Post by mhbruin on Jun 12, 2021 9:10:03 GMT -8
US Vaccine Data - We Have Now Administered 307 Million Shots
Half of eligible people fully vaccinated
CALIFORNIA
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How Bad Can COVID Get?
The cleanest way of comparing the pure biological spreading power of viruses is to look at their R0 (pronounced R-naught). It's the average number of people each infected person passes a virus on to if nobody were immune and nobody took extra precautions to avoid getting infected.
It's "foolish", he thinks, to attempt to put a number on how high it could go, but he can easily see further jumps in transmission over the next couple of years. Other viruses have far higher R0s and the record holder, measles, can cause explosive outbreaks.
"There is still space for it to move higher," said Prof Barclay. "Measles is between 14 and 30 depending on who you ask, I don't know how it's going to play out."
So, how are the variants doing it?
There are many tricks the virus could employ to get better at spreading, such as:
- improving how it opens the doorway to our body's cells
- surviving longer in the air
- increasing the viral load so patients breathe or cough out more viruses
- changing when in the course of an infection it spreads to another person
COVID Is Flying Delta
The Delta variant, which was first detected in India and which now makes up 6% of sequenced COVID-19 cases in the United States, has prompted recent calls from President Joe Biden and Dr. Anthony Fauci for more Americans to get vaccinated.
While prevalence of the variant, also known as B.1.617.2, is still low in the U.S., its prevalence has doubled since last week, rising from 3% to 6%, according to a report from HHS.
In India, where the virus exploded in April and May and sparked a public health crisis, as well as in the United Kingdom, the Delta variant is now the dominant strain. "We cannot let that happen in the United States," Fauci said during a Tuesday news briefing.
"Get vaccinated," he added. "Particularly if you’ve had your first dose, make sure you get that second dose. And for those who have been not vaccinated yet, please get vaccinated."
As of Thursday, 52% of Americans had received at least one dose of the vaccine and 43% were fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
-----------------
Did He Say Mexico Would Pay For It? He Meant the US Military
The Biden administration is returning more than $2 billion to military projects that had previously been set aside for the construction of former President Donald Trump's border wall, the White House Office of Management and Budget said Friday.
In one of his first actions in office, President Joe Biden ordered a pause on wall construction and called for a review of projects and funds. Friday's announcement builds on the Biden administration's decision to cancel all contracts for wall construction on the US-Mexico border that used funds originally intended for military missions and functions.
-----------------
Some People are Getting a Lovely Surprise in their Checking Accounts
The Internal Revenue Service reports it has distributed additional stimulus cash to millions of people who lost income during 2020 and qualified for more than they had originally received.
Known as "plus-up" payments, the money goes automatically to people whose 2020 tax returns show they missed out when the first two rounds of checks -- which were sent based on 2019 tax filings -- went out.
More than 1 million of these payments have gone out over the past two weeks, totaling $2.5 billion. The IRS said it has delivered more than 8 million of the supplemental payments this year.
Some People Are Happy to Hear from the IRS
-----------------
The Coming Bigger Chip Shortage. We Are Not Talking About Potato Chips
Taiwanese officials are fretting about whether a severe outbreak of Covid-19 could jeopardize the island's critical role in the global semiconductor supply chain. But there's another threat to the industry that experts worry may have even more drastic consequences: the climate crisis.
Taiwan — which accounts for more than half of the world's output of chips — has been grappling for months with its worst drought in more than 50 years, an event experts say could become more frequent due to the effects of climate change.
"There is clearly pressure in the semiconductor industry," wrote Mark Williams, chief Asia economist at Capital Economics, on Thursday in a note that referenced the water shortages and coronavirus cases, along with rolling power outages.
-----------------
QANON Ron Cannot Lie on YouTube for a WHOLE Week
YouTube suspended Sen. Ron Johnson’s account on Friday after the Wisconsin Republican posted his recent remarks about alternative therapies to treat Covid-19.
“We removed the video in accordance with our COVID-19 medical misinformation policies, which don’t allow content that encourages people to use Hydroxychloroquine or Ivermectin to treat or prevent the virus,” a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement.
