Dystopian Series ‘Watchmen’ Leads All Emmy Nominees With 26

07/28/2020 Arts 0

“Watchmen,” cloaked in superhero mythology and grounded in real-world racism, received a leading 26 nominations Tuesday for the prime-time Emmy Awards.  
The series, which captured America’s unease as it faces racial clashes amid a pandemic, was nominated as best limited series and received bids for cast members including Regina King and Jeremy Irons.
King was part of a vanguard of actors of color who showed that TV academy voters took heed of the calls for change.
The Amazon comedy “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” is the second most-nominated series with 20, followed by Netflix’s “Ozark” with 18.  
“This year, we are also bearing witness to one of the greatest fights for social justice in history. And it is our duty to use this medium for change,” Frank Scherma, chairman and CEO of the Television Academy said at the outset of the presentation.
The nominations, typically unveiled with fanfare at the TV academy’s Los Angeles headquarters, were announced online Tuesday by Leslie Jones (“Saturday Night Live”) and presenters Laverne Cox (“Orange is the New Black”), Josh Gad (“Frozen”) and Tatiana Maslany (“Orphan Black”). Cox, Gad and Maslany appeared on by video feeds.
The nominees for best comedy series are: “Curb Your Enthusiasm”; Dead to Me”; “The Good Place”; “Insecure”; “The Kominsky Method”; “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; “Schitt’s Creek’: “What We Do in the Shadows”
The nominees for best drama series are: “Better Call Saul”; “The Crown”; “Killing Eve”; “The Handmaid’s Tale”; “The Mandalorian”; “Ozark”; “Stranger Things”; “Succession.”
The nominees for drama series actress are: Jennifer Aniston, “The Morning Show”; Olivia Colman, “The Crown”; Jodie Comer, “Killing Eve”; Laura Linney, “Ozark”; Sandra Oh, “Killing Eve”; Zendaya “Euphoria.”
The nominees for drama series actor are: Jason Bateman, “Ozark”; Sterling K. Brown, “This is Us”; Billy Porter, “Pose”; Jeremy Strong, “Succession”; Brian Cox, “Succession”; Steve Carell, “The Morning Show.”
The nominees for lead actor in a comedy series are: Anthony Anderson, “black-ish”; Don Cheadle, “Black Monday”; Ted Danson, “The Good Place”; Michael Douglas, “The Kominsky Method”; Eugene Levy, “Schitt’s Creek”; Ramy Youssef, “Ramy.
The nominees for lead actress in a comedy series are: Christina Applegate, “Dead to Me”; Rachel Brosnahan, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Linda Cardellini, “Dead to Me”; Catherine O’Hara, “Schitt’s Creek”; Issa Rae, “Insecure”; Tracee Ellis Ross, “black-ish.”
A high energy Jones kicked off the announcement Tuesday morning by appearing on a virtual set and joking that she was told there would be many others on set to announce the nominees and that she was locked in a studio with only a camerman.
The Emmy Awards, hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, will be presented Sept. 20 on ABC.

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Scientists Get Closer to Blood Test for Alzheimer’s Disease

07/28/2020 Science 0

New study results are boosting hopes that there soon may be a simple, reliable way to help family doctors diagnose the most common form of dementia. Researchers say an experimental blood test was able to distinguish people with Alzheimer’s disease from those without it in several studies.
The accuracy ranged from 89% to 98%, though the test still needs more validation. Several companies are developing these tests, which measure a protein that damages the brains of people with the disease. The results were discussed at an Alzheimer’s conference Tuesday, and some were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Developing such a test has been a long-sought goal, and scientists warn that the new approach still needs more validation and is not yet ready for wide use.
But Tuesday’s results suggest they’re on the right track. The testing identified people with Alzheimer’s vs. no dementia or other types of it with accuracy ranging from 89% to 98%.
“That’s pretty good. We’ve never seen that” much precision in previous efforts, said Maria Carrillo, the Alzheimer’s Association’s chief science officer.
Dr. Eliezer Masliah, neuroscience chief at the U.S. National Institute on Aging, agreed.
“The data looks very encouraging,” he said. The new testing “appears to be even more sensitive and more reliable” than earlier methods, but it needs to be tried in larger, more diverse populations, he said.Living a healthy lifestyle can reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s or other dementia, even if you have a genetic risk, a large study found.The institute had no role in these studies but financed earlier, basic research toward blood test development.
Results were discussed at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference taking place online because of the coronavirus pandemic. Some results also were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
More than 5 million people in the United States and many more worldwide have Alzheimer’s. Current drugs only temporarily ease symptoms and do not slow mental decline.
The disease is usually diagnosed through tests of memory and thinking skills, but that’s very imprecise and usually involves a referral to a neurologist. More reliable methods such as spinal fluid tests and brain scans are invasive or expensive, so a simple blood test that could be done in a family doctor’s office would be a big advance.
Last year, scientists reported encouraging results from experimental blood tests that measure abnormal versions of amyloid, one of two proteins that build up and damage Alzheimer’s patients’ brains. The new work focuses on the other protein — tau — and finds that one form of it called p-tau217 is a more reliable indicator. Several companies and universities have developed experimental p-tau217 tests.
Dr. Oskar Hansson of Lund University in Sweden led a study of Eli Lilly’s test on more than 1,400 people already enrolled in dementia studies in Sweden, Arizona and Colombia. They included people with no impairment, mild impairment, Alzheimer’s and other neurological diseases.
The p-tau217 test outperformed a host of other measures for indicating which patients had Alzheimer’s as verified by brain scans. It also was comparable to the brain scans and some spinal tests in accuracy.
The Arizona portion of the study included 81 people who had donated their brains upon death, so researchers were able to show that blood testing while they were alive closely matched evidence of disease later.
The Colombia part of the study included people with a rare gene that virtually destines them to develop Alzheimer’s at a young age, typically in their 40s. In those with the gene, p-tau217 blood levels started to rise “around 20 years before symptoms,” Hansson said.
The study’s sponsors include the U.S. National Institutes of Health, Swedish government health groups, the Alzheimer’s Association, many foundations and several companies. Some study leaders work for Lilly or consult for the company.
Two other research groups independently reported evidence for p-tau217 testing at the conference.
Scientists at the University of California, San Francisco, found it helped distinguish people with Alzheimer’s from those with another neurological disease — frontotemporal lobar degeneration — with 96% accuracy in a study of 617 people.
Dr. Suzanne Schindler of Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, also found p-tau217 better than some other indicators for revealing which patients had plaques in the brain — the hallmark of Alzheimer’s.
“When patients come to me with changes in their memory and thinking, one of the major questions is, what’s the cause? Is it Alzheimer’s disease or is it something else?” she said. If tau testing bears out, “it would help us diagnose people earlier and more accurately.”
Schindler has already launched a larger study in a diverse population in St. Louis. Researchers have done the same in Sweden.
If benefits are confirmed, Masliah, Carrillo and others say they hope a commercial test would be ready for wide use in about two years.  

