While COVID-19 Rages, Don’t Forget About Pandemic Flu

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Don't panic, but there is another virus out there that could cause a pandemic.  This one is an influenza strain circulating in pigs and their caretakers in China.  It is not currently causing widespread illness, and it may never do so. But it has "all the essential hallmarks of a candidate pandemic virus," according to the authors of a new study in the FILE - A patient receives a flu vaccination in Mesquite, Texas, January 23, 2020.‘Good news, bad news’ "There's good news and bad here," Pavia said. "I think the bad news is that once again, it looks as if we're identifying strains of flu that are emerging in populations with the potential to jump to humans."However, only a handful of serious cases have been reported."The severity remains low. That's…


Facebook Bans Violent ‘Boogaloo’ Groups, Not the Term Itself

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Facebook has banned an extremist anti-government network loosely associated with the broader "boogaloo" movement, a slang term supporters use to refer to a second Civil War or a collapse of civilization. But the platform didn't try to name the group, underscoring the difficulty of grappling with an amorphous network linked to a string of domestic terror plots that appears to obfuscate its existence. Among other complications, its internet-savvy members tend to keep their distance from one another, frequently change their symbols and catch phrases and mask their intentions with sarcasm. The move by Facebook designates this group as a dangerous organization similar to the Islamic State group and white supremacists, both of which are already banned from its service. The social network is not banning all references to "boogaloo" and said it…


Measles Mumps and Rubella Vaccine May Protect Some People from COVID-19

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Something data crunchers have noticed during the coronavirus pandemic: countries with recent outbreaks of measles have fewer deaths and serious illnesses from the coronavirus. Is this a coincidence? Or is there something about the measles mumps and rubella vaccine that protects against the worst outcomes of the coronavirus? We learn more from VOA's Carol Pearson.Produced by: Barry Unger ...


UN Calls for End to Practices Threatening Women, Girls Worldwide

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The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) has called for urgent action to stop female genital mutilation, child marriage and other harmful practices carried out against millions of women and girls around the world each year.UNFPA made that call as it presented its State of the World Population report from UN headquarters in Geneva Monday. The report was embargoed until Tuesday.UNFPA Director Mónica Ferro told journalists the report cites at lease 19 practice against girls and women girls that have been universally denounced as human rights violations – from breast ironing to virginity testing.  Ferro said the study was also groundbreaking in that it treats these practices as human rights violations. The study indicates that every day, hundreds of thousands of girls around the world are subjected to practices that harm…


Presidential Campaigns Embrace Tech to Reach Voters During Pandemic

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With social distancing as the new pandemic normal, U.S. presidential campaigns were faced with an unprecedented situation. They no longer were able to send out organizers and volunteers to connect with potential voters face-to-face. Intimate, high-dollar fundraising events were also out of the question. “The coronavirus pandemic shifted things overnight. It was a sudden and instant transformation to 100% virtual campaigning, just like the pandemic disrupted everyone else's daily life. The same is true of our campaigns,” said Eric Wilson, a Republican digital strategist and director of the Center for Campaign Innovation. “You're just seeing a lot more creativity in terms of how and where the campaigns are finding the voters they need to get their message across to,” said Tara McGowan, CEO and founder of Acronym, a progressive nonprofit organization and head of the political action committee Pacronym.  Lally…


Chinese Scientists Discover New H1N1 Virus Strain That Could Infect Humans

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Scientists in China have identified a new strain of a flu virus in pigs that has the potential to infect humans and lead to a new pandemic.   In a paper published in the U.S.-based journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists say the new “G4” strain was discovered during a surveillance program of pig farms and slaughterhouses across 10 provinces between 2011 and 2018.      The new virus is a variation of the H1N1 swine flu virus that killed hundreds of thousands of people around the world in 2009.      The scientists discovered the G4 virus has already infected workers at various farms and slaughterhouses throughout China.  The new H1N1 strain can grow and quickly multiply in the cells that line the airways of…


Social Media Platforms Face Reckoning Over Hate Speech 

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For years, social media platforms have fueled political polarization and hosted an explosion of hate speech. Now, with four months until the U.S. presidential election and the country's divisions reaching a boiling point, these companies are upping their game against bigotry and threats of violence. What's not yet clear is whether this action is too little, too late — nor whether the pressure on these companies, including a growing advertiser boycott, will be enough to produce lasting change. FILE - Reddit employees work at the company's headquarters in San Francisco, California, April 15, 2014.Reddit, an online comment forum that is one of the world's most popular websites, on Monday banned a forum that supported President Donald Trump as part of a crackdown on hate speech. Also on Monday, live-streaming site Twitch, which…


