Inside the battle to save the most endangered river in the country

When you are in the Snake River, you can be in two states -- Idaho and Oregon -- at once.

You can find yourself in magical places that are sacred to the Nez Perce Tribe, surrounded by ancient petroglyphs. 

In some areas, the water plunges so deep beneath the canyon rim that it outdoes the Grand Canyon by nearly 2,000 feet.



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Snake River among most endangered rivers in US


To say it simply, it’s majestic. And like many rivers in the United States, it's in peril.

The Snake River is the most endangered river in the United States in 2021, according to American Rivers, which has put out a list every year for 36 years.MORE: Earth Day 2021: Why reforestation is a crucial part of saving the environment

At the center of the issue is salmon, which "have never been closer to extinction than they are today,” said Amy Souers Kober, vice president for communications at conservation group American Rivers.

© Ted S. Warren/AP, FILE FILE -The Lower Granite Dam spills into the Snake River in Whitman County, WA in this May 2019 photo. Congressman Simpson (R-ID) is proposing to breach this and 3 other dams to help fish migration

Many see it as a crisis, and one that can be solved -- but while salmon are at the heart of the problem, it goes even deeper than that.

The salmon

In the 1880s, it was estimated that between 25,000 and 35,000 sockeye would make the 900-mile journey up the river and back to Idaho to spawn each year.

In 1992, a single, solitary sockeye was able to make the trip, according to National Geographic. He was known as Lonesome Larry.

The salmon population has since rebounded, but not to levels anywhere near what the Snake River previously saw.MORE: Government refusal to protect wolverines sparks lawsuit from conservation groups

“I’m raising children in this region. And I would like more than anything for my children to see these fish returned in solid numbers,” Mark Deming, a local Idaho fisherman and director of marketing at Northwest River Supplies, said. "When people don’t come to fish, then the cash registers aren’t ringing, and that’s had a pretty big economic impact."

Fishing generates more than $5 billion annually in the Pacific Northwest, supporting more than 36,000 jobs, according to American Rivers.

Salmon are vital to both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and essential to the livelihood of more than 130 other forms of wildlife, according to biologists.

© ABC News Tom Kammerzell owns Maple K. Farms in Whitman County, WA. He fears breaching the dams would cut his wheat profits entirely because they would become too expensive to ship in other ways

They are also a crucial part of the Nez Perce culture. The Nez Perce story states that the salmon gave of himself so that the Nimiipuu could thrive. In return, they would protect the land. The tribe, which has inhabited the area for centuries, is said to have saved explorers Lewis and Clark from freezing and starving to death.

“Salmon is more than a resource to us ... [it] signifies our creation, our life and our continued life on this land,” Nakia Williamson, director of the Nez Perce Tribe culture resources program, said.

The tribe has had to resort to using hatcheries and transplanting salmon to keep the population growing.MORE: Sustainable crop, timber production can reduce extinction of species by 40%: Study

Salmon have been dying at a rapid rate over the last 10 years. If that continues, nearly 80% of salmon populations could come mostly from hatcheries by 2025, "and some even before that,” said Jay Hesse, the Nez Perce Tribe department of fisheries resource management research division director.

The dams

The Nez Perce Tribe says the four dams located on the lower part of the Snake River are impeding the salmon’s migration route.

“What these dams do is make it more difficult for fish to reach their spawning grounds," Deming said. "So when you’re thinking about climate change, you have to think about getting these fish up to high elevation, cold, clear mountain streams where they can spawn."

In years past, wildlife officials have created “fish passages'' at the lower four dams, and conservation groups say that is helping. Still, salmon continue dying on that journey, and few survive getting through the dams to the ocean in the first place.

“A trip that took approximately two days before the dams were constructed now takes 10 to 30 days, during which 50% of the juvenile spring/summer chinook and 45% of the juvenile steelhead typically die,” Hesse said.

Climate change is making this all the more urgent. The river and the pools behind the Lower Snake dams are heating up, creating lethal conditions for salmon. Removing those dams would “create the refuge that salmon need in a warming world,” Kober said.

As things are now, the dams are vital to the region. They provide enough power to keep the lights on in 800,000 homes in an efficient -- and what some say is an environmentally friendly -- way

.

© ABC News Mark Deming, a local fisherman in Idaho, says the fish we see today coming back from the ocean returning to these rivers is a tiny fraction of what it once was.

That calm, glassy water also makes it easy and cost effective to ship goods. The Snake River winds through 5 million acres of farmland in Southeast Washington alone, and 10% of the entire country’s wheat crop is sent on a barge down the Snake River.

“We are feeding the world ... are you going to put human lives over fish?" asked Tom Kammerzell, a 5th generation farmer who lives in Whitman County, the largest wheat producing county in the United States. "It’s not an either or, there’s a way of doing it together and having both, but you have to look at all of the pieces.”

Kammerzell estimates he would lose all his profits if the dams were breached and he was forced to ship by rail or truck, which he argues is not just more costly but could be worse for the climate as well.MORE: Fire danger in Southwest as summer warmth on the way for Northeast

Todd Myers, who sits on the board of the Puget Sound Salmon Recovery Council, said removing the dams would be “foolish and costly,” adding that the fall chinook salmon runs on the Snake River are actually nearing recovery in Washington, and the steelhead are recovering as well. He notes that the spring chinook are in crisis, but so are many other salmon runs across the Pacific Northwest.

