Over decade of annual screening, half of women have false-positive mammogram


About half of women who undergo a mammogram will have a false-positive result sometime over 10 years, according to a new study.

 Photo by Rhoda Baer/Wikimedia Commons

March 25 (UPI) -- As many as half of women who undergo breast-cancer screenings experience a false-positive mammogram result over 10 years of annual evaluations, a study published Friday by JAMA Network Open found.

The study looked at results from digital breast tomosynthesis, or 3D mammography, as well as two-dimensional mammography.

The risk for false-positive results after 10 years of screening was considerably lower for women who have a 3D mammogram every other year, the researchers said.

In addition, repeated breast cancer screening with 3D mammography only reduced the likelihood of having a false-positive result slightly when compared with standard digital two-dimensional mammography, they said.

RELATED Study: AI for accurate mammogram readings not yet ready for prime time

Women with non-dense breasts also were less likely to have a false-positive result on 3D mammography, according to the researchers.

"Findings from our study highlight the importance of patient-provider discussions around personalized health," study co-author Michael Bissell said in a press release.

"It is important to consider a patient's preferences and risk factors when deciding on screening interval and modality," said Bissell, an epidemiologist at the University of California-Davis.

RELATED Study: Risk for cancer greater in older women with high breast tissue density

A false-positive occurs when a mammogram is flagged as abnormal, even when there is no cancer in the breast, according to BreastCancer.org.

Nearly one in five women who undergo screening are called back for reevaluation due to false-positive results, the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York estimates.

Breast cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer-related death among women in the United States, and early detection with mammography lowers the risk for advanced breast cancer and death from this disease, according to the American Cancer Society.

RELATED Skipping mammograms raises odds for breast cancer death in women

However, a false-positive result often leads to more testing for women who receive them but no diagnosis of breast cancer, Bissell and his colleagues said.

When abnormalities are found on a mammogram, women are usually recalled for additional imaging and follow-up tests, the researchers said.

If found to be cancer-free at the end of this diagnostic reevaluation -- and for one year after her recall -- a woman is considered to have received a false-positive result, they said.

Although around 12% of women screened using 2D mammography are recalled for more tests, only 4% of those recalls, or fewer than 1%, result in a cancer diagnosis, according to the researchers.

For this study, Bissell and his colleagues analyzed data collected by the Breast Cancer Screening Consortium, which records mammography trends nationally, for 3 million screenings performed on 903,495 women ages 40 to 79 years.

The screenings were performed between 2005 and 2018 at 126 facilities across the country, the researchers said.

The researchers evaluated the mammography technology used, the time between screenings, patient age and breast density, they said.

The probability of receiving at least one false-positive result over a 10-year period was slightly lower with 3D than 2D digital mammography, according to the researchers.

With 3D mammography, about 50% of women experience at least one false-positive result compared with 56% of those screened with 2D digital mammograms, the data showed.

The decrease in false-positive results s with 3D versus 2D mammography was greatest for women with non-dense breasts and those who had annual screenings, the researchers said.

Women who underwent 3D mammography every other year were about 40% less likely to have a false-positive result, they said.

Regardless of the type of screening, false-positive results were substantially lower for older than younger age groups and women with entirely fatty versus extremely dense breasts, according to the researchers.

"Despite the important benefit of screening mammography in reducing breast cancer mortality, it can lead to extra imaging and biopsy procedures," co-author Diana Miglioretti said in the press release.

This can cause unnecessary "financial ... costs, and patient anxiety," said Miglioretti, professor and division chief of biostatistics at the UC-Davis.

Rudy Giuliani associate Lev Parnas pleads guilty to wire fraud


Rudy Giuliani associate Lev Parnas waits in the office of Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer to procure tickets to the Senate impeachment trial of President Donald Trump at the U.S. Capitol in Washington on January 29, 2020. 

File Photo by Ken Cedeno/UPI | License Photo


March 25 (UPI) -- A Florida-based political donor linked to Rudy Giuliani pleaded guilty Friday to wire fraud related to an insurance company he co-founded.

Lev Parnas, 50, appeared by video in a Manhattan hearing to enter the change of plea before U.S. District Judge Paul Oetken.

Parnas said that between 2012 and 2019, "I agreed with another person to give false information" to potential investors in his start-up company, Fraud Guarantee. He founded the company with co-defendant David Correia, who previously pleaded guilty to the scheme.

"I'm extremely sorry for my actions, your honor," Parnas said in court, according to WABC-TV in New York City.

Parnas and Correia told investors that Fraud Guarantee would help investigate potential business opportunities for signs of fraud.

Prosecutors said the men paid $500,000 to Giuliani, former New York City mayor and personal lawyer for former President Donald Trump, to work as a consultant for the supposed company.

Giuliani acknowledged he was paid the consulting fee but said he wasn't aware of any impropriety. He hasn't been charged in the scheme, Politico reported.

Parnas faces up to five years in prison when he's sentenced June 29.

In October, a jury found the Ukraine-born Parnas guilty of six counts of campaign finance charges for using money from a Russian backer to fund political donations to win support for a recreational marijuana business.

Florida non-profit cleaning beaches with litter-sifting robot

March 25 (UPI) -- A Florida nonprofit has enlisted the help of a unique robot to clean cigarette butts, bottle caps and other small pieces of litter from the state's beaches.