Johnson’s account is blocked from uploading videos for a week. The company’s policy states it does not allow content that spreads medical misinformation contradicting local health authorities or the World Health Organization’s information about Covid-19, regardless of the speaker.
In a June 3 virtual appearance before the Milwaukee Press Club, Johnson criticized the Trump and Biden administrations for “not only ignoring but working against robust research (on) the use of cheap, generic drugs to be repurposed for early treatment of Covid,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
----------------
The Sins of the Parents Are Visited on the Children
Vaccination rates for children 12 to 17 have surged in the Northeast and lagged in the South, one month since the first Covid-19 vaccines were cleared for ages 12 and up, according to an NBC News analysis.
In Vermont, nearly 59 percent of adolescents have received their first dose. In Massachusetts, the number is more than half. And in Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire and Rhode Island, more than 40 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds have received one shot.
Meanwhile, young people living in the South are least likely to have had their first dose. Just over 7 percent of Mississippi 12- to 17-year-olds have received their first dose, and less than 10 percent of that age group in Louisiana.
How Does Your State Stack Up?
-----------------
State by State - But a National Program Would be Better
On Wednesday, Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak, a Democrat, signed legislation creating a public health insurance option for the state's marketplace, joining Washington State as the only two states to offer a public plan. The move could expand coverage to the 350,000 uninsured Nevada residents, and lower the cost of health insurance overall on the market.
-----------------
Note to Joe Manchin: The Voter Suppression Bills Being Passed in Red States are NOT Bi-Partisan
In places such as Florida, Georgia, Arizona, Iowa, Kansas, and Montana, the most restrictive laws approved this year have passed on total or near-complete party-line votes, with almost all state legislative Republicans voting for the bills and nearly all Democrats uniting against them, according to an analysis of state voting records provided exclusively to The Atlantic by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU.
That pattern of unrelenting partisanship has left many state-level Democrats incredulous at the repeated insistence by Manchin, a conservative Democrat from West Virginia, that he will support new federal voting-rights legislation only if at least some Republican senators agree to it.
Don't Be Incredulous. Manchin is Bought and Paid For By Corporate America
-----------------
Everybody Loves Joe
-----------------
The Danger of NOT Prosecuting the Previous Guy
-----------------
Pining for the Pine Island Glacier
A critical Antarctic glacier is looking more vulnerable as satellite images show the ice shelf that blocks it from collapsing into the sea is breaking up much faster than before and spawning huge icebergs, a new study says.
The Pine Island Glacier’s ice shelf loss accelerated in 2017, causing scientists to worry that with climate change the glacier’s collapse could happen quicker than the many centuries predicted. The floating ice shelf acts like a cork in a bottle for the fast-melting glacier and prevents its much larger ice mass from flowing into the ocean.
That ice shelf has retreated by 12 miles (20 kilometers) between 2017 and 2020, according to a study in Friday’s Science Advances The crumbling shelf was caught on time-lapse video from a European satellite that takes pictures every six days.
“You can see stuff just tearing apart,” said study lead author Ian Joughin, a University of Washington glaciologist. “So it almost looks like the speed-up itself is weakening the glacier. ... And so far we’ve lost maybe 20% of the main shelf.”
Between 2017 and 2020, there were three large breakup events, creating icebergs more than 5 miles (8 kilometers) long and 22 miles (36 kilometers) wide, which then split into lots of littler pieces, Joughin said. There also were many smaller breakups.
-----------------
Clearly Texas Needs More Guns
A gunman is at large after a mass shooting that left 13 people injured in Austin, Texas, early Saturday.
Two victims are in critical condition and 11 are in stable condition, the Austin Police Department said.
....................
Dallas police are investigating a shooting that injured five people Friday, including a 4-year-old girl.
Around 4:45 p.m., police responded to reports of shooting among two groups of people "involved in a disturbance regarding an unknown matter," police said in a website post.
The child was taken to Children's Medical Center and is in stable condition, police said.
The four adult victims, all women, were taken to local hospitals and had injuries that were not life-threatening, police said.
Investigators obtained images of a vehicle they believe the suspect was driving.
-----------------
I Have to Pay My Estimated Taxes This Week, But ...