“I think it’s ironic to single out the Snake, it’s one of very few places where (the salmon) are doing well,” Myers said.

He didn't disagree that help is needed, but he emphasized that help is needed everywhere and removing the dams would contribute to an already problematic energy shortfall.

“Destroying the dams would be like removing every wind turbine and solar panel in Washington state," he argued. "Destroying that much CO2-free electricity and increasing the possibility of Texas-style blackouts is an enormous risk."
A proposed solution

Currently, Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson wants to have $33.5 billion from President Joe Biden’s infrastructure plan earmarked to save the Snake River. His plan includes removing the earthen part of the dams to clear the waterways, replacing the energy produced at the dams and upgrading transportation and irrigation services the dams provide, hoping to make the communities the river serves, like the farmers, whole until they can supplement shipping methods.

“By creating this fund up front, the Northwest delegation, governors, tribes and stakeholders could then write legislation over the next year that will end the lawsuits, solve very difficult and complex issues and bring certainty and security for now and future generations,” Simpson told ABC News.

© Emily Nuchols/Under Solen Media Shannon Wheeler, Chairman of the Nez Perce Tribe, says the salmon are integral to his tribe and "if the salmon are gone, that's the way we go too.”

But that kind of additional spending in one place is viewed as “irresponsible” by many, including Myers.

“Washington state [already] spends about $100 million annually on salmon recovery," he said. "The federal government provides about $40 million a year on top of that.”MORE: Whitest white paint could help fight climate change

Myers added that a vast majority of the salmon declines are in the “marine environment." Warmer ocean waters have salmon struggling across the region, a much larger problem that needs to be addressed.

Salmon have been in the world's waters for an estimated 4 to 6 million years. To see the numbers diminish and possibly disappear because of human intervention is something people on both sides of this issue agree must be addressed. But the argument over exactly how and exactly how quickly remains.

“Through science, technology and experience, we should be able to correct those things to help them, and so we're here to speak for them,” Shannon Wheeler, chairman of the Nez Perce Tribe, said. “If the salmon are gone, that's the way we go, too.”

ABC NEWS 4/26/2021

DISARM, DEFUND, DISBAND; COPS

Why gun control efforts should go beyond mass shootings, advocates say

A spate of mass shootings in recent months has once again trained the spotlight on how to prevent those tragedies, which garner national headlines and the attention of lawmakers and activists alike.

But data from the Gun Violence Archive shows that they account for a small fraction of the tens of thousands of deaths from gun violence in the U.S. each year.

Now, some are questioning whether gun control efforts are too focused on mass shootings rather than smaller-scale, but more prevalent, deaths and suicides by gun.

Mass shootings like the 2012 Sandy Hook, which claimed 26 lives, the 2018 Parkland massacre and others scarred the nation and led to efforts to ban assault weapons, high-capacity magazines and bump stocks, but have faced challenges in getting passed into law.

In March, the House passed a bipartisan bill for universal background checks for gun sales. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has promised to hold a vote on the legislation. But the odds of it passing are slim because of Senate rules that require 60 votes.

Advocates say President Joe Biden’s executive actions, announced earlier this month in the wake of the Atlanta and Colorado shootings this year, could help combat less prominent acts of gun violence, but they are limited initiatives because they're not legislative proposals.

© The Washington Post via Getty Images, FILE

Biden's actions included a proposed rule to regulate the sale of so-called “ghost guns” and ask the Department of Justice to publish model "red flag" legislation -- which allows police or family members to petition a court to order the temporary removal of firearms from a person if deemed mentally unfit or potentially a harm to themselves or others -- for states within 60 days. They also called for investments in evidence-based community violence intervention to end gun violence in communities experiencing spikes in homicides, and a new annual report on firearms trafficking, which hasn't been done since 2000.

Rob Pincus, the co-founder of the Center for Gun Rights and Responsibility, a group that works with gun owners and advocates for safe gun use, said magazine capacity limits and assault weapon bans “don’t address the issues of suicide, negligence, or specific targeted homicides" and should focus more on homicide and suicide by firearm.

“How many bullets is enough to kill yourself? It's one. So there is no magazine capacity ban that's going to have any impact whatsoever on [a majority] of the firearms involved deaths,” Pincus told ABC News.

Mass shootings a fraction of gun deaths

Gun violence has surged in recent years -- even as the coronavirus pandemic shut down public gatherings.

2020 saw the highest level of gun violence deaths in 20 years, according to firearm death data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In 2020, 43,551 gun violence deaths were reported, according to the Gun Violence Archive, an independent database that has collected gun violence incidents from law enforcement agencies, media and the government since 2013.

Of those, 19,395 deaths were homicides, murders, unintentional deaths or instances of defensive gun use and 24,000 were suicides. A fraction, however -- 610 deaths -- were from mass shootings, which the Gun Violence Archive defines as a minimum of four victims shot, either injured or killed. Not all mass shootings are public events that make national news.

© ABC News / Gun Violence Archive.org Illustration

In 2019, the Gun Violence Archive reported nearly 40,000 deaths involving guns, more than 15,000 from homicides, murders, unintentional deaths or defensive gun use, over 24,000 from suicides and 417 from mass shootings.

“The reality is that mass shootings, though, represent about 4% of all gun deaths,” Kris Brown, the president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, told ABC News. “It's not to be any one thing that solves an epidemic that claims 40,000 lives and leaves 80,000 injured [a year].” Those numbers are five-year averages Brady established based on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) annual gun fatality data.