The nonprofit Keep Florida Beautiful said the beach cleaning robot, BeBot, was donated to the group by Surfing's Evolution and Preservation Foundation.

"It is meant to go over soft dry sand and it sifts the very top layer of sand, removing very small pieces of debris that are often missed in manual cleanups," Savanna Christy, executive director of Keep Florida Beautiful, told WKMG-TV.

Christy said the robot is not yet sensitive enough to clear microplastics, which measure 5 millimeters and smaller, but it can sift out anything larger than a squared centimeter.

"It does pick up plastic fragments, bottle caps, cigarette butts, plastic straws, food wrappers -- you name it, it's picking it up and sifting it out of the sand," Christy said.

Keep Florida Beautiful is the first nonprofit in the nation to use the remote-controlled robot for beach cleaning, the organization said.

Study shows that realistic models could make for more environmental wins


Researchers say scientific models meant to improve the environment and marine fisheries that consider real-world variables -- such as the availability of materials -- the win-win potential of these plans could increase. Photo by dimitrisvetsikas1969/Pixabay


March 24 (UPI) -- Environmental "win-wins" are ideal outcomes -- such as increasing a shrimp catches in ways that also have environmental sustainability by limiting adverse environmental impacts -- are harder to come by than thought, according to new research.

The Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder found in a study published Thursday in the journal Nature Sustainability that incorporating real-world complexity -- including communication and compromise -- into outcome models may increase the environmental success of such plans.

"We used math to show real-world complexity makes win-wins harder to achieve," lead study author Margaret Hagwood said in a press release.

"Allowing scientists and stakeholders to compromise and aim for more achievable, realistic goals about environmental impact, food production, biodiversity, economic yield, etc," said Hagwood, a graduate student at CU Boulder.

The CIRES team analyzed 280 previous trade-off models and also created algorithms to show what happened when more variables were added in.

"At its core, it's a study about how to bridge a communication divide," said study co-author Ryan Langendorf.

Langendorf, a CIRES and CU Boulder Environmental Studies postdoctoral researcher, said adjusting goals to be more realistic helps to potentially create more ideal win-win environmental outcomes.

RELATED Little Ice Age subject of study

The CIRES study should help environmental modelers and managers to better communicate, according to Matthew Burgess, CIRES Fellow and assistant professor of Environmental Studies and Economics at CU Boulder.

"If a win-win means a community needs certain resources they can't afford, they will never reach an ideal outcome," Hagwood said.

"By identifying these barriers and minimizing them with proactive policies or technological advancements, you make the win-win more attainable," she said.

Spread of COVID-19 to animals raises concern for further mutations

By HealthDay News

Reports of deer and other animals contracting COVID-19 from humans has researchers concerned about how the coronavirus may mutate inside them, and whether it could jump back to people in new, more dangerous forms.

 File Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI | License Photo

The spread of a virus from animals to people and back again is not unique to COVID-19 and has occurred at least 100 times, according to a new study.

This so-called disease "spillback" has recently attracted significant attention due to the spread of COVID-19 in farmed mink, lions and tigers in zoos and wild white-tailed deer in the United States and Canada.

Some data suggest deer have given the virus back to humans in at least one case, and there is concern that reservoirs of the virus in animals might provide it with an opportunity to mutate into new variants that could be passed back to people.

"There has understandably been an enormous amount of interest in human-to-wild animal pathogen transmission in light of the pandemic," said study senior author Gregory Albery, a postdoctoral fellow in biology at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.

RELATED COVID-19 Delta variant confirmed in house cat in Pennsylvania

"To help guide conversations and policy surrounding spillback of our pathogens in the future, we went digging through the literature to see how the process has manifested in the past," he said in a university news release.

Albery and his colleagues found that nearly half of spillback incidents occurred in captive animal settings like zoos, and more than half of the cases involved were human-to-primate transmission.

That's not surprising because it's easier for viruses to jump between closely related species, according to findings published this week in the journal Ecology Letters.

RELATED Hong Kong experts defend decision to euthanize hamsters, other animals with COVID-19

The researchers noted that zoo animals receive regular health care and wild populations of endangered great apes are closely monitored.

"This supports the idea that we're more likely to detect pathogens in the places we spend a lot of time and effort looking, with a disproportionate number of studies focusing on charismatic animals at zoos or in close proximity to humans," said lead author Dr. Anna Fagre, a virologist and wildlife veterinarian at Colorado State University.

"It brings into question which cross-species transmission events we may be missing, and what this might mean not only for public health, but for the health and conservation of the species being infected," she added in the release.

RELATED Vietnamese pangolins carry coronaviruses similar to COVID-19

The researchers did find that scientists can use artificial intelligence to anticipate which species might be at risk of contracting COVID-19, but they said a lack of knowledge about wildlife disease presents a significant problem.

"Long-term monitoring helps us establish baselines for wildlife health and disease prevalence, laying important groundwork for future studies," Fagre said. "If we're watching closely, we can spot these cross-species transmission events much faster, and act accordingly."

More information

There's more about animals and COVID-19 at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Copyright © 2021 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

On This Day: Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire kills 146

On March 25, 1911, a fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in New York City killed 146 people, mostly female immigrant workers. 

The tragedy led to the eventual enactment of many state and national workplace safety laws.

