The agony of Colombia's quarantined sex workers

Rodrigo ALMONACID, AFP•April 18, 2020



A Medellin sex worker and her young daughter sort through a food package donation (AFP Photo/Joaquin SARMIENTO)

Bogota (AFP) - Ana Maria broke quarantine rules to make a "home visit," while Estefania left home to sell drugs.

Survival has become a struggle for Colombia's sex workers during the coronavirus pandemic lockdown, as cupboards are bare and bills pile up.

Before the health emergency, they worked on the streets or in brothels in a country where sex work is legal. Now, with half of humanity in confinement and those places off limits, they are struggling on handouts and meager savings.

Neither will suffice, though, and many risk fines or even prison to break the lockdown. Worse still, they're potentially exposing themselves to the virus, which has infected almost 3,500 Colombians and killed more than 150.

"I was in quarantine but I had to go and do a home visit," Ana Maria told AFP.

"What can I do? I can't die of hunger," said the 46-year-old from Facatativa, a town 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the capital Bogota.

With a dwindling supply of gas for cooking, and no more fruits or vegetables in her pantry, she took a taxi to a client's home for an encounter that would earn her $10.

"I couldn't wait... the state help hadn't arrived," said Ana Maria, referring to subsidies promised to vulnerable people.

The lockdown began on March 25 and Ana Maria said she had strictly complied until April 3 when she paid the home visit.

The quarantine is due to last until April 27 at least.

Sometimes she hears knocking at her door, usually a friend with hungry children.

But, "I've nothing" to give, she said.

- 'Critical situation' -

Sometimes Fidelia Suarez's cellphone rings at 2:00 am. On the other end of the line she hears the "desperate" voice of one of the 2,200 members of Colombia's union of sex workers.

"We're in a critical situation," said Suarez, the union's president.

"Some are on the brink of going hungry or of being turned out of their homes because they can't pay the rent," said Suarez, although officially there's a ban on evictions during the lockdown.

Suarez spends her days delivering food to union members in Bogota but the requests outnumber the donations.

She's furious with "the authorities' indifference" and wants "concrete solutions" for the thousands of legal Colombian sex workers.

"They only remember us in times of politicking."

There are more than 7,000 sex workers in Bogota, according to the 2017 census, said Diana Rodriguez, the district secretary for women.

"We're taking action and joining forces so that those engaged in paid sexual activities and abiding to confinement in their homes will benefit" from subsidies of $30-$60, she said.

- Clients 'are afraid' -

Rodriguez said most prostitutes the government has been in contact with are abiding with confinement.

Luz Amparo, 49, doesn't want to infect herself, her two children and four grandchildren whom she lives with. The seven of them live off donations.

"I call friends (clients) but they don't go out, they're afraid," she said.

Some 415 kilometers away in Medellin, Estefania needs money for food, rent for the tiny room she lives in, and to send to her three children.

"Today I have to go out to pay for the room. I owe two days... I don't know how but I need to pay," she said.

The room costs $5.40 a night but the landlord halved it due to the economic crisis caused by the pandemic.

Before the coronavirus arrived in Colombia, 29-year-old Estefania worked at night. In general, she provided services to three clients and went home with $50.

But there are no more clients in the downtown Medellin park she calls an office.

Now she heads out around midday trying to sell candy and drugs. She was almost caught by police.

She was counting down the days for the quarantine to end when the government tacked on an extra couple of weeks.

"I have to pay for a room, food -- there are a lot of problems coming"

Join us April 22nd, 2020 at 10am PDT - 8pm PDT for the Live Event HERE!

FIRST EVER DIGITAL EARTH DAY APRIL 22 / 50TH

We can make a better world for everyone. Tell everyone you know about April 22 and join us at earthday.org. EARTH DAY Today marks the 50th Anniversary of Earth Day, as well as the first ever digital Earth Day. Beginning at 9am ET, join us online, as we flood the world with messages of hope, optimism and, above all, action. Follow along with us and our hosts Ed Begley, Jr., and his daughter, Hayden, on our website for a full day of videos and actions we can all take to better our planet. You’ll be joined by global leaders, activists, actors and musicians, including Pope Francis, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, Former Vice President Al Gore, Zac Efron, Dave Mathews, Jason Mraz, Dr. Sylvia Earle, Christiana Figueres and many more. Join Roger Waters, Valerie Jarrett, Jack Johnson, Najib Saab, Michael Franti, Stephania Giannini, Maya Lin, Ashok Sridharan, Lisa Jackson, Diana Nyad, Kaddu Kiwe Sebunya and Ziggy Marley all live at earthday.org! This year, we act for climate justice. Will you join us? Climate change threatens already vulnerable communities most, and those at risk of climate impacts are those individuals who least contribute to climate change. We’re fighting for a cleaner, safer, more just and sustainable world that protects and supports all of us. The urgency has never been greater, and the stakes have never been higher — we face mass extinction of species, catastrophic pollution of oceans, destruction of communities and displacement of millions. We know that the fight for climate change takes more than a day — it takes a movement. That’s why Earth Day Network works across diverse programs to mobilize citizens on climate action and provide people with new, meaningful ways to act, with campaigns like Vote Earth, Earth Challenge 2020 and the Great Global Cleanup. On #EarthDay2020, we seize all the tools and actions that we have, big and small, to change our lives and change our world, not for one day, but forever. Will you join us? Together, Earth Day Network