Focus on mental health

Brown said Indiana has a "red flag" law and if it was used, it could have prevented the Indianapolis Fedex facility shooting on April 15 that left 8 dead. Last year the gunman's mother told police she was worried about his behavior after he purchased a gun and allegedly threatened police suicide. Police could have alerted a court and petitioned an order to remove his firearm.

“It's just heartbreaking that an extreme risk law was not thought of there, because it's exactly those kinds of situations that can save lives,” Brown said.

© Jeff Dean/AFP via Getty Images Crime scene investigators walk through the parking lot at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis, April 16, 2021.

Pincus said focusing on gun owner’s mental health is key in curbing such shootings as well as suicides, which account for a majority of gun deaths in the U.S. each year.

“Indianapolis is such an unfortunate example of where the "red flag" system fails,” he said. “He never got mental health attention. He never got over whatever suicidal impulse and rage he had," he said.

Pincus said "red flag laws" don't offer the mental health support gun owners may need and suggested mental health professionals should be able to work with their clients on a cooperative basis to have them placed on a list to prohibit them from purchasing firearms.

“What we're really talking about is mental health practitioners having a mechanism to work with gun owners in clinical situations, during counseling or therapy and say, 'Would you agree, this is a time when your mom can hold your gun or put [the guns] in storage for a time. This is a temporary state. But we're also going to put you into the National Instant Check system on a prohibited list to prevent a tragedy from happening while you're in this condition,'” he said.

Violence intervention and access control

Advocates say safe storage and addressing mental health is key, as about 60% of gun deaths are from suicide according to a Department of Justice survey from 2010 -- a trend advocates say has persisted over the years.

Another key way to end gun violence is investment into community violence intervention programs that send case workers to victims of gun violence, work in hospitals with victims, and those recently released from prison.

"The gun violence that we see that plays out on a regular basis in this country is overwhelmingly not mass shootings. It's suicides with firearms and interpersonal gun violence," that disproportionately effects urban communities of color, Robin Lloyd, the managing director of Giffords, a gun control advocacy group, told ABC News.

“A huge proportion of the people who are shot end up later on becoming potential perpetrators,” Brown said. A 2002 U.S. Department of Justice report found juveniles who are victims of violence are more likely to commit gun violence offenses.

Pincus stressed the greatest way to tackle gun homicides and suicides is training and prevention of unauthorized access

.

© The Washington Post via Getty Images, FILE Ghost guns that were secured by the DC Metropolitan Police Department are displayed during a press conference held by Mayor Muriel Bowser who announced a new legislation to ban the import of ghost gun kits and parts in Washington, Feb. 28, 2020.

“When we focus on access control, we focus on secured storage, we focus on making sure people around the gun in the household are educated in its use,” he said.

Advocates also called for greater awareness campaigns focused on responsible gun use, safe storage, mental health and suicide prevention similar to campaigns urging the public to wear seat belts in cars and to stop smoking.

“It's public awareness, education, and social pressure," Pincus said.

Calls for a national standard

At the federal level, gun reform activists are pushing for universal background checks to stop not just mass shootings, but all forms of gun violence.

“The background check loophole is basically the fact that you can buy a firearm in this country legally without getting a background check. That happens at gun shows, it happens via the internet, it just happens because two people can meet in a parking lot. No questions asked," Lloyd said.

"Because there's a patchwork of laws in this country, it makes [gun guidelines] inconsistent. Illinois, for example, even though the state has stronger gun laws, because its [neighbors] Indiana, Wisconsin and others don't, guns are very easily trafficked from those states into Illinois. And that puts Illinois communities at risk," she added.

A reason Congress has been slow to act on gun reform is the Senate filibuster, a rule that requires 60 Senators to agree to vote on a bill.

Jared Carter, a constitutional law expert from Vermont Law School, explained ultimately little is likely to change with gun reform when it comes to passing legislation.

“I think the likelihood of anything controversial, and we know that gun rights Second Amendment issues are some of the most controversial, are not going to pass if you need to get 60 votes in the Senate,” Carter told ABC News. “As long as the filibuster is still in existence, nothing of significance is going to pass.”

“It has not helped America that this issue has become politicized. A bullet is not political. It will hit you indiscriminately,” Brown said.

Frustrated Canada presses White House to keep Great Lakes oil pipeline open

By David Ljunggren, Nia Williams and Laura Sanicola 
4/25/2021

© Reuters/CARLOS OSORIO FILE PHOTO: 

Border city's industry under threat with looming pipeline closure

OTTAWA/NEW YORK (Reuters) - Canada is pushing on several diplomatic fronts against the U.S. state of Michigan's efforts to close a cross-border oil pipeline, the second such dispute since Joe Biden became U.S. president in January, complicating the governments' efforts to work together to lower carbon emissions.

The conflict over the aging but key pipeline highlights the disruptions caused by a global shift away from fossil fuels. Both governments are working to accelerate the energy transition, but their oil industries are interdependent, so a policy shift in one country can affect energy supply, and the political balance, in the other.

The United States imports more crude from Canada than any other nation, at about 3.7 million barrels per day, or about 80%of Canada's crude output.

Ottawa's strategy, according to four sources familiar with the government's thinking, is to repeatedly raise the issue of Enbridge Inc's Line 5 with numerous U.S. counterparts - including Biden - to get them to pressure Michigan's Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer to keep the pipeline open.

