It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Wednesday, March 25, 2020
Stuart Gordon, Cult Classic Horror Director, Dies at 72
Stuart Gordon, best known as the filmmaker behind such cult classics as “Re-Animator” and “From Beyond,” has died, his family confirmed to Variety Tuesday night. He was 72.
Although best known for his seminal work in independent horror, Gordon had a varied career that included founding the Organic Theater Company with his wife, Carolyn Purdy-Gordon. The Organic premiered such prominent works as David Mamet’s “Sexual Perversity in Chicago” and “Bleacher Bums,” which starred Dennis Franz and Joe Mantegna. He was a co-creator of the “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids” franchise, for which he shared a story credit, and produced the film’s sequel and directed an episode of the TV spin-off. In 2005, he directed a film adaptation of Mamet’s “Edmond,” starring William H. Macy. Other films include “Fortress,” “Castle Freak” and “King of the Ants.”
In recent years, Gordon was active in L.A. theater, finding success directing the solo show “Nevermore…An Evening with Edgar Allen Poe” starring his “Re-Animator” star Jeffrey Combs. He also directed and co-wrote the book for “Re-Animator: The Musical,” which won several awards and was praised by a Variety critic, who wrote, “not since ‘Little Shop of Horrors’ has a screamfest tuner so deftly balanced seriousness and camp.”
Gordon also won a Stage Raw Award for directing “Taste,” a two-person drama that premiered in 2014, based on a true story where one man agrees to be eaten by another.
He is survived by his wife, Carolyn Purdy-Gordon, daughters Suzanna, Jillian and Margaret Gordon, four grandchildren and his brother, David George Gordon.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average stock index posted its largest percentage gain since 1933 on Tuesday, rising 11.4 percent and erasing some of the sharp losses over the past few weeks. The Republican National Committee celebrated this gain.
For those with a general knowledge of 20th century history, 1933 was in the heart of the Great Depression, and the market's 15.3 percent jump that year happened less than two weeks after Franklin Delano Roosevelt was sworn in after crushing Republican President Herbert Hoover, promising a big-government New Deal to rescue the economy. Also in 1933, the unemployment rate hit 25 percent. Historian Kevin Kruse has some more dour news for those hoping a sharp jump in the stock market signals sunny days close ahead.
The good news: The Dow went up by 11.37% today, which is the fifth biggest percentage gain in its entire history.
The bad news: The top four gains all came during the Dow plunge of 1929-1932 that carried us into the Depression, while the next two came during the 2008 meltdown. pic.twitter.com/Sn7BJhSpY4 — Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) March 24, 2020
"Many investors cited their own hope tied to the powerful government response coming from Congress, the White House, and the Federal Reserve," Politico reported Tuesday night. "But most acknowledged the day’s surge was likely just another bear-market rally, a momentary melt up after a meltdown that we will likely see again in an era of extreme volatility taking cues from the Great Depression. Traders and economists acknowledged the real market optimism will come from the health front — the coronavirus curve peaking and sliding enough for America’s businesses and workers to slowly return to normal." Peter Weber
"I want to have a frank conversation with you," commentator Glenn Beck, 56, said on his show Tuesday, the latest conservative to paint the coronavirus lockdowns in terms of life versus liberty. "I would rather have my children stay home and all of us who are over 50 go in and keep this economy going and working, even if we all get sick. I would rather die than kill the country, because it's not the economy that's dying, it's the country."
"When he says 'I' he means of course 'you,'" David Frum tweeted in response to Beck's death offer, issued from safe inside his Dallas-area home studio. But even if he was serious about dying to save America from sheltering in place to keep doctors and hospitals from collapsing under the weight of a spike in COVID-19 cases, Beck, like Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) on Monday night, is presenting "a false binary, and a distraction," Christopher Hooks writes at Texas Monthly. "The only way to get the economy going again is to contain the virus. The only way to contain the virus is to pause the economy, and in order to do that as briefly as possible, the economic timeout has to be thorough."
