RACIST FOR PROFIT MEDICINE USA
Study: Cancer risk higher among Hispanic people compared to White people


The risk for many cancers remains higher among Hispanic people compared to White people, the American Cancer Society said. Photo by Rhoda Baer/Wikimedia Commons


Sept. 21 (UPI) -- Hispanic people in the United States are up to 30% less likely to develop cancer and die from the disease compared with White people, according to an analysis published Tuesday by CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians.

However, Hispanic people still have a two-fold higher risk than White people for being afflicted by potentially preventable, infection-related cancers, including liver and stomach cancers, the data showed.

In addition, Hispanic women are more than 30% more likely to suffer from cervical cancer, which is almost completely preventable through screening and vaccination, compared to White women.

The risk for cervical cancer is 78% higher for Hispanic women in Puerto Rico compared to White women nationally.

Much of the high burden of cancer in the Hispanic population could be reduced by increasing access to high-quality prevention, early detection and treatment services, the researchers said.

"Addressing this critical gap ... is going to be essential for mitigating the predicted growth in the cancer burden," study co-author Kimberly Miller, a scientist at the American Cancer Society, said in a press release.

At least part of this reduced access to key screening and treatment services is due to shortfalls in health insurance coverage among Hispanic people, research suggests.

The society publishes its report on the risk for cancer among Hispanic people every three years.

The Hispanic/Latino population is the second-largest racial or ethnic group in the United States, accounting for 19% of the total population, or more than 62 million people, in 2020, based on census figures.

However, it also has the highest percentage of people without health insurance of any major racial or ethnic group -- nearly triple that of White people, at 26% versus 9%, among adults ages 18 to 64 years, a recent study found.

RELATED Cancer patients less likely to face 'catastrophic' care costs under ACA, study finds

In Puerto Rico, nearly one-half of the 3 million Hispanic people living there receive health insurance through Medicaid, according to a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Medicaid, the federal government-run program for low-income individuals and families, is substantially underfunded in the territory, Miller and her colleagues said.

In addition, variations in cancer risk between Hispanic people and White people, as well as within the Hispanic community, are driven by differences in exposure to cancer-causing infectious agents and behavioral risk factors, the researchers said.

For example, the prevalence of cigarette smoking in 2019 was 16% among White people compared to 9% among Hispanic people residing in the continental United States, a recent analysis found.

However, within the Hispanic population, smoking prevalence ranged from 6% among those with roots in Central or South America to 17% among those from Puerto Rico who now live in the continental United States.

Hispanic people also have among the highest prevalence of excess body weight, the second-most important modifiable cancer risk factor, Miller and her colleagues said.

Cancer still is the leading cause of death among Hispanic people, reflecting the younger age of the population.

An estimated 46,500 cancer deaths will occur among Hispanic individuals in the continental United States and Hawaii in 2021, the researchers said.

The most common causes of cancer death among Hispanic men are lung cancer, at 13% of diagnoses, and colorectal cancer and liver cancer, each at 11%.

Among Hispanic women, the most common cancers are breast cancer, at 14% of diagnoses, and lung cancer, at 10%.

Fewer than half of Hispanic people age 45 and older were up-to-date with colorectal screening -- colonoscopy and sigmoidoscopy -- in 2018 compared with 58% of White people, with a lower percentage even among those who were uninsured, according to a recent study.

"More research is needed to assess not only the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the utilization of cancer care, but also the impact on cancer incidence and mortality trends as COVID-19 has disproportionately affected minority populations in the U.S.," Miller said.

Myanmar leads global plunge in digital freedom after military coup, report says


Myanmar saw a massive decline in Internet freedom after a February military coup, the Freedom on the Net report said, headlining a year that saw a global erosion in digital rights.

 File Photo by Xiao Long/UPI | License Photo

Sept. 21 (UPI) -- Myanmar saw its Internet freedom plummet in the wake of a military coup, a report released Tuesday by U.S. think tank Freedom House said, headlining a year that saw an erosion of digital rights around the world.

The 2021 Freedom on the Net report found a global decline in Internet freedom for the 11th consecutive year, as governments censored and arrested users for online speech and weakened data and privacy protections.

Myanmar's overall score dropped by 14 points on the report's scale of 100, marking the most severe decline ever documented.

"As part of its attempt to crush dissent and maintain power, the military junta shut down Internet service, blocked social media platforms and websites, seized control of the telecommunications infrastructure and ramped up intrusive surveillance," the report said.

The Southeast Asian state, which remains embroiled in a violent internal conflict after its military coup in February, fell to the third-lowest position in a ranking of 70 countries, ahead of only Iran and China in a bleak year for online freedom.

"Free expression is under unprecedented strain around the world," the report said. "In 56 countries, a record 80% of those covered by Freedom on the Net, people were arrested or convicted for their online speech."

The report found that at least 20 countries shut off the Internet at some point during the year, while users in 41 countries faced physical attacks as retribution for online activities, another record high.

Among the year's disturbing trends was rising government use of spyware and extraction technology developed by private companies such as Israel's NSO Group.

"A booming commercial market for surveillance technology has given governments more capacity than ever before to flout the rule of law and monitor private communications at their discretion," the report said.

After Myanmar, Belarus and Uganda saw the next-largest drops in their rankings as both countries cut off digital access and arrested online critics during election seasons.


Belarusian incumbent President Alyaksandr Lukashenka claimed victory in a fraudulent August 2020 election and followed up with a brutal campaign of repression against pro-democracy protesters and online journalists and activists.

In Uganda, longtime President Yoweri Museveni's government shut down the Internet, flooded social media with misinformation and harassed journalists amid a January 2020 election that opponents have called rigged.