By UPI Staff

A police officer surveys the damage after the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire on March 25, 1911, in New York, New York. 

File Photo by a Brown Brothers/Cornell University | License Photo

Witness watches helplessly as fire victims leap to their death

By W. G. Shepherd, United Press

(Wm. G. Shepherd, a United Press reporter, was in Washington Square, half a block from the scene of this afternoon's disaster when the first puff of smoke issued from the building. He was on the scene before either the fire department or police reached it. This is his story, from the view point of an eye-witness.)

NEW YORK, March 25, 1911 (UP) - I was walking through Washington Square when a puff of smoke issuing from the factory building caught my eye. I reached the building before the alarm was turned in. I saw every feature of the tragedy visible from outside the building. I learned a new sound - a horrible sound. It was the thud made by a speeding, living body on a stone walk.

Thud-dead! Thud-dead! Thud-dead! Thud-dead! Sixty-two thud-deads! I call them because the sound and the thought of death came to me, each time, at the same instant. There was plenty of chance to watch them as they came down; the height was eighty feet.

The first 10 thud-deads shocked me. I looked up, saw that there were scores of girls in the windows. The flames from the floor below were beating into their faces. Somehow I knew that they, too, must come down, and something within me - something that I didn't know was there, steeled me. I even watched one girl falling. She, waving her arms, tried to keep her body upright. The very instant she touched the sidewalk, she was trying to balance herself. Then came the thud - then a silent, unmoving pile of clothing and twisted broken limbs.

As I reached the scene of the fire a mushroom of smoke hung over the building. I glanced up, and on the edge of the roof, saw a young man walking along with his overcoat over his arm. He appeared to be waiting for the fire engines, but none were there. There was none even in sight or within hearing.

I noticed that the man was well dressed and had a jaunty air.

His hands were in his trousers pocket. Five minutes later I saw him jump out into space; his overcoat parachuted in the air beside him, and a moment later he was lifeless on the sidewalk.

I looked up to the seventh floor. There was a living picture in each window-screaming heads of girls waving their arms.

"Call the firemen!" they screamed - scores of them.

"Get a ladder!" cried others.

They were all alive and whole and sound as we stood on the sidewalk. I could not help thinking of that. We called to them not to jump. We heard the siren of a fire engine in some distant block. The other sirens sounded from other directions.

"Here they come," we yelled. "Don't jump. Stay there."

One girl climbed onto a window sash. Those behind her tried to hold her back. Then she dropped into space. I didn't notice whether those above watched her drop, because I had turned away.

Then came that first thud-dead impression. I looked up. Another girl was climbing onto the windowsill. Others were crowding behind her. She dropped. I watched her fall and heard the sound. Two windows away, two girls were climbing onto the sill; they were fighting and crowing each other for air. Behind them I saw many screaming heads. They fell almost together, but I heard two distinct thuds.

Suddenly the flame broke out from the windows below them and curled up into their faces. The firemen began to raise a ladder.

Others took a life net and while they were rushing to the sidewalk two more girls shot down. The firemen held it under them, two bodies broke it; the grotesque simile of a dog jumping through a paper hoop struck me. Before they could move the net another girl's body flashed into it. The thuds were just as loud, it seemed as if there had been no net there. It seemed to me that the thuds were so loud that they might have been heard all over the city, like dull explosion roars.

I had counted 10. Then my dull sense began to work automatically. I noticed things that had not occurred to me before to notice, little details that the first shock had blinded me to. I looked up to see whether those above watched those who fell. I noticed that they did - watched them every inch of the way down, and probably heard the roaring thuds that we heard, unless the roaring flames were too loud.

I looked up and saw a face in the midst of all the horror. A young man at a window helped a girl to the window sill; then he held her out, deliberately, away from the building, and let her drop. He seemed cool and calculating; he held out a second girl in the same way and let her drop; then he held out a third girl; they didn't resist. I noticed that they were as unresisting as if he were helping them on to a streetcar instead of into eternity.

Undoubtedly he saw that a terrible death awaited them in the flames and his aid was only a terrible chivalry.

Then came love amid the flames. He brought another girl up to the window. Those of us who were looking, saw her put her arms around and kiss him. Then he held her out into space and dropped her. But, quick as a flash, he was on the window sill himself. His coat fluttered upward; the air filled his trousers legs; I could see that he wore tan shoes and hose. His hat was on his head.

Thud-dead! Thud-dead! They went into eternity together. I saw his face before they covered it; could see in it that this was a real man. He had done his best. We found out later that in the room in which he stood, many girls were being burned to death by the flames and were screaming in an inferno of heat and smoke. He chose the easiest way and was even brave enough to help the girl he loved into eternity after she had given him a goodbye kiss. He leaped with energy, as if he believed that he could cheat gravitation and would arrive first in that mysterious land of eternity only a second of time distant, to receive her. But her thud-dead came first.

The firemen raised their ladder. It reached only to the sixth floor. I saw the last girl jump for it and miss it. Then the faces disappeared from the windows. By now the crowd was large, though all this had occurred in less than seven minutes, the start of the fire and the thud deaths. I heard screams around the corner and hurried there - what I had seen before was not so horrible as what followed. Girls were burning to death before our eyes; there were jams in the windows; no one was lucky enough to be able to jump, it seemed. But one by one the jam broke. Down came bodies in a shower, burning, smoking, lighted bodies with the disheveled hair of the girls trailing upward. They had fought each other to die by jumping instead of by fire.