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Partial List of Emmy Nominees in Top Categories

07/28/2020 Arts 0

Partial list of nominees for the annual prime-time Emmy Awards, announced Tuesday by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. For the complete list, visit Emmys.com: Comedy series: “Curb Your Enthusiasm”; Dead to Me”; “The Good Place”; “Insecure”; “The Kominsky Method”; “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; “Schitt’s Creek”: “What We Do in the Shadows.” Actor, comedy series: Anthony Anderson, “black-ish”; Don Cheadle, “Black Monday”; Ted Danson, “The Good Place”; Michael Douglas, “The Kominsky Method”; Eugene Levy, “Schitt’s Creek”; Ramy Youssef, “Ramy.” Actress, comedy series: Christina Applegate, “Dead to Me;” Rachel Brosnahan, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel;” Linda Cardellini, “Dead to Me;” Catherine O’Hara, “Schitt’s Creek;” Issa Rae, “Insecure;” Tracee Ellis Ross, “black-ish.” Supporting actress, comedy: Yvonne Orji, “Insecure”; Alex Borstein, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Betty Gilpin, “GLOW”; Marin Hinkle, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Kate McKinnon, “Saturday Night Live”; Cecily Strong, “Saturday Night Live”; D’Arcy Carden, “The Good Place;” Annie Murphy, “Schitt’s Creek.” Supporting actor, comedy: Mahershala Ali, “Ramy”; Alan Arkin, “The Kominsky Method”; Sterling K. Brown, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Daniel Levy, “Schitt’s Creek”; Tony Shalhoub, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Kenan Thompson, “Saturday Night Live”; William Jackson, “The Good Place”; Andre Braugher, “Brooklyn Nine-Nine.” Drama series: “Better Call Saul”; “The Crown”; “Killing Eve”; “The Handmaid’s Tale”; “The Mandalorian”; “Ozark”; “Stranger Things”; “Succession.” Actor, drama series: Jason Bateman, “Ozark”; Sterling K. Brown, “This is Us”; Billy Porter, “Pose”; Jeremy Strong, “Succession”; Brian Cox, “Succession”; Steve Carell, “The Morning Show.” Actress, drama series: Jennifer Aniston, “The Morning Show”; Olivia Colman, “The Crown”; Jodie Comer, “Killing Eve”; Laura Linney, “Ozark”; Sandra Oh, “Killing Eve”; Zendaya, “Euphoria.” Supporting actor, drama series: Kieran Culkin, “Succession”; Billy Crudup, “The Morning Show”; Giancarlo Esposito, “Better Call Saul”; Bradley Whitford, “The Handmaid’s Tale”; Mark Duplass, “The Morning Show”; Nicholas Braun, “Succession”; Matthew Macfadyen, “Succession”; Jeffery Wright, “Westworld.” Supporting actress, drama series: Helena Bonham Carter, “The Crown”; Laura Dern, “Big Little Lies”; Julia Garner, “Ozark”; Thandie Newton, “Westworld”; Fiona Shaw, “Killing Eve”; Sarah Snook, “Succession”; Meryl Streep, “Big Little Lies”; Samira Wiley, “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Limited series: “Little Fires Everywhere”; “Mrs. America”; “Unbelievable”; “Unorthodox”; “Watchmen.” 
 

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Erdogan Seeks to Tame Social Media, Again 

07/28/2020 IT business 0

Turkey is poised to introduce drastic measures to control social media platforms.  The proposed legislation is drawing growing international criticism with social media remaining one of the few venues for dissent.  FILE – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan delivers a speech at the Bestepe National Congress and Culture Center in Ankara, July 21, 2020.Infuriated by tweets mocking his son in law and daughter, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, declared this month, the “immoral [social media] platforms” would be “completely banned or controlled.” Under new legislation set to pass before Eid holidays later this week, the likes of Facebook, Twitter, and Tik Tok will be compelled to open offices in Turkey by requiring them to assign representatives who would be subject to Turkish laws, including tax regulations. “It builds upon and expands upon the current regime of controls,” said Professor Yaman Akdeniz, co-founder of the Freedom of Expression Society, an advocacy group in Istanbul. Until now, the social media giants have resisted Ankara’s demands to open offices in Turkey. But in an innovative approach, proposed legislation uses the threat of ending net neutrality to force compliance. New attempt to control Social media platforms that fail to comply face cuts of up to 95% of their Internet bandwidth, making them unusable. “This is well thought out legislation on the government’s part,” said Akdeniz. Previous attempts by Erdogan to tame social media have failed. Despite over 400,000 web pages banned and thousands of people prosecuted for social media postings, the Internet remains a powerful venue for dissent and independent news.Internet tools like Virtual Private Networks, VPN, and proxies are widely used in Turkey to circumvent website bans. A three-year ban on Wikipedia was so widely flouted the government capitulated and lifted the restrictions. But controlling bandwidth could be more effective than blocking websites. “This will be a very serious restriction which may not be easy to bypass with alternative ways,” said Akdeniz. “Turkey’s attempt to restrict access to social media platforms should not be underestimated.” Turkish authorities usually temporarily cut bandwidth to curtail social media use, in the aftermath of major terror attacks.  In what appears to be a new coordinated approach, the government’s Internet regulators have been stepping up their efforts to curtail the use of VPN and proxies. “A considerable number of VPN services are already blocked from Turkey, and more will be blocked,” said Akdeniz. Devlet Bahceli, leader of the far-right Nationalist Movement Party, MHP, the parliamentary coalition partner of Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party, AKP, called for efforts to be stepped up to end the use of VPN and proxies.  Using tax laws The president’s director of communications, Fahrettin Altun, says the new legislation is about holding the social media giants financially accountable, accusing them of “uncontrollably making profits in our country and continue their operations immune to any tax obligations.” The European Union is also calling on social media companies to be more financially accountable. In a statement released this month, the EU commission unveiled plans “that extends EU tax transparency rules to digital platforms.” But there is growing international concern over Ankara’s plans. “If passed the new law will enable the government to control social media, to get content removed at will, and to arbitrarily target individual users,” said Tom Porteous, deputy program director at the New York-based Human Rights Watch. “Social media is a lifeline for many people who use it to access news, so this law signals a new dark era of online censorship.” Until now, social media platforms have walked a tightrope by complying with some — but not all — Turkish regulatory authority demands to remove sites and ban users. But under the proposed reforms, failure to comply would result in substantial fines that they would be obliged to pay if they open an office in Turkey. “If the social media platforms decide to establish offices in Turkey,” said Akdeniz, “then they will be compelled to remove the content as well as close down accounts subject to blocking and removal decisions involving defamation as well as other so-called personal rights violations.” Twitter, Facebook, or Tik Tok  have so far commented on the proposed legislation, but analysts believe the companies have plenty of reason to oppose it.  Lucrative market Turkey’s young net-savvy population is seen as a lucrative market for the social media giants. FILE – People wearing face masks to protect against the spread of coronavirus, walk a in popular shopping street, in Ankara, Turkey, June 27, 2020.The growing popularity of social media as an alternative to mainstream media, most of which is under government control, is seen as Erdogan’s primary motivation behind the pending legislation. “Even members of the AKP and MHP constituencies consider social media as their primary source of information,” said analyst Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners.  “One of the main reasons Erdogan could make so many mistakes and still stay in power is because he controls the flow of information reaching his entire voting segment, now he realizes those days have gone. People have moved to an alternative medium which he has no control,” added Yesilada. With the Turkish economy hit by the COVID 19 pandemic, recent opinion polls suggest Erdogan’s AKP’s popularity is at historic lows, even though it remains the most popular party with Turkey’s fractured opposition.  The proposed law opens the door to revamping Erdogan’s and his party’s image. “News websites, as well as social media platforms, will be compelled to remove content from their servers and news archives,” said Akdeniz. “The idea behind this is to cleanse AKP’s and the government’s past injustices, corruption, and irregularity allegations.” Yesilada warns that even if the latest reforms succeed, the Turkish leader could yet pay a high price. “We have ample survey evidence that the young generation are hooked to social media, and they already have a poor view of Mr. Erdogan and his politics. Controlling social media will completely turn them off the AKP and Mr. Erdogan.” 

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Can You Get the Coronavirus Twice?

