How the Biogen leadership conference in Boston spread the coronavirus

A total of 70 coronavirus infections in the state have been traced to the Biogen leadership conference at the Boston Marriott Long Wharf.
BIOTECH BOO BOO IN THE AGE OF CORONAVIRUS

© David L. Ryan/Globe Staff

It opened with breakfast, at 7 a.m., in the Harbor View Ballroom of the Boston Marriott Long Wharf hotel, where a wide bank of windows offers a sublime view across the inner harbor, steel gray on a cloudy morning, to Logan Airport in the distance.


About 175 executives were expected at the Biogen leadership conference on Feb. 26. Employees from Biogen locations around the United States and the world reunited with colleagues they don’t often get to see.

They greeted each other enthusiastically, with handshakes and hugs, and then caught up over breakfast, picking from plates of pastries and the self-serve hot food bar. They were there for two days of discussions and presentations about the future of the Cambridge-based, multinational biotech firm, which develops therapies for neurological diseases. It was the kind of under-the-radar gathering that happens in this region just about every week.

Within days, though, the Biogen conference would be infamous, identified as an epicenter of the Massachusetts outbreak of Covid-19, with 70 of 92 coronavirus infections in the state linked to the conference as of Tuesday night, including employees and those who came into contact with them. That doesn’t include a cascade of individual cases in Tennessee, North Carolina, Indiana, New Jersey, Washington, D.C., and Norway, and suspected cases in Germany, Austria, and Argentina.Baker declares state of emergency as coronavirus cases more than double

The virus raced through this two-day conference at a frightening speed that state health officials and company executives were unable to match. As one of the biggest and best-known biotech firms in Massachusetts and public health authorities in one of the nation’s premier medical communities struggled to connect the dots, dozens of Biogen employees were developing symptoms of the dangerous disease — even as they traveled around Boston, the country, and the world.

Concerns about holding large gatherings were already circulating locally at least a week before the Biogen conference. Massachusetts had detected its first coronavirus case on Feb. 1 — a man in his 20s who had flown back from Wuhan, China, where the virus was widespread. On Feb. 19, the Japanese tech company Sony announced that due to concern about infections it would skip the annual PAX East gaming expo at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, Feb. 27- March 1.

Biogen spokesman David Caouette said he is unaware of any internal discussions about canceling the Biogen conference due to the global spread of the virus.

“At the time of the meeting, we were absolutely following national guidance on travel and in-person meetings,” Caouette said in a statement.Live updates on the coronavirus outbreak from around the world

Guests at the Long Wharf conference included people from Italy, a country where the virus had spread, but not people who had been to China, where it originated late last year, he said.

After a day of highly technical presentations on Wednesday, Feb. 26, many of the Biogen attendees gathered at 6:30 p.m. at the State Room, a few blocks away at 60 State St., for dinner and awards.

The conference picked up Thursday morning and went half a day, concluding in the afternoon, when attendees headed for the airport or home.

By Saturday night, signs of trouble were emerging. One Biogen executive reported feeling sick, and planned to seek treatment at Massachusetts General Hospital in the morning, according to a person familiar with the company. That executive was told on Sunday that a coronavirus test was not warranted under existing criteria, the executive told colleagues on Sunday.For workers in the time of coronavirus, a troubling choice: work sick, or lose pay?

On Monday, another Biogen employee from the conference attended a Naples, Fla., executive round-table, held by the consulting giant PwC. According to Biogen, that employee had flu-like symptoms while at the Florida event. Biogen would not say whether that person has since tested positive ― it declines to discuss individual cases. But PwC said in a statement that it is taking the potential interaction very seriously, informing "all participants who attended our PwC event that one of the participants was in proximity to individuals who have tested positive for COVID-19.”

Biogen chief medical officer Maha Radhakrishnan on Monday sent a message to people who attended the Boston conference advising them to see a doctor if they felt ill.

By Tuesday morning, March 3, more executives who had been at the Boston conference were not feeling well, according to the person with knowledge of the company, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the situation. Some of them had gone to MGH or to their doctors to request coronavirus testing, only to be rebuffed because they did not meet the federal government criteria for a test, which at the time was a set of symptoms in addition to recent travel to a breakout area or contact with someone known to have the virus.

Biogen officials reached out to public health authorities in Massachusetts on March 3, according to a document obtained by the Globe, to report a cluster of about 50 conference attendees with flu-like symptoms in this region and overseas. Those officials were told that the cases did not satisfy requirements for testing.Coronavirus: Take a look at how Greater Boston communities have been disrupted

Massachusetts Public Health Commissioner Dr. Monica Bharel said in a Tuesday news conference that she is unable to pinpoint exactly when her department learned that people who attended the Biogen conference were ill with Covid-19, and when the agency acted to test others who attended the conference or were in contact with those attendees.

All the days are “blurring together,” Bharel said.

Another person familiar with the events, who asked to remain anonymous because they are not cleared to speak on the issue, confirmed that Biogen’s chief medical officer first contacted the state public health department the morning of March 3. Biogen told DPH that day that a cluster of people who attended the conference were ill, according to the unnamed person.A list of area colleges canceling classes, sending students home due to coronavirus fears

Biogen called the DPH again the next day, March 4, according to the person familiar with these events, and alerted DPH that at least two people from Europe who were at the conference had tested positive for Covid-19.

That same day, a “significant number" of people from Biogen — though still fewer than 10 — came to the Emergency Department at MGH asking for coronavirus tests, said Dr. Paul Biddinger, chief of the division of emergency preparedness at the hospital.

MGH had not been informed previously of the Biogen meeting or that people had been exposed to the virus.

“There was concern that there may be many more coming,” Biddinger said. Too many Biogen walk-ins, the hospital feared, could disrupt care for other patients.

All the Biogen people got a medical evaluation but many did not have symptoms that would rise to an emergency; they just wanted testing, Biddinger said.

“For each person, we talked to [Department of Public Health] staff about these patients and whether or not they meet testing criteria,” he said. “Some were tested and some were not.”

Some of the Biogen walk-ins became “very frustrated” that they couldn’t get a test. “There were some challenging discussions,” Biddinger said.

At 10 a.m. on March 5, senior Biogen leadership held a call with people who were at the Boston conference, reporting that three attendees had tested positive for Covid-19 outside of Massachusetts.Coronavirus impacts will ripple across many Mass. sectors

Several hours later, Biogen executive vice president Alphonse Galdes and Radhakrishnan sent out a message to people across the company describing the illnesses associated with the conference:

“We wanted to inform you that an unexpected high number of attendees have reported varying degrees of flu-like symptoms (fever, headache, cough, body ache, chills, general fatigue, and malaise being among the most common symptoms reported),” the message said. It added that three attendees had tested positive for Covid-19.

The message said the company could not identify the people who had tested positive, but that out of caution, Biogen wanted everyone who was at the conference to work from home.

That information alarmed some employees, who were concerned about having been exposed to the illness in the days prior to the announcement, and were surprised that the company didn’t give employees a better handle on the situation sooner.

