are not the first pandemics that we’ve dealt with,” Hughes told Reuters. “We’ve dealt with Ebola. We’ve dealt with SARS.”
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26015
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Nurses submitting coronavirus tests say they all are coming back positive.
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We could find no evidence that labs are deliberately manipulating COVID-19 test results to create false-positives. Similarly unproven claims have been circulating for weeks and echo months-old conspiracy theories. Jeffrey Sebelia, the source of the Facebook post, said it was a “word-of-mouth story” from his mom. He had no further proof to support the claim. While COVID-19 tests may sometimes produce false-positive results, they’re rare. Experts are more concerned about false-negatives. Data currently shows more than 90% of coronavirus tests come back negative.
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false
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Facebook Fact-checks, Coronavirus, Facebook posts,
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"What do Elon Musk and the winner of ""Project Runway"" Season 3 have in common? They’ve both shared unproven claims about -positive coronavirus test results. Since states started reopening in May, COVID-19 cases have increased in the United States. A June 27 post claims that’s because the labs that process coronavirus tests are falsifying results. ""It’s frightening how we’re being rail railroaded,"" reads the post, which is a screenshot of an Instagram post from Jeffrey Sebelia, the winner of the third season of ""Project Runway."" ""My mom actually knows a nurse in San Francisco who was giving COVID tests. After every test came back positive she got suspicious. So she sent in two separate blank tests. Unused swabs. Those both came back positive."" Sebelia said his mom and some co-workers used fake names to submit 10 unused swabs that all tested positive. ""What the he’ll is going on ????"" reads the post, which we cannot access since Sebelia’s account is private. ""It’s beyond greed and money for hospitals. We are being controlled and manipulated beyond anything we could ever imagine."" The Facebook post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) Similar posts have been shared thousands of times, according to CrowdTangle, an audience metrics tool. (Screenshot from Facebook) We reached out to Sebelia for evidence to back up his post. He told us it was a ""word-of-mouth story"" from his mom. ""She doesn’t lie but beyond that there is no proof,"" he said in an email. Sebelia is right — there is no proof to back up his claims. But over the past several weeks, many social media users — including Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX — have passed on secondhand stories about fraudulent COVID-19 tests or unproven claims about -positives. So we wanted to look into the notion that labs are falsifying COVID-19 test results. Public health officials say that -positive tests are rare; the real concern is -negatives. While COVID-19 tests may sometimes produce -positive results, there is no evidence that labs are deliberately manipulating samples. And public health officials are more concerned about -negatives than -positives. There are three main coronavirus tests: diagnostic, antibody and antigen. Diagnostic tests look for the genetic material of the coronavirus in a sample that’s typically taken from a person’s nose or throat. Health care providers and public health officials use them to confirm whether someone has the disease. Since diagnostic tests are considered the most common and reliable COVID-19 test, we’re going to focus on them. There are more than 100 diagnostic tests that have received emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration. Many cities and health care providers use private firms like LabCorp and Quest Diagnostics to provide and process diagnostic coronavirus tests. We reached out to both companies for a comment, but we haven’t heard back. We could find no evidence that labs are deliberately altering coronavirus test results to create -positives. There have been several cases of tests producing the wrong results. In mid-May, the Food and Drug Administration issued a warning saying that a rapid-response test from Abbott Laboratories could produce -negative results. Abbott advised health care providers not to store patient samples in solutions known as ""viral transport media."" The company said the swabs should be placed directly into the device and then the test will work as expected. The accuracy of COVID-19 tests, particularly for people who are not experiencing symptoms, is still uncertain. But -positive results appear to be an outlier. A LabCorp fact sheet for the company’s diagnostic coronavirus test says there is a ""very small chance"" the test can give -positive results. The instructions for a similar test from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say that test results are ""highly dependent on prevalence."" ""-negative test results are more likely when prevalence of disease is high,"" the document reads. ""-positive test results are more likely when prevalence is moderate to low."" In layman's terms: as coronavirus infections increase, so does the chance of -negative results. So it stands to reason that, as the U.S. continues to see new COVID-19 cases rise, -negative results are more common than -positives. That fact can have worse unintended consequences than -positive results. People who receive -negative results may not seek treatment for COVID-19 symptoms and risk infecting more people. Sebelia’s post inspired a slew of copy-pasted hoaxes about COVID-19 testing. Many cite friends or family members, and they echo months-old conspiracy theories about the coronavirus pandemic. A June 30 Facebook post is very similar to Sebelia’s story. ""Nurses at a hospital doing covid testing became suspicious when all their tests were coming back positive,"" reads the post. ""They sent 2 tests with unused swabs and they came back positive. Nurses used fake names, sent 10 unused swabs to be tested and all came back positive. We are being played!"" The post is a screenshot of a now-deleted tweet from a user named Robert Tayman, whose account was created in February and regularly promotes conspiratorial content. He said in a follow-up tweet (also deleted) that the nurses are ""close personal friends that work at a major hospital in Baltimore, Maryland."" (Screenshot from Twitter) The Baltimore Department of Health denied commenting for this story. Tayman’s tweet was deleted, but screenshots quickly made their way to Facebook, where they were shared thousands of times. The first few posts with Tayman’s tweet were published in conservative and anti-media groups on June 29, according to CrowdTangle. At first, users started off linking to the tweet, but soon users were posting screenshots of the post. Eventually, the text of the tweet was copied and shared with no context at all — similar to how chain emails work. Another Facebook post, published June 29, also recounts the story about nurses sending in ""10 unused swabs"" that all came back positive. The post is a screenshot of an Instagram post and cites a sister who’s a cardiac ICU nurse. ""The consensus was not that +cases don’t exist, but that the numbers are exaggerated,"" reads text in the screenshot. In each iteration of the post, the one clear theme is that every test comes back positive. But that belies the actual numbers hospitals and health departments are reporting. According to data compiled by the COVID Tracking Project, the rate of positive coronavirus tests has never exceeded 21.9% (that was in early April). The positivity testing rate hit a low of 4.4% in mid-June. Currently, it’s around 7%. That means 93% of tests produce negative results. These recent posts were not created in a vacuum. Similar rumors have circulated recently in India and Turkey. And conspiracy theories that claim officials are falsifying coronavirus test results — or that the pandemic itself is fabricated — have been circulating online for months. In late March, a website called the Cabal Times wrote about a video from a Swedish YouTuber who goes by the name Zakleo Se Bumbar. The video spins an elaborate conspiracy theory that asserts -positive COVID-19 tests are driving the bulk of new cases. The Facebook post claims that labs are manipulating coronavirus tests to create -positive results. We could find no evidence to back that up. Sebelia, the source of the claim, said it was a ""word-of-mouth story"" from his mom without proof. Similarly inaccurate or unproven claims about coronavirus tests have been circulating for weeks, many of which echo months-old conspiracy theories about the pandemic. While COVID-19 tests may sometimes produce -positive results, there is no evidence that labs are deliberately manipulating samples. Experts are more concerned about -negatives, which could pose health consequences. The Facebook post is inaccurate."
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25936
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Opening the schools “is a local determination, but it’s not a state determination.”
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Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared a state of emergency in March, and subsequently closed schools by executive order. During a state of emergency, the state holds power over local entities, such as school districts.
