| In Trump-Cuomo spat on coronavirus, the gloves come off Posted: 17 Apr 2020 10:46 AM PDT  The New York governor, who has been reluctant to engage with Trump during the crisis, turned the president's criticisms back on him.
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| Sunlight destroys virus quickly, new govt. tests find, but experts say pandemic could last through summer Posted: 17 Apr 2020 01:07 PM PDT  Preliminary results from government lab experiments show that the coronavirus does not survive long under high-temperature, high-humidity conditions, and is quickly destroyed by sunlight, providing evidence from controlled tests of what scientists believed — but had not yet proved — to be true.
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| Doctors who contract coronavirus prepare for the worst, and return to work in fear after recovering Posted: 17 Apr 2020 03:29 AM PDT  Amidst the coronavirus pandemic, emergency room workers are encountering a harsh new reality, often going from caregiver to patient when they contract the virus themselves.
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| Landlords are sexually harassing tenants by using housing insecurity fears created by the coronavirus pandemic, according to reports Posted: 18 Apr 2020 07:34 AM PDT  An organization in Hawaii said it received more reports of landlord sexual harassment in the past two weeks than it had in the past two years.
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| Every deportation flight from the U.S. is an 'alarm bell' as Central American countries brace for coronavirus Posted: 18 Apr 2020 10:49 AM PDT  Central American countries are on edge as deportation flights from the United States arrive in the region with passengers who have tested positive for the novel COVID-19 coronavirus, The Associated Press reports.Because the United States has only tested a limited number of detained immigrants for the virus, there are fears that its spread throughout the U.S. detention centers is much wider than has been reported. Subsequently, that could mean that countries like Guatemala, where more than 1,600 people have returned after being deported from the U.S., could have an unknown number of undetected cases.Earlier this week, Guatemala's Health Minister Hugo Monroy said at least half of all deportees from the U.S. tested positive, including many who did not exhibit symptoms, while President Alejandro Giammattei said Friday he was suspending deportation flights after numerous passengers that arrived this week were confirmed to be carrying the virus.Guatemala and other countries like Honduras and El Salvador have instituted quarantine measures, to varying degrees, but there's still a fair amount of worry because of the vulnerable state of their health-care systems. César Ríos, the director of the non-governmental Salvadoran Institute of Migration, said every arriving deportation plane is "an alarm bell" for the region. Dr. Michele Heisler, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan, warned Guatemala "will be overwhelmed" because of the U.S.'s "irresponsible" actions. Read more at The Associated Press.More stories from theweek.com A parade that killed thousands? President Trump might never hold another rally Hong Kong police arrest pro-democracy activists in biggest crackdown since protests began
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| Hong Kong police arrest democracy activists, media tycoon Posted: 18 Apr 2020 12:31 AM PDT  Among those arrested were 81-year-old activist and former lawmaker Martin Lee and democracy advocates Albert Ho, Lee Cheuk-yan and Au Nok-hin. Police also arrested media tycoon Jimmy Lai, who founded the local newspaper Apple Daily. Lai, Lee Cheuk-yan and Yeung Sum — a former lawmaker from the Democratic Party — were charged in February over their involvement in a mass anti-government demonstration on Aug. 31 last year.
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| Michigan Gov. Whitmer says she hopes to have 'some relaxing' of stay-at-home order by May 1 Posted: 17 Apr 2020 05:46 AM PDT  The Democratic governor did not elaborate Friday on which part of the order she might be willing to lift.
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| China adds nearly 1,300 coronavirus deaths to official Wuhan toll, blaming reporting delays Posted: 16 Apr 2020 08:19 PM PDT  China has denied covering up the true extent of the coronavirus outbreak after releasing new figures that increase the death toll in Wuhan by 50 per cent. The death toll for Wuhan now stands at 3,869 after China added 1,290 to the tally. It came as the number of infections increased retrospectively by 325, pushing the overall count to 50,333, according to a government statement posted online. Officials said the revision was due to overwhelmed hospitals and medical staff, which meant some people died at home after being unable to be admitted. The surge of patients also meant delayed or missed reports about infections and deaths. The change to data will likely seed further doubt about the accuracy of figures reported by the Chinese government, which has already been questioned by politicians and officials in the US and UK. US intelligence officials have concluded that China concealed the extent of the outbreak and under-reported the infection and death count.