Two people familiar with the company said a number of employees got up and left after reading the e-mail, with many of them heading straight to MGH to request a test.See all coronavirus coverage

In an e-mail from the company Thursday evening, Biogen officials asked employees to refrain from going to MGH to be tested for the coronavirus. The e-mail said their efforts “are overwhelming the emergency room” and that hospital police may have to bar Biogen employees from entering the area.

Biogen acknowledged for the first time on Thursday night that the coronavirus had been spread at its meeting the week before. By Friday, MGH and Brigham and Women’s set up temporary testing facilities in their ambulance bays to handle an influx of potential patients.

The outbreak at Biogen rippled through the state’s close-knit biopharma industry, which employs about 74,000 people and is marbled with Biogen alumni.Were you or someone you know at the Biogen meeting? Tell us what you know about it.

Several of the Biogen executives from the Long Wharf conference also attended a health care event hosted by Cowen and Co. March 2-4, at the Boston Marriott Copley Place, including CEO Michel Vounatsos and other top officials.

Cowen has since warned attendees of its event that Biogen informed Cowen that multiple individuals at the March 2 event have tested positive for Covid-19.

Cowen spokesman Dan Gagnier directed inquiries to Biogen.

Caouette, the Biogen spokesman, said in a statement that the company could not discuss the specifics of the cases, but he confirmed that multiple people from Biogen “who were at the March 2 Cowen investment conference in Boston" have tested positive.

“Several of our colleagues are doing well and others are fighting this novel virus and living in isolation from their families. Knowing they are in pain, hurts each of us,” Vounatsos wrote in an e-mail to staff on Monday.

“I am grateful for the courage our team has shown in this challenging time, working late into the night and in constant communication with public health partners. In particular, I want to thank our medical team for providing their expertise to support our employee’s safety and well-being.”
This story was reported by Andy Rosen, Hanna Krueger, Kay Lazar, Jonathan Saltzman, Liz Kowalczyk, and Mark Arsenault of the Globe staff. It was written by Arsenault.
Edward Fitzpatrick of the Globe staff contributed to this report.

Why toilet paper has become the latest coronavirus panic buy


By Scottie Andrew, CNN

Masks were the first to go. Then, hand sanitizers.

© Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images Shelves are empty of toilet rolls in a supermarket in Sydney on March 4, 2020. - Australia's biggest supermarket announced a limit on hand sanitisers and toilet paper purchases after the global spread of coronavirus sparked a spate of panic buying Down Under.

Now, novel coronavirus panic buyers are snatching up ... toilet paper?

Retailers in the US and Canada have started limiting the number of toilet paper packs customers can buy in one trip. Some supermarkets in the UK are sold out. Grocery stores in Australia have hired security guards to patrol customers.

© WILLIAM WEST/AFP/Getty Images Supermarkets in Australia are largely selling out of toilet paper due to novel coronavirus fears. An Australian newspaper even printed out eight extra pages in a recent edition to serve as emergency toilet paper.

An Australian newspaper went so far as printing eight extra pages in a recent edition -- emergency toilet paper, the newspaper said, should Aussies run out.


Why? Toilet paper does not offer special protection against the virus. It's not considered a staple of impending emergencies, like milk and bread are.

So why are people buying up rolls more quickly than they can be restocked?


Reason 1

People resort to extremes when they hear conflicting messages

Steven Taylor is a clinical psychologist and author of "The Psychology of Pandemics," which takes a historic look at how people behave and respond to pandemics. And compared to past pandemics, the global response to the novel coronavirus has been one of widespread panic.

"On the one hand, [the response is] understandable, but on the other hand it's excessive," Taylor, a professor and clinical psychologist at the University of British Columbia, told CNN. "We can prepare without panicking."

The novel coronavirus scares people because it's new, and there's a lot about it that's still unknown. When people hear conflicting messages about the risk it poses and how seriously they should prepare for it, they tend to resort to the extreme, Taylor said.

"When people are told something dangerous is coming, but all you need to do is wash your hands, the action doesn't seem proportionate to the threat," he said. "Special danger needs special precautions."


Reason 2
Some are reacting to the lack of a clear direction from officials

Several countries have already imposed mass quarantines. People buying up toilet paper and other household supplies may be preparing for the same thing in their city, said Baruch Fischhoff, a psychologist and professor in the Department of Engineering and Public Policy and the Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University.

"Unless people have seen ... official promises that everyone will be taken care of, they are left to guess at the probability of needing the extra toilet paper, sooner rather than later," he told CNN. "The fact that there are no official promises might increase those probabilities."


Reason 3

Panic buying begets panic buying

Images of empty shelves and shopping carts piled high with supplies have inundated news reports and social feeds. People see images of panic buyers, assume there's a reason to panic and buy up supplies, too, Taylor said.

"People, being social creatures, we look to each other for cues for what is safe and what is dangerous," he said. "And when you see someone in the store, panic buying, that can cause a fear contagion effect."

All those photos of empty shelves may lead people to believe that they must rush out and grab toilet paper while they still can. And what started as perceived scarcity becomes actual scarcity, Taylor said.

Social media is a huge player in novel coronavirus fear-mongering, Taylor said. Misinformation spreads with ease, and open platforms amplify voices of panic.

Reason 4

It's natural to want to overprepare

There may be some practicality in stocking up, says Frank Farley, a professor at Temple University and former president of the American Psychological Association.

With the CDC and other international health agencies now advising that certain populations should stay home and avoid contact with other people or crowds, it's natural to want to prepare, he said.

"[The novel coronavirus] is engendering a sort of survivalist psychology, where we must live as much as possible at home and thus must 'stock up' on essentials, and that certainly includes toilet paper," he told CNN. "After all, if we run out of [toilet paper], what do we replace it with?"

You'll be spending money on toilet paper at one point or another -- the only extra costs are the hassle of doing it sooner rather than later, contending with long lines and having difficulty finding it, Fischhoff said.

Since they'll eventually use the toilet paper, the analysis is different than if they'd bought something they likely wouldn't use, like a perishable item, he said.

The US Department of Homeland Security advises Americans to keep at least two weeks' worth of food, toiletries and medical supplies on hand anyway, but Taylor said most people don't. So when health officials publicly advise to stock up, they may take it to the extreme.


Reason 5

It allows some to feel a sense of control

The people who are stocking up on supplies are thinking about themselves and their family and what they need to do to prepare, Taylor said -- not healthcare workers, sick people or even regular folks who might run out of toilet paper sometime soon.

"It's all due to this wave of anticipatory anxiety," Taylor said. "People become anxious ahead of the actual infection. They haven't thought about the bigger picture, like what are the consequences of stockpiling toilet paper."

But people only act that way out of fear. Fischhoff said that preparing, even by purchasing toilet paper, returns a sense of control to what seems like a helpless situation.

"Depending on how people estimate the chances of needing the toilet paper, the hassle might be worth it," he said. "If it gave them the feeling that they had done everything that they could, it might free them to think about other things than coronavirus.

Trump's Desired Coronavirus Payroll Tax Cuts Met With Pushback
BETTER TO PROVIDE DIRECT WAGES FOR TIME OFF THROUGH UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE

President Donald Trump is pushing for an economic stimulus package that includes payroll tax cuts for workers and financial relief for businesses as the spread of the novel coronavirus exacerbates fears of a global recession.

© Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty President Donald Trump arrives at the US Capitol to attend the Republicans weekly policy luncheon on March 10 in Washington, DC. He is flanked by (L-R) Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, Vice President Mike Pence and Republican Policy Committee Chairman Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO).
But as the details for such a plan remain absent, so too does the support among members of Congress, including some Republicans. Democrats are putting forth proposals of their own that they say would better prevent the American economy from slipping into a prolonged period of economic downturn.

In order for a politically divided Washington to reach a speedy agreement, it appears likely that the president will need to go further than the payroll tax cuts he's proposed.

"Stopping all this depends on stopping the spread of the disease. That's where the priority must be," said Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), vice chairman of the Joint Economic Committee. "We don't want people having to choose between a paycheck and preventing the spread of the disease."

Trump and his top administration officials have sought to quell fears over potential economic impacts coronavirus could have on the American economy. However, those fears have only grown in the wake of the Dow Jones industrial average on Monday experiencing a record plummet of more than 2,000 points, on top of plunging oil prices.
Click to expand



The president is pushing for payroll tax cuts for workers and businesses, a rate that is currently at 6.2 percent on an employee's first $137,700 earned for Social Security and 1.45 percent of all earned income for Medicare. As of Tuesday, it remained yet to be seen by what amount and for how long the tax would be slashed.

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), the majority whip, suggested it would be cut by roughly 2 percent as it was under President Barack Obama in response to the Great Recession.

Trump has also said they'll provide small businesses with loans and work to prop up travel industries like airlines and cruises hit hard as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is recommending consumers skip such forms of travel.

And Vice President Mike Pence said that after meeting with private health insurance companies, they agreed to waive copays for coronavirus testing and treatment, in addition to promising no surprise medical billing and covering telemedicine sessions for elderly patients so they can avoid leaving their home. Medicaid and Medicare said last week they would also cover all coronavirus costs.

"We want to protect our shipping industry, our cruise industry, cruise ships. We want to protect our airline industry," Trump told reporters on Capitol Hill Tuesday after meeting with Senate Republicans during their weekly luncheon. "The consumer is ready, and the consumer is so powerful in our country with what we've done with tax cuts and regulation cuts and all of those things."

But the payroll tax cut proposal has been met with opposition by Democrats and skepticism from some Republicans, including Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a close ally to Trump. Various GOP lawmakers argue that such a loss in tax revenue would be costly for the government and do little to help the overall economy.

"I'm not so sure that's the right stimulus," Graham said. "But we need something."

Democrats argue that payroll tax cuts would only benefit a certain portion of workers and would leave out the unemployed and retired. And they also point to the fact that many workers, particularly those who are paid hourly, don't receive paid time off, decreasing the likelihood they would choose to forgo paychecks by staying home and self-quarantining.

Democrats have come out with a laundry list of solutions they say need to be included in any stimulus package in order to reach all corners of the U.S. economy. That includes paid sick leave, free coronavirus testing, expanding federal food assistance programs like SNAP and school lunches, enhancing unemployment insurance, providing loans and grants to small businesses and reimbursing patients for any non-covered coronavirus-related costs.

"That'll get money into the economy where it belongs—the people who are affected—not dropping money out of an airplane and hoping a few dollars land on the people who are affected," said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).

"You know what doesn't help stop the spread of the coronavirus? More corporate tax cuts," he added, citing a Washington Post story that the White House will likely provide aid to oil and natural gas producers impacted by the drop in oil prices.

In an effort to curb the spread of the virus, Congress passed a bipartisan supplemental funding bill of more than $8 billion last week. The measure will fund research for treatments and vaccines, as well as help state and local health facilities that may be resource-strapped or ill-prepared for such a pandemic.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Tuesday that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin will have "ball control for the administration" when it comes to negotiations with Congress on a stimulus package.

Mnuchin and Trump senior economic adviser Larry Kudlow also met with GOP senators at lunch on Tuesday. Afterward, Mnuchin crossed the Capitol to meet with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who has called for the same proposals outlined by Schumer.

The People Who See Bernie Sanders as Their Only Hope
“This is a campaign of the working class, by the working class and for the working class!”  

© Kitra Cahana for The New York Times Volunteers at a rally for Senator Bernie Sanders in Phoenix last week. Mr. Sanders has shown in each of his bids for the White House that his populist message resonates with many working-class voters.

PHOENIX — Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont nearly shouted those words to a raucously supportive crowd here last week. The line received thunderous applause, as it always does.

At campaign events over the past year, Mr. Sanders has spoken to tens of thousands of people who come to hear his message of political revolution — who come to imagine a country with universal health care, no student debt and a $15 minimum wage. Almost every line he says onstage rises to a crescendo, inviting cheers of appreciation. With every promise and policy proposal, the crowd becomes a sea of waving blue and white signs with the “Bernie” logo.

The Sanders campaign has exposed a class divide within the Democratic Party: His promises of a leg up are most alluring to those who need it, and most confounding to those who do not.

Six more states go to the polls on Tuesday in what is now a head-to-head matchup in the Democratic presidential race between Mr. Sanders and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. The path for Mr. Sanders to retake a delegate lead is much narrower than it was a week ago, but no matter how the primaries turn out for Mr. Sanders, he has built a fierce following of voters who want and expect more from their party, from their government, from their country.

That’s how Audrey Yanos views Mr. Sanders and this political moment. Ms. Yanos, a 39-year-old medical administrator, has voted for the Democratic candidate in every presidential election in her adult life. But Ms. Yanos has misgivings: Those Democrats, she believes, have never done all that much to deliver the promise of the American dream. She has begun to feel that the country has betrayed people like her.

Mr. Sanders, she says, is different. Ms. Yanos voted for him in 2016, and did so again last Tuesday in the Colorado primary, which he won easily over Mr. Biden.

“We are struggling all the time, and what we have is not working,” she said one evening last week during a brief break between dinner and her son’s basketball practice. “We’re all scraping by, one disaster away from real catastrophe, and we need someone who understands that.”

That sentiment — that Mr. Sanders understands the catastrophe looming for so many people, and that so many other politicians do not — is central to Sanders supporters, and crucial to understanding where these voters might turn if Mr. Sanders is not the nominee. If the Democratic Party wants to keep such voters engaged and committed to showing up in the fall, leaders will have to speak more directly to them and better address their needs.

Many of his supporters know what it’s like to struggle in one way or another. They need prescription drugs but can’t afford them. They are buried under relentless student debt. They juggle jobs with caring for ailing parents or young children, or both. They want better lives, more stable lives, and need some help.

© Daniel Brenner for The New York Times Audrey Yanos voted for Bernie Sanders in 2016 and again this year in Colorado’s primary. “It’s not that I think it will be all rainbows and sunshine if he’s elected,” she said. “Things won’t change overnight.”

When Mr. Sanders has asked people at his town halls to tell their stories — often by prodding them to share their insurance premiums or deductibles — their voices have sometimes shaken. Sometimes there are tears.

Ms. Yanos was the first person in her family to attend college. She considers herself lucky because a scholarship paid for tuition and books, so she graduated with about $25,000 in debt, which she paid off last year. Financially, she is far better off than her parents were when she was a child. And yet she sees no evidence of a booming economy in her own life.