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false
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Education, New York, Coronavirus, Tom Reed,
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"Rep. Tom Reed weighed into the debate over how to begin the new school year amid the Covid-19 pandemic. It should be up to local authorities - not the state - to establish their re-opening plans, Reed said. ""I caught the governor’s comment yesterday that ‘opening the schools is not the president’s choice,’"" Reed said during a news conference in Buffalo on July 9. ""That’s true. That is a local determination, but it’s not a state determination."" Reed, a Republican from Corning who said he wants to see schools re-open, said that the state ""should defer to the local school districts, and the superintendents, and the school boards. They’re the ones that know their school districts."" He added: ""It’s not the governor’s call either. It’s the local officials that should be doing that."" Since reopening schools matters to parents, teachers and employers among many others, we wondered if Reed is correct, that the decision to reopen is a local determination, not a state one. We consulted with five people who work in education and know New York well, including lawyers, people who study education and a representative of school superintendents. Their opinions differed on Reed’s statement. Some said an argument could be made for local or state authorities holding the power, while others said that executive authority during an emergency gives the governor control. Another said the state has authority over the districts regardless of whether a state of emergency has been declared. During an emergency, the governor has complete authority to open and close public schools, said Brian Backstrom, director of education policy studies at the Rockefeller Institute of Government, part of the State University of New York. The details of how schools will operate will be left to the state Board of Regents in consultation with districts, but the governor will set the standards for when districts can be open, Backstrom said. A spokesman for Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Jason Conwall, said that schools typically have local authority, but that during a declared emergency, the governor’s powers supersede local governments. The schools were closed by an executive order, Conwall said, and will be reopened by one. Conwall directed us to several executive orders that Cuomo has issued since the coronavirus became a concern in New York, including 202.4, which closed ""every school in the state of New York"" by March 18, for two weeks. It was subsequently extended by other orders. On May 7, executive order 202.28 closed schools through the end of the school year. These orders stipulated that state aid would not be lost by the districts because they are closed. An executive order on June 5 allowed for in-person special education instruction for summer school. A subsequent order, 202.45, issued June 26, continued to close schools to in-person instruction, except for special education. The executive director of an organization that advocates for public school students said that districts are creations of state governments, and that states have authority over opening and closing, even in non-emergency situations. ""When you think about it legally, in New York, like in all 50 states, (states) are required to maintain and support public school systems,"" said David Sciarra of the Education Law Center, which is based in New Jersey and is partially funded by teachers’ unions. ""Authority is granted by the state, period, pandemic or not,"" he said. But some experts said that in times when an emergency has not been declared by the governor, the circumstances would be different. Several, including Robert Lowry, deputy director for advocacy, research and communications at the New York State Council of School Superintendents, said that public schools must be in session for 180 days in New York or they risk losing state aid for every day they are not in session. ""A district could elect to remain closed, but few districts would be willing to go more than a few days losing aid,"" Lowry said. Lowry pointed to Section 3604 of state education law, which provides that the state education commissioner may forgive state aid penalties for ""any day or days on which session had been previously scheduled but the superintendent was required to close the school or schools due to a properly executed declaration of a state or local state of emergency."" Cuomo signed such an executive order on March 7. Kathryn McCary, an education lawyer based in Schenectady, said that although public school districts have ""significant local autonomy"" and are funded with property taxes raised locally, they are dependent upon state aid, as well as federal funding for certain programs. ""So yes, it is theoretically a local decision, but it isn’t an unconstrained one,"" she said. David Bloomfield, an education lawyer and professor at Brooklyn College and The CUNY Graduate Center, said that in New York, reopening would typically be a local determination, as long as the district meets the statutory 180-day minimum attendance requirement. But Cuomo, under executive powers conferred to him by the Legislature, has emergency authority that preempts local school boards. We also approached Reed’s office for evidence of his claim. ""School districts in collaboration with other local elected officials, teachers, and parents, as opposed to one-size-fits-all mandates from Albany, should determine school reopenings,"" Reed said in a statement. ""Members of our school boards are duly elected by the communities they serve and are in the best position to determine the appropriate course of action for their students and teachers, including when to safely reopen."" In April, PolitiFact New York found that both New York state and New York City had authority to close New York City schools. Reed said that the decision to open schools is not a state determination. School calendars are typically set by districts, as long as they can meet the state’s 180-day statutory requirement. During this pandemic, however, the governor closed the schools by executive order, and Cuomo’s spokesman said that he will be opening them by executive order. A few days after Reed made his statement, the executive branch and the state Education Department announced guidelines and detailed what should be contained in plans for re-opening. If districts do not work with the state, and seek its approval for their reopening plans, they could lose state funding."
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41824
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The races in Florida for Senate and governor were “won” on election night by the Republicans.
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With votes continuing to be counted in very close elections in Florida, Georgia and Arizona, President Donald Trump and some other Republicans have been crying foul, making false and misleading claims of supposed election fraud perpetrated by Democrats in an attempt to “steal” the elections.
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false
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absentee ballots, provisional ballots, voter fraud, voting,
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With votes continuing to be counted in very close elections in Florida, Georgia and Arizona, President Donald Trump and some other Republicans have been crying foul, making false and misleading claims of supposed election fraud perpetrated by Democrats in an attempt to “steal” the elections.There is no evidence of an organized effort by Democrats to “steal” elections, and the ballot counting is proceeding in due course. It often takes more than a week for counties around the country to count mail-in, absentee and provisional ballots. What’s unusual is that these ballots could tilt the results one way or the other. And in Florida, a mandatory recount has already been triggered in the elections for U.S. Senate and for governor.Nonetheless, the president and other Republicans have been muddying the national dialogue and spinning the facts:In his claims, the president has alleged the Florida vote count has been “massively infected” with “large numbers of new ballots” showing up “out of nowhere” while other ballots are “missing or forged.” And he has claimed election officials are suspiciously “finding votes in Florida and Georgia” after the election. But there is no evidence of any of that.In Florida, where Trump has focused much of his ire and Gov. Scott warned “there may be rampant fraud happening in Palm Beach and Broward Counties,” election officials say there has been no evidence to date of any criminal tampering with election results.On Nov. 12, a spokeswoman for the Florida Department of State, which supervises elections, reiterated that it was overseeing the certification of election results and to date had seen “no evidence of criminal activity.” The department is headed by Secretary of State Ken Detzner, a Republican appointed by Scott. And despite Scott and State Attorney General Pam Bondi urging the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to look into potential voter fraud, FDLE says so far it hasn’t seen anything to investigate. That doesn’t mean there haven’t been some problematic election issues in Florida. For example, CNN reported that a North Florida county hit by Hurricane Michael allowed about 150 ballots to be submitted by fax and email, contrary to Florida Department of State guidelines. And it is possible that some incidents involving fraud may come to light, such as a person with a felony conviction voting even though their voting rights have not been restored, said Lorraine Minnite, a professor at Rutgers University and author of “The Myth of Voter Fraud. But Minnite said that she is not aware of evidence of any kind of voter fraud in Florida, Georgia or Arizona.During an emergency hearing on Nov. 12, Circuit Chief Judge Jack Tuter said he had seen no evidence of illegal activity in the vote-counting in Broward County, and he urged both sides to “ramp down the rhetoric.”