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| Trump blasts new coronavirus message: 'LIBERATE' swing states that have Democratic governors Posted: 17 Apr 2020 10:30 AM PDT  President Trump fired off a series of tweets Friday that appeared to encourage citizens in states protesting strict coronavirus lockdown orders to "LIBERATE" themselves from their governors.
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| Spanish virus lockdown prolonged as toll tops 20,000 Posted: 18 Apr 2020 02:25 PM PDT  Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Saturday announced the nationwide coronavirus lockdown would be extended two weeks to May 9, hours after the official death toll passed 20,000. "We have done the hardest part through responsibility and social discipline... we are putting the most extreme moments behind us," Sanchez said. Spain, which has been under confinement since March 14, has recorded 20,043 deaths from the virus, the latest health ministry figures showed -- the third-highest official toll after the United States and Italy.
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| Coronavirus: Japan doctors warn of health system 'break down' as cases surge Posted: 18 Apr 2020 04:43 AM PDT  It comes as coronavirus cases in the country surge, leaving its doctors and hospitals stretched.
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| Jeff Bezos Buys a Fourth Apartment in a Luxe Manhattan Building Posted: 17 Apr 2020 02:01 PM PDT  It seems the Amazon CEO has plans to create a multi-floor dream home overlooking Madison Square Park
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| Holy Fire lit as Orthodox Easter bells echo over near-empty Jerusalem Posted: 18 Apr 2020 05:42 AM PDT  The Holy Fire ceremony symbolising Jesus' resurrection was lit in a deserted Jerusalem on Saturday, without the joyful throng of Orthodox Christian pilgrims who normally attend a spectacle that brings the Easter season to a colourful climax. Bells tolled above a near-empty Church of the Holy Sepulchre as the Greek Orthodox Patriarch, Theophilos III, emerged carrying the flame from the crypt where Christians believe Jesus was buried. This year, amid coronavirus precautions in a locked-down Jerusalem, he was accompanied only by a handful of mostly Orthodox clergy, some wearing face masks.
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| Cuomo says New York is 'past the plateau' as coronavirus hospitalizations continue to fall Posted: 18 Apr 2020 10:56 AM PDT  Despite the good news, another 540 New Yorkers died as a result of the virus on Saturday, and 2,000 more were admitted to hospitals in the state.
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| Beijing Admits to Undercounting Coronavirus Deaths, Raises Wuhan Death Toll by 50 Percent Posted: 17 Apr 2020 07:49 AM PDT  The Chinese Communist Party has revised its reported death count in Wuhan by exactly 50 percent, an attempt to improve the "credibility of the government" as residents and experts have warned the actual count is far higher that what's been previously reported.In an interview Friday with the Xinhua state news agency, officials pointed to unreported deaths at homes as the reason for the revision, to show "accountability to history, to the people and the victims," and to promote "open and transparent disclosure of information and data accuracy." Deaths rose 1,290 to 3,869 in the revised number.But Wuhan residents have warned that the death count is at least 40,000, pointing to increased demands on funeral homes and cremation numbers, which the government has censored reporting on. U.S. intelligence has also told the White House that mid-level bureaucrats in Wuhan have been lying about the number of cases, with some experts estimating that the total caseload in China could be close to three million, way above the official count of over 82,000 officially confirmed cases."The provinces report nonsense, such as Jiangsu with zero deaths in a population of 80 million," Derek Scissors of the American Enterprise Institute told National Review. "The lessons China learned are all wasted, even harmful if decision-makers elsewhere believe China is offering accurate information and represents a model."Wuhan lifted its total lockdown earlier this month, but city doctors have warned that tens of thousands of asymptomatic cases could exist, in comments that were subsequently removed from publication by the government.
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| John Kerry: New Trump environmental rules will 'kill more Americans' Posted: 17 Apr 2020 04:56 AM PDT  Former Secretary of State John Kerry charged Thursday that the Trump administration was using the coronavirus pandemic as a cover to weaken key environmental regulations that will "kill more Americans."