“I look around and see so many other people barely holding on,” Ms. Yanos said, choking back tears as her kids did their homework at the kitchen table. “It’s not that I think it will be all rainbows and sunshine if he’s elected, things won’t change overnight. But people younger than me, they are going to demand change in their lifetime.”

Everything seemed to be clicking for Mr. Sanders before last week. He had finished at the top of the nominating contests in Iowa and New Hampshire, then dominated in Nevada. But on Super Tuesday, a surging Mr. Biden all but extinguished that momentum, winning 10 of 14 states with the support of many black working-class voters. Mr. Biden and Mr. Sanders are now heading into primaries in Michigan and other major Midwestern states that are favorable in many ways to the former vice president. But Mr. Sanders also enjoys plenty of support in these states, particularly from white working-class voters.

In both of his bids for the White House, Mr. Sanders has shown that his populist message resonates in some corners, even as it repels much of the Democratic establishment, which has steadily lined up behind Mr. Biden. Rallies for Mr. Sanders often resemble rock concerts, drawing tens of thousands of people who come decked out in campaign gear, with T-shirts that proclaim “Unidos con Bernie” and signs that say “Not me, Us.”

Polling throughout the campaign has shown Mr. Sanders drawing some of his strongest support from voters with household incomes under $50,000; his numbers taper off as incomes rise. A month ago, when he was leading in the polls, people with household incomes of $50,000 and under supported Mr. Sanders twice as much as any other candidate. At that time, he commanded the support of most Democratic voters making $100,000 and under.

Exit polls on Super Tuesday did not ask respondents directly about their income. But in the three states where he won and exit polls were conducted — Colorado, Vermont and California — Mr. Sanders performed five to eight percentage points better among those without a college degree than those with one. In Massachusetts and Minnesota, both states he had hoped to win but ended up losing decisively to Mr. Biden, Mr. Sanders’s numbers among college graduates lagged his showing among those without degrees by double digits.

“Bernie is the only candidate I’ve ever felt a connection to, in a sense that he genuinely cares about the working class in a way that no other candidate has ever shown support to us,” said Andrew Hilbert, 26, who came to see Mr. Sanders in Phoenix.

Mr. Sanders’s support this year has proved particularly enduring in the West, where many communities remain visibly scarred by the Great Recession. And his focus on the working class helps explain part of his appeal to Latino voters, who are disproportionately young and are more likely to come from a working-class background. Many such voters point to the illusion of an “up by your bootstraps” mentality and strongly believe that the only way to create a fair economy is to drastically change the way the current one works.

“We’ve had decades of policies fail to meet our needs, and we’ve got to break that cycle,” said Antonio Arellano, the executive director of Jolt, a group in Texas that focuses on turning out young Latino voters and that endorsed Mr. Sanders. “What we’re seeing for the first time ever is the courage to break from the past and radically build the future. Not taking us as a given entity, but as a constituency that is demanding something more.”

Having spent her life in Orange County, California, Rita Xochitl Estrada, a 39-year-old fitness instructor and student at California State University, Fullerton, has seen countless examples of extreme wealth and extreme poverty. Ms. Estrada calls herself a “romantic but pragmatic” socialist, and said she was not all that optimistic that Mr. Sanders would win the primary, let alone the presidency. Her biggest hope, she said, is that he is ushering in a new era of politics with more of a focus on the poor.

“If nobody pushes it, we will never get there, which is why we are still stuck the way we are,” said Ms. Estrada, who came to the polls with her 21-year-old son, who also voted for Mr. Sanders. Like other Latino supporters of the Vermont senator, Ms. Estrada views herself as part of a movement of that will live on regardless of his political fate, and that harks back to the Chicano movement of the 1960s and ’70s. “This is a country that wants the current class structure to stay in place, and it’s really hard to fight against that.”

Many working-class supporters point to Mr. Sanders’s opposition to the Iraq war as the initial issue that drew them into his orbit. Having watched many friends sign up for the military as a path to the middle class only to come back with traumatic mental and physical injuries, they are deeply skeptical of American intervention overseas, as Mr. Sanders has been for his entire career.

There are also voters who are drawn to Mr. Sanders’s consistency in a chaotic, punishing world.

Originally from El Salvador, Ruth Trujillo-Acosta, 59, and her husband, Gustavo Acosta, 61, are just trying to make things work. They worry about retiring, afraid that they have no savings. They worry that their children are not even thinking about college because it’s too expensive. They both went to college as adults, but still have student loans to pay off.

The two now live in Holyoke in western Massachusetts. She is a mental health clinician. He is an academic adviser at a community college. They consider themselves independents, but are unequivocal about supporting Mr. Sanders.

“We really are paycheck to paycheck and this is the guy — he really is going to be able to change that,” she said as the couple waited for Mr. Sanders to begin a rally last month in Springfield, Mass.

She was cleareyed that Mr. Sanders might not be able to carry out all of his policy proposals — “I don’t think that he’s going to create a complete revolution right away,” she said — but she said he at least provided hope, and it was worth giving him a shot.

Their support of Mr. Sanders, she said, comes down to this: “Our values are with this guy.”

© Kitra Cahana for The New York Times Mr. Sanders’s support has proved particularly enduring in the West, which was hit hard by the Great Recession.

Sydney Ember reported from Phoenix, and Jennifer Medina reported from Denver. Giovanni Russonello contributed reporting from New York.

Coronavirus engulfs Europe: Angela Merkel warns up to 58 MILLION Germans - 60-70% of the population - will be infected, as Spain sees infections triple in two days and Italy records 168 fatalities in ONE DAY

Infection is now transmitting between humans in nearly 30 countries across Europe, the WHO warned today

Angela Merkel warned as many as 70 per cent of Germans could become infected with the coronavirus

Chancellor's prediction would see 58 million of 82 million population of Germany contract the spreading virus

Germany so far has seen two fatalities and registered 1,139 cases of virus and has cancelled public events 

Spain saw a surge of virus cases reach 1,622 infections and 35 deaths as schools and universities were closed

Coronavirus death toll outside China soared to past 1,000 as Italy recorded 168 fatalities in just one day

In the UK the sixth victim of the disease was recorded as infections in the county rose by 61 in a day to 382

Worldwide COVID-19 has infected more than 114,000 people and over 4,000 have died from the illness

By CHRIS DYER FOR MAILONLINE and REUTERS 10 March 2020

As many as '60 to 70 per cent' of Germans will be infected with the deadly coronavirus, Chancellor Angela Merkel warned today, as the contagion threatened to rip through Europe.

Addressing a parliamentary group meeting of her Christian Democratic Union party in Berlin today, Merkel said that 58 million Germans could contract the disease if it spiralled out of control, according to insiders who spoke to newspaper Bild.

But Health Minister Jens Spahn pointed out during the meeting that 80 per cent of all infected patients would have almost no symptoms.

The infection is now transmitting between humans in nearly 30 countries across Europe, the World Health Organization has warned today.

Fears of the life-threatening infection have now engulfed the continent, which has recorded more than 17,000 cases and over 700 deaths in Europe alone.