07/28/2020 Science 0

Is it possible to get the coronavirus more than once?  Scientists don’t know for sure yet, but they believe it’s unlikely.  Health experts think people who had COVID-19 will have some immunity against a repeat infection. But they don’t know how much protection or how long it would last.  There have been reports of people testing positive for the virus weeks after they were believed to have recovered, leading some to think they may have been reinfected. More likely, experts say, people were suffering from the same illness or the tests detected remnants of the original infection. There’s also the chance that tests could have been false positives.  Scientists say there has been no documented instance of a patient spreading the virus to others after retesting positive.  With similar viruses, studies have shown that people could fall sick again three months to a year after their first infections. It’s still too early to know whether that’s also possible with the coronavirus.  “It’s very much emerging science,” said Dr. Philip Landrigan, director of the global public health program at Boston College.  A small U.S. study published last week also found the antibodies that fight the coronavirus may last only a few months in people with mild illness, suggesting people could become susceptible again. But antibodies aren’t the only defense against a virus, and the other parts of the immune system could also help provide protection.  Settling the question of whether reinfection is possible is important. If it can occur, that could undermine the idea of “immunity passports” for returning back to workplaces. And it would not bode well for hopes of getting a long-lasting vaccine. 

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Stakes High as Depp’s Libel Case Against UK Tabloid Closes

07/28/2020 Arts 0

Johnny Depp’s libel case against a British tabloid that accused him of abusing ex-wife Amber Heard was wrapping up Tuesday after three weeks of court hearings that dissected a toxic celebrity love affair.
The “Pirates of the Caribbean” star is suing News Group Newspapers, publisher of The Sun, and the newspaper’s executive editor, Dan Wootton, at the High Court in London over an April 2018 article that called him a “wife-beater.”  
In closing arguments, Depp’s lawyer, David Sherborne, said the actor strongly denied “this reputation-destroying, career-ending allegation.”
Once Sherborne is finished, judge Andrew Nicol will retire to sift claim and counterclaim as he considers his verdict. He is expected to hand down his ruling in several weeks.What Is The Judge Deciding?
Neither Depp nor Heard is on trial, though it has been easy to forget that during a case that raked over messy details of the couple’s volatile relationship.
Depp is the claimant in the civil case, NGN and Wootton are the defendants and Heard is their main witness. To defeat Depp’s libel claim, the newspaper must persuade the judge that, on the balance of probabilities, its story was accurate.
NGN’s lawyer, Sasha Wass, said in her summing-up that there was no doubt Depp “regularly and systematically abused his wife” and so the “wife-beater” label was justified.
But Sherborne said The Sun’s article — which urged J.K. Rowling to have Depp fired from the movie version of her book “Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them” — gave the false impression Depp had been “tried, convicted and sentenced” for domestic violence.
“Acting as both judge and jury, the defendants plainly and squarely state that Mr. Depp is guilty (of a) series of serious and violent criminal offenses,” he said.What Is In Dispute?
The two sides agree that the relationship between Depp and Heard, which began after they met on the set of 2011 comedy “The Rum Diary,” soured long before they divorced in 2017. Texts, emails and recordings attest to the increasingly bitter relations between Depp, now 57, and the 34-year-old model and actress.
But they disagree completely over who started and escalated their fights.
Depp denies Heard’s claim of 14 separate incidents in which he allegedly hit, slapped and shoved her, pulled her hair and threw bottles at her “like grenades.” The judge was shown photos of Heard with black eyes, red marks on her face and an injured scalp — alleged evidence of Depp’s violence.
Depp said the photos were part of a “dossier” of fake evidence and claimed that Heard hit him, even severing the tip of his finger with a thrown vodka bottle. Under cross-examination Depp admitted headbutting Heard during a tussle, but said it was by accident as he tried to stop her punching him.
Heard acknowledged having a short temper and said she punched Depp once in March 2015. But she said it was to prevent him hitting her sister.What Have We Learned?
The trial has provided an up-close and often unflattering look at Hollywood stardom, revealing details of Depp’s life of wealth, luxury, emotional turmoil and substance abuse.
Mark Stephens, a media lawyer at law firm Howard Kennedy, said the sensational case “has all of the hallmarks of the Roman arena.”
“People will remember this case not for the results, but for the evidence — the rather nasty, gory evidence — that was involved,” he said.
The settings for the disintegrating relationship were as glamorous as the allegations were sordid. The alleged assaults took place on Depp’s private island in the Bahamas, a Los Angeles penthouse, a luxury train and a private jet.
Depp said in the witness box that he had made $650 million since he joined the lucrative “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise — and ended up $100 million in debt after his financial advisers neglected to pay his taxes for 17 years. Friends described Depp as a generous big spender, and he said he’d spent $5 million sending the ashes of his literary hero, drug-fueled journalist Hunter S. Thompson, into space.  
Whichever spouse was to blame, the relationship left a trail of destruction. Damage to a rented house in Australia where the couple had an altercation was estimated at more than $100,000. The couple’s downtown L.A. penthouse was trashed during another argument.
The low point of the relationship, according to Depp, came when excrement was found in a bed at the penthouse. Heard blamed one of the couple’s two Yorkshire terriers, but Depp suspected Heard or one of her friends was to blame.Who Are The Winners And Losers?
British libel law is widely considered to favor claimants over defendants, but Depp could end up a loser even if he wins.
Depp said he sued The Sun because his career had been harmed by Heard’s allegations. But the case has amplified the claims for millions of people around the world, whatever the judge ends up deciding.
“It almost beggars belief that anyone rational has taken this case to court,” Stephens said. “Now, I know that many people say it’s all about vindication. It’s all about proving he’s not a wife beater. But the stakes are very, very high for everybody. And at some level, mud sticks.”
Heard also has had her character questioned and has been accused of fabricating evidence. She was accused by a #MeToo activist, Katherine Kendall, of appropriating a violent rape that happened to Kendall for her own ends.
The most likely winners are Wass and Sherborne, tough lawyers who both made strong cases for their clients. Sherborne also has a starring role in another big celebrity trial — he’s representing the Duchess of Sussex in her lawsuit against the Mail on Sunday newspaper over publication of a private letter she sent to her father Thomas Markle.Will The Verdict Be The End Of The Story?
Not likely. Depp is suing Heard for $50 million in Virginia over a Washington Post story about domestic violence. The trial is due to be held next year.
Stephens said that if Depp “loses in London, he’s almost certain to lose that American case. So this is in some ways a dress rehearsal for the second case.”

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Scientists Develop Material that Repairs Itself

07/28/2020 Science 0

Inspired by the pandemic-induced need for durable, clean face masks and other personal protection equipment to prevent the spread of COVID-19, researchers may have developed a biosynthetic polymer material that repairs itself by synthesizing a protein found in squids.A study published Monday in the science journal Nature Materials reports on an international team of researchers from Germany, Turkey, and Penn State University in the United States. It describes how they were able to transform unique proteins found in squid teeth into a soft, biodegradable material that could be used to develop so-called “soft robots” and tear-resistant personal protective equipment (PPE).Self-repairing materials are not a new thing, but researchers say the existing materials can take up to 24-hours to “heal” and when they do, they tend to not be as strong as the original. But the lead author of this latest study, Abdon Pena-Francesch, said they were able to reduce “a typical 24-hour healing period to one second.”He said, “In nature, self-healing takes a long time. In this sense, our technology outsmarts nature.” The researchers say their material also reproduces itsself back to 100 percent of its original strength.Co-author of the study Melik Demirel says the materials regenerative properties have to be activated by adding water or pressure, but they envision the process could be activated using light.Along with PPE, researchers say their material has applications in any product that puts materials under continual repetitive motion that might develop tiny tears and cracks and eventually break. This might include industrial robotic arms or prosthetic legs.  Demirel says the material not only provides performance, but it also is biodegradable, meaning it quickly and cleanly dissolves in nature. That means, he says, the future of masks and ventilators could be green as well. 