Mark Earth Day's 50th birthday with #ClimateStrikeOnline & Amnesty International


Art by Emily Thiessen (@archipelagic)


Today marks the 50th anniversary of Earth Day — a special day to celebrate the world around us, and to join others in calling attention to the urgency of protecting the place we all live.

Our human rights are intertwined with the environment. People need a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment to fully enjoy their human rights, including the rights to life, health, food and water. Other human rights, like the rights to information, freedom of expression and access to justice, are essential for protecting the environment.

We may not be able to meet in person to mark Earth Day, but we can still come together to celebrate and demand action for our planet.

Between today and Friday, April 24, you can support the next big youth-led #ClimateStrikeOnline from home! Here's how: 

Make a climate strike sign
Take a photo of yourself (or with others!) holding the sign 

Post to your favourite social media channel with the hashtags #ClimateStrikeOnline and #DigitalStrike. Be sure to tag @amnestynow!

You can find more details in our Earth Day blog here.

Don't use social media? There are many other ways you can take part!
Put a sign in your window 

Send your photo to members@amnesty.ca. We'll share some online! 

Share this email or our Earth Day blog 

Take action in support of Earth Defenders under attack in Honduras, Colombia and Ecuador with our Spring Activism Guide

For more information and design ideas for your sign please visit globalclimatestrike.net and Amnesty Canada's climate justice page.

Just as putting human rights at the heart of the fight against COVID-19 is crucial, the same is true for the climate crisis. Thank you for using your creativity and energy to speak out together for climate justice. See you at #ClimateStrikeOnline!

NATIONAL FARMERS UNION OF CANADA 

Reading Worth Sharing during COVID-19

NFU members are deep thinkers and great writers.  This email highlights some of their work as well as insightful writing from the NFU office.

The NFU continues to speak on your behalf on daily update calls with the AAFC Minister's office.  We are providing information about Federal programs as they are made available. And -- we continually publish op eds, media releases and other documents to help both the farming community and the general public  understand the critical need for a strong farming sector and local and regional food systems that focus on food sovereignty. 

Contents

*|MC:TOC|*

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Coronavirus: Another layer of anxiety for farmers

In an article in the Journal Pioneer, NFU-PEI District Director, Douglas Campbell, 

"challenges all Islanders to think of ways to engage government and others. We need to stop the viral threat of the industrial model of agriculture to farmers and to the land. Let’s stop saying, “when we get back to normal …” The normal is pretty disastrous for farmers and the land. We can do better than the ‘normal’. Let’s find new ways together."

We extend that challenge across the country.  Thank you, Doug, for your strong writing that captures the unease of farmers "trying to produce food within an impossible model." 

You can read all of Douglas Campbell's article here.  It is good reading and a strong call to action!

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Food and Agriculture – Lessons from the Pandemic

The emergence of viruses in intensive livestock operations over the last 40 years is detailed by NFU member Jean-Eudes Chiasson in his insightful piece published in Acadie Nouvelle presented here.

NFU's Jean-Eudes seeks to:

"raise awareness at this point when quarantine is required, as so many of us have more time to read, to inform ourselves, to consult computerized databases available at our fingertips in order to ask questions about the food system, to discover its mechanisms, and to begin to reflect about the foods we eat, their composition, and where they come from.

Let’s also take this opportunity to think about the use of crop protection products, about their effects on consumers, about the people tasked with applying them, about the composition of fertilizers, their health impacts, as well as on animal health, about soil degradation and, on a broader scale, about everyone’s health.

It is just as important to ask ourselves about methods of production, how animals are treated, and about the farmer’s income so as to subsequently define what we really wish for: how should the food on our plates be produced and who should be the players at the base of our food chain. Let us not forget either to take a serious look at the effects of our food system on the climate.

Jean-Eudes Chiasson, Vice-President of “Ferme Terre Partagée”

This article was originally printed in French in Acadie Nouvelle. Read it in French here.  Thanks to Ronald Fournier for the professional translation.

