(2020-04-13). At least 7 dead after TORNADOES wreak havoc across southern US states, leveling homes & knocking power lines (VIDEOS). rt.com 
Several people died after powerful tornadoes swept through parts of southern America, damaging homes, knocking down power lines and blocking roads with uprooted trees. Louisiana and Mississippi have been hit the hardest. | At least seven people were killed after tornadoes combined with severe rainstorms battered Mississippi. One fatality was confirmed in Walthall County, two in Lawrence County, three in Jefferson Davis County, and another one in Jones County as of Sunday evening. | pic.twitter.com/KaedWPL76M— James Pugh (@jpughinreallife) (2020-04-13). 'The UK is dead': Near-unanimous disgust after British police threaten to 'appear from shadows' to bust rural picnics. rt.com 
Central Bedfordshire police have triggered an avalanche of social media scorn after warning residents that their scenic picnics would be ambushed by eagle-eyed law enforcement tasked with supervising Covid-19 lockdown measures. | The police force, which serves a rural area of eastern England, took to Twitter to announce that they would be on the prowl for unruly locals trying to enjoy the nice weather outside. | "If you think that by going for a picnic in a rural location no one will find you, don't be surprised if an officer appears from the shadows! We are covering the whole county," they wrote, including a…
(2020-04-13). Trump says record oil production cuts will soon DOUBLE. rt.com 
Global oil producers have already agreed on the world's largest ever production cut, but US President Donald Trump has said that cut may soon be doubled, to bring the world "back to business" from the coronavirus pandemic. | The Organization of Petroleum Exporting States (OPEC) and producers outside the bloc agreed on Sunday to cut their output for May and June by 9.7 million barrels per day (bpd), an amount equal to ten percent of the world's oil supply and the largest such cut in history. | "Having been involved in the negotiation," Trump tweeted on Monday, "the number that OPEC+ is looking to cut is 20 Mill…
(2020-04-13). US envoy urges Afghanistan & Taliban to accelerate prisoner releases. rt.com 
The US special envoy who negotiated a deal with the Taliban has said that an initial prisoner exchange between the insurgents and the Afghan government was an "important step" toward peace. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, the Taliban on Sunday released 20 Afghan security-force prisoners. The move came after the government last week released hundreds of insurgent captives. | "The release of prisoners is an important step in the peace process and the reduction of violence," US special representative for Afghanistan reconciliation Zalmay Khalilzad tweeted on Monday. "Both sides should a…
(2020-04-13). Colombia: Police Abuse Becomes Common During COVID-19 Outbreak. telesurenglish.net Colombian citizens denounced the police brutality and misuse of power during quarantine enforcement due COVID-19 outbreak inside the South American nation, a new report revealed. | RELATED: | Social media users shared videos showing police imposing arbitrary and random fines during the quarantine period in Colombia this past week. Colombian officers are also intimidating citizens who are seen outside of their homes. | Esteban Velazquez, a psych…
(2020-04-13). How does COVID-19 affect the heart? newsnetwork.mayoclinic.org The effects of COVID-19 on the lungs are well-known. As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, more information is becoming available about the role the virus, called SARS-CoV-2, has on the heart. "Individuals with known cardiovascular disease are at an increased risk of more severe complications from respiratory viral illnesses, including the flu and COVID-19," says Dr. …
(2020-04-13). Convalescent Plasma: A Therapy for COVID-19? newsnetwork.mayoclinic.org To develop a treatment for patients with COVID-19, researchers around the world are steadfastly exploring numerous angles, including testing existing antiviral drugs and new compounds. One potential treatment that has garnered attention is known as convalescent plasma therapy. The approach involves giving patients an infusion of antibody-rich plasma from people who have recovered from an infection …
(2020-04-13). Cuba is Willing to Send More Medical Brigades to the World. telesurenglish.net Cuba is in condition to send more medical brigades to countries that need support to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, the Cuban government said | RELATED: | "We defend solidarity, even in times of pandemic," Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez said on Sunday on the social network Twitter. | According to Rodriguez, new Cuban medical brigade from the Henry Reeve International Contingent left for Italy, in Europe, this…
