ABOLISH SCOTUS

Dark Money Built the Supreme Court’s Radical Conservative Supermajority


A secretive, well-financed dark money network helped build the Supreme Court’s radical conservative supermajority and has been bankrolling its toxic caseload — all to create the appearance of broad-based support for extremist rulings.

The Supreme Court building in Washington, DC, photographed in 2016. 

(AgnosticPreachersKid / Wikimedia Commons)

BYANDREW PEREZ /ADITI RAMASWAMI

06.23.2022

\ Jacobin\

The barrage of devastating, precedent-setting Supreme Court rulings that has started to drop may have many Americans wondering how we arrived at such a dark moment. The answer is simple, even if it is rarely discussed in corporate media: it lies in a giant pile of anonymous cash that was deployed to buy Supreme Court seats, help determine justices’ caseload, and shape their decisions.

A secretive, well-financed dark money network helped build the Supreme Court’s radical conservative supermajority and has also been bankrolling many of the politicians and organizations involved in the most controversial cases now before the court. That includes the cases that could invalidate federal abortion rights and prevent the federal government from combating climate change.

The public will almost certainly never know the identities of the ultrawealthy individuals and interests who paid to stack this court and influence its decisions, but much of the credit should go to a man named Leonard Leo and his cadre of conservative activists.

The cochairman of the Federalist Society, the conservative lawyers’ group in Washington, Leo is best known for serving as President Donald Trump’s top judicial adviser. Leo, an antiabortion zealot, helped select Trump’s Supreme Court picks while simultaneously leading a dark money network that boosted their confirmations with TV ads and contributions to conservative groups that promoted the judges.

Leo’s dark money network has also funded Republican state attorneys general and conservative nonprofits that are backing and even directly arguing some of the most contentious cases before the high court right now.

It is in these cases that the Supreme Court has issued or is widely expected to issue rulings that will end federal protections for abortion rights; strip environmental regulators of their ability to regulate carbon emissions; dismantle the high court precedent requiring police officers to inform people of their rights to remain silent and to an attorney when they’re being detained; and strike down blue-state restrictions on carrying concealed firearms.

The court may also give conservative state lawmakers more power to chip away at Americans’ voting rights and weaken tribal sovereignty.

So to fully understand how we got here, it’s important to follow the money — at least to the extent that we can.
Quietly Building the Court’s Conservative Supermajority

Leo and his allies first formed the Judicial Crisis Network in 2005 to help confirm George W. Bush’s justices, John Roberts and Samuel Alito — and Leo reportedly played a “decisive role” in both of their selections. The organization has grown quietly and steadily since then and played a key role in flipping the court and building its six-three conservative supermajority.

In 2016, following the death of conservative justice Antonin Scalia, the Judicial Crisis Network spent $7 million on an advertising and advocacy campaign to pave the way for Republican senators to avoid holding a vote on President Barack Obama’s court pick, Merrick Garland.

Under Trump, Leo helped select Trump’s Supreme Court picks, while the Judicial Crisis Network spent tens of millions of dollars on ad campaigns to confirm Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett.

The Judicial Crisis Network and its sister group, a charitable organization called the Judicial Education Project, both routinely funneled big donations to allied conservative nonprofits that helped create an echo chamber supporting the judges’ nominations.

In early 2020, Leo told Axios of his plans to remake the Judicial Crisis Network and Judicial Education Project and expand their scope.

The Judicial Crisis Network was rebranded as the Concord Fund, while the Judicial Education Project was renamed the 85 Fund. Both organizations maintained their original names as trade names; the Concord Fund continues to run ads under the alias of the Judicial Crisis Network.

Now both organizations have grown into financial juggernauts. The Concord Fund reported raising more than $48 million between July 2020 and June 2021, a period of time that included Barrett’s confirmation. The 85 Fund brought in nearly $66 million in 2020.

Throughout their history, these organizations have done an exceptional job of keeping their donors secret, while raising giant sums from just a few contributors.A secretive, well-financed dark money network helped build the Supreme Court’s radical conservative supermajority.

According to its most recent tax return, which was obtained by the watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, the Concord Fund raised nearly all of its recent $48 million haul from two anonymous donors. As we previously reported, one of those donors is the Rule of Law Trust, a nonprofit helmed by Leo, which gave the group $22 million in 2020. None of the very few and obviously ludicrously wealthy donors to the Rule of Law Trust have been disclosed.

Between 2018–19, the Concord Fund received $3 million from the 45Committee, a dark money group affiliated with the billionaire Ricketts family, which owns the Chicago Cubs.

The 85 Fund, meanwhile, received more than $20 million in 2020 from a nonprofit called Donors Trust. The latter organization has long been known as a “dark money ATM,” because billionaires use it as a pass-through vehicle to disguise their donations to conservative groups.
A Two-Pronged Attack on the Judiciary

Leo’s dark money network has spearheaded a two-pronged attack on the judiciary: first it has worked to install conservative judges, then it has worked to bring those appointees specific cases designed to destroy previous precedents, along with amicus briefs, or “friend of the court” filings, offering them rationales for doing so.

In its first mission to populate the bench with right-wing ideologues, Leo and his allies have worked closely with Republican Senate leaders. In its 2020–21 tax return, the Concord Fund reported donating $9 million to One Nation, a dark money group affiliated with Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who led the Republican strategy to deny Garland a vote as Obama’s nominee in 2016.

At the time, McConnell justified blocking a vote on Garland’s nomination by arguing that the seat should not be filled in an election year. But in 2020, McConnell led the campaign to swiftly install Barrett to the court despite Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death coming just forty-six days before the election. Barrett was confirmed eight days before the election.Throughout their history, these organizations have done an exceptional job of keeping their donors secret, while raising giant sums from just a few contributors.

Those maneuvers, supported with advocacy and donations from Leo’s Concord Fund and 85 Fund, helped turn what could be a five-four Democratic majority now into a six-three conservative supermajority that may soon overturn longstanding Supreme Court precedents on abortion rights and policing, and gut the government’s ability to regulate greenhouse gases and potentially much more.

As conservative judges have been installed throughout the judiciary, the Concord Fund and the 85 Fund have simultaneously financed the Republican attorneys general and nonprofits that are supporting and, in some instances, directly leading the highest-stakes cases before the Supreme Court right now. The Concord Fund has long been the top financier of the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA), which works to elect GOP state attorneys general, donating more than $17 million to the organization since 2014, according to the New York Times.