However, it was an increasingly authoritarian China that remained "the world's worst abuser of Internet freedom," the report said, with Beijing imposing "profoundly oppressive" restrictions on digital users.

Over the past year, online journalists and citizens were sentenced to long prison terms for criticizing the government or simply sharing news stories, while information on topics such as the COVID-19 pandemic was heavily censored. China has also tightened its controls over the country's tech giants in a move that consolidates even more power in Beijing's hands.

On the opposite side of the ledger, Iceland was ranked as the best environment for Internet freedom for the third year in a row, scoring 96 out of 100 points for its near-universal connectivity, minimal restrictions and strong rights protections.

Estonia came in second, while Costa Rica, included in the report for the first time in 2021, ranked third as one of the first countries in the world to recognize Internet access as a fundamental right.

Taiwan was another new entry this year and ranked fifth due to a "vibrant online landscape" that is supported by an independent judiciary and affordable access.

The United States landed at 12th place following a decline for the fifth year in a row, thanks in a part to the growing proliferation of false, misleading and manipulated information online. The report also cited the enhanced online surveillance of racial justice protesters and the secret collection of phone and email records by the Justice Department during a leak investigation.


Authorities in at least 48 countries pursued new regulations on tech companies such as Facebook, Google and Twitter over the past year, the report noted.

In some cases, the rules were meant to rein in the unchecked power of the tech giants. More frequently, however, countries such as India and Turkey exploited new laws to remove online content critical of the government and access user data, the report said.

WHITE JUNKIES
Opioid addiction kills as many people in U.S. as heart attack, study says

By HealthDay News


People who have been hospitalized with opioid addiction-related issues in the United States die at rates similar to those for heart attack, according to new research. File Photo by chuck stock/Shutterstock

Hospitalized opioid addicts die at a rate similar to people who have a heart attack after leaving the hospital.

Nearly 8% of patients addicted to opioids died within 12 months of hospital discharge, according to researchers from Oregon Health & Science University.

"We need systems that can address comprehensive needs of people with substance use disorder and serious medical illness," said study co-author Dr. Honora Englander. She is an associate professor of medicine at OHSU in Portland.

"That means trauma-informed systems that destigmatize addiction to make health care systems more trustworthy and more effective for our patients," Englander explained in a university news release.

RELATED Rising number of U.S. cardiac arrests linked to opioid abuse, study says

The study looked at data on more than 6,600 Medicaid patients treated in Oregon hospitals between April 2015 and December 2017.

Drug-related causes, including overdoses, accounted for 58% of the 522 deaths that occurred within a year of leaving the hospital.

The other deaths were from diseases of the circulatory, respiratory and endocrine systems, the researchers found.

RELATED Study: Some seniors at increased risk for opioid misuse after hip surgery

According to study co-author Caroline King of OHSU's department of biomedical engineering, "A lot of the research has focused on overdose deaths.

We found that overdoses are really just the tip of the iceberg for these patients, representing 13% of deaths in the year after discharge."

A one-year death rate of 8% is similar to that from conditions like a heart attack.

Englander pointed out that, "for heart attacks, hospital systems across the U.S. have universally accepted standards, metrics, and quality reporting that drives performance. The same should be true for opioid use disorder, where death rates are similar."

King said health systems need to do a better job of integrating and removing the stigma from the medical care these patients need.

And, Englander stressed, "It should be easier to access methadone than heroin. Right now, that is not the case -- systems are such that people have to work so hard just to get life-saving treatment."

The findings were published online recently in the Journal of Addiction Medicine.

More information

There's more about opioid addiction at the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Copyright © 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Animal sedative driving rise in fatal drug overdoses, CDC says

The animal sedative xylazine is increasingly being seen as a driver behind drug overdose deaths in the United States, the CDC said in a recent report.

An animal tranquilizer, xylazine, is increasingly linked to drug overdose deaths across the United States, health officials say.

According to a new report from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, xylazine has turned up in overdose deaths in 25 of 38 states examined.

In 2019, xylazine contributed to death in 64% of cases and almost always also involved fentanyl.

The drug is mixed with opioids, such as fentanyl or heroin, to enhance their effects, but this cocktail can increase sedation and respiratory depression.

RELATEDAnimal tranquilizer driving deadly rise in opioid ODs in Philadelphia

That, in turn, increases the risk of a fatal overdose, CDC researchers explained.

"The detection of xylazine in multiple jurisdictions is concerning and warrants continued surveillance to inform overdose response and prevention efforts given that naloxone administration may not be as effective when xylazine is mixed with opioids," wrote Mbabazi Kariisa, from CDC's division of overdose prevention at the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, and colleagues.

The drug naloxone can reverse effects of an opioid overdose, but xylazine is not an opioid, so naloxone may not work well in these users.

RELATEDDrug overdose deaths up nearly 30% in U.S. during pandemic-scarred 2020

Still, since xylazine is usually paired with opioids, it should always be given, Kariisa said.

"As there is no pharmaceutical antidote for xylazine, immediate supportive care such as respiratory and cardiovascular support is especially critical," Kariisa said.

Xylazine is used in veterinary medicine to sedate animals and is not meant for use in humans.

Another report in Friday's issue of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, highlighted the increase of xylazine overdose deaths in Connecticut.

Between 2019 and July 2020, deaths from the combination of fentanyl with xylazine rose from 6% to 11%, the researchers reported.

Pat Aussem is associate vice president at the Partnership to End Addiction. She said, "People who use xylazine may unknowingly consume it, as it can be added to the drug supply either to enhance drug effects or as a cutting agent to increase volume and reduce costs."

