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92bf3dcd939679c9b3c446ecf8c0bf7c | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/06/29/actions-needed--improved-lab-safety/29296625/ | Senators, health experts demand action to address biolab accidents | Senators, health experts demand action to address biolab accidents
Key members of Congress, public health leaders and biosecurity experts demand better oversight and accountability for laboratories in the wake of a USA TODAY Network investigation that revealed widespread safety lapses and pervasive secrecy that obscures failings by researchers and regulators.
The investigation uncovered hundreds of lab accidents and near-miss incidents that occurred in biological laboratories working with dangerous pathogens in recent years, putting scientists and sometimes even the public at risk. Oversight of labs is fragmented and largely self-policed, and even when labs commit the most egregious safety violations, they are allowed to keep operating and their names are kept secret by federal officials, the investigation showed.
The "lack of transparency and significant variability in how safety lapses are reported and reprimanded across all levels of government is very concerning," said U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.
Johnson, R-Wis., said research on high-risk pathogens is important to protecting public health, but "we need to ensure agencies are holding labs accountable and shoring up trust in this program through reasonable transparency and communication with the public."
U.S. Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the ranking Democrat on the committee, said high-profile laboratory mishaps in recent months "underscore the need for our federal government to improve the way it handles select agents and infectious diseases at high-containment research facilities."
Much of the oversight of labs working with "select agents" — the government's term for viruses, bacteria and toxins that have the potential to be used as bioweapons — is hidden from public view, making it difficult to determine the effectiveness of the inspection and enforcement program. Labs that work with other dangerous microbes that aren't on the government's select agent list — such as tuberculosis bacteria and the MERS virus — are largely self-policed when it comes to biosafety.
More than 100 labs working with select agent pathogens have faced enforcement actions since 2003, the USA TODAY investigation revealed last month. Five labs have had "multiple referrals" for sanctions, two labs have been kicked out of the program and five labs have been suspended from doing any work with these kinds of pathogens. Regulators with the Federal Select Agent Program refuse to release the labs' names, citing a 2002 bioterrorism law they say requires such secrecy.
Former senator Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut independent who chaired the Senate's homeland security committee before he left Congress in 2013, said he hopes USA TODAY's reporting "spurs interest in the Administration and among lawmakers to reform a system that is clearly flawed." He called for "overhauling" the Federal Select Agent Program.
Lieberman co-chairs a Blue Ribbon Study Panel on Biodefense examining U.S. readiness for bioterrorism and emerging disease. The panel, sponsored by the Hudson Institute think-tank and funded in part by biotech companies, includes former Homeland Security secretary Tom Ridge and former Health and Human Services secretary Donna Shalala.
Regulation by the Federal Select Agent Program "does not fully address underlying issues in pathogen security, including human error and an inadequate culture of transparency and security awareness," Lieberman said. Some aspects of the program are "so burdensome and drawn out" that they discourage scientists from doing biomedical and biodefense research.
Lab regulators at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which jointly run the Federal Select Agent Program, did not respond to requests for comment on criticisms of the program.
Since last summer, lab safety has drawn concern from the public and policymakers in the wake of several high-profile accidents at federal laboratories. Last year, labs at the CDC had serious mishaps with anthrax, Ebola virus and a deadly strain of avian influenza, and forgotten vials of deadly smallpox virus were discovered in an unauthorized storage room at the National Institutes of Health. In recent weeks, the Pentagon has scrambled to locate dozens of live anthrax specimens an Army lab in Utah mistakenly shipped to labs across the country and abroad for 10 years that were believed to have been killed with irradiation but weren't fully inactivated.
These incidents are just a few of the hundreds that have occurred in recent years at labs operated by universities, private defense contractors and government agencies, the USA TODAY investigation revealed.
"The number of lapses in biosafety that were uncovered is alarming," said Amesh Adalja, a senior associate at the UPMC Center for Health Security, a think-tank that studies policy issues relating to biosecurity, epidemics and disasters.
Gregory Koblentz, deputy director of the biodefense graduate program at George Mason University in Virginia, expressed similar concern. "The overall scope of what you uncovered was surprising," he said. "Another really compelling point your series highlighted is how fragmented our oversight system is on biosafety. … We really need to have a nationwide, centralized biosafety oversight system."
Richard Ebright, a biosafety expert at Rutgers University in New Jersey who has testified before Congress, said lab oversight by the CDC and USDA is clearly ineffective. Ebright said both agencies have conflicts of interests as regulators because they conduct research in their own labs and their departments fund studies at facilities receiving inspections.
Koblentz and Adalja noted that in 2009 — in the wake of another string of lab incidents — a task force of several federal agencies made numerous recommendations for improving biosafety. Adalja said, "The degree to which the task force's recommendations have or have not been implemented — and if not, why not — merits investigation in its own right."
The recommendations of the Trans-Federal Task Force on Optimizing Biosafety and Biocontainment Oversight included identifying or establishing a federal agency to coordinate biosafety for all BSL-3 and BSL-4 labs and mandating compliance with key biosafety measures, which are considered to be guidelines. It called for creating a voluntary and non-punitive lab incident reporting system to analyze trends.
Six years later, it appears such recommendations have not been implemented. The task force was co-chaired by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the USDA. It's unclear what happened after the recommendations were made or who was responsible for acting on them.
HHS officials did not answer USA TODAY's questions, instead issuing a general statement that the department "is strongly committed" to ensuring lab safety and security and that since the 2009 report, "we have and continue to implement concrete measures to improve the handling of hazardous microbiological agents and toxins in our labs." HHS provided no examples of actions taken to identify a single federal agency to oversee biosafety, mandate compliance with biosafety guidelines or create a better incident reporting system.
Former HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who held the position at the time the task force issued its recommendations, was traveling and unavailable for an interview. USDA officials involved with the task force were traveling and unavailable for comment, a spokesperson said.
Officials with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy did not respond to requests for comment about the 2009 recommendations, but they noted other recent actions taken to improve safety and assess the select agent regulations.
Creating a better lab incident reporting system — and process for disseminating lessons learned — is critical to reducing lab accidents, several experts said.
"People need to learn from those mistakes, but it's awfully hard to learn about mistakes that are made and what can be learned from them if you never hear about them," said Eric Blank, senior director of public health systems at the Association of Public Health Laboratories.
Blank said the United States needs to create a more comprehensive biosafety program for laboratories and not focus only on select agents with an emphasis on security. He said Canada's system of lab oversight could serve as a model.
The lack of transparency about lab incidents, federal oversight and enforcement actions — and even the whereabouts of research facilities experimenting with risky pathogens are other issues that need addressing, some public health experts and community advocates said.
Of particular concern are high-containment labs that work with the most dangerous microbes, yet there is no publicly available list of the facilities and even health departments and the federal government don't know where they all are. USA TODAY's "Biolabs in Your Backyard" project identified more than 200 biosafety level 3 and 4 lab facilities nationwide and disclosed in an online interactive database information about their research and more than 20,000 pages of their safety records collected lab-by-lab.
USA TODAY's database of labs is a "good start," but it's not comprehensive and local public health officials need federal regulators to share information about the labs and the types of pathogens they work with, said Blank, whose association's members include health department laboratories that monitor and detect health threats in their communities and respond to outbreaks.
"It's a challenge, as you noted in the article, to get information from the various federal programs. They're not particularly forthcoming, and that's kind of puzzling," Blank said.
"Public health is supposed to be a full partner in homeland security issues," said Jeff Levi, executive director of the Trust for America's Health, a national non-profit group that watchdogs public health issues.
Health officials must know about labs and lab incidents in their communities to be prepared to respond quickly to assess for any threat to public health, identify those who may have been exposed and, if needed, assist in arranging quarantine or ensuring infection control, said Chris Aldridge, senior director for infectious diseases and informatics at the National Association of County and City Health Officials.
The mistakes with shipments of live anthrax by the Army's Dugway Proving Ground are an example of how local public health labs and officials become the front-line responders when incidents happen, Aldridge and Blank noted.
Transparency about labs and incidents needs to extend to the public, said Scott Yundt, an attorney for Tri-Valley CAREs, a community-based watchdog group in Livermore, Calif., that has monitored activities at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory since 1983.
"Once these labs are operating, there really is no engagement with the public at all," Yundt said. He said there needs to be legislation to require regular disclosures of lab operations and incidents, similar to weekly public reporting required about safety issues at nuclear facilities done through the independent Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board.
Yundt said the public and policymakers should be able to readily find out, at least in general terms, the kinds of pathogens and research underway at each facility. Without that information, it's difficult to compare what labs are doing and determine whether efforts are duplicated and taxpayer money is used efficiently. He said labs' claims that releasing information poses a terrorism risk are overblown.
Koblentz at George Mason University said the issues around biosafety have more traction than they have in several years.
"I think there is a window of opportunity here to put in place some much more effective oversight mechanisms," he said. "We've been lucky that the incidents that happened last summer and that are ongoing with Dugway, as far as we know, haven't involved any infections. This is a wakeup call."
Read full coverage of USA TODAY's ongoing investigation of lab safety and security issues at biolabs.usatoday.com.
Follow USA TODAY investigative reporter Alison Young on Twitter: @alisonannyoung
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a1f33b9abd9d83759d34ca744d8d9c3e | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/06/30/black-churches-fires-charleston-shooting/29516267/ | Fires at black churches raise concern | Fires at black churches raise concern
Fires at several predominantly black churches in Southern states the past two weeks — at least three of them attributed to arson — raise concerns about potential fallout from the recent South Carolina church shooting.
The fires have all taken place in the weeks since the attack June 17. A 21-year-old man with apparent white supremacist beliefs is accused of going on a shooting rampage inside the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., killing nine people.
The burned churches are in Florida, Tennessee, North Carolina and South Carolina. Federal investigators are looking into some of the cases to determine whether hate crimes were the cause, but so far the fires do not appear to be related.
And Tuesday night, a fire raged through a prominent African-American church, Mount Zion African Methodist Episcopal, in Greeleyville, S.C. that was burned to the ground by the KKK in 1995. Authorities said it was too soon to tell what caused the fire, which took place during a night of frequent storms and lightning strikes.
The fire rekindled painful memories from the arson that destroyed the church 20 years ago, Williamsburg County Councilman Eddie Woods Jr. told the Associated Press.
"That was a tough thing to see," Woods said. "It is hurting those people again. But we're going to rebuild. If this was someone, they need to know that hate won't stop us again,"
"This is a systematic attack against the black church," said the Rev. Anthony Evans, president of the National Black Church Initiative, a coalition of 34,000 African-American churches. Evans said he's had several conference calls with black church leaders across the USA about the fires. "We are on alert status."
The fact that the recent fires occurred so close together in the wake of the Charleston shooting could be cause for concern, said Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center. The fires may be retaliation for the backlash against the Confederate flag that followed the shootings, he said. After photos surfaced of suspect Dylann Roof wearing Confederate flag patches, retailers such as Walmart and Amazon suspended sales of the flag because of its popularity with white supremacists. Four of the rebel flags were recently removed from the state Capitol grounds in Alabama, and South Carolina lawmakers will decide whether or not to do the same next month.
Websites popular with white supremacists, such as Stormfront.org, lit up with angry denouncements of the treatment of the Confederate flag, Potok said.
"The single most suspicious thing about these fires is that they came so close together and so hard on the heels of attacks on the Confederate battle flag," Potok said. "That is a revered symbol for the radical right."
Some of the church fires were severe, such as the one last week at Briar Creek Road Baptist Church in Charlotte, which gutted an entire church wing. The FBI is investigating.
Others, such as the fire at College Hill Seventh-day Adventist Church in Knoxville, Tenn., were less damaging. Firefighters arrived at that church at around 10 p.m. June 21 to find a church van in flames in the parking lot and smoldering piles of hay and bags of soil near a side entrance, said Capt. D.J. Corcoran, a spokesman with the Knoxville Fire Department.
There were no obvious signs pointing to a hate crime, and the property was mostly unhurt, he said. The incident remains under investigation.
Potok said he is waiting on results of the investigations before drawing connections between the fires and the Charleston shooting. There has been a history of church fires after major events.
Hours after Barack Obama was elected as the nation's first black president in November 2008, arsonists torched the predominantly black Macedonia Church of God in Christ in Springfield, Mass.
Attacks on black churches have a long history in this country, said Mark Pitcavage, director of investigative research at the Anti-Defamation League.
Dating to post-Civil War Reconstruction, members of the Ku Klux Klan targeted black churches as a way of terrorizing the black community, he said. One of the most infamous attacks is the bombing in 1963 of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala., which killed four girls, ages 11 to 14.
As recently as the mid-1990s, a rash of church fires prompted the formation of the National Church Arson Task Force. The group investigated 429 arsons and bombings of churches from 1995 to 1997 but found only a handful of cases involved hate groups.
That does little to quiet the fears of folks such as Evans, who has reached out to the Department of Justice about the attacks.
"This is a nationwide attack on the black church," he said. "We're taking it very seriously."
Contributing: The Associated Press
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ae903f9dbcb9fab6ffe60c4cb06592c8 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/06/30/obama-overtime-workers/29496891/ | Obama to propose expanding overtime for millions | Obama to propose expanding overtime for millions
President Obama detailed a proposed plan on Monday that would widen the circle of salaried employees able to receive overtime benefits in an opinion piece published in The Huffington Post.
In the piece, Obama asserts that an exemption that was intended for highly paid white collar employees affects workers making as little as $23,660. Under the president's plan, overtime protections would go to salaried employees who make up to $50,400 per year.
"We've got to keep making sure hard work is rewarded," the president writes. "Right now, too many Americans are working long days for less pay than they deserve."
Obama maintains this is not only good for employees, but also for employers who are now paying employees what they deserve and are being undercut by those who don't.
The plan would strengthen the middle class, the president says.
"Will we accept an economy where only a few of us live exceptionally well?" Obama writes. "Or will we push for an economy where every American who works hard can contribute to and benefit from our success?"
"In this country, a hard day's work deserves a fair day's pay. That's at the heart of what it means to be middle class in America."
The increased salary ceiling would bring overtime benefits to about 15 million more workers, Ross Eisenbrey, vice president of the Economic Policy Institute, told Bloomberg Business.
The Society for Human Resource Management said in a statement Monday that while it understands the need to improve employee compensation, it also is concerned that the non-profit and service economy sectors will be disproportionately affected by the proposed plan. The proposal also would force employers to have to track time of salaried managers and stick to rigid schedules, "all of which will have a significant impact on employee morale," the statement read.
The National Retail Federation, which represents retailers in more than 45 countries, argues that the plan might motivate employers to rework supervisory structures and reduce the numbers of entry-level management jobs, according to Bloomberg.
Americans United for Change, an advocacy group, praised the proposed rule as one that would help close the "income inequality gap."
It is not just good for workers putting in extra time without compensation, said Jeremy Funk, the group's communications director. "It's also good for the economy as a whole, because putting more money in the pockets of hard-working middle class families means more demand for goods and services from local businesses."
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46ea6ab22a1f8a5e301944bd16cd8f3e | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/06/30/trump-sues-univision-over-miss-usa/29537631/ | Trump sues Univision for dumping Miss USA telecast | Trump sues Univision for dumping Miss USA telecast
Donald Trump sued Univision for $500 million on Tuesday, days after his disparaging remarks about Mexican immigrants prompted the leading Spanish-language broadcaster to drop its July telecast of the Miss USA pageant.
The suit, filed in New York by his Miss Universe Organization, called Univision's decision "in reality, a politically motivated attempt to suppress Mr. Trump's freedom of speech under the First Amendment as he begins to campaign for the nation's presidency." He accuses Univision of violating their multi-year deal.
"Always fight back when right," Trump tweeted.
Univision Networks' president of programming, Alberto Ciurana, was named as a co-defendant. In a photo he posted to his Instagram account, Ciurana compared Trump to Dylann Roof, the 21-year-old man charged with murdering nine African Americans in a Charleston, S.C., church.
The complaints says the photo, which was later removed, became "the subject of hundreds, if not thousands of press articles, yet another example of Univison's dubious efforts to create a false narrative in an attempt to upset Mr. Trump's longstanding personal and business relationship with the Hispanic community."
In response, Univision called Trump's suit "both factually false and legally ridiculous."
"Our decision to end our business relationship with Mr. Trump was influenced solely by our responsibility to speak up for the community we serve," the statement added.
During a June 16 news conference announcing his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination, the real estate mogul proposed a "great wall" along the Southern border, paid for by Mexico, which he accused of "sending" immigrants who are criminals, drug dealers and "rapists."
Univision said it would "continue to fight against Mr. Trump's ongoing efforts to run away from the derogatory comments he made" about Mexican immigrants.
In a news release announcing the legal action, Trump doubled down on those comments.
"Nothing that I stated was different from what I have been saying for many years. I want strong borders, and I do not support or condone illegal immigration," he said. "There is a high level of crime occurring in this country due to unchecked illegal immigration. This is a major security issue for the United States."
Attacking U.S.-Mexico trade deals, he added, "I have great respect for Mexico and love for the Mexican people and their tremendous spirit! However, their leaders and trade negotiators are far smarter than those representing the United States, and our citizens and economy are suffering greatly as a result.
"That won't happen if I become president— this disturbing trend will end and it will end quickly," he said.
On Monday, NBC, which has been a 50% owner of the pageant since 2002, severed its ties with Trump and also dropped plans to televise the July 12 pageant in Baton Rouge, La.
Tuesday, co-host Cheryl Burke announced that she, too, is backing out.
Nonetheless, Trump says the show will go on.
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c28bb9293d96097f3a3ea10b43a48c0f | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/01/children-jump-fire-atlanta/29562387/ | 2 girls jump from window to escape Atlanta fire | 2 girls jump from window to escape Atlanta fire
Atlanta, Ga. (WXIA) -- Two girls jumped to safety from a fire in an apartment north of Atlanta on Tuesday.
At the scene, one of the girls in a third-floor window called for help after breaking the glass. Two neighbors below coaxed her to jump into their arms. The second girl appeared in the window and also jumped.
"I heard someone banging on the window -- you could see the window all broken, so we just ran over there and helped them out," said Deigo Silva, who caught the girls.
Officials said the fire destroyed the homes of 29 people, including 11 families. The Red Cross assisted those displaced.
Local authorities are investigating the cause of the blaze.
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80cb84038e22edb48b3c4698fb3c07ef | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/01/family-hands-out-grateful-american-coins-to-military/29583807/ | Family hands out Grateful American coins to military | Family hands out Grateful American coins to military
Seven years ago Deborah Benson started brainstorming. She wanted a way to teach her sons, Brock and Max, that heroes aren't rock stars or football players.
Now, the idea she came up with has reached thousands of servicemen and women.
"We've sold over 55,000 coins," she said with a smile. "I've probably coined over 200."
Deborah started the Grateful American coin nonprofit. The proceeds from the sale of her military-themed coins benefit wounded veterans.
"The Marines like the red with the gold and Air Force likes the blue with the silver," she said. "We've seen grown men tear up especially when the boys coin."
"Some veterans still haven't even been thanked and they really should," said 14-year-old Brock, who started handing out the coins with his mom when he was seven. "I thank them for their service and defending our country."
On Wednesday, just a few days before the 4th of July, the family was out at Tampa International Airport searching for men and women in uniform. They handed out nearly a dozen coins and every recipient was grateful.
One was even moved to tears.
"When we came back from (Vietnam), nobody cared," Navy veteran Rip Puls said while wiping his eyes. "It's special to have people come up and thank me for my service."
Puls had a pocket full of coins that reminded him of his friend who he lost in battle. Now, thanks to Deborah and her kids, he has another to add to his collection.
"I'll keep it in my pocket everywhere I go."
The Grateful American coins are for sale. They have donated more than $113,000 to partner organizations, including The Special Operations Warrior Foundation and Paws for Patriots.
To learn more about the Grateful American coin, click HERE.
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3dd1b98ad603b136ecad0bed74110c2d | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/02/measles-death-washington-state/29624385/ | Measles kills first patient in 12 years | Measles kills first patient in 12 years
The USA has suffered its first measles death in 12 years, according to Washington state health officials.
The woman's measles was undetected and confirmed only through an autopsy, according to the Washington State Department of Health. The woman's name was not released, but officials said she lived in Clallam County.
The woman was probably exposed to measles at a medical facility during a measles outbreak this spring, according to the health department. She was at the hospital at the same time as a patient who later developed a rash and was diagnosed with measles. Patients with measles can spread the virus even before showing symptoms.
The woman, who died of pneumonia, had other health conditions and was taking medications that suppressed her immune system, the health department said.
Pneumonia is one of several serious common complications of measles and the most common cause of death from the virus, said William Schaffner, a professor at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville. Measles kills one or two children out of every 1,000 infected, according to the CDC.
It's not surprising that the woman had no obvious measles symptoms; people with compromised immune systems often don't develop a rash when infected with the virus, said Paul Offit, chief of infectious disease at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
The woman's death was a preventable, but predictable, consequence of falling vaccination rates, said Peter Hotez, president of the Sabin Vaccine Institute and Texas Children's Hospital Center for Vaccine Development in Houston.
Measles has surged back in recent years as groups of like-minded parents have opted against fully vaccinating their children. Last year, 644 people contracted the virus.
A measles outbreak that began at Disneyland over the Christmas holidays in December spread across the country, including to Washington state.
So far this year, 178 people have been diagnosed with measles, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Some states have reacted to the outbreaks by passing laws to require more children to be vaccinated. Both California and Vermont this year repealed exemptions that allowed unvaccinated children to attend school because of their parents' personal beliefs.
A USA TODAY investigation earlier this year found that Washington's vaccination levels may not be high enough to prevent outbreaks.
Communities need to vaccinate at least 92% of children to prevent outbreaks, said Robert Glatter, an emergency physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City.
In Washington state in 2013-2014, one-third of the 1,634 schools with kindergartens had vaccination levels for kindergartners under 90%, USA TODAY found.
An additional 263 schools did not have up-to-date vaccination records for that school year when the state provided USA TODAY data this February.
The statewide vaccination rate for the nearly 84,000 kindergartners whose records were collected was 89.5%.
Before vaccines were available, the disease struck 3 million to 4 million Americans a year, hospitalizing 48,000 and killing 500.
During the last major measles epidemic, from 1989 to 1991, measles infected 55,000 people and killed 166. The outbreak spurred the CDC to increase the recommended number of measles shots for children from one to two. The measure dramatically cut the number of measles cases, which hovered around 60 a year until recently.
Measles remains a leading killer of children elsewhere in the world, killing nearly 146,000 in 2013, according to the World Health Organization.
People with compromised immune systems are at high risk from measles. They often can't be vaccinated. Or, if they are vaccinated, their bodies don't respond in a way that protects them from disease, according to the Washington state health department.
There are hundreds of thousands of these patients in the USA, and they depend on others around them to get vaccines, Offit said.
"It's not your right to catch and transmit a potentially fatal infection," Offit said.
By keeping overall levels of measles low, vaccinated people create a wall of protection that prevents disease among vulnerable people, including babies too young to have received their first shots, said William Schaffner, a professor at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville.
"We are responsible not only for our health but for the health of those around us," Schaffner said. "The only way we can protect them from these disease is if we are vaccinated."
Pediatrician Richard Pan, a California state senator who championed his state's tougher vaccine law, said the woman's death shows why vaccines are vital. Opponents of the law already have mounted an effort to repeal the legislation, which was signed by Gov. Jerry Brown Tuesday.
"I'm so sorry to hear about this preventable tragedy," Pan said. "All the more reason we must be vigilant about stopping these deadly diseases now. In my own state, a child is currently in hospice because of a measles complication. This is exactly why the law I wrote needs to take effect."
Measles is one of the most contagious viruses and spreads easily when infected people breathe, cough or sneeze. People who aren't protected — because they haven't had measles or a vaccine — can contract the virus even two hours after an infectious person leaves the room.
The last confirmed measles death in the United States was reported in 2003, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
"These are communicable diseases," Schaffner said. "They don't just happen to me. They can be spread to others, often unknowingly so."
Contributing: Meghan Hoyer.
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31f47814f1488e905e2b1fcbde48dca2 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/07/barbara-comstock-disturbed-by-tsa/29821841/ | Congresswoman 'disturbed' by TSA claims report | Congresswoman 'disturbed' by TSA claims report
U.S. Rep. Barbara Comstock isn't happy with security officers at her home airport Dulles International and its rate of passenger claims of baggage damage, loss and theft at the hands of security screeners.
Comstock, a Republican who represents northern Virginia, wrote to Homeland Security secretary Jeh Johnson on Tuesday in the wake of a report that Dulles has the highest loss claim rate among the nation's 30 busiest airports. That was revealed in a joint investigation by the USA TODAY Media Network and WUSA9 last week.
The Transportation Security Administration paid 331 Dulles travelers about $68,000 over the past five years for claims of lost, broken or stolen items. They ranged from a $24 purse to several hundred dollars for damaged jewelry and electronics.
When adjusted for the number of people served at the nation's busiest airports, Dulles stood out. Orlando International Airport was a close second in terms of paid claims per 1 million estimated passengers screened by TSA.
"This is especially alarming with the rate being close to 50% higher than Baltimore Washington International Airport and surpassing Reagan National Airport by over 150%," Comstock wrote.
Comstock called the issue "a local and personal concern" and demanded answers. She requested DHS provide information on why Dulles had more claims than other airports and details on paid and pending claims.
TSA paid passengers more than $3 million for claims over the last five years, according to the review of about 50,000 complaints. The agency said its investigates each claim filed by a passenger to determine if the TSA or its agents are responsible. The data review by USA TODAY shows the agency approves or settles about one-third of all passenger claims.
TSA officials point out that damage and theft make up a tiny fraction of the 2.5 million bags handled every day—and that bags spend much more time in the hands of airport staff and airline workers.
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17738e1ed77bd42de1a229fcec0c67a3 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/12/states-allowing-women-to-get-birth-control-without-a-prescription/29990205/ | Calif., Ore. allow women to get birth control without a prescription | Calif., Ore. allow women to get birth control without a prescription
California and Oregon will be the first states in the nation to allow women to get birth control pills and other hormonal contraceptives directly from their pharmacists – without a doctor's prescription.
As California officials were busy finalizing regulations on a state law passed in 2013, Oregon's governor Kate Brown signed a similar bill into law last week.
The two measures were hailed by women's health advocates. They noted that men have long had an easier time getting birth control, simply purchasing condoms over the counter.
"We support efforts like these that remove barriers to women gaining access to birth control and other reproductive health care," said Kathy Kneer, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood Affiliates of California, in a written statement.
She added that hormonal contraception has been widely studied and shown to be safe -- "so safe that the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has recommended that it be available over the counter."
The contraceptives won't be available like cough drops or antacids, however. In California, pharmacists can only dispense them after providing a health screening to women and taking their blood pressure. Oregon will also require a health screening, but the state's specific rules haven't been developed.
The laws differ somewhat. California's law has no age restrictions on patients – minors have the same access as adults. In Oregon, pharmacists may only give new birth control prescriptions to women 18 or older. Women under 18 must show proof of prior birth control prescriptions from a physician. Also, Oregon likely will require pharmacists to undergo more training than the one hour of education required of California pharmacists, said Marcus Watt, executive director of the Oregon State Board of Pharmacy.
California's rules are expected to take effect after Oct 1 and Oregon's law after Jan. 1.
Elizabeth Nash, senior state issues associate at the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive health think tank, said other states could end up following California's and Oregon's approaches, depending on how they work.
"A lot of eyes are watching what's going to happen next," she said.
The laws moved ahead despite partisan debate in Congress over access to birth control. There, members of both parties support legislation allowing over-the-counter access – without any prescription -- but Republican legislation would not require insurers to pay for it.
Democrats say that is an attempt to get around requirements to cover prescription birth control under the Affordable Care Act and would effectively make hormonal contraceptives off limits to many poor women. They have introduced a bill that would require insurance coverage of over-the-counter hormonal contraceptives.
California's regulations and Oregon's law do not address insurance coverage of birth control. But California's pharmacists have voiced concerns that insurers won't pay for time spent screening women and dispensing birth control, as they would for a doctor's visit.
Pharmacists in California say they are preparing for the new regulations and hoping to resolve the reimbursement issue. It has taken nearly two years to develop regulations implementing California's 2013 law, which also allows pharmacists to prescribe other medications that once required a doctor's prescription, including travel medicines, smoking cessation treatments and the opioid overdose antidote naloxone.
The overall expansion of pharmacists' prescribing authority is aimed at relieving the burden on physicians faced with an influx of patients newly insured under the Affordable Care Act.
"Honestly, we're really excited," said Ken Thai, part-owner and manager of the El Monte Pharmacy Group, with 10 stores in Southern California. "Medical clinics in the area are overflowing, with long wait times. We're already doing other services like immunizations and cholesterol checks, and our customers already see us as a resource. We're ready for something like this. It's been a long time coming."
Until now, California pharmacists could only provide emergency contraception, also known as the "morning-after pill," without a doctor's prescription.
Most major pharmacy chains will likely participate in offering non-prescription birth control because they were involved in developing the protocols, said Virginia Herold, executive officer of the California State Board of Pharmacy.
Representatives from CVS, Walgreens and Costco would not confirm their chains' participation, either declining to comment or saying that they are awaiting the final regulations.
Some patients welcomed the change – glad for the convenience, if nothing else.
"I think it's really wonderful," said 26-year-old Anne Wong, who lives in San Francisco. "It's a drag to have to go to clinic and talk to the doctor to get birth control pills – it takes a chunk out of your day."
Wong, who at age 17 emigrated with her family from Thailand, said the new access would help women in her community practice safer sex. The topic "is still taboo," Wong said.
But with the new regulations, "I could just tell my parents I'm going to a store for something. All I'd need to do is just walk to the Walgreens near my house."
Kaiser Health News is an editorially independent program of the Kaiser Family Foundation .
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cfce9dbdf276975fd49dcd079cdfbe52 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/13/garner-death-settlement/30111715/ | New York City settles Eric Garner case for $5.9 million | New York City settles Eric Garner case for $5.9 million
Nearly a year to the day after Staten Island police killed an unarmed father of six who was allegedly selling untaxed cigarettes, the City of New York said it had reached a settlement in the case.
The city on Monday agreed to pay the family of Eric Garner $5.9 million, said Scott Stringer, the city's comptroller.
On July 17, 2014, as officer Daniel Pantaleo held Garner in a chokehold and others wrestled him to the ground, Garner pleaded, "I can't breathe." The arrest was caught by a bystander shooting cell phone video, and Garner's death, along with that of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., a few weeks later, generated months of protests against police overreach in encounters with African-American suspects.
A medical examiner ruled Garner's death a homicide, but a Staten Island grand jury last December declined to indict Pantaleo.
Several inquiries into Garner's death are still pending, including investigations by the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, the Civilian Complaint Review Board and state health officials, who are looking into the actions of emergency medical responders who treated Garner, The New York Times reported.
Stringer, who has has made a point of resolving civil rights cases quickly to reduce legal fees, said the settlement "is in the best interests of all parties." While he noted that the city hasn't admitted liability in the case, he said the settlement "acknowledges the tragic nature of Mr. Garner's death."
Garner's family had sought $75 million in damages, and had rejected an earlier offer of $5 million last week, The New York Daily News reported. The city had until Friday, the first anniversary of Garner's death, to settle the case before the family filed a lawsuit.
Garner's family was expected to lead a rally on Saturday outside the Brooklyn offices of the U.S. attorney to call for a federal case to be brought against the officers involved. The Rev. Al Sharpton's National Action Network was expected to participate.
"This is not about people getting money," Sharpton told The Times on Monday. "This is about justice. We've got to restructure our police departments and how we deal with policing nationwide."
Letitia James, the city's public advocate, called the settlement an important first step in achieving justice for Garner's family. She said she hoped it would bring them "a level of closure." James said the city must honor Garner's memory "by ensuring a lasting legacy of reform that fixes a system that has been broken for far too long. We must continue to work together to improve technology and training within the NYPD, codify the powers of a special prosecutor, promote diversity in police leadership, and unseal the minutes from the Garner grand jury."
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, speaking to reporters on Monday before the settlement was announced, said the anniversary of Garner's death was "on the mind of many New Yorkers." He noted that police were being retrained and that the city was moving forward on equipping officers with body cameras, among other measures.
"I think we've come a long way, even in the last year, in terms of bringing police and community together," he said.
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026dd970f3470ff6bb9c6439c0a308e8 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/16/chattanooga-shooter-mohammed-abdulazeez-profile/30265707/?hootPostID=52c4a7574e1fa025b46c6a2fb56a07da | Chattanooga shooter straddled worlds | Chattanooga shooter straddled worlds
The shooting suspect in the deadly Chattanooga rampage was a talented mixed-martial arts fighter of Arab descent who embraced American ideals, but increasingly struggled to balance his Muslim and American worlds, his former trainer said.
The FBI identified Mohammod Youssuf Abdulazeez 24, as the shooter in the Thursday afternoon attack that left four Marines dead. Police haven't said whether the gunman was killed by officers or shot himself.
Federal prosecutors said on Thursday they were investigating the incident as possible "domestic terrorism." Federal law enforcement officials said it appeared the shooter acted alone, but investigators were still looking for any possible associates who may have helped inspire the incident or helped him acquire the weapon, said the officials, who were not authorized to comment publicly.
In the shaded, quiet neighborhood where Abdulazeez lived with his family, about seven miles from the Naval Reserve Center where the killings occurred, neighbors were stunned by the developments.
"I didn't find anything wrong with the kid," neighbor Dean McDaniel said. "He just intermingled with the kids in the neighborhood."
Abdulazeez attended Red Bank High School in Chattanooga and went on to acquire a degree in electrical engineering at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, according to an online resume.
A page in his Red Bank High School yearbook shows a clean-cut Abdulazeez dressed in a tuxedo and smiling next to the quote: "My name causes national security alerts. What does yours do?"
Abdulazeez also had a sporting side. He trained at the Chattanooga Fight Factory, a mixed-martial arts gym, for more than a year when he was 17 and 18 years old, said Scott Schrader, the gym's owner and Abdulazeez's trainer. Abdulazeez worked out three to five days a week at the gym and quickly grew into an aspiring young fighter, he said.
Promptly each evening at 6 p.m., Abdulazeez would interrupt his workout and unfurl his prayer rug in the gym's offices to conduct evening prayers, Schrader said. He would also hang out with Schrader and other friends from the gym at local restaurants and bars, where they would watch mixed-martial art matches.
"You could see he was trying to become more Americanized," he said. "But his family disapproved (of the fighting)."
Abdulazeez had several friends at the gym, but one in particular, a former Chattanooga police officer, would constantly exhort militant Islamic views and threatened anyone who bad-mouthed the faith, Schrader said. The man was the one who introduced Abdulazeez to the Fight Factory and became the young fighter's closest mentor, he said.
In 2010, Schrader drove Abdulazeez more than 100 miles south to compete in the North American Grappling Championships in Atlanta. Grappling is a wrestling-like form of martial arts that doesn't allow striking an opponent. Abdulazeez won a silver medal in his division at the tournament.
"He was a good grappler, a good wrestler," Schrader said. "He was a good, respectful kid. I never had a problem out of him."
A few months after the tournament, Abdulazeez competed in a mixed-martial arts fight. After the fight, his father, who was waiting for him outside the ring, berated him loudly for taking part in the sport, Schrader said. "He was really furious," he said.
Abdulazeez worked out at the gym a few more times after the incident, but showed up less and less, and finally stopped coming altogether. A 2009 caged-in fight between him and fighter Timmy Hall posted on YouTube shows Abdulazeez taking down his opponent and landing several blows, before the two-minute video ends.
But the clean-cut sport fighter was increasingly turning his attention to other things. He maintained an Islam-focused blog that explored the sacrifices Muslims should make in the name of their religion, according to the SITE Intelligence Group, which tracks online terrorist activity.
Three days before the shooting, Abdulazeez published a series of posts stating that "life is short and bitter" and that Muslims should not let "the opportunity to submit to allah…pass you by," according to SITE. He also stressed the sacrifice of the Sahaba (companions of the Prophet) with mention that they "fought Jihad for the sake of Allah," according to the group.
"Every one of them had to make sacrifices in their lives and some even left all their wealth to make hijrah (migration) to Medina," Abdulazeez wrote.
Contributing: Kevin Johnson, USA TODAY and Matt Slovin, The Tennesean
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56b19956f82cb1172a2775f4c1c9ef7f | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/23/movie-theater-lafayette-louisiana-shooting/30599561/ | Gunman opens fire in Lafayette, La. theater: 3 dead, 9 injured | Gunman opens fire in Lafayette, La. theater: 3 dead, 9 injured
A man opened fire with a handgun Thursday night at a movie theater in Lafayette, La., killing two people and injuring at least nine others before killing himself, authorities said.
Sgt. Brooks David of the Louisiana State Police described the alleged shooter in the incident at the Grand Theatre as a white male, about 58, who entered the theater by himself. Authorities know the identity of the man but are not yet releasing it, David said. About 100 people were inside of the theater at the time, authorities said.
The victims range in age from their late teens to their 60s, Lafayette Police Chief Jim Craft said.
The man did have a criminal record but it was "pretty old," according to Craft.
After the man opened fire, he tried to leave with the people fleeing the theater, Craft said. But investigators believe that he spotted two officers in the parking lot, then turned around and went back into the theater. He then fired a single shot, and officers found him dead inside.
"We don't know if this was just a random act or whether it was a domestic situation," Craft said.
Early Friday, Craft said what was believed to be the vehicle of the alleged shooter had been found and a suspicious package was inside. The Louisiana State Police Bomb Squad was investigating, Craft said. The area has been evacuated.
A backpack and other items were inside the vehicle, said Col. Mike Edmonson, Louisiana State Police superintendent.
Another Grand Theatre in the city was closed and additional police were deployed to other theaters as a precautionary measure, Craft said. In addition to representatives from the state police and local police department, representatives for the FBI and the district attorney were on site, Craft said.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal spoke emotionally from the scene, hailing the first responders.
"I want to praise the law enforcers who ran toward danger," Jindal said. "This is a time for us to come together. What we can do now is pray. We can hug these families, shower them with love, thoughts and prayers.
"This is an awful night for Lafayette, an awful night for Louisiana, an awful night for the United States," a somber Jindal said.
President Obama, who arrives in Kenya Friday, was briefed on the shooting aboard Air Force One.
"The thoughts and prayers of everyone at the White House, including the President and First Lady, are with the community of Lafayette," White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said in a statement.
Witness Katie Domingue of Carencro, La., told The Advertiser that she was at the theater with her fiance for the 7 p.m. showing of Trainwreck when, about 20 minutes into the movie, she heard a loud noise. She looked up and saw "an older white man" shooting, but not in her direction, she said.
"He wasn't saying anything," she said. "I didn't hear anybody screaming either."
Domingue said she heard about six shots in all before running with her fiance to the nearest exit, leaving behind her shoes and purse.
Other witnesses described a crazed and chaotic scene.
Nick Judice of the family-owned Judice Inn restaurant across the street from the theater, said there was a full dinner crowd when the shooting took place.
"All of a sudden,people looking out the windows saw people running out of the theater" and ambulances racing up, Judice said. "It's pretty crazy."
Rebecca Vickers, an employee at the Mellow Mushroom pizza restaurant about 50 yards from the scene, said two of her workers who had just finished their shifts were about to enter the Grand Theatre when "cops pulled up and shouted, 'Don't go into the theater!' "
U.S. Rep. Charles Boustany, a Republican who is from Lafayette, said late Thursday that he and his wife were saddened by the incident in his hometown.
"Bridget and I are praying for the families and friends of the victims at this difficult time," Boustany said in a statement. "I will work with the Lafayette Police Department, local, state and federal officials to get to the bottom of what happened tonight."
Actress Amy Schumer, the star of Trainwreck, tweeted: "My heart is broken and all my thoughts and prayers are with everyone in Louisiana."
Contributing: The (Lafayette, La.) Daily Advertiser, Susan Miller in McLean, Va., The Associated Press
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47a7848366bdbba4d0544bd46eff9122 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/27/medicare-mortality-costs-study/30757669/ | 'Jaw-dropping': Medicare deaths, hospitalizations AND costs reduced | 'Jaw-dropping': Medicare deaths, hospitalizations AND costs reduced
The U.S. health care system has scored a medical hat trick, reducing deaths, hospitalizations and costs, a new study shows.
Mortality rates among Medicare patients fell 16% from 1999 to 2013. That’s equal to more than 300,000 fewer deaths a year in 2013 than in 1999, said cardiologist Harlan Krumholz, lead author of a new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) and a professor at the Yale School of Medicine.
“It’s a jaw-dropping finding,” Krumholz said. “We didn’t expect to see such a remarkable improvement over time.”
Researchers based the study on records from more than 68 million patients in Medicare, the federal health insurance program for people age 65 and older.
Researchers were able to find additional information about hospitalization rates and costs among Medicare’s traditional “fee-for-service” program, in which doctors and hospitals are paid for each procedure or visit. This information wasn’t available for people in the managed-care portion of Medicare, which had about 29% of patients in the overall Medicare program in 2013.
Among fee-for-service patients, hospitalization rates fell 24%, with more than 3 million fewer hospitalizations in 2013 than 1999, Krumholz said. When patients were admitted to the hospitals, they were 45% less likely to die during their stay; 24% less likely to die within a month of admission; and 22% less likely to die within a year, the study found.
Costs for hospitalized patients also fell by 15% among fee-for-service patients.
Krumholz said these improvements are probably driven by several important trends.
Hospitals and their staffs get some of the credit. “There has been tremendous focus on making sure that our hospitals are safer and that treatments are more timely and effective,” Krumholz said.
A 1999 report from the Institute of Medicine, which found that hospital errors killed up to 98,000 people a year, jump-started a movement to improve health care, said P.J. Brennan, chief medical officer at the University of Pennsylvania Health System. “That was one of the first shots fired in the patient safety movement,” said Brennan, who was not involved in the new study.
Public health improvements also likely played a part in cutting death rates, Krumholz said. While more Americans today are obese than in the 1990s, the air is generally cleaner and fewer people smoke. New drugs for common conditions such as cancer and heart disease also may have kept people alive longer.
“What’s gratifying is the cost savings don’t appear to have come at the expense of quality,” said Helen Burstin, chief scientific officer at the National Quality Forum, a non-partisan group that aims to improve the quality of health care.
Burstin said she hopes the country will expand its efforts to improve health care quality by focusing on outpatient care, such as that given in nursing homes or by home health aides.
Krumholz said his results shouldn’t encourage complacency.
“The things we’re trying to do to make things better are working,” Krumholz said. “Rather than wave the victory flag, we want to see that trend continue. There’s no reason to take our foot off the pedal.”
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9c3270fa0f8c0c4a36cb00a4e02b3836 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/27/ntsb-southwest-nose-landing-laguardia/30736777/ | NTSB: Southwest nose landing at LaGuardia was captain's fault | NTSB: Southwest nose landing at LaGuardia was captain's fault
The Southwest Airlines pilot who landed nose first and skidded thousands of feet to a halt at New York's LaGuardia Airport two years ago should have aborted the landing, federal accident investigators have determined.
The National Transportation Safety Board blamed the accident July 22, 2013, on the captain's attempt to recover from a bad landing approach by taking control of the Boeing 737-700 from the co-pilot at just 27 feet off the ground, rather than simply circling the airport for another landing attempt.
The board also blamed the captain for failing to comply with Southwest's own standard operating procedures to abort a landing higher off the ground if the descent isn't lined up correctly with the runway.
"The flight crew's performance was indicative of poor crew resource management," the board said in a statement accompanying the decision Thursday.
The board said the incident raised safety concerns because 75% of the aviation accidents investigated featured cues that the pilots should have aborted their landings. Despite airline flight manuals urging pilots to circle the airport after an unstable approach, a study at an International Air Safety Summit in 2011 suggested that pilots continued landing in 97% of unstable approaches.
Southwest's plane landed hard enough that the nose-gear punched up into the plane's electronics bay and it skidded 2,175 feet to a halt, according to investigators.
Eight people suffered minor injuries on the flight; 141 passengers and crewmembers were uninjured.
Southwest fired the captain in October 2013. Documents that investigators released in October 2014 documented friction between the captain and first officer during the landing.
The 49-year-old captain had flown for Southwest more than a decade and she had 12,000 hours of flight time, including 2,600 as pilot in command on a 737, according to investigators.
Southwest had hired the first officer, 44, a year-and-a-half before the accident, after he spent 20 years in the Air Force, investigators said.
The first officer flew the plane from Nashville but said that the captain was giving instructions about the landing. The pilots avoided thunderstorms in the area, but they approached the airport with a tail wind the captain said reached more than 30 mph.
The pilots agreed to set the plane's wing flaps at 40 degrees, rather than the customary 30 degrees, to help slow the plane down, according to investigators. But the first officer told investigators he landed with 30-degree flaps about 98% of the time, and that the higher drag of 40 degrees meant the pilot had to be "on his game."
When the plane was about 500 feet off the ground, the captain noticed that the flaps were still at 30 degrees, so she set them to 40 degrees.
About 100 to 200 feet above ground, the plane was still above the intended glide slope and the captain exclaimed repeatedly "get down," according to investigators.
About 27 feet off the ground, 3 seconds from touch down, the captain took control of the plane by saying "I got it," and the first officer replied, "OK, you got it," according to investigators.
The plane's nose was pointed down 3 degrees and it hit descending at a rate of 960 feet per minute, according to investigators.