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| Russia Reports New Record Daily Rise in Coronavirus Cases Posted: 18 Apr 2020 01:35 AM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- Russia recorded its largest daily increase in coronavirus infections, with the new cases rising by almost 5,000 in a single day.New infections jumped by 4,785 to 36,793, the official Russian coronavirus information center reported on its website. Forty people died in the past day, including 21 in Moscow, bringing the number of fatalities to 313. The pace of new cases increased 17.6% after slowing to less than 15% in the previous two days.Officials in Moscow have tightened restrictions on moving around the capital, introducing a new system of digital travel passes on Wednesday to try to curb the spread of the virus. President Vladimir Putin has ordered most Russians to stay at home until April 30, warning this week that the epidemic has yet to reach its peak in the country. On Thursday, he postponed all planned public celebrations of the May 9 World War II victory, including the Red Square military parade.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Ecuador's death rate soars as fears grow over scale of coronavirus crisis Posted: 17 Apr 2020 03:09 PM PDT  Mortalities in one province leap from 3,000 to 11,000 in six weeks, with health and mortuary services overwhelmed New data suggests that Ecuador's coronavirus toll may be much higher than previously indicated, after figures revealed a massive jump in deaths in the province at the centre of the country's devastating outbreak.Since the beginning of March six weeks ago, 10,939 people have died in Guayas province, which includes Ecuador's largest city, Guayaquil, according to figures released late on Thursday.The region would usually see about 3,000 deaths in a six-week period, with the new figures suggesting that the local death rate has almost quadrupled.In Ecuador as a whole, coronavirus has been confirmed as the cause of only 421 deaths, and is suspected in a further 675, but interior minister María Paula Romo said the true number was probably much higher."The number of deaths is totally out of the ordinary," she told the Guardian.Ecuador has been one of worst-affected countries in Latin America, overwhelming medical and mortuary services in Guayaquil, where grieving families have been forced to live alongside corpses of loved ones or abandon them in the street."We've wanted to be open about the statistics for deaths to show a more complete panorama," Romo said, adding that the full statistics would explain "why the funeral services and cemeteries simply could not cope in recent days in Guayaquil and Guayas".The crisis in Ecuador's commercial capital has become a warning to Latin America, where many countries have poor health services and high inequality.Last week, authorities in Guayaquil started handing out thousands of cardboard coffins and created a helpline for families who need corpses to be removed from their homes.Nearly 70% of Ecuador's coronavirus cases have been concentrated in Guayas province, which had 5,777 of the national total of 8,450 cases on Friday.Authorities said nearly 30,000 coronavirus tests had been administered in the country. There are plans to increase capacity to 1,400 tests a day.However, some regional authorities say the death toll will continue to rise. Andrés Guschmer, a Guayaquil councillor who has been leading the fight against the virus in the city, has predicted the number of people infected will exceed 35,000.
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| 44 jihadists found dead in Chad prison: prosecutor Posted: 18 Apr 2020 03:09 PM PDT  N'Djamena (AFP) - A group of 44 suspected members of Boko Haram, arrested during a recent operation against the jihadist group, have been found dead in their prison cell, apparently poisoned, Chad's chief prosecutor announced Saturday. Speaking on national television, Youssouf Tom said the 44 prisoners had been found dead in their cell on Thursday. The dead men were among a group of 58 suspects captured during a major army operation around Lake Chad launched by President Idriss Deby Itno at the end of March.
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| Pakistan lifts limit on mosque congregations as Muslim holy month approaches Posted: 18 Apr 2020 08:08 AM PDT |
| To know the real number of coronavirus cases in the US, China, or Italy, researchers say multiply by 10 Posted: 17 Apr 2020 05:11 AM PDT  Nations with severe outbreaks may only be confirming around 10% of coronavirus cases, research suggests.
