BOOK: Reconsidering value and labour in the digital age
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Fetishism and Revolution in the Critique of Political Economy. Critical Reflections on some Contemporary Readings of Marx’s Capital - Continental Thought and Theory, Volume 1, Issue 4, pp. 365-398, 2017
2017, CONTINENTAL THOUGHT & THEORY: A JOURNAL OF INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM
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USA BEST HEALTHCARE MONEY CAN BUY
Long-term complications of COVID-19 signals billions in healthcare costs ahead
Caroline Humer, Nick Brown, Emilio Parodi
Long-term complications of COVID-19 signals billions in healthcare costs ahead
Caroline Humer, Nick Brown, Emilio Parodi
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Late in March, Laura Gross, 72, was recovering from gall bladder surgery in her Fort Lee, New Jersey, home when she became sick again.
Laura Gross looks out from her balcony in Fort Lee, New Jersey, U.S., July 31, 2020. Picture taken July 31, 2020. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
Her throat, head and eyes hurt, her muscles and joints ached and she felt like she was in a fog. Her diagnosis was COVID-19. Four months later, these symptoms remain.
Gross sees a primary care doctor and specialists including a cardiologist, pulmonologist, endocrinologist, neurologist, and gastroenterologist.
“I’ve had a headache since April. I’ve never stopped running a low-grade temperature,” she said.
Studies of COVID-19 patients keep uncovering new complications associated with the disease.
With mounting evidence that some COVID-19 survivors face months, or possibly years, of debilitating complications, healthcare experts are beginning to study possible long-term costs.
Bruce Lee of the City University of New York (CUNY) Public School of Health estimated that if 20% of the U.S. population contracts the virus, the one-year post-hospitalization costs would be at least $50 billion, before factoring in longer-term care for lingering health problems. Without a vaccine, if 80% of the population became infected, that cost would balloon to $204 billion.
Some countries hit hard by the new coronavirus - including the United States, Britain and Italy - are considering whether these long-term effects can be considered a “post-COVID syndrome,” according to Reuters interviews with about a dozen doctors and health economists.
Some U.S. and Italian hospitals have created centers devoted to the care of these patients and are standardizing follow-up measures.
Britain’s Department of Health and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are each leading national studies of COVID-19’s long-term impacts. An international panel of doctors will suggest standards for mid- and long-term care of recovered patients to the World Health Organization (WHO) in August.
YEARS BEFORE THE COST IS KNOWN
More than 17 million people have been infected by the new coronavirus worldwide, about a quarter of them in the United States.
Healthcare experts say it will be years before the costs for those who have recovered can be fully calculated, not unlike the slow recognition of HIV, or the health impacts to first responders of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.
They stem from COVID-19’s toll on multiple organs, including heart, lung and kidney damage that will likely require costly care, such as regular scans and ultrasounds, as well as neurological deficits that are not yet fully understood.
A JAMA Cardiology study found that in one group of COVID-19 patients in Germany aged 45 to 53, more than 75% suffered from heart inflammation, raising the possibility of future heart failure.
A Kidney International study found that over a third of COVID-19 patients in a New York medical system developed acute kidney injury, and nearly 15% required dialysis.
Dr. Marco Rizzi in Bergamo, Italy, an early epicenter of the pandemic, said the Giovanni XXIII Hospital has seen close to 600 COVID-19 patients for follow-up. About 30% have lung issues, 10% have neurological problems, 10% have heart issues and about 9% have lingering motor skill problems. He co-chairs the WHO panel that will recommend long-term follow-up for patients.
“On a global level, nobody knows how many will still need checks and treatment in three months, six months, a year,” Rizzi said, adding that even those with mild COVID-19 “may have consequences in the future.”
Milan’s San Raffaele Hospital has seen more than 1,000 COVID-19 patients for follow-up. While major cardiology problems there were few, about 30% to 40% of patients have neurological problems and at least half suffer from respiratory conditions, according to Dr. Moreno Tresoldi.
Some of these long-term effects have only recently emerged, too soon for health economists to study medical claims and make accurate estimates of costs.
In Britain and Italy, those costs would be borne by their respective governments, which have committed to funding COVID-19 treatments but have offered few details on how much may be needed.
In the United States, more than half of the population is covered by private health insurers, an industry that is just beginning to estimate the cost of COVID-19.
CUNY’s Lee estimated the average one-year cost of a U.S. COVID-19 patient after they have been discharged from the hospital at $4,000, largely due to the lingering issues from acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), which affects some 40% of patients, and sepsis.
The estimate spans patients who had been hospitalized with moderate illness to the most severe cases, but does not include other potential complications, such as heart and kidney damage.
Even those who do not require hospitalization have average one-year costs after their initial illness of $1,000, Lee estimated.
Slideshow (2 Images)
‘HARD JUST TO GET UP’
Extra costs from lingering effects of COVID-19 could mean higher health insurance premiums in the United States. Some health plans have already raised 2021 premiums on comprehensive coverage by up to 8% due to COVID-19, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Anne McKee, 61, a retired psychologist who lives in Knoxville, Tennessee and Atlanta, had multiple sclerosis and asthma when she became infected nearly five months ago. She is still struggling to catch her breath.
“On good days, I can do a couple loads of laundry, but the last several days, it’s been hard just to get up and get a drink from the kitchen,” she said.
She has spent more than $5,000 on appointments, tests and prescription drugs during that time. Her insurance has paid more than $15,000 including $240 for a telehealth appointment and $455 for a lung scan.