“Everything the lawyers are saying out there at the elections office is being beamed out across the country,” Tuter said. “We should be careful what we say. These words mean things these days.”Trump says that the races in Florida for Senate and governor were “won” on election night by the Republican candidates, Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis, respectively, and now the Democrats are trying to go back and “STEAL two big elections.” But the president simply got out in front of the final tallies, which won’t ultimately be known until all of the absentee and provisional ballots are counted.And, because the races are so close, an automatic recount also has been triggered.“Rick Scott … won by a comfortable margin,” Trump told reporters on Nov. 9. “He easily won, but every hour it seems to be going down.”Trump echoed those sentiments on Twitter.Mayor Gillum conceded on Election Day and now Broward County has put him “back into play.” Bill Nelson conceded Election – now he’s back in play!? This is an embarrassment to our Country and to Democracy!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 9, 2018Trying to STEAL two big elections in Florida! We are watching closely!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 10, 2018Asked on ABC’s “This Week” on Nov. 11 if the president had any evidence that Democrats are trying to “steal” the elections, Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president, said, “Well the evidence is that Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis have won. In fact, Andrew Gillum conceded on the night of the election, now we’re going backwards.” (Gillum withdrew his concession a day earlier on Nov. 10. )But election night results are always preliminary, and provisional and absentee ballots take more time to process. When elections aren’t particularly close, the public doesn’t notice that it usually takes more than a week to certify election results.“The count is never final on election night – each state has a deadline for certifying the election, and counties (and in some states, towns) are crossing i’s and dotting t’s until then,” Loyola Law School Professor Justin Levitt, an expert in election fraud, told us via email.“More generally, what is happening in these three states [Florida, Georgia and Arizona] is that various elections for Senator and Governor were really close, and so a lot of attention has focused on absentee ballots and particularly provisional ballots, and on checking the tallies of ballots from election night,” Levitt said. “But that same process is going on in elections all across the country: election officials are assessing absentee and provisional ballots to see whether they were properly cast by eligible, properly registered voters each voting once, and double-checking the tallies of regular ballots cast at the polls.”Never mind that some networks will project the winner of a close race, as some did for DeSantis on election night.“When the networks ‘call’ the election on election night, what they’re doing is assessing the likelihood of a final result based on exit polls and early tallies from polling places (and from absentee ballots that the jurisdiction may have already counted), and making statistical assessments of the likelihood that once all ballots are cast, the person who won could have actually lost,” Levitt said. “But election results are never instantaneous, and every single one of the network’s announcements is a preliminary estimate. … [T]he results from election night for some of the races were really close … and so crossing each “t” and dotting each “I” may matter a lot in who wins. But the process that’s going on in Florida and Georgia and Arizona is pretty much the same thing that’s happening even for races where the result is more certain, all across the country.”Lorraine Minnite, at Rutgers University, said most people probably pay little attention to election administration, such as the “often intricate rules that govern election procedures, including ballot counting.”“In addition, most elections are not tight nail-biters,” Minnite told us via email. “I can understand why the average citizen might be confused about why the elections in Georgia, Florida and Arizona have not yet been decided. But, no one should worry yet – close elections take longer to count, and all ballots must be accounted for.”At this point she said she has seen no evidence of election fraud.Trump has repeatedly referred to election officials suspiciously “finding” votes for Democrats. But there is no evidence to date that vote counts have been influenced by anything other than legally cast ballots. Indeed, most of the changing vote totals have been due to officials tallying mail-in, provisional and absentee ballots not counted on Election Day.Trump told reporters on Nov. 9 that in Florida, “all of a sudden, they’re finding votes out of nowhere.” In Arizona, he said, “all of a sudden, out of the wilderness, they find a lot of votes.” And, Trump said, “Do you notice, the votes never go the other way [in Republicans favor]?”Trump raised similar concerns about “found” votes on Twitter:You mean they are just now finding votes in Florida and Georgia – but the Election was on Tuesday? Let’s blame the Russians and demand an immediate apology from President Putin!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 9, 2018Rick Scott was up by 50,000+ votes on Election Day, now they “found” many votes and he is only up 15,000 votes. “The Broward Effect.” How come they never find Republican votes?— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 9, 2018In the case of Arizona, it simply takes longer to count ballots because about 75 percent of Arizona voters cast ballots by mail. Although Republican Senate candidate Martha McSally appeared to be winning the race on election night, Democrat Kyrsten Sinema pulled ahead by about 2,000 votes after Maricopa County released the results of 120,000 outstanding ballots available two days after the election. By Nov. 12, Sinema’s lead had grown to more than 32,000 votes, CNN reported. That night, the Associated Press projected Sinema as the winner of the race, and McSally called Sinema to concede the race.In Florida, the vote differentials have changed as counties began to submit tallies from provisional and absentee ballots.“The election officials aren’t finding votes – they’re counting votes that were not cast as regular ballots on election day,” Levitt said. “The ballots were already there: they’re revealing for whom those ballots were cast. That’s a whole lot different from ‘finding’ new votes.”In fact, it is possible that not all ballots have even arrived. The state accepts ballots from military and overseas voters until Nov. 16, provided they are postmarked Nov. 6.The president is also wrong to say election officials have not been “finding” Republican votes as well.“There are many tens of thousands of ballots being evaluated, some of which reveal votes for Republicans, some of which reveal votes for Democrats, some of which reveal votes for both (for different offices), some of which reveal votes for neither,” Levitt said. “The reports in the press generally only give the net differential margin, and in this case the Democratic candidates have been narrowing the margin as more votes are counted. But that does not mean that only votes for Democrats have been counted. In reality, there have been many votes for Republicans counted since the election as well.”In Florida, a teacher at Miramar Elementary School in Broward County said she came across a box labelled “Provisional Ballot Box.” Republican Sen. Marco Rubio retweeted a report of what he called the “left behind” box and criticized Broward County officials for “apparently” misplacing ballots. “Just let that sink in for a moment,” Rubio tweeted. But county election officials say the boxes at the school contained no ballots — just election supplies. Election experts say mismatched signatures on mail-in and provisional ballots, compared with voter registration documents, are actually fairly common, and aren’t necessarily evidence of fraud. Rather, handwriting can change over time, so a legal voter could be deemed to have a mismatched signature from when he or she registered to vote years before.But in a tweet, Trump said reports that “SIGNATURES DON’T MATCH” on some ballots in Arizona meant there had been “electoral corruption” and may be grounds to consider a new election.Just out — in Arizona, SIGNATURES DON’T MATCH. Electoral corruption – Call for a new Election? We must protect our Democracy!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 9, 2018And on “Fox News Sunday” on Nov. 11, Scott alleged his Democratic opponent has “gone to court to say that fraudulent ballots, fraudulent ballots that were not properly delivered, sign, whatever should have — should be counted, OK? Senator Nelson is clearly trying to find — to try and commit fraud to try to win this election. That’s all this is.”States have different procedures to check if the signatures on absentee and provisional ballots match the signatures the voters gave when registering to vote, and what to do about it if they don’t.A lawsuit filed by the Nelson campaign against the Florida secretary of state argues that tens of thousands of Floridians who voted via provisional ballot are at risk of disenfranchisement due to a “standardless signature matching process.” The suit seeks to prevent the state from rejecting ballots with mismatched signatures. It is scheduled to be heard this week.According to the suit, the state’s “entirely standardless, inconsistent, and unreliable signature matching process” has “a disparate impact on People of Color and young, first time voters, violates the prohibition against undue burdens on the right to vote … and subjects Florida voters to disparate treatment and inconsistent standards in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.”According to a 2016 survey by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, 1 percent of absentee ballots nationally were rejected in the 2016 election, and “non-matching signature” was the top reason (27.5 percent). See Table 1.