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Twitter Deletes Tweet by Donald Trump Jr, Limits His Account

07/28/2020 IT business 0

Twitter has limited Donald Trump Jr.’s account and deleted one of his tweets for violating Twitter’s COVID-19 misinformation policies.  The tweet, posted on Monday, had what Twitter termed a misleading video on the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine.  An adviser to Trump Jr., Andrew Surabian, tweeted an angry response, in which he said that Trump Jr.’s account had been suspended, adding that “big tech is the biggest threat to free expression in America.”  He added in a statement to Business Insider that Twitter’s action is evidence that “the company is committing election interference to stifle Republican votes.”BREAKING: @Twitter & @jack have suspended @DonaldJTrumpJr for posting a viral video of medical doctors talking about Hydroxychloroquine.Big Tech is the biggest threat to free expression in America today & they’re continuing to engage in open election interference – full stop. pic.twitter.com/7dJbauq43O— Andrew Surabian (@Surabees) July 28, 2020A Twitter spokesman said that the account was not suspended, and instead “Twitter required the tweet to be deleted because it violated our rules” and they merely limited “some account functionality for 12 hours.”  Under limited account functionality, Trump Jr.’s account remains visible and he is able to browse Twitter, but during the 12 hours he is not able to tweet, retweet, or like anything on the micro-blogging platform.

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WHO Says COVID-19 Threatens Gains on Hepatitis

07/28/2020 Science 0

The World Health Organization warns that the COVID-19 pandemic is threatening gains made in eliminating Hepatitis B and C, which cause liver damage and liver cancer.  In observance of World Hepatitis Day Tuesday, the WHO is calling for action to stop transmission of viral hepatitis from mother-to-child. Around 325 million people globally live with hepatitis B or C and an estimated one-point-three million people die of this viral disease each year.  The World Health Organization reports the proportion of children under age five chronically infected with hepatitis B has dropped from five percent to under one percent since the 1980s.  This, thanks to the availability of a safe and effective vaccine.WHO Director-General, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus considers this a big achievement.  He says progress toward the elimination of the disease is being made in Asia where childhood hepatitis B immunization coverage is high.“However, progress is being hampered by low coverage of hepatitis B vaccine in some regions, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, where many children still miss out on the all-important vaccine dose at birth,” Tedros said. “One of the most significant challenges we face in eliminating hepatitis B is mother-to-children transmission.” 
 FILE – Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO) Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus speaks during a news conference in Geneva, Switzerland.Tedros says inoculating children at birth is the most important strategy for controlling the disease and saving lives.   He says children who are immunized against the virus will protect future generations from becoming sick and dying from liver damage and liver cancer.To mark World Hepatitis Day, the WHO is issuing new guidelines for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of hepatitis B.  Tedros sees the implementation of the new guidelines as an important stepping-stone on the road to hepatitis elimination.  But, he warns, that road has been made harder by COVID-19.“Services for prevention, testing and treatment have been disrupted, supply chains are being interrupted, limited financial and human resources are being diverted and the political focus has shifted to containing the pandemic and economic recovery,” Tedros said. “All of which means there is a real risk we could lose the gains we have made.” The WHO warns high levels of disruptions of both the birth dose and childhood hepatitis B immunization would likely result in five-point-three million additional chronic infections among children born in the next decade, leading to a million related deaths.  Health officials are urging governments to act now to ensure young children receive this life-saving vaccine to prevent new long-lasting hepatitis B infections.

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Cameroon Dispatches Healthcare Workers to Find, Treat Hepatitis Patients

07/28/2020 Science 0

Healthcare workers in Cameroon are marking World Hepatitis Day (July 28), to raise awareness of the virus, which causes inflammation of the liver and kills about 300 people per day in Sub-Saharan Africa.  While global coverage of a birth dose vaccine for Hepatitis B is 43%, according to the World Health Organization, only 6% receive it in the WHO’s African Region, which does not include Egypt, Eritrea, Libya, Somalia, or Sudan.  In Cameroon, health officials have begun dispatching healthcare workers to find hep B patients who are avoiding treatment and getting the vaccine for their newborns.Farmer Valerie Mbappe, 52, said she was diagnosed with hepatitis in April.But she was reluctant to go to a doctor because her uncle told her she should be treated by a traditional healer.After going to the healer, Mbappe’s abdominal pain, fatigue and fever have gotten worse.She said now that she knows that she can be treated at the hospital, her advice is that people should not be reluctant to visit health facilities for their hepatitis screening.  She said she was told by the nurse that she should stop drinking and smoking heavily because it may lead to complications during her treatment.Mbappe was brought to the General Hospital in Yaoundé by members of SOS Hepatitis, a charity group that helps patients seek treatment.Spokesman for the group Samuel Yamissi said the efforts are part of this year’s World Hepatitis Day activities, marked annually on July 28.He said their main target is the majority of patients who refuse to go to hospitals and prefer traditional treatments.Everyone who tests positive for hepatitis can get help from his group and the government, said Yamissi.  He said those who test negative will be given their first dose of the hepatitis vaccine. People who take the first dose of the vaccine should come for the second dose after three months and the last dose after six months, said Yamissi, to be free of the disease.In 2019 Cameroon reported 12,000 new cases of hepatitis B, up from 9,600 in 2018.But Cameroon’s Ministry of Health says 13 percent of people are living with hepatitis B in the country of 25 million.Despite the high rate of infection, the ministry says less than 1,500 Cameroonians are receiving treatment.The Ministry of Health’s Dr. Simon Eyong treats hepatitis B patients.He said to encourage patients to go to hospitals, the government reduced the cost of treatment from $250 per month to less than $50.”Since it is a slow killer disease, which symptoms only appear when it has already reached its climax, get tested, get vaccinated.  Keep away from unprescribed medications like anti-inflammatories like Paracetamol,” said Eyong.Cameroon’s 360 government hospitals this year for the first-time dispatched health workers to track patients and ensure they get their treatments and vaccines.The health ministry’s Dr. Abdoulaye Sajo said the government also targets birth dose hepatitis vaccines for newborns.He spoke via telephone from the northern town of Garoua.Sajo said the government has given firm instructions that all newly born babies, all mothers, and all pregnant women should be screened and vaccinated against hepatitis B. He said the government has also given instructions that everyone tested positive should be treated immediately.  The only challenge they have, said Sajo, is meeting the so many mothers who never visit hospitals and prefer to deliver at home.Only 35 percent of Cameroon’s 25 million people visit hospitals.Others rely on traditional healers and only go to hospitals when their health becomes critical. 