Hooks continued with "the practical aspects" of this kind of "offer of self-sacrifice":
[I]f Patrick gets sick and dies, that won’t be the end of the story. He may well infect other people, who will infect other people, and so on. Some of those people could die. He may give it to his wife or his grandkid before he shows symptoms, or to a nurse tending to him after he goes to the hospital. ... And it should also be said that even if America’s elderly were unanimously willing to undergo a culling so that their grandkids can go back to happy hour, they are not the only ones vulnerable to this. It kills perfectly healthy young people. [Christopher Hooks, Texas Monthly]
A 17-year-old died in California on Tuesday, likely from COVID-19. And New Yorker contributor Yascha Mounk posted this cautionary tale Tuesday night: "Three days ago, a 28-year old employee of the International Monetary Fund suggested that the cost social distancing is exacting 'on the economy' might be more important than 'the human aspect of the disease.' Today, he succumbed to COVID-19." These "deaths will not help the recovery proceed faster," Hooks notes. Peter Weber
Britney Spears seemingly called for the redistribution of wealth and a general strike on Monday, "regramming" a post written by Instagram user Mimi Zhu. "During this time of isolation, we need connection now more than ever," the text shared by Spears said, going on to describe how "we will learn to kiss and hold each other through the waves of the web. We will feed each other, redistribute wealth, strike. We will understand our own importance from the places we must stay."
The "Work B---h" singer captioned the post by quoting the text's penultimate line — "communion [moves] beyond walls" — and adding three emoji roses, a symbol commonly used by the Democratic Socialists of America.
"Queen of [the] proletariat," cheered on one fan in the comments. Jeva Lange
Mexico street artists and vendors worry about virus-hit future
Yussel GONZALEZ, AFP•March 24, 2020 Street musician Luis Valdovinos is seen in Mexico City, where increasingly empty streets are making it harder for him to make a living (AFP Photo/ALFREDO ESTRELLA)
Mexico City (AFP) - Before the coronavirus pandemic struck, Luis Valdovinos was earning about $12 a day playing his barrel organ in the streets of Mexico City.
Now, it's taking him a lot longer to make that much money.
The streets of the Mexican capital are emptying out with each passing day, as residents become more and more aware of the need to practice social distancing to curb the virus's spread.
For performers like Valdovinos, such measures are threatening his livelihood. - ADVERTISEMENT -
"Some people have money (to offer), and the rest of them can go to hell," said the 46-year-old, whose instrument creates a somewhat ominous drone that fits the mood of a city in fear.
"All of Mexico is afraid. Businesses are closing. Unfortunately, those of us who live off the streets every day are the ones who are hit hardest."
Valdovinos is part of the whopping 56 percent of all Mexicans who work in the informal economy. No taxes, no social security, no safety net.
Many of those people live day to day, and simply cannot work from home, as tens of millions of people around the world with typical office jobs are able to do.
"Those who cannot have a 'home office' run a greater risk of suffering the economic and social consequences of this public health crisis," said the advocacy group Citizen Action Against Poverty.
"Their low income and list of needs make these people the most vulnerable in a virus pandemic scenario that requires quarantining and social distancing," the group said. - 'No other choice' -
Gabriel Gonzalez is facing many of the same problems as Valdovinos.
The 42-year-old Gonzalez is a street clown -- he specifically dons the make-up of the sinister Pennywise from Stephen King's "It."
Before the coronavirus crisis erupted, he could count on making about $40 a day in fees paid by tourists wanting to take pictures with him.
Now, he's making 10 times less than that, as the mega-city of more than 20 million people turns into a virtual ghost town, and tourists are scarce.
DR QUACK Pence again touts chloroquine as coronavirus treatment after it's linked to deaths ITS FISH TANK CLEANER!! Kathryn Krawczyk,The Week•March 24, 202
Vice President Mike Pence touted a potentially unsafe COVID-19 treatment on Tuesday even after it had been linked to deaths.
Pence, who's been leading the White House's response to the new coronavirus, appeared for a Fox News town hall on Tuesday. That's where Dr. Mehmet Oz asked him about the malaria drug chloroquine that's been discussed as a potential treatment for the new coronavirus, and Pence seemed more than hopeful about the drug's prospects.
"There's no barrier to access chloroquine in this country. We're looking to add to that supply," Pence said of the drug. "We are engaging in a clinical trial" with the intent to make chloroquine available "for off-label use." But when asked if he'd take chloroquine if he became infected with COVID-19, Pence only said he'd follow the advice of his physician, even after repeated prodding from Oz. That cautious part of Pence's response was left out of a clip shared by the Trump campaign.
