Climate change-driven disasters making insurance premiums too dear for farmers

Vic Country Hour / By Jane McNaughtonWednesday 15 July 2020

Peter Holding is a mixed farmer from Harden, NSW, and member of Farmers for Climate Action.(ABC News: Anna Vidot)

Australian farmers are facing increasingly frequent droughts, floods, hailstorms and bushfires, resulting in insurance premiums rising to the point where cancelling or underinsuring are the only options.

Key points:

A NSW farmer says the fossil fuel industry is effectively killing the agriculture sector
Insurance premiums are being driven to unaffordable levels by the impacts of climate change

The Insurance Council of Australia says 80 per cent of Australian homes are underinsured — and that figure's likely higher in the bush

Climate change has already cost farmers more than $1 billion since 2000, according to ABARES.

Third-generation lamb and cropping farmer Peter Holding said government inaction on global warming could have disastrous flow-on effects to the agriculture industry.

"Climate change poses a cataclysmic set of challenges for farmers," the Farmers for Climate Action member said.


"It's pretty severe and it's getting worse.

"As the frequency [of natural disasters] increases, the insurance premiums are just going to go up — there's no doubt about that."

The southern New South Wales farmer and volunteer firefighter said prolonged fire seasons are just one example of how climate change is affecting agricultural practices.

"The Canberra fires in 2003 was when we first saw the phenomenal firestorm effect," he said.

"And that's getting more common."

Fire surrounds a homestead during the Canberra fires in January 17, 2003.(Copyright: Jeff Cutting)

Rising risks, rising costs

Insurance Council of Australia spokesman Campbell Fuller said the industry was worried about the effects of man-made climate change.

"The insurance industry is very aware of concerns in the rural sector about climate change, natural disasters and about access to insurance," he said.
Find more rural news
See the latest news and information from the agriculture and mining industries, including weather and the markets, on ABC Rural.

"Insurers gather the latest available data from governments, especially around bushfire exposure and flood exposure, as well as seasonal forecasts from the Bureau of Meteorology."

Mr Fuller says insurers build a robust picture of the seasonal exposure that properties have per annum, which is then is priced into premiums.

"As the climate changes, and as risks are reassessed, that logically leads to changes in premiums to reflect the risks," he said.

Effect of climate variability on average farm profits 1949-50 to 2018-19 at current farms and commodity prices.(Supplied: ABARES)

'No silver bullet'

Mr Fuller said appropriate land use and resilient infrastructure in areas of higher risk to natural disasters needed to be prioritised.

"Changes in risk that can be predicted by climate change modelling need to be taken into account," he said.

"In many parts of Australia there's plenty of evidence that primary producers are taking measures to reduce the risks to their properties into their own hands."

Eighty per cent of Australian households are underinsured, and Mr Fuller says that percentage is probably much higher in rural areas.

This banana plantation at Taylors Arm, west of Macksville, was destroyed by fire in 2019.(ABC Rural: Claire Wheaton)

"Underinsurance and non-insurance is an issue in rural areas, and it is a constant concern to the industry as well as regulators and government agencies," he said.

"When properties are not insured, communities can struggle to rebuild after natural disasters and the burden falls more heavily on charities and government in the recovery phase."

Mr Fuller said farmers were likely to insure infrastructure such as their homes, sheds and equipment, but fences, livestock and crops were less likely to be included.

"There is no real silver bullet here," he said.


"It's a combination of actions that need to take place at a community level, and involving all levels of government."

Mr Holding said the cost of premiums meant insurance was not an option for some producers.

"I've had to pull back the farm's scale an awful lot to cut debt and make sure that we're still viable," he said.

Valuable farm machinery was destroyed by fire on the Duff beef and soybean property in the Upper Macleay Valley in 2019.(Supplied: Carolyn Duff)

Fossil fuels 'undermining' agriculture

Financial strain is not the only issue climate change has delivered to farmers.

"Unfortunately we're getting less good years and a lot more variability," Mr Holding said.

"There's a lot of impacts and I can't see it stopping any time soon.

"The droughts are just continuing, since the turn of the century we've had [so many years] of drought, interlaced with floods."

This map shows the decline of winter rainfall across southern Australia over the past 20 years.(Supplied: CSIRO/BOM)

Mr Holding said although farmers had "been adapting since the day they invented the plough", it would become impossible if the rate of environmental change continued to increase.

"Cutting emissions is the only option there, and that means moving away from fossil fuels — but the government seems wedded to that," he said.


"The fossil fuel industry is creating emissions and that is slowly but surely making agriculture unviable.