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| 25 years after Oklahoma City bombing, anxiety remains high Posted: 16 Apr 2020 08:52 PM PDT  In the 25 years since a truck bomb ripped through a federal building in downtown Oklahoma City and killed 168 people, the United States has suffered through foreign wars, a rise in mass shootings and a much deadlier act of terror, the Sept. 11 attacks. Ordinarily, survivors and victims' families would gather Sunday at the memorial where the Alfred P. Murrah Building once stood to pay tribute to the lives that were lost and tragically altered, as they have every year since the bombing. Instead, the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum will offer a pre-recorded video that will air online and on TV and will include the reading of the names of everyone killed followed by 168 seconds of silence.
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| Small-business loan program ran out of money within minutes, some banks say Posted: 18 Apr 2020 03:00 PM PDT  "It was Hunger Games," said one senior banking executive.
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| Elizabeth Warren is the 'candidate to beat' in Biden running mate poll of Wisconsin and Michigan Democrats Posted: 17 Apr 2020 11:21 AM PDT  A poll of Democrats in Michigan and Wisconsin found that Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) was "the overall candidate to beat" as presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden's running mate, Axios reports.In a poll conducted by MRG Research for Donors of Color Action that Axios reviewed, 62 percent of registered Democratic voters in Wisconsin said Warren would make a "good" or "great" vice president, putting her ahead of Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) at 57 percent and Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) at 52 percent. In Michigan, 53 percent of voters supported Warren as vice president, below only the state's governor, Gretchen Whitmer (D), who this week said Biden's running mate "is not going to be me.""Warren reflected the most consistent support among white and black voters in both states," although former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams was the top choice for black voters, Axios reports.This comes as Abrams and Warren this week have both expressed interest in serving as Biden's vice president in interviews. Abrams in an interview with Elle said she would be "an excellent running mate," and asked on MSNBC whether she would be Biden's running mate if asked, Warren responded, "Yes." The poll surveyed 1,640 registered voters in Wisconsin and Michigan from March 23 through April 5. The margin of error is 3.5 percentage points. Read more at Axios. More stories from theweek.com A parade that killed thousands? Every deportation flight from the U.S. is an 'alarm bell' as Central American countries brace for coronavirus President Trump might never hold another rally
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| Coronavirus forced schools online, but many students didn't follow Posted: 17 Apr 2020 10:33 AM PDT  Teachers across the U.S. report their attempts at distance learning are failing to reach large numbers of students.
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| Trump and Cuomo Mock Each Other in Real Time Over Virus Aid Posted: 17 Apr 2020 03:27 PM PDT  (Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo traded blows in real time during Cuomo's daily virus briefing, with the president tweeting that the governor should "Stop talking!" and Cuomo mockingly telling Trump to use his signature line from "The Apprentice" and fire his aides working on the pandemic response.The exchange on Friday was the sharpest yet between the two Queens, N.Y., natives, who for weeks in the initial phase of the crisis had worked hard not to publicly criticize each other. New York is the epicenter of the nation's coronavirus outbreak, with nearly 13,000 fatalities so far.Cuomo has previously praised Trump's assistance and thanked him for aid. Even after Trump said that New York was asking for too much, Cuomo kept criticizing the federal response but didn't attack Trump personally.Cuomo's broadside against Trump -- with one soliloquy lasting 17 minutes without interruption -- showcased a side of the governor's personality that is talked about in political circles but rarely displayed in public: bristling, pugnacious, abrasive.Minutes earlier, Cuomo had been delivering his standard daily assessment of the outbreak, in a routine that has been a balm of sorts for anxious New Yorkers. He reflected on the emotional toll of the pandemic, talking about how he was using the downtime to deepen family bonds.Suddenly, here he was, lecturing Trump on live television about the Constitution and the founding fathers.While it may have cheered New Yorkers to see their governor calling out Trump and the federal handling of the crisis, it also risked alienating a president who rarely hesitates to undermine and attack perceived enemies and critics. Clips of the diatribe have been carried on national television