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Woman accused of shooting at drivers on a Florida interstate says she was directed by God

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Woman accused of shooting at drivers on a Florida interstate says she was directed by God

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22 year old woman, Taylon Nichelle Celestine, checked out of her hotel before the incident on Monday and she allegedly told the staff that she was going on a shooting spree as directed by God in relation to the Solar Eclipse. The shooting resulted in two injuries. Celestine has now been arrested for attempted murder.

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Woman accused of shooting drivers on Florida interstate says she was directed by God

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Taylon Nichelle Celestine is accused of wounding two drivers on Intestate 10, the Florida Highway Patrol said.

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Jeffery Epstein and his Stephen Hawkins accusations followed with his allegedly sexual encounter with famous late-night host, Jimmy Kimmel:

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Jeffery Epstein and his Stephen Hawkins accusations followed with his allegedly sexual encounter with famous late-night host, Jimmy Kimmel:

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Involving Hawking, questioners asks, in reference to Epstein, “Did Jeffrey ever talk to you about Stephen Hawking’s proclivities?” The respondent answers, “Yes, he liked watching undressed midgets solve complex equations on a too-high-up chalkboard.” Additionally, the respondent replies “yes” when asked whether Hawking “frequented on the island for pleasure.” The other image includes an exchange about Kimmel in which the respondent says they gave him multiple massages and had s*x with him at the comedian’s suggestion.

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FILE - This photo provided by the New York State Sex Offender Registry shows Jeffrey Epstein, March 28, 2017. On Friday, Jan. 5, 2024, The Associated Press reported on stories circulating online incorrectly claiming court documents connected to a lawsuit involving financier Jeffrey Epstein that were released this week include details about theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, who died in 2018, Hawking's "proclivities" and a sexual encounter involving late night host Jimmy Kimmel. (New York State Sex Offender Registry via AP, File)

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FILE - Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley speaks at a town hall campaign event, Tuesday, Jan. 2, 2024, in Rye, N.H. On Friday, Jan. 5, The Associated Press reported on stories circulating online incorrectly claiming Haley is ineligible to be president because her parents were not U.S. citizens at the time of her birth. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty, File)

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FILE - The T-Mobile logo is seen on a storefront, Oct. 14, 2022, in Boston. On Friday, Jan. 5, 2024, The Associated Press reported on stories circulating online incorrectly claiming T-Mobile is going to fine individual consumers for texting about topics that fall under the categories of sex, hate, alcohol, firearms or tobacco. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)

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A roundup of some of the most popular but completely untrue stories and visuals of the week. None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media. The Associated Press checked them out.

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Images made to look like court records circulate online amid Epstein document release

CLAIM: Court documents connected to a lawsuit involving financier Jeffrey Epstein that were released this week include details about theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking's "proclivities" and accusations about a sexual encounter with late-night host Jimmy Kimmel.

THE FACTS: No such reports were included in the documents. Images made to look like question-and-answer sessions included in the court documents were fabricated. In both cases, the alleged participants were unidentified. In the fake image involving Hawking, the questioner asks, in reference to Epstein, "Did Jeffrey ever talk to you about Stephen Hawking's proclivities?" The respondent answers, "Yes, he liked watching undressed midgets solve complex equations on a too-high-up chalkboard." Additionally, the respondent replies "yes" when asked whether Hawking "frequented the island for pleasure." The other image includes an exchange about Kimmel in which the respondent says they gave him multiple massages and had sex with him at the comedian's suggestion. Posts that shared the images had received tens of thousands of views on X, formerly Twitter, and other social media platforms as of Friday. Hawking is mentioned twice in the documents that were released on Wednesday. One reference involves a 2015 email from Epstein offering a monetary award to friends, family or acquaintances of Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein's victims, if they could help disprove allegations that the physicist had participated in an "underage orgy" on one of Epstein's islands. The other is a request for Giuffre to turn over all photos or videos of her with a number of individuals, including Hawking. But there is no reference to any "proclivities." In 2006, a few months before Epstein was charged with multiple counts of unlawful sex with a minor, Hawking was one of many scientists who attended a five-day conference in the Caribbean funded by Epstein. The physicist appears in multiple pictures from the event. Kimmel does not come up in the documents at all. Ahead of their release, social media users wrongly claimed that his name might appear, spurred by a comment New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers made Tuesday on ESPN's "The Pat McAfee Show." Kimmel said in response on X that he had never met Epstein and that Rodgers' "reckless words put my family in danger." Moreover, the purported document snippet that mentions Kimmel states that it is part of page 1,375, but only 944 pages of records had been made public when the image began spreading. Other major public figures social media users have falsely claimed are named in the documents include Oprah Winfrey, Tom Hanks, Elon Musk and many more. There was much speculation before the release that the records amounted to a list of rich and powerful people who were Epstein's "clients" or "co-conspirators." But the records come from a 2015 lawsuit filed by Giuffre against Epstein's former girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell, which was settled two years later. U.S. District Judge Loretta A. Preska, who ordered the release, said most of the names were already public. They include many of Epstein's accusers, members of his staff who told their stories to tabloid newspapers, people who served as witnesses at Maxwell's trial, people who were mentioned in passing during depositions but aren't accused of anything salacious, and people who investigated Epstein, including prosecutors, a journalist and a police detective. There are also boldface names of public figures known to have associated with Epstein over the years, but whose relationships with him have already been well documented elsewhere. Previous documents from the case were released in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022. About 60 of 250 records currently released had been made public as of Thursday, with more expected in the coming days. Epstein killed himself in jail in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex-trafficking charges. Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison term for helping Epstein sexually abuse underage girls.

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False claims question Haley's eligibility to serve as US president

CLAIM: Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley is ineligible to be president because her parents were not U.S. citizens at the time of her birth.

THE FACTS: Haley is a natural-born U.S. citizen who is eligible to serve as president. The former ambassador to the United Nations was born on Jan. 20, 1972, in Bamberg, South Carolina, according to information on her official website when she was governor of the state. With the Iowa caucuses just two weeks away, some on social media are erroneously claiming that Haley, who served as governor of South Carolina from 2011 to 2017, cannot legally hold the country's highest office. "Nikki Haley is Constitutionally ineligible to be President....or Vice President," reads one post on X, formerly Twitter, that had received approximately 10,200 likes and shares as of Friday. The post links to an article that argues Haley is ineligible because her parents were not U.S. citizens when she was born. In her 2012 autobiography, Haley wrote that her parents "were born in the Punjab region of India." Haley's office told South Carolina newspaper The State in 2015, when she was governor, that her father, Ajit Randhawa, became a U.S. citizen in 1978 - six years after Haley's birth - while her mother, Raj Randhawa, was naturalized in 2003. But experts agree Haley is a legitimate candidate as defined by the Constitution, regardless of her parents' citizenship status. Her birth in Bamberg makes her a natural-born citizen, one of three qualifications to hold the U.S. presidency. "Having been born in South Carolina, she is clearly a 'natural born citizen,' without regard to the fact that her parents were immigrants," Geoffrey Stone, a professor of law at the University of Chicago who is an expert on constitutional law, told The Associated Press. Stone called claims otherwise "bonkers" and said that there are no legitimate arguments that would disqualify Haley from the presidency based on her parents' citizenship. The Constitution stipulates that the president must be "a natural born citizen" of the U.S., be at least 35 years old and have been a U.S. resident for at least 14 years. The 14th Amendment clarifies that anyone born in the country is a U.S. citizen, with exceptions for the children of people whose allegiance belongs to another nation, such as those of foreign diplomats. Similar false claims that Vice President Kamala Harris is not legally eligible to serve as U.S. vice president or president because of her parents' citizenship have previously spread online. Haley's campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

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No, T-Mobile isn't going to start policing customers' personal texts

CLAIM: As of Jan, 1, 2024, T-Mobile is going to fine individual consumers for texting about topics that fall under the categories of sex, hate, alcohol, firearms or tobacco.

THE FACTS: A new T-Mobile policy aimed at curbing mass marketing texts that don't meet industry standards is being misrepresented on social media as an effort to censor the messages of everyday people. The wireless carrier is instituting new fines for third-party vendors that send mass messaging campaigns on behalf of other businesses, not for individual consumers. These fines apply to texts that discuss sex, hate, alcohol, firearms or tobacco under certain circumstances, such as if the content violates federal law or is sent without an age verification system. "Well, just when you thought censoring couldn't get worse, as of Jan. 1 of 2024, which is like a week away, T-Mobile is now going to be policing and fining your text messages," a woman says in an Instagram video. "Yes, personal text messages on your phone. And if your messages fall under what they call SHAFT - that is the acronym for sex, hate, alcohol, firearms or tobacco - they are going to start fining their customers for talking about stuff about that on their bandwidth," she continues. T-Mobile will be introducing three new fines in 2024, but personal texts won't be affected. "The change only impacts third-party messaging vendors that send commercial mass messaging campaigns for other businesses," the company wrote in a statement emailed to The Associated Press. "The vendors will be fined if the content they are sending does not meet the standards in our code of conduct, which is in place to protect consumers from illegal or illicit content and aligns to federal and state laws." Content that manipulates people into revealing private information will result in a fine of $2,000, while content on subjects that are not legal federally and in all 50 states - such as marijuana and solicitation - will elicit a $1,000 charge, according to notices p osted last week by third-party vendors that facilitate mass text campaigns. Other violations - for example, "SHAFT" content that is sent without verifying recipients' ages - will cost companies $500 each. T-Mobile's statement also noted the company does not have the ability to censor personal messages, aside from filters that "protect our customers from unwanted texts that could contain malware and other fraudulent or malicious activities such as phishing." This is not an update to T-Mobile's general terms of service. Rather, the fines apply to companies that violate text marketing industry standards regarding illegal, unallowed or illicit content that have been previously set by the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association. Adherence to these standards is already outlined as part of T-Mobile's code of conduct for its commercial messaging customers.

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Find AP Fact Checks here: https://apnews.com/APFactCheck

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Follow @APFactCheck on Twitter: https://twitter.com/APFactCheck

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Goldin debunks, analyzes and tracks misinformation for The Associated Press. She is based in New York.

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NOT REAL NEWS: A look at what didn't happen this week

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A roundup of some of the most popular but completely untrue stories and visuals of the week. None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media.

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Fake Drug Pulled From US Markets due to Ineffective Nature

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Fake Drug Pulled From US Markets due to Ineffective Nature

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A drug for Lou Gehrig’s disease failed in a large study, the medicine will be pulled from the market, since it didn't help patients with the deadly neurological condition. New patients diagnosed will no longer be able to get a prescription.

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WASHINGTON -- The maker of a drug for Lou Gehrig's disease that recently failed in a large study said Thursday it will pull the medicine from the market, acknowledging it didn't help patients with the deadly neurological condition.

Amylyx Pharmaceuticals announced it will voluntarily halt sales and marketing of the drug in the U.S. and Canada, where new patients will no longer be able to get a prescription.

"While this is a difficult moment for the ALS community, we reached this path forward in partnership with the stakeholders who will be impacted and in line with our steadfast commitment to people living with ALS," company executives said in a statement. Patients already taking the therapy who wish to continue will be able to enroll in a program to receive it for free.

The Food and Drug Administration approved the much-debated drug, Relyvrio, in September 2022, following a years-long advocacy campaign by patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.

The drug's failure is a bitter disappointment for patients and advocates, who have pressed the FDA and other federal agencies to fund and approve more experimental therapies for the fatal muscle-wasting disease.

Relyvrio's withdrawal leaves just three ALS medicines available to U.S. patients, only one of which has been shown to extend survival by several months.

Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Amylyx said in March it was considering pulling its drug after a clinical trial in 600 patients failed to show any improvements in survival or other health measures, such as muscle strength or walking ability.

The company's voluntary action resolves what could have been a major dilemma for the FDA. The agency's regulators would not have had a clear path to quickly force the drug from the market if the company had refused to remove it. That's because the FDA granted the drug full approval, despite the preliminary nature of the company's data on effectiveness.

The 2022 approval was mainly based on results from one small, mid-stage study that was criticized by some of the agency's own internal scientists. Normally the agency requires two large, late-stage studies that show a clear benefit before granting approval. But at the time FDA officials explained that "regulatory flexibility" was appropriate when reviewing Relyvrio, "given the serious and life-threatening nature of ALS and the substantial unmet need."

The medication is part of a string of drugs for deadly, degenerative diseases that have won FDA approval in recent years despite questionable evidence they work.

ALS gradually destroys the nerve cells and connections needed to walk, talk, speak and breathe. Most patients die within three to five years of a diagnosis.

Relyvrio is a powder that combines two older drugs: a prescription medication for liver disorders and a dietary supplement associated with traditional Chinese medicine.

Amylyx faced criticism for pricing the drug at $158,000 for a year's supply. Sales were disappointing, with some patients discontinuing the medicine after only a few months.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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ALS drug will be pulled from US market after study showed patients didn't benefit

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The maker of a drug for Lou Gehrig's disease that recently failed in a study says it will pull the medicine from the U.S. market

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US, EU eye Chinese legacy chips in renewed semiconductor accord

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US, EU eye Chinese legacy chips in renewed semiconductor accord

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The United States and the European Union committed to extend their cooperation on identifying disruptions in the semiconductor sector, with a particular emphasis on mainstream "legacy" chips from China. It said the two partners would share market intelligence about "non-market" policies and practices, which they converse prevail in China.

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LEUVEN, Belgium, April 5 (Reuters) - The United States and the European Union committed to extend by three years their cooperation on identifying disruptions in the semiconductor sector, with a particular emphasis on mainstream "legacy" chips from China.

The two sides concluded a two-day session of their Trade and Technology Council on Friday with a l2-page joint statement on the meeting's outcomes.

It said the two partners would share market intelligence about "non-market" policies and practices, which they argue prevail in China, and consult on planned action to address distortions on the global supply chain.

European Commission Vice President Margrethe Vestager, who oversees EU policy on technology, said the EU and U.S. were taking "the next steps" regarding legacy semiconductors.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told a news conference that China was producing some 60% of legacy chips, found in cars, household appliances and medical devices, and would continue to do so in the coming years.

"And we know there's a massive subsidisation of that industry on behalf of the Chinese government which could lead to huge market distortion. And so that's why we're focused on it," she said.

The Commerce Department has already launched a survey to assess market distortion, she said, adding that the EU would do a similar exercise soon, with the two set to share their results.

The two partners have also committed to join forces in research to find alternatives to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in chips. The "forever chemicals" do not readily break down and studies show they can harm human health.

The Technology Roundup newsletter brings the latest news and trends straight to your inbox. Sign up here.

Reporting by Philip Blenkinsop; Editing by Devika Syamnath

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab

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US, EU eye Chinese legacy chips in renewed semiconductor accord

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The United States and the European Union committed to extend by three years their cooperation on identifying disruptions in the semiconductor sector, with a particular emphasis on mainstream "legacy" chips from China.

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Partisan Bias: Using Border Crisis for Political Gain

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Partisan Bias: Using Border Crisis for Political Gain

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This article contains partisan bias. In this source it shows how Trump and Biden are using the border crisis for their political gain, but by using framing, tone, and source selection it paints Trump as the one who is impeding the process of getting rid of illegal immigration at the border.

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WASHINGTON (AP) - President and his likely Republican challenger Donald Trump both head to the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas on Thursday in a sign of how central immigration has become to the 2024 election and how much both candidates want to use it to their advantage.

Each has chosen an optimal location from which to underscore his respective points.

Biden, who wants to spotlight how Republicans tanked a bipartisan border security deal on Trump's orders, will go to the Rio Grande Valley city of Brownsville. For nine years, this was the busiest corridor for illegal crossings, but illegal crossings there have dropped sharply in recent months.

Trump, for his part, wants to continue his attacks on Biden and keep up his dialed-up rhetoric after saying migrants were poisoning the blood of Americans. He will do so from Eagle Pass, roughly 325 miles northwest of Brownsville, in the corridor that's currently seeing the largest number of crossings. Trump is expected to speak from a state park that has become a Republican symbol of defiance against the federal government's immigration enforcement practices.

In other words, the split screen moment couldn't possibly be more split, and each candidate is asking voters to side with his approach to immigration.

Among voters, worries about the nation's broken immigration system are rising on both sides of the political divide, which could be especially problematic for Biden.

According to an AP-NORC poll in January, the share of voters concerned about immigration rose to 35% from 27% last year. Fifty-five percent of Republicans say the government needs to focus on immigration in 2024, while 22% of Democrats listed immigration as a priority. That's up from 45% and 14%, respectively, from December 2022.

The number of people who are illegally crossing the U.S. border has been rising for years for complicated reasons that include climate change, war and unrest in other nations, the economy, and cartels that see migration as a cash cow.

The administration's approach has been to pair crackdowns at the border with increasing legal pathways for migrants designed to steer people into arriving by plane with sponsors, not illegally on foot to the border.

Arrests for illegal crossings fell by half in January, but there were record highs in December. The numbers of migrants flowing across the U.S-Mexico border have far outpaced the capacity of an immigration system that has not been substantially updated in decades. Trump and Republicans claim Biden is refusing to act, but absent law change from Congress, any major policies are likely to be challenged or held up in court.

Trump this week said Biden was copying him by heading to the border, although the White House insisted the president's trip was quietly in the works before Trump's visit was announced.

"I finally found a way to get him down to the border," said Trump, who is again making immigration a centerpiece of his campaign. "We let it out that we're going on Thursday ... and all of a sudden, out of the blue, he announced he's going."

Unlike Trump, Biden has made few trips to the border. Since the president was last at the border , the debate over immigration in Washington has shifted further to the right. Democrats have become increasingly eager to embrace border restrictions now that migrants are sleeping in police stations and airplane hangars in major cities.

During bipartisan talks on an immigration deal that would have toughened access for migrants, Biden himself said he'd be willing to "shut down the border" right now, should the deal pass.

The talks looked promising for a while. But Trump, who didn't want to give Biden a political win on one of his signature campaign issues, convinced Republicans to kill the deal. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., declared the deal dead on arrival.

Biden vowed to make sure everyone knew why.

"Every day, between now and November, the American people are gonna know that the only reason the border is not secure is Donald Trump and his MAGA Republican friends," Biden said earlier this month, referring to the former president's Make America Great Again slogan.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said the president would meet with U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials, law enforcement officials, frontline personnel and local leaders during his trip to Texas.

Trump will speak from Shelby Park, an expanse along the Rio Grande owned by the city of Eagle Pass. It was taken over last month by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who then banned Border Patrol agents from operating there. The Biden administration sued, and the U.S. Supreme Court allowed federal agents to cut the razor wire encircling the park, but Abbott has since put more up in a defiant move that challenges federal authority.