Meanwhile, other groups funded by Leo’s network have been filing amicus briefs offering legal justification for some of the more destructive cases currently before the Supreme Court. In its most recent annual tax returns, the 85 Fund reported distributing $34 million in grants to political groups and nonprofits, while the Concord Fund gave out $28 million to nonprofits.
How the Scheme Works

The playbook is now straightforward: Leo’s dark-money network installs right-wing judges, then Republican attorneys general boosted by Leo’s network bring cases and amicus briefs, while other groups funded by the same network file their own briefs — all to create the appearance of broad-based support for extremist rulings.

The Supreme Court’s Carson v. Makin decision, handed down Tuesday, illustrates how the multi-faceted scheme works in practice.

In a six-three decision, the court’s conservatives held that Maine must give public money to private religious schools. The decision represents a major infringement on the notion of separation between church and state in the United States and threatens the concept of a secular public education.

The Carson decision was undergirded with an amicus brief signed by twenty-one Republican state attorneys general, who are generally elected with support from the Concord Fund–backed RAGA. Briefs were also filed by Advancing American Freedom, a nonprofit founded by former vice president Mike Pence that received $1 million from the Concord Fund between 2020–21, as well as the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which received $150,000 from the 85 Fund in 2020.Leo’s dark-money network installs right-wing judges, then Republican attorneys general boosted by Leo’s network bring cases and amicus briefs, while other groups funded by the same network file their own briefs.

Another brief was filed by the Independent Women’s Forum and its Independent Women’s Law Center. The 85 Fund donated $310,000 to the Independent Women’s Forum in 2020, while the Concord Fund donated $500,000 to its sister group, Independent Women’s Voice, between 2020 and 2021.

This scheme has been consistently replicated in other cases currently before the high court:

• Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization — The Supreme Court is likely to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 that established a constitutional right to an abortion across the country — a decision that would endanger reproductive health care access for tens of millions of people.

Mississippi Republican attorney general Lynn Fitch is leading the case to overturn Roe. Fitch, who benefited from $225,000 in RAGA money in her 2018 race, asked the Supreme Court to uphold a Mississippi law that would ban most abortions at fifteen weeks of pregnancy, even in cases of rape or incest. Eighteen Republican attorneys general filed a brief supporting Mississippi’s petition, as did a dozen Republican governors. The Concord Fund has donated $1 million to the Republican Governors Association this election cycle, according to Political MoneyLine.

According to a review by us of their most recent tax returns, the Concord Fund and the 85 Fund donated to a long list of groups that filed amicus briefs in the Supreme Court abortion case: the Susan B. Anthony List ($2.3 million from the Concord Fund); Pence’s Advancing American Freedom ($1 million from the Concord Fund); Concerned Women for America ($440,000 from the Concord Fund, $100,000 from the 85 Fund); the Ethics and Public Policy Center ($488,000 from 85 Fund); the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty ($150,000 from the 85 Fund); CatholicVote.org Education Fund ($50,000 from the Concord Fund to Catholic Vote Civic Action); and Family Research Council ($25,000 from the Concord Fund to Family Research Council Action).

• West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency — The case could decide whether the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is allowed to issue rules to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and could have significant implications for the government’s ability to tackle the climate crisis, aswell as for other federal agencies’ rulemaking abilities. According to the New York Times, “The Supreme Court is expected to hand down a decision that could severely limit the federal government’s authority to reduce carbon dioxide from power plants.”

West Virginia attorney general Patrick Morrisey (R) is leading the case, with seventeen Republican attorneys general signing on to his petition. Kentucky Republican attorney general Daniel Cameron offered his own amicus brief on the matter to the high court. The New Civil Liberties Alliance, which received $1 million from the 85 Fund in 2020, also filed a brief.

• Vega v. Tekoh — This case considers whether a person’s constitutional rights are violated if law enforcement officers do not inform them of their so-called Miranda rights — their right to remain silent and right to have legal representation when they’re being detained. According to the Hill, the Supreme Court “seems poised to reverse its decision in Miranda” from 1966. Twenty-two Republican attorneys general, many of whom were elected with the help of RAGA, filed an amicus brief supporting the petitioner.

• New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen — The Supreme Court just handed down a ruling on this major gun case that could drastically change the rules around firearms that can be carried in New York. The decision, which will hobble the state’s rigorous gun permit process, could have disastrous consequences, by making it easier in several blue states to legally carry concealed weapons in public.

Twenty-six Republican attorneys general, many of whom are supported by RAGA, filed an amicus brief supporting the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, which is fighting to weaken the state’s gun laws. The Leo-backed Independent Women’s Law Center also filed a brief.

• Berger v. North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP — Justices will decide whether state lawmakers can intervene in a lawsuit filed against North Carolina concerning the constitutionality of the state’s restrictive voter ID law. Lawmakers want to intervene in the case because they disagree with the state attorney general’s handling of the matter.

A ruling in the legislators’ favor could establish the “independent state legislature doctrine” pushed by conservatives as the law of the land, enshrining state legislatures’ supremacy in regulating elections. Elections experts say this doctrine could give Republicans “intellectual cover” to override popular votes, and even “could be fatal to democracy.”

Nine Republican attorneys general with ties to RAGA filed a brief in the case, as did the Republican State Leadership Committee, which has received $1 million from the Concord Fund this cycle. The Honest Elections Project, an organization that’s part of Leo’s 85 Fund, submitted a brief in the case calling on the court to declare that the independent state legislature doctrine is law.

• Oklahoma v. Castro-Huerta — The case will determine whether states have the authority to prosecute non–Native Americans who commit crimes against indigenous people on tribal lands. States currently have jurisdiction when the culprit and victim are both non-Indian. Handing states the authority to prosecute in the cases where offenders are non-Indian would have sweeping consequences for tribal sovereignty, upsetting “the balances struck between Congress, the tribes, and the states for more than a century,” as the New Republic wrote.

Once again, RAGA members are involved. Oklahoma attorney general John O’Connor (R) is leading the case, with five more Republican attorneys general signing on to his petition.

You can subscribe to David Sirota’s investigative journalism project, the Lever, here.