Southwest's flight operations manual says any landing should be aborted when the plane isn't in the proper configuration to land at least 1,000 feet in the air. But the flaps were changed at 500 feet and the captain noticed the plane was above the intended glide slope at 100 feet in the air, which investigators said were both opportunities to circle the airport for another try.
The board found that "the captain's decision to take control of the airplane at 27 feet above the ground did not allow her adequate time to correct the airplane's deteriorating energy state and prevent the nose landing gear from striking the runway."
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f74cb024e19148eb113b2d6a11d68f6b | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/28/hamster-mood-angry-study/30803989/ | Study: Hamsters have moods, too | Study: Hamsters have moods, too
If your pet hamster nearly bites off your finger as you try to stroke its fur, don't assume it hates you. Maybe it's just in a bad mood.
Even hamsters have good moods and bad moods, scientists have found – and a hamster's emotional state can influence its outlook on life. A hamster in a sunnier frame of mind is more optimistic, while a gloomier hamster is inclined to a darker view of the world, the researchers learned.
Fortunately, the results confirm that a hamster doesn't need a pay raise or a shopping spree to cheer up. Little things -- a bigger pile of wood chips, a roomier running wheel – will do.
Both pet owners and scientists who work with the creatures should heed the findings, say the authors of the new study, which appears in this week's Royal Society Open Science. Some 1.1 million hamsters are kept as U.S. pets and another 120,000 live in U.S. laboratories.
"Although hamsters are cute, and happy hamsters sounds fun, there are very serious implications," says study author Emily Bethell, an animal behaviorist at Britain's Liverpool John Moores University. If scientists' lab hamsters are stressed, "the animals … aren't actually very good models for their scientific research."
Bethell and her colleague Nicola Koyama worked with Syrian hamsters, the orange-sized fur balls common in pet stores and classrooms. The hamsters were mum about their inner lives, so the researchers had to infer their moods through clever experiments.
The animals were allowed to roam a test area equipped with a single water bottle. If the bottle was to the far left, it held sugar water; if the bottle was to the far right, it held water laced with bitter quinine. The sweet-toothed hamsters quickly learned which was which.
Then the researchers deprived some hamsters of the comforts to which they'd grown accustomed, such as chew sticks. Luckier hamsters, however, got extra wood chips, little huts for snuggling and other perks.
Then hamsters were placed in a test area where the water bottle was confusingly positioned in the middle. The animals living in the nicer digs were more likely to approach the ambiguous bottle, hoping for the best. Many of the hamsters in the more barren homes, on the other hand, didn't bother.
The results suggest that more contented hamsters – like happier humans – are more optimistic. This connection between sunnier mood and optimism has been found in other animals as well, from rats to sheep, so it's no surprise it should be found in hamsters, says neuroscientist Rafal Rygula of the Polish Academy of Sciences, who has done similar work.
"Knowing that hamsters have emotions, and that a small, unenriched cage could make them unhappy and even pessimistic, will for sure make people think twice before deciding on the size and equipment of homes for their little friends," Rygula says via email.
The hamsters involved in Bethell and Koyama's experiments must now be some of the most optimistic animals in existence. They've been adopted by people who know how to treat a hamster right: students specializing in animal behavior and the like.
"They have happy endings here," Bethell says, in "very loving homes."
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0de8f89a26c27f82c75fb729566aa7cc | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/31/5-things-you-need-know-friday/30663493/ | 5 things you need to know Friday | 5 things you need to know Friday
Beijing to host 2022 Winter Olympics
China's capital will host the 2022 Winter Olympics, the International Olympic Committee announced Friday. Beijing hosted the Summer Games in 2008. The city beat Almaty, Kazakhstan. Both candidates faced criticism for their human rights and press freedoms records. An online petition urged IOC members to reject Beijing's bid. Since the Beijing Summer Olympics in 2008, authorities have reportedly cracked down on human rights activists, recently rounding up more than 200 "rights-defender lawyers" and the activists associated with them. Beijing and Almaty were the only two candidates left after four candidates dropped out citing political or financial reasons.
Presidential hopefuls address National Urban League
Presidential contenders for 2016 Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush, Ben Carson, Martin O'Malley and Bernie Sanders will speak at the annual National Urban League conference Friday in Fort Lauderdale. The theme this year is #SaveOurCities, and candidates are expected to share plans for a "more equitable" America. Catch our coverage at onpolitics.usatoday.com.
MLB trade deadline looms
Baseball's trade deadline is Friday at 4 p.m. and what a deadline it is! It's hard to tell the buyers from the sellers this season, but one thing is for sure: You can expect a flurry of activity. (Trades still happen after July 31, of course; they're just complicated by Major League Baseball's waiver process.) And for those who think it's just dollars and cents and statistics, see Wilmer Flores.
Rare blue moon appears Friday night
Skywatchers can catch a glimpse of a rare blue moon Friday after sunset. The name is misleading, however. A blue moon appears gray or silver, just like other full moons. The uniqueness comes in the timing. The phenomenon happens once every three years, when a full moon appears for a second time in a single month. Skywatchers can also see the Delta Aquarids meteor shower Friday, though it will dim against the moon's shine.
It's National Heatstroke Prevention Day
Heatstroke can be deadly and can happen in mere minutes, which is why many public health advocates are trying to raise awareness around the issue. Children are particularly vulnerable, with 38 dying in hot cars every year, most because they were left in their carseats but some because they went into a vehicle without their parents' knowledge. Surprisingly little has been done from a technology standpoint to prevent these deaths, although a new carseat with an alert system will be available at Walmart in August.
Bonus item: Let the bingeing begin — again
Even if you've got a Trapper Keeper full of appointments, you'll want to make time for Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp, the new Netflix series debuting Friday. Based on the 2001 cult classic, original stars — including Bradley Cooper, Amy Poehler and Paul Rudd — are returning, plus some hilarious guests (i.e. Lake Bell and Jon Hamm).
Birthday: "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling turns 50. (It's also Harry's birthday.) Rejoice, all you Muggles!
And, the essentials:
Weather: A soggy, hot Friday is on tap for much of the southern tier of the U.S. while the Northwest bakes and the Northeast gets a break from the humidity.
Stocks:U.S. futures were mixed before the start of regular trading.
Weekend TV: Wondering what to watch this weekend? TV critic Robert Bianco looks at Descendants, Bachelor in Paradise and Island Hunters.
If you missed Thursday's news, we've got you covered here.
Need a break? Try playing some of our games.
You can also subscribe to get the day's top news each weekday in your inbox or find us on the Yo! app: justyo.co/usatoday.
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fb1026cc98c2f71b8764a6ab266040cd | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/07/31/germany-shelves-nazi-crimes-probe--minnesota-man-michael-karkoc-who--exposed--ss-commander/30924353/ | Germany shelves Nazi crimes probe of U.S. man | Germany shelves Nazi crimes probe of U.S. man
BERLIN — German prosecutors have shelved their Nazi war crimes investigation of a retired Minnesota carpenter whom The Associated Press exposed as a former commander in an SS-led unit, saying Friday that the 96-year-old is not fit for trial.
Munich prosecutor Peter Preuss told the AP that Michael Karkoc's attorney had refused to allow him to be examined by a medical expert from Germany, and that his office's decision was instead based on "comprehensive medical documentation" from doctors at the geriatric hospital in the U.S. where he is being treated.
He said doctors there had provided prosecutors with a comprehensive evaluation of Karkoc's health over the past year, which was evaluated by a medical expert in Germany.
"There are no doubts about the authenticity of the documentation of his treatment," Preuss said.
The German investigation began after the AP published a story in 2013 establishing that Karkoc commanded a unit in the SS-led Ukrainian Self Defense Legion accused of burning villages filled with women and children, then lied to American immigration officials to get into the United States a few years after World War II.
A second report uncovered evidence that Karkoc himself ordered his men in 1944 to attack a Polish village in which dozens of civilians were killed, contradicting statements from his family that he was never at the scene.View gallery
Karkoc's family, who live in Minneapolis, have denied he was involved in any war crimes.
The German investigation has taken longer than usual, because prosecutors first had to wait for a court ruling that they had jurisdiction in the case.
That came last year, when the Federal Court of Justice said Karkoc's service in the SS-led unit made him the "holder of a German office."
That gave Germany the legal right to prosecute him even though he is not German, his alleged crimes were against non-Germans and they were not committed on German soil.
Someone in that role "served the purposes of the Nazi state's world view," the court said.
When cases in Germany are shelved they can be reopened at any time if circumstances change, but in this case Preuss said that is very unlikely.
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de91ddb55cb1bd1fb7d22a29c4b36468 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/04/air-conditioning-women-workers/31120009/ | Workplace AC comfy for men -- but not women | Workplace AC comfy for men -- but not women
No wonder so many women at their desks bundle up like polar explorers.
Across the USA, climate-control systems are designed to account for the amount of body heat given off by the average man — even though female office workers produce far less body heat than male workers, according to researchers writing in this week's Nature Climate Change.
The lower heat production, or metabolic rate, of women generally means they "require a warmer environment," says study author and biophysicist Boris Kingma of Maastricht University Medical Center in the Netherlands. "If you create a building that cools a room for somebody with a higher metabolism, and you put somebody in there with a lower metabolism, that person will definitely start using a heater" — or turn up the thermostat.
The study itself is generating some heat among outside scientists who disagree with its conclusions. But the study's authors contend that this gender discrimination of the thermostat dates back decades. Changing it, the researchers say, could benefit both the planet and the countless shivering, cardigan-clad women turning blue in their cubicles.
Kingma tested the metabolic rate of female students by having them don sweatpants and T-shirts and sit in an experimental chamber. On average, the students' rate was up to one-third lower than the male rate used to calculate influential building-temperature targets.
Those temperature targets, published by the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers, call for interiors to be cooled to 73 to 79 degrees in the summer and are widely observed by engineers and building managers in North America. If the targets incorporated the female metabolic rate rather than a male-based rate, the recommended temperature for women would be roughly 2 to 4 degrees higher, Kingma says.
"I can only speculate" on why the targets have ignored women for the last few decades, he says. "I do not think it is on purpose."
The new study is "significant" because it provides further evidence that "females, on average, do feel cooler than males," Pekka Tuomaala, a researcher at the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland who was not involved in the new study, said via email. If climate-control systems accounted for women, energy might be saved and women would be more comfortable, he said.
Other researchers, however, point to simple things like the necktie to explain why women freeze at their desks all summer.
"They authors are probably correct" that women have a lower metabolic rate, says Texas A&M University's Charles Culp, a specialist in building physics. "However, there are many other factors that are really hard to nail down."
For example, women tend to adapt their clothing to summer weather more than men do, says Bjarne Olesen of the Technical University of Denmark, who helped draft the ASHRAE temperature targets. He also points to experiments showing that men and women actually prefer the same temperatures when wearing the same clothes and performing the same activities.
Kingma responds that those same experiments show that women are more sensitive to slight temperature deviations because of their different metabolic rate or body composition or both.
But even men can find themselves shivering in air conditioning set to "Arctic." What we should really be worrying about "is not these gender differences but the fact that we're over-cooling buildings in the summer," says Gail Brager, associate director of the Center for the Built Environment at the University of California, Berkeley. "It's wasting a lot of energy and creating problems with thermal comfort for everyone. … (That's) a much bigger problem to solve."
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e7825ebf26d89e852b8bbddfa5211c7e | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/04/ex-illinois-gov-blagojevich-wants-full-panel-hear-his-appeal/31124581/ | Ex-Illinois Gov. Blagojevich wants full panel to hear his appeal | Ex-Illinois Gov. Blagojevich wants full panel to hear his appeal
CHICAGO —Lawyers for former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich on Tuesday asked the full 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to consider his appeal after a three-judge panel of the same court last month upheld all but five counts of his corruption conviction.
Blagojevich's attorneys made the request in a 46-page filing as the former governor issued a statement vowing to “fight on” and declaring that “at stake is nothing less than the rule of law.” It’s the first statement from the governor since he entered prison 3-½ years ago.
“There is nothing I desire more than to return home to my wife and two young daughters,” Blagojevich said in the statement. “I cherish them more than anything in the world. I wish this was over."
Blagojevich began serving a 14-year prison sentence in Colorado in 2012 after he was convicted on 18 counts, including attempted extortion and conspiracy to solicit bribes, in a scheme centered on using power to extract favors and campaign cash.
The court vacated five counts related to Blagojevich’s attempt to trade the appointment of a U.S. Senate seat that then president-elect Barack Obama vacated in late 2008. Blagojevich had offered to appoint Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett a vacant seat in exchange for Obama appointing him to a Cabinet slot. The court ruled that the suggested swap was not illegal but amounted to “a political logroll.”
“A proposal to appoint a particular person to one office (say, the Cabinet) in exchange for someone else’s promise to appoint a different person to a different office (say, the Senate), is a common exercise in logrolling,” the court said in its opinion.
When the court vacated five counts against him last month, it opened the door for Blagojevich to be resentenced. But the appeal panel's opinion suggested the 14-year sentence might still be appropriate even after subtracting the five overturned counts.
“It is not possible to call 168 months unlawfully high for Blagojevich’s crimes,” Judge Frank Easterbrook wrote.
The court upheld charges against Blagojevich related to accusations that he tried to extract cash from then-U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill., in exchange for a Senate appointment and other efforts by the governor to get paid for official acts.
Tuesday’s filing seeks what is known as "en banc" hearing before all the judges on the appeals court.
En banc hearings are rarities, typically used by the court to mull decisions that conflict with a Supreme Court decision.
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47dd756b809280e1a160c2b0a855d089 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/05/5-things-you-need-know-wednesday/30995675/ | 5 things you need to know Wednesday | 5 things you need to know Wednesday
1. Dentist's hunting guide appears in court for Cecil's killing
After pleading not guilty to the charge of failing to prevent an unlawful hunt, hunter Theo Bronkhorst appeared again in a Zimbabwean court Wednesday regarding the death of Cecil the lion. His trial was postponed to Sept. 28. Bronkhorst acted as a guide for Minnesota dentist Walter Palmer in the July 1 killing of Cecil. U.S. wildlife officials are investigating Palmer and his admitted killing of Cecil. Bronkhorst, Palmer and the second guide, Honest Trymore Ndlovu, allegedly drew Cecil away from a wildlife preserve and shot him with a crossbow. Palmer has said he believed the hunt was legal.
2. Obama to make case for Iran nuclear deal
President Obama seeks to bolster support on the Iran nuclear deal Wednesday in a speech at American University in Washington. Obama faces a fight in Congress on the agreement, which would restrict Iran's nuclear program in exchange for ending economic sanctions. On Tuesday, Senate Democrats Barbara Boxer, Tim Kaine and Bill Nelson announced their support, but House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said they will move forward with a resolution of disapproval. Israel remains adamantly opposed, and a Quinnipiac University poll released Monday found that American voters oppose the agreement by a two-to-one margin. Obama has said he will veto any legislation aimed at blocking the deal, setting up a potential showdown with Congress.
3. CEO pay vs. worker pay
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is scheduled to vote on a long-delayed and closely watched rule that would require publicly traded companies to disclose the ratio between CEO total compensation and the median of annual total compensation of all other employees. CEO pay is an annual source of angst for investors who, on one hand, are willing to pay leaders what it takes for good results, but at the same time can't help but puzzle over the seemingly ever-upward march of CEO pay. The pay gap has received extra attention this year due to protests around minimum wage, particularly in the fast-food industry. U.S. CEOs made 303 times as much as the average worker in 2014, according to a report from the Economic Policy Institute released in June.
4. 50 Cent back in bankruptcy court
Rapper 50 Cent returns to bankruptcy court Wednesday after revealing he spends $108,000 a month on expenses. The "Get Rich or Die Tryin" artist filed for bankruptcy in July after New York City jurors ordered him to pay $7 million to a woman who said he posted online a sex tape she made with a boyfriend. His lawyer listed his worth as $4.4 million, with a monthly income of $185,000. 50 Cent — real name Curtis Jackson III — was ranked by Forbes as one of hip-hop's five richest artists with a net-worth of $155 million.
5. Pollution risks overshadow the 2016 Rio Olympics one-year countdown
On Wednesday, we're exactly one year away from letting the games begin — the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, that is. Yet health officials are questioning the health risks of swimming in Rio's waters. This week the head of World Rowing said he will commission another viral test of the water and expects other sports to follow suit. Much of the area's waste and sewage goes untreated and runs down hillside ditches to stream into Olympic water venues, according to an Associated Press investigation released last week. The AP found one beach where athletes enter the water contained over 2 million human adenovirus per liter — that's 2,000 times the reading that water experts in the U.S. said would be considered highly alarming. Regardless, athletes are hitting crunch time in preparations for the games, which start on Aug. 5, 2016.
And, the essentials:
Weather: Severe storms are forecast in the central Plains Wednesday, while much of the northeastern U.S. enjoys a mild, pleasant day.
Stocks: U.S. stock futures were higher Wednesday, as investors waited for U.S. jobs data to assess when the Federal Reserve will increase interest rates.
TV Tonight: Wondering what to watch tonight? TV critic Robert Bianco looks at America's Next Top Model, Mr. Robinson and Mr. Robot.
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You can also subscribe to get the day's top news each weekday in your inbox or find us on the Yo! app: justyo.co/usatoday.
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a2c61cc567be27e0bed69ae461988ac3 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/05/duodenoscope-infections-not-reported/29988165/ | Deadly infections from medical scopes go unreported, raising health risks | Deadly infections from medical scopes go unreported, raising health risks
Corrections and clarifications: This story originally was published Aug. 5, 2015; it initially misspelled the name of Kevin Kavanagh
Reports of superbug outbreaks linked to a specialized type of medical scope continue to climb, but government efforts to assess the public health risk are stymied: No one knows how often the infections occur — or where.
Duodenoscopes, which are run down the throat to treat intestinal problems, have been tied to scores of infections and more than a dozen deaths at hospitals in Los Angeles, Chicago, Seattle and other cities. Indiana's health department recently notified federal officials of two more scope-related infections that have not been disclosed previously.
But for every duodenoscope-related illness that's reported, countless others are not, an ongoing USA TODAY investigation finds.
Many suspicious illnesses in duodenoscope patients never come to the attention of federal authorities, including cases identified by the newspaper in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and other states. So federal health officials know the cause of the problem — bacteria can lodge in the scopes' recesses and move from patient to patient — but they can't discern its prevalence or the magnitude of the threat it may pose.
Some duodenoscope-associated infections aren't catalogued because hospitals and health departments can't make a definitive link to the devices. Countless others never get detected, mistaken for other, more routine infections. And even when infections are confirmed as scope-related, they sometimes go unreported because hospitals and health departments aren't necessarily required to alert federal authorities.
"The number of transmissions is basically unknowable," says Alex Kallen, an infectious-disease physician who coordinates epidemiological investigations at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "There is clearly a detection problem in identifying [duodenoscope-related] infection clusters."
When the infections do come to light, Kallen adds, the CDC "does not have a mandatory system for reporting these outbreaks." Instead, the agency relies on hospitals and local health departments to report outbreaks on their own initiative.
Duodenoscopes are used about 650,000 times a year in the USA, often to treat blockages in the bile and pancreatic ducts, such as gallstones and tumors. The Food and Drug Administration warned of the scopes' contamination risks in February, soon after USA TODAY first reported on the problem. But the agency said infection rates appear low and advised that duodenoscopes remain far safer and less invasive than other surgical options for many critical procedures.
"They're saying the [scopes'] benefit is high, and that's true, but they don't really know the risks, because they don't have solid data on complications," says Kevin Kavanagh, an ear, nose and throat doctor who heads Health Watch USA, a patient safety group. "Without knowing the true risks, it's not really an informed decision. It's a judgment call."
THE CASES NOT COUNTED
The mystery unfolded over several months: Ten patients at UMass Memorial Medical Center all were infected with the same drug-resistant bacteria after treatment with duodenoscopes.
Working with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, investigators at the Worcester hospital took cultures from the devices, hunting for evidence of the bacteria. But they came up empty; the scopes had been cleaned and reused repeatedly by the time doctors recognized their potential role in the outbreak, which ended in 2013.
Investigators found the cases were "associated with" the scopes, the health department said in a statement, but "no link … was clearly established."
The CDC's list of scope-related outbreaks makes no mention of the cases at UMass Memorial — no report was filed with the agency and none was required. In fact, the CDC, which is chiefly responsible for identifying and addressing public health threats, has been notified of scope-related outbreaks in just nine hospitals.
But the problem is far more widespread.
The FDA, which requires medical device companies to report safety incidents involving their products, has received more than 100 notifications of duodenoscope-associated infections from manufacturers since 2013 — and each report can involve multiple patients.
Yet even that FDA tally is incomplete: USA TODAY revealed in April that some scope-related infections haven't been disclosed in the manufacturer reports, and the agency acknowledges that compliance is spotty. What's more, the FDA reports are stripped of identifying information, so even when a device problem is disclosed, the public has no way to know where it occurred or how many people were affected.
"Because of the underreporting, we just don't know the extent of this [duodenoscope] problem," says Lisa Fonkalsrud, president of the Society of Gastroenterology Nurses and Associates. Given the uncertainties in identifying and confirming infections, she adds, "there is no real way to kind of wrap your arms around it."
USA TODAY's investigation first revealed in January that duodenoscopes had been tied to several superbug outbreaks, igniting a nationwide controversy that led to an ongoing federal investigation of the devices' three manufacturers: Olympus, Pentax and FujiFilm.
In its February safety advisory, the FDA warned that all three companies' scopes can trap bacteria in an "elevator" mechanism that controls tiny surgical tools at the devices' tip. Even if scopes are cleaned and disinfected properly between uses, it said, the bacteria can survive.
Just this week, the FDA suggested additional measures hospitals can adopt to check scopes for residual bacteria and kill surviving microbes. But even with those steps, which are voluntary and costly, "the risk of infection transmission cannot be completely eliminated," the agency said.
The challenge is identifying the casualties.
THE ELUSIVE LINK
Elsie Florian's infection surfaced quickly after doctors at Pittsburgh's Allegheny General Hospital used a duodenoscope to treat her for a blocked bile duct. Tests revealed CRE, a drug-defying bacteria with mortality rates of 40% or more.
"I went on the computer and saw all the stories about people getting these infections from [duodenoscopes]," says Jena Bence, Florian's granddaughter. "We kept waiting for [Allegheny] to be mentioned, but it never was."
Florian died in April. A "hospital-acquired" infection was listed as the possible cause, but Allegheny said in a statement that it "did not find any definitive evidence of a scope association … through bacterial cultures performed on [the] devices."
The cultures are a notoriously elusive way to link a scope to an infection: It can be weeks before the illness emerges and a culture is taken, and scopes typically have been cleaned and reused repeatedly in the interim.
Still, that matching-culture standard was applied when CRE infected duodenoscope patients at Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte.
In May, Carla Warner told an FDA advisory panel that her husband, Bill, fought CRE for eight months after a duodenoscope procedure at the hospital in 2013. She recounted his 60-pound weight loss and the torture of watching his excruciating pain.
"Would you be willing to allow a [duodenoscope] to be used on yourself or a family member?" she asked.
Bill Warner wasn't the only duodenoscope patient at Carolinas Medical to contract CRE, but the hospital and the state Health Department concluded there was no connection. "We cultured the duodenoscopes," the hospital said in a statement, "and did not isolate CRE."
Yet there's no rule that says a matching bacterial culture is needed to link a duodenoscope to a suspicious infection.
Last year, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia notified the CDC of CRE infections in eight patients treated with duodenoscopes. The hospital cultured its scopes and found no bacteria matching the strain causing the infections. Ultimately, the CDC listed the episode as a duodenoscope-associated outbreak, though, according to the hospital, "no definitive link between the patients and scopes was found."
"A negative [duodenoscope] culture should not be relied on to rule out a scope as a source of an outbreak," says Kallen, the CDC official. "There doesn't necessarily have to be a positive duodenoscope culture; it is more of a preponderance of evidence. … If you have other epidemiological links, the scope might well be the source."
Even when there is hard epidemiological evidence linking a scope to patient infections, cases still go unreported to the CDC.
In late 2012, doctors at UPMC Presbyterian Hospital in Pittsburgh investigated a cluster of CRE infections among patients treated with duodenoscopes. Cultures of the scopes revealed the presence of CRE bacteria and, based on that and other epidemiological evidence, investigators concluded that the infections were tied to the devices.
The hospital made no secret of the outbreak — it alerted the state and local health departments, its physicians published their findings and described the investigation at professional conferences, and hospital officials spoke in local news reports about the scopes' association with the infections. But the CDC wasn't notified, so there's no mention of the case on the agency's list of duodenoscope-associated infections.
THE CASES NOT SEEN
Many experts say duodenoscopes have spread bacteria for decades, but any resulting illnesses typically would have involved routine bugs that could come from anywhere. When an infection cropped up, doctors simply treated it with antibiotics, the infection resolved, and no one gave much thought to its source.
That changed with the emergence in recent years of antibiotic-resistant superbugs.
"Some transfer of bacteria [from duodenoscopes] is not even going to cause disease … and if you get [an infection] that's relatively minor, that also isn't going to get much attention," says Stephen Kralovic, a physician who helps direct infectious disease response for the Department of Veterans Affairs medical system. "It's only when you see something like CRE, because of its virulence, that the problem becomes apparent."
When hospitals see CRE and other antibiotic-resistant "red flag" bacteria, they typically move aggressively to identify the source. When duodenoscopes began spreading infections from CRE and other drug-defying bacteria around 2012, the devices' contamination issues started to get noticed.
Still, public health officials believed initially that the problem was user error, concluding that hospitals were not following scope manufacturers' instructions for cleaning and disinfecting the devices. It wasn't until early last year that the CDC warned practitioners that the devices could remain contaminated even when instructions for "reprocessing" them were followed precisely.
Determining the true incidence rate for scope-related infections "is going to be an important area for research," says Colleen Schmitt, a physician and past president of the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy. "We want to get that information to our members as well, so we can be sure we understand the extent of the problem."
THE HUMAN TOLL
For patients and their families, the stakes are enormous.
Elsie Florian's family has filed a lawsuit against Olympus, which made the scope used for her procedure. It alleges that the company knew about the contamination problem with its duodenoscopes and failed to properly alert regulators and the medical community.
"They knew this could happen, that's what's most aggravating," says Deborah Smoody, Florian's daughter.
Olympus, which faces several lawsuits over the safety of its duodenoscopes, declined to comment on the Florian case; it argues in court filings that the factual allegations are non-specific and the case should be dismissed. Olympus, Pentax and FujiFilm all say they are working with the FDA to assess any changes that may be necessary in their scopes' designs or cleaning protocols.
Before her surgery, Florian, 76, volunteered regularly at a seniors' center and considered a move to the more social setting of a seniors' community. Once the infection attacked, she grew frail, bouncing between the hospital and a nursing home, relying on oxygen machines to breathe.
Florian insisted she'd recover: She was determined to attend her granddaughter's wedding a couple of months away in Colorado.
She died three weeks before the trip.
"No one else should have to go through what we did," Smoody says. "People should know how often this is happening."
Follow USA TODAY Investigative Reporter Peter Eisler on Twitter: @ByPeterEisler
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beccca477ea7b2ef3885fbf8d9040bc0 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/07/chicago-police-agree-reform-stop-and-frisk/31277041/ | Chicago police and ACLU agree to stop-and-frisk safeguards | Chicago police and ACLU agree to stop-and-frisk safeguards
CHICAGO — The Chicago Police Department and American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois announced Friday that they’ve come to an agreement on monitoring how officers go about conducting street stops of citizens in the nation’s third-largest city.
The deal follows fierce criticism of Chicago police disproportionately targeting minorities for questioning and searches under the controversial "stop and frisk" practice.
Under the agreement, police will track all street stops and protective pat-downs — not just those that don’t result in an arrest, as they have in the past.
In addition, the city and ACLU have agreed to name an independent consultant, former U.S. magistrate Arlander Keys, who will issue public reports twice a year that detail how the department conducts street stops and recommend policy changes.
The police department also agreed to bolster training of officers to ensure that officers don’t use race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation when deciding to stop and frisk, and to conduct pat-downs only when reasonably suspicious that a person is armed and dangerous.
The agreement goes into effect immediately.
Lat March, the ACLU published a study that showed black Chicagoans were subjected to 72% of stop-and-frisk searches even though they make up only about a third of the city's population. The report also said Chicago residents were stopped by police at a rate four times greater than New York City residents. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio announced changes to the city's stop-and-frisk policy last year.
Police officers can legally stop, question and frisk someone if they have reasonable suspicion that the person has engaged in criminal activity or is about to. But the ACLU said Chicago police, who conducted about 250,000 stop and frisks that did not lead to an arrest last summer, appeared to be acting unlawfully.
In announcing the settlement, Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy said the department is committed to practices driven by crime data and community intelligence.
"As the men and women of the Chicago Police Department work to make our city safer and identify the small subset of individuals who torment our neighborhoods with violence, it is imperative that we use every tool and resource in a way that is not only lawful but respectful of the residents we serve,” McCarthy said in a statement.
The ACLU said the agreement incorporates a bulk of the changes it sought without going through a protracted legal battle.
“What we have done here is move past the litigation process and advanced directly to a collaborative process, to insure that stops on Chicago streets meet constitutional and legal standards,” ACLU Legal Director Harvey Grossman said.
The city and police department still face a lawsuit on the issue. Following publication of the ACLU report in March, six African Americans who said they were subjected to unwarranted stop-and-frisk searches filed suit against the city and police department, charging their constitutional rights and those of many others had been violated.
Since it was originally filed, more than 40 additional plaintiffs have joined the suit.
Antonio Romanucci, an attorney for one of the original six to sue, said the deal brokered by the ACLU and police address many of his client’s concerns.
His client, Darnell Smith, says he was stopped and frisked by police without cause as he stood outside his grandparents’ home on the city’s South Side, while he was waiting for a restaurant delivery.
While Romannuci called the agreement a “victory,” he said the lawsuit will move forward.
“This practice affected so many people for such a long period of time that we have to make sure that this agreement that’s in place remains enforceable,” Romanucci said. “The one way to do that is to continue ahead with our lawsuit..and ensure that what the city says it actually will do.”
Follow USA TODAY Chicago correspondent Aamer Madhani on Twitter @AamerISmad
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0e8a0a7d24963007e56a4224f61c6384 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/07/ferguson-residents-move-toward-healing/31146009/ | Nearly a year after Michael Brown's death, Ferguson residents move toward healing | Nearly a year after Michael Brown's death, Ferguson residents move toward healing
FERGUSON, Mo.— Nearly a year after then-Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson killed unarmed black teen Michael Brown, Dionne Henderson, who heard the gunshots and ran out to the street, still isn't sure what to think of the incident.
Part of her believes Wilson, who is white, shot in self defense to protect himself, but Henderson, who is black, also mourns the loss of an 18 year old and feels unsettled when she recalls his body lying in the hot sun for hours just outside her Canfield Green apartment. She is sure of one thing, however: She wants to move out of Canfield Green Apartments, as many of her neighbors have done, before the Aug. 9 anniversary of Brown's death.
"I want to move out because soon it will be the 9th and I know people are going to be back here. I'll have to take back roads to get home," said Henderson, a retired bus driver who has lived in the apartment complex for two years. "In a way, I'm proud that all kinds of people can stick together and protest. But, people were also out there so-called protesting, robbing stores and stuff like that. That's the sad part."
Hundreds of protesters descended on the city in the days after Brown's death. A second wave of protests turned violent on Nov. 24, following a grand jury decision not to indict Wilson. In March, the Justice Department announced it would not bring criminal charges against the officer, saying in an 86-page memorandum that Wilson acted in self-defense.
While Henderson, 42, contemplates her future, she and many other residents hope this small St. Louis suburb can one day shed its reputation as ground zero for America's race problems. Residents and the city's leadership say life here is improving.
The city's new interim police chief, city manager and municipal judge say they are committed to helping change systemic problems that plagued the police department and court systems. National companies, such as Starbucks, plan to open stores here. A new Boys and Girls Club recently opened.
Along West Florissant Avenue, one of the city's main thoroughfares, buildings set ablaze by protesters have been demolished and cleaned away. Artists painted colorful images on boarded up building, creating rows of cheerful murals. In the afternoons, people saunter around town, dipping into local restaurants and stores.
Yet local businesses still struggle and some residents say they haven't fully processed seeing protests consume their city.
Charles Davis, who opened Ferguson Burger Bar the day before Brown's death, lost thousands of dollars over the past year as police shut down streets during the unrest. With customers unable to access the restaurant, meat rotted and goods went to waste. Yet, Davis, who also lives in Ferguson, never boarded up his business and credits God for protecting it from any physical damage by looters. Business is slower than he'd like, but he's convinced better days are ahead.
"Throughout history, it has always taken an unfortunate situation in order to make things better or have a positive change," Davis, 48, who is black, said. "The good thing is, this has brought people together who never really sat down and talked to each other. It's brought different races together."
Doug Taylor recently moved his auto repair shop into a space right next to where crowds of people burned down a QuikTrip convenience store the day after Brown's death. The previous owner lamented last year that the protests damaged cars in for repair. Now that man lives in Virginia, Taylor says, and Taylor is happily fixing cars of Ferguson residents.
Taylor, who is white, grew up in north St. Louis County and has hired Devan Lee, a black 22-year-old, through YouthBuild USA, a program that connects low-income young people with job training opportunities. Taylor said he feels confident that his business is safe and hopes people of all races will learn to put Ferguson's past behind them. Next door, the Urban League has plans to build an empowerment center to give young unemployed or underemployed young people training before matching them with jobs.
"Everybody needs to get along with this black-and-white issue," Taylor, 50, said. "God put us here for a reason, to get along."
Lee, who had been arrested for stealing cars, agrees. He appreciates Taylor giving him a chance and hopes to turn his life around. "I really want to own my own shop in Ferguson," he said. "I see what this can do for the community and the state we are in now."
The protests prompted political change. In a city where 67% of the 21,000 residents are black, the majority of its political leaders at the time of the shooting were white. Ferguson's police chief, city manager and a judge at the time of the shooting, who are all white, resigned after the Justice Department issued a critical report that found the Ferguson police department engaged in a broad pattern of racially biased enforcement.The city hired Interim City Manager Ed Beasley on June 9, and Interim Police Chief Andre Anderson began work July 22. Both men are black.
In April, Ferguson residents elected two black city council members, putting blacks in control of half the city council for the first time in Ferguson's history. The election marked increased civic activism, with 29% of eligible voters casting more than 3,700 ballots — more than double the 12% of eligible voters who came out for last April's mayoral election.
Wesley Bell, one of the newly elected black city council members, said Ferguson has an opportunity to implement broad, sustainable changes that can have positive ripple effects around the world. He added, however, that the city is still wrestling with issues like institutional racism that permeate the country.
"You can't fully heal until you've identified not just the symptoms but the actual affliction," Bell said. "There are issues that have predated Ferguson. There are issues that have afflicted us nationally, regionally. Those issues have to be addressed before we can say that we are fully healed."
Ferguson's Mayor James Knowles III points to federal programs such as the controversial No Child Left Behind law — aimed at making every child in every state proficient in math and reading, and which Knowles says impact schools in a way that local leaders don't have control over — and a lack of jobs across the country as things that affect Ferguson, but are outside of its leaders hands. Knowles said he will embark on a "listening tour" to learn about residents' concerns after a recent petition fell 27 signatures short of forcing a recall election. The best change from the past year's unrest, he said, was an increase in political engagement by residents.
"My hopes for Ferguson this coming year are that residents who have begun to have their voices heard over the past year will stay engaged, will become part of the process, (and) will help bring this community closer together," Knowles, 36, said.
In other aspects, the city has been slower to change.
Five months after the Justice Department's critical report, federal authorities and the city's attorney remain locked in negotiations about how to move forward. Just five of the city's 50 police officers are black, including the interim police chief.
Sgt. Dominica Fuller, a 17-year veteran of the Ferguson police department and a black woman, says she's never seen her colleagues display racist behavior. She declined to talk about Wilson, but said she looks forward to more community policing so officers can get to know the people they serve. She's also welcomed the chance to use the city's new international status for good.
"In the beginning you didn't know anything about Ferguson, you didn't even know where we were in the city or county of St. Louis, Mo.," she said. "Ferguson has an opportunity shine, to take something that was dealt to us and turn it into a positive."
Now, like many, Brian Fletcher, a city councilman and former mayor, hopes Ferguson will turn the corner on its tumultuous past and become a model for the nation.
"If you look at Wikipedia and look up the history of Ferguson, it's primarily about Michael Brown, even though our city is 120 years old," Fletcher said. "I hope in a few years, it will be talking about how we rebounded both economically and how we've come together as a community to work together for the betterment of all people."
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c8eece5b749a2b9c72c2668c38162492 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/19/5-things-you-need-know-wednesday/31844623/ | 5 things you need to know Wednesday | 5 things you need to know Wednesday
1. Meeting documents could reveal Fed's rate-hike plan
Clues on the Federal Reserve's rate-hike timetable could come when the minutes from its late-July meeting are released Wednesday. Many think rates could increase as early as September, but some say recent market volatility overseas could push the hikes back. Any hints that global market turbulence is high on the Fed's worry list could signal that it plans to hold off on raises, especially after China's devaluation of the yuan.
2. Possible plea set for ex-Subway spokesman Jared Fogle
Former Subway spokesman Jared Fogle is expected to appear in federal court Wednesday morning, where he will plead guilty to charges related to a child pornography investigation, according to a media report. WREG-TV also reported that the U.S. attorney plans to hold a news conference afterward. Last month, federal and state troopers raided Fogle's home in connection to a child pornography case involving Russell Taylor, the former executive director of Fogle's foundation. Fogle became a spokesman for Subway after he went on a diet of turkey and veggie subs and lost 235 pounds. The sandwich franchise tweeted Tuesday, "We no longer have a relationship with Jared and have no further comment."
3. Venti pinot, please: Starbucks begins selling beer and wine
Starbucks will begin selling beer, wine and small plates — think bacon-wrapped dates and truffle mac 'n' cheese — at two dozen new locations across the U.S. on Wednesday. The company has been cautiously testing the move for years, and it will now have more than 70 locations participating in what it calls "Evenings," an effort to increase sales after 4 p.m. The ramp-up starts in Denver, Miami, Orlando, New York and Northern California, and Starbucks projects the program will reap $1 billion in additional annual sales by 2019.
4. Brady will skip 'Deflategate' hearing in N.Y.
Tom Brady decided not to attend Wednesday's "Deflategate" federal court hearing in New York. Settlement talks between attorneys representing Brady and attorneys for the NFL yielded little progress, and Brady chose to leave for West Virginia to practice with the Patriots. U.S. District Court Judge Richard Berman told both sides last week that it wasn't necessary for Brady or NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to attend the hearing this week. Both were in attendance at the first hearing, which was held last week. The Patriots are scheduled Wednesday and Thursday for joint practices with the New Orleans Saints.
5. Jury weighs manslaughter for police officer charged in unarmed man's shooting
A North Carolina jury will resume deliberations Wednesday in the trial of a white police officer accused of fatally shooting an unarmed black man who was in a car accident and ran toward police. Officer Randall Kerrick is charged with voluntary manslaughter in the 2013 shooting of Jonathan Ferrell, a former Florida A&M football player. Prosecutors say Ferrell was not armed and posed no threat when Kerrick shot him 10 times. The defense argued that Ferrell was out of control as he ran toward Kerrick, and that the officer was defending himself and others. Kerrick faces up to 11 years in prison if convicted.
And, the essentials:
Weather: The eastern U.S. will be soggy and humid while the West will be clear and hot.
Stocks: China's Shanghai composite index slumped as much as 5% on Wednesday before recovering to finish higher, and U.S. stock futures were lower.
TV Tonight: Wondering what to watch tonight? TV critic Robert Bianco looks at Mr. Robinson, Black-ish and Steampunk'd.
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c4ee749f83f8c893fbd1a1df0aae7141 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/26/tv-shooter-sued-tallahassee-station--discrimination/32401317/ | Virginia shooter Bryce Williams sued Tallahassee station for discrimination | Virginia shooter Bryce Williams sued Tallahassee station for discrimination
The Tallahassee Democrat published this story on Flanagan's lawsuit in 2000:
A local television anchor-reporter, slated to lose his job with Tallahassee's NBC affiliate in two weeks, has filed a racial discrimination suit against the station --- alleging that news producers and other managers made offensive remarks about blacks and fired him for complaining about it.
Management of WTWC-TV, Channel 40, said the station was having a "reduction in staff" requiring the firing, but that the company was proud of its diversity record.
Vester Flanagan, who has reported for WTWC-TV since last March, said he and another black employee were referred to as "monkeys" and that a supervisor once told him that "blacks are lazy and do not take advantage of free money" for scholarships and economic opportunities. He said when he cited his own background of nearly seven years in television, going back to internships at San Francisco State University, the supervisor told him he was an "exception."
Flanagan, 26, said Thursday he was told on Feb. 9 his employment contract will not be renewed after March 15. Since filing suit late last month, he said, "their reaction has been more of arrogance and retaliation --- they told me, 'This is war,' and there could be no compromise."
General Manager Maria Moore said the station has not been served with the suit and could not comment on personnel issues or pending litigation. She said the decision not to renew Flanagan's contract was caused by corporate belt-tightening but declined to say how many staff cuts were being made at the station or how many blacks and whites worked at various levels in the company.
"I am very proud of the diverse staff we have at NBC News 40, and the environment of respect we have created," she said. "We have a strong story to tell at the proper time and to the proper authorities."
Moore declined to comment on specific allegations made by Flanagan but said "the decision was based on a reduction of staff. His position will not be replaced." Flanagan, who had been a weekend news anchor and night reporter three days each week, was recently reassigned as a full-time reporter on weekdays. He said his bosses refused to let him use station equipment to make "resume videotapes" to send to other stations, which he said is a common practice in TV news.
Flanagan declined to identify producers and other managers who allegedly made offensive comments. His attorney, Marie Mattox, said she and Flanagan did not want to further aggravate feelings in the office if it is possible to work out a settlement.
"It's gotten really hard for him now," said Mattox.
Flanagan said a white supervisor, working on a story about a black homicide suspect who had "gold and green teeth," referred to the suspect as "just another thug." The same supervisor also speculated that the man had "collard greens" in his teeth.
Flanagan said that after complaining to supervisors about insensitive comments, he filed a formal complaint with the Florida Commission on Human Relations last December. He said "I had people coming up to me and saying, 'Hey, I hear you're not going to be around the station long' " in January, before the station notified him that his contract would not be renewed.
Mattox asked Leon County Circuit Judge Nikki Clark to issue an injunction to block Flanagan's termination and to award unspecified financial damages, legal fees and court costs.
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203627cef59c2fea7d362243d02952bb | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/27/pilot-shortage-faa-1500-hours-required-colgan-crash-alpa/32008451/ | Airline fears of pilot shortage spark Congress fight over required training | Airline fears of pilot shortage spark Congress fight over required training
The regional airlines that provide half the country's flights want Congress to reduce a requirement that all commercial pilots have 1,500 hours of flight time when Federal Aviation Administration legislation is renewed later this year, but families of air crash victims plan to fight back.
Regional carriers contend the congressional requirement caused a pilot shortage and forced them to cancel flights. Airlines have complained for years about difficulty finding trained pilots to hire. But pilots say airlines would have no trouble finding qualified pilots if they hiked starting salaries.
As the Sept. 30 expiration date approaches for FAA policy legislation, regional airlines are "pushing very hard" against the 1,500-hour rule, Rep. Peter DeFazio of Oregon, the top Democrat on the House Transportation Committee said. He said he expects other lawmakers to offer amendments to reduce the requirement when legislation is considered this fall.
"They've got a number of my colleagues in a panic," he said. Carriers threatened to reduce flights to congressional districts, he said.
"We're going to have to fight to keep that."
Congress adopted the requirement that every pilot have at least 1,500 hours flying in 2010 after the last fatal crash of a U.S. passenger airline, the February 2009 Colgan Air flight 3407 that crashed near Buffalo during a snowstorm. The rule, which took effect in August 2013, raised the experience level for first officers from 250 hours to the 1,500 hours that captains must accumulate. FAA made exceptions for former military pilots who have 750 hours and graduates of four-year schools who have 1,000 hours.
The National Transportation Safety Board blamed the Colgan crash on the captain's inappropriate response to a warning that the Bombardier Q400 turboprop was going too slow to remain aloft. The pilots lacked training to avoid the aerodynamic stall and were fatigued, the investigation found. The Colgan pilots had 3,379 hours and 2,244 hours of flying experience.
FAA regulations that grew out of the Colgan crash required greater simulator training to avoid aerodynamic stalls and increased rest periods between shifts. Six regional-airline executives told a House hearing in April 2014 that the 1,500-hour rule mistakenly favors quantity of training over the substance of what pilots need to learn.
Relatives of the crash victims who fought for the changes say they are prepared to defend them.
"Our antenna's up," said Scott Maurer of Palmetto, Fla., whose 30-year-old daughter Lorin died in the Colgan crash. "You've got to keep watching – there are so many snakes in the grass."
In addition to more flight hours, a mandatory retirement age of 65 and a growing need for pilots each contribute to fears of a shortage. Boeing, the plane manufacturer, projected a need for 558,000 new pilots worldwide during the next 20 years, including 95,000 in North America.
A Government Accountability Office report in February 2014 found that airline demand hadn't yet outpaced the supply of pilots. But 11 of 12 regional airlines contacted by GAO reported trouble filling openings.