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New York Concert Investigated for COVID-19 Rules Violations

07/28/2020 Arts 0

New York state authorities are opening an investigation into a drive-in concert by the musical group the Chainsmokers on Long Island this weekend that did not appear to be adhering to COVID-19 social distancing guidelines.The Saturday concert, which might have had an audience of thousands of people, was intended as a benefit, with proceeds going to charity and took place in the town of Southampton.New York Governor Andrew Cuomo tweeted Monday that videos of the concert “show egregious social distancing violations. I am appalled.” He added that, “The Department of Health will conduct an investigation” and “we have no tolerance for the illegal and reckless endangerment of public health.”The concert, according to its event page, was intended to be a socially-distanced drive-in event with a maximum of 600 vehicles. Attendees were supposed to stay within a certain distance of their car and leave only to use the restroom, in which case they were required to wear a mask.But various clips from the concert show large groups of people standing shoulder to shoulder, many without masks.All non-essential gatherings of over 50 people are banned in New York, with a fine of up to $1,000.New York State Health Commissioner Dr. Howard Zucker sent a letter on Monday about the concert to Southampton Town Supervisor Jay Schneiderman. In his letter, Zucker said he was “greatly disturbed” by reports of “thousands of people in close proximity, out of their vehicles, a VIP area where there was no pretense of a vehicle, and generally not adhering to social distancing guidance.”He added that he did not know why the concert was “allowed to continue when it became clear violations were rampant.”The U.S. has had over 140,000 COVID-19 deaths. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends social distancing and wearing a mask to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
 

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Small Business Uses Technology to Stay Afloat During Pandemic

07/28/2020 IT business 0

The coronavirus pandemic has forced small businesses around the world to come up with new ways to cope with the new reality – including using technology to stay afloat.   VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo reports.

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Potential US COVID-19 Vaccines Enter Final Phase of Human Testing

07/28/2020 Science 0

Widescale testing began Monday in the United States on two potential COVID-19 vaccines to determine their safety and effectiveness.   A volunteer in Savannah, Georgia early Monday morning received the first dose of an experimental vaccine manufactured by U.S.-based biotech firm Moderna and developed by researchers at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.  The volunteer is the first of 30,000 healthy people around the country who will receive two doses of the vaccine over the next several weeks in a late-stage phase of the study to see whether people get infected or sick from COVID-19.   An earlier phase of the study discovered that while none of the volunteers experienced a serious side effect from the new vaccine, more than half reported mild or moderate reactions such as fatigue, headaches, chills, muscle aches and pain at the injection site.    Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told reporters Monday that the first results of the late-stage trial of the vaccine may be known by as early as November.  If the trial is successful, Moderna will produce 500 million doses a year, with the hopes of making 1 billion doses annually beginning in 2021.   Development of the Moderna/NIAI vaccine is part of President Donald Trump’s Operation Warp Speed initiative, which is aimed at delivering 300 million doses of an approved vaccine by January.  Moderna has received nearly $1 billion in funding from the program, including $472 million committed just on Sunday to support the late-stage testing phase.Nurse Kathe Olmstead prepares a shot as the world’s biggest study of a possible COVID-19 vaccine, developed by the National Institutes of Health and Moderna Inc., gets underway, July 27, 2020, in Binghamton, N.Y.The second experimental vaccine, made by U.S.-based Pfizer in collaboration with Germany-based BioNTech SE, will also be given to 30,000 people across the United States, Brazil, Argentina and Germany.  Pfizer, which is conducting its research independent of Operation Warp Speed, has received a $1.95 billion commitment to produce 100 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine if it proves to be safe and effective. Researchers on both projects are relying on a new process called messenger RNA to improve the efficacy of their respective vaccines.  Messenger RNA, or mRNA for short, tricks the body into producing a similar protein found in COVID-19, which the immune system sees as foreign and learns to recognize. The immune system would then be prepared to protect the body if the person is exposed to the real virus.   Utilizing Messenger RNA has yet to result in the production of any new vaccines, but it has the potential, more than current methods, to quicken the process.   “Having a safe and effective vaccine distributed by the end of 2020 is a stretch goal, but it’s the right goal for the American people,” Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, told reporters Monday.  Dr. Collins said the government is seeking volunteers from groups who have been the most affected by COVID-19, including African Americans, Hispanics, Native Americans and the elderly.   He also insisted that safety is not being compromised despite the fast pace of development.   The two potential COVID-19 vaccines are among the nearly 150 being developed around the world that are in various stages of testing.  Three more new vaccines   developed, respectively, by U.S.-based biotech firm Novavax, pharmaceutical giant Johnson and Johnson, and a joint collaboration between Britain’s University of Oxford and U.S.-based AstraZeneca will soon enter late-stage testing also involving 30,000 participants.  All three companies are taking part in the Trump Administration’s Operation Warp Speed. More than 16.4 million infections have been reported around the world, including over 654,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University statistics.     The United States leads the world in the number of confirmed cases with more than 4.2 million, including 148,011 deaths. 

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Hawaii Dodges Hurricane Douglas

07/27/2020 Science 0

Much of Hawaii was spared when Hurricane Douglas passed just north of Oahu, Maui and the island of Hawaii, also known as the Big Island, early Monday. The Category 1 storm was on what forecasters had called a “dangerously close” path, but the islands managed to “dodge the bullet” as one police chief put it, when the storm veered slightly away from its forecast path. No severe damage has been reported from Douglas’ heavy rain and fierce winds. But the threat to Hawaii is not totally over. Hurricane warnings are out for some parts of the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument – a World Heritage site described as “cluster of small, low lying islands and atolls” – northwest of the main Hawaiian Islands. Tropical storm warnings and watches have been issued for other parts of Papahānaumokuākea, which is the largest contiguous fully protected conservation area in the U.S., and one of the largest marine conservation areas in the world, encompassing 1,508,870 square kilometers of the Pacific Ocean. As of Monday afternoon, Hawaiian time, Douglas was still a dangerous storm with top sustained winds of 130 kilometers per hour but is forecast to weaken Tuesday into Wednesday.  

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Trump Wears Mask, Voices Hope for Coronavirus Vaccine

07/27/2020 Science 0

For the second time, U.S. President Donald Trump has been photographed wearing a mask amid the coronavirus pandemic.  Trump wore the face covering as he toured a North Carolina laboratory where key components are being manufactured for a COVID-19 vaccine developed by Novavax. “I trust all Americans to do the right thing, but we strongly advise everyone to especially, especially focus on maintaining a social distance, maintain a rigorous hygiene, avoid crowded gatherings and indoor bars and wear masks when appropriate,” Trump told a group of reporters traveling with him just before his tour of the Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies Innovation Center. “Nothing’s happened like this since the end of World War II,” the president said of the billions of dollars being spent in the global race to produce and mass deploy a vaccine in record time.  Before the tour of the plant, Trump spoke to several dozen North Carolina politicians, scientists, White House officials, journalists and Secret Service agents; Trump was the only person not wearing a mask.  The president, who has faced criticism for what is perceived as a belated and inadequate response by the federal government to the coronavirus pandemic, said the U.S. states “largely had what they needed” but that all of them “are not out of the woods.”  Trump defended his administration’s response to the pandemic, despite the U.S. reporting the largest number of coronavirus cases and deaths in the world.  “We report our cases. Most of the world doesn’t,” Trump said.  The United States has conducted more than 52 million tests, the president said, adding, “nobody’s even close.”  President Donald Trump wears a face mask as he participates in a tour of Bioprocess Innovation Center at Fujifilm Diosynth Biotechnologies, July 27, 2020, in Morrisville, North Carolina.Trump said U.S. officials are monitoring caseloads in Latin America, a region of particular concern.  “You have some very, very highly infected countries outside of our borders,” he said.  The mortality rate for U.S. COVID-19 patients older than 18 is 85% lower than it was in April, according to the president, giving credit to better therapies and improved knowledge about the coronavirus.  In the past week, the disease killed more than 1,000 Americans a day for five straight days, according to the Vice President Mike Pence, center, gestures as he speaks during a news conference with FDA Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn, left, and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, right, at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, July 27, 2020.While Trump was in North Carolina, Vice President Mike Pence was in Miami, where clinical trials of another vaccine jointly developed by the National Institutes of Health and Moderna Inc. began Monday.   “It’s a historic day, a day when we begin in earnest to work on a vaccine,” Pence said.  Some health experts say it sometimes can take years for a safe, effective vaccine against a disease to be successfully developed.  Food and Drug Administration chief Dr. Stephen Hahn was with Pence in Miami and told reporters the FDA “will not cut corners” to evaluate a vaccine.  Several other countries are also working on developing a COVID-19 vaccine.  