CONTRIBUTORS

Andrew Perez is senior editor and a reporter at the Lever covering money and influence.

Aditi Ramaswami is an associate editor at the Lever.

World health body wants new name for

‘monkeypox’ calling it ‘discriminatory and

 stigmatizing’

by GIN

June 23, 2022


The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced plans to find a new name for the viral disease informally known as ‘monkeypox’ which, says the world body, is “discriminatory and stigmatizing.”

WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in a briefing on the matter, said the virus is no longer behaving as it did in the past and therefore should be renamed. But a public narrative persists in suggesting the current outbreak is linked to Africa, West Africa or Nigeria, noted a group of 29 biologists and other researchers. That builds on an existing stigma, although the virus has been detected without a clear link to Africa.

The majority—84%—of confirmed cases are from the European region, followed by the Americas, Africa, Eastern Mediterranean region and Western Pacific region.

“The most obvious manifestation of this is the use of photos of African patients to depict the pox lesions in mainstream media in the global north,” the researchers said.

Ahmed Ogwell, deputy director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and more than a dozen infectious disease experts in the U.S. and Europe are soliciting suggestions for a new name using the website virological.org.

“We are removing the distinction between endemic and non-endemic countries, reporting on countries together where possible, to reflect the unified response that is needed,” the WHO said in its outbreak situation update dated June 17 but sent to media on Saturday.

As for what the virus should be called, the scientists suggest starting with hMPXV, to denote the human version of the monkeypox virus. Rather than geographic locations, they say, letters and numbers should be used, based on order of discovery. In that system, the lineage behind the current international outbreak would be dubbed B.1.

The Geneva-based UN health agency is due to hold an emergency meeting on June 23 to determine whether to classify the global monkeypox outbreak as a public health emergency of international concern—the highest alarm the U.N. agency can sound.

It has been reported in 39 countries so far in 2022, and most of them are having their first-ever cases of the disease, according to the WHO. Worldwide, it says, there are around 3,100 confirmed or suspected cases, including 72 deaths. The normal initial symptoms include a high fever, swollen lymph nodes and a blistery chickenpox-like rash.

Between Jan. 1 and June 15, 2,103 confirmed cases, a probable case and one death have been reported to the WHO in 42 countries, it said.

World Health Network declares Monkeypox a pandemic

By Karthikeya
| Updated: Thursday, June 23, 2022


Cambridge, Jun 23: The World Health Network (WHN), a coalition of scientists formed against the Covid-19 threat, has declared the Monkeypox outbreak a Public Health Emergency of Global Concern.

With 3,417 confirmed Monkeypox cases across 58 countries, the WHN noted that the outbreak will not stop without concerted global action. "Even with death rates much lower than smallpox, unless actions are taken to stop the ongoing spread-actions that can be practically implemented-millions of people will die and many more will become blind and disabled, it said in a statement.


According to the WHN, the essential purpose of declaring a pandemic is to achieve a concerted effort across multiple countries or over the world to prevent widespread harm. "There is no justification to wait for the Monkeypox pandemic to grow further. The best time to act is now. By taking immediate action, we can control the outbreak with the least effort, and prevent consequences from becoming worse. The actions needed now only require clear public communication about symptoms, widely available testing, and contact tracing with very few quarantines. Any delay only makes the effort harder and the consequences more severe", said Yaneer Bar-Yam, PhD, President of New England Complex System Institute and co-founder of WHN.

Although most cases have been in adults, any spread among children will lead to much more severe cases and more deaths, the WHN said. Infections of animals, especially rats and other rodents, but also pets, will make it much more difficult to stop. Passively waiting will lead to these harms without any compensating benefit, the statement added.

"The WHO needs to urgently declare its own Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)-the lessons of not declaring a PHEIC immediately in early January 2020 should be remembered as a history lesson of what acting late on an epidemic can mean for the world," said Eric Feigl-Ding, PhD, Epidemiologist and Health Economist, and co-founder of WHN.

WHO considers declaring monkeypox a global health emergency

The WHN said actions are needed to prevent widespread public communication about the symptoms that identify Monkeypox.

WHO to discuss declaring monkeypox outbreak a global health emergency

By Maria Cheng  The Associated Press

Posted June 23, 2022 

The WHO said it did not expect to announce any decisions made by its emergency committee before Friday.

READ MORE: Monkeypox in Canada: 211 confirmed cases reported across the country

Many scientists doubt any such declaration would help to curb the epidemic, since the developed countries recording the most recent cases are already moving quickly to shut it down.

Last week, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described the recent monkeypox epidemic identified in more than 40 countries, mostly in Europe, as “unusual and concerning.” Monkeypox has sickened people for decades in central and west Africa, where one version of the disease kills up to 10 per cent of people infected. The version of the disease seen in Europe and elsewhere usually has a fatality rate of less than 1% and no deaths beyond Africa have so far been reported.

“If WHO was really worried about monkeypox spread, they could have convened their emergency committee years ago when it reemerged in Nigeria in 2017 and no one knew why we suddenly had hundreds of cases,” said Oyewale Tomori, a Nigerian virologist who sits on several WHO advisory groups. “It is a bit curious that WHO only called their experts when the disease showed up in white countries,” he said.

2:14More than half of Canadians confident in monkeypox response, but 55% worried about spread: poll

More than half of Canadians confident in monkeypox response, but 55% worried about spread: poll – Jun 17, 2022

Until last month, monkeypox had not caused sizeable outbreaks beyond Africa. Scientists haven’t found any mutations in the virus that suggest it’s more transmissible, and a leading adviser to the WHO said last month the surge of cases in Europe was likely tied to sexual activity among gay and bisexual men at two raves in Spain and Belgium.

To date, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed more than 3,300 cases of monkeypox in 42 countries where the virus hasn’t been typically seen. More than 80% of cases are in Europe. Meanwhile, Africa has already seen more than 1,400 cases this year, including 62 deaths.

READ MORE: Does monkeypox represent a global health emergency? WHO to decide

David Fidler, a senior fellow in global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, said WHO’s newfound attention to monkeypox amid its spread beyond Africa could inadvertently worsen the divide between rich and poor countries seen during COVID-19.