(2020-04-13). Trump Shared a Tweet Urging Fauci's Firing. Will Fauci Be Axed as a Scapegoat? truthout.org President Donald Trump shared a tweet on Sunday that suggested he might be thinking about removing Anthony Fauci from the coronavirus task force, or possibly from his position within the National Institutes of Health, over his comments from this past weekend in which the doctor stated that an earlier implementation of mitigation efforts could have saved lives. | The tweet that the president shared came from a former candidate for Congress who had once sought the seat held by Speaker of the Hou…
(2020-04-13). Trump Asserts He Alone Has Authority to Reopen Economy — Experts Say Otherwise. truthout.org President Donald Trump issued out a pair of tweets on Monday morning in which he asserted that he alone, and not state governors, had the authority to end shelter-in-place orders to allow all businesses and services to reopen. | Trump blamed the news media for trying to create "conflict and confusion" by claiming that the authority to "open up the states" lies with governors rather than the president. | "Let it be fully understood that this is incorrect," Trump insisted. "It is the decision o…
(2020-04-13). Digital Day of Action to #ShutDown850 Bryant St. indybay.org Phone, Email, and Social Media…
(2020-04-13). WHO sets up Ebola vaccination sites in DR Congo. yenisafak.com The World Health Organization (WHO) said Monday it has set up Ebola vaccination centers in Beni, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), a day after a second virus-linked death in the country's northeastern region.Pop-up vaccination sites were rapidly set up in Beni to vaccinate contacts linked to recent Ebola deaths in the area, the WHO African Region said on Twitter.It said that the WHO and other partners were working to overcome resistance, and break the chain of transmission within the community.For the last few weeks, no new case had been reported until last Friday when a 26-year-old man died of Ebola in the cit…
(2020-04-13). US: Storms in Deep South kill 11, emergency imposed. yenisafak.com At least 11 people died and hundreds of buildings were damaged as storms lashed the southern state of Mississippi in the U.S. on Easter Sunday.The fatalities and multiple injuries were confirmed on the official Twitter page of the state's Emergency Management Agency.Mississippi's Republican Governor Tate Reeves declared a state of emergency on Sunday night "to protect the health and safety of Mississippians in response to the severe tornadoes and storms."National Weather Service officials said powerful winds were sweeping through the state, with multiple tornadoes reported at the Alabama state line and in Louisia…
(2020-04-13). Level Up Challenge? Funny Husky Jumps Over Toilet Paper Rolls. sputniknews.com As nearly the entire world is in the grips of a quaratine, social media users have begun inventing different challenges to with boredom, including a toilet paper jumping challenge for pets.
(2020-04-12). Poetry: Rhyming not necessary but some assembly required. dissidentvoice.org 
This sense of viral isolation, dread and global make-over (for good and worse) gets the proverbial juices flowing of our local and national bards. It's not a stretch to say there are many people on our coast and farther east who consider themselves to be "poets." With a liberal dose of simile, any number of …
(2020-04-12). OPEC+ strikes last-minute deal to cut almost 10 mn barrels a day of oil production. rt.com 
After four days of marathon talks, major global oil producers have finally inked an agreement to slash oil output by 9.7 million barrels per day (bpd), in a bid to boost the energy market amid the coronavirus pandemic. | The members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and other oil-producing states outside of the cartel, known as OPEC+, reached the deal to cut their output for May and June, Kuwait's Oil Minister Khaled Al-Fadhel announced on Twitter. | ÿ®ŸÅÿ∂ŸÑ ŸÖŸÜ ÿߟџџá ÿ&…
(2020-04-12). Dr. Marandi: Blocking My Voice on Social Media Networks Shows US Degree of Intolerance. iranian.com Seyed Mohammad Marandi, senior Iranian political analyst and university professor, blasted the American social media networks for silencing influential pro-resistance voices, including his accounts, saying that the move is a clear indication of their deep intolerance of all opposition. Speaking in an exclusive interview with FNA, Dr. Marandi said, "There is a large number of …
(2020-04-10). 'Madness that will start riots': Philadelphia police drag man off public transit for not wearing mask (VIDEOS). rt.com 
Viral videos are showing police in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania telling people to wear masks on public transportation to help stop the spread of Covid-19, and harshly enforcing this rule with non-complying passengers. | The first video, posted by the Philly Transit Riders Union on Friday, shows an official informing transit riders that they are not allowed to be on board if they are not wearing masks to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. | He says all of this while he himself is not wearing a mask. A rider also not wearing a mask is then told to exit the vehicle. | throwing off riders for not having masks. A…