Combined with opioids, xylazine's sedating effects, especially at bedtime, seem to be part of the appeal for people who seek it out, hence the slang name "sleep cut" or "tranq," she noted.

"The combination of opioids and xylazine increases the risk of an overdose, as both drugs are central nervous system depressants. It can depress breathing, blood pressure and heart rate to dangerous levels or result in a fatality," Aussem said.

Special care may be needed if xylazine is involved in an overdose, she added, since naloxone's effectiveness may be diminished.

"Calling 911 is always important when a suspected overdose occurs, but maybe more so for supportive respiratory and cardiovascular care related to xylazine," Aussem said.

"Xylazine also appears to cause painful skin ulcers, so keeping wounds clean and/or getting professional treatment may be needed," Aussem said.

People using substances and the health care providers who work with them need to be educated on additives and their harmful effects, Aussem said.

"Further, when an overdose occurs, offering quality care is needed rather than merely stabilizing the person and discharging them to the street," she added

.More information

For more on drug dangers, head to the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Copyright © 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

ISRAEL DENIED IT, BUT IRAN WAS RIGHT

Report: Iranian nuclear scientist slain with Israeli remote-control gun

Soldiers carry the coffin of slain Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh during funeral procession inside the Iranian defense ministry in November 2020. Photo by Iranian Defense Ministry | License Photo

Sept. 18 (UPI) -- Iran's top nuclear scientist was assassinated by Israel's national intelligence agency using a high-tech remote-controlled machine gun, according to a report published Saturday in The New York Times.

Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was shot on Nov. 27, 2020, while driving his Nissan Teana between a vacation home on the Caspian Sea and a country house and the town of Absard, where he planned to spend the weekend with his wife, according to the report.

Iranian agents working for Israel had parked a blue Nissan Zamyad pickup truck on the side of the road with a 7.62-mm sniper machine gun hidden among decoy construction materials.

An assassin with the Mossad, Israel's intelligence agency, fired the gun at Fakhrizadeh. The assassin was more than 1,000 miles away using an advanced robot to operate the weapon that was smuggled into the country in small pieces.

However, explosives planted on the gun and robot left them intact, allowing Iranians to piece together what happened.

Israel has long been concerned about Iran developing nuclear weapons. Iran's leaders blamed Israel for the assassination saying it was carried out using high-tech means.

"Unfortunately, the operation was very complicated and was done using electronic equipment and no [perpetrators] were at the scene," Ali Shamkhani, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, said at a burial ceremony for Fakhrizdeh.

The Jerusalem Post followed up Saturday confirming the Times' reporting, saying it cleared up the confusion surrounding Fakhrizadeh's death.

The Post further reported that questions remain over how successful the operation was in delaying Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Israel had Fakhrizadeh in its sights since 2007 and was concerned he was accelerating Iran's nuclear program, according to the Times report. In 2012, Israel put its assassination plan on hold as the United States began negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program.

After President Donald Trump quashed the agreement with Iran, Israel resumed its assassination plans in 2019 and 2020 along with high-ranking U.S. officials, the Times reports.

Iran's English language Press TV reported that it would target the U.S. in legal proceedings for its support of Israeli-led assassination of nuclear scientists. Iranian officials are asking the United States to renew discussions over its nuclear program.

Israel reportedly used a remote-controlled gun to ...

https://www.engadget.com/israel-remote-control-iran-scientist...

2021-09-18 · While the remote gun was supposedly difficult to set up (Israel smuggled parts in very gradually), it both kept agents out of harm's way and avoided raising alarms like a drone.

Remote controlled weapon station - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remote_weapon_system

• Overview
• See also

A remote controlled weapon station (RCWS), or remote weapon station (RWS), also known as a remote weapon system, (RWS) is a remotely operated weaponized system often equipped with fire-control system for light and medium-caliber weapons which can be installed on ground combat vehicleor sea- and air-based combat platforms. Such equipment is used on modern military vehicles, as it allows a gunner to remain …

Wikipedia · Text under CC-BY-SA license

RIP REST IN POWER
Melvin Van Peebles, godfather of Black cinema, dies at 89



1 of 9

FILE - Gotham Tribute Honors recipient, filmmaker Melvin Van Peebles attends the 18th Annual Gotham Independent Film Awards at Cipriani Wall Street on Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2008, in New York. Van Peebles, a Broadway playwright, musician and movie director whose work ushered in the "blaxploitation" films of the 1970s, has died at age 89. His family said in a statement that Van Peebles died Tuesday night, Sept. 21, 2021, at his home. (AP Photo/Evan Agostini, File)


NEW YORK (AP) — Melvin Van Peebles, the groundbreaking filmmaker, playwright and musician whose work ushered in the “blaxploitation” wave of the 1970s and influenced filmmakers long after, has died. He was 89.

In statement, his family said that Van Peebles, father of the actor-director Mario Van Peebles, died Tuesday evening at his home in Manhattan.

“Dad knew that Black images matter. If a picture is worth a thousand words, what was a movie worth?” Mario Van Peebles said in a statement Wednesday. “We want to be the success we see, thus we need to see ourselves being free. True liberation did not mean imitating the colonizer’s mentality. It meant appreciating the power, beauty and interconnectivity of all people.”

Sometimes called the “godfather of modern Black cinema,” the multitalented Van Peebles wrote numerous books and plays, and recorded several albums — playing multiple instruments and delivering rap-style lyrics. He later became a successful options trader on the stock market.