“There may be legitimate reasons why WHO only raised the alarm when monkeypox spread to rich countries, but to poor countries, that looks like a double standard,” Fidler said. He said the global community was still struggling to ensure the world’s poor were vaccinated against the coronavirus and that it was unclear if Africans even wanted monkeypox vaccines, given competing priorities like malaria and HIV.

“Unless African governments specifically ask for vaccines, it might be a bit patronizing to send them because it’s in the West’s interest to stop monkeypox from being exported,” Fidler said.

2:37WHO looks into reports of traces of monkeypox found in semen

WHO looks into reports of traces of monkeypox found in semen – Jun 15, 2022

WHO has also proposed creating a vaccine-sharing mechanism to help affected countries, which could see doses go to rich countries like Britain, which has the biggest monkeypox outbreak beyond Africa _ and recently widened its use of vaccines.

To date, the vast majority of cases in Europe have been in men who are gay or bisexual, or other men who have sex with men, but scientists warn anyone in close contact with an infected person or their clothing or bedsheets is at risk of infection, regardless of their sexual orientation. People with monkeypox often experience symptoms like fever, body aches and a rash; most recover within weeks without needing medical care.

READ MORE: WHO creates monkeypox vaccine-sharing program amid inequity fears

Even if WHO announces monkeypox is a global emergency, it’s unclear what impact that might have.

In January 2020, WHO declared that COVID-19 was an international emergency. But few countries took notice until March, when the organization described it as a pandemic, weeks after many other authorities did so. WHO was later slammed for its multiple missteps throughout the pandemic, which some experts said might be prompting a quicker monkeypox response.

“After COVID, WHO does not want to be the last to declare monkeypox an emergency,” said Amanda Glassman, executive vice president at the Center for Global Development. “This may not rise to the level of a COVID-like emergency, but it is still a public health emergency that needs to be addressed.”

2:04Canada issues travel notice as monkeypox cases spread

Canada issues travel notice as monkeypox cases spread – Jun 8, 2022

Salim Abdool Karim, an epidemiologist and vice chancellor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, said WHO and others should be doing more to stop monkeypox in Africa and elsewhere, but wasn’t convinced that a global emergency declaration would help.

“There is this misplaced idea that Africa is this poor, helpless continent, when in fact, we do know how to deal with epidemics,” said Abdool Karim. He said that stopping the outbreak ultimately depends on things like surveillance, isolating patients and public education.

“Maybe they need vaccines in Europe to stop monkeypox, but here, we have been able to control it with very simple measures,” he said.

© 2022 The Canadian Press

Experts say monkeypox virus may

sometimes spread through the air

By HealthDay News

This electron microscopic image depicts a monkeypox virion. On the left are mature, oval-shaped virus particles, and on the right are immature virions. Photo by Cynthia S. Goldsmith, Russell Regnery/CDC/Wikimedia Commons

After adding, and then deleting, a recommendation that U.S. travelers wear masks to protect themselves from monkeypox, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention still says that those traveling to countries where the disease is spreading and "other people who may be in close contact with a person who has been confirmed with monkeypox" should consider wearing masks.

Why the new guidance? The advice comes as experts say the monkeypox virus can sometimes spread through the air, at least over short distances, but it's not clear exactly how much that contributes to the spread of the disease.

When it updated its guidance last week for travelers, the CDC advised: "Wear a mask. Wearing a mask can help protect you from many diseases, including monkeypox."

But in a statement released Tuesday, the agency said it "removed the mask recommendation from the monkeypox travel health notice because it caused confusion," The New York Times reported.

The CDC still advises monkeypox patients to wear a surgical mask, "especially those who have respiratory symptoms," and also asks other household members to "consider wearing a surgical mask" when in the presence of the person with monkeypox.

As of Wednesday, the United States had confirmed 35 cases of monkeypox in 12 states and the District of Columbia. Worldwide, more than a thousand people have been diagnosed with the disease since the first case in the outbreak was reported on May 13, and at least another thousand cases are under investigation, the Times reported.

In previous monkeypox outbreaks, most cases occurred among people who had close contact with an infected person or animal, but airborne transmission was still the only explanation for some cases.

RELATEDBritain now has more than 300 cases of monkeypox, health officials say

But in media and public briefings, health officials have not specifically discussed the possibility of airborne transmission of the monkeypox virus or the use of masks for protection, according to the Times.

Still, monkeypox does not spread easily, unlike pathogens such as coronavirus or flu virus.

Monkeypox infection requires "really close sustained contact," Andrea McCollum, the CDC's leading expert on the virus, told the Times.

RELATED First D.C. monkeypox case confirmed; hundreds of cases counted worldwide

"This is not a virus that was transmitted over several meters," she explained. "That's why we have to be really careful how to frame this."

When the Times asked McCollum whether health officials should make the possibility of airborne transmission more widely known, she replied, "It's a fair point to make, and it's something we certainly should consider moving forward."

Planning for potential airborne transmission of monkeypox is particularly important in hospitals, Dr. Donald Milton, an expert on viruses at the University of Maryland, told the Times.

The many unknowns of monkeypox -- including the primary method of transmission -- were discussed at a conference last week organized by the World Health Organization.

"It's very ambiguous what the true or dominant route of transmission is, and some of that can be addressed in animal models," Nancy Sullivan, a researcher at the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said at the conference, the Times reported. "Probably that needs to take a front seat for some of the laboratory research."

More information

Visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for more on monkeypox.

Copyright © 2022 HealthDay. All rights reserved.



Read More

U.S. monkeypox response mirrors early

 coronavirus missteps, experts say

Biden administration response raises concerns that

 country is ill-prepared for next pandemic

By Lena H. Sun,
Dan Diamond and
Fenit Nirappil

WASHINGTON POST
June 23, 2022 

Public health experts, including within the Biden administration, are increasingly concerned that the federal government’s handling of the largest-ever U.S. monkeypox outbreak is mirroring its cumbersome response to the coronavirus pandemic 2½ years ago, with potentially dire consequences.

As a result, they said, community transmission is occurring largely undetected, and the critical window in which to control the outbreak is closing quickly.

“It’s been unbelievably challenging,” said Lauren Sauer, director of the Special Pathogens Research Network within a government-funded consortium of medical centers focused on pathogens training and education. “It felt like January 2020 all over again.”