networks."You don't want federal disaster response contingent upon whether the President likes you," said Bob Griffin, a former U.S. Homeland Security official in the Obama and Trump administrations who is now dean of the College of Emergency Preparedness, Homeland Security and Cybersecurity at State University at Albany. "The frustration that you're seeing from Governor Cuomo reflects a level of frustration, candidly, that most of the governors are feeling in the sense that Trump decides when he wants to get involved and take credit, and then deflects blame."Trump's Twitter attack on Friday, posted about a half-hour into Cuomo's briefing, came in response to Cuomo's suggestion that the federal government was falling short on coronavirus testing."Governor Cuomo should spend more time 'doing' and less time 'complaining,'" Trump tweeted. "Get out there and get the job done. Stop talking!"He went on: "We have given New York far more money, help and equipment than any other state, by far, & these great men & women who did the job never hear you say thanks. Your numbers are not good. Less talk and more action!"After a reporter read the president's tweets aloud, Cuomo fired back with a thinly veiled dig at Trump's TV-viewing, famously listed on his schedule as "executive time": "First of all, if he's sitting home watching TV, maybe he should get up and go to work."The governor delivered a stream of zingers, saying the president cared more about helping big businesses than states, and, responding to Trump's comment about different states making their own policy, he said: "No, no, no, that's called a map of the United States. It's not a puzzle."The exchange overshadowed another day of encouraging evidence that the crisis is ebbing, with hospitalizations, intensive-care admissions, intubations and deaths all ticking down, though they remain at elevated levels.Cuomo said 630 New Yorkers died in the prior 24-hour period. Fatalities have declined steadily in recent days from a peak of 799 on April 9.Even after he had moved on to addressing other subjects, Cuomo returned to throw more insults at Trump, making fun of his TV career and asking that a data slide be shown on the screen "so the president can see what he said."Cuomo had been smart to go out of his way to nurture a productive relationship with Trump to maximize aid for the state, in the form of FEMA help with Javits, use of the navy ship, and in procuring ventilators, said Bruce Gyory, senior adviser of government and regulatory affairs at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, LLP.But now there's not much left to do outside of testing, said Gyory, a New York-based Democratic political consultant. Cuomo may still need the President but he needs him less -- and apparently could not let the taunts go unanswered."In effect, the governor had to join the argument," Gyory said.On the conflict between the president and some of the nation's governors over the timing of reopening schools and businesses the states: "All he is doing is walking in front of the parade, he has nothing to do with the timing of the parade," Cuomo said of Trump.On Trump saying that some governors showed a lack of appreciation for federal help: "What am I supposed to do, send a bouquet of flowers?"On federal projections about the scope of the pandemic: "Our only mistake then was believing your numbers and believing your projections," he said, addressing Trump. "If that was a mistake, then I'm guilty. But I thought New York State relying on what you said would have been a safe assumption. I won't make that mistake again. And it was your CDC and your White House Coronavirus Task Force that made those projections."And on the separation of powers between the federal government and the states: "What are you going to do? Grant me with what the Constitution granted me before you were born? It's called the Tenth Amendment. I didn't need the president of the United States to tell me that I'm governor."Cuomo said the president was wrong to insist on personal gratitude for federal assistance: "Thank you for Javits, thank you for the U.S. Navy Ship Comfort. By the way it's just doing your job as president, it's not thank you like you wrote a check yourself."(Adds outside analysis of dispute ramificaitons.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Turkey's coronavirus cases overtake Iran, highest in Middle East Posted: 18 Apr 2020 10:46 AM PDT  Turkey's confirmed coronavirus cases have risen to 82,329, Health Minister Fahrettin Koca said on Saturday, overtaking neighbouring Iran for the first time to register the highest total in the Middle East. An increase of 3,783 cases in the last 24 hours also pushed Turkey's confirmed tally within a few hundred of China, where the novel coronavirus first emerged. Koca said 121 more people have died, taking the death toll to 1,890.
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| Coronavirus at Smithfield pork plant: The untold story of America's biggest outbreak Posted: 17 Apr 2020 07:00 AM PDT  Infections spread like wildfire through a pork factory in South Dakota. Here's how it happened.