But he was best known for “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song,” one of the most influential movies of its time. The low-budget, art-house film, which he wrote, produced, directed, starred in and scored, was the frenzied, hyper-sexual and violent tale of a Black street hustler on the run from police after killing white officers who were beating a Black revolutionary.

Mario Van Peebles and his father in 2018. (Photo by Willy Sanjuan/Invision/AP)

With its hard-living, tough-talking depiction of life in the ghetto, underscored by a message of empowerment as told from a Black perspective, it set the tone for a genre that turned out dozens of films over the next few years and prompted a debate over whether Black people were being recognized or exploited.

“All the films about Black people up to now have been told through the eyes of the Anglo-Saxon majority in their rhythms and speech and pace,” Van Peebles told Newsweek in 1971, the year of the film’s release.

“I could have called it ‘The Ballad of the Indomitable Sweetback.’ But I wanted the core audience, the target audience, to know it’s for them,” he told The Associated Press in 2003. “So I said ‘Ba-ad Asssss,’ like you really say it.”

Made for around $500,000 (including $50,000 provided by Bill Cosby), it grossed $14 million at the box office despite an X-rating, limited distribution and mixed critical reviews. The New York Times, for example, accused Van Peebles of merchandizing injustice and called the film “an outrage.”

Van Peebles, who complained fiercely to the Motion Picture Association over the X-rating, gave the film the tagline: “Rated X by an all-white jury.”

But in the wake of the its success, Hollywood realized an untapped audience and began churning out such box office hits as “Shaft” and “Superfly” that were also known for bringing in such top musicians as Curtis Mayfield, Marvin Gaye and Isaac Hayes to work on the soundtracks.

Many of Hollywood’s versions were exaggerated crime dramas, replete with pimps and drug dealers, which drew heavy criticism in both the white and Black press.

“What Hollywood did — they suppressed the political message, added caricature — and blaxploitation was born,” Van Peebles said in 2002. “The colored intelligentsia were not too happy about it.”

In fact, civil rights groups like the NAACP and the Congress of Racial Equality coined the phrase “blaxploitation” and formed the Coalition Against Blaxploitation. Among the genre’s 21st century fans was Quentin Tarantino, whose Oscar-winning “Django Unchained” was openly influenced by blaxploitation films and spaghetti Westerns.

On Wednesday, a younger generation of Black filmmakers mourned Van Peebles’ death. Barry Jenkins, the “Moonlight” director, said on Twitter: “He made the most of every second, of EVERY single damn frame.”

After his initial success, Van Peebles was bombarded with directing offers, but he chose to maintain his independence.

“I’ll only work with them on my terms,” he said. “I’ve whipped the man’s ass on his own turf. I’m number one at the box office — which is the way America measures things — and I did it on my own. Now they want me, but I’m in no hurry.”

Mario Van Peebles, from left, Melvin Van Peebles and Mandela Van Peebles attend History Channel's "Roots" mini-series premiere in 2016. (Photo by Charles Sykes/Invision/AP)

Van Peebles then got involved on Broadway, writing and producing several plays and musicals like the Tony-nominated “Ain’t Supposed to Die a Natural Death” and “Don’t Play Us Cheap.” He later wrote the movie “Greased Lighting” starring Richard Pryor as Wendell Scott, the first Black race car driver.

In the 1980s, Van Peebles turned to Wall Street and options trading. He wrote a financial self-help guide entitled “Bold Money: A New Way to Play the Options Market.”

Born Melvin Peebles in Chicago on Aug. 21, 1932, he would later add “Van” to his name. He graduated from Ohio Wesleyan University in 1953 and joined the Air Force, serving as a navigator for three years.

After military service, he moved to Mexico and worked as a portrait painter, followed by a move to San Francisco, where he started writing short stories and making short films.

Van Peebles soon went to Hollywood, but he was only offered a job as a studio elevator operator. Disappointed, he moved to Holland to take graduate courses in astronomy while also studying at the Dutch National Theatre.

FILE - Melvin Van Peebles arrives at the world premiere of "Peeples" at the ArcLight Hollywood on Wednesday, May 8, 2013 in Los Angeles. Van Peebles, a Broadway playwright, musician and movie director whose work ushered in the “blaxploitation” films of the 1970s, has died at age 89. His family said in a statement that Van Peebles died Tuesday night, Sept. 21, 2021, at his home. (Photo by Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP, File)

Eventually he gave up his studies and moved to Paris, where he learned he could join the French directors’ guild if he adapted his own work written in French. He quickly taught himself the language and wrote several novels.

One he made into a feature film. “La Permission/The Story of the Three Day Pass,” was the story of an affair between a Black U.S. soldier and a French woman. It won the critic’s choice award at the San Francisco film festival in 1967, and Van Peebles gained Hollywood’s attention.

The following year, he was hired to direct and write the score for “Watermelon Man,” the tale of a white bigot (played by comic Godfrey Cambridge in white face) who wakes up one day as a Black man.

With money earned from the project, Van Peebles went to work on “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.”

Van Peebles’ death came just days before the New York Film Festival is to celebrate him with a 50th anniversary of “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.” Next week, the Criterion Collection is to release the box set “Melvin Van Peebles: Essential Films.” A revival of his play “Ain’t Supposed to Die a Natural Death” is also planned to hit Broadway next year, with Mario Van Peebles serving as creative producer.