“It is not unusual to find signatures that don’t match,” Minnite said. “Handwriting can change over time, and a voter who has been registered at the same address for many years who votes irregularly may find him or herself in a situation where the elections office asks for an updated signature.”States have different procedures to check signatures on ballots. Some states have automated systems that do initial screens of signatures, followed by a human review of rejected ballots due to mismatches. In some states, Minnite said, if a signature on a mail ballot doesn’t match, the voter may be contacted to come into the election office to provide an updated signature.In Arizona, only a handful of counties allowed voters to verify their signatures after the election, and a legal battle between Democrats and Republicans resulted in a settlement that will allow all Arizona counties to verify ballot signatures until 5 p.m. on Nov. 14.In Florida, it’s misleading for Scott to call ballots with mismatched signatures “fraudulent ballots.” Indeed, former Florida Rep. Patrick Murphy tweeted on Nov. 9 that he discovered his absentee ballot wasn’t counted in Palm Beach County “due to ‘invalid signature’ match.”“People’s signatures change over time, and in different situations,” Levitt said. “Your signature on a supermarket checkout machine is probably not the same signature as on the deed to a house.”It’s also important to note, Levitt said, that “the signatures on provisional and absentee ballots are all evaluated before anyone knows who the ballot is cast for: the signature is on the outside of an envelope, and the ballot is on the inside, and you can’t tell who the votes were cast for looking at the outside of the envelope. So the decisions on counting or not counting provisional or absentee ballots are made independent of the identity of the voter’s preferred candidates.”On “Fox News Sunday,” Scott claimed, “Sen. Nelson’s lawyer said that a noncitizen should have the right to vote.” But that’s not clear from the evidence.In a brief exchange during a canvassing board meeting, a lawyer representing Nelson objected after a provisional ballot was disqualified because the voter was deemed to be “not a citizen.”The Nelson campaign’s lead recount attorney later said the lawyer was “not authorized to make such an objection” and that “noncitizens cannot vote in U.S. elections.”Scott’s claim came during an interview on “Fox News Sunday” on Nov. 11. Host Chris Wallace asked him, “You’re accusing Bill Nelson of trying to commit fraud?”Scott responded, “His lawyer said that a noncitizen should vote.”Fox News, Daily Caller and The Blaze all obtained a transcript of a Palm Beach County Canvassing Board proceeding on Nov. 9 when officials were reviewing provisional ballots. According to the transcript, provided by a court reporter hired by the Palm Beach County GOP, when one provisional ballot was discarded, Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Susan Bucher explained, “Not a U.S. citizen; not counted.” The transcript states that lawyer Jack Scarola responded, “Objection Nelson.”No explanation was provided for the objection, and the ballot was quickly disallowed after a 2-1 vote in which Bucher and Judge August Bonavita voted not to count it. We could not reach Scarola to determine why he objected, or if he was attempting to argue the person was misidentified as a noncitizen. It is a leap from that brief exchange to claim the attorney “said that a noncitizen should have the right to vote.”As the stories note, Marc Elias, recount attorney for the Nelson campaign, later issued a statement saying, “The lawyer who was present was not someone we had authorized to make such an objection. Noncitizens cannot vote in U.S. elections.”The president suggested that Fusion GPS, a research firm that hired former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele to investigate Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign, had something to do with the vote counting in Florida. It doesn’t.The tenuous connection is that the attorney for Nelson’s campaign in Florida, Elias, also represented the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016, when he hired Fusion GPS to research Trump.Trump made the claim during remarks to reporters before he departed for Europe on Nov. 9.Trump, Nov. 9: And Rick Scott, who won by — you know, it was close, but he won by a comfortable margin — every couple of hours it goes down a little bit. And then you see the people, and they were involved with that fraud of the fake dossier, the phony dossier. And I guess I hear they were somehow involved or worked with the GPS Fusion people, who have committed — I mean, if you look at what they’ve done, you look at the dishonesty.During his remarks, a reporter asked if Trump had any evidence of fraud. The president responded: “Well, I don’t know, you tell me. It’s always the Democrats. It’s always GPS Fusion. It’s always crooked stuff.”Fusion GPS was founded by former Wall Street Journal reporters Glenn R. Simpson and Peter Fritsch. In 2016, the law firm Perkins Coie, and specifically Elias, represented Clinton’s campaign and the DNC and hired Fusion GPS, which subsequently hired Steele. (Previously, the conservative Washington Free Beacon had hired Fusion GPS to investigate Trump and other Republican primary candidates. )Steele’s research made up the dossier, a series of memos on supposed contacts between Russian officials and members of the Trump campaign. It alleged the Kremlin has compromising information on Trump.It’s no surprise that Nelson would want to hire Elias during the recount. Elias’ bio says “he is a preeminent counselor in the areas of federal and state campaign finance law … as well as recounts and election contests. He is also a nationally recognized authority and spearheads litigation efforts in the areas of voting rights and redistricting.”
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33809
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A government memo regulating the sale of cabbages ran close to 27,000 words.
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Sightings: A version of the legend came up during an episode of television’s West Wing (“100,000 Airplanes,” original air date 16 January 2002).
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false
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Legal Affairs, Documentary Evidence
|
The legend of the wordy government memo regulating the sale of cabbage is often held up as a telling illustration of needless verbosity and a prime example of the sort of pointless government spending everyone is in favor of seeing cut from the bone: Pythagorean theorem: 24 words The Lord’s Prayer: 66 words Archimedes’ Principle: 67 words The Ten Commandments: 179 words The Gettysburg Address: 286 words The Declaration of Independence: 1,300 words The US government regulations on the sale of cabbage: 26,911 words For anybody who doesn?t fully understand the Euro situation, it is explained very simply in the picture below…….. THIS IS BRILLIANT – and loopholes Europe in a “few” words Pythagoras’ theorem – 24 words. Lord’s Prayer – 66 words. Archimedes’ Principle – 67 words. 10 Commandments – 179 words. Gettysburg address – 286 words. US Declaration of Independence – 1,300 words. US Constitution with all 27 Amendments – 7,818 words. EU regulations on the sale of a cabbage – 26,911 words It’s a shame such an archetype is naught but pure invention, yet it appears it was never anything other than the product of someone’s fertile imagination. Versions of the showcased list have been around for at least a half a century, with earlier ones decrying a memo by the government of France specifying the price of duck eggs, a British one referring to “shell eggs,” and an American one (from 1953) about fresh fruits. While not all accounts agree on the precise number of words used in the various religious and patriotic texts pointed to as effective models of brevity, the 26,911 words expended in the cabbage tome eerily remains almost constant. In 1977, Mobil Oil was fooled by this thing — they vectored the legend in its “Pipeline Pete” print advertisement as a bit of revealed truth. Mobil had found the item in a house organ published the year earlier by FMC Corporation, an agricultural concern in Chicago. That version went back to yet another publication that had found it printed on a card someone was carrying in his wallet. A 1987 book (Pearls of Wisdom: A Book of Aphorisms) claimed an “EEC [European Economic Community] directive on the import of caramel and caramel products requires, apparently, no fewer than 26,911 words.” Once again, someone was so charmed by a bit of authoritative-sounding apocrypha that he chose to pass it along as revealed truth. In a 1965 case report on the great cabbage hoax, Max Hall was able to trace numerous print sightings back as far as 1951. Oral reports gathered by him suggested it existed in the 1940s as well. Although Hall could not establish the precise origin of the story, he did conclude it might have first been applied to the Office of Price Administration (OPA) during World War II and then to the Office of Price Stabilization (OPS) in the period when price controls were in effect during the Korean War. Eventually, the claim came to be proffered as a more general ridicule of the government. (We note that a U.S. Dept. of Agriculture document from 1945 which details “Standards for the Grades of Cabbage” falls about 26,000 words short of being a 27,000-word memo.) Folklore this may well be, but the future for the non-existent cabbage memo still shines bright, if recent references to it are any guide. In 1994, David McIntosh, who had served as executive director of Vice President Dan Quayle’s Council on Competitiveness, passed along this tidbit as one of those little facts one supplies to bolster a position. That same year, Congressman Lamar Smith used it to decry administrative excesses, as did Senator Orrin Hatch during the Regulatory Act debate in 1994. On a lesser scale of rumor-mongering, it also pops up in a 1992 monograph on regulatory costs by economist Thomas Hopkins. A New Hampshire coalition called “Get Government Off Our Backs!” was also bruiting it about in 1994. In 1993, Jack Critchfield, chief executive officer of Florida Progress Corp., passed along the cabbage tale in a speech to the Greater Largo Chamber of Commerce. William Randolph Hearst Jr. also stated it as fact in a 1992 article calling for federal spending to be slashed, attributing it to Joe Kingsbury-Smith, the newspaper chain’s national editor. A columnist in California spread the wordy memo tale as fact in April 2000. The cabbage memo has so far resisted all efforts to debunk it. The Washington Post has twice run bits detailing its known history (in 1992 and 1995), as did The New Republic in 1977. The San Francisco Examiner also tried to put paid to the memo in 1995, but to no avail. Some myths are too deeply cherished to be displaced by mere fact.