Last November, Michigan ordered Line 5 to shut by May 13, citing the environmental risk of a possible leak in the four-mile (6-km) stretch of the 540,000-bpd line passing under the Straits of Mackinac in the Great Lakes.

The White House has shown no sign of responding to Canadian entreaties, so Ottawa is considering more drastic options, including a threat to invoke an obscure bilateral treaty to keep Line 5 operating or intervene in the legal dispute currently playing out in U.S. courts.

Line 5, which flows crude oil and refined products from Wisconsin to Sarnia, Ontario, via Michigan, has been in operation for nearly 70 years, but officials in Michigan are increasingly alarmed by its advanced age.

The line has never leaked into the straits but there have been at least eight other spills since 1980, according to U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration data.

The imbroglio over Line 5 comes just three months after Biden angered the Canadian oil and gas industry by cancelling a permit for the long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline project on his first day in office.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government reluctantly accepted that decision, even though it killed thousands of construction jobs and further soured Ottawa's relationship with the main energy-producing province of Alberta.

Ottawa has resolved to fight publicly to keep Line 5 open, which - unlike Keystone - is already operating and a vital link in Enbridge's export network that ships the vast majority of crude from Canada's western oil patch to the United States.

DOZENS OF MEETINGS

Canadian government officials are frustrated by how much time they are spending on the matter, the sources said.

Canada has discussed the pipeline's fate in dozens of bilateral meetings, including 23 virtual meetings between lawmakers and U.S. members of Congress, according to a spokesman for Canada's Natural Resources Minister Seamus O'Regan.

"Clearly Line 5 is an important issue for the government of Canada ... at the same time we need to be advancing on a cooperative basis the work we're doing on climate action," Canada Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson told Reuters earlier this month.

Wilkinson raised the pipeline on Feb. 24 during a meeting with U.S. climate envoy John Kerry. Trudeau also raised Line 5 with Biden when the two met in February to discuss making global warming a joint priority. The Canadian prime minister attended a U.S. international climate summit hosted by Biden last week.

Neither Kerry nor the White House responded to a request for comment.

Calgary-based Enbridge has refused to shut the pipeline, arguing the governor's order needs to be backed by a judge. The case is being heard in U.S. federal court and the two parties started mediation on April 16.

Enbridge spokesman Ryan Duffy said a negotiated solution would be in the best interests of all parties.

Trudeau's administration is mulling whether to take part in the legal challenge by filing an amicus, or "friend of the court" brief, which would explicitly lay out their reasons for backing Enbridge, said a source directly familiar with the matter.

Ottawa is also considering invoking the never-before-used 1977 Transit Pipelines Treaty, designed to stop U.S. or Canadian public officials from impeding the flow of oil in transit.

"The federal government continues to have a role to play, and we appreciate what they've done to date," Enbridge's Duffy said.

SPINAL CORD

Line 5 is key to fuel supply for the Great Lakes region on both sides of the border, helping supply an area with a population of more than 40 million people.

Environmental campaigners have long been concerned Line 5 could leak into the straits. Whitmer, a Biden ally, made shutting it a key promise in her 2018 gubernatorial campaign.

Wilkinson, after meeting with Kerry, told reporters that "the issue in Michigan is the governor."

Canada's Ambassador Kirsten Hillman and Infrastructure Minister Catherine McKenna have both met separately with Whitmer, but she has not changed her stance.

A spokeswoman for Whitmer told Reuters that the governor stands behind her decision to close the pipeline.

Enbridge said shutting Line 5 would cause fuel shortages and gas price spikes, and require 15,000 trucks and 800 rail cars a day to replace deliveries to Ontario. Michigan would also need truck transport to account for lost propane delivery, while refineries in Ohio and Michigan would need to secure supply from other suppliers.

Scott Archer, business agent with Local 663 Pipefitters Union in Sarnia, home to three of Ontario's refineries, described Line 5 as the "spinal cord of Ontario's infrastructure" in testimony to Canadian lawmakers.

"Shutting down Line 5 will in effect kill my hometown... and many more places like it in Canada and the U.S.," he said.

(Reporting by Nia Williams in Calgary, David Ljunggren in Ottawa and Laura Sanicola in New York; additional reporting by Valerie Volcovici in Washington; Editing by Marguerita Choy)

Turkmenistan, declares national holiday to celebrate dog breed

The Alabays, used by herders are among the world’s largest dogs

April 26, 2021 

A man dressed in a national costume, center, pets his border guard 

shepherd dog Alabai during Dog Day celebration in Ashgabat | AP

Turkmenistan, a Central Asian nation has created a new national holiday to honour its native dog breed the Alabai. President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov’s son on Sunday observed the holiday by judging a competition alongside Deputy Prime Minister Rasit Meredow. 

Berdymukhamedov established the state holiday to encourage people to venerate the huge dog breed as a source of national pride. Last year a six-metre high gilded statue of an Alabay dog was installed at a busy traffic circle in the capital, Ashgabat. The holiday falls on the same day the native Akhal-teke horse, known for its speed and endurance is celebrated. 

The Alabays can weigh up to 80 kilos when fully grown and are among the world’s largest dogs. They were traditionally used by herders.