There were 32 of them in that shower. The flesh was cooked and the clothes on most of them were burned away.

The girls who jumped on the other side of the street had done their best to fall feet down, but the fire-tortured suffering ones fell inertly, didn't care how they fell, just so death came to them on the sidewalk instead of the fiery furnace behind them.

The floods of water from the firemen's hose that ran from the gutter were actually stained red with blood.

On the sidewalk lay heaps of broken bodies. I saw a policeman later go about with tags, which he fastened with a wire to the wrists of the dead girls, numbering each one with a lead pencil and I saw him fasten a tag number 54 on to the wrist of a girl who wore an engagement ring.

A fireman who came down stairs from the building said there were at least fifty bodies in the big room on the seventh floor. Another fireman told me that more girls had jumped down an airshaft in the rear of the building. I went back there to the narrow court and saw a heap of dead girls.

And there I saw the first fire escape I had seen. It was narrow. The fireman told me that many girls had gone down it and that others had fallen from it in the rush. But on the two fronts of the building there were no fire escapes.

The only way down was the thud-dead long way.

These girls were all shirtwaist makers. As I looked at the heap of dead bodies I remembered their great strike of last year in which these girls demanded more sanitary work rooms and more safety precautions in the shops. These dead bodies told the result.

MARCH 27, 1911
Names of victims in the Triangle Shirtwaist Co. fire

NEW YORK, March 27, 1911 (UP) -- The total number of fatalities as a result of the fire has been placed at 142. Up to this morning all had identified but 53. Today nineteen more have been identified as follows:

Frances Maile, 21, 135 Sullivan street.

Rose Friedman, 18, 77 Eighth street.

Rosie Bassius, 31, 97 West Houston street.

Ida Brodsky, 15, 308 East Tenth street.

Sarah Sabassowitz, 17, 212 Avenue B.

Irene Graetinzo, 24, 6 Bedford street.

Mary Herman, 40, This body was charred beyond all human resemblance and all of the clothing burned off. Identification was made by a garter buckle of a peculiar design.

Nettie Liebowitz, 22.

Nettie Rosenthal, 41, was identified by Minnie Blonstein, who was working with her. Miss Rosenthal stumbled and was trampled under foot by the mad rush of other frightened girls. The body was recognized by the rings on the fingers.

Vincenzio Zellota, 16, Hoboken. Her clothing had all been burned off and recognition was possible only by an iron plate attached to her shoe.

Rebecca Raynes, 19. This identification made by her younger sister, Nettie, is not yet complete as Nettie Raynes collapsed on seeing the body and was taken to a hospital in a hysterical condition.

At 11:30 the line of those seeking admission to the temporary morgue extended over five blocks. The police would only permit half a dozen in the building at a time.

Gartana Nicola, 16

Mollier Gerstein, 17.

Loed Rosen, 38. Rosen landed in the country three weeks ago. He was saving to make a home for his invalid wife and six children, who are in Russia.

Bessie Stump, 19.

Celia Isenburg, 17.

Ada Brooks, 18.

Mrs. Annie Starr, 30.

Jennie Stelino, 16.

The list of identified up to this morning follows:

Albino Caruso, 20, shirtmaker.

Laura Brunette, 17,operator.

Tessie Kepple, 18, shirtmaker.

Theodre Rotner, 22, shirtmaker.

Jacob Zeitner, 33, shirtmaker.

Becky Ostrowsky, 20, operator.

Tina Frank, 17, shirtmaker.

Morris Bernstein, 19, operator.

Beckie Kabbleman, 16, shirtmaker.

Annie Novovbrisky, 20, shirtmaker.

Pearl Sklazar, 25, shirtmaker.

Benny Kuritz, 19, shirtmaker.

Annie L'Abbate, 16, shirtmaker.

Tessie Sarcino, 20, apronmaker.

Max Lehrehr, 22, shirtmaker.

Lerehr, man, 19, single, shirtmaker.

Becky Kessler, 19, shirtmaker.

Lizzie Adler, 24, shirtmaker.

Maria Manara, 27, operator.

Violet Schochep, 21, operator.

Dominick Kaimen, 24, operator.

Jennie Rosenburg, 21, shirtwaist operator.

Fannie Lanzer, 21, forewomen.

Abraham Binevitz, 30, shirtmaker.

Sally Weintrauth, 17.

Roscoe Weiner, 23, shirtmaker.

Mary Ullo, 26, shirtmaker.

Frances Gabutto, 17. operator.

Nicolene Nicolese, 21, operator.

Annie Altman, 16.

Antonita Pasqueleto, 16, operator.

Gertrude Bierman, 22, operator.

Tessie Wiesner, 21, operator.

Annie Collette, 30.

Rosie Sorkin, 18.

Becky Nerberer, 19, operator.

Rebecca Felbisch, stitcher.

Bertha Wandrus, 18, operator.

Rosie Girrito, 18, forewomen.

Bettina Nalale, 18.

Clotilde Terranova, 22, presser.

Rosie Lermark, 19.

Vincenzo Benenti, 22, single.

Jennie Poliny, 20, shirtmaker.