"Americans have to brace themselves, especially in the small- and medium-sized communities, for one of two things: withdrawal or reduction of service, or higher ticket prices," said Jim Higgins, an associate professor at the University of North Dakota's aviation department, who studied the shortage.
Republic Airways, which serves American, Delta and United airlines, lost half its stock value in July after announcing a pilot shortage forced it to cut 4% of its flights in April, May and June.
Bryan Bedford, CEO of Republic Airways, told a House hearing in April 2014 that the rule would fail to improve safety and "would hasten the growing pilot shortage and imperil air service at communities across the country."
In February 2014, United, Republic, Great Lakes and Silver airlines blamed service cuts at least partially on a shortage of pilots caused by the tougher federal training requirements.
"Collectively, these new regulations have put many of us in the position of having to park airplanes, cut flights and eliminate cities," John Sullivan, CEO of Champlain Enterprises, which operates as CommutAir and flies as United Express, told lawmakers in April 2014.
But the Air Line Pilots Association, a union with 52,000 members, questions whether such a shortage exists.
"We reject that out of hand," said Capt. Tim Canoll, the union president.
Pilots say more people would spend the $150,000 to $200,000 to acquire a commercial license if regional airlines paid more to starting pilots. The five lowest-paying airlines pay first-year pilots less than $21,000 per year, according to the union. To bolster salaries, some regional airlines offer signing bonuses. For example, Endeavor Air – a regional affiliate for Delta Air Lines – offers a $20,000 annual retention payment through 2018.
To recruit more potential pilots, airlines must show pilot recruits a clear path to a career in aviation that could result from significant training expenses, Canoll said.
“It’s been two years" since the rule took effect, Canoll said. "Anyone can accumulate 1,500 hours if they want to within two years."
University of North Dakota's Higgins, a former airline pilot, said only one fatal crash in the last 100 in the U.S. involved pilots with fewer than 1,500 hours of flying.
"It was a really good sound-bite and feel-good measure," Higgins said. "It's exceptionally safe with low-time pilots."
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564c381f50a73e8e1a689a6251f4488a | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/28/murder-father-journalists-parker-gun-control/71344580/ | Gun control measures debated in wake of Roanoke journalist killings | Gun control measures debated in wake of Roanoke journalist killings
ROANOKE, Va. -- More effective gun control is expected to be a tough issue to tackle, even as family members and political leaders decry this week's on-air killing of two journalists.
"We've got to keep crazy people from getting guns," said Andy Parker, father of reporter Alison Parker who was shot to death Wednesday with cameraman Adam Ward. Parker spoke to reporters outside WDBJ-TV after a visit with the station's staff and victims' families by Virginia's Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe.
WDBJ's General Manager, Jeff Marks, said he also urged action on the issue from Rep. Bob Goodlatte, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, who represents Roanoke.
"I told him 'Deal with this issue. Do what you need to do about guns. This public debate needs to continue,'" Marks said.
Parker said he will dedicate himself to lobbying politicians on the issue and called on the press to join him.
"I guarantee you, somebody's got an answer to this and I'm going to find out about it and make it happen," he said. To the reporters standing before him, he said, "You've got to hold people's feet to the fire…. She (Alison) was one of you guys and you've got a voice."
He called for politicians to require more stringent background checks, and said those who don't should be required to explain why they'd oppose "reasonable proposals."
The Virginia legislature in January rejected several gun control bills supported by McAuliffe, which would have barred misdemeanor domestic violence offenders and child support deadbeats from buying guns.
Roanoke Mayor David Bowers declined to be interviewed on the guns so soon after the tragedy.
"In my opinion, it is important for the families, the WDBJ employees and our community to grieve, console and heal," Bowers said in an email. "Thus, I choose not to take advantage of these unfortunate circumstances, nor say or do anything that might cause conflict or antagonism."
Parker spoke in front of a makeshift memorial of balloons and flowers, where residents from around the Roanoke region had come since the shooting to pay respect to the victims.
Gloria Davis, 69, of Salem, Va., a retired child services employee who'd dealt with parents angry about having their children put under protective custody, arrived earlier to say a prayer for the reporter and cameraman she'd watched most mornings on television.
Gun owners should be required to obtain a license like motor vehicle operators, with safety tests and better mental health monitoring, Davis said.
"Some people are just not equipped to mentally to have a gun," she said.
Her granddaughter Sasha Brown, 15, was not sure that would work because she knows other young people who've obtained guns illegally.
"If it's easy for you to get one and it's not legal for you to get one, you're probably not using it for the right purpose," Brown said.
Paul Springer, 59, a disabled Roanoke carpenter who grew up Asbury Park, N.J., brought a bunch of flowers to the memorial. Springer said he's in favor of some gun limits, but that passing such laws is difficult in a country with a history of urban riots. The unrest in Fergusson, Mo., last year was a reminder of large urban riots of the 1960s, which have left the American psyche scarred, he said.
"It all comes down to people worried that something's going to go down and they won't have any weapons to defend themselves," Springer said. "I'm pro-Second Amendment, but I do believe not everyone should carry a gun."
As for preventing the mentally ill from purchasing a gun, Springer said that's "undoable" because it would be too complicated and expensive.
"You can't do a psychological profile of every gun buyer," Springer said. "That's not going to happen."
Vester Flanagan, who killed Parker and Ward and shot and injured the woman they were interviewing, purchased the handgun he used legally after passing a background check. Flanagan had been fired from WDBJ more than two years ago, in part for anger issues, and was escorted from the station by police.
Roy Frame, a manager at Roanoke Firearms a few blocks from the station, said the mental health component of Virginia's background check only reports people who were voluntarily or involuntarily committed for a mental health reason.
"There are a lot of people who are angry," Frame said. "They can't do mental checks on people on a regular basis."
Frame said he could see the benefit of some kind of licensing requirements, but that he'd worry about restrictions that would bar customers he has helped, such as an elderly veteran or battered women who need to protect themselves.
"There's no magic button for this," Frame said.
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539801bbd37a069ba5be8dd29309b34f | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/28/official-pope-francis-us-visit-souvenirs-include-plush-doll-bobblehead-and-cardboard-cutout/71310114/ | Why a plush doll is a pope visit souvenir | Why a plush doll is a pope visit souvenir
It's a good thing Pope Francis has a sense of humor.
After all, what would a pontiff with a less jovial bent — his predecessor, Pope Benedict, perhaps — think of the 10-inch "Pope Francis Plush Doll," priced at $20 (plus tax and shipping), produced to mark the Argentinian Holy Father's visit to Philadelphia in September, one of three stops on a mini-American tour?
Or the $160 "Pope Francis Life-size 69" standee," which, its makers claim, is "professionally mounted on art-quality gatorfoam … perfect for schools, parishes, church groups, weddings, Bible school or any event where you want to offer a special photo opportunity that will thrill people." (There's a 10-inch tabletop version for $20 if that's too big.)
Pope Francis in America | USAToday.com
Or the $25 "Pope Francis Bobblehead," which "celebrates the 'People's Pope' " and "is made from high quality polyresin with styrofoam protection and a colorful collectors box."
Yes, these are among the official souvenirs!
OK, so there are the more usual keepsakes, such as plates, commemorative coins, rosaries and tote bags, offered on the website for the World Meeting of Families (WMF), the event in Philadelphia that Francis will attend Sept. 26 and 27.
But the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, which will host the meeting, feels that the more lighthearted items are very appropriate to the fun-loving cleric and the joyfulness of the occasion, according to Joan Doyle, a retail consultant to cultural organizations who was hired by the WMF to advise on official souvenirs.
"We had workshops with various stakeholders," she says, "including representatives from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia — bishops and so forth — to make sure we understood what kind of products they wanted."
Doyle says the church and WMF have a sense of humor about the items. "They actually do," she laughs. "It's my understanding that the Vatican actually sells the bobblehead. And I have the life-size cutout in my office, while the World Meeting uses one for photo ops and selfies. It's hugely popular!"
And the plush doll? "Frankly, that's charming — a charming way to introduce a child to the Holy Father."
Pope Francis is a triple threat when it comes to memorabilia, according to Kristen Swanson, a professor of merchandising and strategic communication at Northern Arizona University who has studied the sale of souvenirs for about 25 years.
"First, it's because souvenirs in general are kind of a sacred item," she says. "Souvenirs are a remembrance of an experience, and we want to buy something, a souvenir, that will keep us in that sacred moment when we go back to our normal lives.
"And then because you have the pope and you bring religion into it, it becomes even more sacred.
"And then you have the third fact — that this particular pope is so incredibly beloved. People love this person so much, another of the reasons why a person would want a pope souvenir from this occasion."
The devil is in the details, Doyle says. "There are nuances between bobbleheads. Ones with an oversized head tend to be more kitschy and mocking, whereas bobbleheads where things are more in proportion, such as ours, are not that way."
Of course, it's not just official souvenirs that will be on sale. The huge interest in the popular pope, whose relaxed style and friendly demeanor have captivated Catholics and others across the world, has led memorabilia manufacturers to crank up their trinket machines in the hope of making a buck or two, some tasteful (or not) and some for charity (or not).
Take Mia Bella Candles, a company based in Wilkes Barre, Pa. Workers at the factory headed by Bob Scocozzo are busy hand-painting molded candles bearing a likeness of Pope Francis, which sell for $32.95 (plus shipping and handling) on the company's website.
"My goal is to sell a million — there are a lot of Catholics out there," Scocozzo, who plans to donate 40% of the proceeds to two religious organizations, told NBC News. "I'm a Catholic on Christmas and Easter, but I love this guy."
The World Meeting is likely to draw more than a million visitors, and Philadelphia appears to be on top of the heap for souvenirs during the pope's tour. In New York City, where Francis is due to attend services at St. Patrick's Cathedral and the site of the 9/11 attacks, as well as preach at Madison Square Garden and address the United Nations, memorabilia mania appears more muted.
A USA TODAY visit to the St. Patrick's gift shop across the street from the giant church found only a few small items on display that were related to the visit Sept. 24-25, and online sellers appeared to be ignoring the Big Apple event, though no doubt T-shirt hawkers will be busy printing up their wares in the days before the visit.
In Washington, where the pontiff will meet President Obama and address a joint session of Congress on Sept. 22 and 23, souvenir sizzle was similarly low-key. Donald Trump drew more attention from souvenir sellers.
Swanson, the professor, chuckles when told about the bobblehead and plush toy but says they should not be considered irreverent. She says the life-size cutout of the pontiff fits in neatly with our selfie culture.
"So to take a selfie — and for the 21st century, this is just wonderful — of you with the cardboard pope so you have a remembrance of the experience, that is perfect representation of a good souvenir," she says. "Now, if his likeness was plastered on a pair of boxer shorts, that would be a different matter."
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ab1e6c148a31e9a3673d5bf525d9b6cd | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/08/29/colorado-state-university-hemp-variety-trial/71408846/ | CSU researchers test hemp’s hardiness in US | CSU researchers test hemp’s hardiness in US
Somewhere in Northern Colorado, just starting to peek out above the corn stalks that surround it, is an often misunderstood and recently approved test crop.
Colorado State University is starting to research hemp, a plant with practical uses but which is also the same species as marijuana, cannabis sativa.
CSU researchers planted 17 varieties of hemp on just less than a half acre on June 6. CSU is using the same protocols as a research project underway in Europe.
“We’re sort of piggybacking onto that as our first foray into working on hemp,” said John McKay, associate professor of plant evolutionary genetics in CSU’s College of Agricultural Sciences. “The Colorado Department of Agriculture worked with the researchers in Europe as well as negotiated with federal agencies to import the seed on our behalf.
“We’re basically looking to see, overall, how does this plant grow? (And) How does this plant grow in Colorado — because we can compare it to their data.”
Conducting hemp research is permitted under the Agricultural Act (Farm Bill) of 2014, though the United States is the only developed country in the world where domestic hemp production has been outlawed.
Industrial hemp is botanically the same as marijuana, but differs in that it contains less than 0.3 percent THC, the psychoactive compound found in marijuana.
So, while CSU prefers that the exact location of the trial is kept discreet to keep the curious from breaking stalks and dislodging seeds, anyone looking for the hemp for its THC value would be extremely disappointed.
BACKING OFF: No stop-sign symbol headed to edible pot in Colorado
The College of Agricultural Sciences works with the Colorado Department of Agriculture to manage the crops, in part because the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration considers hemp to be the same as marijuana and classifies it as a Schedule 1 narcotic crop.
“While this emerging industry faces a number of unique challenges, such as its legal landscape on a federal level, Colorado’s hemp farmers are becoming national leaders in their industry,” said Don Brown, Colorado’s commissioner of agriculture.
According to votehemp.com, Colorado is among 26 states that have defined hemp as distinct and removed barriers to its production, and is one of seven states that has research crops planted in accordance with an amendment to the Farm Bill written by U.S. Rep. Jared Polis.
“I’m thrilled that CSU will finally begin investigating the properties of industrial hemp, a crop with enormous economic and agricultural promise,” Polis said. “Hemp is used in products ranging from foods and cosmetics to cars and fuel, and I’m confident that CSU’s leadership in agriculture will lead to new innovations in efficiency and certified seed.
“Hemp is an agricultural commodity, not a drug, and I’ll continue working to improve the legal framework for industrial hemp so that researchers, entrepreneurs, and consumers can fully realize its potential.”
Hemp hadn’t been grown in large amounts in the United States since 1957, according to votehemp.com. Growing it without a federal permit was banned in 1970. Colorado, Kentucky and Vermont farmers harvested hemp crops last fall.
Because a half century has passed since hemp was last grown in large quantities, research such as that being done by CSU is needed proponents say. CSU has another variety trial underway on land in southwest Colorado.
Among other things, McKay’s group is trying to determine which varieties might be best suited to Colorado. Hemp is grown in a manner similar to irrigated corn, and the trial grow is also irrigated.
MARIJUANA AND THE LAW: PTSD sufferers sue Colorado over pot decision
“Certainly some (varieties) are doing better than others, and some are doing poorly enough that they wouldn’t do well, on average, in any year,” McKay said. “Some are producing a lot more stalk and biomass. So it depends what the market would be … if you were a farmer and you grew this crop, who would you sell it to, someone who was interested in the fiber or someone who is interested in the grain?
“Some of these varieties are producing more grain, some more fiber, so we can start to get a handle on that.”
Traditionally, hemp is often thought of as being used for rope, but it has hundreds of other uses.
According to the Hemp Industries Association, hemp fiber, oil seed and flowers can be used for health foods, dietary supplements, cosmetics and body care products, building materials, automobile parts, bio-composites, batteries, biofuels, textiles, papers and others.
HIA market research estimates that in 2011, sales of all hemp products in the United States was $452 million, including sales of hemp foods of $43.5 million.
McKay said that the U.S. has lost its market share of natural fiber crops over the last 100 years, to production and processing in countries with cheaper labor like India and China.
MEET OUR NEW MARIJUANA COLUMNIST: Erica Freeman: Let's talk pot
“So it is unlikely that millions of acres of hemp will be grown for textiles anytime soon,” he said. “But there is some interest and investment going into higher tech applications of fiber. At present, the U.S. imports lots of hemp grain from Canada to produce health food (oil and protein) for humans.”
The possibility for good results in Colorado appears to exist, though potentially one of the wettest years on record in the state may have contributed to the trial’s success.
“As a whole the species is pretty vigorous, and nothing is eating it,” McKay said. “We’re not allowed to treat it with anything (pesticide). … But since this (hemp) hasn’t been grown here, there aren’t organisms sitting around waiting to eat it.”
Harvest time would likely require additional equipment for farmers with a lot of hemp, McKay said.
“For the European varieties growing here, it’s unclear exactly how to harvest them,” he said. “These would end up looking different if you grew them in the Ukraine, because of the latitude, the day length and the climate.
“Wherever these have been bred for, they have some system for planting and harvesting. For Colorado, they’re pretty large and most farmers don’t have the infrastructure to deal with them.”
McKay said the project, funded by CSU’s Agricultural Experiment Station, cost about $10,000. Another trial next year is possible, he said.
“We would need to re-import the seed from these varieties,” McKay said. “Now that we’ve done it once, I presume it will be smoother next time.
“We’re still figuring out funding for it. All of our other projects here are funded largely by federal grants, and that’s not an option with this.”
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2e64a5c2e0316db66f9d07f246788382 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/01/lake-county-illinois-sheriff-deputy-killed-massive-manhunt/71520626/ | Police officer killed north of Chicago; massive manhunt underway | Police officer killed north of Chicago; massive manhunt underway
CHICAGO — Law enforcement continued a massive manhunt on Tuesday north of the city, searching for three suspects in the shooting death of a veteran police officer as he patrolled a quiet suburban community.
The killing marks the fourth incident in nine days across the USA where a law enforcement officer has been slain while going about his regular duties.
The incident in the far north Chicago suburbs comes after a Harris County, Texas, sheriff's deputy was gunned down Friday as he fueled his patrol car. Police on Saturday arrested Shannon Miles, who they said shot 15 bullets into Deputy Darren Goforth, 47. Sheriff Ron Hickman described the killing as a "cold-blooded assassination."
On Aug. 26, police officer Henry Nelson was gunned down in Sunset, La. Two days earlier, Senior Trooper Steven Vincent, of the Louisiana State Police, was shot in the head and then taunted after he stopped to provide aid to a man whose truck was stuck in a ditch. Police said a witness to the fatal shooting heard the suspect tell the trooper after he shot him, "You're lucky, you are going to die soon."
Despite the spate of recent killings, the number of law enforcement officers killed by gunfire while on duty this year — 23 as of Aug. 31, according to the Officer Down Memorial Page — is less than the same time period in 2014, when 29 law enforcement officers died by gunfire.
In Tuesday's shooting, the Fox Lake police officer, identified as Lt. Charles Joseph Gliniewicz, was patrolling in an industrial area in the suburb of Fox Lake shortly before 8 a.m. Tuesday, said Lake County, Ill., Sheriff’s Department spokesman Chris Covelli. The officer radioed dispatch to say that he was going to check on suspicious activity he had spotted. Covelli declined to specify what the suspicious activity was.
Moments later, Gliniewicz radioed that he was pursuing suspects by foot, but communication was lost soon after that.
The officer was found in a marshy area, stripped of his gun and other gear.
Mayor Donny Schmit, the top elected official of the town of 10,000, recalled Gliniewicz as an officer with more than 30 years of policing experience who was fondly nicknamed "G.I. Joe." Gliniewicz, he said, was the father of four boys. "His commitment to the people in the community was unmatched and will be dearly missed," Schmit said.
Police established a perimeter as they sought the three suspects, one described by law enforcement as a black male and two described as white males.
Shortly before 3 p.m., SWAT officers from several agencies honed in on one house in Fox Lake where they had information that one or more suspects might be holed up, a law enforcement source who was not authorized to speak publicly said. But that search proved to be fruitless.
The manhunt disrupted train service on Metra's Milwaukee District North Line, and officials at nearby Grant Community High School said they were ordered by police to keep students inside the school. Students at Fox Lake schools also kept students an hour beyond the regularly scheduled dismissal time out of caution.
Late Tuesday, several area schools announced that they would cancel classes on Wednesday as police said they would continue "saturation patrols" in Fox Lake. Law enforcement officials said that they would increase their presence near schools in the area that will remain open.
Follow USA TODAY Chicago correspondent Aamer Madhani on Twitter: @AamerISmad
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ba60718cb2f4fada74810f2130bf7129 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/02/little-stands-pop-up-rib-mountain/71566154/ | Little stands pop up in Rib Mountain | Little stands pop up in Rib Mountain
WAUSAU — Rachel and Greg Kresse were biking in Door County last summer when they noticed an odd little structure off the side of the road. They felt they had to stop and discovered it was full of books.
It was a Little Free Library, and it piqued their interest.
This spring the Kresses saw another such library on another bike ride — this time in Mosinee — and it spurred them into action. In late May the first passerby borrowed a book from their own Little Free Library. It's a red box with a roof and a glass door and three shelves full of books.
"We like to keep people reading these days," Greg said.
As these little structures are popping up all over the state, nation and world, Rib Mountain leaders considered putting the kibosh on them and others like them, such as produce and maple syrup stands. But leaders decided Tuesday night to allow the stands so long as their owners follow existing town rules.
Greg Kresse attended his first Rib Mountain Town Board meeting Tuesday night with Rachel, in case the discussion about little libraries became controversial.It didn't.
"It's not a nuisance," Greg said. "It's not a junk car sitting out on your property."
Town staff weren't totally sure what to do after recently discovering a permanent, donation-only maple syrup stand being operated on a resident's property. As they debated the legality of that stand, they decided to clarify at the same time whether or not the little libraries were allowed in town.
Officials agreed Tuesday that both are permissible, with some restrictions. The libraries can't be too close to a road and must be kept in good condition like all yard decor. Produce stands are allowed so long as they're temporary.
“I think the idea is kind of neat, that you could put up a stand and sell your excess vegetables if you had a garden,” said board member Fred Schaefer.
The Kresses also have an extensive vegetable garden on their two-acre plot in Rib Mountain. Between that "Garden of Eat'n," as they call it, and their Little Free Library lies a small prairie full of native plants.
"Sometimes a car will pull up and a couple of kids will run out (to the little library)," Rachel said. Then she'll see little heads popping up through their prairie.
The two like the idea of encouraging their neighbors and other passersby to read and to garden.
Little Free Library is a Wisconsin nonprofit with a global reach that was started to promote literacy and the love of reading. The Kresse's stand is chartered with the Little Free Library.
About 80 books have been checked out of the Kresses' little library branch in its first three months, and they decided Tuesday night they're likely to keep it going through the winter.
"I think I'm going to snow blow here," Greg said, gesturing from his little library to Blueberry Lane.
Nora G. Hertel can be reached at nora.hertel@gannettwisconsin.com or 715-845-0665. Find her on Twitter as @nghertel.
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143569784c255451beb63d289f10f0a1 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/03/supreme-court-abortion-texas/71640156/ | Supreme Court asked to uphold abortion rights | Supreme Court asked to uphold abortion rights
WASHINGTON -- Women's health care providers in Texas asked the Supreme Court Thursday to overturn a federal appeals court decision that could shut down 75% of the state's abortion clinics and lead to similar restrictions in other states.
The threat posed to all but 10 of the state's clinics by a law passed in 2013 makes it likely that the high court will once again weigh in on an issue that has divided the nation for more than 40 years,
The justices have twice blocked the law from taking effect while appeals continued, most recently in June by a 5-4 vote in which the court's most conservative justices dissented. That makes the legal battle lines clear for a potential showdown in the term beginning next month.
The Supreme Court upheld the right to abortion in the landmark Roe v. Wade case of 1973. Two decades later, it ruled in Planned Parenthood v. Casey that states could impose restrictions for health reasons if they did not pose an "undue burden" on women seeking abortions. The court has since dealt with a variety of specific issues, including allowing states in 2007 to ban so-called "partial birth" abortions.
The Texas law requires abortion clinics to employ doctors who have admitting privileges at local hospitals and to meet the same standards as ambulatory surgical centers. Its challengers claim the restrictions are meant to limit abortions rather than improve health care and would force all but 10 clinics to close in a state where about 60,000 women seek abortions annually.
Before the law was passed, the state had more than 40 clinics. That number has dwindled to 18. By comparison, California has about 500 abortion clinics, and New York has about 250.
"The right at issue in this case is of exceptional importance, and the ultimate disposition of this case will have a profound effect on the lives of thousands of women and their families," the abortion providers said in their petition.
Texas lawmakers and anti-abortion activists claim the law is intended to make abortion clinics and procedures safer without forcing women to travel too far for services. All the state's major metropolitan centers still would have at least one operating clinic, they say.
The state, backed by the appeals court, argued that traveling about 150 miles to obtain an abortion is not an undue burden. Women in west Texas who would not have a clinic even that close could travel into New Mexico, they said.
"Most women in Texas will not have to travel any further than they do right now in order to obtain abortions," the state attorney general's office argued successfully at the appeals court level.
Another case from Mississippi also is pending at the Supreme Court. The state wants the justices to overturn a decision by the same appellate court that blocked a law which threatened to close the state's only remaining clinic. The justices could agree to hear that case, but the one from Texas is considered more likely.
In recent years, the justices have refused to hear abortion cases from North Carolina and Arizona that were won by supporters of abortion rights. Other cases are heading toward the high court from Alabama, Wisconsin and elsewhere. Any case the justices agree or decline to hear is certain to have nationwide impact.
"What happens in Texas won't stay in Texas," said Amy Hagstrom-Miller, CEO of Whole Woman's Health, the lead plaintiff in the case. "I think we have to ask the question, do we want the rest of the country to look like Texas?"
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667cb7df2e88576741c29eba8ca7c4f6 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/09/cyber-attacks-doe-energy/71929786/ | Records: Energy Department struck by cyber attacks | Records: Energy Department struck by cyber attacks
Attackers successfully compromised U.S. Department of Energy computer systems more than 150 times between 2010 and 2014, a review of federal records obtained by USA TODAY finds.
Corrections & clarifications: An earlier version of this story contained conflicting information about the number of successful cyber intrusions involving the U.S. Department of Energy from October 2010 to October 2014. Records show 159 successful cyber intrusions.
Cyber attackers successfully compromised the security of U.S. Department of Energy computer systems more than 150 times between 2010 and 2014, according to a review of federal records obtained by USA TODAY.
Incident reports submitted by federal officials and contractors since late 2010 to the Energy Department's Joint Cybersecurity Coordination Center shows a near-consistent barrage of attempts to breach the security of critical information systems that contain sensitive data about the nation's power grid, nuclear weapons stockpile and energy labs.
The records, obtained by USA TODAY through the Freedom of Information Act, show DOE components reported a total of 1,131 cyberattacks over a 48-month period ending in October 2014. Of those attempted cyber intrusions, 159 were successful.
"The potential for an adversary to disrupt, shut down (power systems), or worse … is real here," said Scott White, Professor of Homeland Security and Security Management and Director of the Computing Security and Technology program at Drexel University. "It's absolutely real."
Energy Department officials would not say whether any sensitive data related to the operation and security of the nation's power grid or nuclear weapons stockpile was accessed or stolen in any of the attacks, or whether foreign governments are believed to have been involved.
"DOE does not comment on ongoing investigations or possible attributions of malicious activity," Energy Department spokesman Andrew Gumbiner said in a statement.
In all cases of malicious cybersecurity activity, Gumbiner said the Energy Department "seeks to identify indicators of compromise and other cybersecurity relevant information, which it then shares broadly amongst all DOE labs, plants, and sites as well as within the entire federal government."
The National Nuclear Security Administration, a semi-autonomous agency within the Energy Department responsible for managing and securing the nation's nuclear weapons stockpile, experienced 19 successful attacks during the four-year period, records show.
While information on the specific nature of the attacks was redacted from the records prior to being released, numerous Energy Department cybersecurity vulnerabilities have been identified in recent years by the department's Office of Inspector General, an independent watchdog agency.
After a cyber attack in 2013 resulted in unauthorized access to personally identifying information for more than 104,000 Energy Department employees and contractors, auditors noted "unclear lines of responsibility" and "lack of awareness by responsible officials." In an audit report released in October of last year, the Inspector General found 41 Energy Department servers and 14 workstations "were configured with default or easily guessed passwords."
Bracing for a big power grid attack: 'One is too many'
Felicia Jones, spokeswoman for the Energy Department Office of Inspector General, said while there have been some improvements, "threats continue and the Department cannot let down its guard."
Records show 53 of the 159 successful intrusions from October 2010 to October 2014 were "root compromises," meaning perpetrators gained administrative privileges to Energy Department computer systems.
Manimaran Govindarasu, a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Iowa State University who studies cybersecurity issues involving the power grid, said the root compromises represent instances where intruders gained "super-user" privileges.
"That means you can do anything on the computer," he said. "So that is definitely serious. Whether that computer was critical or just a simple office computer, we don't know."
Govindarasu said while there could be information in Energy Department computer systems concerning security plans or investments related to the nation's power grid, the grid's real-time control systems are operated by utilities and are not directly connected to the Energy Department's computer systems.
The Energy Department federal laboratories, however, sometimes pull data on the operation of the grid from utilities for research and analysis.
Records show 90 of the 159 successful cyber intrusions over the four-year period were connected to the DOE's Office of Science, which directs scientific research and is responsible for 10 of the nation's federal energy laboratories.
A USA TODAY Media Network report in March found a physical or cyber attack nearly once every four days on the nation's power infrastructure, based on an analysis of reports to the U.S. Department of Energy through a separate reporting system which requires utility companies to notify the federal agency of incidents that affect power reliability.
Amid mounting concerns, the oversight and energy subcommittees of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology will hold a joint hearing at 10 a.m. Thursday to examine vulnerabilities of the national electric grid and the severity of various threats.
The congressional committee's charter for Thursday's meeting, citing USA TODAY's report in March, notes the growing vulnerability of the nation's increasingly sophisticated bulk electric system.
"As the electric grid continues to be modernized and become more interconnected," the charter states, "the threat of a potential cybersecurity breach significantly increases."
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a502b1e05a63a1e9dd78f405f3e5ddc7 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/10/railroad-bridges-fra-maintenance-inspections-sarah-feinberg-canadian-pacific-csx/71997026/ | Feds urge railroads to share more info about safety of aging bridges | Feds urge railroads to share more info about safety of aging bridges
WASHINGTON – The Federal Railroad Administration is urging railroads that repair their own bridges to share more about their inspections and maintenance because of widespread local concerns about bridge deterioration.
In disputes across the country, members of Congress, local officials and residents complain they can't get information from railroads about the safety of deteriorating bridges and tunnels that are often more than 100 years old.
FRA Acting Administrator Sarah Feinberg wrote a letter Thursday to hundreds of local railroads and trade organizations, urging them to build public confidence in their maintenance programs by telling communities more about how they inspect and repair about 100,000 bridges nationwide.
“When a local leader or elected official asks a railroad about the safety status of a railroad bridge, they deserve a timely and transparent response,” Feinberg said in the letter obtained by USA TODAY.
Her letter follows local disputes about oil trains passing through their communities. Concerns were sparked in July 2013, when a freight train carrying Bakken crude oil from North Dakota derailed in the Canadian city Lac-Megantic, and the fire killed 42 people and destroyed dozens of buildings.
In Milwaukee, where the accident train had passed days before, city and federal officials questioned the safety of a downtown bridge, as reported by the Journal Sentinel.
The owner, Canadian Pacific, refused to share annual inspection reports. But the railroad said the bridge is safe and aging steel supports will be encased in concrete.
Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., welcomed Feinberg's letter in the spirit of her legislation pending in Congress that would require FRA to keep inspection reports and share them with community leaders. She also said she was pleased that Canadian Pacific will reinforce the bridge built in 1916 as it nears its 100th birthday.
"But we want to see the inspection report," Baldwin said. "I want to be able to provide that to my constituents who have concerns."
In northern New Jersey, local officials are worried about the safety of a CSX bridge over part of Oradell Reservoir and tunnels in other communities, according to an editorial titled “Oil Train Fears” in the Record newspaper. The officials complained they learn nothing from railroads, but the paper reported that the bridge’s wooden deck would be replaced after a Freedom of Information Act request to FRA.
Andy Cummings, a spokesman for Canadian Pacific, said the railroad is reviewing the letter.
"CP meets or exceeds all federal regulations and has a thorough inspection and maintenance program for all its bridges and structures," Murray said.
A Minnesota Public Radio investigation found railroads reluctant to share information about the condition of bridges. Local and state inspectors can see bridge supports but aren’t given access to load-bearing and design data.
Bridges are often safe even when they look deteriorated, according to Feinberg. While many railroad bridges are more than 100 years old, aging bridges could be safe because they were built for steam locomotives that are heavier than modern trains, she said.
FRA officials observed 4,000 bridges and conducted 800 field audits during the last two years, according to Feinberg. But railroads are responsible for inspecting, maintaining and repairing their privately owned bridges.
Her FRA letter urging greater transparency went to large freight railroads, about 700 short-line railroads, Amtrak and trade groups such as American Public Transportation Association representing commuter lines and the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials.
“Your engagement will help develop a stronger understanding of the work you do and build greater trust and confidence in the safety of our nation’s rail transportation system,” Feinberg said.
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6baa0b5d6c1003632d4fc77d184d058e | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/15/fast-food-scorecard-antibiotics-chipotle-mcdonalds-panera-starbucks-subway/72309072/ | Most restaurant chains get failing grades on antibiotic use in new report | Most restaurant chains get failing grades on antibiotic use in new report
Fast-food giants Burger King, Domino's and Wendy's got failing grades in a consumer report card released Tuesday that ranks the nation's largest food chains in their effort to eliminate the use of antibiotics in meat.
In contrast, Chipotle Mexican Grill and Panera Bread got high marks, according to the scorecard by a coalition of environmental and consumer advocacy groups.
The scorecard comes as fast-food chains increasingly face demands to eliminate antibiotics in meat. Research shows the use of human antibiotics to treat animals raised for food has contributed to the rise of "superbug" bacteria that resists powerful medicine and can lead to dangerous epidemics.
"The prevalence of antibiotic misuse and overuse in U.S. meat production reflects a broader tendency of poor farm management and animal welfare practices in industrial U.S.," said the coalition report titled "Chain Reaction: How Top Restaurants Rate on Reducing Antibiotics to their Meat Supply."
Major U.S. restaurant chains "can make an important contribution to tackling antibiotic resistance by working with their meat and poultry suppliers to reduce routine use of antibiotics," the report says.
Panera, Chipotle, Chick-fil-A, Dunkin' Donuts and McDonald's have all adopted policies that either limit the use of medically important antibiotics or prohibit any antibiotic use in the production of the meat they serve.
The report notes that Panera and Chipotle, which were given A grades, are the only chains that publicly affirm that the majority of their meat and poultry offered is produced without routine use of antibiotics.
The scorecard was put together by Friends of the Earth, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Consumers Union, the Food Animal Concerns Trust, Keep Antibiotics Working and the Center for Food Safety.
Chick-fil-A (B grade) and McDonald's (C grade) have announced plans to limit antibiotic use in their chicken with implementation timelines, while Dunkin' Donuts (C grade) has a policy covering all meats but has no reported timeline for implementation.
The report gives an F grade to 20 of the top 25 restaurant chains — including Burger King, Wendy's and KFC — because they have no disclosed policy on antibiotics use or have policies that the group deemed allow for the routine use of antibiotics in the meats they serve.
The report also gave failing grades to chains such as Starbucks and Subway despite both companies publicly stating they would limit the use of antibiotics in their meats.
Organic farmers face growing pains as demand outpaces supply
Subway announced last month it plans to switch to chicken without human antibiotics by 2016, and it was looking to find antibiotic-free options for other meats served at the 44,000-unit chain.
The coalition said it gave Subway partial credit for its new policy because its website indicates only support for the "elimination of subtherapeutic use of antibiotics," and it is unclear whether the company would end all routine antibiotic use in its supply chains. The coalition report says Subway's public statements have created "uncertainty" about its level of commitment. The sandwich chain, like many of the restaurants ranked, did not respond to the coalition's survey
Starbucks was dinged with an F grade even though it announced in 2009 a buying preference in North America from suppliers who use industry best practices for animal husbandry and processing for dairy, egg and meat production. Last year, the Seattle-based company broadened its animal welfare policy to promote supporting responsible use of antibiotics to support animal health.
"Even though we purchase a limited amount of meat, we are working with our suppliers to address concerns about antibiotic use and are looking to collaborate with others across our industry ... to promote best practices on this issue," Starbucks said in a statement.
This year, McDonald's, the nation's second-largest poultry purchaser, announced it would stop serving chicken raised with antibiotics in its American restaurants.
McDonald's not alone nixing antibiotics
The coalition says it gave McDonald's only a C grade because the chain's routine use of antibiotics is still allowed for "disease prevention" in the production of its pork and beef, and the company does not publicly report on the percentage of poultry served that is raised without routine antibiotics.
As the nation's top purchaser of beef and pork, McDonald's should be doing more to eliminate the use of antibiotics in livestock and poultry, said Sriram Madhusoodanan, director of the Value (the) Meal campaign at Corporate Accountability International.
"If the corporation were serious about becoming a 'modern, progressive burger company,'" said Madhusoodanan, referring to the mantra of McDonald's CEO Steve Easterbrook, "it would immediately implement a strong, accountable and transparent antibiotics policy across its supply chain."
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f930e0dd9ac98d4d0dec25f8a9dfab2d | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/15/school-bus-safety-statistics/72318198/ | Fatal school bus accidents rare | Fatal school bus accidents rare
Fatal school bus accidents like the one in Houston Tuesday that killed two children are rare, federal safety figures suggest — and they rarely kill children, who log thousands of hours riding each year.
From 2004 to 2013, U.S. drivers were involved in 340,039 fatal motor vehicle traffic crashes, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Of those, 1,214, or just .4%, were classified as "school-transportation-related," involving a school bus or other vehicle functioning as a school bus that was transporting children to or from school or related activities, such as sports or field trips.
Two students were killed and three others were injured Tuesday morning when a school bus swerved off a Houston overpass and landed on its side on the access road below. The Houston Independent School District said the bus, which was carrying four students, was on its way to Furr High School when the wreck occurred.
On average, NHTSA reported, about 134 people die in school-vehicle-related crashes each year. Of those, 8% are riding in the buses. Pedestrians, bicyclists and others outside the bus account for 21% of fatalities.
By far the most fatalities — nearly three-fourths — are people in other vehicles.
Once a bus begins rolling down the road, a child is, statistically speaking, safer inside the bus than outside it: Of the 327 school-age children killed in school-transportation-related crashes since 2004, 54 were children riding in buses. Accidents involving these vehicles, NHTSA found, are almost three times as deadly for occupants of the other vehicles.
Since 2004, NHTSA found, 106 people overall, both children and adults, have been killed while riding in or driving a school bus. Of the 106 people killed, 61 were passengers and 45 were drivers.
That works out to about six passenger fatalities per year, said Ryan Gray, editor in chief of School Transportation News, an industry trade publication. Considering about 480,000 school buses cover an estimated 10 billion miles per year, on average, he said, "It shows you how rare the fatalities are.”
Still, school bus crashes draw attention because they involve children and "because, of course, they’re really one of the most recognizable vehicles on the road.”
Most often, he said, public outcry focuses on equipping school buses with seat belts. Houston officials said the bus involved in Tuesday's crash was purchased new in 2008 and that it had lap belts for students.
Gray noted that a similar crash involving a school bus that tumbled over an Alabama overpass in 2006 prompted Texas legislators to pass a measure requiring three-point seat belts, similar to those in passenger cars, on school buses. But, he said lawmakers didn't appropriate the funding required to reimburse school districts for the modifications. Some districts may have installed the three-point seat belts, but others did not.
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b8e4311e0f0803a22be5b6dbd5881ae4 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/16/heritage-group-development-plan-dropped--stately-broadway-home/32536481/ | Heritage group: Development plan dropped for stately Broadway home | Heritage group: Development plan dropped for stately Broadway home
(WBIR - KNOXVILLE) Preservationists are celebrating after they say a developer is backing away from plans to tear down a historic home on Broadway in North Knoxville and build a big box retailer in its place.
Kim Trent with Knox Heritage said Wednesday that Hutton Companies, the developer that had an agreement for the property, has elected to drop the project entirely.
Trent said Hutton was convinced by the community and Knox Heritage that demolishing the home was a bad idea.
That was news to Tim Howard, one of the original owner's sons and one of the estate's administrators. Howard told 10News he'd received no formal notice that the developer was stepping away from an agreement with the estate of Paul Howard, a businessman and former city councilman.
Paul Howard died in March 2014 at age 91. He owned the stately house for decades, adding numerous features to improve it, said Tim Howard, who grew up in the house in the 2900 block of Broadway.
Paul Howard's will directs that the estate sell the property, Tim Howard said.
"Until I get a document, I cannot verify anything," he said.
He said he was disappointed word had gotten out to Knox Heritage before the estate learned of the decision, assuming it's accurate.
"What it does is just confuse things," he said.
Word emerged in April the house and land might be up for redevelopment.
Howard said he and his brothers will proceed as needed on behalf of their father's estate. Howard noted the development agreement with Hutton also included a nearby church.
Over the decades, Paul Howard was meticulous about caring for the sprawling structure with the five chimneys. Knox Heritage honored him in 2014 for preserving the home, thought to have been built around 1903-10. An adjacent house is not part of the sale, according to family members.
Knox Heritage presented Howard with a "Fantastic Fifteen: Excellence in Continuing Maintenance" award in January 2014.
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6dda4d7ee451c823be3eb6147cdf8b1c | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/18/former-top-nobel-official-says-maybe-obamas-peace-prize-was-not-such-a-good-idea/72396794/ | Former Nobel chief: Obama Peace Prize a failure | Former Nobel chief: Obama Peace Prize a failure
Remember that Nobel Peace Prize that President Obama got in 2009? Well, maybe it wasn't such a good idea after all, a former top Nobel official said.
In a just-released book, Geir Lundestad, director of the Nobel Institute for 25 years until stepping down last year, said the prize committee had expected the honor to deliver a boost to Obama, something he believes did not happen.
Speaking to The Associated Press, Lundestad, who sat in on the secretive committee's meetings but did not have a vote, said the committee "thought it would strengthen Obama and it didn't have this effect."
"In hindsight, we could say that the argument of giving Obama a helping hand was only partially correct," he wrote, according to VG, a Norwegian newspaper.
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The award, made by the committee in response to Obama's stated aim of ridding the world of nuclear weapons, came nine months after he took office.
"Even many of Obama's supporters believed that the prize was a mistake," Lundestad wrote in "Secretary of Peace. 25 years with the Nobel Prize".
"In that sense the committee didn't achieve what it had hoped for," he said, noting that Obama himself rarely mentions the prize.
Lundestad also claims the White House even used back channels to find out if the award could accepted in absentia.
"His cabinet … asked whether anyone had previously refused to travel to Oslo to receive the prize," Lundestad said. "In broad strokes, the answer was no."
"In the White House they quickly realized that they needed to travel to Oslo," he added.
Meanwhile, when the institute announced the award, it was met with fierce criticism in the U.S., where many argued that Obama had not been president long enough to have an impact worthy of the Nobel.
Nobel winner Malala urges kids to stand up for rights
Following several headlines that said Lundestad thought it was a "mistake" to have awarded the prize to Obama, he called a press conference on Thursday to deny that was what he had implied. "Several of you have written that I believe the prize to Obama a mistake, but then you cannot have read the book," Lundestad told reporters, according to VG. "It says nowhere that it was a mistake to give Obama the Peace Prize."
"We plan to read the book first before making any comment," said Annika Pontikis, spokeswoman for the Nobel Foundation, told Reuters.
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d08ebcac0a4a33a2b0b559989fa22c4d | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/24/chicago-tv-station-wgn-apologizes-after-using-image-of-star-that-nazis-forced-to-jews-to-wear-during-yom-kippur-segment/72729928/ | TV station uses Nazi symbol in story on Jewish holiday | TV station uses Nazi symbol in story on Jewish holiday
Oy vey, someone wasn't paying attention in history class.
A Chicago TV station has apologized after it used an image of a star that the Nazis forced Jews to wear as the station aired a segment about Yom Kippur, the most solemn day in the Jewish year.
As anchor Tom Negovan reported a story about the holiday, which ran from Tuesday evening to Wednesday sundown, the image projected behind him was of the yellow patch on a background of white and blue stripes similar to the uniforms that Jews and other inmates wore in concentration camps.
It's a clash of the titan holy days
In the middle of the star was the word "Jude," which is German for Jew.
A Twitter storm began almost immediately when Mark Larkinsky, an editor at Chicago Lawyer magazine, quickly tweeted his shock and amazement at the error.
"Holy crap,@WGNNews, this is your stock photo for a Jewish holiday?? Nobody thought that's a bad choice of photo?
In a statement posted online, WGN General Manager Greg Easterly and News Director Jennifer Lyons said the picture came from its image bank, and they "failed to recognize that the image was an offensive Nazi symbol."
The station also apologized on Twitter.
"We are extremely embarrassed and we deeply apologize to our viewers and to the Jewish community for this mistake," the WGN statement said. "Ignorance is not an excuse."
"Please know we are reviewing our in-house policies and changes have already been made to make sure a hurtful oversight like this never happens again," officials with the station wrote in their apology.
"Thank you for your understanding. We promise to do better."
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1792205a20f5a39faf704973849dc7c4 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/24/q-importance-hajj-and-its-tragic-history/72735014/ | Q&A: The importance of hajj, and its tragic history | Q&A: The importance of hajj, and its tragic history
Tragedy again marred the annual hajj pilgrimage as Saudi Arabian officials said Thursday that more than 700 Muslims died in a stampede, the deadliest such incident in more than two decades.
Stampedes during the observance have become astoundingly common over the years, even as the Saudis have poured billions of dollars into improving infrastructure in the holy city of Mecca to keep the millions of Muslim pilgrims safe. Thursday’s stampede comes after more than 100 were killed in the lead-up to this year’s pilgrimage when a crane being used to expand the Grand Mosque toppled on worshippers.
Saudi officials: Over 700 dead in hajj pilgrimage stampede
Here's a look at some questions and answers about one of Islam's holiest observances and the history of tragedy to strike the annual pilgrimage.
What is hajj?
The pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, which draws more than 2 million Muslims most years, is the ultimate gathering of Muslims. Completing hajj is one of the five pillars of Islam, a journey that is required by every Muslim who is financially and physically capable.