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Letter to Ag Minister – NFU request for AgriStablity program changes

NFU VP-Operations Stewart Wells calls on AAFC Minister Bibeau to make changes to AgriStability in this letter.  As Stewart says, "Returning to a 15% margin loss trigger and reference margin cap are improvements that can be accomplished and implemented quickly..."

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Cuts to physician funding devastating for rural Alberta

NFU VP-Policy Glenn Norman issued this media release highlighting that rural family practices will lose their doctors under Alberta's April 1 funding cuts.  Indeed, doctors are also speaking out about this looming crisis in this CTV news coverage. 

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In the News

NFU members are in the news while Canada (and the world) wakes up to learn how our food system works. Eaters everywhere are filled with renewed gratitude for farmers who grow/raise/produce the food and a desire to support their local & regional food systems. 

Here are just a few of the recent highlights. 

CBC story on "the next TP": locally grown seeds, which are critical for seed and food sovereignty.  NFU seed farmers, Greta Kryger, Manish Kushwaha, Katherine Rothermel and Annie Richard share the crunch they are under to keep up with orders. (Nice NFU ballcap, Annie!)

The National Observer interviews smaller-scale farmers from across the country re: COVID & Canada's food system. NFU-O's Sarah Bakker speaks hopefully from her farm: “I feel like we're going to come out of this in a new world.”  "“I want to talk about making people able to afford food, not making food affordable.”

An Ottawa Citizen story covers the uncertainty felt by Ottawa direct-to-market farmers as they lose their restaurant contracts.  NFU Youth President Stuart Oke works to have Ottawa-area farmers markets opened and the NFU sends a letter calling for OMAFRA's help to support all farmers markets as they face COVID.

You can follow more news updates on the National Farmers Union (Canada) Facebook group.  You'll be asked a few questions before you can join so we aren't plagued by spammers and trolls.

Inside the hospital sanitizing 2,000 disposable N95 masks for reuse by hospital workers each day

Shira Feder INSIDER•April 20, 2020

Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Masks being sterilized at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

At the Dana–Farber Cancer Institute, a non-profit hospital located in Boston, a team of researchers discovered they could use existing sterilization technology to decontaminate disposable personal protective gear (PPE) for reuse.

They are the only facility in the world sterilizing their N95 masks, face shields, and PAPR hoods in this way.

Using this technology, they can sterilize 2,000 N95 masks in two hours.

As N95 masks ran out across America, Melissa McCullough began to get concerned.

Patients from all over the world come to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston for cancer care, and the non-profit hospital employs over 5,000 people. But without access to the proper personal protective equipment, or PPE, McCullough knew they wouldn't be able to provide that care.

"We recognized that we had a supply chain problem," McCullough, the senior director of Environmental Health and Safety at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, told Insider. "It was becoming particularly obvious to us that the supply chain was broken and it wasn't coming in."

So the research operations team at the hospital decided to test whether disposable N95 masks, used by medical workers to protect themselves from viruses like COVID-19, could be cleaned effectively enough to be reused. Two weeks later, their hunch was confirmed, and Dana-Farber became the only hospital in the world to use ionized hydrogen peroxide technology to sterilize PPE.

On April 20, Dana-Farber will begin decontaminating 2,000 masks a day with a two-hour sterilization process, and each formerly-disposable mask will be able to be reused five times. Here's what the process looks like.

The decontamination system was built into a room in the hospital.

The machine is manufactured by Tomi, an infectious disease control company based in Beverly Hills.
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Prior to the pandemic, the Steramist ionized hydrogen peroxide system was used to sterilize anything coming into the hospital from the outside world, from garbage bags to sensitive experimental materials.

The machine sends a stream of hydrogen peroxide through a plasma arc, and delivers a misting solution of ionized hydrogen peroxide to everything in the room. The system was designed to work with the existing HVAC system, which shuts off when the machine is on, and aerates the room when the process is over.

McCullough doesn't know exactly how much the system costs, as it was built in with the rest of the building, but she says it's not cheap. She estimates that the misting solution alone costs about $250 per 2,000 masks.

The focus is on sterilizing N95 respirators, face shields, and PAPR hoods.

The world is facing an N95 mask shortage.
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

For the experiment, Dana-Farber researchers had to see if the machine would work on face shields, N95 respirators, and PAPR hoods, which are powered air purifying respirators worn over the head. All of these items, which block coronavirus-laced droplets, are in high demand for healthcare workers at hospitals.

"Anyone who's going into a really hot environment with COVID-19 positive patients is wearing either a heavy duty N95 respirator and a face shield or a PAPR," said McCullough.