Pence's chloroquine confidence comes after President Trump repeatedly touted the drug's potential in a Monday night press conference. After that, Nigeria reported two fatal overdoses of chloroquine and implored its citizens not to use the drug, which "will cause harm and can lead to death." A man in Arizona died and his wife was hospitalized after ingesting a form of chloroquine that's used to clean fish tanks. The woman said she got the idea from Trump.
President Trump continued to downplay the exponential spread of the coronavirus in the United States on Monday, comparing the rising death toll to the number of Americans killed in car crashes and by the seasonal flu. “We have a very active flu season, more active than most,” Trump said at a Monday briefing of the White House coronavirus task force, reverting to how he had described the coronavirus throughout February and early March, before he started to take the outbreak more seriously. The point seemed to be that, as far as mortality numbers go, the coronavirus was not an especially fearsome killer. 14.3k
Sen. Murphy: Private market is failing, health care workers in 'absolute panic' over supply shortages
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) wants the federal government to take over the medical supply chain, as hospitals scramble to find enough supplies and protective gear for health care workers during the coronavirus outbreak.
“Medical professionals are in absolute panic right now. Panic. They do not have enough masks to last them through this week,” said Murphy in an interview with Yahoo Finance. “They are going to start getting sick. They’re going to stop showing up for work.”
“Havoc,” Murphy said, “will be wrought when medical professionals stop showing up and hospitals close down.”
Murphy and Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI) announced new legislation on Monday that would force President Trump to use the Defense Production Act and federalize the manufacture and distribution of some medical supplies. President Trump signed the DPA, but has been hesitant to actually use the powers to order private companies to boost production of medical supplies.
WASHINGTON, DC - MARCH 10: Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) (Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)More
“We have the threat of [the Defense Production Act], if we need it. We may have to use it somewhere along the supply chain, in a minor way,” said Trump in a press briefing on Sunday. “I mean, when this was announced, it sent tremors through our business community and through our country because, basically, what are you doing? You're talking about — you’re going to nationalize an industry or you're going to nationalize — you're going to take away companies. You're going to tell companies what to do.”
Murphy argues telling companies what to do isn’t enough. The senator says Congress and the administration need to nationalize the distribution of supplies.
“The whole supply chain is broken down,” said Murphy. “Right now the private market is failing. It is absolutely failing.”
“I'm a believer in the private market, but not in times of crisis when the private market is incentivizing hoarding and gouging,” he added.
Murphy acknowledged his legislation likely won’t be in the Phase 3 economic stimulus package, but he’s hopeful it could be considered later this week.
President Trump and Attorney General William Barr announced an executive order on Monday evening aimed at preventing price gauging and hoarding. “They refuse to take it seriously”
Murphy also blasted President Trump for apparently suggesting in a tweet that the administration could back off strict isolation measures aimed at stopping the spread of the virus.
WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF. AT THE END OF THE 15 DAY PERIOD, WE WILL MAKE A DECISION AS TO WHICH WAY WE WANT TO GO!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 23, 2020
President Trump told reporters on Monday evening that the administration would reevaluate the situation at the end of the 15 day period. He explained that the U.S. would not be back to business in a week, but he believes it will be sooner than 3 to 4 months.
“The administration has been an abysmal failure in confronting this virus. They refuse to take it seriously,” said Murphy. “Maybe the most dangerous thing that the president has done is this new path that he has taken through social media, to start suggesting that we may give up, we may give up on fighting the virus and just accept that it's going to kill a million Americans — which would be immoral, unconscionable, and an economic and public health disaster.”
Lawmakers are still negotiating an economic relief package that could come with a $2 trillion price tag. A procedural vote to move the bill forward has now failed twice in the Senate. Murphy told Yahoo Finance the Senate could vote again Monday night or Tuesday morning.
“There is, I think, some real concern that the drafting was very sloppy and that much of the money might end up in the hands of companies and corporations that don't end up using it to restore and maintain jobs,” said Murphy. “This is obviously a crisis in which hours matter, but you're spending $2 trillion — so you want to get that right. The worst thing to happen here would be to spend $2 trillion and have it not result in the virus’ spread being halted. That would be an absolute disaster.”
Jessica Smith is a reporter for Yahoo Finance based in Washington, D.C. Follow her on Twitter at @JessicaASmith8.
SNAKEOIL ON FOX Surgeon General Shuts Down ‘Fox & Friends’ for Hyping Unproven Coronavirus Cure
Surgeon General warns 'Fox & Friends' and Dr. Oz for hyping unproven coronavirus treatment
‘It’s not practical’ .Surgeon general warns ‘Fox & Friends’ and Dr. Oz for hyping unproven coronavirus treatment
U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams pushed back on the hosts of Fox & Friends on Monday morning after the trio hyped up an anti-malaria drug as a potential treatment for coronavirus.