The rites of hajj, which date back to the prophet Abraham, are observed between the eighth and twelfth days of the final month of the Muslim calendar.
Pilgrims wear simple white garments, which are intended to strip away distinction of wealth and status.
Highlights of the ritual include pilgrims circling the Kaaba (the cuboid building in the center of the Grand Mosque), walking between the mountains of Safa and Marwah as Abraham’s wife, Hajar, did during her search for water for her son Ismail, and the symbolic casting of stones at three stone columns that represent the devil.
Why is the Kaaba so important?
The Kaaba, which Muslims believe was built by Abraham and his son Ismail as a monotheistic house of worship, is considered Islam’s most sacred site. Believers around the world face the Kaaba during their five daily prayers.
Muslims don’t worship the Kaaba, but view it as a metaphorical house of God. As they circle the Kaaba, believers pray, "Here I am, God, answering your call. Here I am."
Why are there such huge crowds?
The crowds match the importance that hajj holds in the faith. Some believers save for years to make the journey. In wealthier countries, including the U.S., travel agencies market hajj trips that can cost more than $5,000 per person.
While making hajj is seen as one of the vital parts of Muslim life, only a fraction of believers go on the pilgrimage.
A 2013 Pew poll found that only about 9% of Muslims surveyed in 39 countries had made the pilgrimage, but there are signs that the Muslim middle class around the world is growing and, with it, the interest in making hajj.
Just how frequently has tragedy struck pilgrims?
Thursday's stampede happened in Mina, near where pilgrims carry out a symbolic stoning of the devil. The directorate said the crush happened in the morning as pilgrims surged at an intersection of two streets, as worshipers headed toward a five-story Jamarat Bridge — which was designed to ease the pressure of crowds and prevent people from being trampled.
Such tragedies have happened with an alarming degree of frequency, with the area around Mina proving to be a chokepoint in the procession and where several stampedes have occurred in recent years. More than 1,400 people were trampled to death inside a sweltering air-conditioned tunnel in 1990. Hundreds were also trampled to death during the 1994, 1998, 2004 and 2006 pilgrimages.
It’s not just the risk of stampedes that have made completing the hajj dangerous.
Mecca no stranger to tragedy
In 1997, more than 300 people died and hundreds more were injured after an accidental fire swept through a tent city where pilgrims slept. Saudi forces killed hundreds of pilgrims in 1979 after extremists seized the Grand Mosque, and violence erupted again during U.S. protests in 1987.
Ahead of this year’s hajj, the World Health Organization expressed concerned that the gathering could lead to the spread of the deadly Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS), which has been on the rise in countries surrounding Saudi Arabia.
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ce65da5a777196a161f9d8e89cd0071b | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/27/chinas-president-xi-jinping-says-empowerment-women-vital-but-critics-note-his-nations-poor-treatment-some-women-activists/72929602/ | China's Xi Jinping says empowering women is vital; critics note poor treatment | China's Xi Jinping says empowering women is vital; critics note poor treatment
UNITED NATIONS — World leaders meeting Sunday at the United Nations in New York proclaimed their commitment to expand opportunities for women, noting that gender equality is integral to uplift all people.
Chinese President Xi Jinping, in his first state visit to the United States, co-chaired segments of a meeting on gender equality and women's empowerment with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon and pledged that his country would donate $10 million to U.N. Women, a group focused on furthering gender equity.
"We should foster a global environment favorable for women's development,'' Xi said through a translator at the start of the meeting. He added that China would also initiate 100 health-oriented projects in the next five years, help create schools and host 30,000 women from developing countries in China-based training programs.
But, like the rest of Xi's visit, which has been shadowed by concerns about his country engaging in cybertheft and building artificial islands in the South China Sea, the Chinese leader's stewardship of a meeting dedicated to women's empowerment was also controversial, given China's poor record on human rights and recent arrests of several women activists.
"Xi hosting a meeting on women's rights at the U.N. while persecuting feminists? Shameless.#FreeThe20,'' Hillary Clinton tweeted Sunday morning.
The FreeThe20 campaign spotlights 20 women political prisoners, including Chinese activists such as Wang Yu. The 44-year-old lawyer was imprisoned in the wake of her work on behalf of clients that included a group known as the "Five Feminists,'' who were jailed in March because of their plan to speak out about sexual harassment.
"There will be some women whose critically important voices will be missing from the dialogue around the Beijing+20 conference,'' Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said earlier this month about Sunday's meeting. "I am talking about the voices of women political prisoners and other prisoners of concern. ... If you want to empower women, don't imprison them on the basis of their views or on the basis of the rights that they are fighting for.''
The gender equality meeting was convened during a broader U.N. gathering to eradicate poverty, challenge inequality and deal with climate issues over the next 15 years.
"Today, world leaders are signaling their personal responsibility for gender equality and women empowerment,'' Ban said. "We cannot achieve a 2030 agenda without full and equal rights for half the world's population.''
Building upon the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, a plan for expanding women's rights and opportunities that was adopted by 189 nations in 1995, global leaders were asked Sunday to state specific actions they would take to meet those goals.
Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said her administration was committed to enforcing a law that denies bail to those accused of rape, and ensuring better working conditions for health care workers after Liberia's recent experiences with the deadly Ebola virus.
"Liberia has already demonstrated by my election its commitment to women equality,'' she said to applause. "However I must be the first to admit that the gaps are many.''
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said her country is trying to boost child care options and business opportunities for women, among other efforts.
"Wherever women and men participate in all walks of life,'' she said, "the opportunities and chances for development are immeasurably higher.''
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c577e47d15287819a57869095a66a8d0 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/28/us-foreign-born-population-nears-high/72814674/ | U.S. foreign-born population nears high | U.S. foreign-born population nears high
The foreign-born population living in the USA has increased so rapidly that it could break a 125-year-old record within the next decade, according to a Pew Research Center report out Monday.
The percentage of people living in the USA who were born outside the country reached 13.7% in 2015 and is projected to hit a record 14.9% in 2025, the report said. The country's previous high of 14.8% was set in 1890, when waves of Irish, Italian, Polish and other immigrants were coming to the USA.
The findings come at a critical time in the presidential campaign as candidates from both parties debate the proper role of immigration in the country. The foreign-born population represents a growing share of the electorate that Democrats and Republicans court because that voting bloc is big enough to tip presidential elections.
Leading Republicans, including front-runner Donald Trump, say legal and illegal immigration have gotten out of control. Trump and others say the country needs to limit legal immigration, and all the GOP candidates push for increased border security.
Democrats, led by Hillary Clinton, have adopted a more welcoming message, calling for protections for undocumented immigrants living in the country and an immigration system that helps some groups of immigrants enter the country.
The term "foreign-born" includes naturalized citizens, legal permanent residents, visa holders and undocumented immigrants.
Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, a group that supports immigrant rights in the USA, said the influx of foreigners proves the USA remains a beacon of hope across the world, and politicians should accept that role for the country.
"The pure politics of this is that candidates from whichever party should view these numbers as the next generation of voters," Noorani said. "They should remember that what they say now will be taken into account by future generations of U.S. citizens."
Roy Beck, executive director of NumbersUSA, a group that advocates for lower levels of immigration, said Trump and others tap into a legitimate fear that immigration levels are getting out of control.
He uses the example of the late 19th century, when the USA hit its peak of those who were born in another country, creating an overabundance of workers competing for limited jobs. That prompted many Americans to call for an immigration slowdown and proved harmful to immigrants who struggled to get ahead, a situation Beck said is happening again.
"This has been our point all along: If you want to have a good situation for immigrants, there's a threshold that you've got to keep it below," Beck said. "We know what happened last time. It was a very difficult time. And it's not just about the American-born being hostile toward the foreign-born, but the inability of the foreign-born to get ahead, to live the American Dream."
Reporter's notebook: Walking with migrants
The foreign-born population began to increase again after President Johnson signed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 — 50 years ago this coming Saturday. The law eliminated quotas and limits on how many immigrants would be allowed into the USA. The act established a system focused on accepting immigrants with family ties in the USA and those with certain work skills.
Mark Hugo Lopez, co-author of the report, said some flows of migration to the USA, including illegal immigration, have slowed in recent years as the economy struggled and the federal government strengthened border security. But the foreign-born population continues to increase, because there are still far more people trying to reach the USA than trying to leave, he said.
Lopez said the characteristics of immigrants may change over time. For example, Asians will replace Latin Americans as the dominant minority force in the USA by 2055, and Africa may send more people to the USA and other countries in the upcoming decades. He said the idea of the USA as the world's most sought-after destination for immigrants will remain.
"We have seen the United States change its immigration laws before. It became very restrictive in the 1920s, and it's very possible that could happen again," he said. "But today, more Americans believe immigration is a strength rather than a burden."
Other findings from the report:
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276e35c8922dc5161603e6fcbeaf9e2f | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/03/mass-killers-use-other-weapons-besides-guns/73213860/ | Guns are not the only deadly weapon for mass killers | Guns are not the only deadly weapon for mass killers
Mass shootings, such as the killing of 10 people at Umpqua Community College in Oregon, focus the nation's attention on gun laws, from President Obama down to local activists.
But even if guns weren't available, nearly 355 people would likely still have died in mass killing incidents in the U.S. over the past 10 years.
Since 2006, at least 1,068 people have died from gunshots in a mass killing, defined by the FBI as an incident with four or more victims. But another 140 people suffered fire-related injuries, 104 were stabbed and at least 92 were killed by blunt force, according to data tracked by USA TODAY.
BEHIND THE BLOODSHED: THE UNTOLD STORY OF AMERICA'S MASS KILLINGS
People sufficiently enraged to commit such crimes may also be motivated to find other ways, criminologist James Alan Fox of Northeastern University says.
For example, four children, their mother and grandfather died in a house fire that critically injured their father in McKeesport, Pa., last October. Court documents say Ryan Williams was angry that his father had turned him in to police on a theft charge. Williams faces the death penalty.
Still, guns are the most common weapons used in such incidents. Over the past decade, about 75% of the 1,423 who have died in mass killings were shot. And some of the deadliest mass killings have been shootings, such as the Virginia Tech massacre (though the deadliest mass killing at a school in U.S. history happened in Michigan with a series of bombs.)
Mass killings that happen in public places – such as Umpqua Community College – account for about 20% of such incidents. Shootings in public places can sometimes give people more places to hide, or a stronger possibility of a security guard or other person intervening. In less well-publicized, but more common family killings, the incident may take place in a more enclosed or isolated space, or take place overnight, Fox says.
A much broader definition of incidents where people were shot (but not necessarily killed), shows nearly 300 people have been shot in such cases this year. At Umpqua, at least seven people were injured in the shooting.
It's unclear how much gun control would reduce injuries or deaths in such incidents. USA TODAY's data show most guns used in mass killings are handguns, and are often legally obtained.
"When we have these incidents, they tend to motivate people to want to do something about it, and that's a good thing," said Fox, the author of Extreme Killing. "But the kind of crime that's probably most difficult to prevent are these extreme, but rare cases."
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7f1bf6a0a264813a71804b2c88b88636 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/06/sex-education-zimmerman-book/73453030/ | Pregnancy rate, STD stats show sex ed in U.S. not working | Pregnancy rate, STD stats show sex ed in U.S. not working
Modern-day American teenagers are as connected — to the greater world and to each other — as any generation in history. But take a look at their sexual health and you'll start to wonder exactly how they're benefiting from all of those connections.
First the good news: Recent statistics from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) note that teen pregnancy rates have dropped. In 2013, they were at a record low of 26.5 per 1,000 women, down 10% from 2012.
But the CDC also notes that the U.S. teen pregnancy rate is substantially higher than in other industrialized nations. And the picture gets bleaker: of the 34% of teens who said they'd had sex in the previous three months, about four in 10 said they didn't use a condom in their last encounter.
It gets worse: Only about one in five "sexually experienced" teens have ever been tested for HIV. And nearly half of the 20 million new sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) contracted each year are among young people ages 15 to 24.
Most parents count on schools to teach kids about sex. So why is sex education in U.S. schools so ineffective?
It's probably because the topic pushes on nearly all of our fears about our children, historian Jonathan Zimmerman says. Are they naturally sexual beings? If so, what should we teach them about sex? What is the purpose of teaching them about something so intimate and so forbidden? Should the lessons aim to keep them sexually pure? Abstinent until marriage? Or to prevent disease? How about all of the above?
It turns out that Americans are not the only ones wrestling with these questions.
In his recent book Too Hot to Handle: A Global History of Sex Education, Zimmerman finds that even politically liberal countries such as Sweden struggle to get it right. Parents there have long worried that sex education "might awake the sleeping bear" of sexual activity.
Interestingly, each country seems to have coined its own phrase, over the years, to demonstrate just how freaked out parents got over the years about such forbidden knowledge: In Japan, adults worried that it would "wake a sleeping child," while in Thailand the complaint was that it would "show nuts to the squirrel." In Vietnam, such courses would be like "showing the way to the deer."
In reaction, teachers in many countries moved to couch sex ed coursework in more parent-friendly terms: In the 1920s in Denmark, Zimmerman found, it was referred to as Mothercraft and Moral Education. In Germany, it was Marriage and Motherhood. Norwegians called it Family Hygiene.
Calls for family planning in the 1960s and 1970s turned the courses into Population Education; a decade later, the AIDS epidemic led teachers in many countries to reframe it as AIDS Education, Life Skills or simply Adolescence Education.
Zimmerman, a professor of history at New York University, maintains that no country in the past century or so has done much more than just offer sporadic sex education instruction. As a result, he says, any assertions that it has been effective — or, on the other hand, dangerous — are suspect.
"When you hear anyone on any side of the political spectrum in any country say, 'Sex ed is doing x behaviorally' — on the right it's making kids have more sex, or on the left it's making them use condoms — you can pretty much write them off as charlatans," he says.
What makes the U.S. pregnancy and STD statistics all the more astonishing, says Zimmerman, is that we as a nation really should have been able to put this sort of thing behind us in the 20th century, a stretch of history, he notes, that brought us two remarkable developments: near-universal school attendance and a near-complete revolution in sexual freedom and expression. Zimmerman goes so far as to call the last 100 years the Century of School and the Century of Sex.
Yet when you put them together, he says, "they just don't play nicely." We know more about sex, but it's "not because of school. School just hasn't been able to accommodate all of our differences and all of our tensions about this."
Amy Lang, a Seattle-based sexuality and parenting expert, says Zimmerman is absolutely right. "Sexuality is something that most people try to pretend is not an inherent part of being human," she says. Adults are "completely flustered by it" and wish it would go away. "As a culture and even as individuals, we don't want to embrace the fact that we're sexual creatures."
Part of our discomfort, she says, is because we don't want our kids to squirm while they're listening to matter-of-fact discussions about sexuality. "We buy into their discomfort."
The result, she says, is that teens get a lot of their information about sex by watching pornography. "They come into their sexual relationships thinking they already know how to do it. What's missing is that they don't have a fundamental understanding of sexuality — the social, cultural, emotional, inherent aspect of being human."
And short of a sudden change of heart, she says, we shouldn't count on our schools get the job done.
At the moment, only 22 states and the District of Columbia mandate sex education — and only 18 require that information on contraception be provided, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a New York-based research, policy analysis and education organization. Of the states that require some type of sex education, only 13 require that the instruction be "medically accurate," the institute found earlier this year. Just 33 states and D.C. mandate HIV education.
In a way, sex education suffers from the same difficulty as lessons on other fraught topics such as drugs or gangs or alcohol, Zimmerman says. Unlike with history, science or literature, the main purpose of lessons on sex and these other topics is to get students less interested in them. "In most of the other realms, the goal is to not just engage people's interests, but engage them in activity," Zimmerman says. "And in these zones, it's to make them less interested and less active."
Actually, Lang says, she doesn't worry about whether her lessons make the topic more attractive or less. She pushes to make them "as information-rich" as a good history class. "If kids are well-informed about something that's part of their health," she says, "they make better choices."
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c88365c71a5c13fa88780e2cb4e67ba9 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/15/lamar-odom-sexual-enhancement-supplement-viagra/73981664/ | Lamar Odom's sex enhancement supplements may have been spiked | Lamar Odom's sex enhancement supplements may have been spiked
Sexual enhancement supplements – like those reportedly taken by Lamar Odom before he collapsed at a Nevada brothel – are often spiked with powerful and hidden pharmaceuticals, despite labels claiming they only contain herbs and other natural ingredients, experts and regulators have warned for years.
Odom took cocaine and as many as 10 sexual–performance supplement pills leading up to his hospitalization in Las Vegas, according to a 911 call released Wednesday by the Nye County Sheriff’s Department. The product he took was “Reload; 72-hour strong; sexual performance enhancer for men,” two employees of the Love Ranch said on the 911 call.
In 2013, the FDA issued a public warning that consumers should not purchase or use a supplement called Reload because tests found it contains sildenafil, the active ingredient in the prescription erectile dysfunction drug Viagra. The undeclared ingredient may dangerously interact with other drugs, especially nitrates often taken by men with diabetes, high blood pressure or heart disease, the FDA warned.
Dangers of 'herbal Viagra': What every man should know
A photo of the product that the FDA posted with its safety alert included no information about what company made the product. Despite the product's label claiming it was made in the USA, the website listed on it appears to be a Japanese dating site that provides little clue as to who is the maker of the product.
USA TODAY's "Supplement Shell Game" investigation in 2013 found it difficult or impossible to determine who the people or companies are behind many of the drug-spiked supplements detected through a limited testing program run by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. When companies could be identified, USA TODAY found that many of those caught selling spiked supplements are run by people with criminal backgrounds and regulatory run-ins. Consumers buying products from these firms were in some cases entrusting their safety to people with rap sheets involving barbiturates, crack cocaine, Ecstacy and other narcotics, as well as arrests for selling or possessing steroids and human growth hormone. Other supplement company executives had records of fraud, theft, assault, weapons offenses, money laundering or other offenses, the investigation found.
It’s rare for supplements taken by consumers to undergo testing by the FDA. Out of an estimated 85,000 supplement products on the market, the FDA told USA TODAY in 2013 that it was budgeted to run just 1,000 tests per year.
"The current laws combined with lack of regulatory action by the FDA have left dangerous products on store shelves," said Pieter Cohen, an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School, who has published numerous studies about dangerous supplement products. "The FDA is simply not doing their job."
Products marketed as sexual enhancement supplements are a "very high risk sector" for consumers, Cohen said, because they often contain prescription erectile dysfunction drugs delivered in unpredictable doses. Some contain multiple different types of these drugs. Others contain chemical cousins of these drugs that have never been tested on humans and could have significant safety risks, he said.
Makers of tainted supplements have criminal pasts
Under the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994, known by its acronym DSHEA, the FDA must show a product is unsafe before it can take any action to restrict its use or seek its removal from the market.
Products marketed as nutritional supplements – which range from vitamins and minerals to protein powders to herbal blends – are treated like foods and presumed to be all-natural and safe, unless proven otherwise. Although supplements are often sold and used as remedies to treat various conditions, they aren’t required to prove their safety or effectiveness before being sold, as is required for medications.
The FDA has found that products marketed as all-natural supplements for sexual enhancement, weight loss and bodybuilding are among the types most commonly found to be spiked with undisclosed pharmaceuticals.
The FDA said in a statement Thursday that the regulation of dietary supplements is "extremely challenging" and that the industry is huge and growing — currently about $35 billion in sales, up from about $5.8 billion just after DSHEA was enacted. Under the existing law, the FDA said it has "limited authority and faces significant hurdles and resource limitations" in regulating supplement products.
Supplement industry groups have said the FDA needs to do a better job of enforcing the law using authorities it already has.
“We don’t view the problem as a function of the law, because companies that choose to spike products with illegal drugs will find a way to do so regardless of the law — they’re simply law breakers,” said Judy Blatman, a senior vice president at the Council for Responsible Nutrition, an industry group. “It is illegal to sell Viagra, herbal or otherwise, as a dietary supplement.”
The supplement industry for many years has opposed efforts to require that supplements be registered with the FDA so the agency will know what’s on the market and what’s supposed to be in the products.
Legislation called the Dietary Supplement Labeling Act, introduced in 2013 by Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., has gained little traction. The bill seeks to give the FDA the authority to require manufacturers to register products and ingredients with the agency, and also to provide proof of any health benefit claims. It also includes provisions to require more information on product labels. A key goal, the sponsors have said, is to reduce the number of drug-spiked products masquerading as all-natural supplements.
“This bill, which we plan to reintroduce, is desperately needed to improve the currently inadequate oversight,” Durbin and Blumenthal said in a joint statement Thursday.
Durbin and Blumenthal noted that a study published in The New England Journal of Medicine this week found that dietary supplements send at least 23,000 Americans a year to the emergency room and cause at least 2,000 to be hospitalized.
“This study confirms that not enough is being done to protect consumers — especially young adults — from dangerous dietary supplements,” they said.
Read USA TODAY's Supplement Shell Game series at supplements.usatoday.com
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18d1afd65aa422799d11d9ab170d265b | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/15/sexual-supplements-can-dangerous-especially-when-combined-cocaine/73982616/ | Dangers of 'herbal Viagra': What every man should know | Dangers of 'herbal Viagra': What every man should know
Basketball player Lamar Odom's collapse this week – after allegedly using cocaine and sexual supplements – has raised questions about the supplements and their safety and whether they could increase the dangers posed by illegal drugs. Odom is now on life support at a Nevada hospital.
USA TODAY's Liz Szabo talked to medical experts about these products.
Q. What is in a sexual performance supplement?
A. Although these supplements are often called "herbal Viagra" – suggesting that they contain a safer or more natural form of the little blue pill – many contain the active ingredient in real Viagra, according to the Food and Drug Administration.
Odom apparently took supplements called Reload 72-hour Strong and Libimax, according a spokesman for the legal Nevada brothel where he collapsed, who spoke to the Associated Press.
Lamar Odom's sex enhancement supplements may have been spiked
Tests by the FDA in 2013 found sildenafil, Viagra's active ingredient, in Reload. In 2009, the manufacturer of LibiMax recalled the product after tests found that it contained tadalafil, another drug for erectile dysfunction.
Problems aren't limited to LibiMax and Reload. The FDA has found that 300 sexual supplements contain unidentified ingredients.
"Not only do these products contain undisclosed drug ingredients," the FDA says on its website, "but they also sometimes may include combinations of undisclosed ingredients or excessively high doses, both potentially dangerous situations."
Some herbal sexual supplements also contain saw palmetto, ginseng and horny goat weed, used for centuries in China to treat low libido and erectile dysfunction. Others contain yohimbine,made from the bark of a type of evergreen tree, said Pieter Cohen, an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School.
Taking a sexual supplement "is like playing Russian roulette," said Robert Glatter, an emergency physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. "You don't know what you're getting any time you open a bottle of 'herbal Viagra.'"
Q. Why would supplement makers put an expensive drug like Viagra, which can sell for $5 to $10 a pill, into an herbal supplement?
A. Although Viagra is expensive in the USA, it's dirt cheap in China, which makes many of these supplements, Cohen said. Chinese companies sell sexual supplements for a fraction of the cost of Viagra, but can still make a profit. Unlike Viagra, however, which comes in a standard dose, supplements may not have a standard dose of medication. So men could get much less of the active ingredient they're looking for -- or much more.
Q. How risky are these supplements?
A. According to the FDA, the hidden ingredients in these supplements can pose life-threatening risks.
That's because the active ingredients in erectile dysfunction drugs can interact with prescription drugs such as nitroglycerin, used to treat chest pain and other heart problems, according to the FDA. That's a big risk, given that the older men who seek out erectile dysfunction drugs are often the same ones who take nitroglycerin, including men with diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol or heart disease.
Both Viagra-like drugs and nitroglycerin lower blood pressure, Glatter said. Taken together, the combination can cause heart rhythm problems, heart attacks and strokes.
In its 2013 warning about Reload, the FDA said: "Consumers should stop using this product immediately and throw it away. Consumers who have experienced any negative side effects should consult a health care professional as soon as possible."
Even prescription erectile dysfunction drugs such as Viagra, which are regulated much more tightly than herbal supplements, can cause heart attacks, Glatter said.
Sexual supplements that contain Viagra-like drugs are especially risky if men take large doses, Glatter said. Odom reportedly took 10 of the pills.
Consumers should be skeptical about claims that appear too good to be true, said Craig Hopp, program director of extramural research the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, part of the National Institutes of Health. Some herbal sexual supplements promise results in 30 minutes, for example. While pharmaceuticals can work that quickly, Hopp said that plants don't. Supplements that claim to work as quickly as drugs are probably laced with drugs.
Q. Do sexual supplements work?
A. No supplements have ever been shown to be effective for erectile dysfunction, according to the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health.
Unlike prescription drugs, which must prove they're safe and effective before being approved by the FDA, supplement makers don't have to prove that their products work before selling them, said Charles Bell, programs director for Consumers Union, the advocacy arm of Consumer Reports magazine. Because supplements aren't tested through a rigorous scientific process, consumers have no way to know if they really work.
Q. Are supplements riskier than prescription or over-the-counter erectile dysfunction drugs?
A. Unlike prescription and over-the-counter drugs, supplement makers aren't required to post warnings about such side effects or drug interactions on their product labels, Bell said. Many men may not realize the risks.
Sexual supplements can sometimes be much stronger than regular Viagra, Glatter said. "You take more and more pills thinking it's safe," Glatter said. "People think, 'It's natural, so it must be safe.'"
A study in The New England Journal of Medicine this week found that at least 23,000 Americans go to the emergency room – including 2,000 who are hospitalized – after taking dietary supplements. Many of the most common symptoms are heart palpitations.
Side effects from dietary supplements send 23,000 people a year to ER
Q. Do sexual supplements add to the risks of cocaine or other illegal drugs?
A. Absolutely, Glatter said.
Cocaine alone is dangerous and can cause a heart attack, Glatter said. Cocaine, a stimulant, raises blood pressure and makes the heart beat faster. But it decreases the blood supply to the coronary arteries, the blood vessels that supply the heart with oxygen.
Cocaine is also particularly dangerous when combined with alcohol, said Glatter, who noted that some people combine the two in order to soften the experience of coming down off cocaine.
Combining cocaine and Viagra can cause a life-threatening, excruciatingly painful condition called an aortic dissection, or tear in the wall of the body's main artery, Glatter said. This causes blood to bleed into the blood vessel wall – instead of flowing out to the body – which deprives the brain and extremities of oxygen. That, in turn, can cause a stroke. People with this condition can also lose a leg.
The results of Odom's toxicology tests have not yet been released.
"God knows what this guy took," Glatter said.
Adding the club drug ecstasy, which is often taken to boost a sexual experience, only increases the risks from Viagra-like drugs, Glatter said. Combining ecstasy with alcohol and Viagra can cause serotonin syndrome, causing confusion, seizures and a high body temperature. That, in turn, also can lead to stroke.
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09403b6a715ed202ceac7c77d332aa8b | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/21/police-officer-shot-nm/74369582/ | Suspect arrested after police officer shot in N.M. | Suspect arrested after police officer shot in N.M.
A suspect has been arrested after a police officer was shot and critically wounded in Albuquerque, the police department said Thursday.
The eight-year veteran officer underwent surgery Wednesday night after being shot multiple times.
The shooting occurred around 7:45 p.m. by a Walgreen's in the eastern part of the city near Interstate 40. The arrest was announced early Thursday.
Albuquerque Police Chief Gorden Eden said the initial investigation shows that the officer was shot during a traffic stop. The police force named the suspect as 34-year-old Davon Lymon in a post on Twitter.
Contributing: Associated Press
Police arrest person of interest in road rage killing of girl, 4
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8bddf921689dc2a2e707fbde77cf989f | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/24/japanese-how--has-americans-tossing-out-clutter-bagful/74467756/ | A Japanese how-to has Americans tossing out clutter by the bagful | A Japanese how-to has Americans tossing out clutter by the bagful
By the time Anna Kate Mackle of Tampa Bay, Fla., got a copy of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing (the book by Japanese organizer Marie Kondo that has taken the U.S. by storm), she had given decluttering the college try — a few times. Needless to say, it didn’t take.
But something about Kondo’s deliberate and unique method made Mackle rethink her process. “(My family) had been trying to declutter and would do a little bit at a time, but not ever finish,” says Mackle, the principal harpist for the Florida Orchestra. “So we went through the steps that she talks about in the book, and she talks about going in a specific order.”
While other decluttering books suggest tackling one room at a time or discarding five items a day, the KonMari Method outlined in the popular book (2 million copies sold and counting) pushes people to do a complete home overhaul.
Kondo recommends starting with clothes before moving on to harder-to-part-with items such as books and even pictures and heirlooms. In each category, all items must be put on the floor, then picked up and touched one by one. The only question you need to answer to keep the item is, does it spark joy?
“Before, we had been operating under the preamble of ‘Have you used it in the past two years?’ or ‘Do you love it?’ as how to decide whether to throw stuff out,” Mackle says.
So does the process work? Is it magic? Mackle says, yes!
“Just having a calm, happy, organized home and not feeling like every day I am doing the same thing, picking up the same things, is great,” she says.
Less stuff = less stress
Deborah Heisz, co-founder and editorial director of Live Happy magazine, says the declutter trend is popular right now because it not only eliminates dust and distraction; it leads to less stress.
“There has been very key science on the effect clutter has on your life,” she says, citing a 2012 UCLA study that looked at how mothers’ stress hormones spiked when they were dealing with their belongings. “Seventy-five percent of families in the U.S. can’t park their cars in the garage because they have too much stuff. It is genuinely a stress builder.”
The new minimalism is a shift away from the materialistic mindset that has been pervasive in recent years. It’s quite a lifestyle change for people who once strived for more and more stuff and now want to swap the material goods for experiences.
Arizona couple Joshua and Kim Becker began shedding their possessions after a moment of clarity one Saturday morning seven years ago. Dad was cleaning out the garage and
Mom organizing the house as their 5-year-old son played by himself.
“I remember looking at the pile of dirty and dusty stuff that I hadn’t used all winter, and then saw my son playing alone in the back yard,” says Joshua, who has authored e-books on minimalism. “I had the realization that everything I owned wasn’t making me happy. Even worse, everything I owned was taking me away from the very thing that did bring me happiness and purpose and fulfillment in life.”
Although it was hard to get rid of certain things, the family has never looked back.
“In every imaginable way our life has improved,” he says. “We have more time to do things because we are doing less cleaning and organizing. There is more gratitude in our life, more contentment in our life. We have found more generosity, and we stopped comparing what we had to the other people around us.”
Finding focus
Perhaps the most magical outcome of decluttering is the focus people find once the distraction of stuff is removed.
David Diller and his wife, Christina, (whose blog ticoandtina.com includes a focus on minimalism and “cultivating simplicity”) began streamlining their lives in 2012, cutting down on their material possessions and changing how they approach work and life. Now, they say, they’re more focused on what really matters to them: family, travel and experiencing other cultures.
“Before we started this journey our mindset was to have and do more,” she says. “But it wasn’t giving us more life — we felt overwhelmed and stressed and depressed because it was too much.”
The goal, Christina says, is to create an environment where you can stop worrying about things that hold you back and move forward with purpose. “There is a freeing element of not having to keep up with stuff that doesn’t matter and being able to identify what you really need in your life to live and be happy,” she says.
Whether you get to that place with the help of a Japanese guru or take your own road there — make your own magic!
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2bc7258a3edc7cb89e0776d8a7d2edd8 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/24/patricia-leaves-some-tourists-stranded-and-others-eager-to-vacation/74532938/ | Patricia leaves some tourists stranded, others eager to vacation | Patricia leaves some tourists stranded, others eager to vacation
GUADALAJARA, Mexico — Tourists here wavered Saturday whether to continue their long-planned vacations or get home fast after Hurricane Patricia degenerated into a low pressure system, leaving behind less damage than feared.
No deaths were initially reported as emergency crews made their way into the hardest-hit areas of the country.
The tourist destinations of Puerto Vallarta and neighboring Riviera Nayarit escaped massive destruction, motivating some tourists to continue with their trips. The Puerto Vallarta airport resumed normal operations, even as Mexico's Federal Police and armed forces airlifted out stranded tourists.
"The worry was much greater," said Stan Singleton, a bed and breakfast owner in Tlaquepaque, a suburb of Guadalajara popular with tourists and folk artists. "In actuality, we've seen worse."
Singleton stocked up on extra provisions and water to prepare for a potential influx. His seven-room business, Casa de las Flores Bed and Breakfast, filled up quick as Hurricane Patricia approached the coast. But the build up proved to be worse than the storm itself, he said.
Shop owners in Tlaquepaque opened their gift stores and fast food joints early Saturday for business, even as large dark clouds loomed overhead.
While some tourists were stuck in Puerto Vallarta, others were flying in, shaking off concerns their long-planned vacations would be ruined by damage from Hurricane Patricia. "We had nine days off, and we were going to go somewhere," said Tina Speece, 48, of Durango, Colo.
She and her husband, Dan Speece, 50, and their two children, Casie, 21, and Cody, 17, were sitting on an American Airlines flight in Phoenix waiting to fly to Puerto Vallarta.
Tina said she looked into other destinations when they heard the strongest hurricane ever was barreling toward their favorite vacation spot, where they go every year to eat, drink, fish and lay on the beach. Their flight was supposed to be full but half the seats were empty, apparently after many other travelers canceled their trips.
Tina also thought about canceling, but her husband, Dan, talked her out of it. At 10 p.m. Friday, they decided to go after friends already in Puerto Vallarta told them the storm had not been anywhere near as bad as predicted.
Texas hit with heavy rains, heightened flood threat
The pilot announced that upon landing they could expect rain on and off, temperatures in the 70s and most surprising, "the winds are calm." After all the media reports, "we really expected something other than a nice day," the pilot said over the intercom.
Their flight was scheduled to leave at 9 a.m. but was delayed — but not by the weather. Grounds crews needed to check an engine problem.
Patricia weakens to tropical depression; no major damage reported
Favorable geography worked to Mexico's advantage in avoiding deaths and destruction. The storm made landfall on the thinly populated Costa Alegre, a collection of fishing ports, beach towns and, increasingly, luxury villas between Manzanillo to Puerto Vallarta.
"It's a mess," said Daniel Hallas, an American realtor in the seaside community of La Manzanilla, 25 miles from Cuxmala, where the storm made landfall. "All I can say is that it's a mess."
In Barra de Navidad, also in the Costa Alegre, locals reported downed trees and power lines and roofs ripped off of homes, along with flooding during the storm.
"There wasn't much of a warning," said hotel manager Damian Sánchez, who estimated the storm lasted four hours — with a pause while the eye of the hurricane passed.
Contributing: David Agren in Monterrey, Mexico.
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c319f4aa315b8029cccfb9033c06a024 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/25/active-shooter-reported-near-nccus-campus/74609986/ | Active Shooter Reported On NCCU's Campus | Active Shooter Reported On NCCU's Campus
DURHAM, N.C. -- An active shooter was reported near North Carolina Central University's campus Sunday night. In a tweet sent out at 11:14 p.m., the school urged students to "seek shelter away from gunfire" and lock their doors.
NCCU campus police told the CBS affiliate in Raleigh that one student was injured in the incident, but did not reveal the extent of the injuries.
Campus police said that the scene was all clear just after 11:30 p.m.
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e5888d4481918231ffe05c593fbc34da | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/25/newser-shroud-of-turn-mysteries/74583880/ | DNA tests open more Shroud of Turin mysteries | DNA tests open more Shroud of Turin mysteries
(NEWSER) – The mysteries of the Shroud of Turin are proving to be very stubborn in the face of modern technology. An Italian team analyzed DNA from the relic some believe is the burial cloth of Jesus but failed to find conclusive proof of its origins, the Independent reports.
The testing revealed traces of people and pollen from many parts of the world, meaning it that could be a medieval forgery—or that its journey to Europe could indeed have begun in Jerusalem around 30 or 33AD. The results show that over the centuries, the shroud came in contact with many "different types of natural and anthropological environments," according to the researchers, whose study is published in the journal Nature.
One find that will surprise skeptics: One of the most common snippets of mitochondrial DNA was from the Middle East. The type is "rare in western Europe, and it is typical of the Druze community, an ethnic group that has some origin in Egypt and that lives mainly in restricted areas between Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, and Palestine," lead researcher Gianni Barcaccia tells LiveScience, which notes that other experts consider some of the methods used unreliable.
Another find: Barcaccia says some of the oldest DNA on the cloth was from India, meaning the shroud may have been made there. (An earlier study suggested the shroud is real—and was created by a huge earthquake.)
This story originally appeared on Newser:
DNA Tests on the Shroud of Turin Delivered Some Surprising Results
Newser is a USA TODAY content partner providing general news, commentary and coverage from around the Web. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.
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de0410a0afd41a6b766a483ed32a7d12 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/30/5-things-you-need-know-friday/74615888/ | 5 things you need to know Friday | 5 things you need to know Friday
New challenge to Obamacare's 'contraceptive mandate'
The Supreme Court is about to climb back into Americans' bedrooms. Sixteen months after ruling that companies with religious objections cannot be forced to pay for workers' contraceptives, the court faces a push from religious charities, schools and hospitals seeking to get out of the birth control business altogether. On Friday, the justices are scheduled to review petitions asking them to overturn court decisions that would force the non-profits to opt out of the "contraceptive mandate" included in the Affordable Care Act, rather than receiving the blanket exclusion granted churches and other religious institutions. The religious non-profits say even writing a letter or filling out a form to opt out of coverage makes them complicit in it.
Iran joining talks to end Syrian civil war
For the first time, Iran will join international talks on Friday seeking an end to the four-year Syrian civil war. About a dozen countries are participating, including Russia, which together with Iran is the main ally of embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad. Other countries include the U.S., Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which have been supporting Syrian rebel forces. Iran’s participation is controversial because the Islamic Republic supports terrorists and insurgents across the region. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry hopes that Iran, as Assad’s main backer, might play a crucial role in finding a political solution that leads to Assad’s departure and an end to the war.
Apple TV aims to redefine your TV experience
The future of television (according to Apple) can be yours starting Friday when a revamped Apple TV begins hitting stores. The new Apple TV includes Siri helping you find stuff to watch, with a slick new touch-capable remote control and the inclusion of games and other new apps. But it's not flawless, says USA TODAY's Ed Baig. And where's the standout 4K resolution? Users will find the usual entertainment apps (iTunes, Netflix, Hulu, YouTube, etc.)and some new additions like Periscope, but won't yet see Facebook and Twitter. Apple says developers will be adding many more apps in the coming weeks. The revamped Apple TV starts at $149.
More of Clinton's emails will be released
The State Department will release another batch of Hillary Clinton's personal emails Friday, the first since her 10-hour testimony before the House Benghazi panel last week. Like earlier downloads, it's unlikely the emails will show much beyond the minutiae of her daily interactions with staff, lawmakers and outside supporters. Clinton’s standing in the Democratic primary has dramatically improved since the State Department’s last email release in September. The monthly releases will continue until January of 2016 in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
Soldier missing since Korean War to be buried in California
A U.S. soldier is scheduled to be buried Friday in California nearly 65 years after he is thought to have died. The remains of Army Cpl. Robert V. Witt, who had been missing since the Korean War, were returned from North Korea earlier this week to his sister in Huntington Beach, Calif. In 1953, during prisoner of war exchanges, repatriated U.S. soldiers told officials that Witt had been captured during battle and died from malnutrition. It's believed he died on Jan. 31, 1951. Witt will be buried with full military honors at Rose Hills Memorial Park in Whittier, Calif.
And the essentials:
Weather: The USA's two soggy spots Friday will be the southern Plains and the Northwest, while the eastern U.S. enjoys a clear fall day.
Stocks: Asian stocks were muted Friday, while Wall Street was pointing slightly higher.
TV tonight: Wondering what to watch this weekend? TV critic Robert Bianco looks at Grimm, The Good Wife and Project Greenlight.
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1b4f8b669875c3bcb9deb634dad2520f | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/03/theranos-founder-holmes-promises-more-transparency/75070286/ | Theranos' Holmes promises more transparency | Theranos' Holmes promises more transparency
SAN FRANCISCO — Embattled and innovative bloodwork biotech startup Theranos will step up its transparency in the wake of a slew of negative publicity, company founder Elizabeth Holmes told tech conference attendees Monday.
Holmes, 31, told Fortune editor Alan Murray that, "I think right now we want to try and lead in transparency. There’s no reason we can’t do peer review and publish other statistics."
When asked what she thought about Walgreens announcing that it was suspending plans for the expansion of Theranos Wellness Centers into new locations, Holmes said, "They haven’t said that to us. We’re talking with them. We completed our rollout with them in Phoenix. They’ve been a great partner with us there."
The drugstore chain had partnered with Theranos in its initial rollout across dozens of stores in Arizona.
Now no doctor's note needed for blood test in Arizona
Bloodwork darling Theranos under fire
The $9 billion startup came under fire a few weeks ago when the Wall Street Journal published an investigation quoting anonymous former employees who questioned the efficacy and reliability of the company's proprietary technology. Then the Food and Drug Administration, with which Theranos has been working for the past few years, released documents that showed a list of 14 complaints. These included the as-yet untested nature of the company's nanotainer, a small vial that holds the drop or two of blood.
Holmes started Theranos while still an undergraduate at Stanford University, and has since raised $400 million and amassed a board of directors that includes former politicians Henry Kissinger and Sam Nunn. Her mission has always been to make blood tests both easier and less expensive, allowing consumers to have access to their changing health patterns in order to preventively monitor any potential illnesses.
Murray admitted that Fortune has been "all-in" on the Theranos story, giving Holmes her first major magazine cover, and wondered if perhaps she had not "hyped" her company too much. (USA TODAY also had among the first profiles of the entrepreneur, which published in the summer 2014 just as Holmes was beginning to go public with her company.) Holmes calmly responded that the issue wasn't the company's technology, which has proven itself in a range of in-house blood tests using mere drops of blood run through specialized machines, she said. Rather, the company's posture with regard to its findings is the issue.
"We’ve concluded we need to do better job of communicating," she said. "We’ve never talked publicly about what we’re doing with the FDA, (but) we’re incredibly confident in the data we’re submitting to the agency. We’ve done it in the past and we’ll continue to do it in the future. I’ve learned the point about communication."
Murray asked if Theranos was indeed still worth $9 billion considering its recent setbacks. Said Holmes with a smile: "That’s for investors to decide."
Follow USA TODAY tech reporter Marco della Cava on Twitter @marcodellacava
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3ead39883a2a66ab51bb46cb52fade94 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/05/man-killed-by-his-tapeworm-cancer/75207608/ | Man killed by his tapeworm's cancer | Man killed by his tapeworm's cancer
(NEWSER) – Centers for Disease Control researchers say it is one of the strangest and most unsettling cases they have ever encountered. The researchers say that scans of a very ill man in Colombia revealed what "looked like cancer, but the tumors were composed of cells that were not human," NPR reports. The tumors had come from the man's resident tapeworm, which had developed cancer and somehow spread the disease to its host, according to the scientists, whose study published in the New England Journal of Medicine describes the "invasion of human tissue by abnormal, proliferating, genetically altered tapeworm cells" as a "novel disease mechanism." The man died 72 hours after researchers pinpointed the cause of the tumors, Live Science reports.
The Colombian man had HIV, which meant the tapeworm's growth in his body was not halted the way it would have been by a healthy immune system, Live Science notes. A CDC pathologist tells the Washington Post that it took dozens of tests to reveal the cause of the illness, and finding tapeworm DNA in the tumors was a huge surprise. "This is the first time we've seen parasite-derived cancer cells spreading within an individual," he says. "This is a very unusual, very unique illness." The Post notes that the study raises questions about what other parasites dwelling in the human body can develop — and spread — cancer. (For more tapeworm horror, read about what caused this man's headache.)
This story originally appeared on Newser:
Researchers Tested a Man's Unusual Tumor Cells. The DNA Wasn't Human
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Newser is a USA TODAY content partner providing general news, commentary and coverage from around the Web. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.
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7aba9136a91b2c13a2ac8de9e184b853 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/09/blood-pressure-treatment-study/75459834/ | 120 or bust? Blood pressure care could get more aggressive for millions | 120 or bust? Blood pressure care could get more aggressive for millions
Here's a new number to remember: 120.
Millions of Americans with high blood pressure may soon find their doctors urging them to take additional medications, come in for more check-ups and make more lifestyle changes in an aggressive effort to drive their top blood pressure readings that low – largely because of a study that got its first full airing on Monday.
The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine and presented at a meeting of the American Heart Association, shows that deaths and cardiovascular illnesses were cut by a quarter when patients aimed for 120 millimeters of mercury or less of systolic pressure. That's the top number of the two in a blood pressure reading.
A comparison group aimed for 140 or less, the goal widely recommended today.
The benefits of aggressive treatment were striking, even though they came with some increased side effects and would exact a still-uncalculated cost on the health care system, medical experts said.
"This could have a large impact on the prevention of cardiovascular disease. It's an extraordinarily important study," said Daniel Jones, a past president of the heart association and director of obesity research at the University of Mississippi. He also is a member of an expert panel that will update blood pressure treatment guidelines over the next year.
About one third of U.S. adults have high blood pressure and it is a leading reason people visit doctors.
The study came out two months after preliminary results were released with fanfare, but few details, by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health. The institutes, which funded the trial, stopped it early after finding clear results.
Here are some important details:
• The three-year study included 9,300 people over age 50 with high blood pressure and other heart disease risks, but it did not include people with diabetes. A previous smaller trial failed to find similar benefits for them, for reasons still not explained.