“Many of the issues that arise from having a severe contraction of a disease could be 3, 5, 20 years down the road,” said Dale Hall, Managing Director of Research with the Society of Actuaries.
To understand the costs, U.S. actuaries compare insurance records of coronavirus patients against people with a similar health profile but no COVID-19, and follow them for years.
The United Kingdom aims to track the health of 10,000 hospitalized COVID-19 patients over the first 12 months after being discharged and potentially as long as 25 years. Scientists running the study see the potential for defining a long-term COVID-19 syndrome, as they found with Ebola survivors in Africa.
“Many people, we believe will have scarring in the lungs and fatigue ... and perhaps vascular damage to the brain, perhaps, psychological distress as well,” said Professor Calum Semple from the University of Liverpool.
Margaret O’Hara, 50, who works at a Birmingham hospital is one of many COVID-19 patients who will not be included in the study because she had mild symptoms and was not hospitalized. But recurring health issues, including extreme shortness of breath, has kept her out of work.
O’Hara worries patients like her are not going to be included in the country’s long-term cost planning.
“We’re going to need ... expensive follow-up for quite a long time,” she said.
Laura Gross looks out from her balcony in Fort Lee, New Jersey, U.S., July 31, 2020. Picture taken July 31, 2020. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
Her throat, head and eyes hurt, her muscles and joints ached and she felt like she was in a fog. Her diagnosis was COVID-19. Four months later, these symptoms remain.
Gross sees a primary care doctor and specialists including a cardiologist, pulmonologist, endocrinologist, neurologist, and gastroenterologist.
“I’ve had a headache since April. I’ve never stopped running a low-grade temperature,” she said.
Studies of COVID-19 patients keep uncovering new complications associated with the disease.
With mounting evidence that some COVID-19 survivors face months, or possibly years, of debilitating complications, healthcare experts are beginning to study possible long-term costs.
Bruce Lee of the City University of New York (CUNY) Public School of Health estimated that if 20% of the U.S. population contracts the virus, the one-year post-hospitalization costs would be at least $50 billion, before factoring in longer-term care for lingering health problems. Without a vaccine, if 80% of the population became infected, that cost would balloon to $204 billion.
Some countries hit hard by the new coronavirus - including the United States, Britain and Italy - are considering whether these long-term effects can be considered a “post-COVID syndrome,” according to Reuters interviews with about a dozen doctors and health economists.
Some U.S. and Italian hospitals have created centers devoted to the care of these patients and are standardizing follow-up measures.
Britain’s Department of Health and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are each leading national studies of COVID-19’s long-term impacts. An international panel of doctors will suggest standards for mid- and long-term care of recovered patients to the World Health Organization (WHO) in August.
YEARS BEFORE THE COST IS KNOWN
More than 17 million people have been infected by the new coronavirus worldwide, about a quarter of them in the United States.
Healthcare experts say it will be years before the costs for those who have recovered can be fully calculated, not unlike the slow recognition of HIV, or the health impacts to first responders of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York.
They stem from COVID-19’s toll on multiple organs, including heart, lung and kidney damage that will likely require costly care, such as regular scans and ultrasounds, as well as neurological deficits that are not yet fully understood.
A JAMA Cardiology study found that in one group of COVID-19 patients in Germany aged 45 to 53, more than 75% suffered from heart inflammation, raising the possibility of future heart failure.
A Kidney International study found that over a third of COVID-19 patients in a New York medical system developed acute kidney injury, and nearly 15% required dialysis.
Dr. Marco Rizzi in Bergamo, Italy, an early epicenter of the pandemic, said the Giovanni XXIII Hospital has seen close to 600 COVID-19 patients for follow-up. About 30% have lung issues, 10% have neurological problems, 10% have heart issues and about 9% have lingering motor skill problems. He co-chairs the WHO panel that will recommend long-term follow-up for patients.
“On a global level, nobody knows how many will still need checks and treatment in three months, six months, a year,” Rizzi said, adding that even those with mild COVID-19 “may have consequences in the future.”
Milan’s San Raffaele Hospital has seen more than 1,000 COVID-19 patients for follow-up. While major cardiology problems there were few, about 30% to 40% of patients have neurological problems and at least half suffer from respiratory conditions, according to Dr. Moreno Tresoldi.
Some of these long-term effects have only recently emerged, too soon for health economists to study medical claims and make accurate estimates of costs.
In Britain and Italy, those costs would be borne by their respective governments, which have committed to funding COVID-19 treatments but have offered few details on how much may be needed.
In the United States, more than half of the population is covered by private health insurers, an industry that is just beginning to estimate the cost of COVID-19.
CUNY’s Lee estimated the average one-year cost of a U.S. COVID-19 patient after they have been discharged from the hospital at $4,000, largely due to the lingering issues from acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), which affects some 40% of patients, and sepsis.
The estimate spans patients who had been hospitalized with moderate illness to the most severe cases, but does not include other potential complications, such as heart and kidney damage.
Even those who do not require hospitalization have average one-year costs after their initial illness of $1,000, Lee estimated.
Slideshow (2 Images)
‘HARD JUST TO GET UP’
Extra costs from lingering effects of COVID-19 could mean higher health insurance premiums in the United States. Some health plans have already raised 2021 premiums on comprehensive coverage by up to 8% due to COVID-19, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.
Anne McKee, 61, a retired psychologist who lives in Knoxville, Tennessee and Atlanta, had multiple sclerosis and asthma when she became infected nearly five months ago. She is still struggling to catch her breath.