Bertha Gret, 25.

Bertha Kuhler, 20, operator.

Millie Prato, 21, operator.

Jennie Stern, 18, operator.

Theresa Schmidt, 31, operator.

Rosalle Malteese, 14, operator.

Lucia Malteese, 20, operator.

Mechl Marciano, 25, operator.

Tillie Cupersmith, 16, operator.

Meyer Uutal, 23, machinist.

Samuel Tabich, 18, operator.

Lena Godstein, 22, operator.

Isabella Torparello, 17, operator.

Julia Oberstein, 19, operator.

Sadie Nausbaum, 18, operator.

Sonia Wisotsky, 17, operator.

Joseph Wilson, 21, operator of Philadelphia.

Bessie Viavinca, 15, operator.

Beckie Reiners, 19, cutter.

Rachel Grosman, 17.

Rose Mankofsky, 22, operator.

Carrie Uzzo, 22, operator.

Annie Cohen, 25, operator.

Ida Jakofsky, 19, shirtwaist maker.

Annie Pack, 18, waistmaker.

Annie Semnillo, 30, operator.

Gussie Schiffman, 18.

Johanna Carlissi, 31, operator.

Fannie Hollander, 18, operator.

Ethel Snyder, 20, operator.

Cecelia Gettlin, 17, operator.

Pauline Horowitz, 19, operator.

Rose Oringer, 20, operator.

Ida Kanovitz, 18, operator.

Bertha Manders, 22, operator.

Rebecca Serbitsch, 17,operator.

Dinah Greensburg, 18, waistmaker.

Jacob Bernstein, 20.

Rosie Grasso, 16.

Rosie Shapiro, 17.

Tentative agreement reached in Minneapolis teachers strike


On Friday, Minneapolis Public Schools and the Minneapolis Federation of teachers announced a tentative agreement in an 18-day teacher strike. Pictured are teachers striking in Los Angeles on Jan. 18, 2019. File Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI | License Photo

March 25 (UPI) -- Minneapolis Public Schools Friday announced a tentative agreement with the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers that could get teachers back into classrooms after an 18-day strike.

In a statement on its website, the school district said, "MPS is extremely pleased to welcome students back to school on Monday, March 28, pending an MFT membership vote. MPS and MFT reached a tentative contract agreement for our teachers and educational support professionals."

The Minneapois Federation of Teachers also announced the tentative agreement ending the 18 day teacher's strike.

"Early Friday morning, both chapters of the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers and Education Support Professionals reached tentative agreements with the Minneapolis Public Schools that, if ratified, will end the strike," the MFT said in a statement.

The teachers union said the "historic agreements" include major gains made on pay for Education Support Professionals, protections for educators of color, class size caps and mental health supports.

Members of the striking union will vote on whether or not to ratify the tentative agreement.

"MPS looks forward to sharing details about the tentative agreement in partnership with MFT leadership," Minneapolis Public Schools said in its statement.

The teachers union went on strike for higher pay, smaller class sizes and better mental health support.

Minneapolis teachers celebrate tentative deal to end strike

By STEVE KARNOWSKI

FILE - Minneapolis teachers and supporters picket at 34th street and Chicago Avenue South in Minneapolis, on Tuesday, March 8, 2022. Teachers in Minneapolis have reached a tentative agreement to end a more than two-week strike over pay and other issues that idled some 29,000 students and around 4,500 educators and staff. The district and the union for teachers and staff announced the deal early Friday, March 25. (Elizabeth Flores /Star Tribune via AP)


MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Teachers in Minneapolis reached a tentative agreement early Friday to end a more than two-week strike over pay and other issues that idled some 29,000 students and around 4,500 educators and staff in one of Minnesota’s largest school districts.

The union for teachers and support staff planned to announce details later in the day, but said it achieved what it sought when its members walked off the job March 8 after they were unable to agree on a contract with district leaders. Ratification votes were expected over the weekend.

Superintendent Ed Graff said he was looking forward to welcoming students and staff back to school on Monday. However, union leaders said talks on a return-to-work agreement were still underway Friday afternoon.

“These historic agreements contain important wins for our students and the safe and stable schools they deserve,” the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers and Education Support Professionals said in a statement, adding that “major gains were made on pay for Education Support Professionals, protections for educators of color, class size caps and mental health supports” for students.

At a news conference and rally outside district headquarters, union leaders said they would get details out to their members shortly. They said the gains included higher starting wages for the lowest-paid workers, and exemptions for teachers of color from seniority-based layoffs that they said could serve as a national model.

“The collective action of our members has shown that strikes work,” said Shaun Laden, head of the union’s education support professionals unit. “We know that we needed fundamental change in the Minneapolis Public Schools, and that was a big part of what this is about.”

Greta Callahan, who leads the union’s teachers unit, said their gains on the critical issue of mental health supports for students included a doubling of nurses and counselors in elementary schools, and a social worker in every building, but acknowledged they got less than what they had sought.

Laden also acknowledged that some of the gains could be temporary because they depend on one-time federal coronavirus relief money.

Graff declined to give details about the contract at an earlier news conference, but said he believes it’s fair to teachers and staff.

School Board Chair Kim Ellison thanked students for their patience.