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| Trump Hijacks Dr. Deborah Birx’s Coronavirus Presentation Posted: 18 Apr 2020 04:01 PM PDT  During her presentation at the White House COVID-19 briefing on Saturday, Dr. Deborah Birx was cruising along until she waded into one of President Donald Trump and the GOP's sorest spots: the Chinese government's apparent undercounting of coronavirus casualties. As Birx, the White House's coronavirus coordinator, explained a slide showing COVID-19 deaths per capita for various countries, China's was marked with an asterisk at the very bottom.Trump, standing on the sidelines, couldn't help but interject. "Excuse me, does anybody really believe this number?" he said, interrupting an apparently startled Birx—who then wheeled around, smiled, and coolly explained she put China's number on the chart to demonstrate "how unrealistic this could be."Though Birx tried to move on, Trump still couldn't keep quiet. He soon interrupted her again, to make a similar point, this time on the numbers shown for Iran. "Does anyone really believe that number?" Trump asked again. "You see what's going on over there." He then asked to return to the previous slide and walked over to the screen, hovering and pointing incredulously to China and Iran's numbers.The moment was a fitting one for Saturday's roughly 70-minute briefing, which was absent familiar figures like Vice President Mike Pence and Dr. Anthony Fauci.Trump did the lion's share of the talking, veering between lambasting Democratic politicians and the media—in particular New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman—and embracing comfortable topics. He repeatedly mentioned a phone call with unnamed world leaders who, he said, had offered effusive praise for his handling of the outbreak.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Navy Believes Delivery Flights, Not Vietnam Port Stop, Brought Virus to Carrier Posted: 17 Apr 2020 06:32 AM PDT  Navy officials are unable to make a definitive link between coronavirus cases on the Roosevelt and a port call in Vietnam.
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| Photos capture North Korea ships' sanctions busting in Chinese waters: U.N. report Posted: 17 Apr 2020 12:15 PM PDT  On Oct. 10 last year, eight North Korean vessels - several carrying illicit coal shipments - were anchored in Chinese waters off the port of Ningbo-Zhoushan, according to a photo in a U.N. report published online on Friday. The annual report to the U.N. Security Council by independent sanctions monitors said North Korea continued to flout council resolutions "through illicit maritime exports of commodities, notably coal and sand" in 2019, earning Pyongyang hundreds of millions of dollars.
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| People entering Canada could face a $750,000 fine if they don't quarantine for 14 days — even if they don't show coronavirus symptoms Posted: 18 Apr 2020 05:28 AM PDT  Canada also said it would require people coming on planes to prove they have a mask to cover their nose and mouth.
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| 'I pray to God it never happens again': US gulf coast bears scars of historic oil spill 10 years on Posted: 18 Apr 2020 07:36 AM PDT  The Deepwater Horizon devastated the ecology and economy from Texas to Florida but BP-funded recovery programs are ongoing and the sector is a big employerWhen the explosion ripped through the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, Leo Linder was standing in his living quarters in his underwear. He suddenly found himself facing a fellow rig worker in what had been a separate room because the force of the explosion had blown the walls away.Linder wasn't to know it at the time but the blast was to trigger the worst environment disaster in US history, with the BP operation spewing more than 4.9m barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico, fouling hundreds of miles of shoreline from Texas to Florida, decimating wildlife and crippling local fishing and tourism industries.The spill also had a human cost, with 11 workers dying in the disaster. One of them, Gordon Jones, had relieved Linder around an hour before the explosion. "He said, 'What the hell are you doing, go home,'" Linder said. "In many ways he saved my life. The guilt from surviving, as well as the damage done, still gnaws at me. It kills me."The 10th anniversary of the disaster, which began on 20 April 2010, marks a period of devastation and partial recovery, with billions of dollars extracted from BP to aid a clean-up that is still under way. Projects to replenish damaged oyster-catching areas and restore degraded marshland are ongoing. An enduring image of the spill was a brown pelican, the state bird of Louisiana, struggling in oily gunk. But a project to restore Queen Bess island, a crucial rookery for thousands of the birds, is only now nearing completion.The recovery has been patchy, with some businesses unable to recover and some people forced to move away."It was a bit like a bad dream," said Albertine Kimble, a retiree who has spent the past two decades in Carlisle, a small town south of New Orleans. "It was impending doom, it affected