“On good days, I can do a couple loads of laundry, but the last several days, it’s been hard just to get up and get a drink from the kitchen,” she said.
She has spent more than $5,000 on appointments, tests and prescription drugs during that time. Her insurance has paid more than $15,000 including $240 for a telehealth appointment and $455 for a lung scan.
“Many of the issues that arise from having a severe contraction of a disease could be 3, 5, 20 years down the road,” said Dale Hall, Managing Director of Research with the Society of Actuaries.
To understand the costs, U.S. actuaries compare insurance records of coronavirus patients against people with a similar health profile but no COVID-19, and follow them for years.
The United Kingdom aims to track the health of 10,000 hospitalized COVID-19 patients over the first 12 months after being discharged and potentially as long as 25 years. Scientists running the study see the potential for defining a long-term COVID-19 syndrome, as they found with Ebola survivors in Africa.
“Many people, we believe will have scarring in the lungs and fatigue ... and perhaps vascular damage to the brain, perhaps, psychological distress as well,” said Professor Calum Semple from the University of Liverpool.
Margaret O’Hara, 50, who works at a Birmingham hospital is one of many COVID-19 patients who will not be included in the study because she had mild symptoms and was not hospitalized. But recurring health issues, including extreme shortness of breath, has kept her out of work.
O’Hara worries patients like her are not going to be included in the country’s long-term cost planning.
“We’re going to need ... expensive follow-up for quite a long time,” she said.
Analysis: Often on brink, Lebanon headed toward collapse
By ZEINA KARAM
1 of 7 https://apnews.com/dfd6b687da750f7f7c971e04a2bb0daf
A gas station workers gestures as he saying no fuel at the station, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, July 29, 2020. Lebanon is hurtling toward a tipping point at an alarming speed, driven by financial ruin, collapsing institutions, hyperinflation and rapidly rising poverty _ with a pandemic on top of that. The collapse threatens to break a nation seen as a model of diversity and resilience in the Arab world. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
BEIRUT (AP) — Power cuts that last up to 20 hours a day. Mountains of trash spilling into streets. Long lines at gas stations.
It may seem like a standard summer in Lebanon, a country used to wrestling with crumbling infrastructure as it vaults from one disaster to another.
Only this time, it’s different, Every day brings darker signs Lebanon has rarely seen in past crises: Mass layoffs, hospitals threatened with closure, shuttered shops and restaurants, crimes driven by desperation, a military that can no longer afford to feed its soldiers meat and warehouses that sell expired poultry.
Lebanon is hurtling toward a tipping point at an alarming speed, driven by financial ruin, collapsing institutions, hyperinflation and rapidly rising poverty — with a pandemic on top of that.
On Monday, the country’s foreign minister resigned, warning that a lack of vision and a will to implement structural reforms risked turning the country into a “failed state.”
The collapse threatens to break a nation seen as a model of diversity and resilience in the Arab world and potentially open the door to chaos. Lebanese worry about a decline so steep it would forever alter the small Mediterranean country’s identity and entrepreneurial spirit, unparalleled in the Middle East.
In the past, Lebanon has been able to in part blame its turmoil on outsiders. With 18 religious sects, a weak central government and far more powerful neighbors, it has always been caught in regional rivalries leading to political paralysis, violence or both. Its 1975-90 civil war made the word “Beirut” synonymous with war’s devastation and produced a generation of warlords-turned-politicians that Lebanon hasn’t been able to shake off to this day.
Since the war ended, the country has suffered a Syrian occupation, repeated conflict with Israel, bouts of sectarian fighting, political assassinations and various economic crises, as well as an influx of more than a million refugees from neighboring Syria’s civil war. The presence of the powerful Shiite group Hezbollah — a proxy army for Iran created in the 1980s to fight Israel’s occupation — ensures the country is always caught up in the struggle for supremacy by regional superpowers Iran and Saudi Arabia.
But the current crisis is largely of Lebanon’s own making; a culmination of decades of corruption and greed by a political class that pillaged nearly every sector of the economy.
For years, the country drifted along, miraculously avoiding collapse even as it accumulated one of the world’s heaviest public debt burdens. The sectarian power-sharing system allotted top posts according to sect rather than qualifications, which in turn allowed politicians to survive by engaging in cronyism and patronage for their communities.
“One of the problems in Lebanon is that corruption has been democratized, it’s not sitting centrally with one man. It’s all over,” says Marwan Muasher, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“Every sect has a sector of the economy that it controls and draws money from, so that it can keep their sect happy,” he said in a recent talk organized by the Center for Global Policy.
The troubles came to a head in late 2019, when nationwide protests erupted over the government’s intention to levy a tax on the WhatsApp messaging app, seen as the final straw for people fed up with their politicians. The protests touched off a two-week bank closure followed by a run on the banks and then informal capital controls that limited dollar currency withdrawals or transfers.
Amid a shortage in foreign currency, the Lebanese pound has shed 80% of its value on the black market, and prices for basic food items and other goods have seen a meteoric rise. Savings have evaporated, plunging many into sudden poverty.
Lebanon’s fall “represents an epic collapse with a generational impact,” wrote Maha Yehia, director of the Carnegie Middle East Center.
The pillars that long sustained Lebanon are crumbling, including its trademark freedoms and role as a tourism and financial services hub, and wiping out its middle class, she wrote in a recent analysis.