As monkeypox cases rise in Europe and other parts of the globe, health authorities are expressing concern about the unusual uptick. (Video: Alexa Juliana Ard, Meryl Kornfield/The Washington Post)

More than 150 monkeypox cases have been identified in the United States since May 19, federal officials said this week, and more than 3,300 cases have been detected in 42 countries around the world.

The rapidly rising global case counts have prompted the World Health Organization to convene an emergency committee on Thursday to assess whether the monkeypox outbreak represents a public health emergency of international concern — the agency’s highest-level warning, which currently applies only to the coronavirus and polio.

But as other nations have ramped up their efforts to track and prevent the spread of infection, experts say the United States has moved too slowly to expand access to monkeypox testing and vaccinate people at highest risk. The government’s failure to clearly and urgently communicate the symptoms and risks associated with monkeypox, a disease spread by close contact that can lead to fever, pain and a visible rash, has left gay and bisexual men, who are disproportionately contracting the virus, especially vulnerable, public health experts say.

The plodding U.S. response so far raises doubts about the country’s preparedness for the next pandemic, some administration officials say.

Communication about whom to test, when to test them and what monkeypox symptoms look like has been dismal, said Sauer, a public health expert at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Frustrations are running particularly high because, unlike the coronavirus, monkeypox has been studied for decades by global and U.S. experts who know the tools, strategies and vaccine protocols that can limit spread.

A group marching with Intermountain Healthcare waves to onlookers during a parade at the Utah Pride Festival in Salt Lake City on June 5. (Alex Goodlett for The Washington Post)

Biden administration officials on Wednesday said that they have amply prepared for a monkeypox outbreak, touting the government’s efforts to acquire more vaccine doses, warn the public about the emerging outbreak, and begin distributing tests to commercial labs across the country this week. They also insisted their response reflected lessons learned from fighting coronavirus, such as waiting to distribute the “right test that works” to laboratories after federal officials distributed flawed coronavirus tests in early 2020.

“All this work takes weeks to get it done right,” said Raj Panjabi, who leads the White House’s global health security efforts, reflecting on the “humility” that he said officials have tried to apply to monkeypox after struggles in containing the coronavirus and other outbreaks.

Monkeypox dilemma: How to warn gay men about risk without fueling hate

Clinicians, patients and some administration officials have faulted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for testing criteria that they say are too narrow and have resulted in long waits — sometimes multiple days — in identifying positive cases. Under the current framework, physicians who want a test for an individual suspected to have monkeypox must first consult with a state epidemiologist. State public health officials say that protocol helps identify people at highest risk so doctors can recommend isolation and take other steps to prevent community spread.

And just as in early 2020, when the coronavirus first menaced the United States, federal officials at first limited monkeypox testing to a network of several dozen public health laboratories — and did not authorize thousands of commercial laboratories and hospitals to perform their own testing, too.

Monkeypox testing is handled by 86 mostly state and local public health labs, with capacity for more than 8,000 tests a week, according to the CDC. But an official of a large city health department who is working directly on monkeypox response said that number is misleading, because the labs are not concentrated around the major metropolitan areas where the bulk of infections are detected.

Without better access to tests, which involve swabbing a lesion, it is impossible for public health officials to know the true prevalence of the disease.

Monkeypox has repeatedly emerged in Central and West Africa for decades, but the current outbreak has been occurring in countries that have not previously reported infections, raising concern about how and why the disease appears to be gaining a foothold in countries including Britain, Germany, Portugal and Spain.

The response has also been hindered by U.S. physicians’ lack of familiarity with the disease. The CDC initially publicized decades-old photos from more severe outbreaks in Africa, instead of the more subtle rashes detected in the recent global outbreak. The United States was far slower than Britain and Canada to distribute updated education materials, only recently sharing photos showing what the rashes look like on fair skin, said David Harvey, executive director of the National Coalition of STD Directors.

“One of the things that worries me right now is that we are seeing cases pop up in many countries, and we are also seeing numbers being reported in places that are much more aggressive in their surveillance than what we’ve seen here,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist at Brown University’s School of Public Health.

While monkeypox has been spreading mostly among men who have sex with men, the disease is not specific to any one group. “If a woman doesn’t have a particular known risk factor, and some woman shows up in urgent care, what’s the likelihood that she is going to get found?” Nuzzo said.

In most cases, monkeypox symptoms disappear on their own within a few weeks. But for those who are pregnant, children and people with weak immune systems, the disease can lead to medical complications, including death, according to the WHO.

A team from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention researches the monkeypox virus in the Congolese village of Manfouete on Aug. 29, 2017. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post)

Chasing a killer: At a time when a deadly disease can cross the globe, scientists need to understand the mysterious monkeypox.

Two federal officials involved in the monkeypox response said there are “significantly” more cases across the United States that are being missed because testing for monkeypox had not been expanded beyond the network of public health laboratories.

“If we don’t move aggressively now, monkeypox is going to be that much harder to eradicate later — or it could even become endemic” in the United States, said one of the administration officials, who is among more than two dozen across the Department of Health and Human Services and the White House tasked with combating the outbreak and who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media. Many of the same teams have been working on the coronavirus response.

On Wednesday, administration officials said they were authorizing five major commercial laboratories to test for monkeypox starting in early July, a dramatic expansion of capacity. That could allow labs to conduct tens of thousands of additional tests a week. Health-care providers will be able to send specimens directly to the commercial labs for testing without having to first consult with state health officials to determine whether testing criteria are met. Activists say the move was overdue.

About 10 monkeypox tests per day were being performed nationwide in early June, even as other countries such as Britain were performing far more, a senior administration official said Wednesday. While laboratory testing ramped up last week, only about 700 total tests had been conducted as of June 17, the official said.

Before the CDC made its test widely available to commercial labs, the agency needed to update testing protocols, establish agreements with the five labs and ensure personnel had personal protective equipment and vaccinations to protect against infection, according to a senior public health official who spoke under Biden administration ground rules that they not be named.

One man who sought testing on June 13 in New York City for potential monkeypox symptoms — flu-like illness and swollen lymph nodes — was initially advised by a physician that he did not have the disease and did not need a test, said Joseph Osmundson, a virologist at New York University, who spent several days trying to help the individual obtain a test. The man had recently returned to New York from Portugal, where he said he had casual sex with other men. Health officials have advised clinicians to look out for travel-associated cases from Europe, and in situations in which men have had sex with men.