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22240
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Hackers broke into Virginia's prescription-drug database (and) ... obtained more than 8.2 million patient records and a total of nearly 36 million prescriptions.
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Rick Scott cites Virginia drug database failure in congressional testimony
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true
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Drugs, Florida, Rick Scott,
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"Florida Gov. Rick Scott appeared before Congress on April 14, 2011, to testify about the state's problem fighting prescription drug abuse and the proliferation of so-called ""pill mills."" One way Florida is hoping to combat the over-prescribing of pain medications like oxycodone, Scott said, is by implementing a statewide drug database that will track prescriptions that pharmacists fill for patients. The hope is that law enforcement officials can spot doctors who are prescribing too many drugs, or patients who are hopping from doctor to doctor satisfy their fix. Scott initially opposed the database, saying he was concerned about the privacy rights of law-abiding patients -- and asked the Legislature to repeal a 2009 law that created the computer monitoring program. But his position put him at odds with leaders in the state Senate, whose support would have been required to nix the database. So the database is moving moving forward. In his testimony before the House Energy and Commerce subcommittee, Scott repeated concerns about the privacy issues in such a system. He then highlighted a story about Virginia's prescription drug database to help make his point. ""As the database implementation moves forward, I must draw your attention to a serious risk that I believe databases like this pose to the privacy of individuals – most of whom are law-abiding individuals,"" Scott said, according to his prepared remarks. ""As you know, in 2009 the Associated Press reported a massive privacy breach when hackers broke into Virginia’s prescription-drug database. They obtained more than 8.2 million patient records and a total of nearly 36 million prescriptions. ""So, while the database in Florida is brought online, I continue working with my legislative partners to find solutions that protect patient privacy."" We wanted to know if hackers did indeed break into Virginia's database, and if they obtained 8.2 million patient records. News of the break-in to the database first appeared on WikiLeaks, a website founded to publish classified, secret and otherwise private government information. On April 30, 2009, the WikiLeaks website reported that the Virginia Prescription Monitoring Program (PMP) secure website was hijacked with a $10 million ransom demand. ""In my possession, right now, are 8,257,378 patient records and a total of 35,548,087 prescriptions,"" the hacker wrote on the site. ""For $10 million, I will gladly send along the password … If by the end of 7 days, you decide not to pony up, I'll go ahead and put this baby out on the market and accept the highest bid …"" The FBI acknowledged in a May 5 Associated Press article that it was investigating a breach of the system, and in a subsequent article said that WikiLeaks reported that 8 million patient records and 35 million prescriptions were accessed. The WikiLeaks report contained the ransom note, but did not include the posting of any patient records, said Diane E. Powers, a spokeswoman with the Virginia Department of Health Professions. The following day, state officials confirmed that someone had hacked into the database. Virginia authorities said they would not pay the ransom. ""They really think they'll get anything out of this?"" said then-Gov. Timothy M. Kaine. ""Not a chance."" The ransom deadline came and went without noticeable incident, according to media accounts. And most importantly for our check, state officials said it was unclear whether the hackers were able to view patient records, as they had claimed. Powers told PolitiFact Florida that the investigation remains open. No one has been caught in connection with the virtual break-in. The Virginia Department of Health Professions did send a notification letter to all persons whose prescription records in the database contained a nine-digit number that could have been a Social Security number. None of the database information was lost, Powers said, and the PMP continues to operate. So a hacker did break into the database and posted a ransom note claiming to have obtained the records Scott referenced. But it's not clear whether the hacker really obtained access to the records."
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29995
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Kelly Clarkson was fired from 'The Voice' in December 2018.
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You can read more about these celebrity endorsement scams here.
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false
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Fraud & Scams
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On 20 December 2018, a counterfeit website posing as that of US Weekly published an article reporting that singer Kelly Clarkson had been fired from the television show The Voice. This website (gainestylist.com) used the same color scheme as US Weekly and put the celebrity magazine’s logo in their header in order to deceive readers into thinking they were reading a genuine report from a real news outlet: But this was no genuine news article. The fabricated, attention-grabbing story was merely a gateway to an advertisement for an “over-the-counter natural supplement.” The first few paragraphs of this junk news article focused on the imaginary events that supposedly led to Clarkson’s firing. The remainder of the article, however, touted the benefits of a diet pill that, according to the events of this fictional universe, helped Clarkson shed some weight: (Us Weekly News) – Competition on The Voice is heating up but fans were shocked after finding out that Kelly Clarkson was fired. NBC confirmed that they fired Clarkson but wouldn’t comment further. Why the sudden departure for a judge who has only been with the show for two seasons? Did a jealous colleague get Kelly fired? What Really Happened? The drama all started when Jennifer Hudson was announced to be replaced by John Legend in the upcoming season. Hudson who was bitter about the replacement, claims she saw Kelly Clarkson taking some unknown pills backstage and reported it to NBC producers citing that it might be illicit drugs. Executives at NBC noticed that Kelly was losing weight at a rapid pace which left them with many questions about how exactly she was doing it. Pressure from Hudson for NBC to find out what was going on forced producers to terminate Clarkson’s contract because they couldn’t ask her straight up because of privacy issues nor have one of their stars taking drugs. After the extremely baseless accusations from NBC (and Jennifer Hudson), Clarkson finally fired back with her side of the story in an interview with Ellen. The TV star cleared the air and assured fans that she was not taking drugs, but what they saw her taking on set was Keto, an over-the-counter natural supplement she’s been taking to lose weight. Clarkson was not fired from The Voice, she did not endorse (or use) this diet pill, and US Weekly did not publish reports of either activity. This isn’t the first time a bogus website has used junk news and an imaginary celebrity endorsement to sell a questionable product. We’ve previously covered scams claiming that Melissa McCarthy had endorsed a diet pill, that Denzel Washington, Tiger Woods, and Jamie Foxx had touted a brain supplement, and that Ellen DeGeneres was quitting her show to start a skin-care line.
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8792
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Vytorin not linked to cancer in other trials: doctor.