the fisheries and the birds. It was even more depressing than Hurricane Katrina and that flooded my house."Kimble has had to raise her house twice on stilts due to the threat of flooding in an area prone to storms and coastal erosion accelerated by the climate crisis. The process has also been worsened by the oil and gas industry's practice of forging canals through wetlands, which has introduced corrosive salt water. The nearby town of Pointe à la Hache was turned into a "ghost town" as fishing opportunities vanished, Kimble said."It was a bit like the coronavirus, just dead," she said. "I don't think it's recovered, to tell you the truth."The fishing industry is a major constituent of life in southern Louisiana and shutting down the ability to catch fish, oysters and shrimp was a major blow to communities. Many of the fishermen and women used their boats to help the clean-up effort by deploying booms and spreading oil dispersant.Even after the Gulf was declared safe to fish in again, crews initially reported pulling in smaller catches of oddly deformed fish with oozing sores. Dolphins started dying in record numbers, tuna and amberjack developed deformities to their heart and other organs. Scientists have also found lingering problems within the web of marine life.Recent research by the University of Florida found the richness of species in the Gulf has declined by more than a third due to direct and indirect impacts of the spill. A separate study of 2,500 individual fish from 91 species by the University of South Florida found oil exposure in all of them.Many of the species are popular types of seafood. The extent of the exposure has startled researchers."We were quite surprised that among the most contaminated species was the fast-swimming yellowfin tuna as they are not found at the bottom of the ocean where most oil pollution in the Gulf occurs," said lead author Erin Pulster, a researcher at the university's college of marine science.The seafood industry lost nearly $1bn, while house prices in the region declined by as much as 8% for at least five years, according to a report by the conservation group Oceana."It was an entire Gulf of Mexico-wide event," said Tracey Sutton, a marine scientist at Nova Southeastern University. told Oceana. "Nobody was ready for this scale of pollution. As far as we know, the actual impact of the spill is not over yet."Deepwater Horizon exploded 40 miles off the coast and shot out oil that proved devilishly difficult to clean from the nooks and crannies of Louisiana's marshland. An initial attempt to cap the spill was unsuccessful, necessitating the drilling of a secondary relief well to stem the flow. It took four months to completely stop the gushing oil.In all, BP paid out about $65n in compensation, legal fees and clean-up costs, which includes billions for affected states. A judge ruled the petrochemical giant was "grossly negligent" in the lead-up to the disaster. Subcontractors Transocean and Halliburton were "negligent", the judge said.The payment of the compensation money adds to the complex relationship states like Louisiana, which bore the brunt of the spill, have with the oil industry. The industry caused an environmental and societal catastrophe along the coast and is contributing towards the climate crisis that threatens more and more of the state with inundation each year.But the compensation paid has helped fund various coastal conservation projects and oil and gas remain major, and largely popular, employers in the region. Linder was only on Deepwater Horizon because the pay was four times the $28,000 a year he was earning as an English teacher."I don't think anyone realized right off the bat we'd have this unprecedented natural disaster," said Chip Kline, an assistant to Governor John Bel Edwards and chairman of the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA)."During the spill there were some intense moments with BP but in Louisiana we have an economy largely driven by oil and gas; it employs a lot of Louisiana residents. We try to strike a balance."A decade on, with an incomplete recovery, coastal Gulf communities face a Trump administration that is attempting to reverse many of the safety-based regulations imposed after the oil spill. Residents are hoping this won't lead to a repeat."It made me sick to the stomach thinking about all the oil out there in the beautiful Gulf of Mexico," said Kimble. "I hope and pray to God it never happens again."
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| Landlords are soliciting sex in exchange for rent, advocates say Posted: 17 Apr 2020 02:41 PM PDT  "Landlord coercion has always been a reality, but we've never seen anything like this," Jabola-Carolus said.
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| Sea turtles are thriving now that people are stuck indoors Posted: 18 Apr 2020 04:32 PM PDT  Swimsuit season may be at a halt, but nesting season is in full swing.
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| Cleaning wipes are hard to find—here's where you can still buy them Posted: 18 Apr 2020 06:52 AM PDT  Cleaning wipes are hard to find online, but you can still buy them at retailers like Staples, Target, and Office Depot.