“I know for many of our students, and many of you, the past two weeks have been difficult and long,” she said. “You’ve missed your teachers, you’ve missed your school, you’ve missed your friends. I’m so excited for you that you’re able to return to school on Monday. I know your teachers are going to be incredibly thrilled to see you.”

But a teachers strike entered its third day Friday in Sacramento, California, where unions representing 2,800 teachers and 1,800 school employees hit the picket lines Wednesday over pay and staffing shortages The Sacramento City Unified School District has canceled classes at its 76 schools, affecting 43,000 students.

Across the country, unions are seizing the opportunity posed by tight labor markets to recover some of the power they feel they lost in recent decades. And experts expect to see more labor strife as the country emerges from the pandemic. President Joe Biden’s administration is considering changes that could make it easier for federal workers and contractors to unionize.

The Minneapolis walkout, the city’s first by teachers since 1970, sent families who had endured the most chaotic days of the coronavirus pandemic fretting anew about lost academic progress and scrambling to arrange child care. Churches, Boys and Girls Clubs, YMCAs and park buildings opened their doors to provide students with safe places to hang out and get meals. High schoolers staged a series of solidarity actions to support the teachers, including an all-night sit-in at district headquarters.

Erin Zielinski, mother to a first-grader at Armatage Elementary School in south Minneapolis, greeted news of the settlement with a one-word text: “Hallelujah!” She and her husband said as the strike began that they supported the teachers, though they worried whether the district could meet their demands.

“I’m relieved to know that the union received an offer to be able to continue to provide schools that are good and safe,” she said. “A major reason why we chose to move to Minneapolis in the first place.”

Minneapolis Public Schools administrators and school board members insisted throughout the talks that they didn’t have enough money to meet teachers’ demands, especially for large permanent salary increases. Graff told reporters Friday that the two new contracts with the teachers and support staff “are going to require us to take a look at our budgets and make some adjustments going forward” over the coming weeks and months.

“We walked out united to change the trajectory of MPS and ensure that educators have a greater say in how we do our work,” the union said. “This too has been achieved and will have impacts that improve our district for years to come.”

Teachers in neighboring St. Paul reached a tentative agreement the night before the Minneapolis teachers walked out, getting a deal that had some similarities to what their Minneapolis counterparts were seeking. Union leaders cited that as evidence that Minneapolis administrators had room to compromise, too.

Ben Polk, a special education aide, said he was relieved at the settlement but wanted to see terms before he commented further. Polk said earlier in the strike that understaffing meant aides like him were having to attend to too many higher-need children at once, making it more difficult for both teachers and students.

Graff said schools will probably need to add extra school days in June to meet the minimum state requirements due to the lost time, but that the details had yet to decided.

___

Associated Press writer Doug Glass contributed to this report.

Fridays For Future school climate strikes resume worldwide

Hundreds gather and hold up signs in Pershing Square as part of the Global Climate Strike in Los Angeles on September 20, 2019. The Fridays For Future school climate strikes resumed worldwide Friday.

File Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI | License Photo

March 25 (UPI) -- Friday marked the resumption of worldwide school climate strikes by young activists intent on sparking action to deal with causes of climate change. Hundreds of protests were expected on all seven continents.

On its website, Fridays For Future posted a map of planned protest actions.

"The catastrophic climate scenario that we are living in is the result of centuries of exploitation and oppression through colonialism, extractivism and capitalism, an essentially flawed socio-economic model which urgently needs to be replaced," Fridays For Future said in a statement on its website.

Many of the Fridays For Future actions in Europe were also tied to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

"Colonizers and capitalists are at the core of every system of oppression that has caused the climate crisis," Fridays For Future said, "and decolonization, using the tool of climate reparations, is the best kind of action."

Fridays For Future is a youth-led climate strike movement that started in August 2018 when then-15-year-old Greta Thunberg began a school strike for climate in Sweden.

She says young people are demanding a safe future.

Friday's school climate strikes started in New Zealand.

Fridays For Future tweeted a video of the New York City protests and other actions happening around the world.

Demands of the school climate strike activists include keeping the global temperature rise below 1.5 degrees Celsius compared to pre-industrial levels, ensuring climate justice and equality, and listening to the best science when it comes to climate action.

Activists stage global climate protest, slam Ukraine war

By FRANK JORDANS

PHOTO ESSAY 1 of 22

Demonstrators of the Fridays for Future movement march in downtown Rome, Friday, March 25, 2022. Climate activists staged a tenth series of worldwide protests Friday to demand leaders take stronger action against global warming, with some linking their environmental message to calls for an end to the war in Ukraine. (Mauro Scrobogna/LaPresse via AP)

BERLIN (AP) — Climate activists staged a 10th series of worldwide protests Friday to demand that leaders take stronger action against global warming, with some linking their environmental message to calls for an end to the war in Ukraine.

The Fridays for Future movement, inspired by Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, called demonstrations from Indonesia to Europe and the United States.

In Jakarta, activists dressed in red robes and held placards demanding “system change not climate change.”

Others held a banner saying “G-20, stop funding our extinction,” a reference to the fact that the Group of 20 biggest developed and emerging economies accounts for about 80% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Indonesia hosts the group’s next summit this fall.

In Rome, protesters carried a giant inflatable globe through the streets and a banner reading “Make school, not war.”

Some 300 protests were planned in Germany, which has taken in about 250,000 Ukrainian refugees in the past month.