New Swine Flu Found in China Has Pandemic Potential

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Researchers in China have discovered a new type of swine flu that is capable of triggering a pandemic, according to a study published Monday in the U.S. science journal PNAS. Named G4, it is genetically descended from the H1N1 strain that caused a pandemic in 2009. It possesses "all the essential hallmarks of being highly adapted to infect humans," say the authors, scientists at Chinese universities and China's Center for Disease Control and Prevention.  From 2011 to 2018, researchers took 30,000 nasal swabs from pigs in slaughterhouses in 10 Chinese provinces and in a veterinary hospital, allowing them to isolate 179 swine flu viruses.   The majority were of a new kind, which has been dominant among pigs since 2016. The researchers then carried out various experiments including on ferrets, which are widely used in flu studies because they experience…


US Procures Almost Entire Supply of COVID-19 Drug

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The Trump administration says it has locked down nearly the entire supply of one of the only available anti-COVID-19 drugs from the manufacturer for the next several months. That raises questions about access to one of the few treatments available for COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, for much of the rest of the world. Remdesivir is the first drug shown to help patients with COVID-19, though its impact is modest. Hospitalized patients given the drug recovered four days faster than those given a placebo. FILE - Vials of the drug remdesivir are seen at a hospital in Germany, April 8, 2020.FILE - Gilead Sciences pharmaceutical company is seen during the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in La Verne, California.The Institute for Clinical and Economic Review, the drug pricing watchdog, said…


India Bans 59 Chinese Apps Amid Border Tensions

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India has banned the use of 59 Chinese-owned apps, including TikTok, citing security concerns Monday, as relations between the two neighbors worsen. In a statement, India's Ministry of Electronics and IT said it "has decided to block 59 apps since in view of information available, they are engaged in activities which is prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defense of India, security of state and public order." TikTok, a popular video application owned by Chinese parent company ByteDance, counts India as its biggest market. It was not immediately clear how the "ban" would be enforced and whether mobile companies were expected to comply. As of Monday evening, the banned apps were still available on Google's Play store and the Apple App store in India, according to Tech Crunch.The announcement from Delhi comes…


US Supreme Court Strikes Down Restrictive Abortion Law

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The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday handed abortion-rights advocates a victory, striking down a restrictive abortion law in Louisiana that would have left the southern state with only one abortion clinic.The vote was 5-4, with Chief Justice John Roberts siding with the court’s four-member liberal contingent. The decision struck down a law that would have required doctors performing abortions to gain admitting privileges at nearby hospitals, even though abortion-rights activists say patients rarely need to be hospitalized after the procedure.The White House deplored the ruling. Spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany said it "devalued both the health of mothers and lives of unborn children. Instead of valuing fundamental democratic principles, unelected justices have intruded on the sovereign prerogatives of state governments by imposing their own policy preference in favor of abortion to override…


Gilead’s $2,340 Price For Coronavirus Drug Draws Criticism

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The maker of a drug shown to shorten recovery time for severely ill COVID-19 patients says it will charge $2,340 for a typical treatment course for people covered by government health programs in the United States and other developed countries. Gilead Sciences announced the price Monday for remdesivir, and said the price would be $3,120 for patients with private insurance. The amount that patients pay out of pocket depends on insurance, income and other factors. "We're in uncharted territory with pricing a new medicine, a novel medicine, in a pandemic," Gilead's chief executive, Dan O'Day, told The Associated Press. "We believe that we had to really deviate from the normal circumstances" and price the drug to ensure wide access rather than based solely on value to patients, he said. However,…


Images of Brutality Against Black People Spur Racial Trauma 

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Wanda Johnson’s son was shot and killed by a police officer in Oakland, California, 11 years ago, she has watched video after video of similar encounters between Black people and police.  Each time, she finds herself reliving the trauma of losing her son, Oscar Grant, who was shot to death by a transit police officer. Most recently, Johnson couldn’t escape the video of George Floyd, pinned to the ground under a Minneapolis officer’s knee as he pleaded that he couldn’t breathe.  “I began to shake. I was up for two days, just crying,” she said. “Just looking at that video opened such a wound in me that has not completely closed.”  Johnson’s loss was extreme, but, for many Black Americans, her grief and pain feels familiar. Psychologists call it racial…


Summer May Decide Fate of Leading Shots in Vaccine Race 

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—People on six continents already are getting jabs in the arm as the race for a COVID-19 vaccine enters a defining summer, with even bigger studies poised to prove if any shot really works -- and maybe offer a reality check.Already British and Chinese researchers are chasing the coronavirus beyond their borders, testing potential vaccines in Brazil and the United Arab Emirates because there are too few new infections at home to get clear answers.The U.S. is set to open the largest trials  30,000 people to test a government-created shot starting in July, followed about a month later with another 30,000 expected to test a British one.Those likely will be divided among Americans and volunteers in other countries such as Brazil or South Africa, Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National…