While there, Trump is expected to lay out updated immigration proposals that would mark a dramatic escalation of the approach he used in office and that drew alarms from civil rights activists and numerous court challenges.

Some of those include reviving and expanding his controversial travel ban, imposing "ideological screening" for migrants, terminating all work permits and cutting off funding for shelter and transportation for people who are in the country illegally. He's also likely to bring up the killing of a 22-year-old nursing student in Georgia. The suspect is a Venezuelan migrant.

"The country can't survive this much longer," Trump said this week on Michigan's WFDF (910 AM), calling the suspect in the woman's death "an animal."

Trump claimed things were far better during his presidency and now "you have the worst border in history and the whole country's falling apart, and criminals are moving into our country by the millions. And I'll get it all stopped and I'll get it done fast."

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Associated Press Writer Valerie Gonzalez in Eagle Pass contributed to this report.

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2024 united states presidential election

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Biden, Trump try to work immigration to their political advantage during trips to Texas

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President Joe Biden and Donald Trump are both heading to the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas. On Thursday, the two will be there and have chosen optimal locations from which to make their respective points.

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Partisan Bias: 2024 US Presidential Polls: ‘He is as old as I am’, Biden turns table on Trump

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Partisan Bias: 2024 US Presidential Polls: ‘He is as old as I am’, Biden turns table on Trump

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The article shares the US President position in efforts to combat competition for the upcoming election. Partisan Bias is utilized to make Biden look dominant over the opposing party (Trump). The use of framing, seen through the headline, along with the tone help Biden look more competent for presidency.

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2024 US Presidential Polls: ‘He is as old as I am’, Biden turns table on Trump

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2024 US Presidential Elections: US President Joe Biden turned tables on former President Donald Trump when asked about the claims that he is too old to run for a second term.

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Demographic Bias: New North Carolina congressional districts challenged in federal court on racial bias claims-

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Demographic Bias: New North Carolina congressional districts challenged in federal court on racial bias claims-

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On Monday, North Carolina Black and Latino voters sued in federal court seeking to conquer congressional districts drawn recently by Republican state legislators, arguing to weaken minority voting power in violation of the U.S. Constitution. The General Assembly rearranged groups of voters, reduced the voting strength of minorities; strengthening “the state’s white majority.”

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FILE - The North Carolina Senate reviews copies of a map proposal for the state's congressional districts starting in 2024 during a committee hearing at the Legislative Office Building, Oct. 19, 2023, in Raleigh, N.C. North Carolina Black and Latino voters sued in federal court on Monday, Dec. 4, seeking to strike down congressional districts drawn this fall by Republican state legislators that they argue weaken minority voting power in violation of the U.S. Constitution. (AP Photo/Hannah Schoenbaum, File)

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FILE - North Carolina House Speaker Tim Moore, R-Cleveland, speaks with reporters on the House floor of the Legislative Building, July 31, 2023, in Raleigh, N.C. North Carolina Black and Latino voters sued in federal court on Monday, Dec. 4, seeking to strike down congressional districts drawn this fall by Republican state legislators that they argue weaken minority voting power in violation of the U.S. Constitution. Moore, a Republican and one of several lawsuit defendants, said the lawsuit contains baseless "allegations" and a "desperate attempt to throw chaos into North Carolina's elections, on the first day of candidate filing no less." (AP Photo/Gary D. Robertson, File)

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RALEIGH. N.C. (AP) - North Carolina Black and Latino voters sued in federal court on Monday seeking to strike down congressional districts drawn this fall by Republican state legislators that they argue weaken minority voting power in violation of the U.S. Constitution.

The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in central North Carolina challenges four districts where the plaintiffs contend GOP leaders in charge of the General Assembly moved around groups of voters and minimized the voting strength of minorities, thereby strengthening "the state's white majority." They also want a new map adopted.

The map enacted in October puts Republicans in good shape to win at least 10 of the state's 14 congressional seats next November. Under the iteration of the congressional map that had been drawn by state judges for the 2022 elections, Democrats and Republicans each won seven seats. The shift could help Republicans on Capitol Hill retain control of the U.S. House.

"North Carolina's minority populations have long suffered from voting discrimination and vote dilution and as a result have endured persistent disparities in political representation," the lawsuit reads, adding that "the state's newly enacted congressional redistricting plan exacerbates these issues."

The lawsuit filed by 18 individuals challenging the 1st, 6th, 12th and 14th Congressional Districts as racial gerrymanders was filed the same day that candidate filing began for those seats and other positions on the ballot in 2024. The 1st District, covering many rural, northeastern districts, and the Charlotte-area 12th District are currently represented by Black Democrats.

While the plaintiffs seek to prevent the state's full congressional map from being used in elections, their filings don't immediately seek a temporary restraining order preventing their use in 2024. Candidate filing ends Dec. 15 for the March 5 primaries.

State House Speaker Tim Moore, a Republican and one of several lawsuit defendants, said the lawsuit contains "baseless allegations" and is a "desperate attempt to throw chaos into North Carolina's elections, on the first day of candidate filing no less. We are fully confident that these maps are going to be used in this election and every election this decade."

The lawsuit contends that minority voters were harmed by the new Greensboro-area 6th District because they were removed from the previous 6th District and distributed to surrounding districts, which appear to be heavily Republican. This weakened their voting strength, the lawsuit said.

Democratic Rep. Kathy Manning is the current 6th District member. The new 6th District is now considered a GOP-leaning district.

Republican mapmakers also unlawfully diluted the voting strength of minority voters in the 1st District by removing from the district reasonably compact minority communities in Pitt County, the lawsuit said. Democratic Rep. Don Davis is the current 1st District lawmaker.

Looking at Charlotte and points west along the South Carolina border, the lawsuit alleges that Republican leaders removed minority voters out of the 14th District and into the adjoining 12th District so that the 14th was no longer a district where white voters could join up with minority voters to elect their preferred candidate. Meanwhile, the number of minority voters grows in the 12th, which is represented by Democratic Rep. Alma Adams of Charlotte.

The current 14th District member, Mecklenburg County Democratic Rep. Jeff Jackson, previously announced that he's running for state attorney general. Moore, the House speaker, is now running for the 14th District seat.

Two years ago, the state Supreme Court suspended candidate filing for the 2022 elections while state lawsuits challenging congressional and legislative redistricting maps initially approved by the General Assembly in fall 2021 could be reviewed.

The state's justices struck down those maps, ruling in February 2022 that Republican lawmakers conducted unlawful partisan gerrymandering, and ordered new maps be drawn. But a new edition of the state Supreme Court with a majority of Republican justices essentially reversed that ruling in April, opening the door for GOP legislative leaders to adjust lines that favor again their party's candidates.

An earlier U.S. Supreme Court decision also prevents similar partisan gerrymandering claims in federal courts. These two rulings largely force the congressional map's foes to challenge the map on claims of racial bias, which the plaintiffs say date from the Reconstruction era to the recent past.

The latest congressional map "continues North Carolina's long tradition of enacting redistricting plans that pack and crack minority voters into gerrymandered districts designed to minimize their voting strength," the plaintiffs' lawyers write.

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New North Carolina congressional districts challenged in federal court on racial bias claims

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North Carolina Black and Latino voters are suing in federal court to block enforcement of congressional districts that they argue unlawfully weaken minority voting power.

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A deal between Israel and Hamas appears to be taking shape. What would it look like?

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A deal between Israel and Hamas appears to be taking shape. What would it look like?

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This new article talks about how Israel and Hamas are inching toward a new deal that would free some of the roughly 130 hostages held in the Gaza Strip in exchange for a weeks-long pause in the war, now in its fifth month. According to a senior official from Egypt, a six-week cease-fire would go into effect, and Hamas abides to free up to 40 hostages - mostly civilian women, at least two children, and sick,elderly captives.

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CAIRO (AP) - Israel and Hamas are inching toward a new deal that would free some of the roughly 130 hostages held in the Gaza Strip in exchange for a weekslong pause in , now in its fifth month.

U.S. President Joe Biden says a deal could go into effect as early as Monday, ahead of what is seen as an unofficial deadline - the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, around March 10.

A deal would bring some respite to desperate people in Gaza, who have borne a staggering toll, as well as to the anguished families of Israeli hostages taken during Hamas' Oct. 7 attack that sparked the war.

Here is a look at the emerging agreement.

OUTLINE OF THE DEAL

According to a senior official from Egypt, a six-week cease-fire would go into effect, and Hamas would agree to free up to 40 hostages - mostly civilian women, at least two children, and older and sick captives. Israel would release at least 300 Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails, the official said.

Israel would also allow displaced Palestinians to return to certain areas in northern Gaza, which was the first target of Israel's ground offensive and suffered widespread destruction, according to the official from Egpyt, which is mediating the deal along with the U.S. and Qatar.

The Egyptian official said aid deliveries would be ramped up during the cease-fire, with 300 to 500 trucks entering the beleaguered territory per day, far more than the daily average number of trucks entering since the start of the war.

The deliveries to areas across Gaza would be facilitated by Israel, whose forces would refrain from attacks on them and on police escorting the aid convoys, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss details of the talks with journalists.

STICKING POINTS

Despite Biden's optimism, both sides continue to posture ahead of any final agreement even as talks continue in Qatar. Both Israeli and Hamas officials downplayed any sense of progress.

Israel and Hamas have been far apart on their terms for a deal in the past, dragging out negotiations that appeared to have momentum.

Israel wants all female soldiers included in the first phase of hostage releases, according to an Israeli official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing talks. Hamas views all soldiers as more significant bargaining chips and is likely to press back on this demand. The Egyptian official said the female soldiers were at this point being held off until after the first release.

The Egyptian official said the sides also are discussing how many Palestinians would be allowed to return to northern Gaza and whether to limit their return to women and men over 50.

Talks are also pinning down which areas of Gaza that Israel would withdraw troops from, the Egyptian official said, adding that Israel wants Hamas to refrain from using those it left as staging grounds for attacks. It also wants Hamas to stop firing rockets at southern Israel. Hamas has so far rejected both demands, the official said.

The emerging deal leaves a door open for Israel to operate in the southern border town of Rafah once it expires. More than half of Gaza's population has fled to the southern city on the Egyptian border. Israel wants to destroy what it says are the few Hamas battalions left standing there.

WHAT REMAINS TO BE NEGOTIATED?

During the temporary cease-fire, both sides would negotiate toward an extension of the deal that the Egyptian official said would include the release of all the female soldiers in exchange for a higher number of imprisoned Palestinians, including those serving long sentences for deadly attacks.

After the female soldiers, Israel will seek to free male soldiers for whom Hamas will likely demand a high price. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed not to agree to a deal at any cost. But the families of the hostages , whose plight has deeply shaken Israelis, are likely to ramp up pressure if others are freed.

The U.S. hopes the new deal will be a launching pad for implementing its vision for a postwar Gaza that would eventually lead to the creation of a Palestinian state. It wants Gaza to be governed by a revamped Palestinian Authority, which administers part of the Israeli-occupied West Bank. On Monday, it took a first step that could usher in U.S.-backed reforms by disbanding the self-rule government.

Israel wants to retain overall security control in the Gaza Strip and has rejected having world powers impose a state on it.

___

Goldenberg reported from Jerusalem. Josef Federman also contributed from Jerusalem.

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A deal between Israel and Hamas appears to be taking shape. What would it look like?

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Israel and Hamas are inching toward a new deal that would free some of the roughly 130 hostages held in the Gaza Strip in exchange for a weekslong pause in the war. U.S.

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Partisan Bias: PJ Media Source claims Biden is the American Vladimir Putin

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Partisan Bias: PJ Media Source claims Biden is the American Vladimir Putin

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The source discusses Biden and Putin's relationship claiming Biden's response to Alexey Navalny's death shows his lack of power over Putin and his "scripted outage" making him and Putin indistinguishable. This is displaying Partisan bias as the report lacks reference to valid sources and is clearly biased towards the opinions of the conservative party.

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In the early months of his presidency, Joe Biden issued a stern warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding the fate of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny. He said there would be consequences if Navalny were to die in prison.

"I made it clear to him that I believe the consequences of that would be devastating for Russia," Biden said. "What do you think happens when he's saying it's not about hurting Navalny, all the stuff he says to rationalize the treatment of Navalny, and then he dies in prison?... It's about trust. It's about their ability to influence other nations in a positive way."

Of course, Navalny did die in prison. As for that stern warning from Biden? Well, clearly, Putin wasn't worried about what Biden would do, and who could blame him? Joe Biden may have claimed in the 2020 presidential campaign that Putin didn't want to see him elected president because he didn't want to go toe-to-toe with him. For sure, Putin hasn't yet gone toe-to-toe with Biden; he's just walked all over him, laughing at the feeble old man who plays the U.S. president on television.

When Biden made his threat, it was an ironic moment that we perhaps couldn't appreciate at the time. Why not? Because Joe Biden would proceed to use his administration to target his political enemies, including pro-life groups and activists, parents who speak out at school board meetings, and protesters who did nothing wrong during the Capitol riot. These, of course, were bad enough, but Biden wasn't content to just use his power to punish people who opposed his agenda or supported Donald Trump, he had to go after Donald Trump. Not only has his administration directly gone after Trump via the justice system, but it has also helped partisan prosecutors in their efforts against Trump. Make no mistake about it: these efforts aren't just about keeping Trump from returning to the White House, Biden and other Democrats would no doubt like to see die in prison, too.
Report: House Democrats May Not Certify 2024 Election if Trump Wins
So, when Joe Biden expressed outrage at the death of Navalny, that was yet another ironic moment - though this time we knew it. For all of Biden's talk about protecting democracy, his administration has looked more like the Putin regime than past U.S. administrations that upheld traditionally American standards of justice. For the longest time, we could look at blatant examples of injustice worldwide and say "that could never happen in America," but not anymore.

It's no coincidence that same people who accuse Trump of wanting to jail his political enemies cite the 91 felony counts against him without the slightest hint of irony or self-awareness. We're just supposed to take these charges at face value, and ignore the fact that it's partisan prosecutors and the Biden administration behind them.

And yet, going after Trump wasn't the end of it. As Republicans continue their impeachment investigation into Joe Biden, and uncover things that Biden was hoping would never see the light of day, we've seen his Justice Department go to extraordinary lengths to protect him. The Biden Justice Department recently decided to out the confidential human source Alexander Smirnov, accuse him of lying, indict him, and imprison him. Smirnov, a longtime FBI informant, was the source behind accusations that Joe and Hunter Biden demanded a $10 million bribe from the head of Burisma. The timing couldn't be more suspect. Not only were these allegations made three years ago and went un-investigated, they've suddenly been "proven" false, just as Republicans are on the verge of impeaching Biden. Naturally, Democrats are falsely claiming that the indictment of Smirnov undermines the entire impeachment case against Biden. It doesn't, but it sure was a convenient argument to make.

When I think back to Joe Biden's scripted outrage about Navalny's imprisonment and death, the irony that Biden is taking a page out of Putin's book is not lost on me. It shouldn't be lost on anyone, frankly.

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Joe Biden is the American Vladimir Putin

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In the early months of his presidency, Joe Biden issued a stern warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin regarding the fate of jailed Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny. He said there would be consequences if Navalny were to die in prison.

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Nearly 75% of journalists killed in 2023 died in Israel’s war on Gaza: CPJ

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Nearly 75% of journalists killed in 2023 died in Israel’s war on Gaza: CPJ

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A new report has found that 72 of the 99 journalists killed worldwide in 2023 were Palestinians reporting on the Israeli-Gaza war. This makes 2023 the deadliest for the media in nearly a decade. This could display a targeted attack on Palestinians by Israel and may later be presented to the International court.

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Mourners attend the funeral of a Palestinian journalist who was killed in an Israeli attack in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip in November 2023 [File: Mohammed Salem/Reuters]

Seventy-two of the 99 journalists killed worldwide in 2023 were Palestinians reporting on Israel's war on Gaza, making those 12 months the deadliest for the media in almost a decade, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

Killings of reporters would have dropped globally year-on-year had it not been for the deaths in the ongoing war on Gaza, the CPJ said in its annual report released on Thursday.

Keep reading

"In December 2023, CPJ reported that more journalists were killed in the first three months of the Israel-Gaza war than have ever been killed in a single country over an entire year," the organisation said.

In total, it documented 77 journalists killed in the war on Gaza last year while doing their jobs: 72 Palestinians, three Lebanese and two Israelis.

The Palestinian victims account for nearly 75 percent of all journalists killed worldwide.

"This war is unprecedented in terms of the threat to journalists," Jodie Ginsberg, president of the CPJ, told Al Jazeera from New York.

"What's important to remember about this war is that Gazan journalists are the only journalists able to report on what's happening inside Gaza. International journalists have not been able to get in, have not been allowed in, except on very, very controlled trips that are overseen by the Israeli army.

"So we are entirely reliant on those [Palestinian] journalists, who are risking their lives to bring us this story," she added.

On February 7, the New York-based press freedom organisation said the number of journalists killed in the war on Gaza had risen to 85.

The CPJ has previously attacked what it calls the "persecution" of journalists by Israeli forces and is investigating whether a dozen journalists killed in the Gaza conflict were deliberately targeted by Israeli soldiers, which would constitute a war crime.

'Journalists under threat everywhere'

Ginsberg said she was "disappointed ... at the lack of public solidarity that we have seen" with Palestinian journalists during the ongoing war.

She said Western "hesitancy" to show solidarity with those targeted and killed in Gaza was "sadly unsurprising" given that Israel is "the country, the issue that has divided international media, international politicians more than anything".

But she emphasised: "I think it's really important that we let our colleagues inside Gaza as well as in the region know that we stand with them, that we are there to support them, so that we can make sure that press freedom and journalists are protected not just at this crucial moment in Gaza but also globally at a time when journalists are under threat everywhere."

Worldwide, the CPJ report said the death toll of 99 reporters killed was the highest since 2015 and an increase of nearly 44 percent on 2022's figures.

It said the greatest reductions in journalist fatalities in 2023 were registered in Ukraine and Mexico. Both went from 13 killings to two.

Fatalities remained stable in Somalia and the Philippines, the organisation said. However, it warned that Mexico - along with the Philippines and Somalia - was "one of the world's deadliest countries for the press".

"Compounding the situation, government agencies spy on reporters and rights defenders, and a significant number of journalists have had to leave their homes, and abandon their professions, due to violence," the CPJ report warned.

In the Palestinian territories, even when journalists are not on the job, they face the risk of Israeli bombardment or arrest. Gaza's Government Media Office said at least 126 Palestinian media workers have been killed since Israel's war began on October 7.

Journalists working in conflict areas are protected under international humanitarian law. Palestinian journalists accuse Israel of repeatedly violating that law by targeting the media.