Researchers only tested the procedure on 12 N95 masks, as McCullough and her core team, who called themselves SEAL Team 9, "were very cognizant of the fact that these were precious materials," she said.

The materials were set up in the room for five days with biological indicators underneath them. If nothing grew on them, SEAL Team 9 would know that the masks had been sterilized.

The respirators had to be sent a testing facility that checked for filtration efficiency, to ensure the mist hadn't affected their ability to filter pathogens.

Ultimately, the team found that the PPE could be safely re-sanitized at least five times.

The system works because hydrogen peroxide reacts with air and turns to water.

There is a small but growing body of N95 decontamination research being conducted.
Dana Farber Cancer Institute

After the decontaminated N95 masks were rolled out, there was some apprehension from Dana-Farber staffers about whether they would really work.

"There was some concern, when you hear something's been treated with a chemical that you're going to put on your face," McCullough said.

Staffers were concerned because breathing in hydrogen peroxide in high concentrations can be damaging. "It kills pathogens, and it can also kill healthy cells," said McCullough. "A 3% hydrogen peroxide solution, you can buy at CVS and gargle. We're taking a 7.8% solution, and putting it into a mist in the air."

This kills pathogens because hydrogen peroxide reacts with air and turns to water and oxygen. "If you've ever left a bottle of hydrogen peroxide open in your medicine cabinet, when you come back, it will all react with air and turn to water," said McCullough.

To protect against residual hydrogen peroxide, McCullough and her team added extra time for the masks to air out.

Many researchers are rushing to find alternate ways to decontaminate N95 masks.

UV light and dry heat can also be used to decontaminate N95 masks.
Dana Farber Cancer Institute

McCullough says most other hospitals wouldn't be capable of doing this procedure, because they don't have a room dedicated to the sterilization of materials.

"You can do small numbers in a biosafety cabinet that's set up, or you can set up a room with a handheld version of the equipment that we have in the room," she said. "You can do this on individual pieces, but the amount of effort that it takes to do 10 pieces is equivalent to the amount of effort it takes for us to do thousand pieces."

Dana-Farber's decontamination system isn't the only one on the market. There's also the Battelle system, which recently received a $415 million contract from the Pentagon, although McCullough noted that their process takes eight hours to Dana-Farber's two.

Duke University has also announced plans to use hydrogen peroxide for mask decontamination at three of its hospitals.

According to the National Institutes of Health, UV light, dry heat, and ethyl alcohol can also be used to sanitize masks.

Hospital cleaners are on the frontlines, too—so why aren't they getting any credit?

Danielle Campoamor, Hello Giggles•April 22, 2020


I’m standing in my kitchen in Brooklyn, New York, diligently stirring a pot of chicken risotto I’m dangerously close to burning, when I hear the sound of New York City’s new 7:00 p.m. ritual: people from their windows, balconies, and stoops, cheering on the healthcare professionals, hospital cleaners, and other essential employees battling the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic that, to date, has killed over 40,000 Americans. Sometimes the cheers are accompanied by songs, like “New York, New York.” Other times the cheers grow louder as an attempt to best the near-constant scream of sirens that permeate throughout the day; an audible act of defiance against a piercing reminder of the loss of lives happening around us.

But like the homemade signs my 5-year-old made that now hang in his bedroom window to show our appreciation to delivery people, sanitation workers, warehouse workers, doctors, nurses, and EMTs, there is one group of people contributing to the front line that are left out of the city’s 7:00 p.m. communal act of recognition: hospital cleaners.

As of April 14th, a reported 27 hospital workers have died from coronavirus (COVID-19), according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). But the CDC’s count only included 16% of the country’s confirmed coronavirus cases. According to The Guardian’s reporting, the number of healthcare workers—including hospital cleaners—who’ve died is likely much higher, and in some states, like Utah, healthcare worker deaths make up 20% of all coronavirus fatalities.

The average yearly salary for an emergency room physician working in the United States is $287,049, and the average salary of a person who cleans hospital rooms in New York City is $33,442 a year. Yet the jobs they do have equal importance during a pandemic: both are on the frontlines, making it possible for people to seek vital care in the midst of a public health crisis that has strained an already broken healthcare system.

Cleaners and physicians are also both exposing themselves and their families to a virus that’s 10 times deadlier than the flu, but one is compensated far more than the other. While this is surely accounting for the work being done by doctors, and the years of intense schooling and training they’ve endured, it’s also a reminder of how little we value the people who make it possible for others—like doctors, nurses, and technicians—to do their jobs.