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The Vytorin cholesterol fighter sold by Merck & Co and Schering-Plough has not been linked to cancer or cancer deaths in two large ongoing studies of the medicine, an epidemiologist said on Monday during a medical meeting in London.
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true
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Health News
|
“There is no overall credible evidence of an increase in cancer” from the two big studies, Sir Richard Peto, professor of medical statistics and epidemiology at the University of Oxford, said at a meeting where results of an unrelated smaller Vytorin trial suggested a possible cancer risk with Vytorin. Peto said the two far-larger ongoing studies where cancer has not been associated with Vytorin are IMPROVE-IT, designed to assess overall cardiovascular benefits and risks of the medicine, and SHARP, designed to assess possible benefits of the drug to patients with chronic kidney disease. “We should not be diverted by fears of cancer” with Vytorin, Peto said, based upon trends seen in the two larger studies involving about 20,000 patients. By contrast, in the 1,873-patient trial described on Monday, called SEAS, a higher number of patients with thickened aortic valves receiving Vytorin developed cancer or died of cancer than those receiving placebos.
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9642
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Eat This Carb and You Won’t Gain Weight
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The story describes a single small study of 70 women followed for three hours after a meal containing “resistant starch” and whey protein. We aren’t given any numbers, but the story says that women who received resistant starches and whey protein burned more calories than women fed pancakes without that combination, potentially pointing the way toward future nutrition guidelines or at least more studies. The story was a light meal of information that left readers hungry for numbers. But more concerning was the misleading headline, which was not supported by the story or the study under discussion (see “Quality of Evidence” below). Obesity is a global public health problem, and research that clarifies the best foods for maintaining a healthy weight would be beneficial to countless people.
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mixture
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diet studies,nutrition,resistant starches,weight loss
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The story is dealing with low-cost, widely available foods, so we’ll rate this N/A. The story does not use quantified benefits. One opportunity where that could have been added is in this section: “Arciero and his team monitored the women after each meal for three hours and used a device to see how many calories they burned, and what type. To Arciero’s surprise, after women ate pancakes containing resistant starch plus protein, they experienced an increase in fat burning, compared to all of the other kinds of pancakes.” Adding numbers for the calories burned or the “increase” in fat burning would be beneficial. Minus these numbers, we can’t assess the credibility of the conclusions. We’re rating this N/A since it’s about food choices. However, it is possible that the belief that a food contains resistant starch could paradoxically lead to that food’s overconsumption. There are two studies referenced, with a link given, but we are only told about one. This small study was done on 70 women who were followed for three hours after a specific meal. But more details were needed: Was the increase in calorie burning statistically significant or just a trend? Was it enough to expect to see a meaningful impact upon weight even if generously extrapolated? What are the limitations of this kind of research? Meanwhile, the headline makes a bold assertion: “Eat this carb and you won’t gain weight.” The study mentioned in the story didn’t reach that conclusion. Meaning, there is no evidence backing up that claim, creating a presumptive and misleading headline. There was no disease mongering. There don’t appear to be any conflicts of interest. However, the story does not quote any independent sources, only one of the study authors. The story mentions different types of carbs and lists a variety of foods that contain resistant starches. All of these foods are widely available. The story makes it clear that these types of starches are being studied in a variety of ways. The story does not appear to rely on a news release.
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7569
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Virgin Galactic completes first glide flight in New Mexico.
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Virgin Galactic’s spaceship VSS Unity landed in the New Mexico desert on Friday, marking its first glide flight from Spaceport America as the company moves toward commercial operations.
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true
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Virus Outbreak, Technology, General News, Science, Travel, New Mexico, U.S. News
|
The company announced the flight on social media and shared photos of the craft on the runway and members of the crew stationed far apart around the special carrier plane that ferries the smaller spaceship to high altitude. After years of development and testing at Mojave Air & Space Port in Mojave, California, Virgin Galactic is close to starting actual operations at its futuristic terminal and hangar in southern New Mexico. The company has not set a date for the first commercial flights but has said it anticipates doing so in 2020. A small number of test flights are needed before Virgin Galactic can take paying customers on supersonic thrill rides to the lower reaches of space to experience a few minutes of weightlessness and a view of the Earth below. The suborbital flights will reach an altitude of at least 50 miles (80.5 kilometers) before the spaceship glides to a landing. The company considered Friday’s flight a major achievement that has been in the works since the spaceship and carrier plane relocated to New Mexico in February. The flight provided the first opportunity to test all the components required to fly the carrier aircraft and spaceship in glide configuration from their new home base. Officials will now be reviewing data gathered during the exercise so they can prepare for the next test flight. The spaceship reached a glide speed of Mach 0.70 as the pilots performed a series of maneuvers to check handling and aerodynamics and to get more familiar with the New Mexico airspace. Virgin Galactic CEO George Whitesides congratulated his team on hitting the milestone, especially during such challenging times. ’I am grateful for the commitment displayed by everyone involved, not only in helping to support relief efforts in both New Mexico and California, but also for the dedication and creativity which will allow us to continue safely towards our goal of commercial launch,” he said. While many employees have been working remotely during the pandemic, members of the Virgin Galactic team have been helping with relief efforts. They’ve donated meals, masks, gloves and other medical supplies to communities and hospitals in New Mexico and California. The company also has made donations of more than $60,000 in New Mexico and is working on developing oxygen hoods that could potentially help COVID-19 patients. “We’re pursuing sort of an all-hands-on-deck strategy here where we’re really trying to help wherever we can,” Whitesides said. Virgin Galactic went public on the New York Stock Exchange last fall. Company officials are preparing to release their first quarter results Tuesday. More than 600 customers from around the world have put down deposits for flights, and about 8,000 reservations of interest have been made since the successful test flight into space in December 2018. Company officials expect that interest to surpass the company’s capacity for flights for the next few years. The initial seats were sold at $250,000 apiece. Those who want to register interest online are paying a fully refundable deposit of $1,000.
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2586
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One in three open to traveling for medical treatment, poll finds.
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Looking for an affordable face lift without breaking the bank? Want to combine a tummy tuck with two weeks in the sun? You’re not alone.
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true
|
Health News
|
Nearly a third of people surveyed around the world say they are open to the idea of medical tourism - traveling abroad to enjoy cheaper medical or dental treatment, according to a new Ipsos poll of 18,731 adults in 24 countries. Indeed, 18 percent said they would definitely consider it. “The concept of medical tourism is well accepted in many countries,” said Nicolas Boyon, senior vice president of Ipsos Public Affairs. “With the exception of Japan there are at least one third of consumers in every country we covered that are open to the idea,” he said in an interview. Whether for economic reasons or perceptions of superior treatment elsewhere, for treatments ranging from cosmetic to life-saving surgeries, Indians, Indonesians, Russians, Mexicans and Poles were the most open to the idea of being medically mobile. Thirty-one percent or more people in each of those countries said they would definitely consider traveling for a medical or dental treatment. Conversely, people in Japan, South Korea, Spain and Sweden were least likely to be medical tourists. Boyon said it was not surprising that men and women from emerging nations would be medically mobile if the treatments were cheaper. “This probably reflects perceptions of medical care in other countries that is superior to what is available at home,” he said. But he was intrigued by the percentage of people in developed nations such as Italy, where 66 percent said they would definitely or probably consider medical tourism, along with Germany (48 percent), Canada (41 percent) and the United States, where 38 percent of people were open to the idea. “It is a reflection that the medical profession is no longer protected from globalization,” Boyon said. Although medical tourism spans a range of treatments, the most common are dental care, cosmetic surgery, elective surgery and fertility treatment, according to an OECD report. “The medical tourist industry is dynamic and volatile and a range of factors including the economic climate, domestic policy changes, political instability, travel restrictions, advertising practices, geo-political shifts, and innovative and pioneering forms of treatment may all contribute towards shifts in patterns of consumption and production of domestic and overseas health services,” the report said. Various studies using different criteria have estimated that anywhere between 60,000 to 750,000 U.S. residents travel abroad for health care each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Along with variations among countries, the Ipsos survey showed that younger adults under 35 years of age were more likely in most countries to consider medical tourism, than people 50 to 64 years old. In India, 86 percent of young adults said they would consider medical tourism, along with 77 percent in China, and 71 percent in Italy. Boyon suggested that the cost of travel, proximity, borders and quality of care may also be factors considered by potential medical tourists. In both Italy and Germany, about 20 percent of adults said they would definitely consider medical tourism. Both countries are near Hungary, a popular destination for health treatments. Ipsos conducted the poll in Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Great Britain, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Poland, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Turkey and the United States.