There were two weeks left in the Trump administration when the Treasury Department handed down a set of rules governing an obscure corner of the tax code.
The rules were approved on Jan. 5, the day before the riot at the U.S. Capitol. Hardly anyone noticed.
The Trump administration’s farewell gift to the buyout industry was part of a pattern that has spanned Republican and Democratic presidencies and Congresses: Private equity has conquered the American tax system.
The industry has perfected sleight-of-hand tax-avoidance strategies so aggressive that at least three private equity officials have alerted the Internal Revenue Service to potentially illegal tactics, according to people with direct knowledge of the claims and documents reviewed by The New York Times. The previously unreported whistle-blower claims involved tax dodges at dozens of private equity firms.
If You Want to Know More
-----------------
Could the Be the Last Weekend of Benny's (As PM)?
Israel's parliament is poised to cast a historic vote on Sunday that could end Benjamin Netanyahu's 12-year tenure as prime minister and usher in a "change coalition" that includes hardline factions, centrists and an Arab party, the first ever in an Israeli government.
"It's happening!" Yair Lapid, the leader of a centrist party and chief broker of the coalition deal, tweeted in a jubilant message when the vote was scheduled. "The unity government is launching for the benefit of the citizens of the State of Israel."
Despite Lapid's optimism, the outcome remains uncertain as Netanyahu and his allies continue a campaign to derail the odd-bedfellows alliance. Indeed, the vote will unfold after days of heightened tensions, daily protests and threats of violence against those seeking Netanyahu's ouster.
-----------------
It Takes a Lot of Courage for a Teenage Black Girl to Video Police Misconduct
A teenager who recorded the murder of George Floyd in a clear and unrelenting single shot with her cellphone was recognized on Friday by the arbiters of the highest honors in U.S. journalism.
The Pulitzer Board awarded Darnella Frazier a special citation for a video she said has haunted her ever since, showing Floyd's death beneath the knee of Derek Chauvin, a white Minneapolis policeman. Chauvin was convicted of murdering Floyd in a trial during which Frazier's video was played repeatedly.
The citation at the 2021 Pulitzer Prize ceremony is a rare instance of the board recognizing the journalistic achievement of someone with no professional experience in the field, a striking distinction in the genre sometimes known as citizen journalism.
-----------------
Doses Administered 7-Day Average | Number of People Receiving 1 or More Doses | Number of People Fully Vaccinated | |
| Jun 11 | 1,055,610 | 172,758,350 | 142,095,530 |
| Jun 10 | 1,138,099 | 172,423,605 | 141,583,252 |
| Jun 9 | 1,120,083 | 172,054,276 | 140,980,110 |
| Jun 8 | 1,074,204 | 171,731,584 | 140,441,957 |
| Jun 7 | 1,131,867 | 171,310,738 | 139,748,661 |
| Jun 6 | 1,133,361 | 170,833,221 | 138,969,323 |
| Jun 5 | 1,166,993 | 170,272,150 | 138,112,702 |
| Jun 4 | 1,199,416 | 169,735,441 | 137,455,367 |
| Jun 3 | 1,215,518 | 169,090,262 | 136,644,618 |
| Jun 2 | 1,303,431 | 168,734,435 | 136,155,250 |
| Jun 1 | 1,359,049 | 168,489,729 | 135,867,425 |
| May 30 | 1,315,466 | 167,733,972 | 135,087,319 |
| May 29 | 1,394,832 | 167,157,043 | 134,418,748 |
| May 28 | 1,500,632 | 166,388,129 | 133,532,544 |
| May 27 | 1,618,194 | 165,718,717 | 132,769,894 |
| May 26 | 1,703,162 | 165,074,907 | 131,850,089 |
| May 25 | 1,750,524 | 164,378,258 | 131,078,608 |
| May 24 | 1,782,714 | 163,907,827 | 130,615,797 |
| May 23 | 1,827,882 | 163,309,414 | 130,014,175 |
| May 22 | 1,872,697 | 162,470,794 | 129,006,463 |
| May 21 | 1,879,526 | 161,278,336 | 127,778,250 |