Hospital cleaners are also heroes !❤️ pic.twitter.com/NpOICG4gD5
— Scarlett Blossom (@mbethe_landile) April 19, 2020

Sadly, the U.S. has a long history of undervaluing and underpaying the very workers we are now desperately depending on. 

For example, the federal government hasn’t raised the national minimum wage since 2009. Instead of making expansions and allowances for things like hazard pay, the federal government is bailing out CEOs and billionaire moguls as they enjoy the comfort of their quarantine yachts. 

Shake Shack gave back their $10 million government loan, because it’s unnecessary, and during his daily coronavirus press conference President Donald Trump claimed Harvard would be returning their $8.7 million coronavirus federal aid, saying, “They shouldn’t be taking it. When I saw Harvard—they have one of the largest saw endowments anywhere in the country, maybe the world. They’re going to pay back the money.” The richest among us are making promises they cannot keep—like Elon Musk, who pledged 1,000 ventilators to the state of California but never delivered.

 Meanwhile, the people who barely make enough to keep up with the rising cost of living go to work and put their own health at risk to ensure people who are sick are cared for, and those who provide that care can do so safely, adequately, and as frequently as is necessary.

So if the doctors, nurses, and technicians are truly on the front lines, then the 4.4 million janitors and other hospital sanitation workers are the foundation on which they stand.

They’re entering “red zones” during a nationwide shortage of personal protective equipment. They’re not only exposing themselves to the coronavirus, but to industrial-strength cleaning products and other sanitizers that can also be hazardous to their health. And somehow, they’re still smiling under their masks as they enter a room where patients are left to fight against a virus without a family member or friend by their side.

The majority of healthcare workers are women, and over 70% of healthcare workers who’ve contracted coronavirus are women. Many of the healthcare workers are also immigrants. For instance, Hunter Walker, a white house correspondent for Yahoo News, shared via Twitter a picture of his mother-in-law, a hospital cleaner from Peru, which she had posted online. In the post, she said, “This is my chance to thank New York for making my family’s dreams come true,” and shared a picture of her in full protective gear.
My mother-in-law is an immigrant from Peru working as a hospital cleaner near the center of the #coronavirus crisis in Westchester NY. She posted this photo and said, "This is my chance to thank New York for making my family's dreams come true." I love her a lot and am so proud. pic.twitter.com/fSuWt4MFVJ
— Hunter Walker (@hunterw) April 4, 2020

It would be wrong to say these hospital cleaners and other front-line workers who are often overlooked—like public transportation workers, sanitation workers, warehouse employees, delivery drivers—are simply exposing themselves and potentially those they love to a deadly virus because they feel a moral obligation to give back to their communities. While that is undoubtedly true to some extent, continuing to work is also a necessity for many of these employees, and a one-time $1,200 check from the government will not suffice to keep them afloat. Undocumented immigrants won’t even receive a check. (Unless they live in California, where the state is giving their own stimulus checks to undocumented immigrants.)

Hospital cleaners deserve more than recognition and more than our nightly applause. They deserve hazard pay, which could increase their salaries by as much as $25,000. They deserve affordable health care that isn’t tethered to their employment status, paid sick leave and time off, and universal child care so that they can continue to protect their families when their shifts end.

But for right now, I guess taking the time to remember those who’s cleaning our hospitals every night at 7:00 p.m. is, at the very least, a start.

Cuomo calls on the federal government to provide hazard pay to frontline workers: 'Give them a 50% bonus'

Business Insider•April 20, 2020

Cuomo called on the federal government to provide hazard pay to frontline workers.
Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images
At a press briefing on Monday, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called on the federal government to provide hazard pay to frontline workers, including hospital workers, transit employees, and those in the food service industry.

"Pay them what they deserve," Cuomo said. "Give them a 50% bonus."

Pointing to the high infection rates among black and Latino communities, Cuomo said that those numbers can be partly attributed to 40% of frontline workers being people of color.

As New York is seeing the spread of the coronavirus curb within its borders, the frontline workers responsible for running hospitals, food services, and transit while the rest of the state has been on lockdown should be rewarded, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Monday.

At a press briefing, Cuomo proposed that the federal stimulus plan should include hazard pay for frontline workers, many of whom are people of color.

"Thanks is nice, but also recognition of their efforts and their sacrifice is also appropriate," Cuomo said. "They are the ones that are carrying us through this crisis, and this crisis is not over."

New York has seen lower hospitalization rates and fewer deaths from the coronavirus in recent days, pointing to the possibility that the state could be coming up on the other side of the virus' curve. Still, the state remains by far the epicenter of the coronavirus in the US in terms of the confirmed number of patients with COVID-19. New York had more than 248,000 cases as of Monday morning.