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26348
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“So 2 doctors from Bakersfield discover that coronavirus mortality rate is 0.03%. 13x less deadly than what was previously thought! Their analysis has since been banned from YouTube.”
|
Two doctors from Bakersfield, California, called for an end to statewide shutdowns and said testing data showed the infection fatality rate in California to be 0.03%. Experts said their calculations were faulty because the data they used to extrapolate to the entire state was “not representative of the state of California.” Video of their press conference was removed from YouTube. Leading medical associations “emphatically condemn(ed)” their findings in a statement.
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false
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Public Health, Facebook Fact-checks, California, Coronavirus, Facebook posts,
|
"A call from two California doctors to end statewide shutdowns gained national attention in April, and the eye-popping claims they made about COVID-19’s death rate — while widely disputed by public health experts — are still spreading on Facebook. ""So 2 doctors from Bakersfield discover that coronavirus mortality rate is 0.03%,"" the April 28 Facebook post said. ""13x less deadly than what was previously thought! Their analysis has since been banned from YouTube! Wow!"" 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.) But the doctors, owners of Accelerated Urgent Care in Bakersfield, Calif., did not prove the mortality rate for COVID-19 patients is 0.03%. They pitched a theory that experts said was based on faulty calculations and leading medical associations ""emphatically condemn(ed)"" as ""reckless and untested musings."" Precise fatality rates for any new disease are tough to pin down, especially early in a pandemic. Many mild COVID-19 cases go unreported, making it hard to estimate how many infected individuals have died. Plus, the death toll due to COVID-19 could be higher than we know. Nevertheless, the way the doctors made their calculations was problematic, experts said. The Bakersfield doctors used the infection rate among patients tested at their clinics and in California to extrapolate to the entire state and put the fatality rate for infected individuals at 0.03%. They made the claims in an April 22 press conference broadcast by local news. They said 340 of the 5,213 patients they had tested at their clinics had returned positive results, meaning roughly 6.5% had COVID-19. On the state level, testing data from April 21 showed roughly 12% of tests coming back positive, they said. Scaling out to the entire state’s population, they estimated that 4.7 million Californians had been infected — 12% of the state’s total population of roughly 39.5 million people. They used that and the known number of California deaths at the time to get a fatality rate of 0.03%. Dr. Dan Erickson, one of the physicians, said the data showed ""millions of cases, small amount of death,"" adding that the fatality rate was close to that for the flu, which hovers under 0.1%. The doctors found a receptive audience in Fox News hosts Laura Ingraham and Tucker Carlson. Ingraham interviewed them on her show, and Carlson hyped their findings before claiming, in a statement experts said was misguided, that the coronavirus ""just isn’t nearly as deadly as we thought."" Tesla CEO Elon Musk also shared the briefing on Twitter. The doctors did not respond to requests for comment sent through their website. The doctors’ press conference made waves on social media. But soon after it aired, the calculations supporting their push to end shutdowns were roundly disputed. YouTube removed the video from its platform, citing a community guidelines violation. The American College of Emergency Physicians and the American Academy of Emergency Medicine ""emphatically condemn(ed)"" the doctors’ opinions in a statement. ""The data cited by Drs. Erickson and Massihi is extrapolated from a small population to the state of California, resulting in misleading conclusions regarding the mortality of COVID-19. Their data is flawed and represents selection bias,"" the statement said. The University of Washington’s Carl T. Bergstrom wrote on Twitter that the doctors’ calculations amounted to ""sampling bias"" because patients seeking tests likely think they’re sick. The doctors’ calculations are like ""estimating the average height of Americans from the players on an NBA court,"" he said. ""Those are most likely people who had been symptomatic or had a reason to be tested,"" said Thomas Novotny, professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at San Diego State University’s School of Public Health. ""That’s not representative of the state of California."" Testing guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have encouraged health care providers to prioritize patients with symptoms, Novotny noted. The doctors’ comparison of the 0.03% rate they calculated with the flu’s mortality rate was also misleading, Novotny said. The first is ""a temporal estimate for what’s going on with COVID,"" he said, while the second is ""reported every year retrospectively."" ""That’s something that’s not comparable,"" he said. Some of the first widely reported figures have been case fatality rates, which are calculated as the number of known deaths divided by the number of confirmed cases. But case fatality rates don’t reflect the true count of infections, experts say. Tests for antibodies in the blood of people exposed to the coronavirus have offered early glimpses at the fatality rates for all infected individuals in certain geographic areas, although concerns about false positive results have led some experts to question the findings. One thing we can say for sure? The Bakersfield doctors didn’t ""discover that coronavirus mortality rate is 0.03%,"" as the Facebook post claimed. They made an estimate, and experts said that estimate was flawed. A Facebook post said: ""So 2 doctors from Bakersfield discover that coronavirus mortality rate is 0.03%. 13x less deadly than what was previously thought! Their analysis has since been banned from YouTube."" The Bakersfield doctors used testing data to argue that the death rate for COVID-19 infections is 0.03%. Their conclusions were disputed by experts and leading medical associations. The video was removed by YouTube, according to reports."
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9597
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Treating PTSD With Virtual Reality Therapy: A Way to Heal Trauma
|
This story from ABC News looks at the use of virtual reality (VR) technologies to help treat patients suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Unfortunately the information is relayed in a cursory and anecdotal way: The story includes the viewpoint of only one patient and the patient’s psychologist. The story doesn’t place the work in a broader context. For example, readers could easily assume that PTSD treatment with VR is a new phenomenon, when it has been the subject of research for almost 20 years. Also lacking: The context of other established, effective therapies; a discussion of the availability of VR treatment options for PTSD patients; what such treatments may cost; or whether there are any potential risks associated with such treatment. PTSD is, unfortunately, far from rare. According to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ National Center for PTSD, 10 percent of U.S. women and 4 percent of U.S. men will experience PTSD during their lifetime, and those percentages are higher for veterans. The center estimates that 8 million U.S. adults experience the condition each year. PTSD can have significant adverse effects on a patient’s relationships and overall quality of life. There is some evidence that it can also increase the likelihood that an individual will try to commit suicide. In short, PTSD is a serious condition that affects a great many people. It is important to discuss this condition openly and honestly, both to destigmatize PTSD and to raise awareness of treatment options. But it is important to answer fundamental questions that people may have about those treatment options. Are they available? Are they affordable? How well do they work? What are their limitations? This story addresses none of those baseline questions.