"It's very important that these killings are thoroughly investigated and that those responsible are held accountable," Ginsberg told Al Jazeera.

She said her organisation was doing the work to document attacks against journalists in Gaza, which could later be used as evidence and presented to bodies such as the International Court of Justice or the International Criminal Court.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

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Nearly 75% of journalists killed in 2023 died in Israel's war on Gaza: CPJ

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Committee to Protect Journalists says of the 99 journalists killed globally last year, 72 were Palestinians.

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Four Yemeni journalists finally freed after being held hostage for eight years

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Four Yemeni journalists finally freed after being held hostage for eight years

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Four Yemeni journalists finally freed after being held hostage for eight years

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The four journalists – Abdul Khaleq Amran, Tawfik al-Mansouri, Hareth Homaid and Akram al-Walidi – were among the newly released prisoners who alighted from a Red Cross plane on 16 April in Marib. Their liberation was part of an exchange of nearly 900 prisoners between the Shia Houthi rebels and the government.

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Iran Attacks Foreign Journalists To Protect It's National Security

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Iran Attacks Foreign Journalists To Protect It's National Security

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Court case and ITV investigation reveal tactics used by Iran to silence UK-based journalists. Iran has long targeted journalists abroad, reporting on events in Iran, using a range of online and offline tactics, including direct physical attacks, economic sanctions, online abuse, and the harassment of family members.

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Court case and ITV investigation reveal tactics used by Iran to silence UK-based journalists : RSF calls on Iran to stop targeting journalists at home and abroad

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New details about Iranian plots against journalists working in London reveal the shocking tactics used by Iran to silence critical voices. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) calls on the Iranian authorities to immediately stop targeting news organisations, and on the UK government to do everything it can to hold Iran to account and ensure the safety of Iranian journalists.

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Violations and Neglect at Private Prison That Houses Tarrant Inmates

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Violations and Neglect at Private Prison That Houses Tarrant Inmates

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State watchdog finds medical neglect, other violations at private prison that houses Tarrant inmates. The Watchdog interviewed those in higher positions to see if they were involved in the violations, but some didn’t even know that these violations were occurring. Changes are currently being made to fix this problem.

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State watchdog finds medical neglect, other violations at private prison that houses Tarrant inmates

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Tarrant County re-upped its contract with the private prison in October for $22.5 million.

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In Chula Vista, when it comes to public records, not much is public

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In Chula Vista, when it comes to public records, not much is public

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In Chula Vista, when public records have been retrieved, reviewed, redacted and released, they almost never remain public.

Chula Vista officials are committed to transparency and respond quickly and efficiently to every request for public documents. This exposure would shed light on the condition of public record retrieval.

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(Adriana Heldiz/The San Diego Union-Tribune)

In Chula Vista, even when public records have been retrieved, reviewed, redacted and released, they almost never remain public.

That's because Chula Vista officials do not publish the vast majority of documents that have been the subject of prior California Public Records Act requests on the city's archive of released documents.

Instead, residents and other interested parties are required to submit new requests every time they want to see a record. The practice runs contrary to how many other cities process requests for access to internal records.

Chula Vista officials say they are committed to transparency and respond quickly and efficiently to every request for public documents.

But good-government groups say the city's decision to withhold previously requested material on the city public-records archive undermines the intent of the California Public Records Act - and creates unnecessary work for city employees.

"Many cities have recognized that it really is to everyone's benefit to post all of the responses," said David Loy, the legal director of the First Amendment Coalition, a nonprofit that advocates for transparency in government.

Loy said among local governments, the city of San Diego does a good job of archiving thousands of records requests on its system.

"That way, potentially, one does not have to reinvent the wheel in requesting records," he said. "And so the press and public have a complete window into what's being requested and produced."

The Chula Vista city website includes links to what's called a public records archive. But the page lists only a handful of responses to Public Records Act requests, with the oldest dating back to 2020.

In a statement, the city said it "prioritizes transparency with public records" and that the clerk's office posts documents that have been "requested repeatedly" or other records they expect to be sought again.

"These records are posted to save the time of members of the public," the statement said. "PRA responses themselves are also public records, and so can be requested."

Last week, the city had nine requests and document sets posted on the archive page.

Chula Vista officials acknowledged that they received an average of 180 requests per month in 2023 - about half of which went to the City Clerk's Office and half to the Police Department.

"The number of PRAs that we receive has significantly increased in recent years," city spokesperson Michele Clock said by email.

The city of San Diego has more than 33,000 records requests available for review on its records-management archive, and typically receives 600 or more document requests each month.

San Diego's records database is searchable and accessible to thousands of users who routinely hunt for contract information, police reports, permit data and a host of other material.

Some of the records posted on the Chula Vista archive appear somewhat obscure.

The most recently uploaded data includes scoring sheets related to the winning bidder in a public-finance consulting contract, unresolved building and fire code violations and a site plan and other records related to an apartment building in Otay Ranch.

Chula Vista released bid proposals related to its police drone surveillance program - three vendors responded to a 2020 request for proposals - but the City Council continues to litigate a public records request for actual footage of the so-called uncrewed aerial systems.

The city was sued after rejecting a request for drone videos filed by Arturo Castañares, a Chula Vista resident and publisher of the online news organization La Prensa San Diego.

Superior Court Judge Timothy Taylor agreed last April with the city's argument that the footage was "categorically exempt" from disclosure, but the ruling was overturned late last year. The city in January asked the state Supreme Court to consider the case.

The San Diego Union-Tribune asked all five members of the Chula Vista City Council why the city does not regularly publish responses to California Public Records Act requests. None responded to a request to discuss their positions on the city's practice.

Sean McMorris of California Common Cause, a Los Angeles-area nonprofit that advocates for good government and open records, said there are many reasons cities should post responses to public-records requests.

Activists, lawyers, business owners and everyday citizens can review the postings themselves without having to interrupt city employees by submitting a redundant request, he said.

"It also creates a record for the city in terms of litigation," McMorris said. "It induces them to respond more thoroughly because the record is there." In cases of lawsuits, "the city could use it to defend itself and vice-versa."

But too often, McMorris said, government agencies choose to direct people into new requests.

"It's an extremely important process that I think all governments in California need to take more seriously and invest more resources in," he said. "It could be (Chula Vista) has chosen to focus its resources elsewhere, even though that's one of the primary duties of a city clerk's office - to process public records requests."

Lawyers at Consumer Watchdog, another Los Angeles nonprofit advocacy group, also said the city of Chula Vista's public records practices does not serve citizens or the government agency.

"There is absolutely no barrier - cost or otherwise - to posting every public records request along with the city's response and the documents provided," said Jerry Flanagan, the Consumer Watchdog litigation director.

"If the city (of Chula Vista) truly 'prioritizes transparency' they would post all requested records - not cherry-pick the nine they deemed worthy to share," he said. "Online storage costs are just pennies a gigabyte."

Flanagan singled out NextRequest as a good option for public agencies that want to make documents easily searchable and retrievable.

He also credited the city of Los Angeles, which operates its own system.

Of the nine requests posed on the Chula Vista records archive as of last week, one was from this year, five were from last year and there was one each from 2022, 2021 and 2020.

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In Chula Vista, when it comes to public records, not much is public

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Only a handful of records released under state law are posted in the city archive - a process one open-records advocate calls 'extremely important'

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Watchdog finds Trump officials pushed to weaken toxic ‘forever’ chemical report

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Watchdog finds Trump officials pushed to weaken toxic ‘forever’ chemical report

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The watchdog for the EPA found that the Trump administration appointees to the agency meddled in scientific findings on a toxic substance. It was discovered they did not follow the necessary protocols of review and clearance for the toxicity assessment of the PFBS acid.

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Watchdog finds Trump officials pushed to weaken toxic ‘forever’ chemical report

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The report was published four days before Donald Trump left the White House

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Boots baby formula adverts broke rules, watchdog says

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Boots baby formula adverts broke rules, watchdog says

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The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) on Wednesday upheld a complaint against the retailer over ads for four brands of instant formula products that appeared on the sidebar on search engines, such as Google, earlier this year. In the UK, it is against the law to promote instant formula products for babies up to six months since it could discourage breastfeeding.

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Saturn's 'Death Star' moon has a hidden ocean under its surface, scientists say:

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Saturn's 'Death Star' moon has a hidden ocean under its surface, scientists say:

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Scientists have discovered a recently formed "force" under one of Saturn's most storied moons.French astronomer Valéry Lainey and a team of researchers from Observatoire de Paris announced the discovery of Mimas' newly formed ocean, a finding that could change the way scientists define ocean moons as well as the conditions for habitability.

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Scientists have discovered a recently formed "force" under one of Saturn's most storied moons.

Saturn's Mimas moon resembles the Empire's Death Star station in the " Star Wars" franchise due to its gray, icy shell and large impact crater on its surface -- but its famous likeness is not what has researchers talking.

French astronomer Valéry Lainey and a team of researchers from Observatoire de Paris announced the discovery of Mimas' newly formed ocean, a finding that could change the way scientists define ocean moons as well as the conditions for habitability.

The research was published in Nature on Wednesday.

The 250-mile-wide celestial body joins Saturn's other moons, Titan and Enceladus, and Jupiter's Europa and Ganymede moons in the growing list of moons known to have subterranean oceans.

Mimas' neighboring moon, Enceladus, has icy fracturing across its surface and has been observed spouting geysers of water, which indicted the existence of a below-surface body of water, according to NASA.

Mimas' thick, icy exterior, however, has never indicated the existence of an ocean. Researchers suggest this is because Mimas' ocean dwells 12 to 18 miles (20 to 30 kilometers) below the moon's 15-mile-thick frozen shell.

An image from the Cassini spacecraft of Saturn's moon Mimas.

"Mimas would be the most unlikely place to look for the presence of a global ocean," researchers wrote. However, after a "detailed analysis of Mimas' orbital motion" they found that the moon's ocean is "likely to be less than 25 million years old and still evolving."

The researchers from Observatoire de Paris based their findings off observations made by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, which analyzed Saturn's 140-plus moons for over a decade before 2017, when it crashed into the ringed planet.

"The major finding here is the discovery of habitability conditions on a solar system object which we would never, never expect to have liquid water," Valery Lainey told Space.com. "It's really astonishing."

Fellow researchers have hailed the findings on Mimas' hidden ocean as "inspiring," though note the previous hypothesis surrounding Mimas' unique orbit.

"The idea that relatively small, icy moons can harbor young oceans is inspiring," SETI Institute's Matija Ćuk and Southwest Research Institute's Alyssa Rose Rhoden remarked in an editorial published in Nature News & Views Wednesday.

The researchers note that previous understanding of Mimas' orbit came from what was believed to be a "very elongated core," however, the internal ocean hypothesis is "just as plausible."

"This could be explained either by the moon having a very elongated rocky core, which would enhance the difference between its moments of inertia, or an internal ocean, which would allow its outer shell to oscillate independently of its core," Ćuk and Rhoden wrote.

Though colloquially referred to as the Death Star moon after "Star Wars" fame, Mimas was discovered in 1789 by astronomer William Herschel. The name Mimas hails from a giant in Greek mythology.

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Saturn's 'Death Star' moon has a hidden ocean under its surface, scientists say

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French astronomer Valéry Lainey and a team of researchers from Observatoire de Paris announced the discovery of Mimas' newly formed ocean on Wednesday.

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Women Have Too Much Of A Good Thing: The X Chromosome. 

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Women Have Too Much Of A Good Thing: The X Chromosome. 

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X-chromosome inactivation is due to a molecule called Xist. The gene for Xist is found in all X chromosomes. Activating Xist in bio-engineered male mice has shown that Xist activation and genetic background is necessary for autoimmunity to develop. This discovery will lead toward a better autoimmunity-screening panel for women.

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As the researchers discovered, X-chromosome inactivation can lead to autoimmune disorders, although other factors can also cause these disorders - which is why men sometimes develop them.

The great equalizer

X-chromosome inactivation is achieved courtesy of a molecule called Xist. The gene for Xist is present on all X chromosomes, including the single one male cells have. But Xist itself is produced only when the X chromosome that its gene resides on is one of a matched XX pair- and is produced and deployed on only one member of that pair.

Xist consists of RNA, a substance best known for being a simple-minded messenger that shuttles genes' instructions for making proteins to the intracellular machines that make them. Yet RNA can do a whole lot more than schlep genetic information. There are as many different kinds of so-called long noncoding RNA (lncRNA) molecules - lengthy RNA stretches that don't carry instructions for making proteins - as there are of the protein-encoding RNA variety. These lncRNA molecules can park themselves on stretches of chromosomes and change the likelihood that the cellular machinery charged with reading the genes in those locations will do so.

Xist, a type of lncRNA, is much longer than most. Xist coats long sections of one of a female mammalian cell's two X chromosomes - but always just one - cutting that chromosome's output to zero or close to it. The other X chromosome, left undisturbed, pumps out just enough RNA-encoded instructions to keep the cell humming.

But Xist's nestling into the extra X chromosome generates odd combinations of lncRNA, proteins that bind to it, other proteins that bind to those proteins, and DNA some of those proteins cling to. These complexes can trigger a strong immune response, Chang and his colleagues have learned.

In 2015, Chang's group identified close to 100 proteins that either bound to Xist or that bound to those proteins, collectively enabling this molecule to lay anchor along gene-specifying regions of the X chromosome.

Inspecting this Xist "parts list," Chang realized that many of Xist's collaborator proteins were known to be associated with autoimmune disorders. Might the RNA-protein-DNA complexes generated in the course of X-chromosome inactivation be triggering the notoriously high rate of autoimmunity in women compared with men? That question was the impetus for the new study.

What if males made Xist?

To eliminate possible competing causes such as female hormonal action or aberrant protein production by the supposedly silenced second X chromosome, the researchers tossed the Xist ball into the male court. They sewed the gene for Xist into the genomes of two different strains of male lab mice. One strain is quite susceptible to autoimmune symptoms mimicking lupus, with females more susceptible than males. The other is resistant to it.

The inserted Xist gene had been modified in two ways. It could be turned on or off by chemical means, pumping out Xist only when the scientists wanted it to. The Xist gene was also tweaked slightly so that its RNA product would no longer silence the genes of the male mouse's chromosome into which it was stitched.

Every cell in a woman's body produces Xist. But for several decades, we've used a male cell line as the standard of reference.

Merely inserting that modified Xist gene had no noticeable effect on the mice. But the Xistproduced from the inserted gene, once that gene was activated, still formed characteristic complexes with almost all the proteins found earlier to be collaborating closely with Xist.

Now, the scientists could ask: Is a bioengineered male mouse that's been coaxed to produce Xist more prone to autoimmunity than a normal male mouse, which never produces it, or than a male in whom the gene for Xist has been inserted but not activated?

By injecting an irritant known to induce a lupus-like autoimmune condition in the susceptible mouse strain, the investigators could compare its effect on males who made Xist with its effect on normal males, who made none.

In these susceptible mice, males in which the Xist gene was activated developed lupus-like autoimmunity at a rate approaching that of females - and considerably more so than non-bioengineered males.

The absence of autoimmunity in some female or Xist-activated male mice in the susceptible strain showed that not just activation of Xist but also some kind of tissue-damaging stress (caused, in this case, by injection of the irritant) is required to get the autoimmunity ball rolling.

In the autoimmune-resistant strain, activating Xist in bioengineered male mice wasn't enough to induce autoimmunity - as might be predicted by the fact that in this strain even females seldom develop autoimmunity. That suggests that not only Xist activation but also an appropriate genetic background is necessary for autoimmunity to develop.

These constraints on autoimmunity are fortunate, because if there were none all women might be more susceptible to develop immunity, Chang noted.

Toward a better autoimmunity-screening panel

An early step in the development of autoimmunity is the appearance of autoantibodies: antibodies targeting one's own tissues or cell products. Close examination of blood samples from about 100 patients with autoimmunity showed the presence of autoantibodies to many of the complexes associated with Xist. Some of these autoantibodies were specific to one or another autoimmune disorder, indicating their potential utility in identifying particular emergent autoimmune disorders before symptoms develop. Autoantibodies to still other Xist-associated proteins spanned several disorders, designating them as possible common markers of autoimmunity.

"Every cell in a woman's body produces Xist," Chang said. "But for several decades, we've used a male cell line as the standard of reference. That male cell line produced no Xist and no Xist/protein/DNA complexes, nor have other cells used since for the test. So, all of a female patient's anti-Xist-complex antibodies - a huge source of women's autoimmune susceptibility - go unseen."

Researchers from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine; the KTH Royal Institute of Technology, in Stockholm; and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, in Zurich, contributed to the work.

The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health (grants T32AR007422, K99/R00 and T32AR050942), the Scleroderma Research Foundation and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

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Stanford Medicine-led study shows why women are at greater risk of autoimmune disease

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Research throws light on the mystery of why women are much more prone to autoimmune disorders: A molecule made by one X chromosome in every female cell can generate antibodies to a woman's own tissues.

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Apple’s Vision Pro headset hits US stores today. Here’s what you need to know

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Apple’s Vision Pro headset hits US stores today. Here’s what you need to know

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Vision Pro, Apple's first new product in seven years, officially launched in the US on Friday. CEO Tim Cook must prove the AR device, a technology that overlays virtual images onto live video of the real world, is the future of computing.

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Apple's Vision Pro headset to hit stores in the US. Here's what you need to know | CNN Business

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The Vision Pro, Apple's first new product in seven years, has officially launched in stores worldwide.

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Holding photos of their deceased children, parents lobby Congress to pass online safety legislation

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Holding photos of their deceased children, parents lobby Congress to pass online safety legislation

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On Thursday, parents of deceased child victims of Social Media harassment held posters of their children while protesting in front of Congress in order to get them to pass a new piece of legislation called, KOSA, which would force all social media companies to better protect children on their websites from exposure to self-harm, eating disorders, sexual exploitation, and substance abuse.

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WASHINGTON - Clad in black clothing and clutching posters of their deceased children, dozens of parents went to Capitol Hill this week for Wednesday's explosive Senate hearing with the CEOs of the major tech companies in the hot seat.

On Thursday, after the chief executives of X, Meta, Snap, Discord and TikTok were gone, they stayed behind to personally lobby members of Congress to pass legislation they say could help prevent more families from experiencing the tragedies that they have.

The Kids Online Safety Act, or KOSA for short, was introduced two years ago by bipartisan duo Sens. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn. If passed and enacted into law, it would provide children and their parents with more safeguards and tools to protect their well-being online. The bill requires online platforms to prevent or mitigate the promotion of self-harm, eating disorders, sexual exploitation and substance abuse to minors under the age of 16.

The parents, mostly moms, who traveled from across the country said they see real momentum toward passing the bill after Wednesday's hearing.