Left on its own, Lebanon could within months reach a point where it can no longer secure needs for its citizens like fuel, electricity, internet or even basic food.
Already, there are signs of the country being pushed toward a hunger crisis. Fears of a breakdown in security are real. The purchasing power of an ordinary soldiers’ salary has declined in dollar terms from around $900 to $150 a month. Public sector employees have similarly seen their salaries wiped out.
Unlike in previous crises when oil-rich Arab nations and international donors came to the rescue, Lebanon this time stands very much alone.
Not only is the world preoccupied with their own economic crises, traditional friends of Lebanon are no longer willing to help a country so steeped in corruption, particularly after the state defaulted on its debt in April. Moreover, the country is led by a Hezbollah-supported government, making it even more unlikely that Gulf countries would come to the rescue.
Lebanon’s only hope is an IMF bailout, but months of negotiations have led nowhere.
The French foreign minister, on a recent trip to Beirut, could not have been clearer that there would be no assistance for Lebanon before credible reform measures are taken. “Help us to help you!” he repeated.
The words appear to have fallen largely on deaf ears. Lebanese politicians can’t agree on the size of the government’s losses, much less carry out reforms to end the corruption from which they profit.
A complete breakdown of Lebanon threatens the wider region, potentially leading to security vacuums that could be exploited by extremists.
Writing in Washington-based The Hill newspaper, Mona Yaacoubian, senior adviser to the vice president for Middle East and Africa at the U.S. Institute of Peace, said a total meltdown in Lebanon could also provoke new refugee flows to Europe and add yet more turmoil to the arc of instability stretching from Syria through Iraq, with negative implications for U.S. allies in the region.
Given the stakes, the United States cannot afford to ignore Lebanon’s impending collapse, she argues.
“Lebanon is rapidly spiraling toward the worst-case scenario: a failed state on the eastern Mediterranean.”
___
EDITOR’S NOTE: Zeina Karam, the news director for Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, has covered the Middle East since 1996. Follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/zkaram.
By ZEINA KARAM
1 of 7 https://apnews.com/dfd6b687da750f7f7c971e04a2bb0daf
A gas station workers gestures as he saying no fuel at the station, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, July 29, 2020. Lebanon is hurtling toward a tipping point at an alarming speed, driven by financial ruin, collapsing institutions, hyperinflation and rapidly rising poverty _ with a pandemic on top of that. The collapse threatens to break a nation seen as a model of diversity and resilience in the Arab world. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
BEIRUT (AP) — Power cuts that last up to 20 hours a day. Mountains of trash spilling into streets. Long lines at gas stations.
It may seem like a standard summer in Lebanon, a country used to wrestling with crumbling infrastructure as it vaults from one disaster to another.
Only this time, it’s different, Every day brings darker signs Lebanon has rarely seen in past crises: Mass layoffs, hospitals threatened with closure, shuttered shops and restaurants, crimes driven by desperation, a military that can no longer afford to feed its soldiers meat and warehouses that sell expired poultry.
Lebanon is hurtling toward a tipping point at an alarming speed, driven by financial ruin, collapsing institutions, hyperinflation and rapidly rising poverty — with a pandemic on top of that.
On Monday, the country’s foreign minister resigned, warning that a lack of vision and a will to implement structural reforms risked turning the country into a “failed state.”
The collapse threatens to break a nation seen as a model of diversity and resilience in the Arab world and potentially open the door to chaos. Lebanese worry about a decline so steep it would forever alter the small Mediterranean country’s identity and entrepreneurial spirit, unparalleled in the Middle East.
In the past, Lebanon has been able to in part blame its turmoil on outsiders. With 18 religious sects, a weak central government and far more powerful neighbors, it has always been caught in regional rivalries leading to political paralysis, violence or both. Its 1975-90 civil war made the word “Beirut” synonymous with war’s devastation and produced a generation of warlords-turned-politicians that Lebanon hasn’t been able to shake off to this day.
Since the war ended, the country has suffered a Syrian occupation, repeated conflict with Israel, bouts of sectarian fighting, political assassinations and various economic crises, as well as an influx of more than a million refugees from neighboring Syria’s civil war. The presence of the powerful Shiite group Hezbollah — a proxy army for Iran created in the 1980s to fight Israel’s occupation — ensures the country is always caught up in the struggle for supremacy by regional superpowers Iran and Saudi Arabia.
But the current crisis is largely of Lebanon’s own making; a culmination of decades of corruption and greed by a political class that pillaged nearly every sector of the economy.
For years, the country drifted along, miraculously avoiding collapse even as it accumulated one of the world’s heaviest public debt burdens. The sectarian power-sharing system allotted top posts according to sect rather than qualifications, which in turn allowed politicians to survive by engaging in cronyism and patronage for their communities.
“One of the problems in Lebanon is that corruption has been democratized, it’s not sitting centrally with one man. It’s all over,” says Marwan Muasher, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
“Every sect has a sector of the economy that it controls and draws money from, so that it can keep their sect happy,” he said in a recent talk organized by the Center for Global Policy.
The troubles came to a head in late 2019, when nationwide protests erupted over the government’s intention to levy a tax on the WhatsApp messaging app, seen as the final straw for people fed up with their politicians. The protests touched off a two-week bank closure followed by a run on the banks and then informal capital controls that limited dollar currency withdrawals or transfers.
Amid a shortage in foreign currency, the Lebanese pound has shed 80% of its value on the black market, and prices for basic food items and other goods have seen a meteoric rise. Savings have evaporated, plunging many into sudden poverty.