"We've cut the emissions from livestock probably in half, farmers in cropping areas have done all sorts of things to reduce the use of diesel and better use fertilisers.

"So farmers are working on all of these problems to cut their own emissions, but we definitely need some quick action to reduce the emissions of fossil fuel."

Turkey’s ruling party moving to tighten grip on social media

July 21, 2020

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — The Turkish president’s ruling party is submitting draft legislation to parliament that would enable the government to tighten its grip on social media, an official said Tuesday. The opposition fears the legislation will lead to greater censorship in the country.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has greatly concentrated powers into his own hands during 17 years in office, vowed this month to bring social media platforms under control following a series of tweets that allegedly insulted his daughter and son-in-law after they announced the birth of their fourth child on Twitter. At least 11 people were detained for questioning over the tweets.

The nine-article draft legislation would force social media companies with more than 1 million daily users in Turkey — such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube — to establish a formal presence or assign a representative in Turkey who would be accountable to Turkish authorities legally and for tax purposes.

A social media company or its representative would also be required to respond within 48 hours to complaints about posts that violate personal and privacy rights.

The social media giants would be obliged to assign a representative within 30 days after the legislation comes into force, or face gradually increasing fines and bandwidth reductions of up to 90%, ruling party legislator Ozlem Zengin told reporters.

“We aim to put an end to insults, swearing, to harassment made through social media,” Zengin said, adding that the measures sought to “balance freedoms with rights and laws.”

“Our priority is not to close down the social media providers. We are aware of the importance in our lives,” she said.

Opposition parties, however, have expressed concerns that the government’s plans are aimed at further limiting the Turkish public’s ability to access social media and reach independent news and information in an environment dominated by pro-government media.

Thousands of websites already remain blocked in Turkey. In January, the government lifted a more than two-year ban on Wikipedia after Turkey’s top court declared it unconstitutional. Turkey halted access to the online encyclopedia after it refused to remove content the government deemed offensive. The Turkish government has also banned YouTube and Twitter in the past.

Meanwhile, at least 76 journalists and other media workers remain behind bars, according to The Journalists’ Union of Turkey. The Committee to Protect Journalists has labeled Turkey one of the world’s top jailers of journalists.

The draft bill is scheduled to be debated in the general assembly next week, Zengin added.

The legislation is expected to pass with the votes of the ruling party and its nationalist allies.

WHO warns new Ebola outbreak in Congo faces funding gap
BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo (AP) — The World Health Organization said Tuesday it is facing a “serious funding gap” to battle the new outbreak of Ebola in remote corners of northern Congo amid the global COVID-19 pandemic.

The $1.75 million raised so far will only last for a few more weeks, the WHO warned, adding that the response effort is particularly expensive because of how difficult it is to get health teams and supplies into the densely forested area.

Already there have been 24 deaths since the outbreak was declared on June 1. The emergence of Ebola in Congo’s northern Equateur province came just as the world’s second deadliest Ebola outbreak was nearing its end.

“The response to Ebola in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic is complex, but we must not allow COVID-19 to distract us from tackling other urgent health threats,” said Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, the WHO Regional Director for Africa.

The funding shortage threatens to unravel early gains in this epidemic. When Equateur province last had Ebola cases in 2018, it took health officials two weeks to start vaccinating people. This time around, vaccination teams were mobilized within four days of the outbreak declaration, Moeti said.
No licensed vaccine existed when Ebola killed more than 11,000 people in West Africa between 2014-2016. After Ebola cases emerged in eastern Congo in August 2018, health teams eventually were able to combat the disease with two different vaccines.

Still, misinformation about those vaccines flourished in a region long wracked by armed militias. Communities fearful of outsiders in some cases refused to allow health teams in, allowing the virus to spread.

At least 2,280 people died of Ebola over the nearly two-year span of the epidemic in eastern Congo before it ended on June 25.
Previous outbreaks in northern Congo have been more limited — the 2018 one killed 33 people before it was brought under control within months.

Congolese health officials have determined through genetic sequencing that the new outbreak in the north is unrelated to the epidemic in the east,

Uganda’s Bobi Wine, urging unity, launches presidential bid

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Ugandan activist Bobi Wine has launched a new political party ahead of a presidential election in which he hopes to be the face of a united opposition against the country’s long-time leader.

The popular singer and lawmaker, whose real name is Kyagulanyi Ssentamu, has led a political pressure group known as People Power, which has captured the imagination of many Ugandans with its calls for President Yoweri Museveni’s retirement.