Thousands of mostly young people, many carrying Ukraine’s yellow and blue national flag, marched through Berlin’s government district to the Brandenburg Gate — long a symbol of the Cold War division between East and West.

Those speaking at the Berlin rally included two young Russian activists, who denounced their government’s actions in Ukraine.

“There are a lot of Russian people who are against (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, and they do not support what Putin is doing,” Polina Oleinikova told The Associate Press.

Oleinikova, 19, said that people who speak out against the government in Russia now “risk to be imprisoned on a daily basis.”

“It is very scary and we are afraid, but still we are (doing) our activism because we feel that it is very important,” she said. “It is the right thing to do and we won’t stop.”

Fellow climate activist Arshak Makichyan said the war in Ukraine and the sanctions imposed on Russia by the West were also having a drastic impact on the Russian economy

“Everything we had is collapsing,” he said, adding that he hoped Putin would be forced to resign and brought to trial.

Ilyess El Kortbi, a 25-year-old who helped set up Fridays for Future Ukraine, praised his fellow activists from Russia for speaking out.

“They are doing the best they can,” he told the AP. “Even if their regime is authoritarian and really repressive, they still continue standing with us against Putin.”

El Kortbi, who managed to flee just before the Russian advance reached his home city of Kharkiv, appealed to Germany and other European countries to stop buying fossil fuels from Russia.

“The war in Ukraine could stop anytime,” he said. “The EU and especially Germany just need to stop financing this.”

That message was echoed by many Germans at the march, frustrated that their country is paying tens of millions of euros (dollars) a day to buy fossil fuels that contribute to Moscow’s war chest even as the burning of oil, gas and coal harms the planet.

“We are here today to show that peace and climate justice belong together,” said Clara Duvigneau, a student from Berlin.

She said Germany should invest in renewable energy rather than seek alternative sources of oil and gas from places such as the Gulf or the United States.

“We want the energy transition to happen as quickly as possible,” said Duvigneau.

Several hundred young people gathered in Paris, marching from the domed Pantheon on the Left Bank to the Bastille plaza.

They carried signs reading “Wake Up” with a drawing of a burning Earth, calling on French presidential candidates to do more to fight climate change, or accusing French oil company TotalEnergies of cozying up to Putin for its refusal to pull out of Russia.

In Washington, D.C., demonstrators gathered in Lafayette Square, across from the White House, before marching toward the U.S. Capitol.

A few hundred young people showed up, many carrying signs and placards, including one that read, “Fossil fuels fund war. Green energy now.”

Sophia Geiger, 19, an activist with Fridays for Future, said she wants President Joe Biden to declare a national climate emergency — a repeated demand by environmental groups since Biden took office.

Geiger, who is taking a year off from her education to focus on climate action, said, “Even though he acknowledges this is a crisis, he does not act like it.”

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Associated Press writer Suman Naishadham contributed from Washington, D.C.

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Follow AP’s coverage of climate issues at https://apnews.com/hub/climate and of the Russia-Ukraine war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

GERMANY

Fridays for Future protests call for peace and climate justice

Coordinated global demonstrations drew thousands of mostly young people calling for climate leadership under the motto "People not Profit." In Germany, the war in Ukraine and bans on Russian fossil fuels were in focus.

In Germany, the war in Ukraine and Russian fossil fuel imports took center stage as more

 than 10,000 people gathered

Global protests organized by the activism network Fridays for Future attracted thousands of participants across Germany and the world Friday, all under the motto "People not Profit," in what was the group's 10th global climate strike.

The staggered protests began in Asia and Australia then moved to Europe and Africa before finishing later in the Americas.

In Stockholm, Sweden, climate activist Greta Thunberg joined protesters in the streets. Thunberg, whose lone demonstrations inspired the global movement, shared a video on Twitter of her and others hopping up and down with placards, yelling, "We are unstoppable! Another world is possible!"

Authorities in Germany say more than 10,000 mostly young people turned out to protest in Berlin, though organizers claim more than 22,000 attended. Thousands more gathered in Hamburg, Bremen, Munich and many other cities around the country.

Ukraine war shines light on Germany's fossil fuel dependency

In Germany, the war in Ukraine and the role of fossil fuels in it added a new dimension to the sense of urgency expressed by protesters. Participants demanded Germany's government immediately ban all import of Russian fossil fuels, for instance, accusing the administration of "funding the war" as a result of Germany's energy dependency.

The drastic changes recently initiated by Chancellor Olaf Scholz's coalition government were also the object of scorn. Protesters bemoaned the fact that the government now plans to scrap its climate goals to subsidize automobiles for the next two years, and build new liquid gas shipping terminals for imports rather than expanding renewables at home and lowering energy consumption.

Russian and Ukrainian activists were present in Berlin, too, some as invited speakers who told of the dangers of protesting in Russia, but also the necessity of doing so.

One Ukrainian who escaped to Germany from Kharkiv said, "The war in Ukraine could stop anytime. The EU and especially Germany just need to stop financing this."

"We are here today to show that peace and climate justice go together," said Berlin student Clara Duvigneau. She, like many at the rally, expressed extreme frustration at the fact that Germany pays tens of millions of euros to Moscow each day for fuels that harm the planet. "We want the energy transition to happen as quickly as possible," she said. 