| May 20 | 1,828,681 | 160,177,820 | 126,605,166 |
| May 19 | 1,801,333 | 159,174,963 | 125,453,423 |
| May 18 | 1,771,807 | 158,365,411 | 124,455,693 |
| May 17 | 1,830,360 | 157,827,208 | 123,828,224 |
| May 16 | 1,886,917 | 157,132,234 | 122,999,721 |
| May 15 | 1,926,448 | 156,217,367 | 121,768,268 |
| May 14 | 1,951,333 | 155,251,852 | 120,258,637 |
| May 13 | 2,088,962 | 154,624,231 | 118,987,308 |
| May 12 | 2,159,146 | 153,986,312 | 117,647,439 |
| Feb 16 | 1,716,311 | 39,670,551 | 15,015,434 |
Half of eligible people fully vaccinated
| At Least One Dose | Fully Vaccinated | |
| % of Total Population | 52.0% | 42.8% |
| % of Population 12+ | 61.6% | 50.7% |
| % of Population 18+ | 64.1% | 53.6% |
| % of Population 65+ | 86.6% | 75.9% |
CALIFORNIA
7-Day Average Administered | |
| Jun 11 | 161,902 |
| Jun 10 | 161,232 |
| Jun 9 | 178,150 |
| Jun 8 | 165,790 |
| Jun 7 | 182,811 |
| Jun 6 | 183,406 |
| Jun 5 | 179,462 |
| Jun 4 | 165,253 |
| Jun 3 | 165,225 |
| Jun 2 | 170,223 |
| Jun 1 | 179,213 |
| May 30 | 173,351 |
| May 29 | 193,204 |
| May 28 | 213,796 |
| May 27 | 230,733 |
| May 26 | 244,708 |
| May 25 | 258,249 |
| May 24 | 268,071 |
| May 23 | 276,166 |
| May 22 | 285,578 |
| May 21 | 293,987 |
| May 20 | 281,184 |
| May 19 | 278,632 |
| May 18 | 269,324 |
| May 17 | 271,943 |
| May 16 | 286,457 |
| May 15 | 279,347 |
| May 14 | 278,877 |
| May 13 | 298,328 |
| May 12 | 306,629 |
| Mar 1 | 214,579 |
How Bad Can COVID Get?
The cleanest way of comparing the pure biological spreading power of viruses is to look at their R0 (pronounced R-naught). It's the average number of people each infected person passes a virus on to if nobody were immune and nobody took extra precautions to avoid getting infected.
It's "foolish", he thinks, to attempt to put a number on how high it could go, but he can easily see further jumps in transmission over the next couple of years. Other viruses have far higher R0s and the record holder, measles, can cause explosive outbreaks.
"There is still space for it to move higher," said Prof Barclay. "Measles is between 14 and 30 depending on who you ask, I don't know how it's going to play out."
So, how are the variants doing it?
There are many tricks the virus could employ to get better at spreading, such as:
- improving how it opens the doorway to our body's cells
- surviving longer in the air
- increasing the viral load so patients breathe or cough out more viruses
- changing when in the course of an infection it spreads to another person
COVID Is Flying Delta
The Delta variant, which was first detected in India and which now makes up 6% of sequenced COVID-19 cases in the United States, has prompted recent calls from President Joe Biden and Dr. Anthony Fauci for more Americans to get vaccinated.
While prevalence of the variant, also known as B.1.617.2, is still low in the U.S., its prevalence has doubled since last week, rising from 3% to 6%, according to a report from HHS.
In India, where the virus exploded in April and May and sparked a public health crisis, as well as in the United Kingdom, the Delta variant is now the dominant strain. "We cannot let that happen in the United States," Fauci said during a Tuesday news briefing.
"Get vaccinated," he added. "Particularly if you’ve had your first dose, make sure you get that second dose. And for those who have been not vaccinated yet, please get vaccinated."
As of Thursday, 52% of Americans had received at least one dose of the vaccine and 43% were fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
-----------------
Did He Say Mexico Would Pay For It? He Meant the US Military
The Biden administration is returning more than $2 billion to military projects that had previously been set aside for the construction of former President Donald Trump's border wall, the White House Office of Management and Budget said Friday.