___

THEME SONG

New push on to expand nuclear radiation compensation in US
By SUSAN MONTOYA BRYANyesterday

 In this May 11, 2003, file photo, protesters lie on the pavement opposed to the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear storage facility and weapons testing after crossing the line into the Nevada Test Site at Mercury, Nev., and were arrested for trespassing about 70 miles north of Las Vegas. A bipartisan group of lawmakers is renewing the push to expand a federal compensation program for radiation exposure following uranium mining and nuclear testing carried out during the Cold War. Advocates have been trying for years to bring awareness to the lingering effects of nuclear fallout surrounding the Trinity Site in southern New Mexico and on the Navajo Nation, where more than 30 million tons of ore were extracted over decades to support U.S. nuclear activities. 

(AP Photo/Joe Cavaretta,File)


ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — A bipartisan group of lawmakers is renewing a push to expand a U.S. compensation program for people who were exposed to radiation following uranium mining and nuclear testing carried out during the Cold War.

Advocates have been trying for years to bring awareness to the lingering effects of nuclear fallout surrounding the Trinity Site in southern New Mexico, where the U.S. military detonated the first atomic bomb, and on the Navajo Nation, where more than 30 million tons of uranium ore were extracted over decades to support U.S. nuclear activities.

Under legislation introduced Wednesday by U.S. Sens. Ben Ray Luján, a Democrat from New Mexico, and Mike Crapo, a Republican from Idaho, other sites across the American West would be added to the list of places affected by fallout and radiation exposure. Eligibility also would be expanded to include certain workers in the industry after 1971, such as miners.

The legislation also would increase the amount of compensation someone can receive to $150,000 and provide coverage for additional forms of cancer.

A multibillion-dollar defense spending package approved last year included an apology to New Mexico, Nevada, Utah and other states affected by radiation from nuclear testing, but no action was taken on legislation that sought to change and broaden the compensation program.

Advocates, including those who testified before Congress earlier this year, say it’s time to do so, especially because the existing provisions are set to expire next July. The legislation would extend the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, or RECA, another 19 years.

Tina Cordova, a cancer survivor and co-founder of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium, said she has been working on the legislation for months with other residents of places affected by radiation, from Indigenous communities in New Mexico to Gaum.

“We put forth language to make certain the bill went far enough to help as many people as possible,” she said. “This is a make-or-break time for all the downwinders and post-71 uranium workers that have been left out of the original RECA bill.”

While efforts to expand the program have been years in the making, advocates say there is broader interest now because more people would stand to lose access to compensation funds if the law expires. They also acknowledge that some members of Congress might argue that there’s not enough money to bankroll the proposal.

“We won’t settle for that answer any longer. Imagine the insult added to our injury of such a statement,” Cordova said. “There is always money when there’s political will. This is a social, environmental and restorative justice issue that we, as a nation, can no longer look away from.”

On the Navajo Nation, uranium mining has left a legacy of death, disease and environmental contamination. That includes the largest spill of radioactive material in the United States, when 94 million gallons of radioactive tailings and wastewater spewed onto tribal lands in the Church Rock area in western New Mexico in 1979. It happened just three months after the partial meltdown of a nuclear reactor at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania, which got far more attention at the time.

With hundreds of abandoned uranium mines and radioactive waste still to be cleaned up, Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez said residents of the nation’s largest Indigenous reservation have been exposed to dangerous levels of radiation for years and have endured a wide range of illnesses as a result, with some dying prematurely.

Nez called an expansion of the program and extension of the trust fund a matter of justice.

“We look forward to advocating for the advancement of this legislation and to encourage consideration of additional provisions that would advance the objectives of justice and fairness represented by this bill,” he said.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández of New Mexico is helping lead the push in the House. House Republicans who are co-sponsoring include Reps. Yvette Herrell of New Mexico and Burgess Owens of Utah.

For Sen. Luján, the fight for compensation started in 2010 when he was a congressman.

“While there can never be a price placed on one’s health or the life of a loved one, Congress has an opportunity to do right by all of those who sacrificed in service of our national security by strengthening RECA,” he said in a statement.

 

This July 16, 1945, file photo, taken 6-miles away shows the first atomic bomb explosion at the Trinity Test Site in Alamogordo, N.M. A bipartisan group of lawmakers is renewing the push to expand a federal compensation program for radiation exposure following uranium mining and nuclear testing carried out during the Cold War. Advocates have been trying for years to bring awareness to the lingering effects of nuclear fallout surrounding the Trinity Site in southern New Mexico and on the Navajo Nation, where more than 30 million tons of ore were extracted over decades to support U.S. nuclear activities. (AP Photo/File)

In this July 6, 1945, file photo, scientists and other workers rig the world's first atomic bomb to raise it up onto a 100-foot tower at the Trinity bomb test site near Alamagordo, N.M. A bipartisan group of lawmakers is renewing the push to expand a federal compensation program for radiation exposure following uranium mining and nuclear testing carried out during the Cold War. Advocates have been trying for years to bring awareness to the lingering effects of nuclear fallout surrounding the Trinity Site in southern New Mexico and on the Navajo Nation, where more than 30 million tons of ore were extracted over decades to support U.S. nuclear activities. (AP Photo/File )

 In this Nov. 13, 1979, file photo, while United Nuclear Corp. uses a combination of hand work and heavy machinery to clear up a uranium tailings spill along the Rio Puerco, signs warn residents in three languages to avoid the water in Church Rock, N.M. A bipartisan group of lawmakers is renewing the push to expand a federal compensation program for radiation exposure following uranium mining and nuclear testing carried out during the Cold War. Advocates have been trying for years to bring awareness to the lingering effects of nuclear fallout surrounding the Trinity Site in southern New Mexico and on the Navajo Nation, where more than 30 million tons of ore were extracted over decades to support U.S. nuclear activities. (AP Photo/SMH, File)

US projections on drought-hit Colorado River grow more dire

In this Aug. 13, 2020, file photo, a bathtub ring of light minerals delineates the high water mark on Lake Mead at the Lake Mead National Recreation Area near Boulder City, Nev. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation released projections Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2021, that indicate an even more troubling outlook for a river that serves millions of people in the U.S. West. The agency recently declared the first-ever shortage on the Colorado River, which means Arizona, Nevada and Mexico won't get all the water they were allocated next year. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)


FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP) — The U.S. government released projections Wednesday that indicate an even more troubling outlook for a river that serves 40 million people in the American West.