Germany's 'systemic problem' with fossil fuel dependency

Many protesters criticized the Scholz administration's attempts to bolster supply by shifting dependency from one autocrat to another; Economic Affairs and Climate Action Minister Robert Habeck this week traveled to Qatar to negotiate liquid gas purchasing contracts with the emirate.

"If — like Robert Habeck — you have to travel to Qatar to get away from Putin's gas, you have a systemic problem," climate activist Luisa Neubauer told the daily taz newspaper in Berlin Friday. "In either case we finance opponents of democracy and increase the risk of climate collapse."

Another climate movement calling itself the "Last Generation" says it plans more nationwide protests in Germany on Saturday. The group says members will unfurl large banners with climate crisis facts on buildings across the country. The group says it will target banks, businesses and government agencies "financing the global expansion of deadly fossil fuel use."

New Orleans school board reverses little known ban on jazz


FILE - Jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis performs for school children during a program "Cookin' with Jazz'' with celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse in New Orleans, Aug. 28, 2006. During Carnival season, flocks of marching bands parade through the city streets even though jazz music and dancing has been banned in New Orleans public schools for almost a century. The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate reports the Orleans Parish School Board is poised this week to reverse that policy 100 years after it was passed. School officials say they're glad the local jazz ban has been ignored for decades. The board planned to vote to reverse the policy Thursday, March 24, 2022. (AP Photo/Cheryl Gerber)

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — With its president saying it had racist origins, the New Orleans school board has unanimously reversed a little known but century-old ban on jazz in schools in a city which played a huge role in developing jazz and where it is still played nightly at various venues.

“I’m very glad that we can rescind this policy. I want to acknowledge it. It was rooted in racism,” Orleans Parish School Board President Olin Parker said during the meeting Thursday night. “And I also want to acknowledge the tremendous contributions of our students and especially of our band directors, whose legacy continues from 1922 through present day.”

The board’s resolution said it wanted “to correct the previous action of the School Board and to encourage jazz music and jazz dance in schools.”

Board minutes from March 24, 1922, said “it was decided that jazz music and jazz dancing would be abolished in the public schools.” One member — who walked out on a special meeting called at the end of the session because reporters were not allowed to cover it — abstained from voting on jazz.


Officials told The Times Picayune / The New Orleans Advocate that the 1922 board members were trying to distance students from a genre with African American origins.

A copy of a news clipping from 1922, posted on the newspaper’s website, did not mention race. It quoted the resolution’s sponsor, “Mrs. A. Baumgartner,” as saying she had seen “a lot of rough dancing” at after-school events. “This cheek-to-cheek dancing is terrible,” she said.

Ken Ducote, executive director of the Greater New Orleans Collaborative of Charter Schools, brought the policy to the board’s attention after reading about it in Al Kennedy’s book “Chord Changes on the Chalkboard: How Public School Teachers Shaped Jazz and the Music of New Orleans.”

“It was just one of those things that was buried in the books,” board member Carlos Zervigon said Friday. “Obviously it was ridiculous and never really applied. But what an opportunity to be able to go back and reverse it on the 100th anniversary of its passage and acknowledge what our schools played in the formation and development of music in our classrooms.”

The earlier board’s vote on March 24, 1922, was passed without “prior policy development, analysis, or debate,” and the proposal had not been on the agenda, the current board noted.

“We’re glad that the policy was ignored by our schools, because our schools played a major role in the development of jazz,” said member Katherine Baudouin.

57% of U.S. households paid no federal income tax in 2021

"The reason people don't pay federal income tax is that they don't make enough money,"


The United States Internal Revenue Service Building in Washington, D.C. The Tax Policy Center said roughly 57% of U.S. households paid no federal income tax in 2021. Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI | License Photo


March 25 (UPI) -- Roughly 57% of U.S. households paid no federal income tax in 2021, and 19% of Americans paid neither payroll nor federal income taxes in 2021, according to the Tax Policy Center.

For 2022, the Tax Policy Center estimates that about 47% won't pay federal income taxes.

The share of American households paying no federal income tax rose to more than 60% in 2020 due in part to massive COVID-19 pandemic job losses.

Before the pandemic, 44% paid no federal income tax.

RELATED Report: America's 400 wealthiest families paid 8.2% in income taxes

Tax Policy Center senior fellow Howard Gleckman said in addition to pandemic job losses, a decline in incomes, stimulus checks and tax credits contributed to the large number of households paying no federal income tax.

"Combined, all this substantially reduced the income tax liability of more than a hundred million households and temporarily turned many from payers of small amounts of federal income tax to non-payers," Gleckman said.

Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla., wants to require all American households to pay some federal income tax as part of his Rescue America plan.

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"All Americans should pay some income tax to have skin in the game, even if a small amount. Currently over half of Americans pay no income tax," Scott said.

Gleckman called Scott's plan "silly."

"The reason people don't pay federal income tax is that they don't make enough money," he said.

RELATED Here's how Democrats would raise taxes on the rich

TPC estimates that the lowest-income households -- less than about $27,000 annually -- would pay an average of nearly $1,000 more in taxes in 2022, reducing their after-tax incomes by nearly 6%.

TPC said low-income families with children would pay the most under Scott's plan. His plan would slash their after-tax incomes by more than $5,000, or more than 20%.