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Coronavirus Sidelines US Baseball’s Miami Marlins  

07/27/2020 Arts 0

Major League Baseball last week opened its sharply curtailed season nearly four months late because of the coronavirus pandemic. Now one team, the Miami Marlins, has been hit with an outbreak of infections. The Marlins played a three-game weekend series in the eastern city of Philadelphia but canceled its Monday night home opener in Miami against the Baltimore Orioles when eight more players and two coaches tested positive for the coronavirus. The new infections brought the total on the Marlins team to least 14 in recent days. The team stayed in Philadelphia Sunday night as it weighed health precautions. In addition, the Phillies, the Philadelphia team that played the Marlins, called off their Monday night game at home against the New York Yankees. Major League Baseball cut its normal 162-game regular season schedule to 60 games and started the season with empty stadiums in hopes of averting a widespread health disaster. Some reserve players have been sitting in the stands to give their teammates ample room to socially distance in the dugouts. Even so, several star players have contracted the coronavirus, including Freddie Freeman of the Atlanta Braves and Juan Soto of the Washington Nationals, the 2019 World Series champions. Some coaches, players and on-field umpires have been wearing face masks during the opening games. The Toronto Blue Jays were banned by Canadian authorities from playing at its home field. The Canadian government balked at allowing U.S.-based teams from repeatedly crossing the border when it has already blocked U.S. tourists from entering the country. Toronto Blue Jays’ Brandon Drury celebrates with Danny Jansenafter scoring on a two run single by Bo Bichette off Tampa Bay Rays relief pitcher Andrew Kittredge during the sixth inning of a baseball game, July 26, 2020, in Petersburg, Fla.Two other U.S.-dominated professional sports leagues, the National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League, have opened training camps and hope to restart their seasons in the next few days after halting play for four months. All basketball games are being played in Orlando, Florida, rather than at the normal home arenas of each team, while all hockey games are all being played at arenas in two Canadian cities, Toronto and Edmonton. The National Football League is opening training camps this week but has already canceled the usual four exhibition games each team plays in August in advance of the start of the regular season in September.
   

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Kenyans Urged to Treat Pandemic Stress

07/27/2020 Science 0

 Kenya’s Ministry of Health says the number of mental health cases have jumped dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the country’s mental health taskforce, 25% of coronavirus outpatients and 40% of in-hospital patients suffer from mental health issues such as depression. But more Kenyans are seeking help and speaking up about it. Mohammed Yusuf reports.Camera: Mohammed Yusuf   
Producer:  Rod James 

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Study: Climate, Population Density Key to Mosquitoes Biting People

07/27/2020 Science 0

A new study suggests dry climates and dense human populations are key factors in how mosquitoes have evolved to bite people.Noting that only a handful of the 3,500 species of mosquito feeds on human blood, researchers at Princeton University set out to determine why certain mosquitoes feed on humans. The World Health Organization named mosquitoes one of the deadliest animals on Earth, citing their ability to carry and spread disease.The team studied a variety of mosquito — Aedes aegypti — known to carry ailments that include the Zika virus and dengue fever — and collected samples from 27 sites in sub-Saharan Africa. Through genetic analysis, they found mosquitoes became more likely to feed on humans as population grew denser or more urbanized. This was only in regions with a significant dry season.Authors of the study, published recently in the scientific journal Current Biology, found that during dry seasons, mosquitoes may rely more on water stored by people.The researchers also learned that the preference for feeding on people was the result of specific genetic changes in mosquitoes, meaning they evolved to specifically target humans.They noted that in the areas where the mosquito samples were taken in sub-Saharan Africa urbanization is happening quickly. This could lead to more mosquito bites in many African cities over the next 30 years. The researchers suggest having people in cities make sure their water supplies are well-managed, clean, and not left open to air to help fight off the growing mosquito threat.

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Google Employees to Work from Home Until 2021

07/27/2020 IT business 0

Google employees will work from home until summer 2021 due to COVID-19 concerns, the company announced Monday.The decision affects almost 200,000 employees worldwide, including full-time and contract workers, making Google the first large U.S. company to keep its employees working remotely for over a year.The company stated earlier that most of its employees would work from home for the rest of 2020.The choice to extend remote work into next year could cause other businesses to announce similar plans.Google Chief Executive Officer Sundar Pichai made the choice after debating options with an internal group of executives. According to someone familiar with the situation, Pichai’s decision was influenced by employees with children, many of whom are facing the possibility of online school this year.”To give employees the ability to plan ahead, we’ll be extending our global voluntary work-from-home option through June 30, 2021, for roles that don’t need to be in the office,” Pichai told employees in a memo. “I hope this will offer the flexibility you need to balance work with taking care of yourselves and your loved ones over the next 12 months.” 

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Bollywood Star Aishwarya Rai Bachchan Returns Home After Testing Negative for COVID-19

07/27/2020 Arts 0

Bollywood star and former Miss World Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and her 8-year-old daughter have been discharged from a hospital after testing negative for COVID-19, Aishwarya’s husband Abhishek wrote on Twitter.  
 
Abhishek also wrote that he and his father, legendary actor Amitabh Bachchan, remained in the hospital over two weeks after they first tested positive.Thank you all for your continued prayers and good wishes. Indebted forever. 🙏🏽 Aishwarya and Aaradhya have thankfully tested negative and have been discharged from the hospital. They will now be at home. My father and I remain in hospital under the care of the medical staff.— Abhishek Bachchan (@juniorbachchan) July 27, 2020Amitabh Bachchan, who has starred in over 200 Indian films since the early 1970s, tweeted July 11 that he had tested positive for the coronavirus.   
 
He has been a prominent figure in India’s campaign to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus, filming ads about wearing masks and appealing to citizens to stay home.  
 
Still, despite enforcing one of the strictest lockdowns in the world earlier this year, India’s case numbers of COVID-19 are rising.   
 
India has reported over 1,435,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19, the third highest case number in the world following the United States and Brazil.
 

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Technology Works Behind the Scenes to Keep US Mail-in Voting Secure

07/27/2020 IT business 0

It’s going to be a record year for voting by mail in the U.S. election and that has raised security concerns about each step of the process.  
 
But election officials say they have systems in place to make voting by mail a success even as health concerns about voting during the COVID-19 pandemic is pushing states to expand their current vote-by-mail options.
 
“Somewhere between 90 million and 105 million ballots might come through the mail,” said Eddie Perez, global director of technology development at the OSET Institute, a nonprofit election technology organization. “If what we’re seeing in other primary elections is any guide, it’s probably safe to estimate that somewhere between 65% and 75% of all ballots cast in the November election might come by mail.”
“That’s a very, very significant volume of mail,” he added.
 
To get an idea of how significant, the share of voters who cast ballots via mail-in methods increased nearly threefold between 1996 and 2016 – from 7.8% to nearly 21%, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of the Census Bureau’s voter supplement data. Of course, the total number of voters in each election wasn’t the same, and isn’t known for 2020, so the comparison is imprecise. But the leap from nearly 21% to 75% or even 65% of all votes coming by mail is significant.
 
Numerous logistical and security challenges must be met to make sure voting by mail goes smoothly. Of particular concern is the security of states’ voter registration databases, which could be a rich target for hackers.  
 
Still, election experts say that the mail-in voting process has checks throughout, enhanced by technology and election software, starting with the ballot sent to the voter.  
 