Social distancing, the top doc said, is still currently the best way to stem the spread of the virus.
In recent days, President Donald Trump has embraced chloroquine and its derivative hydroxychloroquine as a “game changer” after a small clinical trial in France showed promise of the drugs’ effectiveness in treating the viral infection. While Trump has hyped the medications as potential cures, the nation’s top infectious-disease expert has expressed hesitancy, noting that the findings are merely anecdotal and that more studies and trials are needed.
During Monday’s broadcast of the president’s favorite morning show, however, celebrity doctor Dr. Oz excitedly shared with the Fox News audience that he had spoken with French doctor behind the trial that’s thrilled Trump and he agrees that it is indeed a “game changer.”
After Oz, who has a history of “dispensing misinformation” on his show, said that he would be working alongside other universities and clinics to start trials soon, Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade brought up Dr. Anthony Fauci’s attempts to temper expectations of the drugs’ abilities to combat the coronavirus, wondering what was “going on there” since it appears there’s no “downside” since it isn’t “hurting people.” (Nigerian health officials have, in fact, issued a warning after three people overdosed on chloroquine.)
Oz, meanwhile, said that while he respects Fauci he feels comfortable hyping the drug treatment because “the data is so strong” and Americans will be taking it anyway now that it’s been advertised.
“It’s going to happen anyway,” he added. “We need more data. Let’s do both. You don’t have to be right or wrong. Start the clinical trials. Get the data back over the next week or two, three, whatever it takes. But meanwhile, people can start treating.”
Later in the hour, the program welcomed on Adams, who immediately tossed cold water on the unproven treatment that the TV doctor had just breathlessly promoted.
“He wonders, you know, and worries about the fact that we don’t have enough pills yet in this country if that works,” co-host Steve Doocy pointed out to Adams.
“Here is the thing about those drugs: There is may and actually does,” Adams noted. “These may be promising. So we are trying to make them as available as possible to people across the country. We need to verify through studies that they actually work.”
“But I also, again, want to go back to the fact that it’s not practical to think we are going to treat our way out of this problem with new drugs or with ventilators or with supplies,” he continued. “We need to lower demand. We need more people talking about staying at home.”
The surgeon general went on to say that this is the reason why he’s contacted young celebrities to get the word out to millennials and Generation Z that they need to stay home and socially distance themselves.
During another morning-show appearance, Adams gave a stark warning to Americans that the worst was yet to come. “I want America to understand, this week, it’s going to get bad,” he said on NBC’s Today.
Trump, however, has begun to hint that he may give up on social-distancing guidelines as early as next week. Even though health experts believe it will take several more weeks or months before people can start living life normally, the president fired off an all-caps tweet on Sunday night saying “WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF.” He also retweeted several right-wing personalities on Monday morning calling for social-distancing guidelines to be abandoned after the White House’s 15-day period is up.
'Unconscionable': Latino, black student numbers at NYC elite public high schools stay low
For years, parents, educators and politicians in New York City have been embroiled in a fierce debate over the dismally low acceptance numbers for Latino and black students in its highly selective, elite public high schools — especially considering they make up 7 in 10 students.
Now, new data released by officials indicates the debate will continue with a renewed vigor, as the number of black and Latino students at such schools remains virtually unchanged.
According to admissions statistics from the N.Y.C. Department of Education, black and Latino students make up only 11.1 percent of admitted students for the 2020-2021 school year, a 0.5 percent increase from the previous year.
"New York City is the most segregated school system in the nation for black students, [and] the second most for Latinx students," said David Kirkland, an associate professor of urban education at New York University, and the executive director of its Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools. "It's unconscionable, those numbers, in a city that expresses a commitment to equity and diversity."
At Stuyvesant High School, the most selective of the nine specialized schools, only 10 black students and 20 Latino students received admissions offers — fewer than the previous year, and a small fraction of the 766 admitted. At others, these numbers were even lower: Staten Island Technical High School admitted only one black and eight Latino students. "The New Jim Crow"
Admissions to these schools hinge on a standardized test that some feel creates disproportionate barriers to populations that are already underrepresented.