The Bureau of Reclamation recently declared the first-ever shortage on the Colorado River, which means Arizona, Nevada and Mexico will get less water than normal next year. By 2025, there’s a 66% chance Lake Mead, a barometer for how much river water some states get, will reach a level where California would be in its second phase of cuts. The nation’s most populated state has the most senior rights to river water.

While the reservoir on the Nevada-Arizona border is key for those three lower Colorado River basin states, Lake Powell on the Arizona-Utah border is the guide for Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming and Utah in the upper basin. Smaller reservoirs upstream of Lake Powell have been releasing water into the massive lake so it can continue producing hydropower. But any bump from the releases that started this summer isn’t factored into the five-year projections, the Bureau of Reclamation said.

The agency’s projections show a 3% chance Lake Powell will hit a level where Glen Canyon Dam that holds it back cannot produce hydropower as early as July 2022 if the region has another dry winter.

“The latest outlook for Lake Powell is troubling,” Wayne Pullan, the bureau’s director for the upper basin, said in a statement. “This highlights the importance of continuing to work collaboratively with the basin states, tribes and other partners toward solutions.”

Lake Powell and Lake Mead, the largest man-made reservoirs in the U.S., largely rely on melted snow. They have been hard hit by persistent drought amid climate change, characterized by a warming and drying trend in the past 30 years.

Both have dipped to historic lows. The lakes had a combined capacity of 39% on Wednesday, down from 49% at this time last year, the Bureau of Reclamation said.

The seven states that rely on the Colorado River signed off on a drought plan in 2019 to help prop up the lakes by voluntarily contributing water. All agree more needs to be done and are discussing what will replace a set of guidelines for the river and the overlapping drought plan when they both expire in 2026.

The federal government also has formed a working group.


 In this Aug. 13, 2021, file photo a buoy rests on the ground at a closed boat ramp on Lake Mead at the Lake Mead National Recreation Area near Boulder City, Nev. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation released projections Wednesday, Sept. 22, 2021, that indicate an even more troubling outlook for a river that serves millions of people in the U.S. West. The agency recently declared the first-ever shortage on the Colorado River, which means Arizona, Nevada and Mexico won't get all the water they were allocated next year. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)


The Bureau of Reclamation’s five-year projections are meant to help water managers better plan for the future using the best available data, said Jacklynn Gould, who oversees the lower basin for the agency. Its August projections are what determine water deliveries to the states.

The agency says there’s a 22% chance that Lake Mead will drop to an elevation of 1,000 feet (304 meters) above sea level in 2025. Federal officials have said water would become inaccessible to states downstream at 895 feet (272 meters) feet, often referred to as “dead pool.”

The agency that supplies water to most people in Nevada has constructed “straws” to draw water from further down in Lake Mead as its levels fall.

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This story has been corrected to show Lake Powell has a 3% chance of reaching a point where hydropower from Glen Canyon Dam would be impacted in 2022, not 90%.

THANKS TO TRUMP

U.S. COVID-19 death toll surpasses total of 1918 Spanish flu pandemic


Patients sick with the Spanish flu are hospitalized at a makeshift ward at Camp Funston, Kansas, in 1918. File Photo courtesy of the U.S. Army

Sept. 20 (UPI) -- The death toll from COVID-19 surpassed that of the 1918 Spanish flu outbreak Monday, making it the deadliest pandemic in U.S. history, according to a count compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

The total number of U.S. deaths from COVID-19 stood at nearly 676,000 as of late Monday afternoon, according to a running tally kept by the university's Center for Systems Science and Engineering.

That surpasses the 675,000 Americans estimated by U.S. health officials to have died in the Spanish influenza epidemic of 1918-19. The number of deaths worldwide was estimated to be at least 50 million.

The John Hopkins data showed COVID-19 is still claiming more than 1,900 lives per day as the United States endures another ongoing wave of infection due to the highly contagious Delta variant.

"In terms of raw numbers of deaths, that's a high number," University of Michigan public health expert Howard Markel told the heath news website STAT. "And it's higher still than it should have been, frankly."

Many of the lessons from the Spanish flu epidemic may have been lost due to time and the fact that it was such a rare event, he said.

"We finally now have a modern pandemic," Markel added. "In modern times with modern vaccines and so on. So to me, this is the one I'm going to be teaching my medical students and public health students."

The H1N1 virus that caused the 1918 pandemic had genes of avian origin, although there is no universal consensus regarding where it originated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It caused an especially high death rate among healthy people between 15 and 34 years of age and lowered the average life expectancy in the United States by more than 12 years.

No vaccines were available to protect against infection and no antibiotics were on hand to treat secondary bacterial infections, meaning that control efforts worldwide were limited to isolation, quarantine, good personal hygiene, use of disinfectants and limits on public gatherings.

"Obviously, we have much better advantages now, 100 years later," Dr. Paul Offit, who advises the FDA on COVID-19 vaccines, told CNBC.

But, he added, he is "frustrated" with the death toll of the current pandemic, which has been worsened by people refusing to take advantage of effective and freely available vaccines.