“Sometimes you hear talk as if blank ballots are simply being sent out into the world almost willy-nilly without control,” Perez said. “And that’s simply not the case. There’s always a tight association between a voter whose eligibility has already been verified and the step of actually sending that voter a ballot.”  Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 7 MB480p | 11 MB540p | 15 MB720p | 28 MB1080p | 50 MBOriginal | 67 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioRunning digital traps
 
Once the voter mails in or drops off the ballot, the county’s voting software system goes to work. Digital scanners take images of the ballot envelope to make sure the voter’s signature on the outside matches the one the county has on file. Barcoded information on the ballots is scanned and cross-referenced with the voter registration record.  
 
“The county always knows who has been issued a ballot, is that indeed an eligible voter, is every single ballot received coming from an eligible voter,” Perez said. “Once those traps have been run, there’s a critical process verifying that the ballot and the voter’s name on the ballot actually came from the voter.”  
 
A digital scanner scans the ballots and counting begins. Any anomaly – a missing or wrong signature, a stray mark – is sent to a team to review.   
 
Neal Kelley is the registrar of voters for Orange County, California. He expects to start processing mailed-in ballots 30 days before the official election day.  
 
“There’s multiple times those ballots run through that automation because it’s like a factory floor,” he said. “It’s quality control standards, because we have to look at the signature more closely.”  
 
Voters can track their ballot’s progress, much like the way they can track a package being delivered – via text messages or a ballot tracking app, Kelley said.  
 
“It actually gives you more data than your Amazon package,” he said. FILE – Mail-in ballots for the 2016 U.S. general election are seen at the Salt Lake County Government Center, in Salt Lake City, Utah, Nov. 1, 2016.Uncounted mail-in ballots
 
But voting by mail isn’t a panacea. Not all who vote get their ballots counted. In California’s March 2020 primary, about 100,000 mail-in ballots – about 1.5% of the 7 million turned in – did not get counted, according to the Associated Press.
 
Common problems with mail-in ballots include those mailed too late, voters failing to sign ballot envelopes and voters’ signatures not matching the ones the county has on file.  
 
Reforms around the country have addressed these problems. This year, California has extended the window for when mail ballots need to arrive to be counted: 17 days after Election Day. If there is a problem with a ballot, such as problem matching the ballot’s signature with the one on file, counties must contact voters to see if they can fix the problem.  
 
But even with those reforms, Kim Alexander, president and founder of the California Voter Foundation, said she worries about one group – young and new voters.  
 
“They have three strikes against them,” she said. “They are unfamiliar with voting. They are not very familiar with how the U.S. Postal Service works. And they’re not used to making a signature. They don’t write checks. They don’t sign checks. So you put all those three together, and it means we have a lot of outreach and education work.”
 
That’s what election officials are doing now, racing the clock, checking voter registrations, sending mailers to get the word out about how to vote by mail.  
 
Not everything will go smoothly, they say, and the public may have to be patient. Election results may not be known for weeks, perhaps not until early December.  
 

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UK’s Johnson Urges Britons to Shed Weight

07/27/2020 Science 0

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is urging citizens to exercise and shed weight, saying he has done so since his recovery earlier this year from COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.  The prime minister’s office introduced a “Better Health” campaign Monday and released a video of himself walking his dog and talking up the benefits of regular exercise.Johnson said at the peak of his illness, when he was taken into the intensive care unit to be treated for COVID-19, he was way overweight. Since he returned from the hospital, Johnson said he started running, which has become easier for him and that he has lost more than six kilograms.Johnson’s advice comes after a recent report from Public Health England showing the overweight and obese are at greater risk for severe illness and of death from COVID-19.  The prime minister said losing weight and becoming fit would also protect the National Health Service from becoming overwhelmed with patients.Johnson said he doesn’t want to be excessively “bossy or nannying” about losing weight, because he understands the struggles many people have with doing so. He said he just wants to be helpful.  As part of the “Better Health” campaign, Johnson’s government will fight the “obesity time bomb” by banning advertising of junk food before 9.00 p.m., ending “buy one get one free” deals and putting calories on menus.  Government data show more than 60% of British citizens are overweight as is one in three children. The data indicate overweight children are five times more likely to become overweight adults.Losing weight is hard but with some small changes we can all feel fitter and healthier.If we all do our bit, we can reduce our health risks and protect ourselves against coronavirus – as well as taking pressure off the NHS. Our Better Health Strategy https://t.co/WdazXhuhRNpic.twitter.com/KZhW8p17FJ— Boris Johnson #StayAlert (@BorisJohnson) July 27, 2020 

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Everywhere And Nowhere: The Many Layers of ‘Cancel Culture’