"It's a David and Goliath story," Maurine Molak, whose son, David, died by suicide at the age of 16 after monthslong cyberbullying on Instagram, told NBC News on Thursday.

"We are fighting this billion-dollar lobby campaign against the work that we're doing. Our children matter and we're sick and tired of [Big Tech] deploying all of these people to crush the work that we're doing here," she added.

The bill would also default application controls to the most stringent option to protect minors, allowing parents to control their kids' privacy and account settings, and that includes an option to "opt-out" of algorithmic recommendations. Platforms would be required to issue annual independent audits that identify the risks of harm to minors and compliance with the law.

But the bill has also faced criticism, particularly after a video of Blackburn appearing to suggest that it could be used to censor transgender content went viral. Others worry the bill would be used to censor online speech far beyond the abusive and harmful content these parents are hoping to target.

Blumenthal said he and Blackburn believe their bill could be the first major piece of legislation in years that Congress passes to regulate the internet "partly because of the parents who have mobilized to come here with the courage and strength to tell their stories of grief and pain," noting that the momentum now "really feels different."

Blackburn agreed, predicting: "This is going to be that first piece that gets across the finish line."

Joann Bogard, whose 15-year-old son Mason died after trying a viral social media challenge in 2019, was among the parents who lobbied members on Thursday. She and others held photos of their children behind tech CEOs at the hearing the day before to make their case for KOSA, earning an apology from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

"It is the strongest bill out there. It's the one that's going to give parents tools that they need to protect our kids online better. It's going to put that onus back on the social media companies, so they have to fix their flawed product. And it requires them to be transparent," Bogard said. "We need that bill that's going to do a lot, not just one piece of it. We need it to do a lot."

The senators, parents and advocates rallying in support of the legislation know it won't be easy.

"These folks have a lot of strength in the political world," Blumenthal said, referring to Big Tech companies who have spent hundreds of millions of dollars lobbying Congress to ward off federal regulation, according to public data on OpenSecrets. "The employees they can muster and the disinformation they can propagate and the campaign contributions they can give, in all the ways that business as usual is done, they'll prevail. This can't be business as usual. This cause is too important."

The legislation received a boost this week when Snap, the company that owns Snapchat, became the first major tech platform to back KOSA. Microsoft later followed suit when their vice chairman and president posted his endorsement of the legislation on X. And during Wednesday's hearing, X CEO Linda Yaccarino offered her support for the bill for the first time. Meta, Discord and TikTok did not weigh in.

Opponents of the legislation, including civil rights groups and some lawmakers, say that its definition of harm is too broad, leading to possible censorship of content that promotes politically polarizing issues, gender equality, or abortion rights.

"KOSA contains major, detrimental loopholes that are going to empower states with extremist leaders, like in my home state of Florida, to use the provisions in this legislation to bully and try to erase the existence of LGBTQ+ and particularly trans people online, while at the same time threatening our right to privacy by requiring everyone to upload their ID in order to verify their age to go online," Congress' only Gen Z member, Rep. Maxwell Frost, D-Fla., told NBC News in a statement.

Blumenthal signaled this week that the senators are open to amending some of the language to get more lawmakers on board.

"We're in continuing conversations with a variety of stakeholders about specific provisions of the bill," Blumenthal said during a press conference on Tuesday. "There are some nips and tucks that we're going to make in response to concerns, very legitimate points that many of these groups have made. And we hope, hope, within a very short period of time to have a final version."

A spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., told NBC News in a statement that "children's online safety is a priority" for their legislative agenda this year.

"While we work to pass the supplemental and keep the government funded in the coming weeks, Leader Schumer will continue to work with the sponsors of the online safety bills to ensure the necessary support," they said.
If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline or chat live at 988lifeline.org. You can also visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for additional support.

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Holding photos of their deceased children, parents lobby Congress to pass online safety legislation

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WASHINGTON - Clad in black clothing and clutching posters of their deceased children, dozens of parents went to Capitol Hill this week for Wednesday's explosive Senate hearing with the CEOs of the major tech companies in the hot seat.

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This would be considered as an entertaining way of gun violence. This game finds a way to make gun violence entertaining by making it a multiplayer, survival game. This trailer shows how people need to survive from one another in order to “win the game”. This trailer is an example of an entertaining game of gun violence.

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Fortnite Battle Royale - Gameplay Trailer | PS4

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This article by Jagwire reporter, Madelyn Mulryan, is found under the “opinion” section as Mulryan is sharing her own personal views on the issue of gun control/gun violence. Her argument suggests that the best answer to lessening gun violence is to regulate the sale of certain types of advanced firearms.

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Constantly hearing the tragic news of shootings desensitizes people to things like death which should not be considered normal. It is time to change gun laws in America to reflect this.

To begin, the purchase of machine and automatic-style guns should be outlawed. In fact, the majority of Americans agree, with 64% supporting a ban on assault style weapons, according to the Pew Research Center. There is no reason self defense or hunting would require a gun capable of killing hundreds of people in minutes. According to Brittanica, these guns can shoot 500 to 1000 rounds per minute, proving that hand-operated reloading guns are the only ones that are safe.

To solve this, gun purchase needs to be more regulated. Someone who wants to own a gun should have to have thorough background checks that make sure customers haven't been in prison, along with mental health checks to insure guns are going to the right consumers. Someone who has a history of doing dangerous things without thinking should not have access to something that could kill civilians. Participants in the aforementioned Pew Research Center study agreed, with 88% supporting the restriction of gun purchase for mentally ill individuals. This shows that it is time for change in America.

While the right to bear arms is an amendment, that doesn't mean that all types of weapons should be allowed. Just like how someone with no training wouldn't be allowed to operate nuclear weapons, gun owners should be held to the same standard.

The fact that school shootings happen whatsoever should be a wakeup call that our gun policies should be more strict. Many Americans are aware it is a growing problem - 58% think laws should be stricter compared to 52% in 2017 - and it is time for laws to reflect that.

The people who believe that it is a problem are right, and the issue runs deeper than many realize. Just hearing about shootings can negatively affect adolescents' mental health. According to the American Psychological Association , "a study of more than 2,000 teens found that greater concern about school shootings and violence predicted increases in anxiety and panic six months later."

Hearing about shootings that happen almost everyday is concerning. Students and staff shouldn't have to worry about whether they will have to use their MacBooks as a defense mechanism or history books as a weapon; those in power need to make a change.

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Opinion: Guns need to be strictly controlled

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Constantly hearing the tragic news of shootings desensitizes people to things like death which should not be considered normal. It is time to change gun laws in America to reflect this. To begin, the purchase of machine and automatic-style guns should be outlawed. In fact, the majority of Americans agree, with 64% supporting a ban...

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This is considered provoke/propaganda because it was created to critique the USA. This is supposed to point out the fact that Americans are known for their obesity and gun violence by classifying Americans as Ronald McDonald holding a Gun.

LINK

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This represents raw footage because it’s unprocessed. It looks like it came off of someone's house security camera that was posted on the internet. This video looks like a drive-by shooting, targeting someone's house. This is a clear example of gun related violence.

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This is classified as advertisement because the slogan on the T-Shirt “Stop Gun Violence”  is designed to cater to people who are against gun violence, so that they will buy this product.

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This would be considered news since it is informing US citizens about a national problem, gun violence. It provides statistics and figures on people affected by gun violence. It shows a thematic map indicating the geographic pattern of mass shootings in 2023. These statistics also show unintentional killings, showing the importance of gun safety.

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More than 40,000 people killed in gun violence so far in 2023

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Gun violence in the U.S. has taken an average of roughly 118 lives each day in 2023, according to data from Gun Violence Archive.

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The T-shirt chewing enzyme ready to tackle plastic waste

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The T-shirt chewing enzyme ready to tackle plastic waste

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The plastic is PET, which is a polymer - a long molecule in which smaller chemical units, called monomers, are closely linked together. The enzyme is now so powerful that it can completely break down the PET polymer into monomers, allowing plastic waste to be effectively disposed of.

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How one French company is trying to improve plastic recycling.

She was tasked with modifying and experimenting with an enzyme that her colleagues had discovered in a pile of rotting leaves in the park next to the university, called LCC - leaf-branch compost cutinase.

LCC helps microbes break down the waxy coating of leaves, and Ms Sulaiman hoped it might also help degrade plastic.

One afternoon, she cut up some plastic packaging from a pair of headphones and left the shards in water overnight with some samples of LCC. By the morning, it looked different.

"The piece of plastic had some holes, or some breakdown," she recalls. "That made me feel so surprised."

The plastic was PET, which is a polymer - a long molecule in which smaller chemical units called monomers are joined tightly together.

Polymers are found everywhere in nature - cellulose, a structural component of trees and other plants, is the most common example.

Enzymes have evolved alongside them to break down their chemical bonds, allowing microbes to biodegrade organic material.

But enzymes have only been exposed to plastics for a few decades, which is why the materials don't degrade. However, over the past two decades scientists have found a way to give evolution a helping hand.

Prof Alain Marty and his team have been tweaking an enzyme so it can break down the bonds in plastic

That's what Prof Alain Marty and his colleagues at the University of Toulouse in France have been doing.

Over eight years they re-engineered LCC - now LCCICCG - to become a trained PET specialist.

The enzyme is now so efficient that it can completely break the PET polymer down to its constituent monomers - the chemicals producers need to make new plastic. Prof Marty likens it to breaking apart a pearl necklace.

"We are using an enzyme that you can consider a molecular scissors," he says. "We break down the link between the pearls, liberate the pearls and in this way, after purification, we can sell these pearls again."

He is now the chief scientific officer at Carbios, which has a demonstration plant in Clermont-Ferrand, in central France.

It looks a bit like a microbrewery, with a large cylindrical reactor surrounded by other equipment for processing PET plastic.

The biggest machine of all processes polyester-rich clothes. Polyester, a form of PET plastic, accounts for about half of the clothing fibre the world produces.

Eventually, most of these clothes end up being incinerated or sent to landfill, often in the developing world.

But the big machine in Clermont-Ferrand offers them an afterlife, shredding them and then meticulously removing buttons and sequins.

The reactor at the Carbios demonstration plant is where the plastic is broken down

The scraps of fabric that make it through this process are then fed into another machine where they are turned into soft pellets. Mountains of jewel-like shards from plastic bottles go through the same machine, also to be turned into pellets. This step increases the surface area of the material and weakens the molecular bonds of the plastic.

Importantly, the pellets do not need to be 100% PET. The pellets from textiles contain other fabrics like cotton and the bottles contain green dyes. Mixed plastics, such as food trays, can also be dealt with.

The company is now about to radically scale up operations. By 2025 the plan is to open a factory in northeast France that will be able to recycle 50,000 tonnes of PET waste a year - that's 300 million T-shirts, or two billion bottles.

Carbios does not aim to become a recycler, but will license its process out to other companies, which means it has the potential to spread quickly. They have formed a consortium with big brands including Nestle, L'Oréal and PepsiCo.

Since it produces the same chemical monomers that plastic producers are already using, minimal change is needed.

But the familiarity of its product is also a challenge - since these indistinguishable chemicals will cost about 60% more than those derived from petrochemicals.

"With time Carbios will get access to more and more feedstock," says Emmanuel Ladent, Carbios chief executive.

"So the cost of raw materials will go down, because we have access to feedstocks which today are incinerated or go to landfill."

He adds that any future carbon tax will also benefit them.

Carbios are not alone in this sector - other research teams are working on PET recycling with a variety of enzymes.

But none of these teams are at the point of scaling their process up.

Less than 10% of plastic worldwide is recycled

"I'm really enthusiastic about the work that Carbios is doing, because they are kind of blazing the trail if you like," says Prof Andy Pickford, from the Centre for Enzyme Innovation at the University of Portsmouth. "If people can see this works, then hopefully more people will buy into it."

But he adds that he is less optimistic for recycling other plastic types. Some may never be able to be recycled, and we may do well to move away from using these plastics.

Any progress would be welcome - according to the OECD, less than 10% of plastic worldwide is recycled. Every year, around half of the world's 400 million tonnes of plastic waste goes to landfill.

More technology of business

Carbios is already turning its attention to plastics with more complex chemical structures. Nylon is top of the list, but Prof Marty tells me this will need a completely different enzyme to unlock it.

Meanwhile, Sintawee Sulaiman, who first witnessed LCC degrade plastic in 2010, is pleased with the progress her enzyme has made since she gave it its first meal of headphone packaging.

"I feel very lucky to have met LCC," she says. "And I really hope that it can help the world - to change the world into a better place."

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The T-shirt chewing enzyme ready to tackle plastic waste

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A French start-up is ready to use an enzyme which can break down plastic on an industrial scale.

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Family of American 4-year-old released by Hamas hopes she can still live a good life

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Family of American 4-year-old released by Hamas hopes she can still live a good life

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The family of a 4-year-old Israeli American girl who was released after seven weeks in Hamas' captivity have described her as a "miracle" and said they hope she can return to normality. Abigail’s parents were killed at the Kfar Aza kibbutz during the Oct. 7 attack that triggered the current Israel-Hamas war. Her older brother and sister survived by hiding in a closet. Click the link above to find out more.

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The family of a 4-year-old Israeli American girl who was released after seven weeks in Hamas' captivity have described her as a "miracle" and said they hope she can return to normality.

Abigail Mor Edan was freed from Gaza along with 16 other hostages Sunday, the third day of a tentative truce between Hamas and Israel that came after weeks of intense fighting across the Gaza Strip.

Abigail's parents were killed at the Kfar Aza kibbutz during the Oct. 7 attack that triggered the current Israel-Hamas war. Her older brother and sister survived by hiding in a closet.

So far, 51 Israelis and 18 people of other nationalities who were taken by Hamas have been released as part of the cease-fire deal.

"We can only pray and hope that as the days go on she will be able to live a good life," Liz Hirsh Naftali, Abigail's great-aunt, told the "TODAY" show Tuesday morning from Washington, D.C.

She said Abigail was "elated" to be reunited with her siblings and cousins but acknowledged the tragedy she had endured at such a young age.

"It's going to be a very slow process, it's 50 days and having seen her parents murdered, but at least she is home safe," Naftali said.

"My hope is she will be embraced and go back out and play soccer with her siblings and go back to school and that, while she is a miracle and the hope for the future, that she will be able to live her life as a little girl," she said.

Naftali said Abigail was held hostage with a woman and her three children, which she called a "blessing" because of the woman's ability to care for her and "comfort her in the darkness for 50 days."

Naftali didn't name the woman but last week the Hostages and Missing Persons Families Forum, an Israeli group, said Abigail was being kept with Hagar Brodutch, 39, and her three children.

Naftali's daughter Noa told "TODAY" that her cousin, who turned 4 Friday, was "sweet and feisty" and liked to boss her siblings around. "She has a love of life," she said.

Abigail and her siblings will now be raised by their aunt, Liron, the sister of their murdered mother, and her husband, Zuli.

In a separate interview shown on "TODAY," another of Abigail's aunts, Ella Mor, said that the girl had become a symbol to the entire country.

"In Israel, people feel she is Israel's baby, she is the Israeli baby of everyone," she said.

Earlier this month, Naftali told NBC News' Lester Holt that Abigail was in her father's arms when he was shot by a Hamas gunman. The girl then "crawled out from under her father's body ... full of his blood," she said.

The temporary truce between Israel and Hamas entered a fifth day Tuesday, with the release of more Israeli hostages and Palestinian prisoners.

The cease-fire agreement, brokered by Qatar, Egypt and the United States, compelled Hamas to release at least 50 hostages in exchange for the release of 150 Palestinian prisoners, primarily minors who have been held in Israeli jails, in some cases for many years.

There are still about 173 Israeli hostages inside Gaza, the Israeli prime minister's office said Tuesday.

The first U.S. government flight with humanitarian aid for Gaza is scheduled to arrive in Egypt's northern Sinai on Tuesday, senior Biden administration officials told NBC News.

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4-year-old American who saw her parents murdered has become a symbol in Israel, family says

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The family of a 4-year-old Israeli American girl who was released after seven weeks in Hamas' captivity have described her as a "miracle" and said they hope she can return to normality.

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There has been an outbreak of infectious respiratory diseases that has caused clusters of pneumonia among children in Northern China. This has increased hospital admissions due to mycoplasma pneumoniae , a respiratory syncytial virus, which causes cold-like symptoms, and viruses responsible for seasonal flu.

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CDC speaks out over China’s pneumonia outbreak as concerns grow

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The health agency said it was monitoring the situation, and that the rise in hospitalizations was due to “simultaneous increases in a number of known” diseases.

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How the death of a young mom led to the unraveling of a national fentanyl trafficking network

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How the death of a young mom led to the unraveling of a national fentanyl trafficking network

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Diamond Lynch, a 20 yr old mom, died in 2021 after taking a pill laced with fentanyl. Through searching her text messages and analyzing leftover pills police were able to discover a fentanyl distribution network that extended from D.C to California down to Mexico. This discovery has now prevented the deaths of thousands of Americans.

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It began with the death of a 20-year-old mom, just a month after her baby boy's first birthday. She was one of 70,000 Americans lost to the scourge of fentanyl in 2021.

Police officers couldn't save Diamond Lynch, who overdosed in her Washington, D.C., apartment after taking a pill laced with the powerful and dangerous chemical opiate. But they quickly began investigating how she died, with the help of federal prosecutors and the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Starting with some text messages and a handful of pills, authorities unraveled a massive fentanyl distribution network that extended from the D.C. area to California to Mexico. So far, 25 people have been charged. Court documents say the dealers did business largely in the open, largely on Instagram, and smuggled fentanyl-laced pills in candy boxes. The pills were made to look like Percocet and other pharmaceutical opiates.

It's part of a DEA initiative called "OD Justice," an effort to work backward from overdose deaths to try to hold traffickers accountable and make a dent in the flow of fentanyl.

"We are doing hundreds of investigations like this across the United States," Anne Milgram, head of the DEA, told NBC News.

Investigators used messages on Diamond Lynch's phone to find the dealers who sold her the fatal dose, Milgram said. "Then we expanded it out to who was supplying them. We traced that back to Los Angeles, San Diego and ultimately to Mexico."

In an investigation dubbed "Operation Blues Brothers," after the color of the deadly pills, federal agents benefitted from the carelessness of the accused drug traffickers, who communicated via social media messages that can easily be obtained with warrants. This also showed how, as Milgram put it, " social media has become the superhighway of drugs."

"What we see day in and day out across the United States," she said, "is that these pills - the fentanyl that's killing Americans - are being sold on Snapchat, on TikTok, Facebook marketplace, Instagram, openly. ... These individuals were using Instagram for almost every part of their business. They were using it to pick the blue color of the [pills] that they were buying from the wholesalers to sell on the streets. They were using it to coordinate shipments from L.A. to D.C. They were using it to arrange payments. So basically every part of the business is being facilitated by Instagram, in this case that ultimately resulted in Diamond's death," Milgram noted.

Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, declined to comment on the record. The company has said drug sales are banned from its platform and that the problem of fentanyl crisis is a "whole of society" problem.

Two of the 25 defendants have pleaded guilty - Larry Jerome Eastman and his sister, Justice Michelle Eastman, who admitted to supplying the drugs that killed Diamond Lynch. He was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison and she got just over three years. The other defendants have pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiracy, drug trafficking, gun and other charges.

According to court records and an internal DEA document obtained by NBC News, investigators seized nearly 95,000 fentanyl-laced pills linked to the network and more than 14 pounds of the drug itself, enough to kill more than 400,000 Americans.

At the same time, Milgram acknowledged that enforcement does not appear to be putting a dent in the overall flow of fentanyl into the U.S. - and that the risk for drug users is greater than ever.

"We've seized almost 70 million fake pills containing fentanyl this year to date," the DEA administrator said. "Last year, the entire year, we seized about 58 million. Now, seven out of 10 of those pills contain a potentially deadly dose. Last year it was six out of 10."

Said Milgram, "Fentanyl is the deadliest drug threat we've ever seen in the United States."

Court records say investigators found Larry and Michelle Eastman through CashApp transactions on Diamond Lynch's phone, which led them to Instagram photos of him displaying cash and drugs.

Evidence from the Eastmans led authorities to a larger retail network in D.C., which was purchasing drugs from a wholesale network in California, the records show. Instagram photos showed members of the California group posing with illegal guns, some of which were seized in court-ordered searches. The Californians were buying their drugs from the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico, which manufactures them using precursors imported from China, officials say.

"Why are the cartels sending more pills and fentanyl to the U.S.?" Milgram asked. "Why are they making them stronger and more deadly? And the short answer is that all they care about is making money and selling more. They want to get people addicted to fentanyl. It's how they sell more. So the fact that some people die ... they see it as the cost of doing business."

Diamond Lynch's mom, Paula Lynch, was aware her daughter had a drug problem. She had overdosed once before, only to be saved by two doses of Narcan, which can counteract the effects of opiates. But Paula told NBC News she had no idea just how much risk her daughter was taking by purchasing what she thought were prescription opioid pills from a street dealer.

"We didn't know," she said. "I thought it was more of a recreational thing. ... We never heard the word 'fentanyl' until she was deceased."

Paula, who is now raising her grandson, says she will live with regret forever that she couldn't help her daughter.

"What I would say to young people is definitely one pill can kill," she said. "It's chemical warfare on American citizens, period."

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How a young mom's death led to the unraveling of a drug trafficking network

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The DEA used info from Diamond Lynch's phone to find where she got the drugs that killed her, a trail that stretched from Washington, D.C., to California to Mexico.

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Palestinian children affected by the Israel-Hamas war

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Palestinian children affected by the Israel-Hamas war

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Throughout the span of the conflict between Gaza and Israel, many Palestinian children have been critically affected by the constant artillery and violence that occurs within the communities, deteriorating the children’s mental health and safety in general. 950 Palestinians have died within the span of the war, including 260 children.

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The Israeli air strikes have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of children in Gaza, the total blockade poses further risks.

Displaced Palestinian children who fled their homes amid Israeli strikes sheltered in United Nations-run schools in Gaza [Mohammed Salem/Reuters]

With warplanes carrying out air strikes and Israel's announced total blockade of the Gaza Strip, residents have been stripped of access to many necessities, including food and water.

In response to the Hamas attack on Israel, Gazan neighbourhoods, including al-Karama and Rimal, have been bombarded and the civilian death toll, including hundreds of children, continues to rise.

Keep reading

Here is a look at how the war is affecting Palestinian children on the Gaza Strip:

How many Palestinian children were killed and injured?

On Wednesday, the death toll in Gaza reached at least 950 Palestinians, including 260 children, with the Palestinian Health Information Center reporting that 10 percent of the 3726 people injured were children.

According to the Defense for Children International (DCI), a Palestinian human rights organisation focused on child rights, since 2005, six major military offensives in Gaza have killed at least 1,000 Palestinian children.

"We know from previous experience that children will be terrified," said Jason Lee, Save the Children's country director for the occupied Palestinian territory, in a statement on Saturday.

Children and the blockade

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant announced a complete blockade of Gaza on Monday, justifying the move by describing Palestinians as "beastly people".

This means that the supply of electricity, gas, food and water has been cut off in Gaza, which has already living under a land, sea and air blockade since 2007 with its borders controlled by Israel.

Since this blockade, Israel has launched five military attacks on Gaza, destroying homes.

Due to the blockade and lack of access to materials, reconstructing the homes has been slow and difficult, displacing the inhabitants.

Children are highly vulnerable to these conditions - lack of access to clean water, sanitation resources, and protection from weather extremes - causing a strain on their physical and mental health.

The lack of food in the complete blockade will also lead to a higher rate of food insecurity. DCI reported that children in Gaza have previously resorted to dangerous methods of collecting food or money for food, entering zones where they can be attacked by the Israeli military.

The lack of water and sanitation facilities in Gaza has previously resulted in children suffering from diseases including the flu and typhoid fever, according to DCI.

Frequent electricity deficits have exacerbated the issue of children being vulnerable to extreme heat and cold, DCI said in the report.

Mental health

According to a 2022 report by Save the Children, four out of five children in Gaza are living with depression, grief and fear, while more than half struggle with suicidal thoughts. Children there also experience trauma from witnessing the deaths of other children.

Education disrupted

Since the beginning of the Israeli air strikes, over 73,000 Palestinians left their homes to seek refuge in 64 schools run by UNRWA, the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees.

However, schools are no longer safe spaces and according to UNRWA, as at least four schools in Gaza have suffered damage from Israeli bombing.

On Tuesday, the Education Above All (EAA) Foundation's Al Fakhoura school was destroyed amidst air strikes. The programme provided scholarships to Palestinian students in need. In a statement, EAA said that "collective punishment, reprisals, and attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure are serious violations of international humanitarian law, and if deliberate they are war crimes."

The students in Gaza also experience the constant fear of an Israeli incursion. The Ministry of Education has created training programs for teachers and students in schools near the Gaza borders to carry out evacuation drills in case of an attack.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies

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How are Palestinian children affected by the Israel-Hamas war?

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The Israeli air strikes have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of children in Gaza, the total blockade poses risks.

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Use of Human Shields in Israel–Hamas War

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Use of Human Shields in Israel–Hamas War

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The majority of the 11,100 Palestinians killed in Israeli attacks are civilians (2/3 of them are women and children). The Israeli army has accused the Palestinian resistance group, Hamas, of also using civilians as human shields. The Palestinian armed group has rejected these allegations and Israel hasn’t provided concrete proof for its allegations.

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What’s a ‘human shield’, Israel’s justification for Gaza civilian killings?

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Experts discuss the legal implications of the term as Israel has used it to justify attacks on hospitals and civilians.

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Doctors at Gaza’s biggest hospital say newborns are dying after facility goes ‘out of service’

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Doctors at Gaza’s biggest hospital say newborns are dying after facility goes ‘out of service’

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Ever since the conflict in Gaza, hospitals have been filling up. This causes there to be no space for babies to come into the world. Newborns and other patients at Gaza’s largest hospital are dying as power fails and resources run out. According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, it is said that at least 35 babies who are born prematurely are bound to die at any moment. The challenges for Gaza’s hospitals continue to mount: As fighting has intensified , ambulances have come under fire, power is going out, and dead bodies have piled up in an overwhelming surge of patients.

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Doctors at Gaza’s biggest hospital say newborns are dying after facility goes ‘out of service’

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More infants born prematurely and receiving care at Al-Shifa hospital are at risk of dying as the facility goes out of service, the Palestinian Health Ministry said.

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US support for Israel will lead to damaged global relations according to Arab leaders.

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US support for Israel will lead to damaged global relations according to Arab leaders.

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The US is actively involved in the Gaza-Israeli war as they participate in negotiations over hostages. Further, the US has shown outstanding support for Israel by providing weaponry and calling for “humanitarian pauses” instead of a total ceasefire. Arab leaders warn that US support for Israel will “shatter American influence for years to come”.

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U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on his plane as he departs Israel en route to Jordan on Nov. 3. (Jonathan Ernst/Pool/AP)

NEW DELHI - A month into the Gaza war, President Biden's steadfast support for Israeli leaders, even as the Palestinian civilian death toll mounts, riskslasting damage to Washington's standing in the region and beyond, Arab leaders and analysts say, warning that the perceived U.S. acceptance of attacks on refugee camps, hospitals and apartment buildings could shatter American influence for years to come.
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Anger over the campaign's enormous civilian collateral is increasingly directed at the United States, not just at Israel, and has been a constant source of friction throughout Secretary of State Antony Blinken's travels in the Middle East and Asia over the past week. Prime ministers and diplomats have admonished him over Israeli actions, with many charging that the attacks are facilitated by U.S. weaponry and that efforts to push for " humanitarian pauses " rather than an enduring cease-fire is a formula for continued violence against noncombatants.

"The whole region is sinking in a sea of hatred that will define generations to come," said Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, speaking alongside Blinken in Amman. He called for Washington to put a halt to Israeli attacks on civilians. "The U.S. has a leading role to play in these efforts. And on it and on all of us fall the very heavy responsibility of ending this catastrophe."

Blinken's conversations with Israeli leaders also were tense, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his top lieutenants ceded little ground to U.S. concerns about civilian safety, maintaining that Hamas operatives are hiding among innocent bystanders in Gaza. Even in Tokyo, at a gathering of nations typically supportive of the United States, foreign ministers had contentious conversations about the U.S. handling of the Gaza crisis, although the European Union's chief diplomat, Josep Borrell, directed most of his ire at his German counterpart for taking the U.S. side rather than backing Borrell's effort to deliver a sharper call to Israel to halt its offensive. French President Emmanuel Macron later broke with the U.S. position, calling for a cease-fire.

As massive pro-Palestinian demonstrations were held throughout the world, hundreds of thousands of people in Indonesia, Pakistan and elsewhere criticized Israel and its American backers for the death toll, which has surpassed 11,000 Palestinians, many of them children, according to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Health Ministry.

Biden administration officials acknowledge the challenge they face while balancing between support for Israel and the steep civilian toll in Gaza. Officials say they are hopeful that if the Israeli response ends quickly - say, by the removal of top Hamas leadership - then the long-term implications for the United States will be lower. There is hope, too, that instances of unintended death and injury will diminish as the bombing campaign is supplanted by ground operations, even as Blinken expresses a sense of urgency over civilian safety.
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American concerns about waning influence in the Middle East long predate the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel that left 1,200 dead, but the current situation will probably accelerate and deepen the fallout, analysts said. And the close ties between the United States and Israel over the approach in Gaza has left Arab leaders unwilling to be seen doing any favors for Washington.

"What the Americans are doing now, this policy, is damaging them. At least 1.3 billion people in the world are going to hate them," said Gen. Abbas Ibrahim, a former top Lebanese official who has been involved in negotiations to secure the exit of foreign nationals trapped in Gaza. "And it's not just about Muslims anymore. There are people demonstrating all over the world."

He said that he relayed as much, bluntly, to U.S. officials who traveled to Beirut in recent days as part of the diplomacy to avert a wider regional conflict. They "didn't answer," he said. "This is their policy. But they are wrong."

The anger toward Washington has given Russia and China an opening to portray themselves as defenders of Palestinians, boosting their image in the developing world and using their propaganda outlets to amplify the connection between the United States and Israeli actions in Gaza. Moscow hosted senior Hamas leaders last month, earning praise from the organization and condemnation from Israel.

For a world already split over Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the Gaza crisis is offering fodder, for those who want to seize it, that Western nations care more about the deaths of White Christian Ukrainians than non-White Muslims in the Middle East.

"There's something happening in terms of the reaction to this crisis that is unlike anything I can remember in recent years, maybe even dating back to the Gulf War and other episodes of U.S. policy in the Middle East," said Suzanne Maloney, director of the foreign policy program at the Brookings Institution.

"There's a sense" in the developing world that there is a "double standard in terms of victims," she said - an unfair perception, she added, given that Russia invaded a weaker neighboring country that did not pose a security threat, leading to the deaths of Ukrainian civilians, while Israel is responding to an ongoing threat from Hamas following an attack.

Still, the war's toll has put U.S. officials in an untenable position. Many privately acknowledge their discomfort with Israel's targeting of Hamas positions within groupings of civilians. Blinken has repeatedly publicly declared his pain at seeing imagery of Palestinian children being pulled from rubble - which the father of two young children also mentions in his closed-door meetings with fellow top diplomats, officials say.

And over the course of his travels in recent days, he has considerably sharpened his tone as Netanyahu stalled efforts that would ease the humanitarian disaster.

"Far too many Palestinians have been killed. Far too many have suffered these past weeks, and we want to do everything possible to prevent harm to them," Blinken said Friday in New Delhi, at the conclusion of a nine-day tour that stopped in eight countries and the West Bank.

At the outset of his travels, when Blinken met with Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders in Tel Aviv, he told them that there could not be another week of carnage such as the one that had just occurred, with scores of refugees dead when their camps were bombed, dwindling supplies of food and water, and communications cutoffs that impede ambulances from reaching the injured.

Prolonging civilian suffering, U.S. officials say, risks radicalizing young Palestinians and heightening the chances of a regional war if Iran and its proxy forces feel a need to respond.

But the administration faces a complicated task in how it frames its message to the Israelis publicly, in part because it doesn't want to be seen as denying support to an ally in its moment of need. "The real work of diplomacy doesn't happen in the public statements, it happens behind the scenes," Maloney said. "We're in this place where people are reacting to the public rhetoric and not to the results of the private advocacy."

The Israeli government says that when it has hit camps, ambulances and areas near hospitals, the intended targets are Hamas operatives or infrastructure. U.S. officials say they back Israel's intelligence informing those strikes, but they have pushed its leaders to change their calculus about how many civilian deaths are acceptable in exchange for each high-value Hamas target. Israel has a far greater tolerance for collateral civilian deaths than does the United States, say U.S. officials who have discussed the issue with the Israelis.

Yet no matter how hard the Biden administration pushes Israel, the White House is unlikely to break free from assuming blame for its most divisive actions on the battlefield, analysts said, invoking images of the bear hug that the U.S. president gave to Netanyahu on his visit to Israel soon after the Hamas attack.

"There is a degree to which people in the Arab world and the Global South are drawing a line between Gaza destruction and the presidential embrace of Prime Minister Netanyahu," said Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, using a phrase, Global South, that refers to many of the nations of Latin America, the Middle East,Asia and Africa.

"There's a way that the United States is hitched to what the Israelis want to do, whether the United States wants to do it or not," he said.

With protests flaring around the world and some countries withdrawing their ambassadors from Israel in protest, the frustration extends far beyond the immediate region. In Malaysia, for instance, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said at a pro-Palestinian rally last month that the invasion of Gaza was the "height of barbarism."

His response has been an effort to shore up domestic support, but it is also a reflection of popular sentiment in Malaysia, where perceptions of Israel and of the United States are at an "all-time low," said Bridget Welsh, an honorary research associate with the University of Nottingham Asia Research Institute-Malaysia.

The Biden bear hug isn't just symbolic, officials say, and the decision to unwaveringly back Israel is coming from the top. Even if Biden's Democratic coalition is increasingly uncomfortable with the scale of Palestinian losses, he faces little pressure from Congress to shift course, officials familiar with the situation say.

Nor is it obvious that the United States has leverage to halt the Israeli assault, even though it is Israel's biggest military backer. The Biden administration believes that Israel has a sufficient arsenal already in hand for it to complete its objectives in Gaza, officials said, meaning that even if U.S. military aid were cut off immediately, Israel would probably keep up its assault. U.S. help would become more paramount in the event of a two-front war.

Senior administration officials say that sometimes Washington's role is not to be loved, but to be effective. During Blinken's trip- his second visit to the region since the crisis began -Israeli officials asked U.S. diplomats to push Arab leaders to give them space. Arab leaders, in turn, told the Americans that if they did not get the Israelis to pay more attention to humanitarian concerns, the outrage among their own populations would proliferate.

Neither side declared much appreciation for U.S. policies - but they also said that they felt that the Americans were the only interlocutors who could effectively pressure the other side.

"American power is going to be assessed not by how this starts," Alterman said, "but how this ends."
Rebecca Tan in Singapore and Liz Sly in Beirut contributed to this report.

Israel-Gaza war live updates: Israeli forces enter al-Shifa Hospital complex in heart of Gaza City, IDF says

18 minutes ago

Israel-Gaza war live updates: Israeli forces enter al-Shifa Hospital complex in heart of Gaza City, IDF says

18 minutes ago

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U.S. is warned about its global standing as Gaza suffering persists

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Arab leaders admonished Secretary of State Antony Blinken, saying the U.S. will be deemed complicit for civilian deaths in Israel's unrestrained Gaza assault.

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Tennessee college student's parents speak out after daughter hit and killed by stray bullet

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Tennessee college student's parents speak out after daughter hit and killed by stray bullet

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The parents of a Belmont University freshman student speak out after the death of their daughter. Jillian Ludwig, 18, was shot and killed by a stray bullet whilst taking a walk in the park. Find out what her parents said and more by clicking the link above.

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Jillian Ludwig was a student at Belmont University.

The parents of a Belmont University freshman who was killed by a stray bullet earlier this week are speaking out about the death of their daughter.

Jillian Ludwig, 18, was struck in the head by a bullet when walking in a park in Nashville, Tennessee, authorities said. She was taken to the hospital on Wednesday in critical condition and died on Thursday morning.

"There's a piece of my heart that was taken from me," Jessica Ludwig, her mother, told "Good Morning America" in an interview. "And I don't know how to feel that."

"It's kind of hard to comprehend," said her father, Matt Ludwig. "She was thriving so well and doing so well in so many ways, in every way."

Shaquille Taylor, 29, was allegedly shooting at a vehicle across the street from the park when a stray bullet hit Jillian Ludwig.

Jillian Ludwig's parents, Jessica and Matt Ludwig, appear on "Good Morning America."

Police said Taylor was most recently arrested in September, charged with felony auto theft and released on a $20,000 bond. Taylor missed his Nov. 3 court appearance and the court issued a failure to appear warrant, according to Nashville police.

"A repeat criminal who's deemed to have mental health issues should be dealt with in a facility or in some way that deals with those issues. The answer should not be to release him back into the streets," Matt Ludwig told "GMA" on Friday.