Lebanon’s fall “represents an epic collapse with a generational impact,” wrote Maha Yehia, director of the Carnegie Middle East Center.
The pillars that long sustained Lebanon are crumbling, including its trademark freedoms and role as a tourism and financial services hub, and wiping out its middle class, she wrote in a recent analysis.
Left on its own, Lebanon could within months reach a point where it can no longer secure needs for its citizens like fuel, electricity, internet or even basic food.
Already, there are signs of the country being pushed toward a hunger crisis. Fears of a breakdown in security are real. The purchasing power of an ordinary soldiers’ salary has declined in dollar terms from around $900 to $150 a month. Public sector employees have similarly seen their salaries wiped out.
Unlike in previous crises when oil-rich Arab nations and international donors came to the rescue, Lebanon this time stands very much alone.
Not only is the world preoccupied with their own economic crises, traditional friends of Lebanon are no longer willing to help a country so steeped in corruption, particularly after the state defaulted on its debt in April. Moreover, the country is led by a Hezbollah-supported government, making it even more unlikely that Gulf countries would come to the rescue.
Lebanon’s only hope is an IMF bailout, but months of negotiations have led nowhere.
The French foreign minister, on a recent trip to Beirut, could not have been clearer that there would be no assistance for Lebanon before credible reform measures are taken. “Help us to help you!” he repeated.
The words appear to have fallen largely on deaf ears. Lebanese politicians can’t agree on the size of the government’s losses, much less carry out reforms to end the corruption from which they profit.
A complete breakdown of Lebanon threatens the wider region, potentially leading to security vacuums that could be exploited by extremists.
Writing in Washington-based The Hill newspaper, Mona Yaacoubian, senior adviser to the vice president for Middle East and Africa at the U.S. Institute of Peace, said a total meltdown in Lebanon could also provoke new refugee flows to Europe and add yet more turmoil to the arc of instability stretching from Syria through Iraq, with negative implications for U.S. allies in the region.
Given the stakes, the United States cannot afford to ignore Lebanon’s impending collapse, she argues.
“Lebanon is rapidly spiraling toward the worst-case scenario: a failed state on the eastern Mediterranean.”
___
EDITOR’S NOTE: Zeina Karam, the news director for Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, has covered the Middle East since 1996. Follow her on Twitter at www.twitter.com/zkaram.
US energy use hit 30-year low during pandemic shutdowns
By MATTHEW BROWN July 29, 2020
FILE - This April 26, 2020, file photo shows empty lanes of the 110 Arroyo Seco Parkway that leads to downtown Los Angeles during the coronavirus outbreak in Los Angeles, Calif. A record drop in U.S. energy consumption this spring was driven by less demand for coal that's burned for electricity and oil that's refined into gasoline and jet fuel. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill, File)
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — U.S. energy consumption plummeted to its lowest level in more than 30 years this spring as the nation’s economy largely shut down because of the coronavirus, federal officials reported Wednesday.
The drop was driven by less demand for coal that is burned for electricity and oil that’s refined into gasoline and jet fuel, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said.
The declines were in line with lower energy usage around the globe as the pandemic seized up economies.
Those trends are turning around as commercial activity resumes but the impact has already been profound — including energy companies filing for bankruptcy protection and a forecasted dip in annual U.S. and global greenhouse gas emissions.
ADVERTISEMENT
Overall U.S. energy consumption dropped 14 % during April compared to a year earlier, the energy administration said. That’s the lowest monthly level since 1989 and the largest decrease ever recorded in data that’s been collected since 1973.
The largest drop previously seen was in December 2001, after the Sept. 11 attacks shocked the economy and a mild winter depressed electricity demand.
Natural gas bucked the trend with a 15 percent increase in use during the April lockdown. More people at home meant more demand for natural gas as a heating fuel, while relatively few homes are heated with coal or oil, said Brett Marohl, who helped produce the energy administration findings.
Petroleum consumption fell to 14.7 million barrels a day in April, down almost a third compared to the same period in 2019. Demand already has rebounded some after stay-at-home orders expired and large sectors of the economy started moving again.
Led by people resuming some of their old driving habits, particularly in cities, petroleum consumption in June was back up to 17.6 million barrels a day, according to the American Petroleum Institute. But new drilling activity continued to be weak, declining in June for the seventh month in a row to 11 million barrels daily as stockpiles of oil and petroleum products remained near record levels.
The spring drop in oil demand coincided with a market collapse triggered by a price dispute between Russia and Saudi Arabia.
“While we are not out of the woods yet, we do appear to be headed in the right direction,” said Dean Foreman, the industry group’s chief economist.
Coal companies are expected to have an even tougher time recovering from the pandemic, which hit as the coal sector remained on a fairly steady downward spiral since 2007 despite President Donald Trump’s attempts to prop it up.
Coal consumption fell 27 percent in April compared to the same period in 2019, to 27 million tons. Most coal produced in the U.S. is used to generate electricity but many utilities have switched to cheaper natural gas and renewable sources like wind and solar.
The energy administration projects overall consumption will increase for the rest of 2020 but remain below 2019 levels.
Follow Matthew Brown on twitter: @matthewbrownap
By MATTHEW BROWN July 29, 2020
FILE - This April 26, 2020, file photo shows empty lanes of the 110 Arroyo Seco Parkway that leads to downtown Los Angeles during the coronavirus outbreak in Los Angeles, Calif. A record drop in U.S. energy consumption this spring was driven by less demand for coal that's burned for electricity and oil that's refined into gasoline and jet fuel. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill, File)
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — U.S. energy consumption plummeted to its lowest level in more than 30 years this spring as the nation’s economy largely shut down because of the coronavirus, federal officials reported Wednesday.