07/27/2020 Arts 0

So you’ve probably read a lot about “cancel culture.” Or know about a new poll that shows a plurality of Americans disapproving of it. Or you may have heard about a letter in Harper’s Magazine condemning censorship and intolerance.  
But can you say exactly what “cancel culture” is? Some takes:  
— “It seems like a buzzword that creates more confusion than clarity,” says the author and journalist George Packer, who went on to call it “a mechanism where a chorus of voices, amplified on social media, tries to silence a point of view that they find offensive by trying to damage or destroy the reputation of the person who has given offense.”
— “I don’t think it’s real. But there are reasonable people who believe in it,” says the author, educator and sociologist Tressie McMillan Cottom. “From my perspective, accountability has always existed. But some people are being held accountable in ways that are new to them. We didn’t talk about ‘cancel culture’ when someone was charged with a crime and had to stay in jail because they couldn’t afford the bail.”
— “‘Cancel culture’ tacitly attempts to disable the ability of a person with whom you disagree to ever again be taken seriously as a writer/editor/speaker/activist/intellectual, or in the extreme, to be hired or employed in their field of work,” says Letty Cottin Pogrebin, the author, activist and founding editor of Ms. magazine.
— “It means different things to different people,” says Ben Wizner, director of the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project.  
In tweets, online letters, opinion pieces and books, conservatives, centrists and liberals continue to denounce what they call growing intolerance for opposing viewpoints and the needless ruining of lives and careers. A Politico/Morning Consult poll released last week shows 44% of Americans disapprove of it, 32% approve and the remaining 24% had no opinion or didn’t know what it was.
For some, “cancel culture” is the coming of the thought police. For others, it contains important chances to be heard that didn’t exist before.  
Recent examples of unpopular “cancellations” include the owner of a chain of food stores in Minneapolis whose business faced eviction and calls for boycotts because of racist social media posts by his then-teenage daughter, and a data analyst fired by the progressive firm Civis Analytics after he tweeted a study finding that nonviolent protests increase support for Democratic candidates and violent protests decrease it. Civis Analytics has denied he was fired for the tweet.
“These incidents damage the lives of innocent people without achieving any noble purpose,” Yascha Mounk wrote in The Atlantic last month. Mounk himself has been criticized for alleging that “an astonishing number of academics and journalists proudly proclaim that it is time to abandon values like due process and free speech.”
Debates can be circular and confusing, with those objecting to intolerance sometimes openly uncomfortable with those who don’t share their views. A few weeks ago, more than 100 artists and thinkers endorsed a letter co-written by Packer and published by Harper’s. It warned against a “new set of moral attitudes and political commitments that tend to weaken our norms of open debate and toleration of differences in favor of ideological conformity.”
The letter drew signatories from many backgrounds and political points of view, ranging from the far-left Noam Chomsky to the conservative David Frum, and was a starting point for contradiction.  
The writer and trans activist Jennifer Finney Boylan, who signed the letter, quickly disowned it because she “did not know who else” had attached their names. Although endorsers included Salman Rushdie, who in 1989 was forced into hiding over death threats from Iranian Islamic leaders because of his novel “The Satanic Verses,” numerous online critics dismissed the letter as a product of elitists who knew nothing about censorship.
One of the organizers of the letter, the writer Thomas Chatterton Williams, later announced on Twitter that he had thrown a guest out of his home over criticisms of letter-supporter Bari Weiss, the New York Times columnist who recently quit over what she called a Twitter-driven culture of political correctness. Another endorser, “Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling, threatened legal action against a British news site that suggested she was transphobic after referring to controversial tweets that she has written in recent months.
“The only speech these powerful people seem to care about is their own,” the author and feminist Jessica Valenti wrote in response to the Harper’s letter. “(‘Cancel culture’ ) is certainly not about free speech: After all, an arrested journalist is never referred to as ‘canceled,’ nor is a woman who has been frozen out of an industry after complaining about sexual harassment. ‘Canceled’ is a label we all understand to mean a powerful person who’s been held to account.”
“Cancel culture” is hard to define, in part because there is nothing confined about it — no single cause, no single ideology, no single fate for those allegedly canceled.This combination photo shows, from left, morning news show anchors Matt Lauer and Charlie Rose, filmmaker Woody Allen and actor Kevin Spacey, who have all been accused of sexual abuse and harassment.Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby, convicted sex offenders, are in prison. Former television personality Charlie Rose has been unemployable since allegations of sexual abuse and harassment were published in 2017-18. Oscar winner Kevin Spacey has made no films since he faced allegations of harassment and assault and saw his performance in “All the Money in the World” replaced by Christopher Plummer’s.
Others are only partially “canceled.” Woody Allen, accused by daughter Dylan Farrow of molesting her when she was 7, was dropped by Amazon, his U.S. film distributor, but continues to release movies overseas. His memoir was canceled by Hachette Book Group, but soon acquired by Skyhorse Publishing, which also has a deal with the previously “canceled” Garrison Keillor. Sirius XM announced last week that the late Michael Jackson, who seemed to face posthumous cancellation after the 2019 documentary “Leaving Neverland” presented extensive allegations that he sexually abused boys, would have a channel dedicated to his music.  
Cancellation in one subculture can lead to elevation in others. Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick has not played an NFL game since 2016 and has been condemned by President Donald Trump and many others on the right after he began kneeling during the National Anthem to protest “a country that oppresses black people and people of color.” But he has appeared in Nike advertisements, been honored by the ACLU and Amnesty International and reached an agreement with the Walt Disney Co. for a series about his life.
“You can say the NFL canceled Colin Kaepernick as a quarterback and that he was resurrected as a cultural hero,” says Julius Bailey, an associate professor of philosophy at Wittenberg University who writes about Kaepernick in his book “Racism, Hypocrisy and Bad Faith.”
In politics, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, a Democrat, remains in his job 1 1/2 years after acknowledging he appeared in a racist yearbook picture while in college. Sen. Al Franken, a Democrat from Minnesota, resigned after multiple women alleged he had sexually harassed them, but Lt. Governor Justin Fairfax of Virginia defied orders to quit after two women accused him of sexual assault.
Sometimes even multiple allegations of sexual assault, countless racist remarks and the disparagement of wounded military veterans aren’t enough to induce cancellation. Trump, a Republican, has labeled cancel culture “far-left fascism” and “the very definition of totalitarianism” while so far proving immune to it.
“Politicians can ride this out because they were hired by the public. And if the public is willing to go along, then they can sometimes survive things perhaps they shouldn’t survive,” Packer says.
“I think you can say that Trump’s rhetoric has had a boomerang effect on the rest of our society,” says PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel, who addresses free expression in her book “Dare to Speak,” which comes out next week. “People on the left feel that he can get away with anything, so they do all they can to contain it elsewhere.” 

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Virus Vaccine Put to Final Test in Thousands of Volunteers

07/27/2020 Science 0

The world’s biggest COVID-19 vaccine study got underway Monday with the first of 30,000 planned volunteers helping to test shots created by the U.S. government — one of several candidates in the final stretch of the global vaccine race.
There’s still no guarantee that the experimental vaccine, developed by the National Institutes of Health and Moderna Inc., will really protect.  
The needed proof: Volunteers won’t know if they’re getting the real shot or a dummy version. After two doses, scientists will closely track which group experiences more infections as they go about their daily routines, especially in areas where the virus still is spreading unchecked.
 
“Unfortunately for the United States of America, we have plenty of infections right now” to get that answer, NIH’s Dr. Anthony Fauci recently told The Associated Press.
Moderna said the vaccination was done in Savannah, Georgia, the first site to get underway among more than seven dozen trial sites scattered around the country.
Several other vaccines made by China and by Britain’s Oxford University earlier this month began smaller final-stage tests in Brazil and other hard-hit countries.  
But the U.S. requires its own tests of any vaccine that might be used in the country and has set a high bar: Every month through fall, the government-funded COVID-19 Prevention Network will roll out a new study of a leading candidate — each one with 30,000 newly recruited volunteers.  
The massive studies aren’t just to test if the shots work — they’re needed to check each potential vaccine’s safety. And following the same study rules will let scientists eventually compare all the shots.
Next up in August, the final study of the Oxford shot begins, followed by plans to test a candidate from Johnson & Johnson in September and Novavax in October — if all goes according to schedule. Pfizer Inc. plans its own 30,000-person study this summer.
That’s a stunning number of people needed to roll up their sleeves for science. But in recent weeks, more than 150,000 Americans filled out an online registry  signaling interest, said Dr. Larry Corey, a virologist with the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Institute in Seattle, who helps oversee the study sites.
“These trials need to be multigenerational, they need to be multiethnic, they need to reflect the diversity of the United States population,” Corey told a vaccine meeting last week. He stressed that it’s especially important to ensure enough Black and Hispanic participants as those populations are hard-hit by COVID-19.
It normally takes years to create a new vaccine from scratch, but scientists are setting speed records this time around, spurred by knowledge that vaccination is the world’s best hope against the pandemic. The coronavirus wasn’t even known to exist before late December, and vaccine makers sprang into action Jan. 10 when China shared the virus’ genetic sequence.
Just 65 days later in March, the NIH-made vaccine was tested in people. The first recipient is encouraging others to volunteer now.
“We all feel so helpless right now. There’s very little that we can do to combat this virus. And being able to participate in this trial has given me a sense of, that I’m doing something,” Jennifer Haller of Seattle told the AP. “Be prepared for a lot of questions from your friends and family about how it’s going, and a lot of thank-you’s.”
That first-stage study that included Haller and 44 others showed the shots revved up volunteers’ immune systems in ways scientists expect will be protective, with some minor side effects such as a brief fever, chills and pain at the injection site. Early testing of other leading candidates have had similarly encouraging results.
If everything goes right with the final studies, it still will take months for the first data to trickle in from the Moderna test, followed by the Oxford one.  
Governments around the world are trying to stockpile millions of doses of those leading candidates so if and when regulators approve one or more vaccines, immunizations can begin immediately. But the first available doses will be rationed, presumably reserved for people at highest risk from the virus.  
“We’re optimistic, cautiously optimistic” that the vaccine will work and that “toward the end of the year” there will be data to prove it, Dr. Stephen Hoge, president of Massachusetts-based Moderna, told a House subcommittee last week.
Until then, Haller, the volunteer vaccinated back in March, wears a mask in public and takes the same distancing precautions advised for everyone — while hoping that one of the shots in the pipeline pans out.
“I don’t know what the chances are that this is the exact right vaccine. But thank goodness that there are so many others out there battling this right now,” she said.

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