Crowds gathered at Ashgabat, clapped and cheered as the animals were judged on their appearance and agility. The top prize went to a dog that belongs to the country's border force, a Guardian report reads. Since being elected, President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov has gifted several leaders with horses or dogs, including one to Russian President Vladimir Putin, 2012. A video of mistreatment of the puppy gifted to Putin went viral in 2017 and drew criticism from around the world. President Berdymukhamedov has also written a book about the breed.

France's Total Evacuates Staff, Announces Force Majeure on LNG Project in Mozambique

France's Total Evacuates Staff, Announces Force Majeure on LNG Project in Mozambique

© Sputnik / Alexey Filippov

BUSINESS

10:05 GMT 26.04.2021Get short URL

 

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MOSCOW (Sputnik) - French oil company Total on Monday declared force majeure and the evacuation of all personnel from the Afungi Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) project in northern Mozambique over terrorism-related security concerns.

"Considering the evolution of the security situation in the north of the Cabo Delgado province in Mozambique, Total confirms the withdrawal of all Mozambique LNG project personnel from the Afungi site. This situation leads Total, as operator of Mozambique LNG project, to declare force majeure", the firm said in a statement.

It also expressed solidarity with the country's government and people and hope that the security and stability in the area would be restored.

Reports on the evacuation of Total's personnel occurred in early April following the halt of operations on the site in late March over the Islamist seizure on the Palma city, also located in the Cabo Deldago province.

Experts believed that the suspension of work on the project could seriously affect Mozambique's future positions in the world LNG market. The country ranks 14th in the world in terms of natural gas reserves.

Last month, the Daesh* terrorist group took over Palma after several days of hostilities, killing an unknown number of people and displacing some 14,000 others. On 2 April, the police of Mozambique told Sputnik that there were no militants in the town any longer.

Mozambique LNG is projected to be the first onshore project in Mozambique. It includes the development of the Golfinho and Atum fields and the construction of a two-line liquefaction plant with a total capacity of 12.9 million tonnes of LNG per annum and an expansion potential of up to 43 million tonnes.

The start of production is scheduled for 2024. Total is the operator of the project with a 26.5 percent share. The cost of the project is estimated at $20 billion, the investment decision regarding it was made in 2019.

*Daesh (also known as ISIS/ISIL/IS) is a terrorist organisation outlawed in Russia and many other states

‘Dawn is coming’ for Canada amid worst public health crisis in a century: WHO adviser

Rachel Gilmore

4/25/2021

© THE CANADIAN PRESS IMAGES/Lars Hagberg A person wears a surgical mask to protect them from COVID-19 while walking by a sign advising not to gather during the ongoing pandemic in Kingston on Friday, April 16, 2021.

As Canada endures the third wave of COVID-19, a virus that has already claimed tens of thousands of lives within our borders, a World Health Organization adviser has a message for Canadians: “dawn is coming.”

Dr. Peter Singer's comments come on the heels of soaring COVID-19 case counts in Canada, which peaked at over 9,000 cases daily in mid-April. Ontario in particular has faced a crushing third wave, with record-breaking daily cases and ICUs stretched to their limits.

“It's the darkness before dawn. There's really no question that the situation in Canada is very tough. And many, many people are suffering,” Singer, special advisor to the Director-General of the World Health Organization, told The West Block‘s Mercedes Stephenson in an interview.

“This pandemic generally is the worst global public health crisis in one hundred years. So…it is a period of difficulty, but the dawn is coming.”

Canada’s vaccine rollout has been in a race against the emergence of faster spreading and harder-hitting variants of concern, which are rapidly becoming the dominant form of the virus among new cases in Canada. While over 11 million vaccines had been administered in Canada, public health official shared in a Friday briefing that national disease and severity indicators have also increased considerably over the past month.

Video: 75% of Canadians need 1st COVID-19 vaccine for less restrictions in summer, Tam says

However, they also had a spark of good news to share with Canadians.

“In recent days, following the implementation of restrictions in heavily impacted areas of Canada, the national Rt has finally dipped below one,” Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam said on Friday.

“This means that for the first time in many weeks, the epidemic has dropped out of a growth pattern.”

And as more Canadians get vaccinated, Tam said the projections indicate Canada could start to reopen as early as mid-July — depending on many variables, including variants, vaccine take up, and adherence to public health measures.

News like this shows a light at the end of the tunnel, according to Singer.

“The vaccines…rolling out, combined with public health measures, means that this pandemic will end,” said Singer.

“That's the key thing, I think, for people to keep in mind…to make sure they maintain the public health measures, the masking, the physical distancing, avoiding poorly ventilated indoor spaces.”

Video: Canada braces for more hospitalizations as COVID-19 cases surge

But no matter what Canada does here at home, Singer said, there is a much bigger question mark that could impact the real end-date of the pandemic.

“Since the beginning of the pandemic, the WHO has fought day and night to end it. And the defining issue, really, for 2021 is vaccine equity,” he said.

Read more: Vaccine passports gain traction, but experts warn of ‘huge moral crisis in equity’

The vaccine distribution has been “very inequitable” so far, according to Singer. Of the vaccines distributed around the world to date, 83 per cent of them have gone to either high income or upper middle income countries.

Until COVID-19 is under control in every country, new variants will continue to emerge, he warned, threatening the progress being made in the countries who have been able to inch towards reopening.

“No one is going to get out of this until everyone gets out of it,” Singer said.