Wine is calling his new party the National Unity Platform, with an umbrella as its emblem. He has been calling for a united opposition against Museveni, a U.S. ally on regional security who has led this East African country since taking power by force in 1986. The 75-year-old Museveni is increasingly accused of relying on the armed forces to stay in power.

Wine has been arrested or detained many times, including over a treason charge that he denies. With political rallies now banned, presidential aspirants play cat-and-mouse with security forces seeking to break up anti-government gatherings.

Museveni accuses Wine and other opposition figures of encouraging young people into rioting.

“We have consistently said that we are a non-violent movement and we have no plans of establishing a military wing,” Wine said in a statement. “What we are doing today is to launch a political wing of our movement so as to ensure that our mission to use the election as a strategy within the liberation struggle succeeds.”

Wine won a seat in the national assembly in 2017 as an independent candidate not backed by any of major party. His popularity grew when he opposed divisive efforts to prolong Museveni’s rule.

Museveni is eligible to seek another term next year after lawmakers removed constitutional age limits on the presidency.

This week attorneys for Museveni collected his presidential nomination papers, signaling he wants to run again. Museveni’s party insists he remains its most popular member.

But opponents such as Wine, who is 38, say corruption is thriving and accuse Museveni of personalizing power through his firm grip on the military, the most powerful institution in Uganda.

The army has become even more influential amid the coronavirus pandemic as men in military uniform enforce lockdown measures, sometimes with brutal force.

Despite criticism by some that Wine is unprepared for national leadership, he remains popular among impoverished urban dwellers and his supporters urge him to test his popularity across the country.

“If Bobi Wine cannot lead Uganda but he is the politician voters want to lead them, I do not know what anyone can do about this. Abolish democracy? Change the constitution? Jump into Lake Victoria?” said analyst Musaazi Namiti, a columnist writing in the local Daily Monitor newspaper. “Now is the time for Bobi Wine to test his popularity. He should be the candidate.”
If Wine is to credibly represent the major parties as the sole opposition candidate, he will need to strike a deal with Kizza Besigye, a four-time presidential challenger who has not yet revealed his plans. Besigye and Wine announced what they called an alliance in June, although it remains unclear if one will stand down for the other to run.

Uganda has not witnessed a peaceful transfer of power since independence from Britain in 1962.

WW3.0 AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD

Pompeo says US to expand Arctic role to deter Russia, China

Danish Foreign Minister Jeppe Kofod, right and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo give a joint press conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, Wednesday, July 22, 2020. Pompeo arrived in Denmark on Wednesday for meetings with the country's leaders that are likely to address the construction of a disputed gas pipeline which Washington opposes. (Thibault Savary/Pool Photo via AP)

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Wednesday the United States will become more active in the Arctic to counter growing Russian influence and thwart attempts by China to insert itself into the region.

During a brief visit to Denmark, Pompeo hailed the reopening of the U.S. Consulate in the semi-autonomous Danish territory of Greenland and announced a new sustainable fisheries and commercial engagement agreement with the Faroe Islands, another Danish territory in the North Atlantic.

“It’s a new day for the United States in Greenland,” Pompeo told reporters at a joint news conference with Danish Foreign Minister Jeppe Kofod.

The U.S. Consulate in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, reopened in June after a decades-long hiatus. The move attracted attention because of U.S. President Donald Trump’s stated interest last year in purchasing Greenland from Denmark.

Kofod said the idea of the U.S. buying Greenland, which was roundly rejected and ridiculed by both Greenlandic and Danish officials, was not raised during his talks with Pompeo on Wednesday.

“That discussion was dealt with last year. It was not on the table,” he said.

Jenis av Rana, the Faroe Islands’ minister for culture and foreign affairs, told Danish media ahead of Kofod’s meeting with Pompeo that he was keen to discuss what role Washington sees the North Atlantic archipelago playing in the Arctic.

He also wondered about the possibility of a free trade agreement between the United States and the Faroe Islands, an autonomous Danish territory with some 52,000 inhabitants that is located north of Scotland between Iceland and Norway.

Av Rana told Danish broadcaster TV2 he was concerned the Arctic could become a battleground for the U.S. and other major global powers, including Russia and China.

“We’re very worried if the Arctic becomes a playground or a scene of war for the great powers,” av Rana said.

In his talks with Kofod, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and representatives of Greenland and the Faroe Islands, Pompeo said he stressed the importance of energy independence, particularly from Russia.

The Trump administration is vehemently opposed to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline under the Baltic Sea from Russia to Germany. Last week, the administration warned companies involved in the project they would be subject to U.S. penalties unless they halted their work.