"I can tell you that we see a lot of children hospitalized as well, who have high-risk conditions and the problem is not that they didn't get their third dose. The problem is that they are unvaccinated," he said.

COVID-19 creates dire US shortage of teachers, school staff

By JOCELYN GECKER

today

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FILE - In this Aug. 12, 2021, file photo, a student gets help with his mask from transitional kindergarten teacher Annette Cuccarese during the first day of classes at Tustin Ranch Elementary School in Tustin, Calif. Now that California schools have welcomed students back to in-person learning, they face a new challenge: A shortage of teachers and all other staff, the likes of which some districts say they've never seen. (Paul Bersebach/The Orange County Register via AP, File)

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — One desperate California school district is sending flyers home in students’ lunchboxes, telling parents it’s “now hiring.” Elsewhere, principals are filling in as crossing guards, teachers are being offered signing bonuses and schools are moving back to online learning.

Now that schools have welcomed students back to classrooms, they face a new challenge: a shortage of teachers and staff the likes of which some districts say they have never seen.

Public schools have struggled for years with teacher shortages, particularly in math, science, special education and languages. But the coronavirus pandemic has exacerbated the problem. The stress of teaching in the COVID-19 era has triggered a spike in retirements and resignations. Schools also need to hire staffers like tutors and special aides to make up for learning losses and more teachers to run online school for those not ready to return.

Teacher shortages and difficulties filling openings have been reported in Tennessee, New Jersey and South Dakota, where one district started the school year with 120 teacher vacancies. Across Texas, the main districts in Houston, Waco and elsewhere reported hundreds of teaching vacancies at the start of the year.

Several schools nationwide have had to shut classrooms because of a lack of teachers.

In Michigan, Eastpointe Community Schools abruptly moved its middle school back to remote learning this week because it doesn’t have enough teachers. The small district north of Detroit has 43 positions vacant — a quarter of its teaching staff. When several middle school teachers resigned without notice last week, the district shifted to online classes to avoid sending in unqualified substitutes, spokeswoman Caitlyn Kienitz said.

“You don’t want just an adult who can pass a background check, you want a teacher in front of your kids,” Kienitz said. “This is obviously not ideal, but we’re able to make sure they’re getting each subject area from a teacher certified to teach it.”

According to a June survey of 2,690 members of the National Education Association, 32% said the pandemic drove them to plan to leave the profession earlier than expected. Another survey by the RAND Corp. said the pandemic exacerbated attrition, burnout and stress on teachers, who were almost twice as likely as other employed adults to feel frequent job-related stress and almost three times more likely to experience depression.

The lack of teachers is “really a nationwide issue and definitely a statewide issue,” said Linda Darling-Hammond, president of California’s State Board of Education.

A school district in California’s West Contra Costa County is considering hiring out-of-state math educators to teach online while a substitute monitors students in person.

“This is the most acute shortage of labor we have ever had,” associate superintendent Tony Wold said. “We opened this year with 50 — that’s five-zero — teaching positions open. That means students are going to 50 classrooms that do not have a permanent teacher.”

There are an additional 100 openings for non-credentialed but critical staff like instructional aides — who help English learners and special needs students — custodians, cafeteria workers and others, Wold said.

California’s largest district, Los Angeles Unified with 600,000 students, has more than 500 teacher vacancies, a fivefold increase from previous years, spokeswoman Shannon Haber said.

Schools try to fill in with substitutes, but they’re in short supply, too. Only about a quarter of the pool of 1,000 qualified substitutes is willing to work in Fresno Unified, said Nikki Henry, a spokeswoman for the central California district with 70,000 students and 12,000 staffers.

At Berkeley High School, a shortage of substitutes means teachers are asked to fill in during their prep periods, leading to exhaustion and burnout typically not felt at the start of a school year.

“We are absolutely strained. This has been an incredibly stressful start to the year,” said Hasmig Minassian, a ninth-grade teacher who describes physical and mental exhaustion as she tries to juggle staffing needs and the emotional needs of students who are showing signs of more mental fragility and learning loss.

“It doesn’t feel like there are enough adults on these campuses to keep kids really safe. We feel short-staffed in a way we’ve never felt before,” she said. “You know the early videos of nurses crying in their cars? I kind of expect those to come out about teachers.”

The California shortages range from dire to less severe in places that planned ahead and beat the competition, but those are the minority, said Darling-Hammond of the board of education.

Money is not the problem. School districts have the funds to hire staff, thanks to billions in federal and state pandemic relief funding.

“We’re all competing for a shrinking piece of the pie,” said Mike Ghelber, assistant superintendent at the Morongo Unified School District in the Mojave Desert, which has more than 200 openings for special education aides, custodians, cafeteria workers and others. “I don’t know if everybody is getting snatched up, or if they don’t want to teach in the COVID era, but it’s like the well has dried up.”

The district of 8,000 students has ads in newspapers, radio and social media. Teachers are packing “now hiring” flyers into kids’ lunchboxes, with a long list of openings so families can spread the word. In the meantime, everyone is pitching in.

“Principals and administrators are out being crossing guards. Secretaries are directing traffic because we’re short on supervisors,” Ghelber said.

The shortages raise concerns that schools will hire underqualified teachers, particularly in low-income communities where it’s already harder to fill positions, Darling-Hammond said.

Class sizes also are expanding.

Mount Diablo Unified School District, which serves 28,000 students east of San Francisco, has had to fill several elementary school classrooms at the maximum capacity of 32 students. It’s not ideal for social distancing but frees up teachers for online school.