“That’s actually how to make Canadians safe as well, is to ensure that the fire is not raging in any country. Because if it’s raging anywhere, it’s going to be throwing off embers everywhere.”

AS AMERICA WATCHED THE OSCAR'S

Russia suspends activities of Alexei Navalny’s organisation

Andrew Roth in Moscow

THE GUARDIAN 4/26/2021

Russia’s prosecutor has suspended the activities of Alexei Navalny’s nationwide political organisation ahead of a court ruling that is expected to outlaw the opposition movement as “extremist” and threaten supporters with long jail termsThe Guardian

In a decision published on Monday, the prosecutor banned his regional headquarters from holding opposition rallies or engaging in elections activity pending a landmark court decision that could cripple the democratic opposition to Vladimir Putin.

The designation is part of a sweeping crackdown on Navalny’s activities, from sentencing the Kremlin critic to a two-and-a-half year prison term to dozens of arrests of his top aides and regional staff.

“They’re just yelling here: we’re afraid of your activity, we’re afraid of your protests, we’re afraid of smart voting,” wrote Ivan Zhdanov, the head of the Anti-Corruption Foundation, uploading a copy of the prosecutor’s decision. Smart voting refers to efforts to direct opposition against Putin and the ruling United Russia party’s strongest competitors.

Related: Jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny ends hunger strike

Court proceedings are expected to begin on Monday in the extremism case, a designation mostly reserved for terrorist organisations such as al-Qaida or religious organisations such as the non-violent Jehovah’s Witnesses, who have been targeted with mass arrests since being outlawed in 2017.

In a statement this month, the Moscow prosecutor accused Navalny’s organisation of “creating conditions for changing the foundations of the constitutional order, including through the scenario of a ‘coloured revolution’”.

The decision could affect thousands of staff, supporters and donors who have given support via crowdfunding efforts. The evidence in the case has been kept hidden because it contains state secrets, the government has said.

Police have already begun rolling up Navalny’s organisation nationwide, arresting more than 70 staff and supporters at the weekend following a nationwide protest calling for his freedom. Navalny recently ended a 24-day hunger strike to demand better medical care.

The Kremlin critic was arrested in January after returning from Germany, where he had treatment for novichok poisoning that he and the online investigative collective Bellingcat had traced back to Russia’s FSB.

On Monday Navalny’s allies said they would halt their public activities in order to protect their employees from fines and arrests. Membership of extremist organisations is punishable by up to six years in prison.

Several regional headquarters have started posting messages on their social networks saying they will stop updating them. “Unfortunately we can no longer work in the current format. It is not safe for our staff and supporters. From today, no information will appear on this page. It will be frozen,” a message on the Moscow headquarters’ Telegram channel read

.

© Photograph: Anton Vaganov/Reuters A demonstrator is taken away by law enforcement officers during a rally in support of jailed opposition figure Alexei Navalny in St Petersburg last week.

In a recent interview, the Navalny ally Leonid Volkov said that the organisation’s expansion into Russia’s regions was “one of the most painful and irritating [situations] for Putin”.

“If we leave it the way it is, then certainly they’re going to initiate a mass criminal case against all the staff of the regional headquarters,” he said of the organisation.

Protests reveal generational divide in immigrants

Duration: 02:26 

The racial injustice protests in Minnesota reveal a generational divide in the area's immigrant communities. Young people of African descent have taken to the streets, but older generations are more likely to focus on their livelihoods. (April 26)

Sean Speer: Funding for memorial to 100 million victims of communism one thing Liberal budget gets right

100 MILLION IS A MYTH OF THE RIGHT WING

THEY INCLUDE VICTIMS OF THE NAZI'S, UKRAINES SO CALLED FAMINE, CHINA'S FAMINE, ETC.

STILL HARD PRESSED TO COME UP WITH 100 MILLION

CAPITALISM ON THE OTHER HAND CAN DOUBLE, TRIPLE OR QUDRUPLE IT.

Sean Speer 4/24/2021

This week’s federal budget certainly wasn’t conceived with the goal of securing Conservative support. Its high spending and high deficits instead reflect the Trudeau government’s own progressive ambitions as well as the political exigencies of obtaining New Democratic and Bloc Québécois votes in a minority parliament.

© Provided by National Post Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland waits for the first question from reporters on the telephone during a news conference in Ottawa, Monday April 19, 2021.

But it would be wrong to say that there were no Conservative ideas or priorities in Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s budget. Buried deep in the 724-page document was a $4-million commitment to complete the construction of the Memorial to the Victims of Communism in Ottawa. It’s an important project that’s been more than a decade in the making. Minister Freeland and her government deserve credit for helping to see it through to completion.


The idea of a Memorial for the Victims of Communism started in earnest in 2008. Its genesis was a conversation between then-federal Cabinet minister Jason Kenney and the Czech ambassador about the horrors of twentieth-century communism and the need to permanently memorialize in our nation’s capital the more than 100 million people who were killed under its totalitarian reach. Soon thereafter a non-profit organization, Tribute to Liberty, was established with the goal of raising funds to construct such a monument near Ottawa’s parliamentary precinct.

Kenney wasn’t the only one to support these efforts. Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper was also a major booster from the outset. His understanding of the interplay between history and ideas was the main reason. As he explained in a 2014 speech at a Tribute for Liberty fundraiser: “My fear is, as we move further into the 21st century, Canadians, especially new generations, will forget or will not be taught the lessons hard learned and the victories hard earned over the last 100 years.