The drop was driven by less demand for coal that is burned for electricity and oil that’s refined into gasoline and jet fuel, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said.
The declines were in line with lower energy usage around the globe as the pandemic seized up economies.
Those trends are turning around as commercial activity resumes but the impact has already been profound — including energy companies filing for bankruptcy protection and a forecasted dip in annual U.S. and global greenhouse gas emissions.
ADVERTISEMENT
Overall U.S. energy consumption dropped 14 % during April compared to a year earlier, the energy administration said. That’s the lowest monthly level since 1989 and the largest decrease ever recorded in data that’s been collected since 1973.
The largest drop previously seen was in December 2001, after the Sept. 11 attacks shocked the economy and a mild winter depressed electricity demand.
Natural gas bucked the trend with a 15 percent increase in use during the April lockdown. More people at home meant more demand for natural gas as a heating fuel, while relatively few homes are heated with coal or oil, said Brett Marohl, who helped produce the energy administration findings.
Petroleum consumption fell to 14.7 million barrels a day in April, down almost a third compared to the same period in 2019. Demand already has rebounded some after stay-at-home orders expired and large sectors of the economy started moving again.
Led by people resuming some of their old driving habits, particularly in cities, petroleum consumption in June was back up to 17.6 million barrels a day, according to the American Petroleum Institute. But new drilling activity continued to be weak, declining in June for the seventh month in a row to 11 million barrels daily as stockpiles of oil and petroleum products remained near record levels.
The spring drop in oil demand coincided with a market collapse triggered by a price dispute between Russia and Saudi Arabia.
“While we are not out of the woods yet, we do appear to be headed in the right direction,” said Dean Foreman, the industry group’s chief economist.
Coal companies are expected to have an even tougher time recovering from the pandemic, which hit as the coal sector remained on a fairly steady downward spiral since 2007 despite President Donald Trump’s attempts to prop it up.
Coal consumption fell 27 percent in April compared to the same period in 2019, to 27 million tons. Most coal produced in the U.S. is used to generate electricity but many utilities have switched to cheaper natural gas and renewable sources like wind and solar.
The energy administration projects overall consumption will increase for the rest of 2020 but remain below 2019 levels.
Follow Matthew Brown on twitter: @matthewbrownap
Next in summer of player empowerment: Pac-12 players unite
FILE - In this Dec. 6, 2018, file photo, Oregon safety Jevon Holland (8) breaks up a pass for Utah wide receiver Jaylen Dixon (25) during the first half of the Pac-12 Conference championship NCAA college football game in Santa Clara, Calif. A group of Pac-12 football players on Sunday, Aug. 2, 2020, threatened to opt out of the coming season unless its concerns about competing during the COVID-19 pandemic and other racial and economic issues in college sports are addressed. (AP Photo/Tony Avelar, File)
As college football leaders work to rescue a football season worth billions in revenue from the threat of COVID-19, the players have become emboldened.
They are calling out coaches and lawmakers, rallying for social cause s and asking for answers about how they are expected to safely play through a pandemic.
The latest act in this summer of college athlete empowerment comes from the West Coast, but there are already signs the movement could spread to other parts of the country.
A group of Pac-12 players Sunday presented a list of demands on issues ranging from healthy and safety to racial justice to economic rights. If they are not addressed — and exactly what that means is unclear — the players say they are prepared not to practice or play.
“It seems like the ball’s in the Pac-12′s court now,” Arizona State offensive lineman Cody Shear told AP.
Pac-12 referred to a statement it sent out Saturday, saying its support student-athletes “using their voices, and have regular communications with our student-athletes at many different levels on a range of topics.”
Shear was one of 13 players, including Oregon star safety Jevon Holland, from 10 schools listed on a news release sent to reporters. The players claim more than 400 of their Pac-12 peers have been communicating through a group chat app about a possible boycott. Oregon offensive lineman Penei Sewell, expected to be one of the first players taken in the next NFL draft, was among the players who showed support for the movement on social media along with Washington star defensive back Elijah Molden.
How many players would be willing to opt-out is hard to say.
“The Pac-12 players really want to play football,” Shear said, “I think this is a good opportunity for us to kind of make our voices heard given what’s happening in the world right now with the pandemic as well as the racial injustice. I think it’s a great opportunity for players to put their foot forward and make themselves heard.”
Shear said he was up front with Arizona State head coach Herm Edwards about being involved with the movement, and the coach was fully supportive.
Washington State defensive lineman Lamonte McDougle tweeted his support for the issues, but made clear he was playing: “I agree with everything this movement is fighting especially the health concerns but not playing this season isn’t an option for me I got ppl that need to eat. so if the NCAA wants to use me as a lab rat it is what it is.”
Utah quarterback Jake Bentley made a similar post.
The players have some supporters in high places.
“This is perhaps a watershed moment in college sports,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D.Conn.), who has been one of the leading voices among federal lawmakers pushing for changes to college athletics, said in one of several social media posts on the topic Sunday.
Some of the players’ demands seem radical: 50% of all revenue shared with the players. Some modest: A civic-engagement task force to address issues such as racial injustice in college sports. Some are already being addressed: NCAA rule changes allowing compensation for name, image and likeness. Of immediate concern with COVID-19, they’re asking for player-approved healthy and safety standards enforced by a third party.