• Participants who aimed to stay below 140 needed an average of two drugs; those who aimed for 120 or lower needed three – and reached average readings of 121.
• Cardiovascular problems including heart failure, stroke, heart attacks, and death from heart disease occurred in 243 people (5.2%) in the intense treatment group, vs. 319 people (6.8%) in the standard treatment group.
• Deaths from any cause occurred in 155 people (3.3%) in the intense treatment group vs. 210 (4.5%) in the standard treatment group.
• Serious side effects, including fainting, abnormally low blood pressure and acute kidney damage, occurred in 220 people (4.7%) in the intense treatment group vs. 118 (2.5%) in the standard treatment group. Despite the fainting risk, there was no increase in injuries from falls in the intense treatment group. And people over age 75 seemed to tolerate extra medications "at least as well" as younger people, said study co-author Jackson Wright Jr., a professor of medicine at Case Western Reserve University. "That was unexpected."
The study is "a game-changer," but "this is not an edict from Moses – '120 for everyone,' " said George Bakris, director of a hypertension center at the University of Chicago. Bakris, who was not involved in the new study beyond some early trial-design talks, was among several doctors who wrote reactions in the New England Journal of Medicine and other journals
In real life, he said, many patients do not want to take more medications and others have individual circumstances that make it unwise.
If widely adopted, the lower target could be urged for at least 17 million U.S. adults, according to a separate study published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.
Study co-author Lawrence Fine, prevention chief at the heart, lung and blood institute, said in a statement that many patients and providers may want to wait for updated guidelines, but that they can start talking now about "whether this lower goal is best for their individual care."
A variety of drugs that work in several ways are used to treat high blood pressure. While the financial costs of aggressive treatment are a concern, Jones said, "the good news is that these are not whiz bang drugs that cost a lot of money… most of them are generic." Drug companies donated two drugs used in the study.
Jones and other experts also urged patients and doctors not to lose sight of the power of lifestyle changes to lower blood pressure. Losing weight, eating less salt, not smoking and exercising can all help, they said.
"Lose those 20 pounds you've been talking about losing and we might not have to use another medication to get you there," Jones said.
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866c3f630fb6ee9affdbc41f225b74e3 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/12/feds-say-health-sites-first-week-solid-start/75658330/ | Feds say health site's first week was a 'solid start' | Feds say health site's first week was a 'solid start'
More than a half million people selected health plans during the first week of open enrollment on the federal insurance site HealthCare.gov, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said Thursday.
HealthCare.gov is used by consumers in 38 states that didn't establish their own insurance exchanges under the Affordable Care Act.
Of the 543,000 people who submitted applications and chose plans, 34% were new customers and 66% were re-enrolling, CMS said. Nearly 1.2 million people submitted applications for coverage.
Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell called the numbers a "solid start." But she warned that It’s difficult to directly compare this year to last year's start of open enrollment as it started on Nov. 15 last year.
"We know from past experience that people are deadline driven, so we don’t expect to see deadline effects for a few weeks," she said.
As for the numbers, Charles Gaba, a data expert who runs ACAsignups.net, says it's "hard to say what it means yet." The more telling dates will come right after Dec. 15, which is the deadline for people who want to have plans Jan. 1, and during the last week of January, which is the final deadline for enrollment for 2016 plans, Gaba says.
When signups for the state exchanges are added, Gaba estimates the total enrollment so far to be about 714,000.
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9119b5ffb66f25cf38de41c53db4f84c | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/16/congress-may-bar-funding-bring-syrian-refugees-into-us/75880746/ | Congress may bar funding to bring Syrian refugees into U.S. | Congress may bar funding to bring Syrian refugees into U.S.
WASHINGTON — Congressional Republicans moved Monday to try to block funding for President Obama's plan to bring more than 10,000 Syrian refugees into the U.S., reflecting growing concerns by lawmakers that those refugees could include Islamic State terrorists.
At least one of the terrorists who attacked Paris on Friday reportedly entered Europe through Greece amid a group of Syrian refugees, sparking calls from congressional leaders to rethink the administration's $1.2 billion refugee resettlement plan. Obama has called for the U.S. to resettle at least 10,000 Syrian refugees during the 2016 fiscal year, which began Oct. 1.
Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., the chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest, sent a letter Monday to the Senate Appropriations Committee requesting that any upcoming spending bills require congressional approval for the president's refugee plan and for the funds to carry it out.
"The barbaric attacks in Paris — an assault on civilization itself — add immense new urgency," Sessions wrote.
Congress is expected to pass a sweeping "omnibus" spending bill by Dec. 11 to keep federal agencies running next year. Any language to derail Obama's refugee plan would be opposed by the White House, sparking a potential showdown over how to keep the government open.
Sessions and other GOP leaders said that the U.S. government cannot properly vet Syrian refugees because it cannot get information from the Syrian government about the background of its citizens. The U.S. government is backing moderate rebels against the government of Syrian president and dictator Bashar Assad. Roughly 11 million Syrians, almost half the nation's population, have fled their homes since the civil war broke out in 2011, and about 4 million have left their country.
The Obama administration has said that the refugees are being extensively vetted and that the U.S. should not turn its back on Syrian families fleeing for their lives. White House officials also say the U.S. must do its part to help its allies, which are taking in a much greater share of refugees. Germany alone has said it will take in more than 500,000 Syrians annually for the next several years.
House Homeland Security Chairman Michael McCaul sent a letter to the president Monday calling on Obama to suspend the admission of all additional Syrian refugees into the U.S. pending a review of the resettlement program.
"We remain concerned that these resettlements are taking place without appropriate regard for the safety of the American people," McCaul, R-Texas, wrote.
McCaul's request echoed similar statements Monday from a growing list of Republican members of Congress. At the same time, at least 13 Republican governors vowed Monday not to accept Syrian refugees into their states in the wake of the Paris attacks.
After attacks in Paris, governors refuse to accept Syrian refugees
Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, called on Congress to have compassion for the refugees and let them in.
"With reports of a Syrian refugee's passport at the scene of the stadium attack, some are already calling for an end to America's acceptance of any refugees fleeing the horrors of ISIS and the Assad regime," Schiff said Monday. "But to turn our backs on those escaping persecution, many of them religious minorities, runs counter to the proud and generous heritage of a United States that has always helped those in need during turbulent times."
Schiff said there is always some security risk when admitting refugees.
"And this is why the current crisis is a test of our character — a test I am confident we will meet with prudence, compassion and the bedrock core of American values, courage," he said.
White House Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said Sunday that the U.S. government is carefully vetting all Syrian refugees.
"We have very extensive screening procedures for all Syrian refugees who come to the United States," Rhodes said on NBC's Meet the Press. "There is a very careful vetting process that includes our intelligence community, our counterterrorism center and the Department of Homeland Security."
Rhodes said the refugees include women, children and orphans.
"Let’s remember we’re also dealing with people who suffer the horrors of war," he said. "We can’t just shut our doors to those people. We need to do our part to take refugees in need."
Sessions said more refugees could be helped by establishing safe-zones in Syria or surrounding countries where they can go until they are able to return home safely.
"This is the strategy likeliest to produce long-term political reform in the Middle East," he wrote. "It is not sound policy to encourage millions to permanently abandon their homes."
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., a candidate for the GOP nomination for president, said Monday that he is introducing a bill that would stop the federal government from issuing visas to people in countries with a high risk of terrorism until stronger screening procedures are in place.
"The time has come to stop terrorists from walking in our front door," Paul said.
A bill introduced in the House in July by Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas, and co-sponsored by 46 Republicans, would prohibit the admission of refugees into the U.S. until Congress passes a joint resolution giving the Department of Homeland Security permission to bring them in.
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3ea56804657b5da10b84597dadbd55e0 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/11/24/chicago-cop-charged-shooting-black-teen-16-times/76303768/ | Hundreds protest as Chicago releases video of cop shooting teen 16 times | Hundreds protest as Chicago releases video of cop shooting teen 16 times
CHICAGO — Hundreds of protesters chanting "16 shots" wove their way through downtown streets Tuesday night after the city released a dramatic video showing a white police officer firing a fatal barrage of 16 bullets at a black teenager.
Police and elected officials are bracing for more possible backlash and strong public reaction, even after the officer was charged with first-degree murder. An angry crowd of demonstrators at times shouted obscenities at Chicago police, as the video went viral on social media.
The announcement of the charges against Officer Jason Van Dyke come as the city faced a court-ordered Wednesday deadline to release video from a squad car dashcam of the Oct. 20, 2014 incident. Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez described the video, which shows Van Dyke unloading 16 shots on 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, as grim.
"It is graphic, it is violent, it is chilling," Alvarez told reporters after Van Dyke appeared in court Tuesday.
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and city Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy said at a press conference that the video is now available to the public and that residents should remain calm and collected in the days ahead. The city's download link provided to the media was beset by heavy traffic and did not seem able to keep up with the demand for the video.
WARNING: Graphic video below
McCarthy said the department was ready to help facilitate peaceful protests but would not tolerate criminal activity.
"We as the city of Chicago, all of us, have to make an important judgment about ourselves and our city as we go forward," Emanuel said.
Scores of protesters clashed mildly with police late into the evening. One throng of well over 200 activists assembled at Roosevelt Road and Michigan Avenue, with the Chicago skyline as their backdrop, and occasional pushing and shoving with police officers led to heated confrontation and a few arrests. At one point, someone set off a smoke device in the crowd.
Among those at the protest scene was Rev. Michael Pflegar, a prominent Catholic priest and activist on the city's South Side. For the most part, the clashes with police seemed to be verbal and non-violent.
In the video, McDonald can been seen walking down the middle of a thoroughfare. He appears to be walking away from police when he's first struck. About two seconds after he falls and is lying on his side, two puffs of smoke can be seen. Prosecutors said the puffs of smoke were clouds of debris caused by fired bullets. The last visible shot was fired about 13 seconds later and his body has jerked and his arms have moved slightly, while he lays on the ground. At that point, an unidentified officer, who prosecutor's identified as Van Dyke's partner, approaches McDonald and kicks a small knife the teen is holding in his hand.
Alvarez said she made her decision weeks ago to charge Van Dyke, but had delayed announcing while federal authorities completed their parallel investigation of the incident.But after a judge ordered the release of the dashcam video by Wednesday, Alvarez said it was necessary to move up her office's timeline even as her federal counterparts continue to their investigation.
"I felt compelled in the interest of public safety to announce these state charges today, " Alvarez said.
Van Dyke arrived at the Cook County criminal courthouse on Tuesday morning with his lawyer by his side to turn himself in, and ignored questions shouted to him by reporters who awaited his arrival. It marked the first time in more than 30 years that a Chicago police officer had been charged with first-degree murder for a fatality while in uniform.
The Cook County State's Attorney's office said Van Dyke repeatedly shotMcDonald after the young man had an encounter with police officers.
Cook County Judge Donald Panarese, Jr. ordered Van Dyke be held without bail until at least Monday, when he called on prosecutors to return with the dashcam video from a police squad car that captured footage of Van Dyke shooting McDonald.
"I believe it is pertinent," Panarese told attorneys during the bail hearing.
Van Dyke's attorney Daniel Herbert said his client feared for his life after police answered a call about a young man who was acting erratically. A Chicago police union official also told reporters soon after the incident that McDonald, who had PCP in his system at the time of his death and was holding a knife with a three-inch blade, lunged at the officer.
Prosecutors told the court the video clearly shows that McDonald was not advancing on Van Dyke, who started firing six seconds after he got out of his squad car. The shots were fired over 14 to 15 second period. During 13 of the 15 seconds, McDonald was on the ground, prosecutors said.
The city had resisted releasing the video, citing federal and state probes into the incident. A Cook County Circuit Court judge, however, set the deadline last week after independent journalist Brandon Smith sued the city. Smith argued the city had violated state's open record law by failing to release the video.
"I would just state that judgement made the comfort of their living room on their sofa is not the same as the perspective from my client's," Herbert said.
Michael Robbins, an attorney for McDonald's family, said the video shows that the teen was walking away from Van Dyke when he fired. Five other police officers at the scene did not fire a shot. In April, Chicago's city council approved a $5 million settlement for McDonald's family.
City officials expect a sharp reaction to the video's release, which comes as police treatment of African-American men has become hot-button issue nationally in the aftermath of high-profile incidents in New York, Ferguson, Mo., Baltimore, North Charleston, S.C., and elsewhere in the last 18 months.
"Across Chicago there are thousands of police officers who protect our communities every day with the highest professional standards," Emanuel said in a statement Tuesday. "As the State's Attorney made clear, Jason Van Dyke's actions violated those standards and also the moral standards that bind our community together. Rather than uphold the law, he took the law into his own hands and it's now up to the justice system to hold him accountable.
Herbert, Van Dyke's attorney, criticized Emanuel, who on Monday called the officer's actions "hideous," for being "irresponsible" with is public statements against the officer.
"They are unfair and prejudicial to my client," Herbert told reporters. "Thankfully, politicians will not be deciding the fate of my client."
Herbert told the the judge that Van Dyke is a longtime Chicago-area resident. He is married and has two children.
Herbert added that Van Dyke's wife was preparing to hand over his service weapon on Monday. He said his client, who has never traveled out if the country and doesn't have a passport, would not be a flight risk.
Rep. Bobby Rush, a Democratic lawmaker from the South Side, said the video followed along a disturbing path of police misconduct he's witnessed over the years. He also called on Alvarez to step down from her post as county prosecutor, saying she moved too slowly in charging Van Dyke.
"It's going to take true, true repentance," Rush said after viewing the video. "There's a wide, wide gap between the Chicago Police Department and my community."
Emanuel on Monday met with several pastors, community leaders and activists, to urge peaceful protests. In a separate move, McCarthy announced he would move to fire a police officer who was found not guilty of involuntary manslaughter earlier this year for the 2012 shooting death of Rekia Boyd.
Chicago braces for release of police shooting video
Boyd, 22, was killed when off-duty officer Dante Servin fired five shots into a crowd after getting into a dispute. Servin said he was reacting to a man who had reached for his waistband.
Rev. Michael Pflegar, a prominent Catholic priest and activist on the city's South Side, applauded the murder charge and announcement that Servin would be fired. But Pflegar said the city should have taken action earlier.
"We can not ask the Community to trust the Police, if the police do not Police themselves," Pflegar said in a message he posted on social media Tuesday morning. "You can't ask the Community to give information on a shooting, if the Community feels the Police cover up and protect their bad actions.....Hoping this pressure from the Community will begin a new day of Accountability!!!!"
Gov. Bruce Rauner announced Tuesday that his office had been debriefed on the video and that he expected public reaction to be "strong," the Associated Press reports. The governor directed Illinois State Police to work with Chicago Police to make sure the public remains safe following the release of the video. The governor, however, declined to say whether he has deployed any additional state troopers or put the National Guard on standby.
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d113ef5c36bae4b69aec1d951261aa5a | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/01/5-things-you-need-know-tuesday/76554572/ | 5 things you need to know Tuesday | 5 things you need to know Tuesday
Commemorations planned for 60th anniversary of Montgomery bus boycott
Tuesday marks 60 years since the day that Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat in Montgomery, Ala., to a white man, and commemorations of her historic act are planned across the city. Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton will headline an event that will include a tour of the Rosa Parks Museum, Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church, the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, the Tuskegee History Center and other sites linked to the civil rights movement. A marker also will be installed at the spot where Parks was arrested .
Beware the shaker: High-salt symbol hits menus in NYC
The Big Apple's war on bad nutrition is taking on a new enemy: salt. On Tuesday, chain restaurants in the city will have to start putting a special salt-shaker menu symbol on some highly salty dishes: those that exceed the recommended daily limit of 2,300 milligrams of sodium (that's about a teaspoon). Americans eat too much sodium — about 3,400 milligrams per day, experts say — which raises the risk of high blood pressure and heart trouble. The crackdown on salt follows the city's ban on trans fats in restaurant meals and its requirement for chains to put calorie counts on menus.
Federal judge to hear arguments on new Tsarnaev trial
A hearing is set for Tuesday for a federal judge to hear arguments on Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's request for a new trial. The defense has said that a Boston jury could not be objective. Tsarnaev was convicted and sentenced to death earlier this year for his role in the 2013 attack. Twin bombs placed near the finish line by Tsarnaev and his older brother, Tamerlan, killed three people and injured more than 260 others.
Around the world, a focus on HIV/AIDS awareness
Expect to see a lot of red ribbons on Tuesday. It's World AIDS Day, a global health day started in 1988 to raise awareness about the HIV/AIDS epidemic. An estimated 36.9 million people worldwide are living with HIV/AIDS, according to the CDC. Join USA TODAY's Liz Szabo at 1 p.m. ET for a Twitter chat about the latest in prevention and treatment. Swipe through the gallery below for scenes from events around the world.
#GivingTuesday's here! How will you give?
Black Friday and Cyber Monday are over. So what's left to do? Give back with #GivingTuesday, a post-Thanksgiving social media movement that encourages people to make donations to charities and to volunteer. Launched in 2012 by the 92nd Street Y in New York City and the United Nations Foundation, #GivingTuesday participants use the hashtag to spread good deeds and inspiration for giving through Twitter. It works, too. Last year, #GivingTuesday raised an estimated $45 million, according the Case Foundation.
And, the essentials:
Weather: Expect heavy snow in the early morning in the North and showers in the West during the evening commute.
Stocks: Investors drove U.S. stock futures higher ahead of the opening bell.
TV tonight: Wondering what to watch tonight? TV critic Robert Bianco looks at Chistmas in Rockefeller Center, Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas and Empire.
If you missed Monday's news, we've got you covered.
Need a break? Try playing some of our games.
You can also subscribe to get the day's top news each weekday in your inbox or find us on the Yo! app: justyo.co/usatoday.
Contributing: The Associated Press
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db2a38175c25425a3b192c23ab7ab0a6 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/01/obama-paris-news-conference-climate-change-russia-syria/76600396/ | Obama: The world needs a global climate change deal | Obama: The world needs a global climate change deal
PARIS — President Obama expressed confidence Tuesday that the world's nations can soon strike a global climate change agreement, including "legally binding" targets designed to forge a "low-carbon global economy" in the century ahead.
"I’m convinced that we’re going to get big things done here," Obama said during a news conference that followed two days of climate talks in Paris.
The president also told reporters that he and Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin continue to be at odds over Russian support for Syrian leader Bashar Assad, and he said that last week's shooting at a Planned Parenthood office in Colorado again shows the need for sensible gun laws.
While condemning the shooting, Obama also criticized some of "rhetoric" surrounding Planned Parenthood and abortion. While there is a "legitimate, honest debate" about abortion in the United States, Obama said, people should make sure that "we're talking about it factually, accurately, and not demonizing organizations like Planned Parenthood."
As Obama flew back to the United States on Tuesday, diplomats from some 180 countries remained in Paris to try to hammer out a global agreement designed to address the destructive impact of warming temperatures on the earth's environment. The trend of global warming "affects all trends," Obama said, making it "an economic and security imperative" for every country.
Otherwise, he said, "we are going to have to devote more and more and more of our economic and military resources not to growing opportunity for our people, but to adapting to the various consequences of a changing planet."
Officials in large industrial countries have questioned the idea of a global climate change agreement, saying it might hurt their economies. That group includes countries like China, India — and the United States, where members of the Republican majority in the U.S. Congress have vowed to block a variety of Obama administration climate change initiatives.
As Obama left for Paris on Sunday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a Washington Post op-ed that "the president’s international negotiating partners at that conference should proceed with caution before entering into an unattainable deal with this administration, because commitments the president makes there would rest on a house of cards of his own making."
The president's hopes for a "legally binding" agreement on carbon reductions would likely require congressional approval.
While Obama echoed previous statements in calling Tuesday for "a single transparency mechanism that all countries are adhering to," he added the proposal that "those are legally binding — that there’s periodic reviews so that as the science changes and as technology changes, five years from now, 10 years from now, 15 years from now — in each successive cycle, countries can update the pledges that they make."
The president also said the politics of climate change are moving his way, citing a survey in which he says "two-thirds" of Americans said the United States "should be a signatory to any agreement that emerges that is actually addressing climate change in a serious way."
The Paris climate change summit also included talks about threats of the Islamic State, less than three weeks after terrorists aligned with the group killed more than 130 people in Paris.
Asked about his private meeting with Putin, Obama said he is confident that Russia will eventually realize that a successful campaign against the Islamic State will require Assad's removal from power — but that might not happen for some time.
Porch shooting defendant grilled by prosecutors
"I don't expect that you're going to see a 180-degree turn on their strategy over the next several weeks," Obama said. "They have invested for years now in keeping Assad in power."
Putin and Russia said their military is striking at Islamic State territory in Syria; Obama and allies say they Russians appear more interesting in battling non-ISIL rebels who opposed Assad.
Obama spoke with reporters gathered at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in central Paris, about 7 miles from where the climate talks are taking place in Le Bourget.
Earlier at the OECD, Obama met with leaders of small island nations that are directly threatened by climate change: They are gradually sinking into their oceans. Some of the nations involved in the meeting — Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, St. Lucia, Barbados and Papua New Guinea — "could disappear entirely, and, as weather patterns change, we might deal with tens of millions of climate refugees in the Asia Pacific region," Obama said.
"I'm an island boy," he added, referring to his childhood in in Hawaii and Indonesia. "I understand both the beauty but also the fragility."
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94f447c53840e3e9ba2be3711124bf74 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/03/chicago-release-police-shooting-video-ronald-johnson/76732332/ | Chicago to release police shooting video of Ronald Johnson | Chicago to release police shooting video of Ronald Johnson
CHICAGO — Mayor Rahm Emanuel said on Thursday he has decided to release another police video that shows a young man being fatally shot by a Chicago Police Department officer.
The Emanuel administration had previously resisted releasing the video that shows an officer shooting Ronald Johnson, 25, but has decided to change its position after a Cook County judge ordered the city last month to make public police dashcam video of a separate incident that showed an officer shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald 16 times. In both cases, Emanuel had previously cited ongoing investigations of the incidents as reason to keep the footage out of the public eye.
Emanuel said in brief comments to reporters on Thursday that he planned to release the dashcam video of Johnson's shooting death next week.
Detective George Hernandez has been identified in court papers as the officer who killed Johnson, a father of five who lived on the city's South Side.
Across the USA, videos of police killings spark protests, drive conversation
Police said after the incident that Johnson pointed a gun at officers. But Michael Oppenheimer, an attorney for Johnson's mother Dorothy Holmes, says that a police video of the incident shows that Johnson did not have a weapon and was running away from police when he was shot. The lawyer alleges that police planted a weapon at the scene after the fact.
"I think it is a step in the right direction," Oppenheimer said. "Finally, finally, finally, after 14 months of fighting the city on this, they are going to release the video. It is a small step in terms of justice for Dorothy Holmes and her family and her son. There is a long way to go for the city."
Johnson was killed after attending what Oppenheimer described as a memorial gathering for a friend who had been killed not long before the Oct. 12, 2014 incident. Police arrived on the scene after the car that Johnson was riding in had a window shot out by gunfire. Johnson tried to run from police and was chased by officers.
Hernandez pulled up on the pursuit of Johnson in an unmarked squad car. He fired on Johnson five times as the young man was running away, striking him in the back of the knee and in the back of the shoulder, according to Oppenheimer. One of the two shots that hit him struck a jugular vein and exited from his eye socket, Oppenheimer said.
"(The Police) still persist in that officer Hernandez fired because Ronald Johnson turned and pointed a weapon at him and was carrying a gun," Oppenheimer said. "He never turned, he never pointed, and he was not holding a gun."
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan noted the incident, as well as several others involving Chicago cops, in a letter this week to U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, in which she urged the Justice Department's civil rights division to conduct an investigation of the CPD's policies and practices.
Olivia Nalos Opre: Why we hunt, even lions
Oppenheimer has seen the video in his role as the family's attorney in a wrongful death lawsuit against Hernandez and the city, but was prohibited by court order from showing it to the public. The lawyer also had filed suit against the city to release the video under the Freedom of Information Act.
The city said in a statement earlier this week that it was reconsidering its stance on the Johnson video in light of being forced to release the police dashcam video of the McDonald case.
In the McDonald case, police and police union officials initially reported that the teen, who was holding a knife and had PCP in his system, had lunged at officer Jason Van Dyke before he opened fire. The police dashcam video, however, appears to show that McDonald was moving away from Van Dyke when the officer opened fired.
Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder last week and is free after posting $150,000 on a $1.5 million bond.
In the aftermath of the release of the McDonald video, protesters have taken to the streets of Chicago, and have called for Emanuel and Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez to resign.
Emanuel on Tuesday fired his police superintendent, Garry McCarthy, saying public confidence in police leadership had been "shaken and eroded," making it untenable for McCarthy to continue to serve as the city's top cop because of the controversy surrounding the McDonald case.
Like the McDonald video, the dashcam in the Johnson case does not have audio, Oppenheimer said. McCarthy said audio was missing from the McDonald video because of technical difficulties.
"It doesn't make sense in this day and age, that you spend all this money on dashcam cameras...that there is no audio," Oppenheimer said.
The mayor's office declined to comment on the contents of the Johnson video.
Follow USA TODAY Chicago correspondent Aamer Madhani on Twitter: @AamerISmad
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bf68457c5c4fdf2b2d8d92113e2b2860 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/07/china-issues-first-ever-red-alert-air-pollution/76922004/ | China issues first-ever red alert on air pollution | China issues first-ever red alert on air pollution
The air pollution levels that prompted China to issue its first "red alert" for smog in Beijing pose serious health dangers to people who live there.
The heavy smog carries risks for everyone, but especially people with heart disease or lung conditions such as asthma or emphysema, said David Lang chairman of the department of allergy and immunology at Cleveland Clinic, who visited China in October.
The most polluted city is? Hint: Not Beijing
Air pollution can cause cancer, according to the World Health Organization. It also can trigger heart attacks in people with underlying heart disease, said John Groopman, a professor of environmental health sciences at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore who has worked in China for 35 years.
Children are also at greater risk, because they spend more time playing outside and have smaller lungs, Lang said. Heavy pollution can permanently damage children's lungs, putting them at greater risk of lung disease as adults, said Janice Nolen of the American Lung Association. Officials in China urged Beijing schools to close to protect children from the unhealthy air.
In all, about 7 million people worldwide die every year due to air pollution — about 1 in 8 deaths, according to WHO.
Air quality levels are measured on a scale that begins at 0, with levels under 50 considered healthy, Lang said. Pollution levels in the United States rarely exceed 100, the level considered unhealthy.
As of Tuesday morning, the air quality rating in Beijing was 200, on the border between "unhealthy" and "very unhealthy," Lang said. On days when air pollution is this bad, people with asthma and similar conditions should avoid physical activity, and healthy people should reschedule outdoor plans, he said.
"There's no question that this is injurious to health," Lang said, noting that pollution irritates the lungs. "You start coughing after a while."
The most polluted city is? Hint: Not Beijing
Beijing readies for three days of smog under first-ever red alert
When Lang visited the Chinese city of Xian in October, the sky was dark gray, even in the middle of the afternoon. He and colleague, who has asthma, bought protective masks.
While these masks can block large particles of soot, they don't block the smallest particles of pollution, which can get deep into the lung, Groopman said.
This isn't the first time that a city's air has become dangerously dirty.
In 1952, London experienced a "killer fog," a mix of soot and and dense fog that killed thousands of London residents in four days. In 1966, an intense smog over Thanksgiving weekend was blamed for the deaths of 166 people in New York.
The United States hasn't seen air pollution levels like China's in decades, thanks largely to the Clean Air Act of 1970, Groopman said.
Before the Clean Air Act, there were days in Los Angeles when the smog was so thick that "you couldn't even see that there were mountains and hills around," Groopman said.
Efforts to clean the air in the USA have produced dramatic changes, Groopman said.
"There are blue skies over Baltimore today," Groopman said. "Not that long ago, when the steel plant was working and there was a lot of heavy industry, the skies were orange."
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f21cf98ea96c5566171ec6f299214e80 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/08/poll-51-chicagoans-say-mayor-rahm-emanuel-should-resign/76977622/ | Poll: 51% of Chicagoans say Mayor Rahm Emanuel should resign | Poll: 51% of Chicagoans say Mayor Rahm Emanuel should resign
CHICAGO —A new poll published on Tuesday shows that more than half of Chicagoans believe Mayor Rahm Emanuel should resign in the aftermath of the release of a police dashboard video that shows a white police officer shooting a black teen 16 times.
More than 51% of likely voters said Emanuel should resign, while 29% said he should not step down, according to the poll commissioned by The Insider, a newsletter published by Illinois Observer.
Only 18% approved of how Emanuel is handling his job and 67% disapproved, according to the poll which was conducted by the Chicago firm Ogden & Fry. Meanwhile, 63.2% of respondents said they did not believe the mayor when he said he did not view the disturbing video of officer Jason Van Dyke shooting Laquan McDonald ahead of its public release.
The one-day poll was conducted on Saturday and surveyed 739 respondents from throughout the city.
"Right now, you're in the middle of a strong emotional response," said pollster Tom Swiss. "I would be curious to how people are feeling in a month or two months."
The video of the police shooting was released two weeks ago and has touched off near-daily protests in the city, in which activists have repeatedly called for Emanuel and Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez to resign. Both have said they have no intentions of resigning.
Police report in Laquan McDonald case at odds with video
The mayor resisted releasing the video, which shows Van Dyke continually shooting McDonald while he was lying on the ground, but the city was forced by court-order to make it public after being sued by an independent journalist. Van Dyke was charged with first-degree murder on Nov. 24, the same day as the video's release.
"The mayor is challenged not by a poll, but the job of addressing a broken system," said Emanuel campaign spokesman Peter Giangreco. "That is the job this moment in our city demands and one he is absolutely committed to seeing through."
Police and police union officials had initially said McDonald, who was holding a knife and had PCP in his system, had put Van Dyke's life in danger and left the officer with no choice but to shoot. At least five other officers at the scene offered statements to investigators that backed up Van Dyke.
The video, however, showed that McDonald was veering away from the officer when he opened fire. The video also appears to contradict officers at the scene who said that McDonald appeared to be trying to get up after Van Dyke first struck him. The officer would continue to shoot for about 13 seconds after McDonald had been struck by the initial gunfire, according to prosecutors.
Swiss noted that while more than two-thirds of respondents disapprove of Emanuel's job performance, nearly half, at the moment, would prefer he stay in office.
Before the poll was conducted last week, Emanuel fired his police superintendent, Garry McCarthy, and announced that he was creating a blue ribbon task force to bolster police accountability.
Emanuel also said calls for a Justice Department investigation of the police department, prior to the completion of a federal criminal investigation of the McDonald shooting, were "misguided." The following day he reversed course and welcomed federal involvement. Attorney General Loretta Lynch on Monday announced DOJ's Civil Rights Division was launching an investigation.
Even before the McDonald shooting controversy, the mayor's popularity appeared to be waning as the city has struggled to deal with extraordinary financial problems.
Porch shooting defendant grilled by prosecutors
A September poll by Ogden & Fry showed that 25% approved of the job Emanuel was doing, while 50.8% disapproved. The poll was conducted as Emanuel was forced to push for a massive property tax hike in the city to help close a hole in the city's underfunded police and fire department pensions.
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f371f6d5b0427a879c24d87db8cdcacb | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/12/kaiser-multistate-health-plans-are-unavailable-in-many-states/77150208/ | Despite push, ‘multi-state’ health plans are unavailable in many states | Despite push, ‘multi-state’ health plans are unavailable in many states
A health law insurance program that was expected to boost consumer choice and competition on the marketplaces has slipped off course and is so far failing to meet expectations.
Since just a few insurers, or sometimes just one, dominate the market for individuals and small businesses in some states, the law sought to increase competition in those areas by calling for “multi-state” health plans that would be offered by some insurers. The law required that at least two multi-state plans be available to consumers in 31 states by 2014 and in all states by 2017, but it doesn't require insurers to offer the plans and most so far have opted not to. Federal officials and insurance experts say it is unlikely that the 2017 goal will be met.
“Conceptually, the idea just didn’t have legs,” says Linda Blumberg, a senior fellow at The Health Policy Center at the Urban Institute. “It’s too hard to find an insurer who could suddenly compete across the breadth of states and do better on rates than existing insurers.”
The multi-state plan program’s halting start threatens to undermine one of the key tenets of the health law: that boosting competition in the individual market will lead to lower premiums and better coverage. It doesn’t help that health insurance co-ops are shutting down in a dozen states. Of the roughly 9 million people who are covered through the health insurance marketplaces, only 480,000 have multi-state plans. http://www.healthaffairs.org/healthpolicybriefs/brief.php?brief_id=116
Multi-state plans are similar in many ways to the other plans offered on the health insurance marketplaces. Insurers that offer multi-state plans must cover the so-called essential health benefits and follow the same federal rules for setting premiums, among other things. [https://marketplace.cms.gov/technical-assistance-resources/multistate-plan-program.pdf]
http://aspe.hhs.gov/basic-report/how-many-individuals-might-have-marketplace-coverage-at-the-end-of-2016The Office Of Personnel Management, which oversees the Federal Employee Health Benefit Program (FEHB) and has experience with insurers that offer plans in more than one region, was designated by the law to oversee the multi-state plan program.
An ongoing source of consumer confusion is the name: Multi-state plans don’t necessarily offer a national network of providers or in-network coverage away from home, except in emergencies. Some plans do, but consumers need to check the plan documents for network coverage just as they would with any plan.
In the marketplaces’ first year, the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, which represents three dozen independent Blue Cross and Blue Shield companies, [http://www.bcbs.com/about-the-companies/] was the only group to join, offering roughly 150 multi-state plans in 30 states and the District of Columbia. In 2015, a coalition of co-op plans agreed to offer multi-state plans in 11 states as well, bringing the number of states in the program to 35. But the shuttering of some co-ops and BCBS decisions to discontinue multi-state plans in some states led to a drop-off to 32 states and DC in 2016, according to OPM.
An OPM spokesperson said the agency doesn’t anticipate having a multi-state option available in every state by the 2017 deadline.
“OPM does not have the authority to compel any issuer to participate in the [multi-state plan] program,” said a spokesperson by email. “We are hopeful that there will be at least one new issuer or group of issuers participating in the MSP program in 2017.”
The program’s origin is fuzzy. Some say it was created as an alternative to the “public option,” a proposed public health plan run by the federal government that won the support of many consumer advocates but ended up on the cutting room floor during the health law debate. [https://www.cbo.gov/budget-options/2013/44890] Others say it was an alternative to allowing insurers to sell coverage nationally across state lines, a strategy long favored by Republicans who believe it would encourage competition. [http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/01/upshot/the-problem-with-gop-plans-to-sell-health-insurance-across-state-lines.html]
Whatever its beginnings, health policy analysts generally agree that given the way the health insurance markets work, there’s little reason to expect the multi-state plan program to succeed.
In order to offer health plans in multiple states, if an insurer doesn’t already have a network of doctors, hospitals and other providers in a state or region it has to build one, which is no easy task.
“If issuers don’t have a provider network already, they’re not going to be able to get market share,” says the Urban Institute’s Blumberg.
On the other hand, insurers that have a provider network in place in a state or region are generally already selling plans there, and “they don’t want to compete against themselves,” Blumberg says.
An analysis of health plans sold on the marketplaces in 2015 by consultant Avalere Health shows what happened when the Blues’ multi-state and regular individual plans went head-to-head in the marketplaces. Average premiums at the bronze, silver and gold levels for the Blues’ multi-state plans were all higher than average premiums for regular individual Blues plans at those metal levels (there were no platinum multi-state plans offered). For example, average monthly premiums for the most popular silver plans, which pay 70 percent of medical costs, were $447 for the regular Blues plans and $483 for the multi-state Blues plans.
“Because the multi-state plans are always priced higher, they’re not really increasing competition,” says Caroline Pearson, a senior vice president at Avalere. “They’re potentially providing a modicum of consumer choice. But they’re not injecting competition into the market.”
The Blue Cross Blue Shield Association didn’t respond to requests for comment.
The Avalere analysis also found that the multi-state Blues and multi-state co-op plans were not competitive against other carriers. In the most popular silver-level plans, the multi-state Blues plans made up only 4 percent of the lowest priced or second lowest priced plans, while just 2 percent of the silver multi-state co-op plans did. The average for national carriers was 20 percent.
It’s unclear why multi-state plans offered by the Blues or co-ops are pricier than their regular individual plan options on a marketplace, say experts. The plans are often similar in design. In fact, it may be hard for consumers to tell them apart.
“I think they’re confusing for people,” says Sabrina Corlette, research professor at Georgetown University’s Center On Health Insurance Reforms. “People think they’re getting a broad national network, but they’re not. I don’t think the plans add a lot of value.”
Kaiser Health News is an editorially independent program of the Kaiser Family Foundation.
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845aaaa7e734335901247a7b6dda4584 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/14/disgruntled-guest-crashes-hotel-truck/77333694/ | Video: Disgruntled guest crashes pickup truck through Okla. hotel | Video: Disgruntled guest crashes pickup truck through Okla. hotel
A Texas man was being held in jail Monday after police in Oklahoma said he drove his pickup truck through the lobby of a hotel late last week, narrowly missing two women who dove for cover behind the front desk.
Dramatic security camera video of the Dec. 10 incident showed the man, identified as John Edward Parsley, 62, of Gonzalez, Texas, talking to a police officer outside the Alva Comfort Inn and Suites, about 150 miles northwest of Oklahoma City. He then climbed into his GMC pickup and barreled through the front entrance, crushing part of the front desk. Two unidentified women standing behind the desk narrowly escaped at the last second.
After emerging from the truck, Parsley calmly walked to the entrance with his hands raised and was arrested.
The video was provided by the hotel's manager to NBC News. Parsley was held on $1 million bond Monday night in Woods County Jail on two felony counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and one count of malicious injury to property valued at more than $1,000, according to court records.
The incident was evidently the result of a billing dispute, The Enid News & Eaglereported. An incident report filed by police said Parsley was upset because his credit card had been declined twice and he'd been forced to pay cash for two nights at the hotel. He was seeking a refund, police said.
Manager Kingston Christian told investigators that Parsley "stated it wasn't his first bad experience with a hotel manager who was also Indian," according to the report.
Police said Parsley told the staff that he was going to "run his truck over them and the property." Parsley told police he crashed the truck because hotel employees "thought he was bluffing, and he proved he wasn't."
Christian said the hotel, which he opened in 2013, was temporarily closed while staff repaired the lobby. He estimated the damage at more than $100,000.
"We are No. 1 on TripAdvisor, and we don't have angry guests," Christian told the newspaper. "We make sure our guests are happy, but, this person, he was difficult to talk to and wouldn't listen. He purposely drove through to kill front desk staff."
The Woods County Sheriff's Office said Parsley was in town to conduct work for SandRidge Energy. A company representative said Parsley was not longer affiliated with SandRidge.
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92851e824f1e58a7999942fa251c3328 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/16/survey-teens-still-intrigued-e-cigarettes/77363202/ | Survey: Teens still intrigued by e-cigarettes | Survey: Teens still intrigued by e-cigarettes
Cigarette use among teens hit an all-time low, but their fascination with e-cigarettes remains strong, a national survey of nearly 45,000 youth found.
The students surveyed favored e-cigarettes, which heat liquid into a vapor that can be inhaled, over traditional cigarettes. And more than half of them credited curiosity as their primary motivation for trying the battery-operated devices.
E-cigarettes and vaping: Everything you need to know
“They wanted to see what they were like — to experiment,” Lloyd Johnston, the principal investigator for the annual Monitoring the Future study conducted by the University of Michigan and sponsored by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA).
Monitoring the Future, now in its 41st year, surveyed 44,892 students in the 8th, 10th and 12th grades at 382 schools nationwide. The survey asks teens about their use of alcohol, cigarettes, and legal and illegal drugs.
Among 8th graders, 9% reported using e-cigarettes in the previous 30 days, while 4% reported using cigarettes. Among 10th graders, 16% said they used an e-cigarette and 7% said they used a tobacco cigarette in the same time period. Slightly more high school seniors – 17% – reported use of e-cigarettes, while double the percentage – 14% – smoked a tobacco cigarette.
This year marked a drop in rates of tobacco cigarette use among teens from last year’s numbers, but their e-cigarette use, which has only been measured in the survey for two years, held steady from 2014 to 2015. And it’s becoming a point of concern among researchers.
Clearing the smoke around teen e-cigarette use
“The saving grace of e-cigarettes was that people who were addicted to nicotine cigarettes could switch over to these so they weren’t getting the contaminants in tobacco,” Johnston says.
But teens aren’t using e-cigarettes that way, the survey found. One in 10 reported using e-cigarettes to quit smoking, a number Johnston calls “negligible.” Forty percent of the students surveyed reported using e-cigarettes because they taste good.
Unlike traditional cigarettes, e-cigarettes don’t contain tobacco and carcinogens or produce smoke. But that’s not to say they come without risks.
Researchers at Harvard University recently found evidence of chemicals that cause respiratory problems in 47 of 51 types of flavored e-cigarettes they tested. What’s more, Johnston says the lack of federal regulation on e-cigarettes makes it nearly impossible to tell what, exactly, the device’s cartridges — called cartomizers — contain aside from their “fun” flavors.
Study suggests link between flavor in e-cigarettes and lung disease
“[You] just buy these inserts that go into the vaporizer and it can be with nicotine or not. The same stores sell them all," he says. "I don’t even think you always know what’s in them.”
And that's exactly what the survey revealed. Among 8th graders alone, 13% admitted to being unsure of what they were inhaling while using e-cigarettes.
It’s a world that J. Taylor Hays, director of the Mayo Clinic Nicotine Dependence Center, has likened to the Wild West. And it’s a world in need of increased oversight, the survey’s researchers say.
Heart group calls on FDA to quickly regulate e-cigs
“There’s good chance that the Food and Drug Administration will introduce limitations on who can buy these,” Johnston says. “There should be age limitations.”
Although 41 states bar children under 18 from buying e-cigarettes, a March report published in JAMA Pediatrics revealed 94% could easily purchase them online. Banning youth-friendly cartridge flavors, such as bubble gum, cotton candy and tutti frutti, may deter teens from using the devices, Johnston says.
NIDA director Nora Volkow says nicotine hiding in some e-cigarettes may serve as a “gateway” to more dangerous substance addictions. Teens may also repurpose the device for other substances, she says. Yale University researchers recently found about 27% of high school students who have used both marijuana and e-cigarettes reported using the e-cigarette devices to vaporize cannabis.
Teens find a new use for e-cigarettes: Vaping marijuana
“It’s becoming a fashion or a trend to use an e-cigarette,” Volkow says. “That by itself will drive the use of e-cigarettes whether they have drugs or not.”
Decreasing their appeal will become “more urgent as studies emerge that identify the adverse outcomes,” she says.
"If we are not proactive with prevention campaigns, we may lose some of the ground we have gained in the very successful campaigns against cigarette smoking,” Volkow says.
The results of this year’s survey indicate no ground has been lost when it comes to teens’ use of cigarettes, illicit drugs and alcohol. Most of the categories measured continued long-term declines in 2015, while some – such as marijuana use – held steady from 2014. Smart Approaches to Marijuana president Kevin Sabet blames increased commercialization and industrialization of marijuana for the lack of decline in teen usage rates.
"[The industry] is promoting marijuana use and selling products like marijuana sodas and gummi bears," the former White House drug policy advisor said in a statement. "It has counteracted the hard work and advances made by drug prevention advocates, all in favor of financial gain."
The use of both alcohol and cigarettes among teens reached their lowest points since the study’s inception in 1975. Students for Sensible Drug Policy executive director Betty Aldworth said the steadily declining numbers of teens using tobacco and alcohol indicate that education, public health-based prevention and regulation work better than criminalization.
"Youth marijuana use is stable, and even falling in some categories, all while a growing number of states enact legalization," Aldworth said in a statement. "This new data solidifies early indications that the scare tactics peddled by prohibitionists are false. Criminalization isn't the way to encourage young people to make healthy choices; regulating a legal market and honest, reality-based education is."
Survey: Teen marijuana use declines even as states legalize
While this year's survey results are heartening, Johnston says he remains cautiously optimistic.
“I worry that, when everything seems to be going in the right direction, that we get over-confident,” he says.
Which is why Volkow says, “we cannot become complacent … we need to continue with prevention efforts.”
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780d13c9927e6cf87742724b3718cd11 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/17/house-passes-622-billion-tax-breaks/77479114/ | House passes $622 billion in tax breaks | House passes $622 billion in tax breaks
WASHINGTON — The House passed a bill Thursday to provide $622 billion in tax breaks for businesses, families and individual taxpayers.
House members voted 318-109 to approve the legislation, which includes a permanent extension of the child tax credit and a delay in taxes that help pay for Obamacare. All but a handful of Republicans voted for the bill while a majority of Democrats voted against it. However, more than 70 Democrats joined with Republicans to approve the legislation.
Passage of the tax bill was the first step in approving a massive tax and spending deal. The second part of that agreement — a $1.1 trillion spending bill that funds federal agencies through September — is expected to be approved by both the House and Senate on Friday.
The tax and spending package is the last major legislation that Congress will pass before it adjourns for the year. It was the first big budget compromise negotiated under new House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis.
Supporters of the tax bill said it would help create jobs and boost the economy.
"Families and businesses are going to have the long-term certainty they need instead of scrambling year to year to find out what's next," Ryan said.
Opponents said the bill would explode the deficit and leave Congress with less money in the future to pay for important domestic programs.
Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said she likes some of the tax breaks in the bill but objects to the fact that they are not paid for with budget cuts or increased revenue.