And the number of New Yorkers dying from the disease is still "horrifically high," Cuomo said. At least 478 COVID-19 patients in the state died on Sunday — 22 fewer than the day before. The total number of deaths in the state has risen to 12,654, according to Johns Hopkins.

'Pay them what they deserve'

About 40% of frontline workers are people of color, Cuomo said. In certain industries that number is higher. In public transit, that number is 45%, and among building workers, it's 57%.

"Two-thirds of those frontline workers are women. One-third come from low-income households," Cuomo said.

"Pay them what they deserve," he added. "Give them a 50% bonus."
—Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) April 20, 2020

"When you were home with your doors locked, dealing with cabin fever, they were out there dealing with the coronavirus, and that's why they are more infected," he went on.

These People Aren’t Freedom Fighters—They’re Virus-Spreading Sociopaths
The “liberate America” protesters claim they just want to make their own choices about their health and safety, but they really want to force others to risk their lives.

By Elie Mystal APRIL 21, 2020 THE NATION

ITS TIME TO GET BACK TO WORK IS PAINTED ON BACK OF TRUCKMen carrying a guns take part in a “reopen Pennsylvania” 

demonstration on April 20, 2020. (Nicholas Kamm / AFP via Getty Images)
WORK MAKES  YOU FREE

I’m going to make a confession: I am half inclined to let the fringe Republicans agitating to “liberate” America go out and catch Covid-19 and die in whatever way seems best to them. Safely ensconced in my house, living under the protection of a Democratic governor, I am not required to care about maskless fools in Ohio, frosting the statehouse windows with their communicable diseases.

In related news: I’ve never once cared about a recreational mountain climber who goes missing halfway up Mount Killayadumass. You pays your money, you takes your chances.

And yet, I care about the sherpas. I care about the impoverished community of workers who make their living propping up the rugged individualist fantasies of richer people, and who sometimes die in the process of making the mountain-climbing economy work.


It takes a village to climb a mountain, or to “open” an economy. The “liberate America” protesters—and calling them “protesters” is being generous to the small band of fake-news enthusiasts who have been deployed in battleground states to fight this newest front in the culture wars—seem to be under the impression that individual hardiness can protect them from Covid-19 and jump-start the economy. They claim to want the freedom to make their own choices about their health and safety during the pandemic, but what they really want is to force other people to risk their lives so the economy can rebound.

These protesters act like all they want is the liberty to, say, go to a baseball game this summer—without a mask, if that’s what their freedom-confederacy demands. But think about how many people will be forced to play by Republican death-cult rules if we reopen the stadiums. Concession stand workers and parking attendants will have to go back out in public, whether they feel safe or not, with or without access to personal protective equipment. Transit workers who are already feeling the brunt of keeping the “essential” economy going will be pressed into game-day schedules to shuttle people to and from the stadium. Police officers will be pulled off of more important duties to go to the ballpark and keep the peace. The only people who will have a “choice” about whether or not to risk their health are the fans, and most of the people protesting only want the stadiums open so they can catch a game on television.

It’s not just sports. There will be a disparate impact on the people who have to do the work versus the people who will benefit from the work in every industry Republicans are able to bully into reopening. Consumers will retain the freedom to make choices about where they’ll be most safe, but workers will lose that freedom.

Even David Frum understands that the health burden of reopening the economy will fall most heavily on the poorest workers who are the least able to protect themselves. Writing in The Atlantic, he points out that
if the reopening starts in May, it will be phased not by medical advice, but by the hard grammar of wealth and poverty: poorest first, richest last.

In the event of an early and partial reopening, the disparities can only widen. Those who can telecommute, who can shop online, or who work for health-conscious employers like public universities will be better positioned to minimize their exposure than those called back to work in factories, plants, and delivery services.

That’s not liberty; that’s wage slavery. People who cannot risk missing a paycheck or losing a job will be forced to risk their health, while people who can afford to shelter in place a little longer will have the “freedom” to do so.

That these protesters are couching their demand to force people back to work in the language of patriotism is a sick joke. Patriotism contemplates sacrificing your individual desires for the good of the country. Patriotism involves the idea of solidarity and self-sacrifice in the face of national danger.

But these protesters aren’t willing to sacrifice anything for the greater social good. They are literally unwilling to wear masks to help keep other Americans healthy, even when those other Americans are their fellow protesters. They are not willing to stay home to ease the burden on hero health care workers. They are not interested in channeling their cavalier attitude about being outside into ministering to the poor or the lonely, or even to cheering on first responders who are trying, with both hands, to keep communities together. All these people can think to do with all the time they evidently have on their hands is to tie up traffic and bitch and moan.