Denmark’s environmental agency, which had been holding up construction of the last portion of the pipeline, dropped its opposition in October, prompting the U.S. to step up its efforts to stop the project.

The 1,200-kilometer (750-mile) pipeline also is opposed by eastern European countries that say it will increase Europe’s dependence on Russia for energy.

Antarctic biodiversity increasingly under threat as human activity spreads across continent


By environment reporter Nick Kilvert
Posted Wednesday 15 July 2020

Less than 32 per cent of Antarctica remains free from human interference according to the research.(Getty Images: Robert Harding Productions)

Antarctica is one of the most untouched and remote regions left on the planet, but new research shows that it's not as untouched as we thought it was.

Key points:

Less than a third of Antarctica is 'inviolate' or hasn't been visited by people and current sanctuaries are insufficient to protect the continent

Colonisation by pests is becoming more likely as ice recedes

Waste and landfill are thawing, increasing the risk of contamination

In the study published today in Nature, researchers found that people have accessed more than two-thirds of the continent, and that the proportion of "inviolate" areas, or places not impacted by people is shrinking.

Only a small number of specially protected areas have been sanctioned under the Antarctic Treaty — an international agreement to preserve the scientific, environmental and cultural value of specific sites — and very few of those areas haven't suffered from some form of human impact, according to study co-author Steven Chown of Monash University.

"Antarctica still has a fair bit of wilderness but it's not properly protected," he said.

Professor Chown and colleagues are calling for a significant expansion of Antarctic areas that are kept permanently free of people, in order to ensure that its unique biodiversity is conserved

"Some of the negligibly impacted areas, where there is high biodiversity, are what I think are the first [priorities for conservation]."
Human impact highest in most biodiverse areas

For the first time, researchers analysed more than 2.7 million records of human activity in Antarctica over 200 years to establish a thorough picture of our influence over the region.

While most of the continent is still technically wilderness, much of that is the ice-covered interior that doesn't support much biodiversity.

Most human activity — predominantly research and tourism — happens in the ice-free and coastal regions, said Sharon Robinson of the University of Wollongong, who wasn't involved with the research.

"Wherever there's an ice-free area you get biodiversity," said Professor Robinson, who studies mosses and lichens.
Moss grows in coastal and ice-free environments in Antarctica.(Supplied: Sharon Robinson)

Mosses and lichens, which are sentinels of climate change, can grow on mountain tops that stick up out of 3 - 4 kilometres of ice.

"Those [mountain tops] work like islands. So you get things on those islands that don't exist anywhere else [on Earth]."

There are currently 72 specially protected areas in Antarctica.

"The problem is most of the [protected areas] are near stations, Professor Robinson said.

"They were mostly set up so that science could take place, and so you didn't have people building on things that were being studied," she said.

When people visit an area even once, they run the risk of introducing pathogens — things like microbes and plant spores — which have the potential to permanently alter the ecology of the region.
Melting exposing 'everything from fuel to batteries to dead huskies'

And climate change is compounding the threat of poor environmental protections on several fronts.

Firstly, retreating ice sheets mean more exposed land and greater opportunity for pathogens to colonise.

And warmer temperatures also mean species from more northern latitudes are likely to survive in Antarctica.
Retreating ice is beginning to expose buried landfill in Antarctica.(Australian Antarctic Division: Richard Youd)

But there's another threat that the receding ice is posing as well.

Early stations would bury their waste as landfill, rather than transporting it back to their countries of origin.

That was OK as long as it remained frozen, but some of these landfill sites are in danger of thawing, Professor Robinson said.

"That's one of the big concerns with climate change is when the permafrost melts there's all this buried [waste] from the 1950s," she said.


"Everything from fuel to batteries to dead huskies — that's already starting to melt and there's this concern about what to do to clean those up."
The politics of creating people-free zones
In total there are 29 consultative parties to the Antarctic Treaty.(Photo: Peter Campbell/Australian Antarctic Division)

In order to properly protect Antarctica, the researchers argue that there needs to be very large sanctuaries where human access is completely off limits.

Research could still take place in those areas, but only remotely through technologies such as satellite sensing and drone sampling.

There is strong support among the scientific community to increase the amount of people-free regions across Antarctica, said Tony Press of the University of Tasmania's Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies.

But, he said, achieving that goal relies upon getting consensus from all the 29 countries who signed the Antarctic Treaty.


"The obstacles are political or geopolitical really. Somebody has to propose and get support for these initiatives," Professor Press said.