"It is the unpaid-for part of it that is mortgaging our children's future," Pelosi said. "I know it sounds good, but it's a Trojan horse."
Congress to vote on $1.1 trillion spending plus $629 billion in tax cuts
Among the permanent tax breaks included in the bill are a Child Tax Credit of $1,000 per qualifying child, a tax credit for business research and development costs for start-up businesses as well as established companies, expanded tax credits for college expenses, and expanded tax credits for certain charitable donations by corporations and individuals.
The legislation also permanently extends the Earned Income Tax Credit for low-income workers and allows teachers to deduct up to $250 a year in personal expenses from their tax returns.
The bill delays or suspends some of the taxes that help pay for the Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare. It would suspend for two years a tax on medical device manufacturers and delay for two years the "Cadillac tax" — a tax on expensive employer-sponsored health coverage.
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f39144cb78a44bed7c187e5380455e34 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/12/23/police-chase-deaths-up-in-2014/77762174/ | Police chase deaths up in 2014 | Police chase deaths up in 2014
The number of people killed in high-speed police chases surged in 2014 to its highest level since 2007 despite efforts by police departments to reduce the risks of people getting killed and injured, a USA TODAY analysis shows.
A total of 385 people died in motor-vehicle crashes in 2014 that occurred while police were chasing a vehicle, up 16% from the 333 people killed in 2013, the USA TODAY review of federal records shows.
"A huge percentage of these deaths are unnecessary," said Jonathan Farris, former chairman of PursuitSAFETY, which advocates to restrict police chases and improve reporting of chase-related deaths and injuries. Farris' son Paul, 23, was killed in 2007 near Boston by a motorist being chased for a traffic violation.
Approximately 73 of the people killed in 2014 were bystanders -- mostly people in their own cars that were hit by a fleeing motorist -- and 77 were passengers in the fleeing vehicles. Twelve of those killed were children age 14 or younger, including an infant who had not yet turned one. Five were police officers.
Thousands more people were injured in the chases, which usually begin for minor infractions such as traffic violations. Although the federal government does not count injuries in police chases, five states that do keep track reported that a combined total of 1,764 people were injured in 2014 in their states.
Those states -- California, Michigan, Minnesota, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin -- make up nearly 23% of the U.S. population, which suggests that more than 7,700 people may have been injured nationwide in police chases in 2014. Records from those states also suggest that there were about 52,000 police chases in 2014.
High-speed police chases have killed thousands of innocent bystanders
The increase in the number of deaths attributed to police chases could result from improved reporting by police departments, said Maj. Travis Yates of the Tulsa, Okla., police, who teaches courses on police pursuit driving.
"There's been much more pressure on agencies to track these things better," Yates said. "Departments are forced into being more transparent in 2015, which is a good thing."
POLICING THE USA: A look at race, justice, media
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, an arm of the Department of Transportation, tracks chase-related deaths in its database of fatal motor-vehicle crashes. USA TODAY found inaccuracies in the database that resulted in NHTSA understating the number of people killed in police chases in 2013 by as many as 101 people. NHTSA reviewed USA TODAY's findings and has added 11 pursuit-related deaths to the 2013 total, which had previously been 322 deaths.
"I would really question whether that 385 is close to accurate," Farris said of the 2014 death toll. He has been lobbying Congress to require police departments to report each year to the federal government the number of deaths resulting from chases.
The number of chase-related deaths reached a high of 424 in 2007 and has been as low as 246 in 1984. NHTSA began keeping track of the information in 1979.
In recent years, a number of large police departments have adopted policies that allow police to chase only people suspected of violent felonies.
Feds fail to track deadly police pursuits
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22e680ef255d3b1d7491bf1e487357b6 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/06/twitter-account-oregon-organizer-bundy-suspended/78315656/ | Correction: Ammon Bundy Twitter account was a hoax | Correction: Ammon Bundy Twitter account was a hoax
To our readers: As you can see, our Jan. 5 story about Twitter restoring a suspended account of Ammon Bundy, the Nevada rancher leading a group of armed men occupying federal buildings at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon, has been removed. The reporting was based solely on quotes from a Twitter account under Ammon Bundy's name, and posts on the account now claim it was a parody. We wanted to share our decision with you in the interest of transparency.
Original first paragraph of story:
The Twitter social media site on Tuesday restored the suspended the account of Ammon Bundy, the Nevada rancher who is leading a group of armed men occupying federal buildings at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon.
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012a31070e90cfc4c0217c06c23c4236 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/12/implant-aims-help-addicts-stop-using-heroin-prescription-painkillers/78677618/ | Panel recommends FDA approve implant to treat opiate addiction | Panel recommends FDA approve implant to treat opiate addiction
An advisory committee recommended Tuesday that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approve an implant designed to reduce addicts' cravings for heroin or prescription painkillers.
The implant, probuphine, provides a steady dose of buprenorphine, which has been shown to ease withdrawal symptoms, decrease cravings and cut the risk of relapse. Buprenorphine is currently available only as a pill or dissolvable film that's placed under the tongue. Although it can be life-saving, it carries major risks: some addicts sell their supplies to get money for other drugs.
Probuphine's manufacturer, New Jersey-based Braeburn Pharmaceuticals, says the implant eliminates that risk. The FDA typically follows committees' advice.
Probuphine's development comes at a time when addiction to opiates — which include illegal drugs such as heroin, as well as prescription painkillers such as morphine and OxyContin — has been called an epidemic.
The death rate from drug overdoses more than doubled from 1999 to 2013, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Drug overdoses now kill 44,000 Americans a year – more than car accidents.
At the advisory panel's meeting Tuesday, several witnesses described how opiate addiction has harmed them or their families. Two fathers described how their sons died from drug overdoses, and both asked the committee to recommend approving probuphine.
Medications to treat addiction are strictly regulated.
Methadone is available only at specialized clinics, where patients typically must go every day to receive a dose. Buprenorphine is considered safer than methadone because it's less likely to cause an overdose. Patients can receive buprenorphine at a doctor's office, but physicians prescribing the drug must be certified to dispense it and are only allowed to treat 100 patients at a time.
Like all pills, buprenorphine can be accidentally swallowed by children. About 1 million people took buprenorphine in 2012, according to the FDA.
The White House has recommended expanding the use of medications that treat opiate addiction. Addicts who are given such "medication-assisted treatment" cut their risk of death in half, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The medications also halve a person's risk of becoming infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
Advocates push to expand use of medications to treat addiction
Probuphine works like a contraceptive implant, such as Norplant. Four implanted rods, each smaller than a match stick, provide a steady amount of medication for up to 6 months. The FDA is considering approving it for a specific population: "stable" patients who are already taking the dissolvable buprenorphine film at a low dose. The committee voted 12-5 in favor of probuphine.
"I think this will save some folks' lives," said advisory committee member David Pickar, an adjunct professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Medical School in Baltimore.
Doctors who want to prescribe probuphine would have to refer patients to providers trained to implant medical devices, or undergo training to learn how to safely implant and remove it, said Behshad Sheldon, president and CEO of Braeburn Pharmaceuticals, who spoke at Tuesday's advisory committee hearing.
Implanting probuphine takes 10 to 15 minutes and removing it takes about 20 minutes, said Steven Chavoustie, a physician involved in a clinical trial of the device.
Pharmacist Tracy Rupp urged the committee to reject probuphine, noting that its manufacturer presented only one clinical study showing the drug was effective.
In the study, doctors compared the use of probuphine implants and buprenorphine film, Sheldon said. Patients in the study were considered "stable" because they had been safely using the films. After 6 months, 85% of those given probuphine tested negative for illegal drugs, compared to 72% of those given the film.
The study had multiple flaws, said Rupp, director of public health policy initiatives at the National Center for Health Research, a nonpartisan group that analyzes health data.
Some missing urine tests were counted as negative, as if the patient had no drugs in their system. But Rupp noted that people addicted to opiates "often skip tests to avoid a positive test." That could skew the results, Rupp said.
"It is disappointing that the advisory committee set such a low bar for safety and effectiveness," Rupp said after the vote. "Is probuphine effective? We still don't know because the study was poorly designed and missing data."
Judith Kramer, the committee's acting chairwoman, said she voted against recommending probuphine's approval because doctors don't yet know if it's effective for more than 6 months. Many people who are addicted to opiates need to take medication for years, she added.
"We all desperately want something to be available" to treat opiate addiction, said Kramer, a professor emerita at Duke University in Durham, N.C. Yet she added: "I’m very concerned about the precedent this sets."
Addiction treatment hard to find, even as overdose deaths soar
Some addiction specialists say they're concerned about probuphine's safety.
Doctors don't yet know how to safely transition patients from buprenorphine films to the implant, said pharmacist Tracy Rupp, director of public health policy initiatives at the National Center for Health Research, a nonpartisan group that analyzes health data.
Rupp, who recommended the committee reject probuphine, said it takes up to four weeks for the implant to provide the same level of medication provided by the film strips. That suggests patients will need to continue taking buprenorphine by mouth for the first few weeks after receiving the implant, Rupp said.
Rupp said she's worried patients could relapse during that transition. "This is an unacceptable risk for stable patients," Rupp said.
Rupp also said the study didn't match the demographics of addicts in real life, noting 84% of the patients in the study were white. Jennifer Higgins, the committee's acting consumer representative, said she would like the FDA to require studies in more diverse populations.
"This is not the real world of opioid addiction," Rupp said. "Many of these patients will require treatment for years. We need long-term safety data from diverse populations. Patients will require a new incision every 6 months, creating an ongoing risk of harm due to bleeding and infectious complications."
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1ecd9b609841ad8237ece798937af18b | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/12/pentagon-2-us-navy-boats-held-iran-but-returned/78697686/ | Iran detains 2 U.S. Navy boats, 10 sailors in Persian Gulf | Iran detains 2 U.S. Navy boats, 10 sailors in Persian Gulf
WASHINGTON — Iran detained 10 sailors aboard two small U.S. Navy boats on Tuesday, but assured U.S. officials the crew and vessels would be promptly returned.
The two riverine boats were en route from Kuwait to Bahrain when the military lost contact with the vessels, a U.S. military official told USA TODAY. The U.S. is communicating with Iranian officials, who gave assurances of the sailors' safety, the official said.
But the semi-official Iranian news agency FARS reported that Iranian Revolutionary Guards arrested 10 U.S. troops for trespassing in Iranian waters. Nine men and one woman were detained. The vessels carried three .50-caliber machine guns, the agency reported.
Secretary of State John Kerry spoke to his Iranian counterpart, Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif, who promised the two ships would be allowed to continue their voyage, likely at dawn Wednesday local time, according to a senior U.S. official.
The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the incident publicly.
The boats drifted into Iranian coastal waters in the vicinity of Farsi Island in the north Persian Gulf, apparently after one experienced mechanical problems and the other attempted to render aid. It was not clear how far into Iranian waters they traveled, but the move was unintentional, the senior official said.
White House Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said the administration was aware of the incident. “We are working to resolve the situation such that obviously the U.S. personnel are returned to their normal deployment.”
The incident could be a key test for Iran-U.S. relations following a nuclear deal in which the United States and other world powers agreed to lift international sanctions in return for Iran reducing its nuclear program. Relief from the sanctions could begin as early as this week. Kerry and Zarif developed a close relationship during the long negotiations.
While the U.S. expressed confidence the incident would be resolved peacefully, Iran's elite paramilitary forces could continue to provoke the West by exploiting the situation.
Sanctions relief for Iran could come this week
The Iranian seizure is the latest flare-up in an increasingly tense relationship. The U.S. military released a video Saturday showing what it says is an Iranian military vessel firing several unguided rockets near the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman, other warships and commercial craft.
That incident occurred Dec. 26 in the Strait of Hormuz. The images show what appears to be an Iranian Revolutionary Guards vessel firing rockets from about 1,500 yards, or less than a mile.
Video shows Iranian rockets launched near U.S. carrier
Iran’s aggression will take center stage Wednesday at the Supreme Court in Washington. The justices will hear arguments that hundreds of victims of Iranian-sponsored terrorism and surviving family members should win access to about $2 billion in frozen assets of Iran's central bank.
Among them are relatives of 173 of the 241 servicemen killed in the 1983 bombing of a Marine Corps barracks in Beirut. It was carried out by the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah, but federal courts in the United States held Iran responsible. Now the high court must decide if Congress overstepped its bounds by passing a law specifically designed to resolve the standoff over the frozen assets.
Contributing: Gregory Korte and Richard Wolf, USA TODAY, and Navy Times.
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bda398198f79ea27b3f5dcd82353d696 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/15/supreme-court-church-state-constitution-playground/78867336/ | Supreme Court will rule on church-state divide in playground case | Supreme Court will rule on church-state divide in playground case
WASHINGTON -- A Missouri church alleging religious discrimination because it was denied state funds for playground resurfacing has won an audience at the Supreme Court.
The justices will decide if a grant program designed to upgrade playgrounds with material from scrap tires must swing clear of religion -- or whether they should let the separation of church and state slide.
Missouri refused to include Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia among 14 grant winners because the state's Constitution says “no money shall be taken from the public treasury, directly or indirectly, in aid of any church, sect or denomination of religion.” Two lower federal courts upheld its decision.
That didn't sit right with the church or its lawyers, the Arizona-based Alliance Defending Freedom. They told the justices that the church needed the money as much as secular competitors because the jagged edges of its pea gravel playground surface can injure children.
"No public benefit could be further removed from the state’s anti-establishment concerns than a grant for safe rubber playground surfaces that serve no religious function or purpose," they argued in urging the court to hear the appeal.
Ten states led by Nevada backed the church, contending that the tire-recycling program "cannot serve any religious purpose."
The state responded that the issue is "whether states are required by the U.S. Constitution to violate their own constitutions and choose a church to receive a grant when that means turning down non-church applicants."
The court under Chief Justice John Roberts has been solicitous when it comes to religious freedom. Last June, for instance, it ruled without dissent that an Arizona town could not give signs promoting a church's worship services treatment inferior to political campaign signs.
Tiny Arizona church wins Supreme Court case on signs
The year before in a New York case, the justices upheld the public tradition of opening government meetings with a prayer, even if they are overwhelmingly Christian and citizens are encouraged to participate.
Supreme Court upholds prayer at government meetings
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b1e8ecaccf8523ecece4931c3c43aa08 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/15/supreme-court-corruption-governor-virginia-mcdonnell/78611622/ | Supreme Court to define corruption by public officials in McDonnell case | Supreme Court to define corruption by public officials in McDonnell case
The Supreme Court agreed Friday to weigh in on what constitutes corruption by public officials.
The justices will consider former Virginia governor Robert McDonnell's appeal of lower court convictions for accepting more than $175,000 in gifts and loans from a wealthy vitamin executive in exchange for government favors. McDonnell, a Republican, has consistently said he did nothing unusual in exchange for the gifts.
Supreme Court will rule on church-state divide in playground case
The Supreme Court in August granted McDonnell's effort to stay out of prison while fighting his conviction on federal corruption charges. Since then, the ex-governor has mounted a far-reaching campaign to get the justices to hear his case, winning support from Republican governors and former aides to GOP and Democratic presidents, as well as former federal and state attorneys general, civil rights activists and others.
McDonnell and his wife, Maureen, were convicted in 2014 of accepting what the Justice Department characterized as bribes. He was sentenced last January to two years in prison; she received a year-and-a-day sentence. The convictions were upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit last summer. Both remain free pending the Supreme Court's review.
McDonnell contended that he did nothing unusual to help Jonnie Williams, a friend of his wife's, nor asked anyone else to do so in exchange for the businessman's gifts. His phone calls and referrals to government agencies, he and his supporters say, were routine actions that, if deemed criminal, would jeopardize virtually all public officials.
"This prosecution is unprecedented," McDonnell's most recent Supreme Court brief says. "It hinges on a novel, sweeping theory that puts every public official at the mercy of federal prosecutors."
On Friday, the former governor applauded the court's decision to hear his case.
"I am innocent of these crimes and ask the court to reverse these convictions," he said in a statement. "I maintain my profound confidence in God's grace to sustain me and my family, and thank my friends and supporters across the country for their faithfulness over these past three years.”
The federal government alleges that McDonnell and his wife interceded with state health and medical school officials in an effort to help Williams get necessary clinical tests performed on his company's dietary supplement.
"The court of appeals upheld petitioner’s convictions based on the unexceptionable proposition that a public official violates federal corruption statutes where, as here, he accepts personal benefits in exchange for his agreement to influence government matters," the Justice Department said in urging the justices to turn down McDonnell's petition for review.
The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) decried the justices' action and urged them to "reaffirm the importance of strong public corruption laws."
"Former Gov. McDonnell intervened in state health insurance policy decisions and state-funded scientific research procedures on behalf of a wealthy campaign donor trying to push an unproven drug through the research and approval process," the group said, arguing that his actions were not "politics as usual."
McDonnell, 61, was Virginia's governor from 2010-14 in a state that permits its chief executives to serve only one term. He previously was the state's attorney general and a member of the House of Delegates. In 2012, before his downfall, he was regarded as a possible running mate with Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.
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32f6a4b03937b8b8617b5bf6b6696016 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/20/us-attorney-meth-biggest-drug-problem-idaho/79087508/ | U.S. Attorney: Meth is the biggest drug problem in Idaho | U.S. Attorney: Meth is the biggest drug problem in Idaho
BOISE -- A drug problem that's plagued Idaho for years is still a major concern and has recently become the target for federal funds.
U.S. Attorney Wendy Olson says that money is working and recently helped send three methamphetamine distributors in our area to prison.
Alcantar-Armenta, Daniel Valdenegro-Zafiro, and Jose Antonio Diaz-Juarez were indicted in Sept. 2015. They will be sentenced this spring.
Back in 2014, Idaho joined Oregon as a high-intensity drug trafficking area, including Ada and Canyon counties. Now, local, state, and federal agencies receive $200,000 to help crack down on the meth problem.
"Those who traffic meth in our communities and those who bring it to Idaho will be brought to justice," said Olson.
It's a strong message from the U.S. attorney, along with state and local authorities, talking about what she calls the most significant drug problem in Idaho - methamphetamine - and the fight to get rid of it.
"We as a people, we as a community, have to take this on and recognize it for as serious as this is," said Canyon County Sheriff Kieran Donahue.
Olson says they're tackling the issue head on - thanks to federal funding targeted at for Ada, Canyon, and Malheur counties - a region designated as a high-intensity drug trafficking area.
She says the program is working, as their first case resulted in three convictions. Officials say the defendants were found guilty of bringing about two pounds of meth into the Treasure Valley.
"Individuals outside the state were able to obtain meth for a lower price, it was transported into Elmore County and ultimately into Ada County," said Bill Lutz with the Drug Enforcement Agency.
The funding supports task forces and pays for a special assistant to the U.S. attorney to prosecute these types of cases. That person is Bryce Ellsworth.
"A lot of times it's taking one of the larger suppliers of this particular area out of the chain, so being able to do that disrupts the trafficking that occurs here," said Ellsworth.
The Idaho Meth Project started back in 2008 and has decreased meth use more than 50 percent in our area. But board president and first lady Lori Otter says it's still a huge concern.
"It's a 98 percent first-time addiction drug, so meth is not something you want to mess with," said Lori Otter.
She says is affecting families throughout the Treasure Valley, which is clear every time their campaign goes into a classroom to educate students about the danger of the drug.
"For me having that direct contact with kids is crucial because they're the ones having to live with the bad choices of the adults in their family," said Otter.
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666473f91878a827985c388ff375ff29 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/23/kaiser-concierge-medicine-reaches-new-markets/78814342/ | 'Concierge medicine' is reaching new markets | 'Concierge medicine' is reaching new markets
A growing number of primary care doctors, spurred by the federal health law and frustrations with insurance requirements, are bringing a service that generally has been considered “health care for billionaires” to middle-income, Medicaid and Medicare populations.
It’s called direct primary care, modeled after “concierge” practices that have gained prominence in the past two decades. Those feature doctors generally bypassing insurance companies to provide personalized health care while charging a flat fee on a monthly or yearly basis. Patients can shell out anywhere from thousands to tens of thousands of dollars annually, getting care with an air of exclusivity.
In direct primary care, patients pay about $100 a month or less directly to the physician for comprehensive primary care, including basic medication, lab tests and follow-up visits in person, over email and by phone. The idea is that doctors, who no longer have to wade through heaps of insurance paperwork, can focus on treating patients. They spend less on overhead, driving costs down. In turn, physicians say they can give care that’s more personal and convenient than in traditional practices.
The 2010 health law, which requires that most people have insurance, identifies direct primary care as an acceptable option. Because it doesn’t cover specialists or emergencies, consumers need a high-deductible health plan as well. Still, the combined cost of the monthly fee and that plan is often still cheaper than traditional insurance.
The health law’s language was “sort of [an] ‘open-for-business’ sign,” said Jay Keese, a lobbyist who heads the Direct Primary Care Coalition. Before 2010, between six and 20 direct primary care practices existed across the country. Now, there are more than 400 group practices.
The total number of physicians participating doctors may exceed 1,300. The American Academy of Family Physicians estimates 2 percent of its 68,000 members offer direct care.
“This is a movement — I would say it’s in its early phase,” said AAFP President Wanda Filer, a doctor in Pennsylvania. “But when I go out to chapter meetings, I hear a lot more interest.”
But questions persist about feasibility. The lower fees could still be a non-starter for people earning minimum wage or on a limited budget, said Robert Berenson, a senior fellow at the Urban Institute. “Can people afford this? Or is it [still] just for well-off people?”
The American College of Physicians advises doctors to consider whether direct primary care can work within their practices, but also urges physicians to recognize how it could affect poorer patients and look for ways to keep care affordable.
Direct primary care doctors say they see patients across incomes. Dr. Stanford Owen, of Gulfport, Mississippi, treats “waitresses and shrimpers, as well as doctors and lawyers.” He charges $225 for initial visits, $125 for a follow-up, if needed, and then about $50 per month after.
Owen and other physicians report positive experiences, triggering other efforts to apply direct care more broadly. Although most of these doctors eschew dealing with insurance, some have been trying the model with Medicaid and Medicare patients.
If those experiments work — and save money and improve health — they could mitigate concerns about who can afford direct primary care. Berenson pointed out that partnering with insurance or public programs is key to making direct care affordable for lower-income people.
“The idea of setting up stronger primary care services for patients is very exciting and very much needed,” said Ann Hwang, director of the Center for Consumer Engagement in Health Innovation, an outpost of the consumer advocacy group Community Catalyst. But, she added, “This is so new that I think the jury is still really out on whether this will be successful.”
In Seattle, a company called Qliance, which operates a network of primary care doctors, has been testing how to blend direct primary care with the state’s Medicaid program. They started taking Medicaid patients in 2014. So far, about 15,000 have signed up. They get a Qliance doctor and the unlimited visits and virtual access that are hallmarks of the model.
“Medicaid patients are made to feel like they’re a burden on the system,” said Dr. Erika Bliss, Qliance’s CEO. “For them, it was a breath of fresh air to be able to get such personalized care — to be able to talk to doctors over phone and email.”
Qliance has a contract with Centene, an insurance company in the state’s Medicaid program. That Medicaid coverage pays for the monthly fee, which covers primary and preventive care, and for other specialty and emergency services. If patients need a specialist, they’ll get referred to one who accepts Medicaid. Advocates in other states — such as North Carolina, Idaho and Texas — are watching the outcomes and costs while considering rolling out similar programs.
There’s little data so far. Bliss estimated participants will cost Washington state between 15 and 20 percent less than traditional Medicaid. Before launching the Medicaid pilot, Qliance contracted with some companies that provide insurance to their employees — in those cases, employees who opted for Qliance cost about 20 percent less than employees in traditional health insurance. Because patients get better care upfront, the theory goes, they’re less likely to develop expensive chronic illnesses.
Still, expanding this approach is tricky. The number of participating physicians is low. There’s already a nationwide shortage of primary care doctors. In this model, physicians see fewer patients, potentially exacerbating that shortage’s impact. Also, Medicaid negotiates the monthly payment rate, which could be less than what doctors might set independently.
In New Jersey, a pilot program using direct primary care is launching in 2016 for state employees, like firefighters and teachers. It’s a hybrid: When consumers pick a primary doctor, they can choose a direct primary care-style practice, which gives around-the-clock access to preventive and primary care services. The monthly fee is undetermined.
Participants will get benefits such as same-day appointments for non-emergency visits. But when they pick this plan — which will be administered by Aetna and Horizon — they will have access to specialists that participate in the insurers’ plan networks.
In New Jersey, about 800,000 people will be eligible to enroll in the direct primary care program. The state’s hoping to attract and accommodate at least 10,000 in the first year.
That’s appealing, said Mark Blum, executive director of America’s Agenda, an advocacy group that helped develop the project. He cited interest in California, Texas, Pennsylvania and Nebraska. “There are a lot of eyes on New Jersey right now.”
Meanwhile, direct primary care is finding traction with Medicare Advantage, the private health plan alternatives to traditional Medicare. Iora Health, a direct primary care system that contracts with unions and employers, a year ago launched clinics in Washington and Arizona catering to Medicare Advantage patients.
Iora’s setting up similar clinics in Colorado and Massachusetts.
Despite its potential, the direct care model faces the challenges of integration into existing payment systems and attracting more participating doctors. And navigating Medicare and Medicaid rules can deter physicians.
“It’s not for the faint of heart,” said Dr. Rushika Fernandopulle, Iora’s CEO.
How it evolves from here will vary across the country, said Filer, the AAFP president.
“There are some parts of the country where it is working very well,” she said. “But there are other reasons a physician might decide, ‘This is not for my patient base.’”
Kaiser Health News is an editorially independent program of the Kaiser Family Foundation.
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6d30e00f1691edb0bc24acbd7545690b | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/24/oceans-more-plastic-than-fish/79267192/ | By 2050, our oceans will hold more plastic than fish | By 2050, our oceans will hold more plastic than fish
(NEWSER) – Use of plastic has increased 20-fold in the past half-century; production of the ubiquitous material is expected to double again in the next 20 years (and nearly quadruple over the next 50). And, CNN Money reports, nearly a third of all plastic packaging "escapes collection systems."
As for where the rest goes, more than 8 million tons of plastics end up entering our oceans each year, where the pieces can survive for hundreds of years. There are believed to be 165 million tons of it in the ocean right now. We're dumping the equivalent of one garbage truck's worth into the ocean per minute; that's projected to jump to four per minute by 2050, according to a report released Tuesday by the World Economic Forum and Ellen MacArthur Foundation. And that report has an ominous warning: We're on track to have more plastic than fish, by weight, in the world's oceans by 2050. (Right now, the ratio is about 1:5, plastics to fish.)
And the discarded plastic that doesn't end up in the ocean is likely be put in a landfill; those two resting places end up holding about 70% of our plastic, the Washington Post reports. Just 5% of plastics are effectively recycled, according to the Guardian. It's not just a problem of pollution.
"After a short first-use cycle, 95% of plastic packaging material value, or $80 to $120 billion annually, is lost to the economy," the report says.
The solution? A "new plastics economy," per the report, that includes more recycling, reusable packaging, and compostable plastic packaging. "After-use plastics could, with circular economy thinking, be turned into valuable feedstock,” Martin R. Stuchtey, who helped produce the report, tells the Guardian. (This tiny animal may solve a big pollution problem.)
More from Newser:
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b5dddc97b878bd1d2e1de5e1a9faaf81 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/25/fsu-reaches-250k-settlement-winston-accuser/79300122/ | FSU reaches settlement with Winston's accuser | FSU reaches settlement with Winston's accuser
Facing a mounting $1.7-million legal bill, Florida State University decided to settle with Erica Kinsman, a former student who accused former FSU quarterback Jameis Winston of rape.
The $950,000 lump sum payment is the largest ever Title IX discrimination settlement to a single plaintiff claiming a university's "indifference" to a sexual assault, according to the Boulder, Colorado-based law firm representing Kinsman, Hutchison Black and Cook. FSU President John Thrasher signed the settlement on Monday. A filing in the Tallahassee-based United States District Court for the Northern District of Florida said the settlement must be final no later than Feb. 12.
As part of the settlement, Kinsman agreed to drop her title IX lawsuit against the school. The settlement states she will receive $250,000 and her attorneys will receive $700,000. It also comes with a 5-year commitment from FSU to implement "sexual assault awareness, prevention and training programs," her lawyers said. FSU also will produce reports each of the next five years "about its programs to deter and address campus sexual assault."
Despite the out of court settlement, it appears the case didn't end amicably.
One of Kinsman's attorneys, John Clune, said the settlement numbers don't reflect the actual amounts attorneys and Kinsman will receive. Clune would not disclose exact figures due to attorney-client privilege, but said lawyers "are not taking anywhere near" the $700,000 amount. Kinsman, he added, will "definitely" get more than $250,000.
He criticized Thrasher for releasing the settlement amount in a Monday statement to the media, knowing that the final breakdown will be different.
"FSU used that breakdown to justify its large payment to Ms. Kinsman and do not reflect the actual attorney fees on the case, which are far lower than Thrasher’s misrepresentation," Clune said. "We are sorry to see President Thrasher taint an otherwise healthy resolution for both sides."
The actual settlement amount is dwarfed by what the university spent in legal fees: A whopping $1.7 million to the McGuireWoods law firm in Jacksonville.
Thrasher said the university agreed to the settlement to avoid millions of dollars in additional litigation expenses.
“Although we regret we will never be able to tell our full story in court, it is apparent that a trial many months from now would have left FSU fighting over the past rather than looking toward its very bright future," Thrasher said in his statement. "We have decided to instead move forward even though we have full faith that the ultimate outcome of a trial would have been consistent with the previous law enforcement investigations and retired Supreme Court Justice Major Harding’s findings in the student conduct hearing."
The settlement will be paid out of the state of Florida's risk management fund, the university said. The university's legal fees will be paid with $421,000 from the fund and about $1.3 million generated by Seminole Boosters through licensing, concessions and gifts shop revenues. The settlement will not need legislative approval, said FSU spokeswoman Browning Brooks.
Donations to the Boosters — a fundraising arm of the university — will not be used to pay the legal bill, said David Rancourt, Boosters chairman.
"Seminole Boosters supports President Thrasher's ardent defense of Florida State University and the business decision to resolve this suit and move forward," Rancourt said.
Kinsman filed the lawsuit in January 2015, claiming the university displayed a "clearly unreasonable response" to her allegation that Winston raped her at his off-campus apartment in the early morning hours of Dec. 7, 2012. She claimed a "hostile educational environment" was created once the allegation was made public in November 2013 and that the university's "deliberate indifference" to her situation led to emotional distress, an inability to finish school and loss of future earnings.
The university is still under investigation by the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights. The federal investigation focuses on FSU's handling of the case and its Title IX compliance. The settlement acknowledged FSU "has made substantial reforms to its Title IX awareness and processes" by creating a sexual violence task force, the "kNOw MORE" sexual violence prevention initiative and hiring a full-time Title IX coordinator.
The university also has published a Victims' Rights and Resources handbook to educate all students on available services and added six campus safety positions related to Title IX and sexual violence. The university requires incoming freshmen take an online course about making informed choices on sex and relationships. It also has established a men's peer group called Men Advocating for Responsible Conduct and a co-ed faction called NOLE More.
Since April 2014, Thrasher said, there have been more than 100 training sessions on campus related to sexual assault and how to prevent it.
"We have increased our institutional commitment to tackle this complex problem," Thrasher said. "There should be no doubt that Florida State is serious about fighting sexual assault."
Orlando attorney David B. King, who also represented Kinsman, said it was a "good resolution" to the case because they recovered damages and made changes at FSU.
"We’re always interested in a good resolution of our clients’ claims," King said. "Fortunately, FSU was willing, and it made sense to them, to make this case go away."
Kinsman is "grateful" to reach a settlement in the FSU case, her attorneys said.
"I'll always be disappointed that I had to leave the school I dreamed of attending since I was little," Kinsman said in a statement. "I am happy that FSU has committed to continue making changes in order to ensure a safer environment for all students. My hope is that the federal investigation of my complaint by the Office of Civil Rights will produce even more positive change, not just at FSU, but across the country."
Winston was drafted first overall by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in last year's NFL Draft. Kinsman left FSU and will graduate this spring with a degree in mass communications from another university, her attorneys said. Kinsman has filed a separate civil lawsuit against Winston in Orlando.
Clune said neither side was more motivated to settle than the other. Both he and King declined to disclose which party initiated the settlement.
"I'm happy with the result," Clune said. "It's always a trade-off to not have your client see their day in court and continue to dig into the deeper issues of what we were finding at FSU."
Clune also took a jab at the university's athletic department, a nod to accusations that FSU football players receive special treatments during their run-ins with the law.
"I think they've made some great steps," Clune said. "The concern that I would have at FSU is whether or not FSU really has control over what happens in the athletic department."
Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering, the makers of "The Hunting Ground," a documentary focusing on rapes on college campuses and which featured Kinsman, said in a statement the settlement is "a win for survivors everywhere."
"Through her bravery, resilience and integrity, Erica was able to transcend her traumatic experience, stand up to FSU's institutional betrayal and show other sexual assault survivors they no longer have to remain silent," they said.
Contact Sean Rossman atsrossman@tallahassee.com or follow@SeanRossman on Twitter. Contact Byron Dobson at bdobson@tallahassee.com or on Twitter @byrondobson.
Timeline of events in rape allegation against Jameis Winston:
- Dec. 7, 2012: Then a redshirt-freshman, Jameis Winston allegedly rapes Erica Kinsman at his off-campus apartment. The Tallahassee Police Department responds.
- Jan. 10, 2013: Kinsman calls TPD and identifies Winston as a suspect.
- November 2013: News that Winston is named in a sexual-assault case is made public.
- December 2013: State Attorney Willie Meggs declines to press charges against Winston, citing a lack of evidence.
- April 2014: The U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights initiates a Title IX investigation of FSU's handling of the case and its Title IX processes.
- December 2014: Winston is cleared of wrongdoing in a university Student Code of Conduct hearing.
- January 2015: Kinsman files a Title IX lawsuit against the Florida State University Board of Trustees.
- April 2015: Kinsman files a civil lawsuit against Winston, claiming rape, assault, emotional distress and false imprisonment.
- Jan. 25, 2016: Kinsman reaches $950,000-settlement with FSU.
Related stories:
Lawsuit filed by Jameis Winston's accuser won't be heard in Tallahassee
Woman files civil lawsuit accusing Jameis Winston of rape
'Hunting Ground' takes aim at rape on campus, plus FSU
FSU asks for lawsuit over alleged rape to be thrown out
Jameis Winston accuser sues FSU
FSU hires first full-time Title IX director
In other news:
Stanford Samuels III, Bradley Jennings Jr. could bring childhood friendship to Florida State
Thousands skip school after threats
Parents to go to Legislature to support recess bill
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d279cd873d5c93563044702f3ed5f5b3 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/25/planned-parenthood-videos-grand-jury-indictment/79318450/ | Grand jury indicts 2 behind Planned Parenthood videos | Grand jury indicts 2 behind Planned Parenthood videos
A Texas grand jury investigating video-recorded allegations that Planned Parenthood was illegally selling fetal tissue instead indicted two of the people who made the controversial undercover videos.
The grand jury in Harris County indicted David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt on a felony charge of tampering with a governmental record. Daleiden was also indicted on a misdemeanor charge of “prohibition of the purchase and sale of human organs,” Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson said in a statement.
The grand jury declined to indict anyone from Planned Parenthood of the Gulf Coast — the initial target of the investigation. Planned Parenthood officials said violence against clinics rose dramatically as the videos were released in mid-2015.
“We were called upon to investigate allegations of criminal conduct by Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast,” Anderson said in a statement. “As I stated at the outset of this investigation, we must go where the evidence leads us. All the evidence uncovered in the course of this investigation was presented to the grand jury. I respect their decision on this difficult case.”
Daleiden and Merritt created a fake human-tissue company and secretly recorded Planned Parenthood workers discussing the disposal of fetal tissue. Planned Parenthood officials, who have sued the two and several others involved in making the videos, say the recordings were deceptively edited and falsely portrayed the highly regulated process by which tissue from aborted fetuses can be donated for medical research.
"These people broke the law to spread malicious lies about Planned Parenthood in order to advance their extreme anti-abortion political agenda. As the dust settles and the truth comes out, it's become totally clear that the only people who engaged in wrongdoing are the criminals behind this fraud, and we're glad they're being held accountable," Eric Ferrero, a spokesman for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, said in a statement.
Last week, Planned Parenthood filed a federal racketeering lawsuit against Daleiden and Merritt, along with the Center for Medical Progress and BioMax, and several others identified as helping create the videos. The lawsuit filed in San Francisco claims the defendants "engaged in a complex criminal enterprise to defraud Planned Parenthood and prevent the health care organization from providing preventive and reproductive health services to millions of women and men.”
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott last summer called for the grand jury investigation, calling the allegations contained in the videos “repulsive and unconscionable.” Reacting to Monday's announcement, Abbott wrote on Twitter: "Despite today's decision in Harris Co. about Planned Parenthood, Texas will continue to protect life & investigate @PPact practices."
Planned Parenthood videos testify to ugly truth: David Daleiden
In an editorial for USA TODAY published online today, Daleiden defended the videos.
"Six months after these revelations broke, Planned Parenthood still cannot deny that the shocking and indicting words on the videos were spoken by its own senior level leadership," he wrote. "Planned Parenthood cannot rebut the incriminating statements of its own leadership on these tapes, and so it has resorted to an awkward shuffle of blind denials and stagy distractions in their wake. The truth will continue to come out through the congressional probe, through the ongoing state investigations and through the frivolous lawsuit Planned Parenthood now brings in retaliation for its exposure.
Planned Parenthood officials and the organization’s defenders say the videos have prompted a dramatic rise in violence against abortion clinics, including a Nov. 27 shooting at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs that left three dead. The suspect in that case, Robert Lewis Dear, claimed he was a “warrior for the babies.” He’s currently awaiting a mental-health competency exam.
Eleven states launched similar investigations into Planned Parenthood following the videos' release; all cleared the organization of wrongdoing.
Officials with the Center For Medical Progress did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Republicans in the House or Representatives pushed through a resolution last fall to create a special subcommittee — called the Select Investigative Panel on Infant Lives — to investigate Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers. The panel has not yet met or announced a schedule of hearings, but it has begun hiring staff.
The top Democrat on the panel, Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Illinois, said Monday that the Texas ruling proves the congressional investigation is a waste of time and should be shuttered.
Rep. Diane Black of Tennessee, one of the panel's Republican members, called the indictments a "miscarriage of justice" but added, "it will not deter our efforts in Congress to hold Planned Parenthood accountable."
Contributing: Paul Singer
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5d03723f3c5423842a798064716e9887 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/27/tyrannosaurs-faster-than-velociraptors/79423372/ | Forget all you know from Jurassic Park: For speed, T.rex beats velociraptors | Forget all you know from Jurassic Park: For speed, T.rex beats velociraptors
Armed with powerful jaws and sharp teeth, tyrannosaurs were built to kill. But they were also built for something else, researchers say: speed.
As if giant, toothy dinosaurs weren’t scary enough, new evidence suggests tyrannosaurs were tailor-made for running. Even velociraptors, seen in “Jurassic Park” as gold-medal sprinters, weren’t so finely tuned for quickness, the new study concludes.
20 years later, 'Jurassic Park' reopens in 3-D
Velociraptors “could drop down out of a tree and slash you apart,” says Eric Snively of the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, who was not involved with the new study. But the new results, he says, “have shown that velociraptor and its relatives really were kind of pokey.”
The takedown of velociraptor started with an exhaustive survey of the fossilized legs of 50-plus species of carnivorous dinosaurs. Sizing up the legs of little dinos was easy. Getting a read on the gams of the big guys took a “ladder and a really long tape measure,” says study co-author Scott Persons, a graduate student at Canada’s University of Alberta.
Persons and his supervisor Philip Currie, also of the University of Alberta, analyzed the length of each animal’s lower leg – a key to swiftness – while taking into account the animal’s overall size. They found that some meat-eating dinos, though of massive proportions, had very long lower legs. Such leg dimensions allow an animal to cover more ground with each stride.
Among the standouts were the tyrannosaurs, a group that includes not only the famous Tyrannosaurus rex but also species like T. rex’s smaller cousin Gorgosaurus and its Asian look-alike Tarbosaurus, the researchers say in this week’s Scientific Reports.
“Tyrannosaurs as a group are the Radio City Rockettes of the meat-eating dinosaurs,” Persons says. “They’re super-leggy.” Leggiest of all was a lanky reptile that Persons thinks should be labeled Nanotyrannus, the species name some scientists give to a predator that looked like a small T. rex. Nanotyrannus, Persons says, was “the cheetah to T. rex’s lion.”
Not every scientist is convinced by the new findings. The idea behind the study is “really interesting,” says Kevin Middleton of the University of Missouri, and “they might be totally and completely right. But my view is we don’t know yet.” He’d like to see further analysis to verify the results.
Persons says his comparisons stand, and he also has another, more tangible piece of evidence for the swiftness of tyrannosaurs: the tracks of a tyrannosaur out for a walk, an extremely rare find. Persons and his colleagues describe the 66-million-year-old tracks, which meander across a stone slab in Wyoming, in a recent edition of Cretaceous Research.
The spacing of the footprints shows the animal was moving at a pace that for humans would be “a brisk walk … or maybe even a slow jog,” Persons said. That speed, he says, indicates a tyrannosaur would have no trouble catching up with something like a duckbill dinosaur, a plant-eater that would’ve made a nice tyrannosaur meal.
“If you had this dinosaur as a pet and you were walking it, you would get some pretty good exercise,” Snively says. Unlike velociraptor, “they definitely weren’t pokey.”
Jurassic dancing: Scientists find dinosaur 'disco floor'
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3150c6c0b9403b9666188fc5d6149b15 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/01/28/5-things-you-need-know-thursday/79304218/ | 5 things you need to know Thursday | 5 things you need to know Thursday
Space shuttle Challenger disaster remembered
Thirty years ago Thursday, the space shuttle Challenger blasted off at 11:38 a.m. ET. Then, 73 seconds after liftoff, a fireball engulfed the shuttle. As a horrified America watched on live TV, the orbiter broke apart, dooming its crew of seven, including high school teacher Christa McAuliffe, who was supposed to become the first civilian in space. The accident, which was eventually blamed on failed rocket O-rings as well as pressure within NASA to keep launches on schedule, forced a reassessment of the shuttle program and the dangers inherent in human spaceflight. As it does each year on the Challenger anniversary, NASA's Day of Remembrance will honor the Challenger victims as well as the lost crews of the Columbia and Apollo 1 and other astronauts killed in the line of duty.
Last GOP debate before the Iowa caucus
The Republican presidential field (most of them, that is) gathers Thursday night in Des Moines for the final debate before Iowans kick off 2016 voting with caucuses Monday night. The prime-time debate will be at 9 p.m. ET, while the undercard starts at 7 p.m. ET. Both debates will be televised by Fox News. Donald Trump isn't participating, due to his ongoing feud with the network and moderator Megyn Kelly. You can also live stream the debates for free at FOXNews.com and on mobile devices. Additionally, Google, which is co-hosting the debate with Fox, is launching a new online feature that allows the campaigns to post content — including videos, text and even real-time responses to questions — which will appear in a window alongside relevant search results. To see the experimental Google content, search "debate."
Tech earnings: Microsoft, Amazon take their turn
This week's parade of earnings reports by tech giants, which are closely watched by investors as a gauge of the industry's health, continues Thursday when Microsoft and Amazon weigh in. Microsoft, which reports fiscal second-quarter results after the bell, has been trying under CEO Satya Nadella to become more nimble and technologically adventurous. Meanwhile, after a jump of 3 million new Prime customers the week before Christmas, analysts are expecting strong fourth-quarter results from Amazon. Thursday's reports follow ones earlier in the week from Apple, Facebook, Twitter and others.
Delaware state House to vote on repeal of death penalty
Delaware's House of Representatives is scheduled to vote Thursday on a bill to repeal the state's death penalty law. The state Senate passed the repeal bill in April, and Gov. Jack Markell has said he will sign it if it passes. Even if the bill fails, Delaware's death penalty could be affected by the courts: A judge on Monday asked the state Supreme Court to consider whether Delaware's death penalty law is constitutional in light of two recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings. Delaware is one of only three states that allow judges to override a jury's recommendation of life and impose a death sentence.Thirty-one states currently have the death penalty, according to the Dealth Penalty Information Center.
Senate committee holds hearing on Obama's new retirement proposals
The Senate Finance Committee will hold a hearing Thursday on retirement security, days after President Obama’s announcement of a new push to expand Americans’ retirement savings. The Republican chairmen of the tax-writing committees of Congress, who have jurisdiction over retirement plan rules and are holding the hearing, have been working on their own proposals, separate from what the White House previewed on Monday. The administration says Obama’s proposed changes could help 30 million American workers. Obama will fully outline his proposals in the 2017 budget, which he'll submit to Congress next month.
And the essentials:
Weather: A soggy Thursday is on tap for the Southeast and the Northwest while light snow falls in the Great Lakes.
Stocks: Wall Street was on track for a higher start Thursday; Asia markets declined.
TV Tonight: Wondering what to watch tonight? TV critic Robert Bianco looks at Legends, 100 and London Spy.
If you missed Wednesday's news, we've got you covered.
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You can subscribe to get the day's top news each weekday in your inbox.