Europe's crisis – centred in northern Italy but now rapidly spreading – began with a handful of imported cases from China, but has now seen tourist attractions and transport hubs deserted.

Italy went into a nationwide lockdown on Monday night and today recorded its highest single-day toll to date with 168 fatalities. This pushed the number of deaths outside China to more than 1,000.

WHO chiefs have now confirmed local transmission – when an infection spreads within a country – in 27 European nations.

It came as the number of virus cases in Spain surged to 1,622 infections and 35 deaths as universities and schools in the capital Madrid were closed.

Overall in Italy, 631 people have died from the COVID-19 disease caused by the virus and 10,149 have been infected in just over two weeks.

The UK recorded its sixth death from the virus today as infections in the county rose by 61 to 382. Globally, more than 114,000 people have been infected and over 4,000 have died from the illness since the outbreak began in China in December.

Spain's virus cases surged to 1,622 infections and 35 deaths today and Italy recorded 168 fatalities as German Chancellor Angela Merkel warned up to 70 per cent of her citizens could be infected

France recorded a 70 per cent rise in cases over Monday night, with more than 1,200 patients now known to have caught the deadly infection.

The country's health ministry gave chemists the green light to produce their own hydro-alcoholic hand sanitizer gels following a shortage. 

Germany and Spain also saw huge spikes in the number of infected patients, while the UK's toll has risen eight-fold in the space of a week.

Albania today became the latest nation to be struck down, meaning only a handful of countries across the continent have yet to record a case.

Europe's escalating coronavirus crisis comes just weeks before thousands of British families will travel to the continent for Easter.

In other developments, a maintenance worker at Disneyland Paris tested positive for coronavirus, the theme park announced today.

EU chief Ursula von der Leyen today pledged to mobilise 'all the tools' available to the bloc to lessen the economic impact of the coronavirus epidemic, which has roiled markets across the globe.

After EU leaders held crisis talks by video conference to try to coordinate their response to the epidemic, Von der Leyen sought to reassure businesses and governments spooked by the spread of the disease.

Among the measures is a coronavirus response investment fund backed by 7.5 billion euros ($8.5 billion) in EU funding - subject to approval by member states and the European Parliament.

Italy's prime minister Giuseppe Conte announced a new government decree on Monday night, banning public gatherings, restricting all but essential travel between cities and imposing a three-foot rule to keep people in public spaces apart. 

Merkel added to fears of mass-infection when she said up to 58 million of her countrymen could contract the fast-spreading contagion.

When she made the announcement there was silence among other politicians at the meeting, Bild reported. 

Merkel told her party: 'Sixty to 70 per cent of people in Germany will become infected with the coronavirus. We are facing a challenge that we have never had before.'

Germany, which has so far seen two deaths from the disease that has infected more than 110,000 people worldwide, has a population of 82.9 million people.  

Spahn confirmed the Chancellor's figures if a vaccine is not developed before the virus takes hold of Europe, but added that many patients would be symptom-less.

The Spanish capital Madrid is taking drastic measures to prevent the spread of the disease by closing all schools and universities and disinfecting public transport every day. 

Even though the tourist season is fast approaching the government of Catalonia - which includes the popular destination of Barcelona - has said they will bring in similar measures if necessary.

Barcelona's Champions League last-16 second leg match with Napoli scheduled for March 18 will take place without spectators due to fears over the spread of the coronavirus, a club spokesman said today. 

Spanish parliament's lower house suspended all activities for at least a week after lawmaker Javier Ortega Smith's party Vox revealed he had been diagnosed with coronavirus, El Pais reported. 

It comes after the last Britons who were quarantined at the H10 Costa Adeje Palace Hotel in Tenerife were finally allowed to leave today after Italian tourists tested positive for the virus there. 

A British father tested positive in Majorca last month. The 46-year-old patient caught the killer bug in France but only developed symptoms on return to his Palma home on the Spanish island. 

Twenty-eight people have died in Spain from the virus, official figures show. There are a total of 1,204 cases, still far behind Italy's tally.

Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said earlier on Monday, without giving details, that the government was preparing plans to mitigate the impact of the virus on the Spanish economy.

Elsewhere in Europe, Albania reported its first confirmed cases of the killer coronavirus today – a father and son who drove back from Florence.

The unidentified pair – a 54-year-old and his 28-year-old – are in hospital in Tirana, the capital of Albania. Both are in a stable condition. 

Albania today also announced it will close schools and ban public gatherings for two weeks because of the outbreak.

Four European countries – Turkey, Cyprus, Montenegro and Kosovo – have yet to announce any COVID-19 cases. 

Under new measures brought in on Monday, Germany introduced drive-through health screenings where health officials are able to swab patients for the killer infection while they sit in their cars.

The NHS in the UK has already set up drive-thru coronavirus test centre in a bid to keep infected patients away from hospitals. Similar testing methods have been used in South Korea and China.

Today it was announced that large cultural events in the German capital's theatres, operas and concert houses will be cancelled from tomorrow to prevent coronavirus contagion.

The measure will remain in place until April 19, and will also affect concerts at the renowned Berlin Philharmonic, Berlin's pointman on culture, Klaus Lederer, said Tuesday, adding that it was 'regrettable but one must assume the responsibility'. 

Organisers of smaller shows in locations holding up to 500 people will have to decide individually if their events will go ahead, in accordance with guidance given by the federal disease control centre Robert Koch Institute. 

Spahn had recommended that events with more than 1,000 people should be scrapped until further notice, after coronavirus cases in Germany soared past 1,100 this week. 

Several Bundesliga games will be played without spectators, while other huge fairs including Berlin's ITB travel show and the Hannover Messe technology event have been scrapped. 

Everything that is non-essential should be cancelled to contain the virus, Merkel said, adding: 'Games behind closed doors are not the worst thing that can happen in this country.' 

Germany's biggest cluster of infected patients are in the country's most populous state North Rhine-Westphalia, where 323 cases have been reported in the district of Heinsberg alone.

Two people have also died of the virus in the state.

As of Monday, Germany had registered 1,139 coronavirus cases with two fatalities, according to government data. 

President Donald Trump today said the coronavirus outbreak would 'go away' and urged Americans to remain calm as cases jumped and the White House came under mounting pressure to boost its response to the health and economic crisis.

A steady rise in the number of US cases of COVID-19 has concerned health officials and spurred calls within Congress for action to expand testing and avert an economic meltdown.

About three quarters of US states now have confirmed COVID-19 with over 800 Americans infected, Washington state's governor warned of tens of thousands more cases without 'real action' and New York's governor deployed National Guard troops as a containment measure in a hard-hit New York City suburb. 

The outbreak is hitting the German economy through cancellations in the tourism sector and industry is expected to suffer supply chain problems in coming weeks, Economy Minister Peter Altmaier added today.

Asked if Europe's largest economy was heading into a recession in the first half of this year, Altmaier said the situation was very difficult and that he hoped Germany could avoid the type of coronavirus-related restrictions to travel and civic life enforced in Italy. 

Altmaier, speaking after talks with economy ministers from the 16 regional state governments, said Chancellor Merkel's cabinet would on Wednesday pass more flexible rules on short-time working to help companies bridge liquidity problems and avoid layoffs. 