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| China tries to revive economy, but consumer engine sputters Posted: 17 Apr 2020 09:28 AM PDT  China, where the coronavirus pandemic started in December, is cautiously trying to get back to business, but it's not easy when many millions of workers are wary of spending much or even going out.
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| Trump Calls For Reopening America’s Gyms Day After Call With SoulCycle’s Owner Posted: 17 Apr 2020 01:07 PM PDT  President Donald Trump unveiled a proposal this week to reopen America's gyms in spite of the coronavirus outbreak after a phone call that included the head of the company that owns luxury fitness brands Equinox and SoulCycle, who also happens to be a high-profile Trump supporter.In a memo issued on Thursday titled "Guidelines for Opening Up America Again," the White House included gyms among the businesses that would reopen to the general public during "phase one" of its plan to jump-start the American economy, which has cratered amid nationwide stay-at-home orders and business closures. Though the document said gyms could open "if they adhere to strict physical distancing and sanitation protocols," their inclusion nevertheless struck public health experts as bizarre. "Gyms are like a petri dish," said Laurence Gostin, the director of the O'Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University. "People are close to one another, they're sweating, they're coughing and sneezing, they're touching multiple surfaces, they're sharing equipment, they're indoors. Literally all of the heightened risk factors for COVID transmission are all entwined together in a gym."The White House's guidance included mitigation measures that would ostensibly minimize the risk of transmission at gyms that opt to reopen, including "strict physical distancing and sanitation protocols." But Gostin said he's not convinced that the risks of transmission could be sufficiently minimized."It's very hard to socially distance. Machines are right next to each other. It's also very hard to disinfect. You'd have to do it continuously, not just every hour," he said. "There was certainly no attempt to put in any scientific evidence as to why they're safe or how they could possibly be made safe."The decision on gyms came a day after Trump's phone call with 16 business leaders including Bahram Akradi, chief executive of health club chain Life Time, and Stephen Ross, the founder and chairman of the Related Companies. That firm's broad portfolio includes a vast swath of commercial and residential real estate properties, as well as Equinox Holdings, which owns its own eponymous chain of luxury gyms as well as fitness brands SoulCycle, Blink Fitness, and Pure Yoga.Trevor Noah Drags Equinox Owner for Ignoring Trump's RacismThose businesses, like the larger fitness industry, have been hit particularly hard by the coronavirus. SoulCycle has slashed payroll and furloughed employees. Equinox and Blink have both frozen membership charges.Arkadi has donated to prominent Republicans in the past, though not to Trump. He warned in an appearance on Laura Ingraham's primetime Fox News show late last month that he might be forced to lay off up to 90 percent of his employees unless American businesses began to reopen.The White House readout of Wednesday's phone call said industry representatives—which included Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Brian Moynihan of Bank of America, Jimmy John Liautaud, the eponymous owner of the Jimmy John's restaurant chain, and Phil Ruffin of Treasure Island Hotels—"shared ideas for ways their industries can safely return." The White House declined to comment on whether ideas presented by Ross informed its phase one guidelines. In an emailed statement, a Related spokesperson told The Daily Beast, "Stephen Ross never discussed gyms, exercise clubs or anything like that with the President and this story is factually incorrect garbage.""Equinox is an independent company, with multiple investors and Related doesn't make strategic or operational decisions for them," the spokesperson added.Ross was one of more than 200 people named to the White House's economic recovery task forces this week, which will advise the Trump administration on policies to reverse the economic damage done by the coronavirus. He was one of 27 high-dollar donors to pro-Trump groups who made the list. Since the 2016 presidential campaign, he's donated about $300,000 to the Republican National Committee.Ross also hosted a fundraiser for Trump's reelection campaign last year at his home in the Hamptons. The move drew criticism from Trump critics and calls to boycott his fitness businesses, which are among the nation's largest by revenue. That fundraiser, combined with one other, helped the president and affiliated campaign groups raise $12 million. As Ross endured criticism for hosting the event, Trump rushed to his defense. "He's a great friend of mine; he's a very successful guy. We were competitors but friends in real estate in New York in the old days," he told reporters. "He's probably more inclined to be a liberal if you want to know the truth, but he likes me, he respects me."Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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