In one of his first actions in office, President Joe Biden ordered a pause on wall construction and called for a review of projects and funds. Friday's announcement builds on the Biden administration's decision to cancel all contracts for wall construction on the US-Mexico border that used funds originally intended for military missions and functions.
-----------------
Some People are Getting a Lovely Surprise in their Checking Accounts
The Internal Revenue Service reports it has distributed additional stimulus cash to millions of people who lost income during 2020 and qualified for more than they had originally received.
Known as "plus-up" payments, the money goes automatically to people whose 2020 tax returns show they missed out when the first two rounds of checks -- which were sent based on 2019 tax filings -- went out.
More than 1 million of these payments have gone out over the past two weeks, totaling $2.5 billion. The IRS said it has delivered more than 8 million of the supplemental payments this year.
Some People Are Happy to Hear from the IRS
-----------------
The Coming Bigger Chip Shortage. We Are Not Talking About Potato Chips
Taiwanese officials are fretting about whether a severe outbreak of Covid-19 could jeopardize the island's critical role in the global semiconductor supply chain. But there's another threat to the industry that experts worry may have even more drastic consequences: the climate crisis.
Taiwan — which accounts for more than half of the world's output of chips — has been grappling for months with its worst drought in more than 50 years, an event experts say could become more frequent due to the effects of climate change.
"There is clearly pressure in the semiconductor industry," wrote Mark Williams, chief Asia economist at Capital Economics, on Thursday in a note that referenced the water shortages and coronavirus cases, along with rolling power outages.
-----------------
QANON Ron Cannot Lie on YouTube for a WHOLE Week
YouTube suspended Sen. Ron Johnson’s account on Friday after the Wisconsin Republican posted his recent remarks about alternative therapies to treat Covid-19.
“We removed the video in accordance with our COVID-19 medical misinformation policies, which don’t allow content that encourages people to use Hydroxychloroquine or Ivermectin to treat or prevent the virus,” a YouTube spokesperson said in a statement.
Johnson’s account is blocked from uploading videos for a week. The company’s policy states it does not allow content that spreads medical misinformation contradicting local health authorities or the World Health Organization’s information about Covid-19, regardless of the speaker.
In a June 3 virtual appearance before the Milwaukee Press Club, Johnson criticized the Trump and Biden administrations for “not only ignoring but working against robust research (on) the use of cheap, generic drugs to be repurposed for early treatment of Covid,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
----------------
The Sins of the Parents Are Visited on the Children
Vaccination rates for children 12 to 17 have surged in the Northeast and lagged in the South, one month since the first Covid-19 vaccines were cleared for ages 12 and up, according to an NBC News analysis.
In Vermont, nearly 59 percent of adolescents have received their first dose. In Massachusetts, the number is more than half. And in Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire and Rhode Island, more than 40 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds have received one shot.
Meanwhile, young people living in the South are least likely to have had their first dose. Just over 7 percent of Mississippi 12- to 17-year-olds have received their first dose, and less than 10 percent of that age group in Louisiana.
How Does Your State Stack Up?
-----------------
State by State - But a National Program Would be Better
On Wednesday, Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak, a Democrat, signed legislation creating a public health insurance option for the state's marketplace, joining Washington State as the only two states to offer a public plan. The move could expand coverage to the 350,000 uninsured Nevada residents, and lower the cost of health insurance overall on the market.
-----------------
Note to Joe Manchin: The Voter Suppression Bills Being Passed in Red States are NOT Bi-Partisan
In places such as Florida, Georgia, Arizona, Iowa, Kansas, and Montana, the most restrictive laws approved this year have passed on total or near-complete party-line votes, with almost all state legislative Republicans voting for the bills and nearly all Democrats uniting against them, according to an analysis of state voting records provided exclusively to The Atlantic by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU.
That pattern of unrelenting partisanship has left many state-level Democrats incredulous at the repeated insistence by Manchin, a conservative Democrat from West Virginia, that he will support new federal voting-rights legislation only if at least some Republican senators agree to it.
Don't Be Incredulous. Manchin is Bought and Paid For By Corporate America
-----------------
Everybody Loves Joe
-----------------
The Danger of NOT Prosecuting the Previous Guy
-----------------
Pining for the Pine Island Glacier
A critical Antarctic glacier is looking more vulnerable as satellite images show the ice shelf that blocks it from collapsing into the sea is breaking up much faster than before and spawning huge icebergs, a new study says.