But the man told The Post his efforts to obtain a test were repeatedly rebuffed — even after he was found to have “abnormal HPV-like lesions” that weren’t readily visible.

“The pain has been like someone stabbing me from inside — I couldn’t sit, I couldn’t sleep,” said the man, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to protect his privacy. He said he went to four different providers, including a major New York City hospital, before an urgent care clinic collected a specimen on Monday. He said he finally received his results on Thursday afternoon, 10 days after he first sought testing. The results: positive.

Osmundson said he was aware of a dozen similar cases in which people with possible monkeypox symptoms were being rebuffed.

“The CDC is very narrowly defining criteria for testing, and the [New York] Department of Health is not going outside those criteria. So if you don’t check off on every single one of the boxes, based on CDC, you don’t get access to testing,” Osmundson said.

Michael Lanza, a spokesman for the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, confirmed that providers must contact the agency to evaluate the case and determine whether testing is necessary. He said officials have not denied testing requests except in cases with no rash or no known risk factors.

James Krellenstein, co-founder of PrEP4ALL, an HIV-care nonprofit that has pressed state and federal officials to expand testing, said that “no one can confidently say if the outbreak is under control or not.”

“I’m extremely, extremely frustrated,” Krellenstein said. “It’s as if what happened in covid in February of 2020 never happened. This is not the first time, and to see CDC, HHS [and other officials] make the same errors over again is inexplicable, considering how large the cost was in 2020.”

An employee with Jynneos manufacturer Bavarian Nordic works in a laboratory in Martinsried, Germany, on May 24. (Lukas Barth/Reuters)

Public health experts also have criticized U.S. officials for not proactively vaccinating high-risk individuals against the virus, even as other nations have moved more aggressively to do so. Health officials in Britain announced a strategy Tuesday to offer vaccinations to some gay and bisexual men at higher risk of exposure, and New York City officials on Thursday opened a vaccine clinic to those who may have been recently exposed. While U.S. officials have stockpiled two vaccines that are effective against monkeypox, there is a limited supply of the vaccine that is specifically authorized to prevent monkeypox, Jynneos.

U.S. officials “need to have very serious planning conversations” about proactively vaccinating people at high risk for disease, said Janet Hamilton, executive director of the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists. She said individuals who should be prioritized include men who have sex with men, sex workers, lab personnel conducting monkeypox testing, and health-care workers expected to provide direct care for monkeypox patients.

Of the two vaccines that are effective against monkeypox, Jynneos is in high global demand. The other vaccine, ACAM2000, is older and was approved to prevent smallpox. While it is effective against monkeypox, it can cause serious side effects and cannot be used for people with severely weakened immune systems or eczema, according to the CDC.

Senior public health officials said Wednesday that they are considering potential strategies for proactive vaccination. Current CDC recommendations call for vaccinating those at high risk after an exposure.

Inger Damon, the CDC’s top orthopoxvirus expert, said at a briefing with reporters that federal officials have yet to receive information from state and local health departments on the number of Americans vaccinated against monkeypox.

Krellenstein, who joined a call with senior administration officials on Tuesday to discuss the U.S. monkeypox strategy, said the administration could not answer questions about vaccine uptake.

“That’s very concerning, because we do need to be making sure that this vaccine is going into arms,” Krellenstein said, adding that the lack of clarity echoed the CDC’s data problems from the coronavirus response.

Officials say they also are worried about possible supply chain bottlenecks with the vaccine, a problem that emerged during the coronavirus pandemic as countries competed for resources to fight the virus, and hard-hit nations such as India moved to ban exports of coronavirus vaccines.

Jynneos is produced by Bavarian Nordic in Denmark — and is the only vaccine approved by the Food and Drug Administration to prevent monkeypox. Some pandemic experts have warned that if the outbreak worsens, European officials could institute an export ban on Jynneos and limit shipments abroad.

The United States currently has more than 65,000 doses of Jynneos, a two-shot vaccine, immediately available in its Strategic National Stockpile, officials said. The federal government has also requested that 300,000 additional government-owned doses be soon shipped to the United States, and has ordered another 500,000 doses to be delivered later this year.

Public health experts and activists are clamoring for more-proactive vaccinations in high-risk communities, warning that the outbreak could be amplified as the gay community celebrates Pride Month and if clinicians miss opportunities to diagnose probable cases of monkeypox.

“I had four close contacts that likely could have been avoided if I’d gotten my early diagnosis,” said the New York City man who was forced to visit four providers to get tested. He said he decided on his own to isolate when his symptoms worsened, because he worried about the virus spreading, undetected, through the gay community. “Hopefully we can prevent that with the vaccine,” he said.

2022 Monkeypox Outbreak Global Map | Monkeypox | Poxvirus | CDC

Frances Stead Sellers contributed to this report.

How Serious Is Monkeypox?

This viral illness is not like Covid, but there is cause for

concern. Here’s how experts are thinking about it now.

By Knvul Sheikh
June 24, 2022

Health officials have confirmed more than 3,500 cases of monkeypox in 44 countries, including many where the disease does not typically occur, like the United Kingdom, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Canada, France and the United States.

As of June 23, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have confirmed 173 cases of monkeypox in 24 U.S. states and Washington, D.C.

On May 22, President Biden addressed the highly unusual cases, stating that “it is a concern in the sense that if it were to spread it would be consequential.” After more than two years of living through a pandemic, it is understandable that the news of a new virus spreading across the globe could cause alarm, but health experts say that monkeypox is unlikely to create a scenario similar to that of the coronavirus, even if more cases are found. “As surveillance expands, we do expect that more cases will be seen. But we need to put this into context because it’s not Covid,” Dr. Maria Van Kerkhove, the World Health Organization’s technical lead on Covid-19, said in a live online Q. and A. on May 23.

Monkeypox is not a new virus, and it is not spread in the same way as the coronavirus, so we asked experts for a better understanding of the pathogen — and how the disease it causes is different from Covid-19.

How contagious is monkeypox?

People typically catch monkeypox by coming into close contact with infected animals. That can be through an animal bite, scratch, bodily fluids, feces or by consuming meat that isn’t cooked enough, said Ellen Carlin, a researcher at Georgetown University who studies zoonotic diseases that are transmitted from animals to humans.