About 150 kids initially signed up for distance learning, but with spiking infections blamed on the highly contagious delta variant, the number ballooned to 600 when school reopened. The same happened in Fresno, where enrollment in remote learning exploded to 3,800 from 450.

Superintendent Adam Clark said the Mount Diablo district is offering $5,000 signing bonuses for speech pathologists and $1,500 for paraeducators who help students with learning needs.

San Francisco Unified is offering a similar starting bonus for 100 paraeducator jobs. Nearby West Contra Costa County Unified has set $6,000 signing bonuses for teachers, with a third paid out after the first month and rest when the teacher enters year three.

Districts in Oklahoma, North Carolina, New Jersey and elsewhere are offering a range of cash incentives for new teachers, particularly in low-income and low-performing schools.

Of a dozen officials interviewed in California districts, only one said it was facing no shortages.

Long Beach Unified, the state’s fourth-largest district with over 70,000 students, anticipated the need last spring for a hiring spree of about 400 jobs.

“We went full aggressive,” assistant superintendent David Zaid said, including beefing up human resources for a 24-hour turnaround on contract offers.

A virtual interview team worked through the summer. Recruitment events drew hundreds of applicants, and as HR employees met hiring benchmarks, they got rewards like catered breakfasts and an ice cream truck.

“We probably would have experienced the same shortages as others,” Zaid said. “But we became much more assertive, and as a result, we are not in the same position.”

Afghanistan girls soccer team given asylum in Portugal

By ALEX SANZ

September 21, 2021

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In this photo provided to The Associated Press, members of the Afghanistan national girls soccer team are seen on Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2021, in Lisbon, Portugal. Late Sunday night, almost three weeks after the American withdrawal from Afghanistan, the girls and their families landed in Lisbon after an international coalition came to their rescue. (AP Photo)

The girls on Afghanistan’s national soccer team were anxious. For weeks, they had been moving around the country, waiting for word that they could leave.

One wants to be a doctor, another a movie producer, others engineers. All dream of growing up to be professional soccer players.

The message finally came early Sunday: A charter flight would carry the girls and their families from Afghanistan — to where they didn’t know. The buses that would take them to the airport were already on their way.

“They left their homes and left everything behind,” Farkhunda Muhtaj, the captain of the Afghanistan women’s national team who from her home in Canada had spent the last few weeks communicating with the girls and working to help arrange their rescue, told The Associated Press. “They can’t fathom that they’re out of Afghanistan.”

Since the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, the girls, ages 14-16, and their families, had been trying to leave, fearing what their lives might become like under the Taliban — not just because women and girls are forbidden to play sports, but because they were advocates for girls and active members of their communities.

Late Sunday, they landed in Lisbon, Portugal.

In interviews with the AP this week, Muhtaj, members of the soccer team, some of their family members, and soccer federation staff, spoke about their final days in Afghanistan, the international effort to rescue them and the promise of their newfound freedom.

The rescue mission, called Operation Soccer Balls, was coordinated with the Taliban through an international coalition of former U.S. military and intelligence officials, U.S. Sen. Chris Coons, U.S. allies, and humanitarian groups, said Nic McKinley, a CIA and Air Force veteran who founded Dallas-based DeliverFund, a nonprofit that’s secured housing for 50 Afghan families.

“This all had to happen very, very quickly. Our contact on the ground told us that we had a window of about three hours,” said McKinley. “Time was very much of the essence.”

Operation Soccer Balls had suffered a number of setbacks, including several failed rescue attempts, and a suicide bombing carried out by Islamic State militants, the Taliban’s rivals, at the Kabul airport that killed 169 Afghans and 13 U.S. service members. That bombing came during a harrowing airlift in which the U.S. military has acknowledged it was coordinating to some extent with the Taliban.

Complicating the rescue effort was the size of the group – 80 people, including the 26 youth team members as well as adults and other children, including infants.

Robert McCreary, a former congressional chief of staff and White House official under President George W. Bush who has worked with special forces in Afghanistan and helped lead the effort to rescue the national girls soccer team, said Portugal granted the girls and their families asylum.

“The world came together to help these girls and their families,” said McCreary. “These girls are truly a symbol of light for the world and humanity.”

The Taliban have tried to present a new image, promising amnesty to former opponents and saying they would form an inclusive government. Many Afghans don’t trust those promises, fearing the Taliban will quickly resort to the brutal tactics of their 1996-2001 rule, including barring girls and women from schools and jobs.

This week, the Taliban set up a ministry for the “propagation of virtue and the prevention of vice” in the building that once housed the Women’s Affairs Ministry, the latest sign that it is restricting women’s rights.

As the girls moved from safehouse to safehouse, Muhtaj, who is also a teacher, said she helped them stay calm through virtual exercise and yoga sessions and by giving them homework assignments, including writing autobiographies.

She said she couldn’t share details about the rescue mission with the girls or their families and asked them to believe in her and others “blindly.”

“Their mental state was deteriorating. Many of them were homesick. Many of them missed their friends in Kabul,” said Muhtaj. “They had unconditional faith. We’ve revived their spirit.”

Some of the girls spoke to the AP through an interpreter. They said they want to continue playing soccer — something they were urged to not do while they were in hiding — and hope to meet soccer superstar Cristiano Ronaldo, Manchester United’s forward and a Portugal native.

Wida Zemarai, a goalkeeper and coach for the Afghanistan women’s national soccer team who moved to Sweden after the Taliban ascended to power in 1996, said the girls were emotional after their rescue.

“They can dream now,” Zemarai said. “They can continue to play.”

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Follow Alex Sanz on Twitter at https://www.twitter.com/alexsanz