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c834d75cfa29f8e46d6cddf2c4bc8360 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/01/chicago-records-51-homicides-january-highest-toll-since-2000/79632136/ | Chicago records 51 homicides in January, highest toll since 2000 | Chicago records 51 homicides in January, highest toll since 2000
CHICAGO — The nation's third largest city recorded 51 homicides in January, the highest toll for the month since at least 2000.
Gang conflicts and retaliatory violence drove the "unacceptable" increase in homicides, the police department said in a statement. But the rise in violence also notably comes as the Chicago Police Department faces increased scrutiny following the court-ordered release of a police video showing a white police officer fatally shooting a black teenager 16 times, and as the department implements changes in how it monitors street stops by officers.
Chicago routinely records more homicides annually than any other American city, but the grim January violence toll marks a shocking spike in violence in a city that recorded 29 murders for the month of January last year and 20 murders for the month in 2014. In addition to the jump in killings, police department said that it recorded 241 shooting incidents for the month, more than double the 119 incidents recorded last January.
The rise in violence comes after the Chicago Police Department reported 468 murders in 2015, a 12.5% increase from the year before. There were also 2,900 shootings, 13% more than the year prior, according to police department records.
In recent weeks, the police department pushed back against the notion that the rise in homicides could be due to cops becoming less aggressive due to the negative attention the department has received in the aftermath of the release of the police video showing the shooting of Laquan McDonald. The city saw several weeks of largely peaceful protests after the release of the video. The U.S. Justice Department has launched a civil rights investigation of the city.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who faced fierce backlash in the city's African-American community over his handling of the McDonald case, fired his police superintendent, Garry McCarthy, after the video's release.
Interim Superintendent John Escalante expressed frustration earlier this month as the homicide toll climbed, but said it was due mainly to gang activity. He also said he was concerned about social media fueling gang disputes, with fatal incidents starting as a war of words on the Internet.
"It's the new way of taunting, challenging other gangs," Escalante told reporters. "It's the modern way of gang graffiti."
St. Louis saw a dramatic increase in the number homicides following the August 2014 police shooting death of Michael Brown in nearby Ferguson, which spurred months of angry protests. And Baltimore saw a spike in homicides following the death of Freddie Gray in Baltimore in April, an incident that sparked unrest in the Charm City. In both Baltimore and St. Louis, the rise in violent crime began to increase prior to the high-profile incidents and accelerated afterward.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel taps high-profile officer to advise Chicago police
The department says it has seen a decrease in investigative stops by cops on the streets after new rules went into effect Jan. 1 requiring the police department to bolster the monitoring of stops and protective pat downs known as "stop-and-frisk."
The police department entered an agreement with the American Civil Liberties Union to record contact cards for all street stops after the organization criticized the the city's police for disproportionately targeting minorities for questioning and searches. In the past, police officers were required only to fill out cards for stops that didn't result in an arrest. The new contact cards also require police officers to offer greater detail about the stops than they have in the past.
The police department says it recently moved 350 police officers and 31 sergeants from foot patrols into vehicles to help increase visibility in communities hardest hit by the rise of shootings and to improve their ability to quickly respond to incidents.
The department says it has also conducted a series of raids in areas of the city it knows are problematic. One raid last week netted 64 arrests, including 40 suspects who are documented gang members, and the seizure of over $200,000 worth of drugs. Police say they also seized 19 weapons in the raid.
Chicago looks for new police chief to work with embattled Rahm Emanuel
The department has also asked the Cook County Sheriff's Department to step up enforcement of individuals on supervised release and act on outstanding arrest warrants.
Follow USA TODAY reporter Aamer Madhani on Twitter:AamerISmad
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238709a240f9e4904e47869d1be21f6d | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/02/shadow-knows-furry-forecaster-punxsutawney-phil-predicts-early-spring/79684842/ | The shadow knows: Furry forecaster Punxsutawney Phil predicts an early spring | The shadow knows: Furry forecaster Punxsutawney Phil predicts an early spring
Get ready for an early spring. At least, that’s what Punxsutawney Phil says.
The weather-predicting groundhog did not see his shadow as he emerged from his burrow in western Pennsylvania at sunrise Tuesday, thus indicating springlike conditions sooner rather than later. Had he seen his shadow, legend has it, at least another six weeks of wintry weather would be in store.
Members of the top hat-wearing Groundhog Day Inner Circle announced the forecast just before 7:30 a.m.
“Take your jackets off,” shouted the announcer in the small town that has staged the ceremony for 130 years as he announced Phil’s cheery projection.
That said, flipping a coin is pretty much as accurate as Phil. Since 1988, the furry forecaster has been "right" 13 times and "wrong" 15 times, as to whether the USA's temperature would be warmer or cooler than average in February.
And of the last 8 times that Punxsutawney Phil didn't see his shadow, he was "right" 5 times and "wrong" 3 times.
Based on past weather data, "there is no predictive skill for the groundhog during the most recent years of the analysis," according to a report released Friday by the National Centers for Environmental Information in Asheville, N.C.
According to the Associated Press, a German legend says if a furry rodent sees his shadow Feb. 2, winter will last another six weeks. If not, spring comes early.
In reality, the AP reported, Phil’s prediction is decided ahead of time by the group on Gobbler’s Knob, a small hill located just outside the town for which he’s named about 65 miles northeast of Pittsburgh.
Records going back to 1887 show Phil has predicted a longer winter 102 times and an early spring just 18 times. There are no records for the remaining years.
Meanwhile, in Staten Island, N.Y., the borough's own version of the Pennsylvania prognosticator, Staten Island Chuck, agreed with his fellow forecaster. According to the Staten Island Advance newspaper, Chuck crawled out of his burrow at the same time in search for his shadow, to no avail. Chuck made his prediction at the Staten Island Zoo.
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841e16b02b5f6165369ed1cd22052f7e | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/03/low-moderate-income-families-under-connected/79724512/ | Many low-, moderate-income families 'under-connected' to Internet | Many low-, moderate-income families 'under-connected' to Internet
Remember the “digital divide”? Well, forget it.
These days, the key divide isn’t between the digital “haves” and “have nots.” It’s between the fully-connected — people who enjoy multi-device home broadband and Wi-Fi— and the not-quite-fully-connected, who don’t.
New research shows that basic Internet access is nearly universal, even among low- and moderate-income U.S. families: an estimated 94% of these families have some kind of Internet access. Even among the poor, it stands at 91%.
But researchers now say many low-income families are “under-connected,” in many cases getting by with only a single Internet-connected computer or, quite often, with mobile-only Internet access through a smartphone or two.
The gap, researchers say, can not only hurt kids’ ability to be successful in school. It can also hurt adults’ ability to use the Internet to find a job, get medical information or apply for an affordable home loan — “the kinds of things that help families get by and the kinds of things that help families get ahead,” said Vikki Katz, a co-author of the study.
The findings are out today from the New York-based Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop, the creators of Sesame Street.
“We shouldn’t’ be celebrating the conquering of the digital divide because of mobile,” said Katz, an associate professor of communication at Rutgers University.
The problem, the researchers say, isn’t just that many low- and moderate-income families rely on limited, mobile-only Internet access. It’s that many also experience poor service or interruptions: about half say their Internet access is too slow, and one quarter say too many people share the same computer.
Other issues:
For years, said Victoria Rideout, Katz’s co-author, advocates have held out great hope that mobile devices would bridge the "digital divide." And in some sense, she said, they have. “It’s just a little bit rickety of a bridge.”
She added, “What we’ve learned is that whether or not a family has Internet access is no longer a simple black-white, yes-no type of a question, because all Internet access is not created equal.”
Unlike with previous surveys, in which interest in Internet access varied generationally, she said the new survey shows that families “totally understand the importance of the Internet.” Only about 4% said Internet access is “not important.” In most cases, finances are “what’s keeping them from being as connected as they want to be,” Rideout said.
Homes with broadband Internet hit plateau
The report is based on a nationally-representative phone survey, conducted April 16 through June 29, 2015, of 1,191 low and moderate-income parents of children ages 6 to 13.
Katz said many free and low-cost connectivity programs haven't bridged the under-connection divide. They may sound great on paper, but many are problematic in real life — often they offer slow Internet access, “an Ethernet cord to one device,” and no simple way to add wifi service, she said.
So even families who are interested in these programs decide that a free or low-cost connection simply doesn’t meet their needs.
She and Rideout said they hope the new findings will lead Internet providers to reassess these programs based on the realities families face.
“I think we can do better than this,” Katz said.
The report is available at: www.joanganzcooneycenter.org/
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059605c07b939fef83f125b84ebd9931 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/03/zika-q-and-a/79751476/ | Zika Q&A: Congress struggles to reach deal on funding fight against virus | Zika Q&A: Congress struggles to reach deal on funding fight against virus
U.S. officials are gearing up for the onset of locally transmitted cases of the mosquito-borne Zika virus that is spreading rapidly throughout Latin American and the Caribbean.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention considers Zika to be the definitive cause of an epidemic of birth defects in Brazil and other countries with outbreaks of the virus. It also causes Guillain-Barré syndrome, a rare condition in which the body attacks its own nerve cells, causing paralysis. The agency warned the virus is "scarier than we initially thought."
The virus, largely spread by mosquitoes, can sometimes be transmitted sexually or through blood transfusions. The World Health Organization declared the outbreak a "public health emergency of international concern."
Here is the latest on what you need to know:
Full coverage
Q: What is the U.S. doing to prepare for local cases?
A: Congress is still struggling to reach an agreement to provide emergency funding to battle the Zika virus, and lawmakers are worried the fight could last awhile longer, despite increasingly urgent warnings from federal health officials about the need to move quickly to prevent a U.S. outbreak of the mosquito-borne virus.
The Senate passed a bill in late May providing $1.1 billion for mosquito-extermination efforts, testing and vaccine research. But the House passed legislation providing only $622 million and redirecting money from other programs to pay for it, including some funds previously dedicated to fighting Ebola.
The two sides now must come together and reach a compromise that can pass both chambers and be signed by President Obama, who requested $1.9 billion. As an emergency measure, Obama transferred $510 million in unspent Ebola funds to the Zika fight, but public health officials said the country will need much more to prepare for and respond to Zika.
The CDC wants communities to draw up Zika action plans and has set up a model program for communities to reference. It will release millions of dollars in grants for Zika planning and response but only to states that submit a "checklist of readiness activities."
Despite the efforts, U.S. officials are warning that mosquito eradication efforts, lab tests and vaccine research may not be able to catch up with the number of cases.
Q: How do local cities and regions fight the virus?
A: Fighting mosquitoes is fundamentally a local battle led by a patchwork of 700 mosquito-control districts and more than 1,000 other programs within local governments. In some cities, mosquito control is handled by sophisticated professionals with multimillion dollar budgets. In other communities, mosquito control is more of an afterthought, tacked onto other programs, such as the parks and recreation.
Q: How many Americans have been diagnosed so far?
A: So far, nearly 600 Americans in the continental U.S. have been diagnosed with Zika after returning from visits to countries with outbreaks of the virus. Of those, more than 150 were in pregnant women and more than 10 were sexually transmitted. An additional more than 140 pregnant women from U.S. territories, where the vast majority of cases are locally acquired, have also been infected.
Bold Zika mosquitoes love to hang with humans
Q: What parts of the country could be hardest hit?
A: The potential geographic range of the mosquitoes transmitting the virus also reaches farther northward than originally thought, with the Aedes aegypti species present in all or part of 30 states, not just 12. Still, the Gulf Coast — with its steamy climate, abundant mosquitoes and international airports — could be ground zero for the virus. More than 60 million Americans live in the five states there — Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas.
Parts of the U.S. could face a year-round threat from Zika, according to a map of potential hot spots for the virus. Researchers plotted the potential risk for Zika outbreaks in 50 large U.S. cities based on several factors, such as whether the locations are home to the Aedes aegypti mosquito that primarily spreads the virus.
Q: How can the risk of Zika be reduced?
A: Public health officials in the U.S. are calling on home owners to help control mosquitoes this summer by cleaning up trash and other man-made containers that can collect rain water, where the insects breed. Another way to prevent infection is to avoid mosquito bites by staying indoors when visiting an area where the virus is present, wearing long pants and long-sleeved shirts, and using mosquito repellent.
Q. Could birth defects occur in the fetuses of pregnant American women?
A. Yes. One American has already given birth to a baby with microcephaly, a condition in which babies are born with unusually small heads and incomplete brain development. In addition, two other babies have been born in the U.S. with the defect. And the fetus of an unidentified woman in Puerto Rico also tested positive for the disease. Other pregnant women had abortions after ultrasounds showed abnormalities. Some had miscarriages.
It's unclear how widespread birth defects will be in the U.S., but the CDC estimates that a fetus infected with Zika during the first three months of pregnancy has up to a 13% risk of developing microcephaly.
Q&A: What is microcephaly, the birth defect linked to Zika?
Q: Are there concerns this summer's Olympics could spread the virus wider?
A: Brazil's hosting of the Games could give mosquitoes a chance to infect people from around the world. Public health officials in Rio de Janeiro downplay the risk, saying there will be fewer mosquitoes when the sporting event opens during the cool month of August. The World Health Organization said there is "no public health justification" for postponing the Games. The statement by the Geneva-based U.N. health agency came one day after a group of doctors, scientists and bioethicists wrote a letter to the organization calling for the Aug. 5-21 Games to be postponed or moved because of concerns of the spread of Zika.
Q: How is Zika diagnosed?
A: Diagnosing Zika is difficult because its symptoms can mimic those of other mosquito-borne diseases, and there are is just one commercially available test. Until the Food and Drug Administration granted emergency approval for the first commercial test for Zika, doctors didn't have access to an off-the-shelf test to quickly diagnose patients with the disease. Instead, physicians sent blood samples to state public health labs or the CDC in Atlanta.
Urine tests for Zika more accurate than blood
Q. What advice do U.S. agencies give for couples trying to conceive and pregnant women?
A. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says couples trying to conceive should use condoms every time or abstain for six months if the man had confirmed illness or Zika symptoms and was in an outbreak area. If the male partner was in a Zika outbreak area but didn’t get sick, they should abstain or use condoms for eight weeks.
The agency also warns pregnant women to avoid traveling to areas with Zika outbreaks. The WHO issued similar guidance. Women who cannot avoid traveling should consult their doctors and take steps to avoid mosquito bites, such as wearing long sleeves and pants. Women thinking of becoming pregnant should also consult their doctors before traveling to outbreak zones.
Study: Zika may affect babies even in later stages of pregnancy
Q. How serious is the risk of sexual transmission?
A. The WHO says sexual transmission of Zika is more common than previously thought, but scientists still have questions about the first mosquito-borne disease known to spread through sex, including how long it lasts in semen. Doctors aren't sure if a person needs to be sick with obvious symptoms in order to spread the virus through semen.
Q: What does research show about the birth defects Zika causes?
A: The type of microcephaly seen in babies affected by Zika is particularly severe. Babies affected by the virus appear to have "fetal brain disruption sequence," which occurs when normal growth in a fetus is interrupted by a destructive virus or parasite.
In addition to microcephaly and brain abnormalities, babies with Zika infections also have had eye problems that could cause blindness, extra scalp skin, clubfoot and arthrogryposis, a condition in which newborns' joints are stuck in either a flexed or extended position.
Ultrasounds found major abnormalities in 29% of the fetuses from 88 pregnant women in Brazil who tested positive for Zika, according to a study published in The New England Journal of Medicine. The defects included microcephaly. The fetuses from women not infected with Zika showed no abnormalities.
A separate study uncovered evidence that the Zika virus specifically targets developing brain cells, leading to stunted brain development. The findings, which eventually could identify drugs that treat the virus when it first infects, were published in the scientific journal Cell Stem Cell. The research found the virus affects neural stem cells, which develop into much of the nervous system in fetuses, slowing their growth.
Q: Where is the virus currently spreading?
A: Zika is now active in at least 39 countries and territories, mainly in Latin America and the Caribbean. The virus is spreading locally in the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa and Puerto Rico, which the CDC warned could see hundreds of thousands of cases.
Q: How does it spread?
A: The Aedes mosquito spreads Zika. Unlike the flu, it does not spread from person to person. Mosquitoes that bite an infected person can spread it to future victims.
Q. What are the symptoms of Zika?
A. Four out of five people infected by Zika have no symptoms. Those who do usually have mild symptoms lasting two to seven days, such as fever, rash, headaches, joint pain, muscle pain, lack of energy, weakness and pink eye. It typically takes three to 12 days for illness to develop after a mosquito bite.
Q: Is it deadly?
A: Not usually, but people with pre-existing health problems can develop fatal complications.
Q: Are Americans well informed about Zika?
A: Turns out they're not. Although Zika infections are rarely fatal, 42% of those surveyed thought people infected with the virus are "very likely" or "somewhat likely" to die, according to a survey by the Annenberg Public Policy Center. About 44% said those infected with Zika would know it because the virus always produces noticeable symptoms, according to the survey. In fact, 80% of people with Zika infections display no symptoms, according to the CDC. A separate survey found nearly one in three people mistakenly believe the virus can be spread by coughing or sneezing, like a cold.
Q: Why are people concerned?
A: The virus causes serious birth defects. Seven countries have reported microcephaly cases related to the outbreak, with more than 1,300 confirmed cases in Brazil, according to the World Health Organization.
Children with microcephaly may have facial distortions, developmental disabilities, short stature, difficulties with balance and coordination, speech problems and seizures.
Q: What populations are at greatest risk of Zika?
A: People who live in poverty are at greatest risk because they live in environments where mosquitoes thrive: trash-strewn neighborhoods with lots of standing water, where mosquitoes breed, in homes without air conditioning or even window screens to keep the mosquitoes out. Although cities in Latin America and the Caribbean often meet these conditions, many impoverished communities along the Gulf Coast in the USA are also at risk.
Q: How long does Zika last in blood or semen?
A: Scientists largely conclude that Zika stays in the blood for about a week. Mosquitoes can only pick up the virus if they bite someone during this time. Scientists don't know how long Zika can live in semen.
The virus could linger months longer in the blood of pregnant women than other patients, according to a report published in The New England Journal of Medicine. One pregnant woman's blood tested positive for Zika for 10 weeks after being infected. Doctors can't say for sure why the woman harbored Zika in her blood for so long, in spite of having developed antibodies against the virus.
Q: What other ailments are linked to Zika?
A: Zika can cause Guillain-Barre, a rare immune system disorder that can cause temporary paralysis. WHO reported a number of countries with Zika are also seeing a rise of Guillain-Barre.
The virus is linked to a second type of autoimmune disorder called acute disseminated encephalomyeltis, which is similar to multiple sclerosis. The condition causes swelling of the brain and spinal cord that affects the myelin, the coating around nerve fibers.
Another study found the virus may also be associated with a deadly type of brain inflammation. Researchers found the Zika virus in the spinal fluid of an 81-year-old man with meningoencephalitis, a dangerous inflammation of the membranes that surround the brain, according to a report from French researchers in The New England Journal of Medicine.
Q: Can Zika spread through urine and saliva?
A: Scientists in Brazil found the virus can be "active" in the saliva and urine of infected people, but that isn't proof transmission via those routes can occur. More research is needed to confirm a possibility of infection through those fluids.
Q: What are sperm banks doing to keep Zika out of their supplies?
A: U.S. fertility associations have not issued guidelines yet on Zika virus. The British Fertility Society recommends people who have traveled to areas with Zika outbreak should not try to conceive naturally, donate sperm or eggs or undergo fertility treatments for 28 days.
Some sperm banks and fertility societies are taking steps to keep the Zika virus out of supplies of donor sperm to avoid infecting women trying to get pregnant. California Cryobank won't accept sperm donations from men who have traveled to countries with Zika outbreaks in the past month or who have had sex with someone who has traveled there within the past month
Q: Can you get Zika through a blood transfusion?
A: Yes. Brazil has reported that two people have gotten Zika through a blood transfusion. However, the risk of contracting Zika from a blood transfusion in the continental USA is extremely low because the virus is not spreading among local mosquitoes.
The Food and Drug Administration announced it will allow blood centers to screen blood with an experimental test for the Zika virus. The test means that blood donation and collection can resume on Puerto Rico, which had stopped collecting blood in early March because there was no way to test donations for Zika.
Q: Are blood banks taking precautions?
A: Yes. The American Red Cross is asking people to avoid donating blood if they've traveled to Zika-affected areas in the past 28 days. The American Association of Blood Banks issued a similar recommendation. Canadian Blood Services is barring people from giving blood within 21 days of traveling outside Canada, the continental USA and Europe.
Q: How can people reduce the risk of sexual transmission?
A: Using condoms and practicing safe sex reduces the risk of sexual transmission of Zika. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued new recommendations that men who have live in or have traveled to an outbreak area should wear condoms or abstain from sex if they have a pregnant sexual partner.
Q: What is WHO doing to fight the virus?
A: The organization is asking nations around the world for $56 million to fight the Zika virus through the end of June, but the agency has only received $3 million so far.
Q: What are outside organizations doing?
A: The World Bank offered $150 million to fight the Zika outbreak and provide medical care. The institution said more funds could be made available if needed in the future.
Q: When did Zika emerge?
A: Zika virus appeared for the first time in 1947 in Uganda. For decades, health experts considered it a minor-league virus that, until recently, was limited to a narrow belt of equatorial Africa and Asia.
Q: When and where did this current outbreak begin?
A: Zika was first detected in Brazil in May. Researchers suspect the virus may have arrived in South America during the 2014 World Cup Games that drew millions of fans to Brazil. However, a new study suggests it may have reached the county between May and December 2013.
Q: Why did some nations advise women to postpone pregnancy?
A: The spike in birth defects in Brazil prompted Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador and Jamaica to recommend women delay pregnancy until doctors understand more about the virus. El Salvador issued the strongest warning, urging women not to conceive for two years.
However, scientists have no idea how long the Zika virus will pose a risk to pregnant women. Health officials in El Salvador believe that people could develop immunity to the virus over time.
The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights called on Zika-affected nations to repeal restrictive laws that limit access to contraception and abortion, saying advice to delay pregnancy "ignores the reality that many women and girls simply cannot exercise control over whether or when or under what circumstances they become pregnant."
About half of pregnancies are unplanned.
Q: What actions is the travel industry taking?
A: All three of the USA's biggest airlines are allowing some customers to cancel or postpone their trips if they’re ticketed to fly to areas affected by Zika. Hilton Worldwide and Hyatt hotels are waiving cancellation fees in affected areas. Marriott International and Wyndham Hotels and Resorts are addressing cancellation requests on a case-by-case basis but being liberal in waiving fees.
Q: What treatments or vaccines are available for Zika virus?
A: There are no approved treatments or vaccines for Zika.
Q: How is microcephaly treated?
A: There's no treatment for microcephaly. Dozens of Brazilian babies have died. Although some children have normal intelligence and development, their heads remain small, according to the Mayo Clinic.
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cfb88b1586b6c49bee1781a762c3ae7a | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/09/islamic-state-world-threats-senate-testimony/80079254/ | Intelligence officials: ISIL determined to strike U.S. this year | Intelligence officials: ISIL determined to strike U.S. this year
WASHINGTON — The Islamic State militant group will "almost certainly" remain a threat to the U.S. homeland and seek to launch or inspire attacks on American soil in 2016, a top U.S. intelligence official warned Tuesday.
Attacks in the United States by the group, also known as ISIL, "will probably continue to involve those who draw inspiration from the group's highly sophisticated media without direct guidance from ISIL leadership," James Clapper, director of national intelligence, testified in a rare public hearing on Capitol Hill about intelligence threats facing the nation.
Testifying with Clapper were the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Marine Lt. Gen. Vincent Stewart; CIA Director John Brennan; FBI Director James Comey; and Navy Adm. Michael Rogers, who heads the National Security Agency.
Clapper called the Islamic State the "pre-eminent terrorist threat." It can "direct and inspire attacks against a wide range of targets around the world." In a world where violent extremists are active in 40 countries, "ISIL is using the collapse of government authority to expand," he said.
The July attack against military facilities in Chattanooga, Tenn., and the San Bernardino, Calif., terror attack in December "demonstrate the threat that homegrown violent extremists also pose to the homeland," he said.
FBI says San Bernardino terrorist's phone still locked due to encryption
Stewart said the Islamic State will probably conduct additional attacks in Europe and then attempt the same in the U.S. He said U.S. intelligence agencies believe ISIL leaders will be "increasingly involved in directing attacks rather than just encouraging lone attackers," according to the Associated Press.
The leaders also listed other threats facing the nation.
Al-Qaeda, which spawned the Islamic State, remains an enemy. The United States will face disparate threats from conflicts spurred by fights over scarce resources caused by climate change and global warming, and drug traffickers selling lethal heroin produced largely in China.
In addition, the nation's cyber infrastructure remains vulnerable to attack by terrorists such as ISIL, as well as by states such as Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, Clapper said.
North Korea has expanded a uranium enrichment facility and restarted a plutonium reactor that could begin recovering material for nuclear weapons in weeks or months, Clapper said.
Clapper said Pyongyang is committed to developing a long-range, nuclear-armed missile capable of posing a direct threat to the United States, "although the system has not been flight-tested."
The nuclear deal reached last summer between world powers and Iran, known as the JCPOA, is likely to limit Iran's nuclear program as intended, but those benefits could be temporary, Clapper said.
"Iran will probably use the JCPOA to remove sanctions while preserving some of its nuclear capability, as well as the option to eventually expand its nuclear infrastructure," he said. "We do not know whether Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons."
Meanwhile, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards, which is conducting military operations against U.S.-supported forces in Syria and Yemen, have not changed its behavior since the deal was signed, and Iran's ballistic missile launches in October and November are "a message they intend to continue to develop their missile program," he said.
In general, the United States is facing a more violent world with a greater variety of threats than it has in 50 years, Clapper said.
"From the Middle East to South Asia, there are probably more cross border conflicts than since the early 1970s," he said.
On the cyber threat, Clapper said U.S. information systems controlled by the U.S. government and American industry are vulnerable to cyberattacks from Russia and China.
Russia, the world's greatest nuclear power along with the United States, has also re-emerged as a possible adversary, Clapper said.
He said Moscow's incursion in Ukraine and other "aggressive" moves around the globe are being taken in part to demonstrate that it is a superpower equal to the United States. He said he's unsure of Russia's end game but is concerned "we could be into another Cold War like-spiral."
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17c5d9eab109511ba2207d2b44d0e0e0 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/13/state-teacher-background-lookup-resources/80355350/ | How to look up the background of teachers in every state | How to look up the background of teachers in every state
Nearly every state education agency provides a system that parents and members of the public can use to verify and review the credentials of public school teachers in the state.
However, the quality and scope of available information varies from state to state, and there is no way for the public to conduct a nationwide search for disciplinary histories of teachers.
Searchable lists of disciplinary actions taken against teachers are not available online in many states, and only a few states publicly post complete documents providing details about why a teacher's credentials were suspended or revoked.
Broken discipline tracking systems let teachers flee troubled pasts
All states are members of the National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification, a non-profit organization that collects information on disciplined teachers in a nationwide database and makes the data available to state education agencies. However, that information is not available to the public.
To help parents and the public sort through the maze of state information, USA TODAY has compiled a state-by-state listing of resources that take you directly to tools you can use to review educator backgrounds. In states that haven't provided adequate online tools for accessing these public records, we've provided contact information for education officials so you can inquire about specific teachers or urge the state to post its records online.
Alabama
Look up teacher credentials: https://tcert.alsde.edu/Portal/Public/Pages/SearchCerts.aspx.
Alaska
Look up teacher credentials: http://education.alaska.gov/TeacherCertification/CertificationsSearch.cfm
Arizona
Look up teacher credentials: https://oacis.azed.gov/PublicOACIS/NormalPages/Educators.aspx
Arkansas
Look up teacher credentials: https://adeaels.arkansas.gov/AelsWeb/Search.aspx
California
Look up teacher credentials: https://educator.ctc.ca.gov/esales_enu/start.swe?SWECmd=GotoView&SWEView=CTC+Search+View+Web
Colorado
Look up teacher credentials: https://www.colorado.gov/cde/licensing/Lookup/LicenseLookup.aspx
Connecticut
Look up teacher credentials: http://sdeportal.ct.gov/CECSFOI/FOILookup.aspx
District of Columbia
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the District of Columbia Office of the State Superintendent of Education at http://osse.dc.gov/ to ask for information on a teacher's license or disciplinary history.
Delaware
Look up teacher credentials: https://deeds.doe.k12.de.us/certificate/deeds_decredsys.aspx
Florida
Look up teacher credentials: https://app2.fldoe.org/publicapps/edcert/public.asp
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://www.myfloridateacher.com/discipline/summary.aspx
Georgia
Look up teacher credentials: http://www.gapsc.com/Certification/Lookup.aspx
Hawaii
Look up teacher credentials: https://htsb.ehawaii.gov/htsb-renewals/public-search.html?p1=0
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://www.htsb.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/License-Actions_v2.pdf
Idaho
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Maryland State Department of Education at http://www.sde.idaho.gov/contact.html.
Illinois
Look up teacher credentials: http://webprod.isbe.net/ELISInquiry/NormalPages/Educators.aspx
Indiana
Look up teacher credentials: https://licenselookup.doe.in.gov
Iowa
Look up teacher credentials: https://www.iowaonline.state.ia.us/boee/
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: https://www.iowaonline.state.ia.us/ppd/
Kansas
Look up teacher credentials: https://online.ksde.org/TLL/SearchLicense.aspx
Kentucky
Look up teacher credentials: https://wd.kyepsb.net/EPSB.WebApps/KECI
Louisiana
Look up teacher credentials: https://www.teachlouisiana.net/teachers.aspx?PageID=416
Maine
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Maryland State Department of Education at http://www.maine.gov/doe/contact/index.shtml.
Maryland
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Maryland State Department of Education at http://www.marylandpublicschools.org.
Massachusetts
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Massachusetts Department of Elementary & Secondary Education at http://www.doe.mass.edu/contact to inquire about a teacher's license or disciplinary history.
Michigan
Look up teacher credentials: https://mdoe.state.mi.us/MOECS/PublicCredentialSearch.aspx
Minnesota
Look up teacher credentials: http://education.state.mn.us/MDE/EdExc/Licen/TeachLicLook/index.html
Mississippi
Look up teacher credentials: https://sso.mde.k12.ms.us/Login/Login.aspx
Missouri
Look up teacher credentials: https://apps.dese.mo.gov/HQT/CredentialListerChecker.aspx
Montana
Look up teacher credentials: https://apps3.opi.mt.gov/MSEIS/NormalPages/Educators.aspx
Nebraska
Look up teacher credentials: https://dc2.education.ne.gov/tc_lookup
Nevada
Look up teacher credentials: http://nvteachersearch.doe.nv.gov
New Hampshire
Look up teacher credentials: http://my.doe.nh.gov/profiles/educators/search.aspx
New Jersey
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the New Jersey Department of Education at https://www.state.nj.us/education/parents/contact.htm.
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://www.state.nj.us/education/legal/examiners
New Mexico
Look up teacher credentials: http://164.64.166.19/LicenInq/search.asp
New York
Look up teacher credentials: http://eservices.nysed.gov/teach/certhelp/CpPersonSearchExternal.do
North Carolina
Look up teacher credentials: https://vo.licensure.ncpublicschools.gov/datamart/searchByNameNCDPI.do
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://stateboard.ncpublicschools.gov/legal-affairs/disciplinary-process/revoked-license
North Dakota
Look up teacher credentials: https://secure.apps.nd.gov/dpi/ndteach/schoolstaff/publicSearch.aspx
Ohio
Look up teacher credentials: https://coreprodint.ode.state.oh.us/core2.3/ode.core.EducatorProfile.UI/EducatorSearch.aspx
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: https://coreprodint.ode.state.oh.us/core2.3/ode.core.EducatorProfile.UI/DisciplinaryInfoView.aspx
Oklahoma
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Oklahoma State Department of Education at http://sde.ok.gov/sde/sde-service-desk.
Oregon
Look up teacher credentials: http://www.tspc.oregon.gov/lookup_application/lookup_query.asp
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://www.tspc.state.or.us/discipline_list.asp?year=9999
Pennsylvania
Look up teacher credentials: http://www.teachercertification.pa.gov/Screens/wfSearchEducators.aspx
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://www.education.pa.gov/Teachers%20-%20Administrators/Certifications/Pages/Certificate-Actions.aspx#.Vp5ofFQo6po
Rhode Island
Look up teacher credentials: http://ecert.ride.ri.gov/public
South Carolina
Look up teacher credentials: https://ed.sc.gov/educators/teaching-in-south-carolina/current-south-carolina-teachers/view-licensure-status/
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://ed.sc.gov/policy/state-board-of-education/additional-resources/state-board-of-education-orders-of-disciplinary-action/
South Dakota
Look up teacher credentials: https://apps.sd.gov/de04public/teacherlookup/teachersearch.aspx
Tennessee
Look up teacher credentials: https://apps.tn.gov/eli
Texas
Look up teacher credentials: https://secure.sbec.state.tx.us/sbeconline/virtcert.asp
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://tea.texas.gov/Texas_Educators/Investigations/Disciplinary_Actions_Taken_against_Texas_Educators/
Utah
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Utah State Office of Education at http://www.schools.utah.gov/main/CONTACT.aspx.
Vermont
Look up teacher credentials: https://alis.edlicensing.vermont.gov/Protected/ADM/EducatorSearchMember.aspx?&TotalPerameters=5&LikePopup=N&URL=Protected/LIC/DOE/EducatorView.aspx
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://education.vermont.gov/licensing/disciplinary-actions
Virginia
Look up teacher credentials: https://p1pe.doe.virginia.gov/tinfo
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://www.doe.virginia.gov/teaching/licensure/license_actions.pdf
Washington
Information on educator credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Washington Department of Education at http://www.k12.wa.us/AboutUs/ContactUs.aspx.
Look up teacher disciplinary actions: http://www.k12.wa.us/ProfPractices/investigations/DisciplinaryAction.aspx
West Virginia
Information on credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the West Virginia Department of Education at http://wvde.state.wv.us/contact.html.
Wisconsin
Look up teacher credentials: http://tepdl.dpi.wi.gov/licensing/license-lookup-introduction
Wyoming
Information on credentials is not available to the public online. Contact the Wyoming Department of Education at http://edu.wyoming.gov/inside-the-wde/contact.
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f579a6353dce43fbad71627738f98d5a | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/13/timeline-supreme-court-associate-justice-antonin-scalia/80349734/ | Timeline: Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia's life | Timeline: Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia's life
Corrections & Clarifications: A previous version of this story provided the incorrect birth year for Justice Scalia. He was born in 1936.
Key dates in the life of Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia.
March 11, 1936: Born in Trenton, N.J.
1957: Graduated from Georgetown University.
1960: Graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School. Married Maureen McCarthy, with whom he had nine children: Ann Forrest, Eugene, John Francis, Catherine Elisabeth, Mary Clare, Paul David, Matthew, Christopher James, and Margaret Jane.
1961-1967: Practiced law at Jones, Day, Cockley and Reavis in Cleveland, Ohio.
1967-1971: Joined the faculty of the University of Virginia Law School.
1971-1972: Served as General Counsel of the White House Office of Telecommunications Policy.
1972-1974: Served as chairman of the Administrative Conference of the United States.
1974-1977: Served as Assistant Attorney General of the Office of Legal Counsel in the Department of Justice.
1977-1982: Taught at the University of Chicago Law School. He also served as a visiting professor at the law schools of Georgetown and Stanford universities from 1980-1981.
1982: Appointed by President Ronald Reagan to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
1986: Nominated by Reagan to the Supreme Court. His confirmation that year made him the first Italian American justice.
Sources: U.S. Supreme Court biographies, Findlaw.com and The Supreme Court Historical Society.
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a77f931ebd4bc84ef1ee3831cbbda981 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/14/broken-discipline-tracking-system-lets-teachers-with-misconduct-records-back-in-classroom/79999634/ | Broken discipline tracking systems let teachers flee troubled pasts | Broken discipline tracking systems let teachers flee troubled pasts
How the nation's fragmented system for checking the backgrounds of teachers leaves students at risk.
Georgia officials revoked a teacher’s license after finding he exchanged sexual texts and naked photos with a female student and was involved in physical altercations with two others.
A central Florida teacher’s credentials were suspended after she was charged with battery for allegedly shoving and yelling at a 6-year-old student.
In Texas, a middle school math teacher lost his job and teaching license after he was caught on camera allegedly trying to meet a teenage boy in a sting set up by NBC’s nationally aired TV program To Catch a Predator.
All three of those teachers found their way back to the front of public school classrooms, simply by crossing state lines. They’re far from alone.
An investigation by the USA TODAY NETWORK found fundamental defects in the teacher screening systems used to ensure the safety of children in the nation's more than 13,000 school districts.
The patchwork system of laws and regulations — combined with inconsistent execution and flawed information sharing between states and school districts — fails to keep teachers with histories of serious misconduct out of classrooms and away from schoolchildren. At least three states already have begun internal investigations and audits based on questions raised during the course of this investigation.
Over the course of a year, the USA TODAY NETWORK gathered the databases of certified teachers and disciplined teachers using the open records laws of each of the 50 states. Additionally, journalists used state open records laws to obtain a private nationwide discipline database that many states use to background teachers. The computerized analysis of the combined millions of records from all 50 states revealed:
The USA TODAY NETWORK analysis found many examples of failure of screening at the school district level, including school systems first made aware of troubled teachers on their staffs by journalists. One teacher in North Carolina was removed from the classroom and another in Louisiana resigned in recent weeks after journalists questioned school districts about past disciplinary actions in other states.
How USA TODAY audited the country's broken systems for tracking teacher discipline
Problematic teachers amount to a minuscule proportion of the millions of educators nationwide. There are more than 3 million teachers nationwide, and less than 1% have ever faced a disciplinary action.
Despite years of efforts by child safety advocates and some U.S. lawmakers, the federal government does not play a role in mandating teacher background checks or making sure information about even severe abuse cases is shared between states. Other countries, such as the United Kingdom, have a central government system to track disciplined teachers across jurisdictions.
In Texas, the analysis found hundreds of educators who faced serious discipline, but whose names never ended up in NASDTEC's Clearinghouse. As a result, the teachers could conceal their past misconduct if they tried to get a teaching license and a job in another state. Texas Education Agency spokeswoman Debbie Ratcliffe blamed staff turnover for several missing names and said some would be submitted.
“We dropped the ball by not doing so,” Ratcliffe said.
Officials in several more states also said they would fix some disciplinary actions that USA TODAY's analysis revealed were missing from the NASDTEC Clearinghouse. Georgia's teacher credentialing agency added new layer of oversight to its reporting process, and officials in Iowa also promised a complete audit of their system, as a result of discrepancies revealed by this analysis.
NASDTEC Executive Director Phillip S. Rogers said he believes the privately-run system works to prevent many troubled teachers every year from reaching classrooms, but he concedes the database is only as good as the data submitted by state agencies. The analysis found the national database is not only incomplete, but rife with misspellings and other inaccuracies that undermine its usefulness.
“It’s imperfect,” he said, “but it’s very close to being right most of the time.”
To others, an imperfect system is not good enough.
“When parents put their kids on the school bus in the morning, they have every right to expect that their kids are going to the safest possible environment,” said U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., who has pushed federal reforms. “And we’re not doing our job if we could make that environment safer."
Flaws in the nation’s fractured systems for checking teachers' backgrounds are apparent in the stories of educators like Alexander M. Stormer.
Stormer left a troubled past in Georgia to teach in Charlotte until last month, when North Carolina officials were contacted for this story.
In March 2015, Stormer resigned from Atlanta Public Schools after a string of misconduct allegations over a one-week span, according to separate accounts in state education department and police records. Stormer allegedly injured a student’s arm while dragging him from a desk into a hallway and pushed a girl in the chest into a wall. A surveillance camera captured the shoving incident.
The state education department and Atlanta police also reported that Stormer sent improper text messages, including naked photos, to another female student, according to records. In one text message exchange, the records say Stormer asked the student for sex.
Despite the problems in Georgia, Stormer applied for and got teaching licenses in South Carolina and North Carolina. South Carolina was later alerted to his discipline in Georgia by an update to the NASDTEC Clearinghouse, and the state revoked his South Carolina license.
In North Carolina, however, Stormer’s past went undetected. He taught at Phillip O. Berry Academy of Technology in Charlotte until last month, when he was suspended without pay after a reporter for the Asheville Citizen-Times (part of the USA TODAY NETWORK) began asking questions about why he had a North Carolina license and a teaching job after his license was revoked in two neighboring states.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district spokeswoman Renee McCoy said officials there would like a tool to more easily identify educators who have had problems elsewhere.
“It would be our hope that your story might inspire a national teacher license clearinghouse that would list license revocations from any and all states, so that districts would only need to enter a name and any revocation from any state would pop up,” she wrote in an email. Attempts to reach Stormer by phone, e-mail and at the home he owns were not successful.
There are plenty more examples across the country of teachers keeping damaged careers afloat by migrating to new states.
In April 2006, the Florida Department of Education notified Lainie Wolfe it sought to discipline her for a range of accusations including allegedly failing to follow school board policies after receiving a student’s suicide note; making false charges against her principal; and forging the signature of a parent on a student consent form. Florida later suspended Wolfe’s license for two years. Before the action was finalized, Wolfe applied for and was granted a teaching license in Colorado.
When Colorado officials found out years later about the Florida suspension, Wolfe signed a settlement deal in 2011 that is the equivalent to the permanent revocation of her Colorado license.
But Wolfe wasn’t finished teaching. She returned to Florida and was hired by Miami-Dade Public Schools. In 2012, according to Florida records, she “slapped (a) developmentally delayed 6-year-old student” in the face and was fired. Her license is now permanently revoked in Florida and Colorado.
In an interview with USA TODAY, Wolfe said she received glowing recommendations in both states for counseling and teaching, and she disputes many of the accusations against her. Though she denies slapping a student at the Miami school, Wolfe admitted she erred in failing to disclose the pending Florida disciplinary action when she applied for a Colorado license.
"I made a mistake," she said. "I should have disclosed."
Reva Diane Inabnett resigned from a Florida school district in 2012 after allegations that she shoved a 6-year-old led to a battery charge, which was dropped after she completed a deferred prosecution program. Inabnett’s license is suspended in Florida, state records show. She remained licensed in Louisiana and relocated there to teach at Webster Parish schools in 2013. She was teaching in Webster until Feb. 8, when she resigned after an inquiry to the district from USA TODAY.
"The district was aware of nothing that would have impaired her employment in the state of Louisiana, or obviously they would not have hired this lady or any other person," said Jon Guice, attorney for the Webster Parish School Board. "They take their obligations seriously."
In an email, Inabnett said she erred in judgment in Florida, and it was exaggerated. “I learned from my mistake. I did a great deal of soul-searching,” she wrote, adding that she taught successfully in Louisiana for three years. “I realized that we all make mistakes and that I needed to be more careful. I sought a second chance, and got it.”
Sometimes, troubled teachers who relocate find their pasts impossible to escape forever.
After Dallas-area middle school math teacher Stanley Kendall appeared on NBC’s To Catch a Predator allegedly trying to solicit sex from a child, he lost his Texas teaching license.
On camera, Kendall talks at length with the host, apologizing for chatting online about planned sex acts with someone he believed was a young boy and had arranged to come meet in person. "I am truly sorry," he says on the show, stressing he never hurt a student. Police arrested him, but prosecutors chose not to pursue criminal charges against Kendall or anyone else from that episode's sting. The Texas Education Agency permanently revoked Kendall's license the following year for "sexual misconduct," state records show.
However, the televised incident didn't stop him from teaching again. Kendall was hired as a substitute teacher by several Indiana school districts, where he worked unnoticed until someone saw a rerun of the TV show, recognized him and notified schools. A complaint was filed against his Indiana license and state officials investigated. In November 2014, Kendall and the state signed a voluntary license revocation, according to Indiana records.
“TEA pulled my license when they really didn't have grounds to, but they did, and I let it happen because I didn't have money to fight it,” Kendall said in an interview this week. “Teachers don't make a lot of money in Texas."
Rogers, of the clearinghouse operator NASDTEC, said no one attempted to quantify how many names are missing from the database. But, he said, there are countless incidents where the system has done its job.
“What we don’t know is how many people it has stopped. Because obviously it’s a significant number,” he said. “We don’t keep up with the number of people who have applied to a state and were denied a certificate because they were in NASDTEC.”
Background checks and the sharing of misconduct information are inconsistent state to state. In 11 states, background checks are primarily the responsibility of school districts or schools — not the state agency issuing teaching licenses. New Mexico, Nebraska and Indiana said their teacher-licensing agencies do not check all applicants against the NASDTEC Clearinghouse for past disciplinary action.
North Carolina has no requirement that people applying for teaching credentials undergo criminal background checks, leaving it to the discretion of school districts. Vanessa Jeter, spokeswoman for the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, said that although the state doesn’t conduct the checks, “local boards of education are required to have a local policy that addresses criminal background checks for potential and current employees.”
In 2010, the Government Accountability Office, Congress’ watchdog agency, reviewed 15 cases in which a school hired an employee with a history of sexual misconduct. The GAO found at least six of those educators used a teaching position to target more children.
In a second report in 2014, the GAO found child abuse by school personnel is not systematically tracked by any federal agency, and the systems used to check backgrounds of educators “varied widely” between states.
In November 2015, an Arizona Department of Education report found about 22% of 704 educators disciplined by the state since 1996 were not in NASDTEC's Clearinghouse.