These people are not “patriots.” They’re punks. They’re selfish punks who spent all of their time pre-virus tooting about how they didn’t need to contribute to society in the form of taxes, and how they could hold out for years in their doomsday bunkers. But it turns out they couldn’t last four weeks without public meeting places and double-ply toilet paper.


None of this right-wing lunacy can be considered surprising if you consider its source. After all, these are the same so-called freedom-loving individuals who want the government to have so much power it can outlaw a woman’s autonomy over her own body. In The New York Times, Charlie Warzel called the “liberate” protests “the logical conclusion of the modern far-right’s donor-funded, shock jock–led liberty movement.”

The freedom to die is the only form of liberty Republicans want their base thinking about. And Covid-19 is only the latest pathogen. These people also want the freedom to die in mass shootings; the freedom to die from not being able to afford medicine; the freedom to not take the vaccines they can afford; and the freedom to drive 90 mph on a highway with no seat belt, without “the government” telling them to slow their roll.

It’s easy for these people to write off the death of 2 to 3 percent of the country’s population as an “appetizing” “trade-off,” because right-wing media has already conditioned these people to think that the death or suffering of millions is an acceptable price for Republican economic and social policies. These are the people who derisively call food assistance a government handout that’s bleeding the richest nation on earth, and who think women and children fleeing oppression and trauma are faking it. These are the people who oppose universal health coverage that doesn’t give a cut to insurance companies. These are the people who consistently vote against their own economic interests based on the mere promise that racial minorities will get it worse.

It’s a shame that the people most willing to defy social distancing are the least empathetic among us. Because people really concerned about freedom for everybody have a lot of reasons to take to the streets right now. We should be pressuring the government, demanding it provide the financial resources that would allow people to make their own choices about their health and safety. Nobody who can work from home should be forced back to work to chase a paycheck. Nobody who is sick should be forced out of their homes to work to make rent. People who have been laid off because of the pandemic need the full social safety net, including forbearance on rents and mortgages for the foreseeable future.

We ask soldiers and firefighters and reality TV crab fishermen to risk their lives to go to work. Nobody working at a damn chicken plant should be asked to make the same choice.

Philosophically, I’m okay with right-wing agitators’ going out there and getting the coronavirus at a protest, if they want to. Maybe I’m a bad person, but I just don’t have the emotional energy to care about the latest wound Republicans have decided to self-inflict in their never-ending quest to “own the libs.”

But they must not be allowed to infect everybody else. My freedom to live is every bit as important as their freedom to die.


Elie Mystal is The Nation’s Justice Correspondent—covering the courts, the criminal justice system, and politics—and the force behind the magazine’s monthly column “Objection!” He is also an Alfred Knobler Fellow at the Type Media Center. He can be followed @ElieNYC.

CURIOUSER AND CURIOUSER
Director of U.S. agency key to vaccine development leaves role suddenly amid coronavirus pandemic


By NICHOLAS FLORKO APRIL 21, 2020

Rick BrightHHS

WASHINGTON — Rick Bright, one of the nation’s leading vaccine development experts and the director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, is no longer leading the organization, officials told STAT.

The shakeup at the agency, known as BARDA, couldn’t come at a more inopportune time for the office, which invests in drugs, devices, and other technologies that help address infectious disease outbreaks and which has been at the center of the government’s coronavirus pandemic response.

Bright, whose departure was confirmed by three industry sources and two current Trump administration sources, will instead move into a narrower role at the National Institutes of Health. Gary Disbrow, Bright’s former deputy at BARDA, will serve as the acting director of the office, an HHS spokesperson confirmed to STAT.

BARDA was expected to play an even larger role in the coming months; Congress more than tripled BARDA’s budget in the most recent coronavirus stimulus package. Already, the office has a role in some of the splashiest Covid-19 projects, including partnerships with Johnson & Johnson and Moderna Therapeutics, both of which are developing potential Covid-19 treatments.

BARDA has been plagued with management issues virtually since its creation in 2006, with much of the criticism aimed at a contracting department that some say is unresponsive to industry partners. The office has only had two permanent directors since its creation in 2006. Bright has led the organization since 2016.

The BARDA director position is not a Senate-confirmed position. It reports directly to the HHS assistant secretary for preparedness and response.

None of the sources articulated the reason for Bright’s departure, though several mentioned recent chafing between Bright and Bob Kadlec, the current HHS assistant secretary for preparedness and response.

An HHS spokesperson confirmed that Bright will begin working out of NIH. An NIH spokesperson later clarified that Bright will work on diagnostics.