Taylor was initially charged with aggravated assault and evidence tampering for the alleged shooting, police said. In the wake of Ludwig's death, police said they were "in discussion with the District Attorney's Office concerning modified charges."

The president of Belmont University issued a statement shortly after the shooting.

"Jillian is an engaged member of our community who is known for her love of music," Belmont University President Greg Jones said in a statement to the school community. "A music business major and bass player, she is often found at concerts, cheering on fellow musicians and using music as a way to connect with those around her. Jillian is also an avid runner who enjoys being outside."

Jillian Ludwig, 18, who was shot on Nov. 7, 2023, is seen in this undated photo released by the Nashville Police Department.

Nashville Police Department via X

Meanwhile, Jillian's parents are doing their best to come to terms with what happened to their daughter.

"You're just so loved and so missed," said Jessica Ludwig. "And we are so proud of you and you put a lot of living into your 18 years."

The investigation into Ludwig's death is ongoing.

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Tennessee college student's parents speak out after daughter hit and killed by stray bullet

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Authorities in Tennessee are considering new charges against the 29-year-old man police say fired a bullet that killed a freshman at Belmont University in a public park.

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Gaming: Just Dance being made accessible for everyone

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Gaming: Just Dance being made accessible for everyone

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Just Dance's latest version features a wheelchair dance routine, allowing players to follow arm movements while holding their phone or console. Ubisoft's accessibility design specialist, Stacey Jenkins, believes making games accessible to everyone is difficult. Despite progress, gaming companies still need to figure out what works for people with disabilities.

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More than 135 million people have played Just Dance - but how accessible is it for everyone?

Ubisoft's video game has 500 unique choreographies that users from around the world follow.

Seth, 14, from Vale of Glamorgan, was invited to the company's Paris studio to test out the latest version.

He spoke to designers and choreographers and gave his input on a new routine for people in wheelchairs.

Seth, who has a rare muscle wasting condition called Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy, is a member of the Welsh Youth Parliament.

Like most teenagers, I love gaming with my friends and brothers, but using a wheelchair means I'm not always able to join in with every video game.

I have a disability that affects my muscles. If I play a game that involves me moving a lot, I'm not always very good at it and my arms ache easily.

Gaming is important to me, so I wanted to know how tech companies are creating new games to suit people with disabilities.

I was invited, with Children in Need, to meet the Paris-based team behind the hit game Just Dance.

The latest version of the game features, for the first time, a routine performed by a dancer in a wheelchair.

Players are invited to sit and follow the arm movements whilst holding their phone or console.

"Everyone can get joy from dance," Stacey Jenkins, one of Ubisoft's accessibility design specialists told me.

"Game development is a really long process but if you start to think about accessibility right at the beginning, we can make things accessible by design.

"If you're a developer and you're interested in accessibility, you just need to listen to disabled people."

But is it possible to make all games accessible to all people?

"I think it's really difficult to make games completely 100% accessible to absolutely everybody at the same time," says Stacey.

"Every game that we release, if it's more accessible than the last, then we're making good progress."

After chatting to Stacey, I tested Just Dance in the studio with Florent Devlesaver, a Belgian dancer, in a wheelchair, who features in the game.

He told me how he had to adapt the dance moves to work for him, as well as making sure they still worked in a video game.

I loved meeting Florent and having a go at the dance routine in the studio. It was really enjoyable.

It was nice to see that even though you have a disability, it doesn't define you and you can do whatever you want with your life.

I think people are making a huge effort to develop more accessible games, but it's going to take some time.

"We've seen some really amazing progress being made," Stacey tells me.

"I think we've still got a long way to go."

I think gaming companies need to figure out what works for people with disabilities but I definitely think things are changing. I have confidence.

Game On! For BBC Children in Need, BBC Three and iPlayer, 10 Nov, 19:00 to 21:00 GMT

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Gaming: Just Dance being made accessible for everyone

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Seth Burke, 14, who uses a wheelchair, meets the Paris-based team behind hit game Just Dance.

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Ohio voter's have added the right to access abortion to the states constitution. It specifies that abortion will remain prohibited if the doctor judges the fetus to be viable enough to survive birth with exceptions to protect the mothers life and health.

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Ohio voters have added the right to access abortion care to the state's constitution, NBC News projects - another major political victory for abortion-rights advocates in the nearly 17 months since the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade.

The passage of the Issue 1 ballot measure inserts language in the state constitution guaranteeing every person in Ohio the right "to one's own reproductive medical treatment, including but not limited to abortion," and barring the state from "burdening, penalizing or prohibiting" those rights - though it specifies that abortion will remain prohibited after the point a doctor judges a fetus would most likely survive birth, with exceptions to protect the woman's life or health.

Approval of the ballot measure marks yet another victory for abortion-rights advocates, this time in a state that Donald Trump twice carried by 8-point margins. Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and the national right to abortion access in its June 2022 Dobbs decision, ballot measures backing abortion rights have won in every election so far, even in conservative states, including Kentucky and Kansas - and in an August special election in Ohio that served as a proxy battle ahead of November's constitutional amendment fight.

Tuesday's outcome further demonstrates that abortion could remain a major liability for Republicans in elections. As in Ohio, polling has shown that voters across the country broadly favor abortion protections - a fact that Democrats leveraged last year to keep control of the U.S. Senate, fend off a red wave in the House and win several governorships. Next year, it is likely to be central to President Joe Biden's campaign for re-election.

In Ohio, passage of the amendment will effectively counteract the state's " heartbeat bill," which took effect immediately after the Dobbs decision and banned most abortions - with exceptions for the health of the pregnant woman and ectopic pregnancies - but remains temporarily blocked by a state judge.

That case is before the state Supreme Court, which heard oral arguments in September.

Groups on both sides of the abortion fight spent millions in the run-up to an August election in Ohio - another ballot measure campaign, that one over whether to make it harder to amend the state constitution in the future, including raising the threshold for success to 60% instead of a simple majority. It lost in August. Its resounding defeat was a clear win for reproductive rights advocates in Ohio, and in many ways it paved the way for the success of the measure approved Tuesday.

Following that campaign, reproductive rights groups began far outspending anti-abortion groups in the fight over the November measure.

Since Aug. 9, groups supporting the November Issue 1 measure spent $23.7 million on advertising, compared to $10.7 million the anti-abortion groups spent against the amendment, according to AdImpact, a firm that tracks political ad spending.

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Ohio voters enshrine abortion rights in state constitution

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NBC News projects that Ohio voters have passed Issue 1, yet another win for abortion-rights supporters at the ballot box after the fall of Roe v. Wade.

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The health tech startup called Cercle, launched November 8, 2023. Cercle uses AI to try and advance women’s health. This  platform organizes unstructured medical data into a standardized format for fertility doctors and researchers, hoping it will help develop more personalized treatment plans and accelerate new discoveries in pharmaceuticals.

Link

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Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank opens brand new facility, 'The Market'

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Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank opens brand new facility, 'The Market'

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Members of the community helped open The Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Banks newest space. This facility in Duquesne will help the food bank continue to aid those battling food insecurity in their 11-county service area, making Lisa Scales (President/CEO) very delighted and grateful for those who helped.

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/ CBS Pittsburgh

Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank opens brand new facility, 'The Market'

DUQUESNE, Pa. (KDKA) - On Thursday morning, members of the community helped open The Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank's newest space.

This 30,000-square-foot expanded facility in Duquesne will help the food bank continue to aid those battling food insecurity in their 11-county service area.

Lisa Scales, the President and CEO of the food bank said when she looks at this new facility, she is so grateful to the community who came together to make this space happen.

"This is a celebration not only of the completion of the building renovations," she said. "But it is really about the collective power of the community coming together to support us and ensure we are a strong organization."

One of the big features of this new building is an expanded cooler space to keep food fresh along with a new food pantry called "The Market" open six days a week, that is stocked in part with help from Giant Eagle.

Dan Donovan of Giant Eagle said that they have been proud partners of the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank since it first opened.

"So whether you are Giant Eagle or The Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank, what's critically important is being dedicated to giving back to the communities you serve," said Donovan. "What we share is a common passion for feeding people. We do it in different ways. But together we serve our neighborhoods hopefully really well."

You can learn more or help make an impact on The Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank's website at this link.

First published on September 28, 2023 / 2:30 PM

© 2023 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank opens brand new facility, 'The Market'

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Thursday morning was the opening day for the brand new facility and the community was on hand to help out.

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Wrist Temperature Gives Clues to Future Health?

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Wrist Temperature Gives Clues to Future Health?

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Science shows that it’s possible to use skin temperature to monitor people for risk of disease. The continuous measurement of wrist temperature helps identify risk for diseases such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and disrupted temperature rhythms have been linked to many conditions, like metabolic syndrome and diabetes.

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In 1982 the new IBM computers were described in the Newsweek article as being small, easy to use and less costly. Its price started at just under 1600. In 2023, all modern computers are far slimmer and easier to use than the IBM computer. Further, the price of a 2023 computer ranges from 500 to 2000 dollars.

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Hollywood writers reach 'tentative' deal with studios, end months-long strike

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Hollywood writers reach 'tentative' deal with studios, end months-long strike

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Unions representing thousands of Hollywood movie and television writers have finally reached a "tentative" deal with major studios on Sunday. In this, they ended the writers strike that lasted almost 150 days, something that brought pickets to productions and company offices nationwide.

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Hollywood writers reach ‘tentative’ deal with studios, end monthslong strike

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The strike spanned 146 days and brought pickets to productions nationwide.

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Many pandemic programs that allowed free testing, treatment and vaccinations for COVID went away this year as the pandemic emergency designation expired. Starting September 25, the federal government will send up to four free COVID-19 rapid tests to households that request them.

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The Biden administration is whirring the COVIDtests.gov website back to life.

Starting Monday, September 25, the federal government will send up to four free COVID-19 rapid tests per household to anyone who requests them.

This announcement comes with a recognition that COVID hospitalizations in the U.S. peaked in January for the past three years running and that testing is an important component of minimizing the spread of the infection.

Many of the pandemic programs that allowed Americans to get tested, treated and vaccinated for COVID - all for free - went away this year as the pandemic emergency designation expired.

But now the Department of Health and Human Services, through its Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response, is making a $600 million investment in manufacturing of COVID tests.

The money has been awarded to 12 U.S. manufacturers and will buy 200 million tests. HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said the idea is to bolster the U.S. supply chain and reduce reliance on overseas manufacturers.

The first batch of free rapid tests by mail went out during the Omicron wave of January 2022 - that was the apex of COVID infection seen so far. The free test offer was renewed several times, with a total of 755 million free tests distributed.

The government suggests you don't throw out unused tests even if the expiration date has passed. First, check the lot numbers of any you have on hand at COVIDtests.gov - the expiration dates for many have been extended and the website will list them.

The strategic preparedness office also gives free COVID tests to long-term care facilities, low-income senior housing, uninsured individuals, and underserved communities.

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Free COVID tests by mail are back, starting Monday

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People will be able to go to COVIDTests.gov and get four free tests per household, starting next week. The Biden administration says it is trying to prepare for the fall and winter COVID season.

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Musk start-up Neuralink seeks people for brain-implant trial

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Musk start-up Neuralink seeks people for brain-implant trial

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Elon Musk, founder of Neuralink, seems to be in search of individuals willing to try his latest new invention: Brain Computers. These chips are inserted into the brain and have the ability to aid those who have disabilities and cannot control parts of the body, revolutionizing treatment for multiple issues.

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But Dr Rapeaux who is also a co-founder of a neural implant start-up Mintneuro, said it wasn't clear how their method for converting brain signals into useful actions would do better than that used by Blackrock Neurotech for example, and whether it is able to stay accurate and reliable over time, "a known issue in the field".

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Musk start-up Neuralink seeks people for brain-implant trial

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The company hopes to help people with paralysis move a cursor, or type, using its brain implant.

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Chester County prison officials had 'concerns about the leadership' a year before Danelo Cavalcante's escape

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Chester County prison officials had 'concerns about the leadership' a year before Danelo Cavalcante's escape

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The officials in Chester County, Pennsylvania, admitted to the failures of communication on Wednesday, following the convicted murderer Danelo Cavalcante's escape. At the meeting, Josh Maxwell told residents, "[This is].. something we never expected to happen here in Chester County, a place where people move to be and feel safe."

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Officials in Chester County, Pennsylvania, admitted Wednesday that there were failures in official communications following convicted murderer Danelo Cavalcante's escape from their county prison on Aug. 31.

During the first public meeting of the board that oversees the prison since the two-week manhunt for Cavalcante drew national headlines, Chester County Commissioner Josh Maxwell told residents the ordeal was "something we never expected to happen here in Chester County, a place where people move to be and feel safe."

Officials stated that they started having "concerns about the leadership and operations" at the prison a year earlier.

Pennsylvania State Police search for escaped inmate Danelo Cavalcante in Pennsbury Township, on Sept. 7, 2023.

Steven M. Falk/The Philadelphia Inquirer via ZUMA Press Wire

"We want to find ways to earn your trust," Maxwell said. "It's going to take more than a day, more than a meeting today. It's going to take weeks and then months and then years without any incidents to earn the community's trust."

He added that Cavalcante was "one of the worst prisoners we have had in terms of crimes they committed."

Maxwell said the board's concerns a year ago prompted them to hire third-party consultants to evaluate conditions at the prison.

One consultant conducted an unannounced inspection over a three-day span in April, which led to recommendations being delivered in July.

"Those recommendations focused on what they believed to be the root cause of concerns, which was leadership within the prison administration," Maxwell said.

"Ultimately, corrective actions that were tasked to the previous warden were not satisfactorily undertaken."

One day prior to the escape, the board accepted the resignation of the jail's warden and named Howard Holland, a former police chief in nearby Downingtown, as the prison's interim warden. Maxwell said Holland had spent several months as a "special liaison" to the board during the investigations by consultants.

'Emergency communication was lacking'

Maxwell acknowledged that there were issues with how Chester County residents were informed about the escape from the prison, which is located at the edge of Philadelphia's suburbs in one of the wealthiest regions of Pennsylvania.

Danelo Cavalcante was taken into custody on Sept. 13, 2023, after escaping from a prison in Chester County, Pa., two weeks prior.

"We do understand and believe that notifications and emergency communication was lacking regarding this prison escape and the county's Department of Emergency Services will start to make changes immediately," he said.

Maxwell noted in the event of any future escape, ReadyChesCo, the county's notification system for residents, will be activated at the same time as the escape alarms.

"In the situation like this, that notification did not go out quick enough. We own that and will ensure that the Department of Emergency Services corrects that for any incident moving forward," Maxwell said.

Changes ahead in Chester County

During Wednesday's meeting, the Chester County Prison Board approved a $94,000 contract with TranSystems to design security upgrades to the prison, including enclosing the yard that was where Cavalcante's escape began.

The board also approved temporary fixes to the prison, including closing off the area above the entrance doors to the prison yard with a security metal soffit, removing basketball hoops and adding correctional officers to the prison yards to supplement the supervision from the guard tower.

During the meeting, representatives from TranSystems shared photos taken inside the prison and offered three possible options for solutions, with the main one being that the prison yards should be fully enclosed with roofing so that detainees cannot climb out of the yard as Cavalcante did.

Community pushes back, 'You had one job to do.'

Local residents voiced their concerns about Cavalcante's escape during the meeting.

"I'm livid," said Sheila Lerner of Westtown Township. "You had one job to do, which was to ensure the safety of the citizens and manage the prison properly, and you failed it."

Holland, acknowledged that more needs to be done.

"I have work to do," Holland told the board and attendees at the meeting. "The only way I can get that work done and make sure it's acceptable is, one, be clear and transparent about what we're doing at that facility."

Holland is seeking a number of changes to the prison, including adding more high-tech cameras, conducting more drills, improving community relations, adding a new alarm system for the perimeter fence and implementing surveillance by drone.

He said that after the May escape of Igor Bolte from the same facility, razor wire was added near the exterior exercise yards and overhang immediately and $155,000 worth of additional razor wire was recommended for the prison roofline.

"The reason for that was when Mr. Bolte escaped, he didn't use the same path as Mr. Cavalcante," Holland said. "He actually got up onto the prison roof, ran across the roof and over the front overhang."

Although the $155,000 project was authorized on Aug. 14, Holland said the vendor has been waiting on supplies to arrive and the work is not expected to be finished until November.

"The combination of the razor wire added after Bolte's escape and the fine mesh metal fencing added after Cavalcante's escape prevents anyone from accessing the roof from the exterior exercise yards," Holland said.
ABC News' Charlotte Greer contributed to this report.

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Chester County prison officials had 'concerns about the leadership' a year before Danelo Cavalcante's escape

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Chester County prison officials had 'concerns about the leadership' a year before convicted murderer Danelo Cavalcante's escape.

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TikTok fined €345m over children's data privacy

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TikTok fined €345m over children's data privacy

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Tiktok, an online media platform, was fined €345m for breaking European data laws on children's accounts. The fine was issued by Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) over the problem that Tiktok had not been "transparent" with children's privacy data. Tiktok is working towards defaulting all accounts under 17 to private.

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By Tom Gerken & Liv McMahon Technology reporters

Getty Images

Irish regulators have fined TikTok €345m (£296m) for violating children's privacy.

The complaint concerned how the social media app handled children's data in 2020 - particularly around age verification and privacy settings.

It is the biggest fine to date TikTok has received from regulators.

A spokesperson for the social media firm said it "respectfully disagree[s] with the decision, particularly the level of the fine imposed".

"The criticisms are focused on features and settings that were in place three years ago, and that we made changes to well before the investigation even began, such as setting all under 16 accounts to private by default," they said.

The fine was issued by Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) under the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) privacy law.

GDPR sets out rules that companies must follow when handling data.

The DPC found that TikTok had not been transparent enough with children about its privacy settings, and raised questions about how their data was processed.

Data Protection Commissioner Helen Dixon told BBC News the inquiry also found that accounts made by those aged between 13 and 17 were made public by default on registration, meaning the content they posted was visible to anyone.

"That is precisely at the hands of TikTok because of the way they designed the platform, and we say that infringed the data protection by design and by the default requirements of the GDPR," Ms Dixon said.

The firm has been given three months to makes its data processing completely comply with GDPR.

Prof Sonia Livingstone, who researches children's digital rights and experiences at the London School of Economics and Political Science, welcomed the DPC's decision.

"[Children] want to participate in the digital world without being exploited or manipulated. And that means that platforms must explain how their data are treated and, most important, treat their data fairly, since privacy is a child's right," she said.

There remains an investigation under way about whether TikTok has illegally transferred data from the EU to China. TikTok is owned by Beijing firm ByteDance.