The Pine Island Glacier’s ice shelf loss accelerated in 2017, causing scientists to worry that with climate change the glacier’s collapse could happen quicker than the many centuries predicted. The floating ice shelf acts like a cork in a bottle for the fast-melting glacier and prevents its much larger ice mass from flowing into the ocean.
That ice shelf has retreated by 12 miles (20 kilometers) between 2017 and 2020, according to a study in Friday’s Science Advances The crumbling shelf was caught on time-lapse video from a European satellite that takes pictures every six days.
“You can see stuff just tearing apart,” said study lead author Ian Joughin, a University of Washington glaciologist. “So it almost looks like the speed-up itself is weakening the glacier. ... And so far we’ve lost maybe 20% of the main shelf.”
Between 2017 and 2020, there were three large breakup events, creating icebergs more than 5 miles (8 kilometers) long and 22 miles (36 kilometers) wide, which then split into lots of littler pieces, Joughin said. There also were many smaller breakups.
-----------------
Clearly Texas Needs More Guns
A gunman is at large after a mass shooting that left 13 people injured in Austin, Texas, early Saturday.
Two victims are in critical condition and 11 are in stable condition, the Austin Police Department said.
....................
Dallas police are investigating a shooting that injured five people Friday, including a 4-year-old girl.
Around 4:45 p.m., police responded to reports of shooting among two groups of people "involved in a disturbance regarding an unknown matter," police said in a website post.
The child was taken to Children's Medical Center and is in stable condition, police said.
The four adult victims, all women, were taken to local hospitals and had injuries that were not life-threatening, police said.
Investigators obtained images of a vehicle they believe the suspect was driving.
-----------------
I Have to Pay My Estimated Taxes This Week, But ...
There were two weeks left in the Trump administration when the Treasury Department handed down a set of rules governing an obscure corner of the tax code.
The rules were approved on Jan. 5, the day before the riot at the U.S. Capitol. Hardly anyone noticed.
The Trump administration’s farewell gift to the buyout industry was part of a pattern that has spanned Republican and Democratic presidencies and Congresses: Private equity has conquered the American tax system.
The industry has perfected sleight-of-hand tax-avoidance strategies so aggressive that at least three private equity officials have alerted the Internal Revenue Service to potentially illegal tactics, according to people with direct knowledge of the claims and documents reviewed by The New York Times. The previously unreported whistle-blower claims involved tax dodges at dozens of private equity firms.
If You Want to Know More
-----------------
Could the Be the Last Weekend of Benny's (As PM)?
Israel's parliament is poised to cast a historic vote on Sunday that could end Benjamin Netanyahu's 12-year tenure as prime minister and usher in a "change coalition" that includes hardline factions, centrists and an Arab party, the first ever in an Israeli government.
"It's happening!" Yair Lapid, the leader of a centrist party and chief broker of the coalition deal, tweeted in a jubilant message when the vote was scheduled. "The unity government is launching for the benefit of the citizens of the State of Israel."
Despite Lapid's optimism, the outcome remains uncertain as Netanyahu and his allies continue a campaign to derail the odd-bedfellows alliance. Indeed, the vote will unfold after days of heightened tensions, daily protests and threats of violence against those seeking Netanyahu's ouster.
-----------------
It Takes a Lot of Courage for a Teenage Black Girl to Video Police Misconduct
A teenager who recorded the murder of George Floyd in a clear and unrelenting single shot with her cellphone was recognized on Friday by the arbiters of the highest honors in U.S. journalism.
The Pulitzer Board awarded Darnella Frazier a special citation for a video she said has haunted her ever since, showing Floyd's death beneath the knee of Derek Chauvin, a white Minneapolis policeman. Chauvin was convicted of murdering Floyd in a trial during which Frazier's video was played repeatedly.
The citation at the 2021 Pulitzer Prize ceremony is a rare instance of the board recognizing the journalistic achievement of someone with no professional experience in the field, a striking distinction in the genre sometimes known as citizen journalism.
-----------------