TB, Measles, Polio Vaccines Might Fight COVID-19

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As the world waits for a COVID-19 vaccine, scientists are testing whether shots already in use for other diseases might provide some protection from the worst impacts of the disease caused by the coronavirus. Vaccines containing living but weakened organisms, including those against tuberculosis, polio and measles, may provide a boost to the immune system that would help fight the coronavirus.  While they probably wouldn't provide protection as good as a purpose-built vaccine, research has already shown that these immunizations help ward off diseases other than the ones for which they were designed.  Plus, these shots have a proven safety record stretching back decades.  "And not only that, it's something we can put out almost immediately," said Jeffrey Cirillo, director of the Texas A&M University Center for Airborne Pathogen Research and…


Facebook to Label All Rule-breaking Posts — Even Trump’s

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Facebook says it will flag all "newsworthy" posts from politicians that break its rules, including those from President Donald Trump.  CEO Mark Zuckerberg had previously refused to take action against Trump posts that suggested mail-in ballots will lead to voter fraud. Twitter, by contrast, slapped a "get the facts" label on them.Facebook is also banning false claims intended to discourage voting, such as stories about federal agents checking legal status at polling places. The company also said it is increasing its enforcement capacity to remove false claims about local polling conditions in the 72 hours before the U.S. election.Earlier Friday, shares of Facebook and Twitter dropped sharply after the giant company behind brands such as Ben & Jerry's ice cream and Dove soap said it will halt U.S. advertising on…


Microsoft to Close Physical Stores, Take $450 Million Hit

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Microsoft Corp said on Friday it would close its retail stores and take a related pre-tax asset impairment charge of $450 million in the current quarter.The Redmond, Washington-based software giant said would continue to serve customers online, with team members working remotely from corporate facilities.It was not immediately clear if Microsoft's move would lead to any layoffs.The company also said it will rethink other spaces that serve all customers, including operating Microsoft Experience Centers in London, New York City, Sydney, and Redmond campus locations."This is a tough, but smart strategic decision for (CEO) Nadella & Co. to make at this point. The physical stores generated negligible retail revenue for Microsoft and ultimately everything was moving more and more towards the digital channels over the last few years," Wedbush analyst Dan…


Astronaut Loses Mirror During Space Walk

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A spacewalking astronaut on Friday added a small mirror to the millions of pieces of junk orbiting the Earth, as he lost the small object from his space suit, while stepping out of the International Space Station. U.S. Commander Chris Cassidy said the mirror floated away at about 0.3 meters per second. Mission Control said the mirror somehow became detached from Cassidy's spacesuit. Spacewalking astronauts wear a wrist mirror on each sleeve to get better views while working.  The mirror is just 12 centimeters by roughly 8 centimeters and came loose as the ISS was in darkness. Once he was in sunlight, Cassidy inspected his sleeve for clues that might explain how the mirror came off but told Mission Control he found no evidence of thread damage. Cassidy and fellow astronaut Bob…


UN Weather Agency Recognizes 2 World Record Lightning Strikes

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The U.N.’s weather agency, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), says it has verified two “megaflashes” of lightning in South America that set records for longest distance and longest duration.The WMO says on its website Friday its Committee on Weather and Climate Extremes used new satellite lightning technology to verify that an October 31, 2018 lightning bolt that started in southern Brazil traveled just over 709 kilometers.   The WMO says the longest recorded duration for a lightning flash was 16.73 seconds set on March 4, 2019 by a flash that developed over northern Argentina.The agency notes both records are more than double the previous records for distance and duration, set in the U.S state of Oklahoma and in France.The committee maintains official records on global, hemispheric and regional extremes. The committee’s…


Despite Pandemic, Trump Administration Urges End to ACA

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In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the Trump administration on Thursday urged the Supreme Court to overturn the Affordable Care Act.The administration’s latest high court filing came the same day the government reported that close to half a million people who lost their health insurance amid the economic shutdown to slow the spread of the coronavirus have gotten coverage through HealthCare.gov.The administration’s legal brief makes no mention of the virus.Some 20 million Americans could lose their health coverage and protections for people with preexisting health conditions also would be put at risk if the court agrees with the administration in a case that won’t be heard before the fall.In the case before the Supreme Court, Texas and other conservative-led states argue that the ACA was essentially rendered unconstitutional after…


Congo Announces End to Its Second Deadliest Ebola Outbreak

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Eastern Congo marked an official end Thursday to the second deadliest Ebola outbreak in history, which killed 2,280 people over nearly two years, as armed rebels and community mistrust undermined the promise of new vaccines.Thursday's milestone was overshadowed, though, by the enormous health challenges still facing Congo: the world's largest measles epidemic, the rising threat of COVID-19 and another new Ebola outbreak in the north."We are extremely proud to have been able to be victorious over an epidemic that lasted such a long time," said Dr. Jean-Jacques Muyembe, who coordinated the national Ebola response and whose team also developed a new treatment for the once incurable hemorrhagic disease.The announcement initially was set for April but another case emerged just three days before the Ebola-free declaration was expected. That restarted the…