China, where the coronavirus was first diagnosed in late 2019, is Germany's biggest trading partner, and German companies depend on both Chinese demand and supply chains.

Seaborne deliveries from China can take up to six weeks, so the epidemic and related production stops there are hitting the German economy with a time lag.  

Merkel told lawmakers from her conservative bloc that Germany does not need an economic stimulus plan now to counter the impact of the coronavirus but rather liquidity injections. 

Iran announced 43 new deaths from the virus in the past 24 hours, bringing the overall toll to 237 dead, one of the world's highest.

The Islamic Republic confirmed 595 new cases across the country bringing their overall confirmed cases to 7,161.

Globally, more than 110,000 people have been infected with the coronavirus and more than 4,000 have died.


WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS?


Someone who is infected with the coronavirus can spread it with just a simple cough or a sneeze, scientists say.

More than 4,000 people with the virus are now confirmed to have died and more than 110,000 have been infected. Here's what we know so far:

What is the coronavirus?

A coronavirus is a type of virus which can cause illness in animals and people. Viruses break into cells inside their host and use them to reproduce itself and disrupt the body's normal functions. Coronaviruses are named after the Latin word 'corona', which means crown, because they are encased by a spiked shell which resembles a royal crown.

The coronavirus from Wuhan is one which has never been seen before this outbreak. It has been named SARS-CoV-2 by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses. The name stands for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus 2.

Experts say the bug, which has killed around one in 50 patients since the outbreak began in December, is a 'sister' of the SARS illness which hit China in 2002, so has been named after it.

The disease that the virus causes has been named COVID-19, which stands for coronavirus disease 2019.

Dr Helena Maier, from the Pirbright Institute, said: 'Coronaviruses are a family of viruses that infect a wide range of different species including humans, cattle, pigs, chickens, dogs, cats and wild animals.

'Until this new coronavirus was identified, there were only six different coronaviruses known to infect humans. Four of these cause a mild common cold-type illness, but since 2002 there has been the emergence of two new coronaviruses that can infect humans and result in more severe disease (Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) coronaviruses).

'Coronaviruses are known to be able to occasionally jump from one species to another and that is what happened in the case of SARS, MERS and the new coronavirus. The animal origin of the new coronavirus is not yet known.'

The first human cases were publicly reported from the Chinese city of Wuhan, where approximately 11million people live, after medics first started publicly reporting infections on December 31.

By January 8, 59 suspected cases had been reported and seven people were in critical condition. Tests were developed for the new virus and recorded cases started to surge.

The first person died that week and, by January 16, two were dead and 41 cases were confirmed. The next day, scientists predicted that 1,700 people had become infected, possibly up to 7,000.

Just a week after that, there had been more than 800 confirmed cases and those same scientists estimated that some 4,000 – possibly 9,700 – were infected in Wuhan alone. By that point, 26 people had died.

By January 27, more than 2,800 people were confirmed to have been infected, 81 had died, and estimates of the total number of cases ranged from 100,000 to 350,000 in Wuhan alone.

By January 29, the number of deaths had risen to 132 and cases were in excess of 6,000.

By February 5, there were more than 24,000 cases and 492 deaths.

By February 11, this had risen to more than 43,000 cases and 1,000 deaths.

A change in the way cases are confirmed on February 13 – doctors decided to start using lung scans as a formal diagnosis, as well as laboratory tests – caused a spike in the number of cases, to more than 60,000 and to 1,369 deaths.

By February 25, around 80,000 people had been infected and some 2,700 had died. February 25 was the first day in the outbreak when fewer cases were diagnosed within China than in the rest of the world.

Where does the virus come from?

According to scientists, the virus almost certainly came from bats. Coronaviruses in general tend to originate in animals – the similar SARS and MERS viruses are believed to have originated in civet cats and camels, respectively.

The first cases of COVID-19 came from people visiting or working in a live animal market in Wuhan, which has since been closed down for investigation.

Although the market is officially a seafood market, other dead and living animals were being sold there, including wolf cubs, salamanders, snakes, peacocks, porcupines and camel meat.

A study by the Wuhan Institute of Virology, published in February 2020 in the scientific journal Nature, found that the genetic make-up virus samples found in patients in China is 96 per cent identical to a coronavirus they found in bats.

However, there were not many bats at the market so scientists say it was likely there was an animal which acted as a middle-man, contracting it from a bat before then transmitting it to a human. It has not yet been confirmed what type of animal this was.

Dr Michael Skinner, a virologist at Imperial College London, was not involved with the research but said: 'The discovery definitely places the origin of nCoV in bats in China.

'We still do not know whether another species served as an intermediate host to amplify the virus, and possibly even to bring it to the market, nor what species that host might have been.'

So far the fatalities are quite low. Why are health experts so worried about it?

Experts say the international community is concerned about the virus because so little is known about it and it appears to be spreading quickly.

It is similar to SARS, which infected 8,000 people and killed nearly 800 in an outbreak in Asia in 2003, in that it is a type of coronavirus which infects humans' lungs. It is less deadly than SARS, however, which killed around one in 10 people, compared to approximately one in 50 for COVID-19.

Another reason for concern is that nobody has any immunity to the virus because they've never encountered it before. This means it may be able to cause more damage than viruses we come across often, like the flu or common cold.

Speaking at a briefing in January, Oxford University professor, Dr Peter Horby, said: 'Novel viruses can spread much faster through the population than viruses which circulate all the time because we have no immunity to them.

'Most seasonal flu viruses have a case fatality rate of less than one in 1,000 people. Here we're talking about a virus where we don't understand fully the severity spectrum but it's possible the case fatality rate could be as high as two per cent.'

If the death rate is truly two per cent, that means two out of every 100 patients who get it will die.

'My feeling is it's lower,' Dr Horby added. 'We're probably missing this iceberg of milder cases. But that's the current circumstance we're in.

'Two per cent case fatality rate is comparable to the Spanish Flu pandemic in 1918 so it is a significant concern globally.'

How does the virus spread?

The illness can spread between people just through coughs and sneezes, making it an extremely contagious infection. And it may also spread even before someone has symptoms.

It is believed to travel in the saliva and even through water in the eyes, therefore close contact, kissing, and sharing cutlery or utensils are all risky.

Originally, people were thought to be catching it from a live animal market in Wuhan city. But cases soon began to emerge in people who had never been there, which forced medics to realise it was spreading from person to person.

There is now evidence that it can spread third hand – to someone from a person who caught it from another person.

What does the virus do to you? What are the symptoms?

Once someone has caught the COVID-19 virus it may take between two and 14 days, or even longer, for them to show any symptoms – but they may still be contagious during this time.

If and when they do become ill, typical signs include a runny nose, a cough, sore throat and a fever (high temperature). The vast majority of patients will recover from these without any issues, and many will need no medical help at all.

In a small group of patients, who seem mainly to be the elderly or those with long-term illnesses, it can lead to pneumonia. Pneumonia is an infection in which the insides of the lungs swell up and fill with fluid. It makes it increasingly difficult to breathe and, if left untreated, can be fatal and suffocate people.