Harper’s concern is well founded. More than 40 per cent of Canadians were barely born before the Berlin Wall fell in November 1989. Our collective memory and understanding of what the former prime minister described in his remarks as a “poisonous ideology” will fade away as older generations pass on. There’s no reason to think that provincial education curriculum, which these days seems more focused on faddish ideas than foundational facts, will be able to reverse the inexorable effects of an aging population.

© Wayne Cuddington The display board with an artist rendering of the Victims of Communism Memorial.

The consequence is that U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s famous call to leave communism on the “ash heap of history” instead risks becoming the “ash heap” of a fading culture and political inheritance. As a result, we may lose the previous generation’s essential insight about the incompatibility between communism’s mechanistic collectivism and the innate human need for freedom and transcendence.

For these reasons, the Harper government committed $3 million to support the eventual construction of the monument near the Supreme Court of Canada. The remaining funds were to come from private donations.

One of the Trudeau government’s first actions in 2015, however, was to revisit its predecessor’s plan. Then-Canadian Heritage Minister Melanie Joly called the project “too political and too divisive.” She ultimately cut federal funding for the monument in half and insisted on moving it to another location.

It was never entirely clear whether the Trudeau government’s resistance was due to ideology or partisanship — that is, if it was concerned about offending its most vociferous left-wing supporters or it was just instinctively opposed to the project because Conservatives supported it. But, in any case, the monument’s proponents were left with the distinct impression that Ottawa was at best ambivalent and at worst hostile to its construction ultimately proceeding.

There’s reason to believe that Minister Freeland may have been an outlier on this issue within her own government. Due to a combination of her Ukrainian roots and career as a journalist in Eastern Europe, Freeland came to political office with a strong track record of anti-communism and anti-Putinism. It’s notable, for instance, that when she was appointed Foreign Affairs Minister in 2017, she was already banned by the Russian government from entering the country due to her outspoken criticism.

It’s not surprising therefore that Freeland’s first budget provides additional funding to help ensure that the monument is completed in the coming months. What’s interesting though is that the budget’s description of the project — “The Memorial to the Victims of Communism will recognize Canada as a place of communist regimes refuge for people fleeing injustice and persecution and honour the millions who have suffered under ” — reflects the same ideas and themes as championed by the Harper government.

HER ANTI COMMUNISM AND HER FAMILIES LINKS TO THE FASCIST UKRAINIAN NATIONALISTS ARMYS OF WWII, WHO WERE COMPRADOURS WITH THE NAZI'S HAS BEEN WELL DOCUMENTED, SEE BELOW

It’s a positive sign that, notwithstanding our various partisan differences, we can still broadly agree on the inherent wickedness of communism and the need to memorialize those whose lives have been tragically taken by its brutal political manifestations across history and around the world. It seems especially timely in the current moment when China’s communist government is carrying out a genocide against Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang.

While there are no doubt various aspects of the Trudeau government’s budget worthy of criticism, Minister Freeland’s decision to affirm the Harper government’s plans for a Memorial to the Victims of Communism is an important exception. She got this one right and Conservatives shouldn’t be reluctant to say so.

Chrystia Freeland's granddad was indeed a Nazi collaborator ...
https://ottawacitizen.com › national › defence-watch › c...
Mar. 8, 2017 — Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland responds to a question during ... Ukrainian grandfather Michael Chomiak and his ties to the Nazis.

Freeland knew her grandfather was editor of Nazi newspaper ...
https://www.theglobeandmail.com › article34236881
Mar. 7, 2017 — Stories on pro-Russian websites have said minister's stand against Russian aggression in Ukraine is linked to her family's past.

Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland Is 'Proud' of Nazi ...
https://observer.com › 2017/03 › chrystia-freeland-fore...
Mar. 22, 2017 — Chrystia Freeland honors the memory of her grandfather, editor in chief of a Nazi newspaper that described Poland as 'infected by the Jews'

THEN THREE YEARS LATER SHE HAS AMNESIA

Blank spot: Why Chrystia Freeland's refusal to acknowledge ...
https://www.theprogressreport.ca › blank_spot_why_ch...
Aug. 31, 2020 — Is Chrystia Freeland a Nazi collaborator apologist? ... increasingly scandal-plagued Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, has a familial connection.

FUNNY THAT  BECAUSE SHE WAS THE FIRST PERSON TO OUT HER GRANDFATHER AS A NAZI SYPATHIZER AND ANTI SEMITE.

Chrystia Freeland - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Chrystia_Freeland
However, Freeland has known of her grandfather's Nazi ties since at least 1996, when she helped edit a scholarly article by Himka for the Journal of Ukrainian Studies. Freeland is married to Graham Bowley, a British writer and The New York Times reporter. They have three children.

‘We’re the poo crew’: 💩💩💩

sleuths test for Covid by reading signs in sewage 

Linda Geddes 

They call themselves the “poo crew” – a team of health detectives who are tracking down and heading off Covid outbreaks by reading the signs in our sewage. And they are expanding. Earlier this month, the Environmental Monitoring for Health Protection Programme opened a purpose-built laboratory on the fringes of Exeter, its sterile interior in stark contrast to the unsanitary subject of its investigations.

The opening of the laboratory marks a dramatic expansion of what was, until less than a year ago, just a soil pipe dream: testing sewage for coronavirus to understand where it is circulating and get an early warning of future potential spikes in infection. In the future, this network could be expanded to monitor other infectious diseases including flu.