Although it was first discovered in laboratory monkeys in 1958, which gives the virus its name, scientists think rodents are the main carriers of monkeypox in the wild. It is primarily found in Central and West Africa, particularly in areas close to tropical rainforests — and rope squirrels, tree squirrels, Gambian pouched rats and dormice have all been identified as potential carriers.

“The virus has probably been circulating in these animals for a very, very long time,” Dr. Carlin said. “And for the most part, it has stayed in animal populations.”

The first human case of monkeypox was detected in 1970 in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Since then, the virus has periodically caused small outbreaks, though most have been limited to a few hundred cases in 11 African countries.

A handful of cases have made it to other continents, brought by travelers or the import of exotic animals that passed the virus to house pets and then to their owners.

But human-to-human transmission of monkeypox virus is pretty rare, Dr. Van Kerkhove said. “Transmission is really happening from close physical contact, skin-to-skin contact. So it’s quite different from Covid in that sense.”

The virus can also spread by touching or sharing infected items like clothing and bedding, or by the respiratory droplets produced by sneezing or coughing, according to the W.H.O.

That may sound eerily familiar because in the early days of the pandemic many experts said that the coronavirus also had little human-to-human transmission beyond respiratory droplets and contaminated surfaces. Later research showed that the coronavirus can spread through much smaller particles called aerosols with the ability to travel distances greater than six feet. But that doesn’t mean the same will turn out to be true for the monkeypox virus, said Luis Sigal, an expert in poxviruses at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia. The coronavirus is a tiny, single-stranded RNA virus, which may have aided its ability to become airborne. The monkeypox virus, however, is made of double-stranded DNA, which means that the virus itself is much larger and heavier and unable to travel as far, Dr. Sigal said.

Other routes of monkeypox transmission include from mother to fetus via the placenta or during close contact during and after birth.

The majority of cases this year have been in young men, many of whom self-identified as men who have sex with men, though experts are cautious about suggesting that monkeypox transmission may occur through semen or other bodily fluids exchanged during sex. Instead, contact with infected lesions during sex may be a more plausible route. “This is not a gay disease, as some people in social media have attempted to label it,” Dr. Andy Seale, an adviser with the W.H.O.’s H.I.V., Hepatitis and S.T.I.s Program, said during the May 23 Q. and A. “Anybody can contract monkeypox through close contact.”

What are the symptoms and how bad can a monkeypox infection get?

Monkeypox is part of the same family of viruses as smallpox, but it is typically a much more mild condition, according to the C.D.C. On average, symptoms appear within six to 13 days of exposure, but can take up to three weeks. People who get sick commonly experience a fever, headache, back and muscle aches, swollen lymph nodes and general exhaustion.

About one to three days after getting a fever, most people also develop a painful rash that is characteristic of poxviruses. It starts with flat red marks that become raised and filled with pus over the course of the next five to seven days. The rash can start on a patient’s face, hands, feet, the inside of their mouth or on their genitals, and progress to the rest of the body. (While chickenpox causes a similar-looking rash, it is not a true poxvirus, but is caused by the unrelated varicella-zoster virus.)

Once an individual’s pustules scab over, in two to four weeks, they are no longer infectious, said Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada.

Children and people with underlying immune deficiencies may have more severe cases, but monkeypox is rarely fatal. While one strain found in Central Africa can kill up to 10 percent of infected individuals, estimates suggest that the version of the virus currently circulating has a fatality rate of less than 1 percent.

And the easily identifiable rash of monkeypox, as well as its earlier symptoms, could be considered beneficial. “One of the most challenging things about Covid has been that it can be spread asymptomatically or pre-symptomatically, by people who have no idea that they’re infected,” Dr. Rasmussen said. “But with monkeypox it doesn’t appear that there is any pre-symptomatic transmission.”

Still, as the recent outbreak of cases has shown, there are plenty of opportunities to transmit monkeypox in the first few days of an infection, when symptoms are nonspecific, Dr. Rasmussen said.

What to Know About the Monkeypox Virus

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What is monkeypox? Monkeypox is a virus endemic in parts of Central and West Africa. It is similar to smallpox, but less severe. It was discovered in 1958, after outbreaks occurred in monkeys kept for research, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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What are the symptoms? Monkeypox creates a rash that starts with flat red marks that become raised and filled with pus. Infected people may also have a fever and body aches. Symptoms typically appear in six to 13 days but can take as long as three weeks after exposure to show, and can last for two to four weeks. Health officials say smallpox vaccines and other treatments can be used to control an outbreak.

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How infectious is it? The virus spreads mainly through body fluids, skin contact and respiratory droplets, though some experts suggest that it could occasionally be airborne. Typically it does not lead to major outbreaks, though it has spread in unusual ways this year, and among populations that have not been vulnerable in the past.

Card 4  of 5

Should I be worried? The likelihood of the virus being spread during sexual contact is high, but the risk of transmission in other ways is low. Most people have mild symptoms and recover within weeks, but the virus can be fatal in a small percentage of cases. Studies also suggest that older adults may have some protection from decades-old smallpox vaccinations.

Card 5 of 5

Is monkeypox similar to Covid? Health experts say that monkeypox is unlikely to create a pandemic scenario similar to that of the coronavirus. While Covid-19 is a tiny RNA virus that can spread through aerosols, monkeypox is a larger DNA virus that is transmitted mostly through close physical contact and has a much smaller mutation rate than RNA viruses.

Do I need to worry about a rising threat?

The good news is that there is no evidence yet to suggest that the monkeypox virus has evolved or become more infectious. DNA viruses like monkeypox are generally very stable and evolve extremely slowly compared to RNA viruses, Dr. Sigal said. Scientists are sequencing the viruses from recent cases to check for potential mutations, and will know soon if the infectiousness, severity or other characteristics have changed, he said. “But my expectation is that they will not be any different.”

Nevertheless, experts have some explanations for the recent increase in monkeypox cases. Research has shown that incidences of humans contracting viruses from contact with animals — also known as zoonotic spillovers — have become more common in recent decades. Increasing urbanization and deforestation means that humans and wild animals are coming into contact more often. Some animals that carry zoonotic viruses, like bats and rodents, have actually become more abundant, while others have expanded or adapted their habitats because of urban development and climate change.