In a statement, Richard A. Carranza, chancellor of the city's department of education, said that while he was proud of the students receiving acceptances, the numbers pointed to a glaring issue.
"Diversity in our specialized high schools remains stagnant, because we know a single test does not capture our students' full potential," he said in an emailed statement. "I am hopeful we'll move towards a more equitable system next year."
Eight of the nine specialized high schools admit solely on the basis of the Specialized High School Admissions Test, or SHSAT, and the ninth, the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, admits students by audition.
In an email, Amy Stuart Wells, a professor of sociology and education at Columbia University, called the city's one-exam admissions policy "the new Jim Crow of public education." Wells, who serves as the executive director of Reimagining Education for a Racially Just Society at the university's Teachers College, emphasized standardized testing is not a sufficient metric upon which to make such decisions.
"We know that students' learning and knowledge is cultural and that too often standardized tests are culturally biased, resulting in racial and ethnic disparities in results," she said.
Kirkland explains there are a number of reasons why black and Latino students are particularly disadvantaged when it comes to standardized testing, from a lack of cultural emphasis on the practice, to culturally biased language and tasks on the exam, to the inability to afford expensive test prep.
"It's not clear to me that those tests necessarily test ability as much as they test parents' income or sociological location," he said. Proposing alternatives
Kirkland adds that there are a plethora of alternative admissions metrics, pointing to the University of Texas system, which guarantees admissions to a percentage of top performers at every high school, or a more qualitative approach based on interviews and teacher recommendations.
Many city officials agree that the SHSAT is a flawed tool — including New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who has previously advocated for axing the admissions test in favor of a Texas style top of each middle school class admissions policy. But despite the mayor's support, the SHSAT has long been a political minefield in New York City, where many remain concerned about the potential side effects its removal would bring.
According to a 2019 report, Asian American admissions would drop by roughly 50 percent under such a plan, while black and Latino enrollment would be 4-5 times higher. Some Asian American community leaders and groups have opposed the plan, worrying that their voices were not considered on a move which would drastically affect their student populations. Asian American students currently hold more than half of the seats at specialized high schools, despite comprising only roughly a third of SHSAT test takers.
The law which mandates the SHSAT, the Hecht-Calandra Act, would need to be overturned by the state assembly, adding further difficulty to de Blasio's diversity efforts. During his tenure, de Blasio has worked to expand the Discovery program, which allows students from high financial need families who just miss the SHSAT cutoff to attend specialized high schools if they agree to enroll in a summer course. But the program has failed to significantly increase black and Latino admissions.
"If they want to engage in the support of community residents and civil rights groups, they need to come to the table with something more substantial," he said.
"What the specialized high schools set up is a vacuum of who gets to have opportunity and who doesn't," Kirkland said. He adds that those denied admission will go on to a high school with fewer resources, a college with less prestige, and to a job that pays less.
A lack of better educational opportunities can completely change a student's trajectory, especially for those coming from truly disadvantaged families.
To Kirkland, the stakes couldn't be higher, and it comes down to an issue of policy.
"Nothing has changed in terms of policy, therefore nothing has changed in terms of the outcomes that we get," he said. "There are recommendations on the table to do it, and we have to be brave enough, courageous enough, to take a hard look at them.
Fact check: Why is the 1918 influenza virus called 'Spanish flu'?
Matthew Brown, USA TODAY, USA TODAY•March 23, 2020
The claim: The 1918 flu pandemic became known as the “Spanish flu” because wartime censors minimized reports of the illness while the Spanish press did not.
On March 20, the Facebook page Unbelievable Facts shared a graphic on the origins of the 1918 flu pandemic’s more common name, the “Spanish flu.”
According to the post, the pandemic earned the name “because during WWI, wartime censors minimized early reports of illness and mortality” in combating nations “but the papers were free to report the epidemic’s effects in neutral Spain, which created a false impression of Spain as being especially hard hit.”
Unbelievable Facts, which brands itself as “your source for the best bizarre, strange and extraordinary stories on the internet,” has more than 8.3 million followers on Facebook. The post in question has 6,100 reactions and about 1,300 shares on the site. The origins of 1918 influenza and its spread
When it was discovered, the 1918 flu virus was spreading in a world at war. Because of the turmoil that World War I had wrought on societies around the globe, it’s difficult for scientists and historians today to piece together the exact origins of the virus.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention states there is no universal consensus as to the origins of the virus, though experts have theorized about origins as disparate as China, France, the United States and United Kingdom. Others have argued the virus was likely circulating in European armies for months – and potentially even years – before it was officially discovered. The CDC states that the first confirmed cases in the United States were military personnel in the spring of 1918.