“Right now, what it means is we can identify and contain the spread of Covid. But moving beyond that, arguably what the NHS would like to know is what do we need to be prepared for in any given area? Through this programme we might be able to provide information to hospitals and local commissioning groups about what the health of the community looks like and what the demands might be, that could allow for the optimisation of resources and the saving of money,” said Dr Andrew Engeli of the Joint Biosecurity Centre, which is leading the project in collaboration with Defra, the Environment Agency and other partners including the devolved governments of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

The idea was conceived during the early months of the pandemic, after reports that coronavirus was being shed in the faeces of some infected individuals. The immediate concern was that this might render public toilets and swimming pools potent sources of infection, although further studies have suggested that the risk of contracting Covid-19 from sewage is minimal.

However, scientists at the Environment Agency’s Starcross laboratory near Exeter also saw such observations as an opportunity. “We were on standby to offer clinical Covid testing for the NHS, but then a Dutch group published a paper saying that they had found coronavirus in wastewater about five days before they saw a change in clinical cases,” said Dr Jonathan Porter, a microbiologist who has been involved in the wastewater programme from the outset. “When it turned out that our services weren’t going to be useful to the NHS, we decided we should pick this up and give it a go.”

Last July, they began processing samples from 44 wastewater treatment plants, accounting for the combined excretions of 23% of England’s population. The detection of a sudden spike in coronavirus RNA in sewage from a plant near Trowbridge, Wiltshire, provided a crucial first test. “There was no coronavirus really in Trowbridge at that time, but we saw a small spike in the data which lined up with four or five cases that were detected through testing,” said Glenn Watts, deputy director of science at the Environment Agency

Since then, the programme has been expanded to include hundreds of sites, covering around two-thirds of the population of England. Similar programmes are being developed in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, as well as in about 28 other countries around the world – although the English and Scottish programmes are among the most advanced. “I don’t think anyone else is operating at this scale,” Watts said.

The samples arrive by courier at 6am each morning, having been harvested from sewage pipes as they spew their contents into wastewater treatment plants across England before processing. Teeming with bacteria, viruses, and the mushy remnants of our meals, these 500ml plastic bottles of cloudy grey fluid are an epidemiological treasure trove of information about our collective health just waiting to be mined.



The individually barcoded bottles, which look a lot like fizzy drinks containers, are logged on to the system and then wheeled up to the processing lab on silver trolleys, where scientists load samples of fluid into centrifuge tubes, and spin them to separate the liquid components from the solids. It’s dirty work, but done for the public good inside carefully enclosed cabinets designed to both prevent contamination of the sewage samples from outside sources, and to protect the laboratory staff from the multitude of disease-causing microbes they contain.

Chemicals are added to the liquid portion of the samples to extract and purify the genetic material from numerous viruses that it contains, until all that remains from the original 500ml sample is a couple of raindrops-worth of viral RNA. Finally, this is loaded into PCR (Polymerase chain reaction) machines that detect and quantify the amount of RNA from Sars-CoV-2.

Using this data to make sense of how much virus is circulating in England’s cities and towns is by no means straightforward. The amount of poo carried by sewers varies according to the time of day, and the surge in solids may come later in university towns – where students get up later – compared with more rural locations. It can also be diluted by large amounts of rainwater, so all of this must be carefully factored into the scientists’ calculations.

© Provided by The Guardian A firefighter in Marseille extracts samples of sewage water at a retirement home in Marseille, France. Photograph: Daniel Cole/AP

Wastewater analysis is not accurate enough to tell us how many individuals are infected with Covid in any given area at any given time. However, it can provide an early warning of escalating cases in specific geographical areas that can be followed up with additional community testing and messaging, or the sewage equivalent of surge testing – where manhole covers are lifted up and samples taken from sewers in specific areas of a city, say, to try to narrow down the source of the outbreak.

Sewage from individual households or tower blocks is not monitored – although separate research is investigating whether sewage from school wastepipes could be used as an early warning system of outbreaks among pupils, many of whom may be asymptomatic.

“It is like taking a stool sample from a collective bowel,” said James Trout, who oversees the laboratory.

Efforts are also under way to develop methods of using wastewater to trace variants of concern. As proof of concept, during January and February, the team used sewage collected from Bristol to identify 118 separate coronavirus mutations, including those associated with the B117 variant, and the so-called “Bristol variant” – a version of B117 with an additional E484K mutation – in samples from 11 sub-catchments of the city, each containing about 27,000 people. The variant was detected in eight of these areas, including one where no confirmed or suspected cases had been detected through other means. This information was relayed to local and national response teams, to help track and contain its spread.

Related: UK scientists find evidence of human-to-cat Covid transmission

Sars-CoV-2 is not the only virus that is excreted in our poo. Indeed, labs around the world have previously used wastewater to monitor the success of polio vaccination programmes. In Wales, wastewater monitoring is being expanded to keep tabs on other viruses of public health concern, such as influenza, norovirus, and hepatitis A and E. Once such infrastructure has been developed, it could also theoretically be piggybacked to detect viruses in air filters from hospitals or workspaces, say.

It is hardly the most glamorous job, but these sewage sleuths are committed to their cause. “We’re the poo crew. We know a ridiculous amount about poo, but still not as much as we’d like to know,” Engeli said. “It’s way more complicated than we thought.”