“There’s more opportunities for relatively rare pathogens to get into new communities, find new hosts and travel to new places,” Dr. Rasmussen said.

Despite a brief pandemic lull, people are also traveling more frequently and to more parts of the world than they did just a decade ago. And while many of the new monkeypox cases are puzzling because patients did not have a history of direct travel to endemic countries in Africa, epidemiologists may uncover an indirect travel connection as they race to complete contact tracing in the coming weeks.

“The main risk for people these days with regards to viruses remains Covid,” Dr. Rasmussen said. “The good news there is that a lot of the same measures that will reduce your risk of Covid — social distancing, wearing masks in public spaces, practicing good hand hygiene and surface disinfection — will also reduce your risk of getting monkeypox.”

What is the treatment for monkeypox?

If you get sick, the treatment for monkeypox generally involves symptom management. Two antiviral drugs — cidofovir and tecovirimat — and an intravenous antibody treatment originally developed for smallpox could be used to manage monkeypox as well, though they have only been studied in the lab and animal models.

There is also a vaccine that the Food and Drug Administration approved in 2019, for people 18 and older, that protects against smallpox and monkeypox. But health officials stopped routinely vaccinating Americans against smallpox in 1972, when the disease was eradicated in the United States, and smallpox vaccines and treatments are now stockpiled mainly for national security purposes.

“The sporadic monkeypox outbreaks that have occurred in the past haven’t been enough to warrant restarting the smallpox vaccination program,” Dr. Rasmussen said. Health officials in the United States and other countries have begun using some of the stockpiled vaccines and treatments to prevent the spread of monkeypox from patients to their health care providers and close contacts, according to the C.D.C.

If you have a new rash or are concerned about monkeypox, the C.D.C. urges people to contact their health care provider. The agency has asked doctors to be on the alert for signs of the telltale rash, and says potential monkeypox cases should be isolated and flagged to them. Doctors also should not limit their concerns to men who identify as gay or bisexual, or patients who have recently traveled to Central or West African countries.

“It’s really hard to put a timeline on when this will be contained, or how easy it will be,” Dr. Rasmussen said. “But we have the pharmacological tools, in combination with the classic isolation and quarantine procedures that have helped contain monkeypox outbreaks in the past. We can contain it again. The key is going to be identifying all the cases.”

Audio produced by Adrienne Hurst.

Dani Blum contributed reporting.

What to Know About Monkeypox

‘Everybody Should Be Concerned’ About Monkeypox, Biden Warns
May 22, 2022


A version of this article appears in print on May 26, 2022, Section A, Page 9 of the New York edition with the headline: A Primer on Monkeypox, and How This Virus Differs From Covid-19. 

Fethullah Gülen’s niece arrested while trying to cross into Greece

by ATHENS BUREAU

000


The arrest of Imam Fethullah Gülen’s niece by the Turkish authorities was announced by the Turkish Ministry of Defence.

The arrest took place while Sümeyye Gülen was trying to cross into Greece.

According to the announcement, “10 people who were trying to cross illegally into Greece were arrested by troops at the border”.

“The investigation revealed that five of those arrested were members of the FETÖ terrorist organisation and one of them was Sümeyye Gülen, a niece of Fethullah Gülen.”

Who is Fethullah Gülen?

Fethullah Gülen is considered by Erdoğan to be the “leader of terrorists” of the FETÖ organisation, something that is also mentioned in the announcement of the Turkish Ministry of Defense.

In fact, when Recep Tayyip Erdoğan arrived at Istanbul airport after the coup attempt in July 2016, he accused Gülen and his movement of trying to overthrow him.

The imam denied any involvement, but the Turkish president insisted, opening a cycle of retaliation and persecution against members of Hizmet, also known as the Gülen movement.

The 75-year-old Muslim preacher has lived in exile since 1999 in Pennsylvania, USA.

He is the leader of a powerful movement in Turkey, which has a huge network of schools in his homeland, but also around the world, non-governmental organisations and businesses called Hizmet (in Turkish it means “service”) and has a great influence in the media, the police and the judiciary.

Although Erdoğan accuses him today, they were strong allies in the past. The alliance disbanded in 2013, when the Turkish president accused Gülen of being behind corruption scandals.

The imam’s name is now high on the Turkish list of terrorists.

Erdoğan had taken advantage of Gülen’s network to consolidate his power. Today, however, he considers him “the number one enemy of the people.”

Since 2013, Erdoğan has accused the imam of establishing a “parallel state” with the aim of overthrowing him, something the “Gülenists” deny.

Israel cancels agreement to release Palestinian detainee after he ends hunger strike

Palestinian detainee, Khalil Awawdeh [@HudaFadil9/Twitter]

June 24, 2022 

The Israeli occupation authority cancelled its agreement to release Palestinian detainee, Khalil Awawdeh from administrative detention, following his 111 days of hunger strike.

According to the Palestinian Prisoner Society (PPS), Khalil's administrative detention has been increased for another four months and three days, despite reaching a verbal deal with Israeli authorities for his release, which prompted him to suspend his hunger strike.

Khalil, a father of four, was detained on 27 December 2021, and placed in administrative detention – a policy that allows Israeli authorities to detain Palestinians for a renewable period of six months without charge or trial.

The 40-year-old Palestinian prisoner is currently in Ramleh Prison in central Israel after suffering from difficulty in speaking and communicating, in addition to severe pain throughout his body, especially in his lower limbs and muscles.

READ: Palestinian prisoner ends hunger strike on 111th day after Israel agrees release

Following a visit to Ramleh Prison last week, PPS attorney, Jawad Boulos reported that, in addition to poor vision, Khalil was also vomiting blood and having difficulty breathing.

He was previously transferred to hospital but then returned to Ramleh Prison clinic, despite his health condition.

"Khalil's health is in a very bad condition, and his life is at risk," Ameen Shouman, head of PPS, told the New Arab.

"Israeli authorities gave a verbal promise to release Khalil Awawdeh without indicating the date," Shouman added. "This has been a very hard battle for Khalil, and his life is still at risk."

According to the PPS, there are around 4,700 Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails, including around 600 held without charge or trial.


Palestinians hunger-strikers in Israeli jails – Cartoon [CarlosLatuff]