European fines

Despite the fine being in the hundreds of millions, it is actually smaller than other penalties seen in recent months - such as the €1.2bn (£1bn) fine Meta was given by the regulator in May for mishandling people's data when transferring it between Europe and the United States.

It is however substantially larger than the £12.7m fine TikTok was issued by the UK data watchdog in April for allowing children aged under 13 to use the platform in 2020.

The fine issued by the DPC specifically refers to 2020, and TikTok took several actions in the years following to make it more compliant.

This included it becoming one of the first social media sites to make accounts for 13 to 15-year-olds private by default in January 2021.

It will also introduce a change this month which will mean all 16 and 17-year-olds signing up to the platform will have their account set to private by default.

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TikTok fined €345m over children's data privacy

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The complaint concerned how the social media app handled children's data in 2020.

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20 rattlesnakes found inside a homeowner's garage in Arizona

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20 rattlesnakes found inside a homeowner's garage in Arizona

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An Arizona man calls a snake removal company to remove three rattlesnakes from his home. Little did he know, there were more than just three; there were 20- 5 adults and 15 babies. One of the females was pregnant too. Click the article to find out what happened next.

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MESA, Ariz. -- An Arizona man called a snake removal company after seeing what he thought were three rattlesnakes lurking in the garage of his Mesa home. He was wrong.

There actually were 20 snakes - five adult western diamondback rattlers and 15 babies. One of the adult snakes also was pregnant.

Snake wrangler Marissa Maki found most of the rattlers coiled around the base of a hot water heater in the unidentified homeowner's cluttered garage Tuesday.

"That is a lot of snakes. I'm not going to lie. This is crazy," Maki said in a YouTube video recorded by the company, Rattlesnake Solutions.

The western diamondbacks, with their distinctive triangular-shaped heads, are found throughout the Southwest. And though their venom is far less toxic than other rattlesnake species, they still require care when being handled.

Maki used tongs to pick up each snake before dropping them into large plastic buckets and relocating them to a natural habitat in a desert area.

"This is our record for the most rattlesnakes caught in one call!" said company owner Bryan Hughes.

The number could have been higher. Hughes said several shedded skins were found in the garage, indicating as many as 40 snakes may have lived there at some point.

"We'll never know how many rattlesnakes have come and gone over time," he said.

Rattlesnake Solutions made headlines in July when the company successfully removed a non-venomous coachwhip snake from a Tucson home. Their 20-second video showed that 3- to 4-foot (roughly 1-meter) snake being plucked from a toilet bowl and hissing straight at the camera.

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20 rattlesnakes found inside a homeowner's garage in Arizona

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An Arizona man called a snake removal company after seeing what he thought were three rattlesnakes lurking in the garage of his Mesa home

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Covid-19 hospitalization rates have increased due to the new variant BA.2.86. This variant arose in Denmark in July 2023. This variant has spread to 11 countries and is not fully understood due to not knowing the behavior the  mutations in its genetic code have caused.

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The latest variant, or sublineage, of SARS-CoV-2 to emerge on the scene, BA.2.86, has public health experts on alert as COVID-19 hospitalizations begin to rise and the new variant makes its way across the globe.

READ MORE: Your fall guide to COVID, RSV and flu vaccines

The Conversation asked Suresh V. Kuchipudi, a virologist and infectious disease expert at the University of Pittsburgh School of Public Health, to explain what researchers know about BA.2.86's ability to dodge immune protection and whether it causes more severe infection than its predecessors.

What is BA.2.86 and how is it related to earlier variants?

BA.2.86, nicknamed Pirola, is a highly mutated new omicron sublineage of SARS-CoV-2 that was first detected in Denmark in July 2023. The World Health Organization announced that, as of Sept. 6, 2023, BA.2.86 has been detected in 11 countries.

A variant is an alternate version of a virus - in this case, the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 - that has some mutations or changes in its genetic code, compared with the original. Mutations can alter the behavior of the viruses in various ways, such as how effectively they break into cells and how rapidly they can replicate.

WATCH: CDC recommends updated COVID vaccines

The WHO names these variants using Greek alphabet letters, like alpha, delta and omicron. However, another naming system called the PANGO, or pangolin - short for phylogenetic assignment of named global outbreak lineages - tracks variants and their offshoots by way of a lineage system.

Think of it as a family tree for the virus, which is grouped into different lineages, like branches on a tree. The omicron variant is like a big family, and its known family members - BA.2, BA.2.86 and XBB.1.5 - are all branches - or lineages and sublineages - on the same tree.
Nicknamed Pirola, BA.2.86 has more than 30 distinct mutations compared with its predecessors.
What is most unique about BA.2.86?

After the omicron variant showed up in November 2021, it didn't stay the same for long. It kept changing, and soon we got different sublineages of it, such as BA.2, BA.4 and BA.5. The one that's been dominant globally for most of 2023, called XBB.1.5, originated from the mixing, or recombination, of two separate sublineages.

But what's interesting is that BA.2.86, the newest sublineage on the scene, seems to have come from the older BA.2 omicron lineage that was dominant in early 2022 and not from the newer omicron offshoots.

A preliminary study reported that BA.2.86 features 33 distinct spike mutations when compared to its precursor, BA.2. The spike proteins, which form the knobby protrusions coming off the main body of the virus, are like a key that the virus uses to unlock our cells, which is how a new infection begins.

After an infection by one of the variants that cause COVID-19, our bodies create antibodies that target the spike protein to help neutralize the virus and prevent it from infecting cells. So, numerous changes in the spike protein of BA.2.86 could potentially affect how well it evades antibodies as well as the degree of disease severity it causes.

Among the new mutations that BA.2.86 carries, 14 reside within an area of the spike protein called the receptor binding domain, which binds to the receptors on host cells. This suggests that BA.2.86 could have a greater capacity for infecting than its predecessor.

In addition, the new sublineage, BA.2.86, is even more dissimilar when compared to the most recent sublineage, XBB.1.5, with 35 new mutations in the spike protein - including some unusual mutations - than to its precursor, BA.2. These alterations intrigue infectious disease specialists like me, and we are working to understand how they might affect this new variant's behavior.

How concerning are the new variant's mutations?

We researchers do not yet fully understand what these changes might mean and the degree to which BA.2.86 can get around our protective defenses.

Scientists and health authorities closely monitor all emerging variants and lineages for changes that can affect how easily the virus is transmitted, what it might mean for vaccine effectiveness and the severity of disease it can cause. While mutations can be cause for concern, it's important to remember that not all mutations lead to increased danger.
WATCH LIVE: CDC experts consider and vote on new COVID vaccines
The earlier-mentioned preliminary study found that BA.2.86 can escape the protective defenses of antibodies against the recent XBB sublineages. However, in contrast, another new study that has not yet been published found that neutralizing antibody responses against BA.2.86 were comparable to or slightly higher against the recent XBB sublineages. Hence further studies are needed to understand BA.2.86's ability to escape antibody protection.

The emergence of BA.2.86 underscores the need for flexibility in current vaccine strategies to ensure continued effectiveness against these new variants. The newly FDA-approved fall 2023 COVID-19 booster shots are formulated to target XBB.1.5, which was dominant in early 2023 when public health officials made the reformulation decisions. The 2022 booster shot was designed to target both the original strain of SARS-CoV-2 as well as the BA.4 and BA.5 omicron lineages.
Some Americans are choosing to mask up again.
What more do researchers hope to learn about it?

We researchers have much more to learn about BA.2.86's capacity to evade antibody protection from prior infection or vaccination, its transmissibility and its ability to cause severe disease. It is too early to determine whether the late summer rise in hospitalizations is being caused by this new sublineage.

The fact that the new highly mutated SARS-CoV-2 variant traces its origins back to an omicron variant that circulated more than a year ago is a stark reminder of the complex evolutionary pathways that SARS-CoV-2 can undertake as it adapts and changes. It also underscores the critical need for a more comprehensive understanding of the health threats posed by continually emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants.

This is particularly important as there has been a significant reduction in global SARS-CoV-2 genomic surveillance, which tracks the genetic changes over time and identifies new versions. Losing this type of monitoring hampers the process of working to understand the origins of novel SARS-CoV-2 variants. This critical information helps scientists and doctors make better decisions to protect public health.

COVID-19 variants continue to stay one step ahead of our efforts at combating them, so it will become increasingly important that the U.S. step up its genomic surveillance efforts and stay committed to working collaboratively with other countries.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Why public health experts are concerned about BA.2.86, the latest COVID-19 variant

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Researchers still don't know how well BA.2.86 will evade immunity or whether it will cause more severe disease than its predecessors.

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The flooding was caused by two dams bursting, sending a huge wave of water down towards the city. This immediately killed thousands and sent whole neighborhoods out to sea. There are still over 10,000 people unaccounted for as civilians are working desperately to find their loved ones.

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Mr Hammoud says there had been plenty of warnings from engineers about the poor state of the city's two dams and how several more needed to be built to halt the water caused by increasingly heavy yearly rainfall.

"Nothing has been done since 2008 and after the revolution to strengthen the two dams," he told us.

The instability, poor governance, corruption and mafia-style politicking, including a network of people-smuggling gangs, has all conspired to make this tragedy.

Many Libyans believe the bombing during the NATO-backed military campaign to oust the Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi also weakened the structures.

"Someone should pay for these deaths," Mr Hammoud said. "Someone should be held accountable for what happened here."
This story first appeared on the website of NBC News' partner

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'We saw friends being swept away': Inside Derna

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The center of the eastern city of Derna is like one big graveyard - a mass of flattened buildings, wrecked lives and upended vehicles after the deadly floods.

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Lawyer for husband of YouTube mom charged with child abuse speaks out:

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Lawyer for husband of YouTube mom charged with child abuse speaks out:

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The husband of the mother who is currently facing six felony counts of child abuse, speaks out after the release of her arrest is announced. Click the link above to find out what the husband had to say.

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The lawyer for Kevin Franke, husband of Ruby Franke, the popular YouTuber mom who is facing six felony counts of child abuse, is speaking out, nearly a week after news of Ruby Franke's arrest was released.

In an interview with "Good Morning America," Randy Kester, the attorney for Kevin Franke, called the father a "very gentle" person.

"He is a good person. He is very gentle," Kester said. "And no one's ever made any allegations that he's ever physically abused those kids, or anyone else."

The Frankes share six children and rose to fame by offering parenting advice on YouTube, some of it controversial. For example, in one instance, Ruby Franke received criticism online for saying she had kept food from her kids as punishment.

"I'm not even gonna let you have breakfast until you get your chores done," she was seen saying in a since-deleted YouTube video.

In another YouTube video, Ruby Franke was heard saying of her kids, "Up until now, I was really hoping that keeping them home from school and wiping the floorboards would like really bring pain."

The Frankes have been separated and living in separate homes for the past 13 months, according to Kester, who added that Kevin Franke has been "distraught" at the allegations against his wife, and their impact on his family.

Kevin and Ruby Franke are pictured in a still from an undated YouTube video clip.

Kester added that Kevin Franke's main objective is the safety of his kids. "He just wants to do what's best for his kids, get them back, get them under his tutelage and his fathership and protect them," Kester said.

In a YouTube video that also has since been deleted, Ruby Franke's sister, Bonnie Hoellein, said family members had tried to intervene for the safety of the Frankes' six kids before her sister was arrested and charged.

"We all did as much as we could legally," Hoellein said in the video, a clip of which was shared on TikTok. "And you don't know what you don't know."

Ruby Franke was arrested last week in Ivins, Utah, after authorities said her 12-year-old son escaped through a window and ran to a neighbor's house, where he pleaded for food and water.

According to police, the neighbor described the 12-year-old in a phone call to police as emaciated and malnourished, with open wounds. Court documents also described the boy as having "deep lacerations from being tied up with rope."

Police also said they found the Frankes' 10-year-old daughter malnourished.

Following Ruby Franke's arrest, police said her other four children were taken into the care of Utah's Division of Child and Family Services. An official with that agency told ABC News it cannot comment on any case specifically.

Ruby Franke is due in court Friday and has not yet entered a plea. An attorney representing her told ABC News they have no comment on the case at this time.

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Lawyer for husband of YouTube mom charged with child abuse speaks out

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Kevin Franke's lawyer is speaking out after Kevin Franke's wife, YouTube mom Ruby Franke, was charged with child abuse.

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Chandrayaan-3: What has India's Moon rover Pragyaan been up to since landing?

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Chandrayaan-3: What has India's Moon rover Pragyaan been up to since landing?

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Chandrayaan-3, India's third lunar exploration mission, has recently successfully landed on the Moon's South Pole. The rover, Pragyaan, has captured fascinating data about the Moon and its features. Details like temperatures, crater qualities, and pictures are being used to further study the Moon and seek to make the Moon habitable.

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Exactly a week ago, India set down a robotic probe on the Moon, becoming the first country to land near the lunar south pole.

Chandrayaan-3's Vikram lander - carrying a rover in its belly - touched down on the lunar soil after a 20-minute, nail-biting finale watched by millions of people across the world.

Hours later, the Pragyaan rover - Pragyaan is the Sanskrit word for wisdom - exited the lander and took its first steps on the Moon.

The Indian space agency has been providing regular updates on the rover's findings, the photos it's taking, distance it is covering and how it is negotiating the obstacles in its path.

Here's a look at the highlights from the first week of the rover's Moonwalk:

Say cheese

Until now, we had only seen videos and images of the rover, taken by the lander.

But on Wednesday morning, Pragyaan turned its camera on its parent - the Vikram lander - and said, "Smile, please!"

The black-and-white image shows Vikram with all its four legs firmly planted on the lunar ground.

The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) said this "image of the mission" was taken by the navigation camera onboard the rover.

Sulphur finds

Over the past few days, the rover has been hard at work.

On Tuesday evening, Isro said that a laser detector onboard had made "the first-ever in-situ - in the original space - measurements on the elemental composition of the surface near the south pole" and found a host of chemicals, including sulphur and oxygen, on lunar soil.

The instrument "unambiguously confirms" the presence of sulphur, it said, adding that preliminary analysis also "unveiled the presence of aluminium, calcium, iron, chromium, titanium, manganese, silicon and oxygen".

"A thorough investigation regarding the presence of hydrogen is underway," it added.

Noah Petro, a project scientist at Nasa, told the BBC's Soutik Biswas that it's been known from the 1970s - from the Apollo and Luna samples - that sulphur is present in the lunar soil.

But he described Pragyaan's findings as "a tremendous accomplishment".

"I think Isro is highlighting that it's in-situ - so it's important to have measured sulphur on the lunar surface. Sulphur is a volatile element if it's not inside a mineral. So, if it's not part of a crystal, it's very cool to see it measured on the surface," he added.

Negotiating craters

As the rover roams around the mission's landing point - now named the Shiv Shakti Point - in what Isro has described as "the pursuit of lunar secrets", it has covered quite a distance. It has also had to change course to stay safe because of deep craters.

Two days after the landing, Isro said Pragyaan - which travels at a speed of 1cm per second - had "successfully traversed a distance of 8 metres (26ft)".

It added that on Sunday, the rover had encountered a crater with a diameter of four metres. But it was spotted well in time - when Pragyaan was about three metres away.

"It was commanded to retrace the path. It's now safely heading on a new path," Isro added.

Photos released by the space agency show the crater and the footprints of the rover on the lunar soil - going forward and returning.

Taking the Moon's temperature

On Sunday, Isro said that they had received the first set of data about the temperatures on the lunar topsoil and up to the depth of 10cm below the surface from a probe onboard Vikram lander.

The probe - called the ChaSTE experiment, or Chandra's Surface Thermophysical Experiment - is fitted with 10 individual temperature sensors and has thrown up some interesting results.

A graphic posted on X (formerly Twitter) by Isro showed a sharp difference in temperatures just above and below the surface.

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While the temperature on the surface was nearly 60C, it plummeted sharply below the surface, dropping to -10C at 80mm (just about 3 inches) below the ground.

An Isro scientist told the news agency PTI that he was "surprised" by the temperature fluctuation. "We all believed that the temperature could be somewhere around 20C to 30C on the surface but it is surprisingly higher than what we had expected," BH Darukesha said.

The Moon, however, is known for harbouring extreme temperatures - according to Nasa, daytime temperatures near the lunar equator reach a boiling 250F (120C), while night temperatures can plunge to -208F (-130C).

The Moon's poles, it says, are even colder - one crater near the north pole recorded -410F (-250C) which makes it the coldest temperature measured anywhere in the entire solar system. Equally cold temperatures have been recorded at some of the craters which remain permanently in the shadows in the south pole

BBC News India is now on YouTube. Click here to subscribe and watch our documentaries, explainers and features.

Read more India stories from the BBC:

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Chandrayaan-3: What has India's Moon rover Pragyaan been up to since landing?

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Pragyaan has had an eventful week - dodging craters, taking the Moon's temperature and checking for sulphur.

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When doctors prescribed eating more produce to help with medical conditions patients experienced weight loss and significant reduction in blood pressure. Doctors are using food as medicine to prevent or improve chronic health conditions. The only problem with this is food insecurity, which is discussed in the article.

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UNC graduate shot and killed adviser on campus.

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UNC graduate shot and killed adviser on campus.

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Tailei Qi is charged with murder after shooting his advisor, Zijie Yan, inside the UNC campus' science building. Qi's motives have yet to be determined. The event terrified UNC students as some climbed through classroom windows to escape. Today, the UNC faculty and students continue to mourn Yan's passing.

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CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) - A University of North Carolina graduate student walked into a classroom building, shot his faculty adviser and quickly left, authorities said a day after the attack paralyzed campus as police searched for the gunman.

Tailei Qi, 34, was charged Tuesday with first-degree murder and having a gun on educational property in Monday's killing of Zijie Yan inside a science building at the state's flagship public university.

Chapel Hill police arrested Qi without force in a residential neighborhood near campus within two hours of the attack, UNC Police Chief Brian James said at a news conference.

Investigators were trying to determine a motive and searching for the gun, James said. He declined to specify where in Caudill Labs Yan was killed, saying officers are still looking at evidence. Qi was already gone when a team of officers reached the building, James said.

Yan was "a beloved colleague, mentor and a friend of so many on our campus and a father to two young children," UNC Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz at the news conference.

On Wednesday afternoon, the school's iconic Bell Tower will ring in honor of Yan's memory and students are encouraged to take a moment of silence, he said. The school also canceled classes until Thursday.

Earlier Tuesday, Qi briefly appeared in Orange County Superior Court in Hillsborough. Judge Sherri Murrell ordered Qi to remain jailed without bond and scheduled his next court date for Sept. 18. After the hearing, Qi bowed to the judge, his Mandarin interpreter, public defender Dana Graves and the guards who took him away in handcuffs.