“I think it’s all attainable,” said attorney Tim Nevius, a former NCAA investigator who has now represents college players in cases involving NCAA issues. “I think people see these as strong demands due to the historic denial of these basic rights to college athletes. People have trouble wrapping their heads around the fact that these are workers in a multibillion dollar industry.”
Less than two weeks ago, NCAA President Mark Emmert was on Capitol Hill, appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing focused name, image and likeness compensation reform. Lawmakers also took the opportunity to pepper Emmert with other questions about long-term medical care for athletes and other issues.
College sports is entering an economic downturn even if the football season can be played and conferences can save the billions in television revenue that would disappear if there are no games to broadcast.
No football would mean massive shortfalls for athletic departments that could be forced to strip down programs and personnel.
With that knowledge, players are thinking about what they are getting for taking on the added risk of catching COVID-19.
“Student athlete’s lives shouldn’t be put at risk in order to prevent further financial backlash-especially when receiving insufficient compensation,” Washington receiver Ty Jones in one of several player statements released to reports.
Players have already begun opting out of the season for personal reasons. Most notably, Virginia Tech cornerback Caleb Farley, another potential first-round NFL draft pick, announced last week he was skipping the season.
Right now this is the Pac-12′s problem. Already at Washington State it was reportedly causing disruptions in the program.
It might not stop out West.
Several players from outside the conference acknowledge the Pac-12′s movement on Sunday, including Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence, the biggest star in the sport.
“This is in response to the growing inequities in college sports and coincides with a nation reckoning with racism and a global pandemic,” Nevius said. “These recent events have put a spotlight on critical issues in college sports.”
___
Follow Ralph D. Russo at https://twitter.com/ralphDrussoAP and listen at http://www.westwoodonepodcasts.com/pods/ap-top-25-college-football-podcast/
___
More AP college football: https://apnews.com/Collegefootball and https://twitter.com/AP_Top25
FILE - In this Dec. 6, 2018, file photo, Oregon safety Jevon Holland (8) breaks up a pass for Utah wide receiver Jaylen Dixon (25) during the first half of the Pac-12 Conference championship NCAA college football game in Santa Clara, Calif. A group of Pac-12 football players on Sunday, Aug. 2, 2020, threatened to opt out of the coming season unless its concerns about competing during the COVID-19 pandemic and other racial and economic issues in college sports are addressed. (AP Photo/Tony Avelar, File)
As college football leaders work to rescue a football season worth billions in revenue from the threat of COVID-19, the players have become emboldened.
They are calling out coaches and lawmakers, rallying for social cause s and asking for answers about how they are expected to safely play through a pandemic.
The latest act in this summer of college athlete empowerment comes from the West Coast, but there are already signs the movement could spread to other parts of the country.
A group of Pac-12 players Sunday presented a list of demands on issues ranging from healthy and safety to racial justice to economic rights. If they are not addressed — and exactly what that means is unclear — the players say they are prepared not to practice or play.
“It seems like the ball’s in the Pac-12′s court now,” Arizona State offensive lineman Cody Shear told AP.
Pac-12 referred to a statement it sent out Saturday, saying its support student-athletes “using their voices, and have regular communications with our student-athletes at many different levels on a range of topics.”
Shear was one of 13 players, including Oregon star safety Jevon Holland, from 10 schools listed on a news release sent to reporters. The players claim more than 400 of their Pac-12 peers have been communicating through a group chat app about a possible boycott. Oregon offensive lineman Penei Sewell, expected to be one of the first players taken in the next NFL draft, was among the players who showed support for the movement on social media along with Washington star defensive back Elijah Molden.
How many players would be willing to opt-out is hard to say.
“The Pac-12 players really want to play football,” Shear said, “I think this is a good opportunity for us to kind of make our voices heard given what’s happening in the world right now with the pandemic as well as the racial injustice. I think it’s a great opportunity for players to put their foot forward and make themselves heard.”
Shear said he was up front with Arizona State head coach Herm Edwards about being involved with the movement, and the coach was fully supportive.
Washington State defensive lineman Lamonte McDougle tweeted his support for the issues, but made clear he was playing: “I agree with everything this movement is fighting especially the health concerns but not playing this season isn’t an option for me I got ppl that need to eat. so if the NCAA wants to use me as a lab rat it is what it is.”
Utah quarterback Jake Bentley made a similar post.
The players have some supporters in high places.
“This is perhaps a watershed moment in college sports,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D.Conn.), who has been one of the leading voices among federal lawmakers pushing for changes to college athletics, said in one of several social media posts on the topic Sunday.
Some of the players’ demands seem radical: 50% of all revenue shared with the players. Some modest: A civic-engagement task force to address issues such as racial injustice in college sports. Some are already being addressed: NCAA rule changes allowing compensation for name, image and likeness. Of immediate concern with COVID-19, they’re asking for player-approved healthy and safety standards enforced by a third party.
“I think it’s all attainable,” said attorney Tim Nevius, a former NCAA investigator who has now represents college players in cases involving NCAA issues. “I think people see these as strong demands due to the historic denial of these basic rights to college athletes. People have trouble wrapping their heads around the fact that these are workers in a multibillion dollar industry.”
Less than two weeks ago, NCAA President Mark Emmert was on Capitol Hill, appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee at a hearing focused name, image and likeness compensation reform. Lawmakers also took the opportunity to pepper Emmert with other questions about long-term medical care for athletes and other issues.