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false
|
ptsd
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The story does not address cost. This is particularly problematic, given that cost is a particularly timely issue for the field of virtual reality treatment of PTSD. A Tech Insider story published earlier this year paid particular attention to the recent rise of virtual reality (VR) technology, and the corresponding decrease in the cost of that technology. That story quoted the same researcher who is quoted in this ABC News story. In the Tech Insider piece, the researcher says: “It has not been the theory or research that has held back clinical VR, rather the availability, adoption and costs that have limited its widespread use.” We wish this story had addressed the issue. Benefits are not quantified. In fact, with the exception of one patient’s experience, benefits aren’t discussed. And for that one patient, the benefits are discussed in only vague terms. Potential harms aren’t discussed. Even if there are few or no risks, that needs to be addressed. And there is the potential that VR therapy could lead to profound psychological distress for some patients. A chapter in the 2009 book Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder highlights the issue, saying that researchers have reported that at least one patient has discontinued treatment “due to experiencing a distressing flashback.” The chapter authors note that “While this is rarely reported in the exposure literature, this report highlights the need for well-trained clinicians with expertise in the delivery of exposure therapy at a rate that the patient can effectively handle and process and in the sensitive monitoring of patient status.” In other words, this is an issue worth mentioning. The quality of evidence isn’t discussed. This story makes it sound as if the research on VR treatment for PTSD is being done only in one place by one group of researchers. But there are papers on VR treatment for PTSD dating back to the late 1990s (like this one), and the work has been done with patients who experienced trauma in a variety of contexts outside of the battlefield. The story doesn’t mention any of the studies done in this field. No disease mongering here. The story cites one patient and one researcher who has worked with the patient. There is no third-party input and no expert evaluation on the state of the field as a whole. The story does discuss exposure therapy, but only in the context of explaining one researcher’s approach to using VR to treat PTSD. There is no attempt to compare the effectiveness of VR treatment to any other form of treatment — including exposure therapy. It’s worth noting that a review article of the existing literature, published in 2012, found little difference between VR therapy and exposure therapy, but reported that it may be useful for patients who are resistant to traditional exposure therapy. There is no discussion in the story of pharmaceutical treatment options, or of effective psychotherapy methods, such as cognitive-behavioral therapy and others. Also, a note on this statement: “Virtual reality offers a unique opportunity for clinicians and clients alike: to be immersed in the environment that evokes the original trauma, rather than relying on the patient’s imagination.” This could be interpreted to mean that patients “relying on [their] imagination” are not experiencing relevant stimuli–when in fact patient memories can be vivid, painful and very salient. There is no discussion of the availability of VR treatment options for PTSD. Readers could easily assume that it is currently available only at the research center discussed in the story. According to that research center’s own website, it provides treatment at more than 60 sites — and that doesn’t even account for the availability of VR treatment from other providers. For readers who may be interested in learning more about VR treatment opportunities (much less taking advantage of them), this complete lack of information about availability must be frustrating. As noted above, researchers have been evaluating the use of VR treatment to address PTSD since the late 1990s. It’s not clear what is novel about the approach being described in this particular story, nor why the story is being told now. As noted above, an overview of some of the previous work is available in an (open access) review article that was published in 2012. The story does not appear to be based on a news release.
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41643
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CCGs increased their spending on mental health by 6.3% last year while their overall funding increased by 3.7%.
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This is the increase in spending by CCGs on mental health compared to their overall core services budget allocation. The figures don’t account for inflation. Factoring that in, mental health spending went up by 3.9% over that time and overall CCG budgets went up by 1.5%.
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unproven
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health
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Spending on mental health went up by £575 million last year. This refers to the increase in spending by Clinical Commissioning Groups, but doesn’t account for inflation. Factoring that in the increase was around £368 million. It’s not a complete picture of mental health spending because other money is spent by the NHS on specialised mental health services. The figures on this aren’t regularly published. Claim 1 of 2
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11200
|
Fighting Prostate Cancer: Experimental Drug Helps Shrink Prostate Tumors
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"This is a case study in how news is not made, and then is suddenly made. Earlier this month at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting, Mayo Clinic researchers presented a paper on an experimental drug therapy with an immunotherapeutic agent called MDX-010 or ipilimumab used in combination with standardized hormone treatment and radiation therapy for men with inoperable prostate cancer. They reported that two men had their tumors shrink to the point where they could have surgery. CBS didn’t cover the story then. We’re not sure if any mainstream news organizations did. But on Friday, June 19, the Mayo Clinic sent out a news release about the work. And on Monday, June 22, the CBS Early Show had a segment on the work. In its rush to air, the segment actually never described what happened to the men – now described as ""three men"" (not the two men in the conference abstract). The correspondent did go to great lengths to explain that the study was ""very preliminary….early phase II…extraordinarily early.” ""Normally we would not cover a study like this. … Why are we even reporting it? Because it’s just very interesting as a proof of concept."" OK, on the surface. But if CBS now followed an editorial policy of reporting on all early phase II studies that pointed to ""proof of concept"" in 2 or 3 study subjects, they would never have time to report on Iran or the economy or anything else. It’s an interesting piece of research – no question about that. But there is a list from here to the moon of early pieces of research progress in 2-3 people that didn’t pan out in the long run. And even at this point today there are many questions, such as, ""What happened to the other men in the trial?"" Was this ready for network television, with the anchor saying ""Wow. This is big time stuff."" ??? Then the segment should have had at least one independent cancer expert on the air explaining why that is so, and putting the new research into the context of what else is being studied for prostate cancer."
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mixture
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"Costs weren’t described but we can understand why with such an early stage of research. This is where it gets tricky. The abstract of this work presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting earlier this month described 85 men in the trial – of whom 5 showed ""robust treatment response"" of whom 2 showed ""dramatic and indisputable down-staging of their disease."" But this TV segment talked about 108 men in a trial. It suddenly started talking about ""three patients"" but we were never really told what happened to them. This is one of the problems with reporting on non-published work. Which data at which point are we supposed to follow? The segment only briefly stated ""there are some side effects"" and thenmentioned auto-immune colitis in two patients. We wish we were given more details, but will give the story the benefit of the doubt on this criterion. While the correspondent emphasized that the work was ""extraordinarily early,"" he didn’t explain that the latest work hadn’t been published nor peer reviewed. He actually also neglected to explain what actually happened to the three men briefly mentioned in the segment. We know something happened to them – presumably good – but we don’t know what. In fact, the anchor leads in with, ""What is the big news from this study?"" What study? We’re never told. Not where it was done or anything. The producers could have at least put that information in a graphic while the anchor and correspondent were talking. No overt disease mongering. Segment said the research was ""especially applicable for people who have inoperable prostate cancer."" The segment included no interviews with independent cancer experts, prostate cancer specialists, or immunology researchers. The segment didn’t put the new experimental approach into the context of existing treatments or of alternative experimental approaches for prostate cancer. The correspondent appropriately described the study as ""very preliminary….early phase II…extraordinarily early."" Not too extraordinarily early to put on the network TV, but…… For a television report, this segment went to great strides to try to explain what was novel about this experimental approach. We wish it had put the new work into the context of other immunologic approaches that have been or are being researched. CBS pretty clearly followed a Mayo Clinic news release and/or a Mayo Clinic publication. There is no other reason this is in the news now. It was presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting weeks ago and CBS didn’t cover it then. Mayo sent out a news release on Friday. This aired Monday morning."
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