The researchers found that over the 200 years of records they looked at, activity has been increasing recently and is not limited to any single country.

While China is currently building new bases, other countries like Belarus and Turkey are increasing their presence and tourism is expanding, according to Professor Chown.

"If you look at the overall number of people and expeditions and stations being built, it's definitely on the rise," Professor Chown said.

"In the pre-COVID tourist year, we're up to about 50,000 visitors a year."
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Although creating sanctuaries is a necessary step, all the researchers the ABC spoke to said climate change was the biggest issue affecting Antarctica that must be addressed.


"Unless we actually protect these places they're going to disappear before we know what is there and what those organisms can do," Professor Robinson said.

She said the fact that we were able to all-but ban CFCs to combat ozone depletion shows we can work collectively to tackle climate change.

"I'm stubbornly optimistic because not being optimistic means you just give up. You have to have hope."

US wildlife agency RESPONSIBLE FOR PROTECTING ENDANGERED SPECIES rejects protections for rare fish species

This photo provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service shows an Arctic grayling captured in a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service fish trap at Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge near Lima, Montana. U.S. wildlife officials have rejected federal protections for the rare, freshwater fish species at the center of a long-running legal dispute. The decision, on Wednesday, July 22, 2020, comes almost two years after a federal appeals court faulted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for dismissing the threat that climate change and other pressures pose to Arctic grayling. (Jim Mogen/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service via AP)

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — U.S. wildlife officials on Wednesday rejected special protections for a rare, freshwater fish related to salmon that’s been at the center of a long-running legal dispute, citing conservation efforts that officials say have increased Arctic grayling numbers in a Montana river.

The Associated Press obtained details of the decision not to protect the fish under the Endangered Species Act in advance of a public announcement.

The move comes almost two years after a federal appeals court faulted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for arbitrarily dismissing threats to grayling from climate change and other pressures.

FILE - In this June 27, 2005, file photo, an Arctic grayling is shown in Emerald Lake in Bozeman, Mont. U.S. wildlife officials have rejected federal protections for the rare, freshwater fish species at the center of a long-running legal dispute. The decision, on Wednesday, July 22, 2020, comes almost two years after a federal appeals court faulted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for dismissing the threat that climate change and other pressures pose to Arctic grayling. (Ben Pierce/Bozeman Daily Chronicle via AP, File)

While some of those threats will persist, government officials said conservation measures have improved the fish’s habitat and will lessen future temperature increases in the cold waters where they reside.

Known for their iridescent appearance and sail-shaped dorsal fins, Arctic grayling are members of the salmon family that can reach 30 inches (76 centimeters) in length and are prized by many anglers.

Officials credited a conservation agreement involving landowners and government agencies for recent improvements to the grayling’s river habitat in southwestern Montana’s Big Hole Valley.

The Big Hole River and its tributaries — home to one of the few native populations of the fish in the Lower 48 states — saw grayling numbers roughly double during the last decade to about 1,500 adult fish, said Fish and Wildlife Service biologist Jim Boyd. The population figure was derived from an estimate of the number of breeding fish.

“If you can increase the number of breeding individuals, you can start to feel really good about the conservation efforts and know they are truly working,” he said.

Wildlife advocates criticized Wednesday’s decision and said the worsening climate crisis leaves the grayling’s survival in doubt. Even with a commitment from ranchers along the Big Hole to reduce the amount of water withdrawn to grow hay, flows drop sharply during dry periods and imperil grayling, they said.

Despite recent habitat improvements, Arctic grayling occupy only a fraction of the streams across the upper Missouri River basin where they were historically widespread. The species declined over the past century because of competition from non-native fish and after their habitat was significantly altered by dams and high summer water temperatures.

“The commitment of landowners along the Big Hole River is commendable and absolutely essential for the survival of grayling. We question whether it’s enough,” said attorney Jenny Harbine with Earthjustice, the environmental law firm that represented wildlife advocates in a lawsuit over the fish.

Montana Tech professor Pat Munday, a plaintiff in the lawsuit who fishes the Big Hole regularly, said grayling have become increasingly scarce over the past three decades. Munday alleged government biologists were “cooking the books” by inflating population estimates to justify their decision.

“The biologists and technicians get better and better at knowing where to anticipate grayling and they get better at finding them, but that doesn’t mean the numbers are increasing,” said Munday, a professor of science and technology studies and author of “Montana’s Last Best River: The Big Hole and Its People.”

Efforts to protect Arctic grayling date to at least 1991, when wildlife advocates petitioned the government to add the fish to its list of threatened and endangered species. Officials determined in 1994 and again in 2010 that protections were needed. But they were never imposed because other species were given a higher priority.