(2020-04-09). US boasts of intercepting 2 Russian military planes on routine training flight far off Alaska. rt.com 
The US Air Force has reported intercepting two Russian scout planes that entered its "defense identification zone" off Alaska. Moscow says it was a training flight and the planes came nowhere near US airspace. | US F-22 Raptor fighters, supported by an aerial refueling KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft and an early warning E-3 AWACS plane, were mustered to intercept Russian military aircraft over the Bering Sea on April 8, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) reported in a series of tweets on Thursday. | The intercept happened north of the Aleutian Islands, which stretch from the coast of Alaska far…
(2020-04-09). I'm Queer and I've Been in Solitary. Ellen Isn't Experiencing What I Did. aclu.org On Monday, I ended a 12-hour day returning emails to incarcerated queer folks, providing direct aid for housing to folks living with HIV & AIDS who have been incarcerated and challenging the state of Nebraska to provide humane conditions for incarcerated individuals and decided to mindlessly scroll on Twitter. , , I found the quote from the show Ellen DeGeneres filmed from her multimillion-dollar, multi-room mansion: "One thing that I've learned from being in quarantine is that people — this is like being in jail, is what it is," she said. "It's mostly because I've be…
(2020-04-07). Facebook's Strategy for Taking Down Hate Groups is Spotty and Ineffective. splcenter.org Facebook continues to provide a safe haven for hate groups and extremists despite the company's attempts to "stop the most egregious and dangerous groups from using its tools." Hatewatch staff previously reported several extremist groups and pages currently active on the platform directly to Facebook in 2018.
(2020-03-05). [Comment] Time to address disparities in the standard of care for Kaposi sarcoma. thelancet.com Despite clinical trial evidence and guideline recommendations to use pegylated liposomal doxorubicin or paclitaxel for AIDS-associated Kaposi sarcoma, most patients in sub-Saharan Africa continue to receive bleomycin and vincristine.1—3 Before antiretroviral therapy (ART), clinical trials for AIDS-associated Kaposi sarcoma in resource-abundant settings had shown a superior response for pegylated liposomal doxorubicin compared with bleomycin and vincristine.4 A trial in 2010 showed similar progression-free survival for pegylated liposomal doxorubicin plus ART and for paclitaxel plus ART for advanced AIDS-ass…
(2020-02-27). [Comment] COVID-19: combining antiviral and anti-inflammatory treatments. thelancet.com Both coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) are characterised by an overexuberant inflammatory response and, for SARS, viral load is not correlated with the worsening of symptoms.1,2 In our previous Correspondence to The Lancet,3 we described how BenevolentAI's proprietary artificial intelligence (AI)-derived knowledge graph,4 queried by a suite of algorithms, enabled identification of a target and a potential therapeutic against SARS coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; the causative organism in COVID-19).
(2020-02-24). [Comment] COVID-19 pneumonia: what has CT taught us? thelancet.com In late December, 2019, a cluster of cases of viral pneumonia was linked to a seafood market in Wuhan (Hubei, China), and was later determined to be caused by a novel coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; previously known as 2019-nCoV).1 The genome sequence of SARS-CoV-2 is similar to, but distinct from, those of two other coronaviruses responsible for large-scale outbreaks in the past: severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV; about 79% sequence identity) and Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV; about 50%).
(2020-02-24). [Correspondence] Viral load of SARS-CoV-2 in clinical samples. thelancet.com An outbreak caused by a novel human coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was first detected in Wuhan in December 2019,1 and has since spread within China and to other countries. Real-time RT-PCR assays are recommended for diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection.2 However, viral dynamics in infected patients are still yet to be fully determined. Here, we report our findings from different types of clinical specimens collected from 82 infected individuals.
(2020-02-20). [Comment] The burden of viral respiratory infections in young children in low-resource settings. thelancet.com Acute lower respiratory infections (ALRI), encompassing bacterial and viral pneumonias, acute viral bronchiolitis, and bacterial and viral bronchitis, remain the leading cause of global child mortality.1 The thrust of global prevention and treatment efforts has been directed against bacterial causes of ALRI, and deaths from bacterial pneumonia have decreased substantially since 1990 because of improved access to health care and life-saving antibiotics, as well as increased use of vaccines targeted at bacterial respiratory pathogens.