Bayer to Pay $11 Billion in Roundup Cancer Lawsuits

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Germany-based Bayer will pay nearly $11 billion to settle thousands of current and future lawsuits over claims its Roundup weedkiller causes cancer, the company announced Wednesday. Bayer CEO Werner Baumann called it “the right action at the right time.” Along with the cancer lawsuits, Bayer will also pay a billion-dollar settlement over separate lawsuits involving a second weedkiller suspected of killing farmers’ healthy crops, and toxic chemicals dumped in various water supplies in the United States.FILE - A ship passes the main chemical plant of German Bayer AG in Leverkusen, Germany, August 9, 2019. The company has agreed to settlements in cases involving its glyphosate-based weedkiller Roundup.Roundup is used in more than 160 countries and will continue to be sold. Bayer’s subsidiary, Monsanto, developed Roundup's key ingredient, glyphosate, more than 40 years ago.…


Toughest Workout During COVID? Staying Motivated

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Hannah Gjerde starts her day at her hot-mat yoga class on the front lawn of her parent’s home, right before settling onto the couch for the rest of the day. “Being home makes it hard because my dad will be in the kitchen working, or it’s too crowded in my room to do it,” says Gjerde.   Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, many gyms have been deemed non-essential businesses and are not allowed to open. Closing fitness centers has created a sedentary lifestyle for many people.  So more people are moving their fitness routines online.  Gjerde, a Californian, also uses the backyard for her workout space, completing workouts online with an instructor at her usual yoga studio. Gyms and gym-goers alike are finding innovative ways to keep moving while practicing social distancing to thwart the spread of the coronavirus.Photo of Hannah Gjerde working…


Sahara Dust Cloud Looms Over Cuba, Caribbean and Florida

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A massive cloud of Saharan dust darkened much of Cuba on Wednesday and began to affect air quality in Florida, sparking warnings to people with respiratory illnesses to stay home.The dust cloud swept across the Atlantic from Africa over the past week, covering the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico since Sunday and hitting south Florida in the United States on Wednesday, authorities there said.Conditions over the Cuban capital, Havana, are expected to worsen on Thursday, specialists on the Communist-run island reported.Francisco Duran, head of Epidemiology at the Ministry of Health, said the cloud is likely to "increase respiratory and allergic conditions."Air quality in Miami is currently "moderate," the city's health department said, asking people with respiratory problems to stay home.Powered by strong winds, dust from the Sahara travels across the…


Germany Bans Single-Use Plastic Straws, Food Containers

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Germany is banning the sale of single-use plastic straws, cotton buds and food containers, bringing it in line with a European Union directive intended to reduce the amount of plastic garbage that pollutes the environment.The Cabinet agreed Wednesday to end the sale of plastics including single-use cutlery, plates, stirring sticks and balloon holders, as well as polystyrene cups and boxes by July 3, 2021.Environment Minister Svenja Schulze said the move was part of an effort to move away from "throw-away culture." Up to 20% of garbage collected in parks and other public places consists of single-use plastic, mainly polystyrene containers.Plastic takes decades to degrade and microscopic particles have been found inside the bodies of fish, birds and other animals. ...


Boston Approves Ban on Facial Recognition Technology

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The Boston City Council voted unanimously Wednesday to pass a ban on the use of facial recognition technology by city government. The move makes Boston the second-largest U.S. city after San Francisco to enact a ban. The city joins several other Massachusetts communities that passed similar bans, including Cambridge, Springfield, Northampton, Brookline and Somerville. "Boston should not use racially discriminatory technology that threatens the privacy and basic rights of our residents," At-Large Boston City Councilor Michelle Wu said in a statement. "Community trust is the foundation for public safety and public health." The push against the technology is being driven both by privacy concerns and after several studies have shown current face-recognition systems are more likely to err when identifying people with darker skin. "While face surveillance is a danger to all people, no…


Twitter Tackles Violent Upsurge Against Women in Lockdown

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 Twitter has launched a new prompt to fight gender-based violence in response to a surge in sexual assaults and domestic attacks during lockdown, a company official said on Wednesday.   The social network said the feature, currently available in 11 countries, directs users to local helpline services if they search for terms such as "domestic violence" or "sexual assault."   "This is the first time that this notification prompt has been made available in multiple locations in multiple languages," said Kathleen Reen, a senior director of Twitter in Asia-Pacific.   The prompt was introduced across Asia last week, then expanded to the United States on Wednesday, with notifications in English and Spanish. Next step: Europe and Latin America.   "Twitter is a very popular service during crisis. People come to…