Graves left court without talking to reporters and did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

Yan was an associate professor in the Department of Applied Physical Sciences who had worked for the university since July 2019, Guskiewicz said Tuesday. He led the Yan Research Group, which Qi joined last year, according to the group's UNC webpage.

Yan was a respected and approachable professor and research adviser who was deeply knowledgeable about the field, said Wen Liu, a 2022 graduate who worked in the lab for three years.

He was somewhat reserved, yet always willing to answer questions with patience and respect and advise lab members who got stuck in their research, Liu said.

"For hours he would just be doing things and explaining along the way," said Liu, who was a "newbie undergrad in the field" at the time and also worked with Qi in the lab. Qi seemed passionate about research, curious about others' work and "pretty sociable," Liu said.

The lab's main goals were making and studying nanoparticles under the effect of light, using lasers, he said. The work has potential applications in medicine and other fields.

A since-deleted page on the school's website listed Qi as a graduate student in Yan's research group, with Yan as his adviser, though the police chief said their ties were still under investigation. Qi previously studied at Wuhan University in China before earning a masters in mechanical engineering at Louisiana State University in 2021.

The attack and hourslong lockdown terrified students and faculty who had returned last week for the start of the fall semester. On Tuesday, students pet therapy dogs on campus and chalked hearts, peace signs and messages of hope on walking paths.

Noel Harris, a senior journalism student, said she spent confusing and scary hours locked in a class reading news coverage, listening to police scanners and waiting for university updates about whether the danger had passed.

When an officer arrived, the class asked him to slide his badge under the door first, Harris said. The officer said they were safe but recommended they wait until an all-clear was issued. Soon after, Harris recorded video of people climbing out of an adjacent building's windows, and she started to wonder "so is it really safe? What's going on?" she said.

She said Tuesday that she was still trying to understand why the students left through the windows of Phillips Hall, where math and other classes are held but no shots were fired.

"I felt myself just being scared and shocked, but then not shocked at the same time because it's like, this happens every day," Harris said.

___

Robertson reported from Raleigh, North Carolina, and Rankin reported from Richmond, Virginia. Associated Press writers Jonathan Drew in Hillsborough, North Carolina, Sarah Brumfield in Silver Spring, Maryland, and Ben Finley in Norfolk, Virginia, contributed to this report.

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University of North Carolina graduate student left building right after killing adviser, police say

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Authorities say a University of North Carolina graduate student walked into a classroom building, shot his faculty adviser and then left.

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Wildfires in Greece kill 18 people as they rage across Europe

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Wildfires in Greece kill 18 people as they rage across Europe

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A new heat wave hits southern Europe this week. The heatwave has led to dry, hot, and windy conditions perfect for wildfires to form. More specifically, Greece has experienced dozens of wildfires and most recently the cities Alexandroupolis and Athens have been affected leading to the deaths of 18 people and hundreds more injured.

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Greek firefighters found the bodies of 18 people in an area ravaged by a major wildfire burning for days, authorities said Tuesday.

Hundreds of firefighters have struggled to control major wildfires burning out of control for days in northeastern Greece and on Tenerife in Spain's Canary Islands, with strong winds fanning the flames and prompting evacuations of villages and a city hospital in Greece. Firefighters were also battling blazes in Italy.

A new heatwave hit southern Europe, meanwhile, with authorities urging residents to avoid the heat as France, Italy, Spain and elsewhere suffered hot, dry and windy conditions that scientists have linked to climate change.

Hot, dry and windy conditions have seen dozens of wildfires break out across Greece, with the most severe entering its fourth day and encroaching on the northeastern port city of Alexandroupolis. On Monday, two people died and two firefighters were injured in separate fires in northern and central Greece.

On Tuesday, Greek police activated the country's Disaster Victim Identification Team to identify the 18 bodies, which were found near a shack in the Avanta area in theAlexandroupolis region, Ioannis Artopios, a spokesman for the fire department, said in a televised statement.

Given no reports of missing people had been filed in the area, authorities were examining the possibility that the casualties were migrants who had entered the country from the nearby border with Turkey, Artopios said.

The fire risk level for several regions, including the wider Athens area, was listed as "extreme" for the second day Tuesday. Authorities have banned public access to mountains and forests in those regions until at least Wednesday morning and ordered military patrols.

A massive wall of flames raced through forests toward Alexandroupolis overnight, prompting authorities to evacuate another eight villages and the city's hospital. The flames turned the sky over the city and across the region red, hiding the sun as choking smoke and swirling flecks of ash filled the air.

About 65 of the more than 100 patients in the hospital were transported to a ferry boat docked in the city's port, while others were taken to other hospitals in northern Greece. The ferry set sail later Tuesday morning to transport the patients west to the port town of Kavala, where they were to be transferred to another hospital.

Deputy Health Minister Dimitris Vartzopoulos, speaking on Greece's Skai television, said smoke and ash in the air around the Alexandrouplolis hospital was the main reason behind the decision to evacuate the facility.

"We evacuated within four hours," Vartzopoulos said.

A school, several homes and a cemetery were damaged in two villages near Alexandroupolis, where more than 200 firefighters were battling the flames, supported by four airplanes and three helicopters. Dozens more houses were damaged by another wildfire in the Kavala region, local authorities said. A separate fire in the Evros border region was burning through forest in a protected national park, with satellite imagery showing smoke from the Evros region blanketing much of northern and western Greece.

Near Athens, a new fire broke out in the Aspropyrgos area on the capital's western fringes Tuesday morning, prompting authorities to issue evacuation orders for two villages in the area.

Romania sent 56 firefighters and Cyprus send two water-dropping aircraft to help fight the wildfire in Alexandroupolis, while French firefighters helped tackle a separate fire on the island of Evia.

Greece suffers destructive wildfires every summer. Its deadliest wildfire killed 104 people in 2018, at a seaside resort near Athens that residents had not been warned to evacuate. Authorities have since erred on the side of caution, issuing swift mass evacuation orders whenever inhabited areas are under threat.

Last month, a wildfire on the resort island of Rhodes forced the evacuation of some 20,000 tourists. Days later, two air force pilots were killed when their water-dropping plane crashed while diving low to tackle a blaze on Evia. Another three wildfire-related deaths have been recorded this summer.

With their hot, dry summers, southern European countries are particularly prone to wildfires.

In Spain's Canary Islands, firefighters battled to control a wildfire burning for a week on the popular tourist destination of Tenerife. More than 12,000 people have been evacuated from their homes and nearly 37,000 acres of pine forest and scrubland have been burned. Large parts of Spain were under alert for wildfire risk due to a heatwave that sent temperatures spiking over 100 degrees Fahrenheit in many areas.

In Italy, authorities evacuated 700 people from homes and a campsite on the Tuscan island of Elba after a fire broke out late Monday. Two aircraft were helping douse the blaze, which consumed five hectares on the popular tourist island.

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18 people found dead in Greece as wildfires rage across Europe

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Greek firefighters found the bodies of 18 people in an area ravaged by a major wildfire burning for days, authorities said Tuesday.

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Germany's Cabinet approves a plan to liberalize rules on cannabis possession and sale:

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Germany's Cabinet approves a plan to liberalize rules on cannabis possession and sale:

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In Berlin, Germany's Cabinet approved a plan to liberalize rule on cannabis (marijuana), "setting the scene" to decriminalize possession of limited amounts and allow members of "cannabis clubs" to buy the substance for recreational purposes only. The legislation still needs to be approved by parliament.

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BERLIN -- Germany's Cabinet on Wednesday approved a plan to liberalize rules on cannabis, setting the scene for the European Union's most populous nation to decriminalize possession of limited amounts and allow members of "cannabis clubs" to buy the substance for recreational purposes.

The legislation is billed as the first step in a two-part plan and still needs approval by parliament. But the government's approval is a stride forward for a prominent reform project of Chancellor Olaf Scholz's socially liberal coalition, though significantly short of its original ambitions.

The bill, which the government hopes will take effect at the end of this year, foresees legalizing possession of up to 25 grams (nearly 1 ounce) of cannabis for recreational purposes and allowing individuals to grow up to three plants on their own.

German residents who are 18 and older would be allowed to join nonprofit "cannabis clubs" with a maximum 500 members each. The clubs would be allowed to grow cannabis for members' personal consumption.

Individuals would be allowed to buy up to 25 grams per day, or a maximum 50 grams per month - a figure limited to 30 grams for under-21s. Membership in multiple clubs would not be allowed. The clubs' costs would be covered by membership fees, which would be staggered according to how much cannabis members use.

The government plans a ban on advertising or sponsoring cannabis, and the clubs and consumption won't be allowed within 200 meters (656 feet) of schools, playgrounds and sports facilities, or near cannabis club premises.

Officials hope their plan will help protect consumers against contaminated products and reduce drug-related crime. Health Minister Karl Lauterbach said he expects the system to produce "very competitive" prices, "so we think that we can push back the black market well with these rules."

At present, "we have rising consumption, problematic consumption," Lauterbach told reporters. "It simply couldn't have carried on like this."

The center-right opposition argues the government is pressing ahead with legalizing a risky drug despite European legal obstacles and expert opinion. An organization representing German judges says the plan is likely to increase rather than decrease the burden on the judicial system and could even increase demand for black-market cannabis.

Some advocates of legalization aren't happy either.

"What we're getting from the health minister is overregulation, a continued stigmatization of cannabis users and a much too tight regulatory corset, which simply makes it impossible for many, many (cannabis clubs) to work," said Oliver Waack-Jürgensen, who heads the Berlin-based High Ground "cannabis social club" founded last year. He is also on the board of a national association representing such clubs.

Lauterbach rejected the objections.

"The fact that it's being attacked from both sides is a good sign," the minister said. He added that "approval with much more liberalization, like for example in Holland or some American states, would have led to consumption expanding," and that those who oppose any legalization "have no answer" to rising consumption and crime, and a burgeoning black market.

The legislation is to be accompanied by a campaign meant to sensitize young people to the risks of consuming cannabis.

The government says it plans to follow the new legislation by mapping out a second step - five-year tests of regulated commercial supply chains in select regions, which would then be scientifically evaluated.

That's far short of its original plan last year, which foresaw allowing the sale of cannabis to adults across the country at licensed outlets. It was scaled back following talks with the EU's executive commission.

Approaches elsewhere in Europe vary. The Netherlands combines decriminalization with little market regulation.

Dutch authorities tolerate the sale and consumption of small amounts of the substance at so-called coffeeshops but producing and selling large amounts of it, necessary to keep the coffeeshops supplied, remains illegal. Amsterdam, long a magnet for tourists wanting to smoke weed, has been cracking down on coffeeshops.

The Dutch government, meanwhile, has launched an experiment it says aims to "determine whether and how controlled cannabis can be legally supplied to coffeeshops and what the effects of this would be."

In Switzerland, authorities last year cleared the way for a pilot project allowing a few hundred people in Basel to buy cannabis from pharmacies for recreational purposes. The Czech government has been working on a plan similar to Germany's to allow sales and recreational use of cannabis, which isn't finalized.

Denmark's capital, Copenhagen, has proposed legalizing weed but has has been turned down by parliament. France has no plans to liberalize its strict cannabis rules.

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Associated Press writers Pietro De Cristofaro in Berlin, Mike Corder in The Hague, Karel Janicek in Prague, Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen and Sylvie Corbet in Paris contributed to this report.

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Germany's Cabinet approves a plan to liberalize rules on cannabis possession and sale

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Germany's Cabinet has approved a plan to liberalize rules on cannabis, setting the scene for the European Union's most populous nation to decriminalize possession of limited amounts and allow members of "cannabis clubs" to buy the substance for recreat...

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Ötzi the Iceman's true appearance revealed by new DNA analysis

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Ötzi the Iceman's true appearance revealed by new DNA analysis

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Through recent breakthroughs in history, scientists have depicted the appearance of Ötzi the Iceman, a 5,000 year old mummified corpse found in ice in 1991, preserving his features with enough detail to tell his tale. The intact body will reveal more about the history of humans and their origin.

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Ötzi the Iceman's true appearance revealed by new DNA analysis | CNN

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More than three decades after Ötzi's accidental discovery in the Alps, scientists are still learning new things about the murdered iceman.

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Involuntary Hospitalization and Mental Health

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Involuntary Hospitalization and Mental Health

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States across the USA are trying to tackle the mental health crisis. Due to the rise in homelessness laws and policies are being made that will make it easier to institutionalize those with mental illnesses against their will or through court-ordered treatment. This report shows controversial opinions on this subject.

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The new law will make it easier to court-order behavioral treatment plans for individuals with severe mental illness through so-called CARE Court.

Here's how it works. A family member, behavioral health provider, or member of law enforcement petitions a court on behalf of someone with untreated schizophrenia or other psychotic disorder. After that, a court can order a clinical evaluation, and then a care plan that may include treatment, medication, and housing.

If the person fails to complete treatment, they could be considered for even longer-term state oversight. The approach is part of California's effort to address homelessness. San Diego is one the pilot counties that will begin implementing the CARE Court in the fall.

On this hot July day, police dismantled a sidewalk encampment downtown. It's a familiar scene in the Golden State, where it's estimated that nearly a quarter of the unhoused suffer from serious mental illness.

Chronic homelessness is the result of multiple system failures, not just individual choices. The mentally ill cycle through the public health system, the housing system, and the criminal justice system. They may get some help along the way, but many of them end up back on the street.

Anita Fisher knows this all too well.

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States look to involuntarily hospitalize people to confront growing mental health crisis

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Across the country, states are trying to tackle the growing mental health crisis. Some are enacting laws and policies that would make it easier to hospitalize or detain the severely mentally ill against their will or through voluntary court-ordered treatment. California is taking steps toward compelling more mentally ill patients into care.

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Postpartum Depression (PPD) is a common illness among new mothers. Not enough women know about the condition to ask for a diagnosis, symptoms can be seen in the article. To fight PPD the FDA approves a pill for postpartum depression called Zuranolone, which will be sold as Zurzuvae.

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Not enough moms seek help for postpartum depression. Will the new pill help?

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Barriers to postpartum depression treatment include stigma, education and screening.

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Listeria bacteria found in ice cream machines in Washington state linked to 3 deaths:

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Listeria bacteria found in ice cream machines in Washington state linked to 3 deaths:

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In Washington state, the Listeria bacteria, known for its variety of symptoms and caused by eating food contaminated with the bacterium Listeria monocytogenes. Milkshakes made from the machines at the shop, “Frugals”, found to contain Listeria, have been connected to the causes of three deaths. Tap the article for more!

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Milkshakes made from machines found to contain Listeria bacteria and sold at a restaurant in Washington state have been linked to the deaths of three people, according to state health officials.

Investigators found Listeria bacteria in the ice cream machines at a Frugals restaurant in Tacoma, the Washington State Department of Health (WSDH) said. The bacteria was associated with what authorities called a "foodborne listeriosis outbreak," which led to six hospitalizations. Three of those hospitalized later died, according to the WSDH.

Officials said the machines were not cleaned correctly.

Frugals restaurant at 10727 Pacific Ave. S., Tacoma, Wash. in an image from Google Maps Street View.

Health department officials said the Frugals restaurant stopped using the machines on Aug. 8, but Listeria bacteria can sicken people up to 70 days later.

"Most people who eat food contaminated with Listeria will not get seriously sick, but people who are pregnant, aged 65 or older, and those with weakened immune systems should call their health care provider if they ate a Frugals' Tacoma milkshake between May 29 and Aug. 7, 2023," Washington State Department Health officials said in a statement on Friday.

In a statement posted on Instagram, Frugals said they have been "working with PCHD to identify and contain the source of listeria after a test on a milkshake machine" in the Tacoma location "tested positive for the bacteria.

"Today, we were deeply saddened to learn the Washington State Department of Health is reporting six people were hospitalized with foodborne listeriosis and three people later died. We are heartbroken and deeply regret any harm our actions could have caused," the company's statement continued.

Frugals said in the statement they are having their milkshake machines sent to an "independent facility for thorough cleaning, sanitization and re-testing."

The company's statement continued: "[O]ut of an abundance of caution for our customers, we have also directed all milkshake machines in our other locations to be shut down and samples from these machines be sent out for similar testing. Although not required by PCHD, Frugals will also undergo enhanced cleaning, safety and sanitization procedures across all product categories and alt all store locations."

Frugals has not yet responded to ABC News' request for comment.

Listeria can be treated with antibiotics, according to health officials.

Listeria can cause severe illness "when the bacteria spread beyond the gut to other parts of the body" after a person consumes contaminated food, according to the CDC. Those who are pregnant, aged 65 or older, those with weakened immune systems and newborns are most likely to become seriously ill if exposed.

Those infected with listeria may experience "food poisoning symptoms" such as diarrhea, vomiting, or fever, per the CDC. Symptoms for severe illness may include headache, stiff neck, confusion, loss of balance, seizures and flu-like symptoms such as muscle aches and fatigue.

Stock image of a strawberry milkshake on a table. Three people are dead and three others were hospitalized after a Listeria outbreak at the Frugals restaurant in Tacoma, Wash. Officials said the milkshake machines there were not cleaned properly.

As for the case in Washington, genetic fingerprinting of bacteria in the milkshakes showed it was the same strain of Listeria that hospitalized six people between Feb. 27 and July 22, according to the WSDH.

The six people had weakened immune systems, making it harder to fight the disease, officials said.

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Listeria bacteria found in ice cream machines in Washington state linked to 3 deaths

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Milkshakes contaminated with Listeria and sold at a restaurant in Washington state have been linked to the deaths of three people, according to officials.

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Google reportedly building A.I. that offers life advice

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Google reportedly building A.I. that offers life advice

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Through the advancement of A.I. nowadays, Google has now come up with an innovative A.I. responsible for providing the user with life advice, named Google DeepMind. Google has begun contracting with Scale A.I., a start-up company responsible for testing and training the various forms of A.I. for effectiveness and cooperability.

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Google reportedly building A.I. that offers life advice

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One of Google’s AI units, DeepMind, is reportedly using generative AI to develop at least 21 different tools for life advice, planning and tutoring.

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Bradley Cooper faces backlash after using large prosthetic nose in Leonard Bernstein biopic 'Maestro'

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Bradley Cooper faces backlash after using large prosthetic nose in Leonard Bernstein biopic 'Maestro'

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Actor Bradley Cooper receives backlash on social media after the trailer for his Netflix film 'Maestro' dropped on Tuesday. The film will be about Jewish composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein. In the trailer Cooper is seen with a large prosthetic nose which has been called out as antisemitic.

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Bradley Cooper accused of ‘Jewface’ over fake nose in ‘Maestro’; Leonard Bernstein’s kids defend the prosthetic

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Some on social media criticized the film, which Cooper co-wrote, produced and directed, after Netflix dropped a trailer for the biopic Tuesday.