The Fish and Wildlife Service in 2014 determined that protections were no longer needed because the landowner conservation agreement had helped the fish rebound. Wildlife advocates then sued in federal court and prevailed before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2018.

The appeals court faulted the government for not taking into account data that showed the fish’s population in the Big Hole River was then declining and for dismissing the potential for climate change to cause lower water flows and warmer temperatures.

Federal wildlife officials said steps already taken, such as more shade trees on stream banks and the reduced water withdrawals, have decreased the duration of warmer water temperatures that can hurt the fish. Those measures also will help protect them going forward, they said.

“We can decrease water temperatures despite the fact that air temperature is increasing,” Boyd said.

Arctic grayling are native to river drainages around the Arctic Ocean, Hudson Bay and the northern Pacific Ocean. A population in Michigan was wiped out last century, but scientists are seeking to reintroduce the fish to parts of the state.

___

Follow Matthew Brown on twitter: @matthewbrownap

AP-NORC poll: Very few Americans back full school reopening

1 in 10 say daycare centers, preschools and K-12 schools should start the school year like any other.

Fairfax County Public School buses parked at a middle school in Falls Church, Va., Monday, July 20, 2020. Very few Americans believe schools should return to normal operations this fall, a new poll says, even as President Donald Trump insists that’s what parents and students want. The poll, conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, finds that only about 1 in 10 say daycare centers, preschools and K-12 schools should start the school year like any other.

 (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

THEY CAN ONLY OPEN IF YOU INCREASE CUSTODIAL STAFF PER SCHOOL 100%

AND THEY HAVE TO BE IN HOUSE NOT CONTRACTED OUT FOR VIRAL CONTROL  

BOSTON (AP) — Virtual instruction. Mandated masks. Physical distancing. The start of school will look very different this year because of the coronavirus — and that’s OK with the vast majority of Americans.

Only about 1 in 10 Americans think daycare centers, preschools or K-12 schools should open this fall without restrictions, according to a new poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs. Most think mask requirements and other safety measures are necessary to restart in-person instruction, and roughly 3 in 10 say that teaching kids in classrooms shouldn’t happen at all.

The findings are a sharp contrast to the picture that President Donald Trump paints as he pressures schools to reopen. Trump said Wednesday that he would be “comfortable” with his son Barron and grandchildren attending school in person this fall.

“I would like to see the schools open,” he told reporters.

Few schools, however, plan to return to business as usual. Many of the nation’s largest school districts have announced that they’ll be entirely virtual in the fall or use a hybrid model that has children in classrooms only a couple of days a week.

The poll finds only 8% of Americans say K-12 schools should open for normal in-person instruction. Just 14% think they can reopen with minor adjustments, while 46% think major adjustments are needed. Another 31% think instruction should not be in person this fall. It’s little different among the parents of school-age children.
The poll also shows Americans feel the same about colleges and universities reopening this fall.

Americans show little confidence in Trump’s handling of education issues. Only 36% say they approve of Trump’s performance, while 63% disapprove. But a stark political divide on opening schools suggests many Republicans are taking cues from the president.

About 9 in 10 Democrats say requiring students and staff to wear masks is essential to reopening, while only about half of Republicans say the same. Democrats are roughly twice as likely as Republicans to say schools should use a mix of in-person and virtual instruction to reduce the number of students in buildings, 77% to 39%.

Patty Kasbek, of Bartlesville, Oklahoma, said she desperately wants her two children, ages 5 and 10, to return to school. After months at home, the family is stressed and anxious. But with the virus surging, she doesn’t see a safe way to reopen.

“School shouldn’t even be considered right now,” said Kasbek, 40. “We need to get this under control before we play with the virus. It’s just too dangerous to put our kids out there like guinea pigs.”

Her local school district is planning to reopen with new safety measures, she said, but she’s opting to enroll her children in a virtual school. She isn’t as worried about her own health but fears that reopening schools could spread the virus to others.

“I just see it going very badly, and I’m very, very worried for the teachers,” said Kasbek, who considers herself a Democrat.

The poll finds a majority of Americans, 56%, say they are very or extremely concerned that reopening schools will lead to additional infections in their communities; another 24% are somewhat concerned.

Some, however, see little risk. James Rivers, of Ramsey, Minnesota, said schools should reopen without protective measures against the virus. Rivers, a Republican, says Trump is doing a “fine job” and will have his vote in November.