“Dr. Rick Bright will transfer the skills he has applied as Director of the [BARDA] to the [NIH]. … Dr. Bright brings extensive experience and expertise in facilitating powerful public-private partnerships that advance the health and well-being of the American people,” the HHS spokesperson said.

Bright did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Bright’s career has largely centered around vaccine and drug development. His work at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention focused on influenza viruses, antiviral drugs and tests. He has also worked in the biotechnology industry and served as an advisor to the World Health Organization. Before becoming BARDA director, he led the agency’s Influenza and Emerging Infectious Diseases Division.

Lev Facher contributed reporting.

Correction: An earlier version of this story suggested Bright would oversee an NIH public-private partnership; An NIH spokeswoman later said he will not be involved with that effort.

About the Author
Nicholas Florko
Washington correspondent
Nicholas Florko is a Washington correspondent for STAT, reporting on the the intersection of politics and health policy. He is the author the newsletter "D.C. Diagnosis."
nicholas.florko@statnews.com
@NicholasFlorko


COMMENTS

I thought he had such a bright future at the agency
Michael Welch
APRIL 21, 2020 AT 4:05 PM


I’m sure Andy Slavitt will have something to say about this on Twitter.
Maya Ayala
APRIL 21, 2020 AT 3:54 PM


It would be nice if the federal government funded research at universities — both funding programs and especially scholarships for post-graduate research students. Such funding should be contingent upon the university not retaining a patent on those findings. The feds should make that information available for ALL companies to develop treatments for medical purposes.
Jim Croft
APRIL 21, 2020 AT 3:49 PM


So a good civil servant is a wasteful one. Was Edison or Salk greedy ?
Congress couldn’t oversight a lemonade stand let alone something complicated like keeping liter off the streets.
Penn Gwinn
APRIL 21, 2020 AT 3:41 PM


“splashiest Covid-19 projects, including partnerships with Johnson & Johnson and Moderna Therapeutics, ”
Maybe BARDA should invest in University research projects that aren’t so interested in profits, but in learning, research and finding a solution to the problem without profit in mind.
Tim Cole
APRIL 21, 2020 AT 3:35 PM


I hate to see a good civil servant sidelined by Bob Kadlec’s insatiable greed. Where the hell is the Congressional oversight?
Tony
APRIL 21, 2020 AT 4:15 PM


. . . absent . . . I am getting the feeling that the American people have allowed our complacency to be abused by “our elected servants” and those “servants” know it . . .

April 21 (UPI) -- On this date in history:

In 1509, Henry VIII became king of England after his father, Henry VII, died.

In 1836, with the battle cry "Remember the Alamo!" Texas forces under Sam Houston defeated the army of Mexican Gen. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna at San Jacinto, Texas, opening the path to Texas independence.

In 1913, California state Sen. Ernest S. Birdsall of Placer County stated in an interview with United Press that the citizens of California demanded the prohibition of "aliens ineligible for citizenship" from owning farm land. The California Alien Land Law of 1913 was aimed at discouraging immigration to the state.

In 1918, Manfred von Richthofen, German World War I flying ace known as "The Red Baron," was killed by Allied fire over Vaux-sur-Somme, France.

In 1954, U.S. Air Force planes began flying French troops to Indochina to reinforce Dien Bien Phu. The city later fell to communist Viet Minh forces.

In 1960, Brasilia was inaugurated as Brazil's capital, moving the seat of government from Rio de Janeiro.

In 1967, a Greek army coup in Athens sent King Constantine into exile in Italy.

In 1975, Nguyen Van Thieu resigned as president of South Vietnam after denouncing the United States as untrustworthy. His replacement, Tran Van Huong, prepared for peace talks with North Vietnam as communist forces advanced on Saigon.


UPI File Photo

In 1987, the bombing of a bus terminal in Colombo, Sri Lanka, killed 127 people and injured 288.

In 1992, gas explosions ripped through the historic center of Guadalajara, Mexico, killing more than 200 people and injuring hundreds of others.

In 2005, the U.S. Senate approved the nomination of John Negroponte to be the nation's first national intelligence director.


File Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI

In 2008, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced a link had been found between contaminated drug thinners from China and 81 deaths in the United States.

In 2011, John Ensign, R-Nev., resigned his U.S. Senate seat amid a budding ethics scandal. Ensign admitted an affair with his former campaign treasurer earlier and had been under Republican pressure to step down.

In 2017, a Taliban attack on Camp Shaheen near Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, left more than 100 Afghan soldiers dead and dozens injured.

In 2019, comedian Volodymyr Zelensky defeated incumbent President Petro Poroshenko in Ukraine's presidential runoff election.

File Photo by Stepan Franko/EPA-EFE