Figures are showing that young children do not seem to be particularly badly affected by the virus, which they say is peculiar considering their susceptibility to flu, but it is not clear why.

What have genetic tests revealed about the virus?

Scientists in China have recorded the genetic sequences of around 19 strains of the virus and released them to experts working around the world.

This allows others to study them, develop tests and potentially look into treating the illness they cause.

Examinations have revealed the coronavirus did not change much – changing is known as mutating – much during the early stages of its spread.

However, the director-general of China's Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Gao Fu, said the virus was mutating and adapting as it spread through people.

This means efforts to study the virus and to potentially control it may be made extra difficult because the virus might look different every time scientists analyse it.

More study may be able to reveal whether the virus first infected a small number of people then change and spread from them, or whether there were various versions of the virus coming from animals which have developed separately.

How dangerous is the virus?

The virus has a death rate of around two per cent. This is a similar death rate to the Spanish Flu outbreak which, in 1918, went on to kill around 50million people.

Experts have been conflicted since the beginning of the outbreak about whether the true number of people who are infected is significantly higher than the official numbers of recorded cases. Some people are expected to have such mild symptoms that they never even realise they are ill unless they're tested, so only the more serious cases get discovered, making the death toll seem higher than it really is.

However, an investigation into government surveillance in China said it had found no reason to believe this was true.

Dr Bruce Aylward, a World Health Organization official who went on a mission to China, said there was no evidence that figures were only showing the tip of the iceberg, and said recording appeared to be accurate, Stat News reported.

Peter Keck (left), spokesman of the Esslingen district administration, posing from a car to demonstrate how works the new 'Drive-In' virus tests work in Nuertingen on Monday 

Can the virus be cured?

The COVID-19 virus cannot be cured and it is proving difficult to contain.

Antibiotics do not work against viruses, so they are out of the question. Antiviral drugs can work, but the process of understanding a virus then developing and producing drugs to treat it would take years and huge amounts of money.

No vaccine exists for the coronavirus yet and it's not likely one will be developed in time to be of any use in this outbreak, for similar reasons to the above.

The National Institutes of Health in the US, and Baylor University in Waco, Texas, say they are working on a vaccine based on what they know about coronaviruses in general, using information from the SARS outbreak. But this may take a year or more to develop, according to Pharmaceutical Technology.

Currently, governments and health authorities are working to contain the virus and to care for patients who are sick and stop them infecting other people.

People who catch the illness are being quarantined in hospitals, where their symptoms can be treated and they will be away from the uninfected public.

And airports around the world are putting in place screening measures such as having doctors on-site, taking people's temperatures to check for fevers and using thermal screening to spot those who might be ill (infection causes a raised temperature).

However, it can take weeks for symptoms to appear, so there is only a small likelihood that patients will be spotted up in an airport.

Is this outbreak an epidemic or a pandemic?

The outbreak is an epidemic, which is when a disease takes hold of one community such as a country or region.

Although it has spread to dozens of countries, the outbreak is not yet classed as a pandemic, which is defined by the World Health Organization as the 'worldwide spread of a new disease'.

The head of WHO's global infectious hazard preparedness, Dr Sylvie Briand, said: 'Currently we are not in a pandemic. We are at the phase where it is an epidemic with multiple foci, and we try to extinguish the transmission in each of these foci,' the Guardian reported.

She said that most cases outside of Hubei had been 'spillover' from the epicentre, so the disease wasn't actually spreading actively around the world

Anarchy in a VERY small village nightclub: Unseen photos show the Sex Pistols' final UK gig at a children's charity Christmas party - weeks before Johnny Rotten quit and the band split on their acrimonious US tour

Veteran photographer Kevin Cummins' new book titled 'Sex Pistols: The End is Near' showcases previously unpublished images from the band's last gig in the U.K. on Christmas Day in 1977

The concert took place at a small nightclub in Huddersfield, England after they had been banned from every venue across the country; the gig was meant to raise money for the families of striking firefighters; 

Earlier in the day, Johnny Rotten and Sid Viscous hosted a children's party that included disco dancing and a cake fight before things descended into debauchery at night

The band officially broke up three-weeks later while on tour in the United States

By TATE DELLOYE FOR DAILYMAIL.COM 10 March 2020


The Sex Pistols were all but over by 1977, just two years after they erupted onto the scene like a blazing, incendiary comet of punk rock pomp and pageantry.

They scorched the earth with hysterical performances fueled by drug abuse and replete with sexual innuendo, expletives, and insolence. They espoused anarchy and derisively scoffed at anyone or anything that represented 'the establishment' – most notably the Queen of England.

Now picture the notorious four on Christmas Day in 1977 –playing a charity show to raise money for the families of striking firefighters at a small nightclub named Ivanhoe's in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire.

Johnny Rotten handed out badges, posters and other Sex Pistols-branded merchandise as substitute-gifts. Teenagers and young children boogied with Sid Vicious on the dance floor to disco hits by Baccara and Boney M while Rotten judged a pogo dancing contest. Later, he presented them with a massive cake, emblazoned with 'Sex Pistols' that was the 'size of a car bonnet' before things descended into expected good-natured, punk-rock chaos with a food fight.


The party went on through the night, descending into requisite debauchery when the adult punks showed up for the evening concert that would inevitably be the Sex Pistols last gig in the U.K. This implausible combination of wholesome depravity that defined their final show would be forgotten if it weren't for Kevin Cummins, a veteran rock n' roll photographer who recently released previously unpublished photos from that final show in his book, Sex Pistols: The End is Near 25.12.77. 

Johnny Rotten, the lead singer of the Sex Pistols screams into the mic during their last concert in the U.K. before his band broke up three weeks later while on tour in the United States. Previously unpublished images from this concert are now showcased in veteran rock photographer's new book titled: 'Sex Pistols: The End is Near

Bassist, Sid Vicious would later be accused of killing his girlfriend, Nancy Spungen in 1978 during a drug-fulled haze at The Chelsea Hotel in New York City; he died from an overdose that same year while awaiting trial for her murder


Johnny Rotten holds up the microphone between Sid Vicious (left) and guitarist Steve Jones. Earlier in the day, the band hosted a charity Christmas party for the children and families who didn't have enough money to celebrate the holiday amid the firefighter strike. The concert was planned by their manager Malcom McLaren, who enjoyed the controversy the band attracted. According to James Parker in The Atlantic, McLaren would later describe Sid’s aura as a 'halo of anarchy'


Years later Johnny Rotten said the concert was: 'The ultimate reward. One of my all-time favorite gigs. Young kids, and we’re doing Bodies and they’re bursting out with laughter on the ‘f*ck this f*ck that’ verse. The correct response: not the shock horror ‘How dare you?’ Adults bring their own filthy minds into a thing. They don’t quite perceive it as a child does'

By Christmas 1977, the Sex Pistols were personae non gratae in every venue across England after a torrent of negative press accused the band of treason for their number one single: 'God Save The Queen' ('The fascist regime…She ain't no human being'). The polemic song was banned from airwaves after the band timed its release to coincide with Queen Elizabeth's Silver Jubilee.