“I think it should be just business as usual,” said Rivers, 54. “Yes, there is a COVID virus, but is it any more deadly than the common flu? I don’t think so.”

Rivers, who does not have school-age children, said parents who fear the virus can home school. “As for everybody else who isn’t afraid of a virus that has a less than 2% chance of being fatal, send your kid back to school. Let’s get it done,” he said.

Majorities say it is essential that buildings be disinfected daily, temperature checks and face masks be mandatory and desks be spread apart if schools are to reopen.

And 6 in 10 think a mix of in-person and virtual instruction is necessary, to limit the number of students inside at one time. Some of the nation’s largest districts, including New York City’s schools, plan to use that model. But Education Secretary Betsy DeVos says that fails students and taxpayers, arguing that students should be in the classroom every day.

In his campaign to reopen schools, Trump argues that Democrats oppose it for political reasons. He has threatened to cut federal funding for schools that fail to reopen fully. The White House has said he wants to work with Congress to tie future relief funding to reopening. He argues that other countries have reopened schools safely, although some he cites have used the hybrid model that DeVos decried.

The Trump administration also has argued that it’s not just about academics. Students need access to meal programs and mental health services, it says.

But Trump’s demands put him at odds with his own health officials. He rebuked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for releasing school guidelines that he said were too tough.
The poll finds about half of parents saying they are at least somewhat concerned about their child losing services like school lunches or counseling because of the pandemic.

More say they are worried about their child falling behind academically: 55% are very concerned, with another 21% somewhat concerned.

A majority of parents, 65%, are at least somewhat concerned about their own ability to juggle responsibilities.

Jimmy La Londe, 70, of Hiawassee, Georgia, thinks schools should reopen with safety measures that local officials think are necessary. Still, La Londe, who considers himself a Republican, said keeping schools closed will only hurt students and anger taxpayers.

“They have to keep the momentum, they have to keep people used to going to school,” he said. “I don’t think you can stop school forever.”

___

Fingerhut reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Zeke Miller in Washington contributed to this report.

Child abduction, forced labor scandal widens in south Mexico
LIKE THE PROBLEM OF FEMICIDE, CHILD ABDUCTION IS DENIED BY NEO LIBERAL PRESIDENTE AMLO 


Juana Perez, whose 2 1/2 year-old son Dylan is missing, holds a poster of him outside of the presidential palace that asks for President Manuel Andres Lopez Obrador to help her find him, in Mexico City, Wednesday, July 22, 2020. The search for Perez's boy who was led away from a market in southern Mexico's Chiapas state three weeks ago led police to a horrifying discovery: 23 abducted children being kept at a house and forced to sell trinkets in the street. Pérez said officials told her that her son had not yet been found. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano)
MEXICO CITY (AP) — A scandal involving the abduction and exploitation of young children in a colonial Mexican city popular with tourists widened Wednesday when prosecutors released additional evidence that an adult apparently used other children to help kidnap a missing 2-year-old boy.

The search for Dylan Esaú Gómez Pérez led prosecutors in southern Chiapas state, on the Guatemalan border, to a house in San Cristobal de las Casas where 23 abducted children were being kept in deplorable conditions and forced to sell trinkets and handicrafts in the street.

But Dylan, who turns 3 in November, was not among them.

Reviewing surveillance cameras, state prosecutor Jorge Llaven said that a boy and a girl, both apparently around 12, were seen talking to a woman who is a suspect in the June 30 abduction. Llaven identified the woman as only as “Ofelia,” and offered a $13,500 reward for information about the location of her or the missing boy.

In photos from cameras, the boy and the girl enter the public market where Dylan’s mother worked in the colonial city. Dylan appears to follow the boy, and then the girl takes Dylan by the back of the jacket and walks out of the market with him. The girl is later seen returning alone, apparently having handed the missing boy over to someone else.

Llaven said Tuesday that a search carried out Monday, apparently related to Dylan’s disappearance, had revealed a house where children — most between 2 and 15 years old, but three infants aged between 3 and 20 months — were forced to sell things on the street.

“Moreover, they were forced to return with a certain minimum amount of money for the right to get food and a place to sleep at the house,” Llaven said.

San Cristobal is a picturesque, heavily Indigenous city that is popular among tourists. It is not unusual to see children and adults hawking local crafts like carvings and embroidered cloth on its narrow cobblestone streets.

But few visitors to the city suspected that some of the kids doing the selling had been snatched from their families.

The Chiapas state prosecutors’ office said in a statement the children “were forced through physical and psychological violence to sell handicrafts in the center of the city,” adding the kids showed signs of “malnutrition and precarious conditions.”