“We don't know and will probably never know,” John M. Barry, the author of "The Great Influenza," a history of the 1918 flu, told USA TODAY. In his book, Barry advanced the theory that the virus began in rural Kansas, but “work since then has caused me to back away from that. The best evidence points to China. Other theories suggest France or Vietnam.”
The comparatively mild effect the 1918 flu had on China has led some researchers to suspect that the virus or a related milder strain began there earlier, meaning the population had a higher level of immunity to the disease when it reached pandemic levels elsewhere. This research is disputed, however, notably because data from China’s Warlord Period is arguably less reliable.
The 1918 flu was an H1N1 virus with genes indicating it likely originated in birds. This makes it like the H1N1 strain that caused the swine flu pandemic of 2009. Unlike swine flu, however, the 1918 flu was far more damaging for the world; an estimated third of the world’s population was infected, with about 50 million people dying from the virus.
Unlike most influenza viruses, the 1918 flu was most lethal for people ages 20-40 and young children. Researchers don’t fully understand why this was the case, though the lack of a vaccine, poor sanitary conditions and no coordinated response nations likely contributed to the disastrous impact. The possibility of a similar virus having spread during the youth of 1918's older population may be why those 65 and older had a lower mortality rate than would be expected. The role of governments in publicizing the flu's spread
A key factor that made both mitigating the virus and tracing its impact difficult today is that governments at the time downplayed the issue. Countries did not want to lower national morale or cause panic while also fighting what was then the largest and most costly war in history.
Public health officials in France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States all downplayed the spread of the virus, treating it as a normal influenza virus or cases of “simple pneumonia” found in the ranks of soldiers.
“The U.S. didn't formally censor,” Barry said, but the mainstream press and government institutions instead opted for a kind of “self-censorship.” This strategy ultimately proved more damaging, because when the gravity of the situation became unavoidable, governments had lost their credibility about the pandemic.
The pressures of the global conflict weren’t present in the Kingdom of Spain, which was neutral in World War I. As such, Spanish public officials and media more readily reported on the crisis as it spread throughout the country.
Additionally, King Alfonso XIII of Spain also fell gravely ill with the virus, heightening press coverage in the country and grabbing headlines elsewhere. There is no evidence, however, that the virus began in Spain, nor is there any indication that the virus was especially worse in Spain than anywhere else in Europe. Our ruling: True
Though it is difficult to determine from the historical record where the 1918 flu virus originated and how it spread across the globe, the origins of its common name are not in doubt. The Spanish press, being those most likely to report on the virus and its spread, also gave the false impression at the time that the disease originated there.
The name “Spanish flu” has accompanied the 1918 pandemic ever since, largely because other countries were unwilling or uninterested in reporting on the outbreak within their own borders. We rate this claim TRUE, based on our research. Our fact-check sources:
%20--%20Canada%E2%80%99s%20economic%20heartland%20is%20shutting%20down%20as%20Ontario%20and%20Quebec%20step%20up%20efforts%20to%20slow%20down%20the%20coronavirus%20outbreak.The%20two%20provinces%2C%20which%20together%20account%20for%20about%2057%25%20of%20the%20country%E2%80%99s%20economy%2C%20have%20ordered%20non-essential%20businesses%20to%20close%20by%20the%20end%20of%20Tuesday.%20The%20order%20is&tags=){kind=link}
%20--%20Canada%E2%80%99s%20economic%20heartland%20is%20shutting%20down%20as%20Ontario%20and%20Quebec%20step%20up%20efforts%20to%20slow%20down%20the%20coronavirus%20outbreak.The%20two%20provinces%2C%20which%20together%20account%20for%20about%2057%25%20of%20the%20country%E2%80%99s%20economy%2C%20have%20ordered%20non-essential%20businesses%20to%20close%20by%20the%20end%20of%20Tuesday.%20The%20order%20is&picture=https%3A%2F%2Fs.yimg.com%2Fcv%2Fapiv2%2Fsocial%2Fimages%2Fyahoo_default_logo.png&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.yahoo.com%2Fnews%2Fmediacontentsharebuttons%2Fpostshare%2F&display=popup&show_error=yes){kind=link}