The planned U.K. tour had collapsed and the only locale willing to open its doors to the rowdy group was a tiny nightclub named Ivanhoe's in West Yorkshire. After the relatively tame matinee performance was finished, Kevin Cummins left his family's Christmas lunch to attend the evening's R-rated punk rock version - the show that Rolling Stone said was played 'with an energy and conviction that is positively transcendent in its madness and fever.'

'My father didn't speak to me for at least three weeks,' Cummins wrote in his introduction. Cummins was just a teenager at the time, working for the New Musical Express but he would later go on to cover other musicians throughout his career including: Mick Jagger, Ian Curtis, Joy Division, Morrissey, Courtney Love, Patti Smith, and David Bowie.

Taking one final dig at the royals, the Pistols derided the celebrated holiday tradition of the Queen's televised Christmas speech. Johnny Rotten took to the stage to address his audience: 'You've had the Queen's speech. Now you're going to get the Sex Pistols at Christmas. Enjoy.'

Three week later, while on tour in the United States, the band officially called it quits halfway through a show at San Francisco’s Winterland Ballroom. The famous instigators once loathed by the British establishment would eventually became, what the celebrated music journalist Paul Morely wrote in the book's forward: 'as much a part of British history as Churchill, the Royal Mail post boxes, Robin Hood, Sherlock Holmes, Shakespeare.'

Lead singer Johnny Rotten eyeballs his singing audience during the adult-performance part of the evening after the children's Christmas party was finished earlier in the day. The Sex Pistols' U.K. tour collapsed under public scrutiny for their polemic song titled: 'God Save The Queen' ('The fascist regime…She ain't no human being')


Johnny Rotten sings into the microphone between Sid Vicious (left) and guitarist Steve Jones. Kevin Cummins left his family lunch early on Christmas Day to see the historic show (which inevitably was the Sex Pistol's last gig in the U.K.). 'My father didn't speak to me for at least three weeks,' Cummins wrote in his introduction

Rolling Stone Magazine's rave review of the Sex Pistol's 1977 album titled 'Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols' described it as: 'It’s all speed, not nuance — drums like the My Lai massacre, bass throbbing like a diseased heart fifty beats past bursting point, guitars wielded by Jack the Ripper-and the songs all hit like amphetamines or the plague...'

Toward the end of the show, Johnny Rotten put on a beret. James Parker at The Atlantic explained that 'there was this weird French strain to the Sex Pistols’ enterprise'


Ribbing the Queen: Johnny Rotten opened his Christmas performance with: 'You've had the Queen's speech. Now you're going to get the Sex Pistols at Christmas. Enjoy'

Fatal attraction: Turtles eat plastic waste because it smells like FOOD thanks to an algae coating that clogs up the animals’ insides

Researchers studied the behaviour of 15 young loggerhead turtles in the lab

They exposed each to the smell of ocean plastic, clean plastic, food and water

The team found that turtles foraged more when sniffing food or ocean plastic

A smelly chemical emitted by algae that fouls marine plastic may be the cause

The study highlights the need to stop plastic getting into the ocean, experts said

By IAN RANDALL FOR MAILONLINE 9 March 2020

Turtles eat plastic waste in the ocean because it ends up smelling like food thanks to an algae coating — leading to the animals clogging up their insides, a study found.

It had long thought that it was the appearance of polythene debris — which can bear a semblance to jellyfish and seagrass — that made the waste appetising to turtles.

However, US experts found that plastics in the ocean trap microbes and algae — in a phenomenon known as biofouling — which break down releasing a food-like odour.

This leads to what the researchers are calling an 'olfactory trap', causing them to ingest pieces of plastic waste that can provide to be fatal.


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Turtles eat plastic waste in the ocean because it ends up smelling like food thanks to an algae coating — leading to the animals clogging up their insides, a study found

'It's common to find loggerhead turtles with their digestive systems fully or partially blocked because they've eaten plastic materials,' said paper author and marine scientist Kenneth Lohmann of the University of North Carolina in the US.

'There also are increasing reports of sea turtles that have become ill and stranded on the beach due to their ingestion of plastic.'

Dr Lohmann and colleagues studied the behaviour of 15 young loggerhead turtles that had been brought up in captivity — exploring how the creatures reacted to the smell of turtle food, ocean-soaked plastic, clean plastic and water.

The team found that, in the lab setting, the turtles ignored the scents of both water and clean plastic, but displayed foraging behaviours when exposed to the odours of both food and ocean-soaked plastics.

Such foraging behaviours included repeatedly poking their noses out of the water and increasing their searching activities.


'We found that loggerhead sea turtles respond to odours from biofouled plastics in the same way they respond to food odourants,' said paper author and biologist Joseph Pfaller of the University of Florida.

This, he added, suggests 'that turtles may be attracted to plastic debris not only by the way it looks, but by the way it smells.'

'This "olfactory trap" might help explain why sea turtles ingest and become entangled in plastic so frequently.'

'The plastic problem in the ocean is more complex than plastic bags that look like jellyfish or the errant straw stuck in a turtle's nose.'

'These are important and troubling pieces to the puzzle and all plastics pose dangers to turtles.'

No plastics were consumed during the experiments and the turtles were released into the ocean after the study, the researchers said.


Dr Lohmann and colleagues studied the behaviour of 15 young loggerhead turtles that had been brought up in captivity — exploring how the creatures reacted to the smell of turtle food, ocean-soaked plastic, clean plastic and water. Pictured, a turtle in the study smells the air

The study did not determine the exact nature of the plastic-associated odours that attracted the turtles — but the team believe that dimethyl sulfide, a stinky chemical emitted by algae, could be the culprit.

Further studies will be needed to learn more about the chemicals emitted through biofouling, they added.

However, the team warn that their findings highlight how plastic pollution is putting sea turtles and other marine animals at risk.
Sea turtle found dead because of plastic in its intestine


'One concern this study raises is that dense concentrations of plastics may make turtles — or other species — think an area is an abundant source of food,' said biologist Kenneth Lohmann

'One concern this study raises is that dense concentrations of plastics may make turtles — or other species — think an area is an abundant source of food,' said Dr Lohmann.

'These areas may draw in marine mammals, fish and birds because the area smells like a good foraging ground.'

'Once these plastics are in the ocean, we don't have a good way to remove them or prevent them from smelling like food.'

'The best thing we can do is to keep plastic from getting into the ocean at all.'

The full findings of the study were published in the journal Current Biology.

HOW DOES PLASTIC KILL TURTLES?


Sea turtles live in the ocean and feed on vegetation and algae floating in the waters.

Unfortunately, many pieces of litter discarded by humans pollute these waters and resemble food.

The sea turtles mistake them for nutrition and consume them.

This plastic then enters their digestive tract and causes havoc to the animal's innards.

A study in 2018 found eating a single piece of plastic increases the turtles chance of death.

Researchers found there it caused a one in five chance of death - rising to 50 per cent for 14 pieces.

Turtles have a digestive tract which means they are physically incapable of regurgitation.

Once something has been eaten, it stays in the animal unless it can be defecated.

Once inside the animal, if a piece of plastic covers an organ or blocks a key canal, it can create a fatal blockage.

Plastic blockages stopping the passing of food or faeces can kill turtles, but harder pieces can also inflict fatal internal injuries.