“The bottom line is the system that has been created is flawed,” Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas told the state's Board of Education in December. “And until we fix that root problem, we can never assure that we will be able to follow up on these things with 100% accuracy."
How to look up the background of teachers in every state
Over the past decade, there have been many federal government proposals to mandate background checks for teachers, require states and districts to share data about disciplined teachers and prohibit school districts from facilitating the transfer of a teacher accused of sexual misconduct to another jurisdiction. Among the proposals: requiring names of teachers disciplined for sexual misconduct be submitted to a national, government database.A bill introduced by then-Congressman Adam Putnam, R-Fla., would have required the U.S. Department of Education to develop a database of teachers found to have engaged in sexual misconduct and make it public. The measure would have put the USA closer in line with nations such as the United Kingdom, where the government maintains a national database of teachers barred from working with children.
“Our classrooms deserve much more than a piecemeal effort that leaves our nation’s schools exposed to predators moving from state to state,” Putnam said in a speech in Congress in 2009. The bill never got a hearing. Nevertheless, advocacy and education policy groups continued to push for a more reliable way to share teacher misconduct information between states.
“It’s really about protecting kids,” said Sandi Jacobs, senior vice president for state and district policy for the National Council on Teacher Quality. “It seems we could come up with a clear, consistent set of terms and rules so that information is easily shared across states.”
Contributing: Tonya Maxwell of the Asheville Citizen-Times, Chelsea Schneider of The Indianapolis Star, Jason Clayworth of The Des Moines Register, John Kelly and Nick Penzenstadler of the USA TODAY NETWORK, Michelle Boudin of WCNC in Charlotte, Dillon Collier of KENS in San Antonio, Jeremy Jojola of KUSA in Denver, Rebecca Lindstrom of WXIA in Atlanta, Lechelle Yates of WFMY in Greensboro, N.C., Russ Walker and Linda Byron of KING in Seattle and Anne Schindler of First Coast News in Jacksonville.
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f8d27dcd0ce7cd698471bd965997c37c | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/15/jeb-bush-george-w-bush-donald-trump-south-carolina-primary/80398626/ | George W. Bush seeks to rescue brother Jeb in South Carolina primary | George W. Bush seeks to rescue brother Jeb in South Carolina primary
NORTH CHARLESTON, S.C. — South Carolina saved George W. Bush in 2000. Now the former president is looking to save his brother Jeb 16 years later.
"There's no doubt in my mind Jeb Bush has the experience and the character to be a great president," the former president told a crowd of supporters during a rare political appearance Monday, further joking that South Carolina should support the candidate with "the most opinionated mother" in Saturday's primary.
Jeb Bush told the crowd that half-filled the convention center space that he was "so honored that my brother is here" and said he would emulate his "steady hand to keep us safe" when it came to the nation's economic and national security challenges.
The former Florida governor also defended his older brother against attacks by Republican front-runner Donald Trump, saying it was "weird" that the New York businessman once suggested impeachment of President Bush over the Iraq war.
Trump, Jeb Bush clash over George W. Bush
In his speech, George W. Bush did not mention other Republican candidates — or President Obama for that matter — but did appear to allude to Trump by saying that "these are tough times and I know that Americans are angry, but we do not need someone in the Oval Office who mirrors and inflames our anger and our frustrations." The former president also said that strength is not "bluster" or having the loudest voice in the room, but rather the "integrity and character" of people like Jeb Bush.
While extolling his brother's experience as governor and businessman, the former president also told stories about his past political life. He recited "fond memories" of South Carolina that include visits to military bases, the "okra strut" in Irmo and breakfast at Tommy's Country Ham House in Greenville — the latter an event at which a PETA protester poured manure into the parking lot.
"It was kind of a sign of things to come," the elder Bush said.
The ex-president repeated old jokes – "I've been mis-underestimated most of my life" — and trotted out new ones about his pastimes as writer and painter. Of the latter pursuit, Bush said he knows that "the signature is worth more than the painting."
Jeb Bush, who enlisted mother Barbara to campaign for him in New Hampshire, also found himself defending his brother's legacy in the face of continued attacks by Trump.
As Trump continued to assail the former president over 9/11 and Iraq, Jeb Bush repeated his line from last weekend's debate that "while Donald Trump was building a reality TV show," his brother was "building a security apparatus to keep us safe" after the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.
Donald Trump says he may sue Ted Cruz; renews threat of independent run
Trump, who held a news conference near North Charleston just hours before the Bush event, questioned whether George W. Bush kept the nation safe, echoing his debate claims that the 9/11 attacks happened and "the World Trade Center came down during his reign." Trump also criticized Bush's decision to launch the 2003 invasion of Iraq, saying it destabilized the Middle East.
George W. Bush may never have been president if not for South Carolina, or at least its Republican primary.
On Feb. 19, 2000, just 18 days after his blowout loss to John McCain in the New Hampshire primary — the then-Texas governor defeated McCain in the Palmetto State. The win stabilized Bush's campaign and sent him on to the Republican nomination.
Hogan Gidley, a Republican political adviser based in South Carolina, said state party members feel like George W. Bush is one of them, nearly two decades after the primary that bound them together. "We rescued his campaign back in 2000," Gidley said. "We have ownership — he's our guy."
Whether that translates into actual votes for Jeb Bush remains to be seen, he said.
George W.'s win here still resonates as the symbol of South Carolina-style rough-and-tumble politics. McCain supporters still protest what they call dirty tactics, including false and anonymous e-mail and telephone rumors that were circulated about the Arizona senator and his family before the primary.
This year's campaign isn't for the faint of heart either, especially after a debate that some likened to demolition derby, including Trump's attacks on Jeb Bush and his family. Trump, who also criticized Barbara Bush for her attacks last week in New Hampshire, took to Twitter to bash the upcoming Bush event in North Charleston.
Donald Trump dings Jeb Bush for tapping brother George W. to campaign
On Monday he tweeted that the legacy of the last Bush presidency may become "fair game" for the 2016 campaign.
During his speech in North Charleston, George W. Bush lamented the "petty name calling" of the current campaign. The former president also said that, if people want to call him part of the so-called establishment, "I proudly carry that label."
This is only the latest unusual intersection in the political careers of George W. and Jeb Bush.
During the presidency of their father, George H.W. Bush, many observers saw Jeb as the potential successor.
Then came 1994. Jeb Bush lost his election for governor of Florida, while George W., a co-owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team, captured the governor's mansion in Texas. Their roles had reversed.
George W. Bush won the presidency in 2000 after a fierce, still-disputed recount in Florida — the state where Jeb had finally been elected governor in 1998.
Now George W. Bush returns to South Carolina as Jeb Bush faces what looks like an uphill battle, both in South Carolina and in the overall race for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.
The Real Clear Politics polling averages puts Bush nearly 30 points behind Trump both nationally and in South Carolina, and also trailing Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich.
USA TODAY's 2016 Presidential Poll Tracker
Tanya Robinson, 60, an undecided Republican who traveled to North Charleston from nearby Summerville, said the ex-president's appearance should help Bush, but "I don't know if it will win the state."
Robinson, the president of the South Carolina PTA, also said there's a lot of campaigning left before Saturday's primary. "A lot of South Carolinians are not sure yet," she said.
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d59cccacbdd95c2275da388bfd67b2e9 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/15/nations-disciplined-teacher-database-audited/80423918/ | Nation's disciplined teacher data to be audited state by state | Nation's disciplined teacher data to be audited state by state
A state-by-state audit of the nation’s only database for tracking teacher misconduct is being ordered in the wake of a USA TODAY NETWORK investigation that found thousands of missing names in the listing of troublesome educators.
Education agencies in every state voluntarily report to a privately run database operated by the non-profit National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification when they take a disciplinary action against a teacher for anything from minor infractions to serious cases of physical or sexual abuse.
However, the USA TODAY NETWORK’s examination of records about teachers disciplined in all 50 states found more than 1,400 cases where a teacher permanently lost his or her license but was not listed in the NASDTEC database — potentially allowing teachers to flee instances of misconduct by moving to new states.
NASDTEC executive director Phillip Rogers said Monday that education agencies in every state will be required by his organization to audit all of their submissions to the data since they joined the system to ensure their submissions are accurate and complete.
The state-by-state audits, Rogers said, are being required in the interest of “trying to address what you guys (the USA TODAY NETWORK) found on the number of cases that were not entered that should have been entered.”
Rogers said the directive for the state audits is expected within the next 10 days, and several states have already undertaken reviews of their data on their own accord. As part of the changes, he said, states will be required to validate that submissions are accurate and complete before sending them to the national database.
“The purpose for that is (to verify) that they are checking the spelling, checking the numbers, checking all of the information as being accurate,” Rogers said. “I guess people get in a hurry or whatever. So we’ll have to make sure.”
Measures also are being taken at the state and local level to address problems identified by the USA TODAY NETWORK investigation.
Broken discipline tracking systems let teachers flee troubled pasts
“This is simple,” Delaware Sen. Ernesto Lopez said in a statement Monday. “Parents have a right to know, especially when, according to The News Journal, ‘Most of the cases … involve physical aggression or sexual misconduct.’ It is critical that we remove these teachers from the classroom, but equally critical that we are fully transparent with the parents of children who interacted with these teachers.”
Why the U.S. government doesn't have a teacher discipline database
While teachers accused of misconduct account for a very small minority of the millions of educators nationwide, many public officials have pushed for more transparency between states and with the public in teacher discipline cases. There have been several efforts by federal lawmakers in recent years to require that the U.S. Department of Education maintain a centralized, national database of teachers found to have engaged in the most serious type of misconduct, but the proposals have not moved forward and NASDTEC is the system used by states to share information with one another.
Some state legislators say stronger measures are needed to look into the histories of teachers beyond state boundaries. Iowa Representative Megan Jones said she believes the state should require nationwide background checks for all school employees.
“When it comes to something like this,” she said, “the lines that create our state are arbitrary.”
Contributing: Matthew Albright and Saranac Hale Spencer at The News Journal in Wilmington, Del.; Jason Clayworth at The Des Moines Register; Rebecca Lindstrom at WXIA in Atlanta.
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00d5d305ae48f68d28b1c05c5fc658e5 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/16/experts-dismiss-claims-pesticide-not-zika-causes-birth-defects/80451116/ | Scientists debunk theory linking pesticide, not Zika, to birth defects | Scientists debunk theory linking pesticide, not Zika, to birth defects
Experts debunked a theory this week that linked pesticides to an increase in birth defects thought to be caused by the mosquito-borne Zika virus in Brazil.
The theory gained traction among social media users after Argentine environmentalists issued a report linking the surge to pyriproxyfen, a chemical that kills mosquito larvae.
Pyripyroxyfen interferes with a mosquito growth hormone, preventing the larvae from developing into adults, said biologist Laura Harrington, professor and chairwoman of the entomology department at Cornell University in New York.
Brazil's Ministry of Health rejected any link between the chemical and the microcephaly outbreak, noting the World Health Organization deems pyriproxyfen safe for use as a pesticide.
Pyripyroxyfen has been used for decades, with no reports of increased birth defects, said Ernesto Marques, associate professor of infectious diseases and microbiology at the University of Pittsburgh, who is working in Recife, Brazil to study microcephaly.
"It's ridiculous," said Marques, of the purported link between the chemical and microcephaly. "These guys come out of the blue, and people believe them, with no evidence at all. It really shows the lack of science education among the public."
The WHO has said there is no definitive proof yet that Zika — spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito — causes microcephaly, a condition where babies are born with abnormally small heads. But researchers say the evidence of such a link is growing stronger.
Q&A: What is microcephaly, the birth defect linked to Zika?
Scientists didn't connect the Zika virus, discovered in 1947, to microcephaly until last fall when Brazil reported an increase in the birth defect. Doctors noticed the rise about six months after diagnosing the first cases of Zika, suggesting the virus infected the mothers in their first trimester of pregnancy, a critical time for fetal brain development.
Researchers found genetic material from the virus in the brains, placenta and amniotic fluid of several infants with microcephaly, including ones miscarried or aborted by women infected with Zika while pregnant.
A recent analysis of microcephaly cases in French Polynesia found rates of the birth defect increased there after a Zika outbreak in 2013 and 2014. No one noticed the spike until researchers went back to their records to look for it.
Report paints heartbreaking picture of Zika-linked birth defects
Research on Zika and the birth defect "overwhelmingly point to a virus as the cause of microcephaly," said Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.
The Argentine environmental group said on its website that cases of microcephaly have occurred only in places in Brazil where the pesticide has been used. But the Brazilian Ministry of Health said cases have increased across the board — even where the pesticide hasn't been sprayed.
The environmentalists called pesticide spraying from planes a "criminal, useless and a political maneuver" by governments to show they are taking action.
"The reason that the pesticide is found in areas with microcephaly is because it's being used to control Aedes aegypti and Zika," said Grayson Brown, director of the public health entomology laboratory at the University of Kentucky in Lexington. "The larvicide would not be used in areas lacking the mosquito vector. The whole notion is misplaced cause and effect."
Zika Q&A: What to know about efforts to fight the virus, conspiracy theories
The group opposes the use of genetically engineered mosquitoes, which scientists are testing as a way to reduce the insect population. It called the experiment a "total failure, except for the company supplying mosquitoes."
Brown said the environmentalists "are using this tragedy to promote their own agenda" against pesticide and genetic engineering.
"There's a lot of alarmism going around right now, and we would all benefit if it would get tamped down a bit," Brown said. "It is really quite irresponsible and counterproductive."
Zika Virus: Full coverage
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b188b7d86cb7775a2e8578132d6ba253 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/17/cops-fake-teen-doctor-opened-own-office-newser/80506962/ | Cops: Fake teen doctor opened own office -- again | Cops: Fake teen doctor opened own office -- again
(NEWSER) – Visitors to the New Birth New Life Medical Center and Urgent Care offices in West Palm Beach, Fla., may have noticed that Dr. Malachi Love-Robinson looked a little young to be a doctor. That's because he's only 18 years old — and he isn't a doctor.
Police say the Doogie Howser-wannabe was arrested after an undercover officer posed as a patient and received a physical exam and medical advice from the teen, NBC News reports. He has been charged with practicing medicine without a license, and authorities say he was cited by the state health department for doing the same thing a few months ago.
On the medical office's website, Love-Robinson poses in a white coat and describes himself as a "well-rounded professional."
According to WPBF, Love-Robinson is the same teenager who posed as an OB-GYN at St. Mary's Medical Center in West Palm Beach for a month last year. He admitted to the station last month that he was that teen, but he claimed he wasn't impersonating a doctor when he roamed the medical center wearing a lab coat and stethoscope.
"I requested to shadow physicians—next thing I know, cops are there, that's all I know," he said.
Love-Robinson also apparently made house calls: A Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office spokesman tells WPBF that an 86-year-old woman alleges that Love-Robinson visited her house when she was sick, told her she needed to go to a hospital—and stole her checkbook. (Patients became suspicious when this "doctor" kept bumming rides.)
This story originally appeared on Newser:
An 18-Year-Old Opened His Own Medical Office in Florida. He Wasn't a Doctor
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Periods Can Be as Painful as a Heart Attack. It's Time to Take Them Seriously
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Newser is a USA TODAY content partner providing general news, commentary and coverage from around the Web. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.
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c6f54ac4f900cf2ba3e228d974106d11 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/18/states-look-mend-gaps-teacher-screening-systems/80543840/ | States look to mend gaps in teacher screening systems | States look to mend gaps in teacher screening systems
State lawmakers and education officials around the country said this week they plan to address weaknesses in teacher screening policies and practices following an investigation by the USA TODAY NETWORK.
The USA TODAY NETWORK investigation found the nation’s database of disciplined teachers, run by the nonprofit National Association of State Directors of Teacher Education and Certification, is missing the names of thousands of educators who have been disciplined by state agencies.
The missing names in the NASDTEC Clearinghouse, along with flaws in information-sharing and background processes in some states, have allowed some teachers to find jobs in one state while they are barred from teaching in another.
In North Carolina, Lt. Gov. Dan Forest on Wednesday told The (Asheville, N.C.) Citizen-Times he expects teacher screening policy reforms to be put before lawmakers by the time of the state legislature’s “short session,” which starts in April.
“This needs to be on the forefront of what we’re doing in the short session, and it should be a fairly easy lift to make that happen,” Forest said.
In North Carolina, which scored an “F” in the USA TODAY NETWORK’s state-by-state evaluations of screening practices, local school districts conduct background checks on prospective teachers, rather than the state. A 2010 state education task force recommended 15 separate changes to state teacher screening policies, but it was largely ignored.
The North Carolina state Department of Public Instruction has begun internal policy reviews and has started to submit the names of disciplined teachers to the NASDTEC Clearinghouse that were missing, DPI attorney Katie Cornetto told the Citizen-Times.
“At this point, there are internal meetings discussing the task force report and the news reports,” Cornetto said.
In Georgia, state education officials added about 100 names of disciplined teachers to NASDTEC after their absence was brought to the state's attention by WXIA.
Of those reports, two involved teachers accused of having ongoing physical relationships with students. Another report accused the teacher of calling a student into his classroom to grade papers, then giving him a “lingering kiss on the cheek” and nibbling on his ear.
“I am surprised," Paul Shaw, Director of the Ethics division within Georgia’s Professional Standards Commission, told WXIA. "This is the first time it’s been brought to my attention that we possibly need to strengthen our process and we believe we’ve done that. We do take our work seriously."
In Indiana, state education officials told The Indianapolis Star they also reported missing discipline cases to NASDTEC after the newspaper identified unreported cases, and are reviewing records from previous administrations.
Indiana State Rep. Bob Behning, Chairman of the Indiana House of Representatives’ Committee on Education, told the newspaper he is exploring ways to ensure the state reports full information to NASDTEC.
In Tennessee, which also received an “F,” state board of education chairman Fielding Rolston said the board wants to look into problems identified in the report as it undergoes a policies and procedures audit started in October.
"We are concerned," Fielding said to The Tennessean this week. "We need to explore the reasons for the grade and make sure we do whatever we need to do to address any deficiencies at this current time."
Nationally, changes are underway to review the teacher discipline data as well. On Monday, NASDTEC executive director Phillip Rodgers said the organization would direct all 50 states to audit all their previous submissions to the database to ensure they are accurate and complete. Although every state is a member of the private data reporting system, it is voluntary and each state has its own guidelines as to what type of discipline is submitted.
An internal review of NASDTEC reporting has also been launched by education officials in Iowa, according to The Des Moines Register.
In some states, the lack of public transparency surrounding teacher discipline was highlighted by the USA TODAY NETWORK. Following reporting by The (Wilmington, Del.) New Journal, Delaware state Sen. Ernie Lopez said he would introduce legislation to make information about serious educator misconduct available to the public.
“On the whole, our excellent teachers are one of Delaware's greatest assets," Lopez said in a statement Monday. “But too often in recent years we have picked up the morning paper to find another charge of abuse. This needs to stop, and the Department of Education needs to be fully transparent. Protecting bad teachers hurts our kids and sends the wrong message.”
Contributing: Tonya Maxwell of The (Asheville, N.C.) Citizen-Times, Chelsea Schneider and Marisa Kwiatkowski of The Indianapolis Star, Jason Gonzales of The Tennessean, Matthew Albright and Saranac Hale Spencer of The (Wilmington, Del.) News Journal, Jason Clayworth of The Des Moines Register, Rebecca Lindstrom of WXIA in Atlanta.
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04df59806fef2631d7875e58f6bcd437 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/20/supreme-court-justice-antonin-scalia-funeral-mass/80648918/ | At funeral Mass, Justice Scalia eulogized as a man of faith as well as law | At funeral Mass, Justice Scalia eulogized as a man of faith as well as law
WASHINGTON — Forever combative about the law, the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was remembered Saturday as a man whose deeply held religious faith brought him peace.
Rather than a star-studded funeral service featuring judges and politicians, Scalia's sendoff at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception — the largest Roman Catholic church in North America — was a traditional Mass of Christian Burial befitting a true believer.
It also was a family affair, presided over by Scalia's son Paul, episcopal vicar for clergy of the Diocese of Arlington, Va., and attended by the justice's wife of 55 years, Maureen, eight other children and most if not all of their 36 grandchildren. About 100 of Scalia's former law clerks joined the eight surviving and two retired justices, along with other members of his jurisprudential family.
From the moment Scalia's casket, covered by a white-and-gold pall, led a procession to the altar during the opening hymn, the 90-minute service was stamped as religious, not political. In attendance were Cardinal Donald Wuerl, the archbishop of Washington, D.C., Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the Vatican's ambassador to the United States and Pope Francis' personal representative, and scores of other bishops and priests -- "in keeping with your desire to have a simple parish family Mass," Wuerl said to laughter.
"Thank you also for allowing us to have this parish funeral Mass here in this basilica dedicated to Our Lady," Rev. Scalia responded. The church, dedicated to Mary, is a pilgrimage site where Pope Francis celebrated the canonization Mass for St. Junipero Serra last year — the first-ever such Mass on American soil.
Transcript: Rev. Paul Scalia's eulogy for his father, Justice Antonin Scalia
In his homily, Rev. Scalia subtly acknowledged his father's controversial legacy on the Supreme Court. "We are gathered here because of one man -- a man known personally to many of us, known only by reputation to even more. A man loved by many, scorned by others. A man known for great controversy and for great compassion," he said.
"That man, of course, is Jesus of Nazareth."
Catholic funeral Masses do not allow for eulogies by laypeople, and no such tributes were on the program. Instead, Rev. Scalia used his sermon to speak of his father's legacy — as a man of faith and family, if not the law — and also of his uncompromising temperament that became an essential part of his public image.
"God blessed Dad with a deep Catholic faith: The conviction that Christ's presence and power continue in the world today through His body, the Church. He loved the clarity and coherence of the church's teachings. He treasured the church's ceremonies, especially the beauty of her ancient worship; he trusted the power of her sacraments as the means of salvation," Rev. Scalia said.
One of those sacraments is confession, and Rev. Scalia told the story of the time his father somehow found himself in his priest son's confessional line one Saturday and quickly left. "As he put it later, 'Like heck if I'm confessing to you!'" Rev. Scalia said.
"The feeling was mutual," he added, noting that "the Roman collar was not a shield against his criticism."
Justice Clarence Thomas, Scalia's closest ally on the bench, and Leonard Leo, executive vice president of the conservative Federalist Society, recited scripture readings.
After the Mass, family pallbearers carried his casket along a cordon of priests and saluting Supreme Court police officers, back to a hearse for a private burial. A separate, more secular memorial service for family and friends will be held March 1 at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, the Scalia family said Saturday.
Thousands of Scalia's devoted fans -— his expansive family, current and former Supreme Court justices, nearly 100 former law clerks and guests, including Vice President Biden and his wife, Jill — filled the medieval-style church for the funeral Mass on a cloudy, breezy, warm winter day. All the current Supreme Court justices attended, along with former justices John Paul Stevens and David Souter, sitting on folding chairs in front of the first pew.
Among the many judges in attendance was Sri Srinivasan of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, perhaps the leading candidate among many President Obama may nominate for Scalia's seat. Also seen entering the Basilica: Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, a Republican presidential candidate, and former Vice President Dick Cheney.
"He wanted a simple pastoral mass. This was close to it," said Theodore Olson, a former U.S. solicitor general and conservative legal scholar, with a laugh.
On Friday, more than 6,000 people paid their respects as Scalia's body lay in repose at the Great Hall of the Supreme Court. The building remained open to allow everyone in line to get in.
Supreme Court family pays respects to Justice Antonin Scalia
The court's longest-serving justice was a month shy of his 80th birthday when he was found dead last Saturday during a visit to a West Texas ranch. His death has touched off a harsh debate between the White House and Senate Republicans over Obama's right to nominate a successor in the waning days of his presidency and the Senate's right to ignore or defeat that nominee.
That battle will resume following Scalia's public funeral and private burial today. The president, who paid respects Friday as the late justice lay in repose in the Great Hall of the Supreme Court, later was seen carrying a binder with information about potential nominees for weekend reading. Sunday's weekly news shows will reignite the debate amid talk of the South Carolina and Nevada presidential primaries.
Transcript: Rev. Paul Scalia's eulogy for his father, Justice Antonin Scalia
For Scalia's extended family and followers, however, Saturday loomed as a day to say goodbye to the man who was for many the leader among conservative legal scholars. His defense of originalism (that is, reading the Constitution literally, not expansively) and textualism (reading government statutes the same way) changed the way cases were debated and, in some cases at least, won or lost.
The 79-year-old justice also will be remembered as one of the most gifted writers in the court's history and a fierce debater from the bench who changed the nature of oral arguments. His many lectures, speeches and interviews helped to educate and energize younger generations of conservative legal thinkers who will carry on his legacy.
"He was brilliant. He never felt you were there to invent law from the bench, you were there to interpret. He was full of life and vigor. He lived life to the fullest," said Dirk Kempthorne, who was sworn in by Scalia as secretary of the Interior in 2006. "What a wonderful, delightful man. He was the epitome of life and did not take himself too seriously."
"It was a very beautiful service, and I think he would have been pleased," said Republican former senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania. "It was about the things he cared about most, his faith and his family. The emphasis was not on his time on the court or his impact on the country, but how his faith and his family shaped all those things we all know and celebrate about his life."
Antonin Scalia: Will his conservative legacy live on?
Contributing: Christopher Doering.
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361049702ed51c93d5305b931426e332 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/24/some-studies-suggest-link-between-talcum-powder-and-cancer/80847720/ | Studies mixed on link between talcum powder, ovarian cancer | Studies mixed on link between talcum powder, ovarian cancer
A court case involving the family of an Alabama woman who blamed the talc in baby powder for causing their mother's fatal ovarian cancer is raising questions about the product's safety — especially for feminine hygienic use.
A St. Louis jury late Monday ordered Johnson & Johnson to pay the woman's family $72 million in damages. After her cancer diagnosis, Jackie Fox joined dozens of women suing the company for what they said was a failure to inform consumers about the dangers of talc. Johnson & Johnson says its products are safe.
Johnson & Johnson to pay $72M in talcum powder-related cancer case
Talcum powder is made from talc, which absorbs moisture well and helps cut down on friction. That makes it useful for keeping skin dry and preventing rashes. The powder was used for many years when diapering babies, but health concerns led doctors to recommend against its use. Talc is still widely used in other cosmetics.
Some studies suggest a link between talcum powder and ovarian cancer, but scientists say it's not clear yet whether products containing talc can cause the disease.
"Studies of personal use of talcum powder have had mixed results, although there is some suggestion of a possible increase in ovarian cancer risk," the American Cancer Society says on its website. "There is very little evidence at this time that any other forms of cancer are linked with consumer use of talcum powder."
The International Agency for Research on Cancer, part of the World Health Organization, says applying talc to the genital area could be "possibly carcinogenic to humans."
Doctors have examined the possible health risks of long-term exposure to natural talc fibers at work, such as talc miners, to determine if they're at higher risk of lung cancer.
The U.S. National Toxicology Program, an interagency group headquartered at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences has not fully reviewed talc as a possible carcinogen.
People concerned about talc can use other products, such as cornstarch-based ones, the American Cancer Society says. "There is no evidence at this time linking cornstarch powders with any form of cancer," the society says.
In the past, talc contained asbestos, which is proven to cause cancer. All talcum powder used in products for humans has been asbestos-free since the 1970s, according to the American Cancer Society.
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84c6010e8a9e3347255ee5ded2eab71b | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/25/dea-riverside-wiretaps-scaled-back/80891460/ | Prosecutors halt vast, likely illegal DEA wiretap operation | Prosecutors halt vast, likely illegal DEA wiretap operation
PALM SPRINGS, Calif. — Prosecutors in a Los Angeles suburb say they have dramatically scaled back a vast and legally questionable eavesdropping operation, built by federal drug agents, that once accounted for nearly a fifth of all U.S. wiretaps.
The wiretapping, authorized by prosecutors and a single state-court judge in Riverside County, alarmed privacy advocates and even some U.S. Justice Department lawyers, who warned that it was likely illegal. An investigation last year by The Desert Sun and USA TODAY found that the operation almost certainly violated federal wiretapping laws while using millions of secretly intercepted calls and texts to make hundreds of arrests nationwide.
Riverside’s district attorney, Mike Hestrin, acknowledged being concerned by the scope of that surveillance, and said he enacted “significant” reforms last summer to rein it in. Wiretap figures his office released this week offer the first evidence that the enormous eavesdropping program has wound down to more routine levels.
“I definitely don’t apologize for using this tool to hit the cartels in Riverside County,” said Hestrin, who took office last year. “I think the reforms I put in place were necessary, but this is still a tool that I believe in. It needs to be used cautiously, but it should be available when necessary.”
The number of wiretaps authorized in Riverside County started to climb in 2010; it quadrupled by 2014, when the county court approved 624 wiretaps — three times as many as any other state or federal court. Most of the surveillance was conducted at the behest of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents, who used the eavesdropping to make arrests and seize drugs and cash as far away as New York and Virginia.
Officials approved another 607 wiretaps in 2015, according to the figures released by the district attorney’s office. Most were approved in the first half of the year, before Hestrin said he installed a “stricter” standard that required every new wiretap application to have a “strong investigatory nexus” to Riverside County.
Taps have dwindled since then. So far this year, Hestrin has approved only 14. In the first two months of last year, his office approved 126.
If the current rate continues, Riverside County will end 2016 with about between 85 and 120 wiretaps — still enough to rank it among the nation’s busiest wiretapping jurisdictions, based on 2014 records. But the county will no longer be in a stratosphere all its own.
“I’m pleased to hear this, but it never should have gotten out of hand in the first place,” said Steve Harmon, the Riverside County Public Defender. “If there is no strong investigative connection to Riverside County, then Riverside County has no interest being in this business.”
Privacy advocates, who had expressed alarm in the past, were more cautious.
Jennifer Lynch, a senior staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said it was “reassuring” the Riverside wiretap numbers had normalized, but worried there is “no oversight” even for new eavesdropping orders. Almost all wiretaps are sealed, and are sometimes kept secret even from the suspects who are arrested as a result of the eavesdropping, Lynch said.
“We are reliant on the prosecutors and the law enforcement officers to do their jobs and the judges not to just stamp a signature on them, but without releasing these on a regular basis it’s hard to be satisfied that the system is operating the way it should be,” Lynch said.
A Justice Department spokesman declined to comment on the abrupt drop in eavesdropping. In the past, DEA officials had said the surveillance was an important tool for targeting cartels that had turned the suburbs around Riverside into one of the nation's busiest drug trafficking corridors.
The majority of Riverside’s wiretap surge occurred under the watch of former District Attorney Paul Zellerbach, a one-term top prosecutor who was ousted by Hestrin at the end of 2014.
In interviews last fall, Zellerbach said his staff was “efficient and effective” at processing wiretaps. As word spread through law enforcement circles, the office received more and more requests to eavesdrop. Zellerbach had no qualms about leading the nation in taps. “I thought we were doing a hell of a job," Zellerbach said in November.
Others did not share that opinion. Justice Department lawyers warned the DEA in private that the wiretaps were unlikely to withstand a legal challenge, and they generally refused to use them as evidence in federal court.
The surveillance also suffered a more systematic flaw. The Desert Sun and USA TODAY found last year that Zellerbach had been allowing lower-level lawyers in his office to approve wiretap applications, despite a federal law that required him to do it himself. That flaw has the potential to invalidate as many as 738 wiretaps since 2013.
As a result, Riverside’s wiretap operation is now facing its first significant legal challenge. Lawyers for a marijuana trafficking suspect last week asked a federal judge in Kentucky to declare that five wiretaps used in that case were illegal. But their attack on the surveillance spoke far more broadly.
“In sum, Riverside County made a mockery of individual privacy rights, ignored federal requirements limiting the use of wiretaps and permitted law enforcement to intercept telephone calls at their whim and caprice,” argued attorney Brian Butler, a former federal prosecutor.
Although Zellerbach left the district attorney’s office at the end of 2014, the surge of eavesdropping continued well into 2015, with prosecutors approving hundreds in just the first few months of the year. Hestrin, the new district attorney, said most of those he approved were “spinoffs” of previous wiretaps, needed for investigations that he inherited from the Zellerbach administration. The volume was “staggering,” he said.
“A spinoff is technically a new wire but it’s from an existing investigation,” Hestrin said. “Maybe a bad guy is dropping one phone and getting a new one. And I wasn’t going to come in and shut down massive investigations into the cartel.”
Eventually, by the summer, the inherited investigations had run their course and Hestrin introduced his “new standard” for wiretap applications, limiting their use to cases in which the crime was closely tied to the county. In the past, court records show prosecutors had approved surveillance based on tenuous links to Riverside, including one case in which the DEA sought to use a Riverside wiretap to gather evidence on a money laundering suspect in Los Angeles on the basis that the phone belonging to a suspected courier had been in contact with a phone that had, in turn, been in touch with another phone belonging to a Riverside County nightclub owner.
After that change, Hestrin said law enforcement kept asking for wiretaps, but prosecutors “said no frequently.” Eventually, the requests stopped coming.
Riverside’s increased scrutiny of wiretaps applications is a step in the right direction, but it doesn’t erase years of taps that were awarded under questionable policies, said Adrienna Wong, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California.
Wong said Wednesday that the ACLU submitted a public records request asking the DA’s office for wiretap polices — both old and new — after The Desert Sun/USA TODAY investigation was published.
The DA’s office refused.
“Given the lack of transparency, we remain concerned about the issue,” Wong said. “And the fact that the problem may be solved, at least for the time being … doesn’t address what may have happened in the past.”
Heath reported from McLean, Va. Kelman reports for The Desert Sun in Palm Springs, Calif.
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f38d8dbed17fba628d859f87faca295d | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/25/reports-2-dead-hesston-kansas-workplace-shooting/80954886/ | Three dead plus gunman in Kansas shootings; 14 injured | Three dead plus gunman in Kansas shootings; 14 injured
Three people have died in a series of shootings at three sites near Hesston, Kansas, including a lawn care products factory, authorities said Thursday night.
The alleged shooter also died after a confrontation with law enforcement at the Excel Industries plant, Harvey County Sheriff T. Walton said during a Thursday night news conference.
Walton said all the dead were shot inside Excel Industries and a total of 14 were injured in the shootings, 10 of them critically.
The shooter, an employee of Excel, was armed with a long gun and a handgun, the sheriff said. Police killed the suspect when he began firing on officers, who received the first call about the shooting shortly before 5 p.m. local time. The shooter was dead by 5:23 p.m., and the officer who took him down is “a hero as far as I’m concerned,” Walton said.
The sheriff would not identify the suspect or discuss a motive, but said there were “some things that triggered this individual.”
The company employs 1,000 people and about 150 of them were on the job at the time, according to Walton.
One shooting took place in Newton, Kansas, with someone in a vehicle suffering a gunshot wound to the shoulder, Walton said. Another person was shot in the leg at another site, Walton said. One person was shot in the parking lot of the Excel site and the remainder inside the factory, Walton said.
There are about four or five crime scenes in Newton, Harvey County, and Excel in Hesston, Walton said.
One witness told KAKE television that the alleged shooter carried what looked to be an AK-47 assault rifle.
Marty Pierce told the news organization he heard his co-workers yelling "fire" and that he narrowly missed being hit.
"They were saying, 'Fire, fire,'" Pierce said. "We didn't know they were getting shot."
Hesston College nearby was on lockdown in the wake of the incident, Walton said.
"This is just a horrible incident that's happened here ... please bear with us as we try to get through this," Walton said. "There's going to be a lot of sad people before this is all over."
Hesston is about 36 miles northwest of Wichita.
Excel Industries is a family-owned business that was founded in 1960, according to the Kansas City Star. The company is a leading maker of turf-care products and distributes its mowing products through Hustler Turf Equipment and BigDog Mower product lines, according to the company's website.
Contributing: The Associated Press
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a2c8a90f2bd77183601bcf760fdfb56f | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/27/kalamazoo-shootings-father-son-remembered/81061918/ | Kalamazoo shootings: Father and son remembered | Kalamazoo shootings: Father and son remembered
KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Funerals are often thought of as times of sadness, but laughter echoed off the walls of Calvary Bible Church at Saturday’s service for the Smith men.
Richard, 53, and his son, Tyler, 17, both of Mattawan, were victims of the Feb. 20 Kalamazoo shootings that left six people dead and two seriously wounded. The Smiths were attacked at a car dealership in what authorities have called a random attack.
But that fact of their deaths was something the Rev. Paul Fazio railed against as he, and many others Saturday, talked about the Smiths' lives.
"Will you let this tragedy define your future?" Fazio asked the hundreds of gathered mourners. "Don't let this define Rich and Tyler."
Nobody who spoke did. Instead, stories about both Richard and Tyler's passion for life, hard work followed by hard play, and love for their friends, family and sometimes strangers was shared.
Report: Kalamazoo suspect's wife files for divorce
Two photo slideshows set to music showed the lives of the father and son. A lot of those photos featured at least one of them enjoying some kind of vehicle. It was a big part of their lives, according to obituaries posted by Langeland Family Funeral Homes.
Fazio read a letter from one of the Smiths' relatives that showed just how big a part that hobby played for them.
"You are probably in a dune buggy right now," Fazio read, "driving around streets of gold."
Helping others also seemed to be a recurring theme in the lives of the Smiths. People talked about Richard traveling to Florida just to help his brother with a plumbing project, or hearing about a new family moving to Mattawan and wanting to meet and welcome them. Fazio said such acts of kindness were often repeated by Tyler.
When Richard's mom, Wanda Smith, spoke, that concern for others was the first thing heard.
"If I could do something for the hurt in your heart, I would," Wanda said to the crowd.
It wasn't long before the audience laughed again as Wanda did something she said would make Richard happy: She sang a few lines of Willie Nelson's "Crazy."
Emily Smith, Richard's daughter and Tyler's older sister, cried when talking about her "baby brother" and her dad, who she said was the best man she ever knew. But even she spoke more of the times of laughter than anything.
Emily said her brother, as a small child, would often climb into her bed because he was afraid of the dark or just wanted to stay up. In his high school years, Tyler would wake his sister up at midnight, coffee in hand, asking for help on homework due the next day.
One of those late nights was followed by Tyler coming home after school and announcing to Emily, "We got an A!"
Again, laughter rather than the darkness Fazio said can't be allowed to win.
"Those are the images that are remembered," Fazio said of the collection of photographs of the Smiths. "Those are the images that, as tough as it is, make us smile."
A fundraiser for the Smiths has been set up at www.gofundme.com/ubqed2j8. It was at just over $37,000 Saturday afternoon.
Jason Dalton, a 45-year-old Uber driver, was arraigned Monday after police said he went on a shooting spree throughout Kalamazoo County on Saturday night.
Dalton faces 16 charges, including six murder counts, two counts of assault with intent to murder and eight counts of felony firearm.
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87965b6041609216d4f7b09cdfeb8365 | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/29/evening-news-roundup-monday/81110584/ | Never let go: Yep, we're still talking about the Oscars | Never let go: Yep, we're still talking about the Oscars
There's so much to say about the 88th Academy Awards
Where to begin? Let's go back to Titanic — with Jack and Rose. When Leonardo DiCaprio accepted his long-awaited Oscar for best actor, we were feeling all the feels, weeping along with Kate Winslet as we haven't since Rose let Jack die in the icy waters of the Atlantic. ("Never let go." Really?) It was a warm-fuzzy moment in an evening filled with biting jokes and monologues that kept the #OscarsSoWhite discussion going all night. Host Chris Rock was unrelenting. Some jokes worked, some didn’t and when he brought Stacey Dash on stage, everyone asked, "What the —?" Rock even brought in his daughters to sell Girl Scout cookies. (It is that time of year.) If you missed the show, you can catch up, find out what happened after and see the prettiest and not-so-pretty fashions from the red carpet. And if you still need more time with Oscar, here are more than 200 of our most amazing photos.
It wouldn't be the Monday before Super Tuesday without some Election 2016 news
In case you spent the weekend totally starstruck, here's your politics recap. Hillary Clinton defeated Bernie Sanders in South Carolina's Democratic primary Saturday, but Donald Trump stole the spotlight Sunday when he refused to disavow the support of ex-KKK leader David Duke during an interview. Of course, Trump's political rivalswent nuts, and now Trump blames the brouhaha on a broken, "lousy" earpiece. (No word yet on what he's blaming for misquoting Gandhi.) Even so, he's crushing it in the polls and leading in almost all the Super Tuesday states.
If you want to visit the Happiest Place on Earth it's gonna cost you — a lot
Ditto if you want to get into the Magic Kingdom. The Walt Disney Company announced a new "surge" pricing structure for its guests, which means you'll pay more to visit the increasingly popular (and crowded) theme parks on the most popular days. If you visit during less popular times, say a random Thursday in November, you'll pay less. At Disneyland in California, adult tickets are now priced at whopping $119 a day for peak days and kids' tickets aren't much cheaper: $113. Even so, that's less than peak-day admission to Walt Disney World in Florida: $124 for adults and $118 for kids.
Did you hear that? Justice Thomas just spoke. No, really.
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is a man of few words. On Monday, he broke a 10-year silence by asking questions during oral arguments. The case involves two Maine men barred from owning guns under a federal law because of state domestic violence convictions. The men said those convictions don’t merit a lifetime ban. Thomas apparently agreed. "This is a misdemeanor violation. It suspends a constitutional right," Thomas told Ilana Eisenstein, the assistant solicitor general arguing the federal government's case. "Can you give me another area where a misdemeanor violation suspends a constitutional right?" That prompted an exchange in which Thomas spoke 11 times, filling a noticeable void during oral arguments left by the recent death of colleague Antonin Scalia.
Listen to the audio version of #TheShortList in the player below:
In non-Oscar-related news:
In less-important-but-cuter news:
Jabba the hedgehog is going on diet.
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This is a compilation of stories from across USA TODAY.
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91e840e503defb2b04f36a0953e0958c | https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2016/02/29/zika-can-cause-guillain-barre-syndrome-study-shows/81103754/ | Zika can cause Guillain-Barre syndrome, study shows | Zika can cause Guillain-Barre syndrome, study shows
For the first time, researchers have shown that the Zika virus can cause Guillain-Barre syndrome, a rare condition in which the immune system attacks nerve cells and causes paralysis.
Five Latin American countries with Zika epidemics — Brazil, El Salvador, Venezuela, Colombia and Suriname — have reported increases in Guillain-Barre syndrome. Until now, however, doctors didn't have scientific evidence showing the virus actually triggers the condition.
The new evidence comes from a study published Monday in The Lancet, in which researchers analyzed 42 cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome that were diagnosed during a Zika outbreak in French Polynesia from 2013 to 2014. Scientists estimate about 66% of the territory's residents were infected.
In the study, doctors compared patients with Guillain-Barre to those hospitalized for other reasons. All 42 of the Guillain-Barre patients had antibodies designed to neutralize Zika's effects on the body, compared with about half of control patients.
About 88% of the Guillain-Barre patients had experienced Zika-like symptoms — such as fever, rash and joint pain — about six days before developing paralysis, according to the study.
That's a significant detail, according to an accompanying commentary from researchers David Smith at the University of Western Australia and John Mackenzie of Curtin University, also in Australia.
Only about 20% of patients with Zika infections develop symptoms, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The study's results suggest that people who are infected with Zika but don't develop symptoms might be at lower risk from complications, Smith and Mackenzie wrote.
Guillain-Barre typically begins with weakness in the legs, then moves up the body. One in four patients end up on a ventilator because the condition paralyzes the muscles they need to breathe. Although some patients recover fully, 20% are left with a significant disability and about 5% die, Smith and Mackenzie wrote.
About 38% of Guillain-Barre patients in French Polynesia needed intensive care, usually because patients needed breathing machines, according to the study.
Yet patients in this outbreak recovered more quickly than usual; about half were able to walk without help three months later, according to the study.
Guillain-Barre syndrome typically develops after people recover from a virus, such as influenza, or a bacteria, such as Campylobacter, one of the most common causes of food poisoning. Other infections that can cause Guillain-Barre syndrome include dengue virus and West Nile virus, which are both transmitted by the same mosquito that spreads Zika.
Although most patients in the study had been infected at some point in the past with dengue, researchers found no evidence that a history of dengue increased the risk of Guillain-Barre.
Zika was first isolated in a monkey in Uganda in 1947 and caused its first known human case in 1954 in Nigeria, according to background information in The Lancet study. For the next 50 years, Zika caused only sporadic cases.
The first epidemic in people was reported in 2007 on Yap island in the Pacific nation of Micronesia, where 73% of residents were infected, said Arnaud Fontanet, an author of The Lancet study and head of the emerging diseases epidemiology unit at the Institut Pasteur in Paris.
Zika Q&A: What to know about efforts to fight the virus, conspiracy theories
Fontanet said it's not possible to say what percentage of people in Latin America and the Caribbean will be infected with Zika or affected by Guillain-Barre. He notes that Zika may spread differently on a large continent than it did on these islands.
More than 30 countries and territories in the Americas are now battling Zika outbreaks, including Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Zika Virus: Full coverage
Guillain-Barre is normally rare, with about 1.1 cases per 100,000 people in Europe and North America. According to the new study, that rate climbed to 24 cases per 100,000 during the French Polynesia outbreak. The condition is more common as people age and slightly more common in men than women.
Scientists are also investigating an increase in birth defects in Brazil, which has had a surge of infants born with microcephaly, a condition in which babies are born with abnormally small skulls. Although scientists can't yet definitely say the Zika virus causes microcephaly, officials at the World Health Organization say the virus should be "presumed guilty until proven innocent."
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