According to video presented by the prosecutors, many of them slept on what appeared to be sheets of cardboard and blankets on a cement floor. Three other women have been detained in that case and may face human trafficking and forced labor charges.

Dylan was with his mother, Juana Pérez, at the market on the day he was snatched.

Pérez, who traveled to Mexico City to ask President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to help find her son, works at the market selling fruit and vegetables. She said her son would sometimes wander off to play, but that no children had ever been snatched from the market before.

The boy’s father emigrated to California to find work, and thus Pérez, 23, has had to care for Dylan and his sister by herself.

AP Explains: Hagia Sophia’s history of conflict and faith


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Visitors walk inside the Byzantine-era Hagia Sophia, in the historic Sultanahmet district of Istanbul, Friday, Oct. 15, 2010. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is scheduled to join hundreds of worshipers Friday, July 24, 2020, for the first Muslim prayers at the Hagia Sophia in 86 years, weeks after a controversial high court ruling paved the way for the landmark monument to be turned back into a mosque. (AP Photo/Emrah Gurel)


ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is scheduled to join hundreds of worshippers Friday for the first Muslim prayers at the Hagia Sophia in 86 years, after a controversial high court ruling paved the way for the landmark monument to be turned back into a mosque.

A government decree reopened the “jewel” of the Byzantine Empire for Muslim worship and abolished its status as a museum. The conversion of what was once the most important church of Christendom has led to an international outcry.

The 6th century monument, which remains the main feature of the Istanbul skyline, has a history rich with symbolism.



THE BYZANTINE ERA

Hagia Sophia, or the Church of Holy Wisdom, was built by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I on the site of an destroyed basilica of the same name. Completed in 537, it was among the world’s largest domed structures and would serve as the foremost Orthodox Christian church for some 900 years. Imperial ceremonies, including the crowning of emperors, were held there. The multicolored mosaics depicting the Virgin Mary, the baby Jesus, angels and other Christian symbols along with emperors and their families that centuries of rulers installed added to its reputation as an architectural gem.

THE OTTOMAN CONQUEST

Ottoman sultan Mehmet the Conqueror defeated the Byzantine Empire and captured Istanbul, then known as Constantinople, in 1453. The 21-year-old immediately turned the majestic Hagia Sophia into a mosque as an emblem of Muslim triumph over the city. The structure served as an imperial mosque and subsequent sultans added minarets, a school, library and a fountain, completing its transformation into a mosque complex. The mosaics were eventually plastered over in line with iconoclasm traditions that bar the depiction of figures.

A MUSEUM FOR A SECULAR TURKEY

Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the war hero who founded the Turkish Republic from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire in 1923, had Hagia Sophia made into a museum in 1934 as part of his reforms to build a secular country. Its mosaics were brought back into the open, and the structure served for years as a symbol of Istanbul’s rich multi-faith and multicultural past.

Included on the list of World Heritage sites maintained by the U.N. cultural body UNESCO, it became one of Turkey’s most-visited landmarks, drawing millions of tourists every year. However, Atakurk’s decision to cease Hagia Sophia’s use as a mosque was met with dismay by religious and nationalist groups. They had long called for the iconic building to be “freed from its chains” and converted back into a Muslim place of worship.




RESTORATION AS A MOSQUE

Erdogan signed a July 10 decree fulfilling their wishes soon after Turkey’s highest administrative court ruled that Istanbul’s conqueror had bequeathed the Hagia Sophia as a mosque and that the 1934 museum conversion was illegal. His government has vowed to protect the Hagia Sophia’s Christian artifacts and to keep the structure open to tourists outside of prayer hours.

The ticket kiosk outside has been removed and the interior marble floors have been covered in a turquoise-colored carpet chosen by the president himself in preparation for the first Friday prayers. Some 500 invited participants will be required to maintain social distance due to the coronavirus outbreak. The mosaics will be covered up with curtains during the prayers, officials have said.

FULFILLING AN ISLAMIST DREAM

For Erdogan, a pious Muslim whose ruling party has roots in Turkey’s Islamic movement, performing Friday prayers at Hagia Sophia is a dream from his youth coming true. He has described Ataturk’s decision to turn it into a museum as a “mistake” that is now being rectified.

Critics see the president’s decision as the latest move by Erdogan to distract attention from economic woes the coronavirus has only exacerbated and to shore up his conservative-religious support base. Opening up Hagia Sophia to Muslim prayers is also seen as a part of Erdogan’s efforts to deepen Turkey’s Muslim identity and to roll back his predecessor’s secular legacy.