College sports is entering an economic downturn even if the football season can be played and conferences can save the billions in television revenue that would disappear if there are no games to broadcast.
No football would mean massive shortfalls for athletic departments that could be forced to strip down programs and personnel.
With that knowledge, players are thinking about what they are getting for taking on the added risk of catching COVID-19.
“Student athlete’s lives shouldn’t be put at risk in order to prevent further financial backlash-especially when receiving insufficient compensation,” Washington receiver Ty Jones in one of several player statements released to reports.
Players have already begun opting out of the season for personal reasons. Most notably, Virginia Tech cornerback Caleb Farley, another potential first-round NFL draft pick, announced last week he was skipping the season.
Right now this is the Pac-12′s problem. Already at Washington State it was reportedly causing disruptions in the program.
It might not stop out West.
Several players from outside the conference acknowledge the Pac-12′s movement on Sunday, including Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence, the biggest star in the sport.
“This is in response to the growing inequities in college sports and coincides with a nation reckoning with racism and a global pandemic,” Nevius said. “These recent events have put a spotlight on critical issues in college sports.”
___
Follow Ralph D. Russo at https://twitter.com/ralphDrussoAP and listen at http://www.westwoodonepodcasts.com/pods/ap-top-25-college-football-podcast/
___
More AP college football: https://apnews.com/Collegefootball and https://twitter.com/AP_Top25
Cooling of Earth caused by eruptions, not meteors
Analysis of sediment found in Hall's cave shows volcanic eruptions responsible for cooling of Earth around 13,000 years ago
IMAGE: WORKERS EXCAVATING HALL'S CAVE IN CENTRAL TEXAS view more
CREDIT: MIKE WATERS/TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY
Ancient sediment found in a central Texas cave appears to solve the mystery of why the Earth cooled suddenly about 13,000 years ago, according to a research study co-authored by a Texas A&M University professor.
Michael Waters, director of The Center for The Study of the First Americans and Distinguished Professor at Texas A&M University, and colleagues from Baylor University and the University of Houston have had their work published in Science Advances.
Some researchers believed the event - which cooled the Earth by about 3 degrees Centigrade, a huge amount - was caused by an extraterrestrial impact with the Earth, such as a meteor collision.
But Waters and the team found that the evidence left in layers of sediment in Hall's Cave were almost certainly the result of volcanic eruptions.
Waters said that Hall's Cave, located in the Texas hill country, has a sediment record extending over 20,000 years and he first began researching the cave in 2017.
"It is an exceptional record that offers a unique opportunity for interdisciplinary cooperation to investigate a number of important research questions," he said.
"One big question was, did an extraterrestrial impact occur near the end of the last ice age, about 13,000 years ago as the ice sheets covering Canada were melting, and cause an abrupt cooling that thrust the northern hemisphere back into the ice age for an extra 1,200 years?"
Waters and the team found that within the cave are layers of sediment, first identified by Thomas Stafford (Stafford Research Laboratories, Colorado), that dated to the time of the proposed impact that could answer the question and perhaps even identify the trigger that started the ancient cold snap.
The event also likely helped cause the extinction of large mammals such as mammoth, horse and camel that once roamed North America.
"This work shows that the geochemical signature associated with the cooling event is not unique but occurred four times between 9,000 and 15,000 years ago," said Alan Brandon, professor of geosciences at University of Houston and head of the research team.
"Thus, the trigger for this cooling event didn't come from space. Prior geochemical evidence for a large meteor exploding in the atmosphere instead reflects a period of major volcanic eruptions.
"I was skeptical," Brandon said. "We took every avenue we could to come up with an alternative explanation, or even avoid, this conclusion. A volcanic eruption had been considered one possible explanation but was generally dismissed because there was no associated geochemical fingerprint."
After a volcano erupts, the global spread of aerosols reflects incoming solar radiation away from Earth and may lead to global cooling post eruption for one to five years, depending on the size and timescales of the eruption, the team said.
"The Younger Dryas, which occurred about 13,000 years ago, disrupted distinct warming at the end of the last ice age," said co-author Steven Forman, professor of geosciences at Baylor.
The Earth's climate may have been at a tipping point at the end of Younger Dryas, possibly from the ice sheet discharge into the North Atlantic Ocean, enhanced snow cover and powerful volcanic eruptions that may have in combination led to intense Northern Hemisphere cooling, Forman said.
"This period of rapid cooling coincides with the extinction of a number of species, including camels and horses, and the appearance of the Clovis archaeological tradition," said Waters.
Brandon and fellow University of Houston scientist Nan Sun completed the isotopic analysis of sediments collected from Hall's Cave. They found that elements such as iridium, ruthenium, platinum, palladium and rhenium were not present in the correct proportions, meaning that a meteor or asteroid could not have caused the event.
"The isotope analysis and the relative proportion of the elements matched those that were found in previous volcanic gases," said Sun, lead author of the report.
Volcanic eruptions cause their most severe cooling near the source, usually in the year of the eruption, with substantially less cooling in the years after the eruption, the team said.
The Younger Dryas cooling lasted about 1,200 years, "so a sole volcanic eruptive cause is an important initiating factor, but other Earth system changes, such as cooling of the oceans and more snow cover were needed to sustain this colder period, "Forman said.
Waters added that the bottom line is that "the chemical anomalies found in sediments dating to the beginning of the Younger Dryas are the result of volcanism and not an extraterrestrial impact."
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