YAHOO: WHERE HARRIS AND TRUMP DIFFER ON THE BIG ECONOMIC ISSUES

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WHERE HARRIS AND TRUMP DIFFER ON THE BIG ECONOMIC ISSUES

Harris:  Supports the Biden plan to allow all tax cuts to expire except for households earning less than $400,000

THE 2017 TAX CUTS FOR INDIVIDUALS, WHICH EXPIRE AT THE END OF 2025

Trump:  Extend or make permanent all the 2017 tax cuts

Harris:  Raise the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%

CORPORATE
TAXES

Trump:  Lower the corporate tax rate from 21% to as low as 15%

Harris:  Eliminate federal income tax on tips; impose new tax on wealth above $100 million

OTHER
TAXES

Trump:  Eliminate federal income tax on tips and on Social Security income

Harris: Continue to restrict high-technology exports to China and sustain 100% tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles

TRADE

Trump:  Impose a 10% to 20% tariff on most imports and a 60% tariff on imports from China

Harris:  A new $6,000 tax credit for families with newborns; expand the child tax credit by up to $3,600 per child

CHILD
CARE

Trump:  May propose an expansion of the child tax credit

Harris:  Support all green-energy measures Biden has enacted; possibly ease targets for electric vehicle adoption and green electricity production

GREEN
ENERGY

Trump:  Kill or reduce electric-vehicle subsidies Biden signed into law in 2022. Produce more fossil fuels

Harris:  Extend or make permanent temporary subsidies for higher-income Americans to buy insurance through the Affordable Care Act; forgive some medical debt

HEALTHCARE

Trump:  Repeal Affordable Care Act or reduce subsidies

Harris:  Continue executive action to limit asylum claims at the border, pass immigration reform legislation

IMMIGRATION

Trump:  Build a border wall and return to the strict anti-immigrant policies of the first Trump term; deport millions of undocumented migrants

Harris:  Enact a $25,000 subsidy for first-time home buyers; establish incentives and reforms to help build 3 million additional homes

HOUSING

Trump:  Pressure the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates low, ease regulations, open federal land to development

Harris:  Defend a 2022 law requiring Medicare to negotiate the prices of certain drugs with manufacturers

DRUG
PRICES

Trump:  Unclear, but possibly soften Medicare price negotiations with manufacturers

Harris:  Continue military aid to Ukraine

RUSSIA'S WAR
IN UKRAINE

Trump:  Seek a settlement with Russia and end or restrict US military aid to Ukraine

Harris:  Raise from $7.25 per hour to as high as $15

FEDERAL
MINIMUM WAGE

Trump:  No change

Harris:  Continue Biden's efforts to forgive student debt

STUDENT
DEBT

Trump:  No forgiveness

Harris:  $2 trillion increase

10-YEAR EFFECT ON THE NATIONAL DEBT*

Trump:  $4.1 trillion increase

*NATIONAL DEBT ESTIMATES ARE FROM THE PENN WHARTON BUDGET MODEL AND ASSUME EACH CANDIDATE'S PLANS ARE ENACTED IN FULL.

Above is from:  https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-kamala-harriss-approach-to-capital-gains-is-generating-so-much-controversy-112935244.html

Walz has some Chinese expertises

The Republican attack on Tim Walz over Tiananmen Square is almost unbelievable

Opinion by Zeeshan Aleem

• 20h • 4 min read

Topics mentioned in this article

US Elections<?XML:NAMESPACE PREFIX = "[default] http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" NS = "http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" />

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc.; Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz’s meteoric rise and his aptitude for putting down Republicans is driving the GOP crazy and has it scrambling desperately to find comebacks. By far the funniest attempt to take down Walz has come from Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis.

In an interview this week with Fox Business, Johnson warned that Walz is a “radical leftist” and made the case by pointing out what he called Walz’s “strange” relationship with China. “He got married on the anniversary of Tiananmen Square. He’s gone to China. He’s taught in China. He’s got deep connections to China,” Johnson said in the interview.

I had to listen to the interview twice to make sure I wasn’t mishearing it, because I couldn’t believe Johnson had pointed to Walz’s remembrance of the Tiananmen Square massacre as evidence that he could be some kind of Manchurian candidate. Johnson seems unaware that he scored an own goal.

Follow MSNBC’s live blog for real-time updates on the final night of the Democratic National Convention.

Johnson is right about the basic fact: Walz did choose the date of the incident for his marriage. But the 1989 incident, during which Chinese troops opened fire on and killed hundreds — possibly thousands — of peaceful protesters in Beijing who were calling for political reforms, is an event that the Chinese Communist Party loathes anybody mentioning. The government has aggressively sought to suppress information about the protests and the Communist Party’s crackdown in China; even so, the event remains one of the most iconic reference points for human rights criticism of Beijing. Walz has said the date “will always have a lot of bitter memories for the people”; his choice to make it the date of his wedding anniversary is clearly an homage to the victims. Walz’s act of remembrance is an act of rebellion against the Chinese government’s agenda to conceal its murderous repression.

In other words, Johnson, a China hawk like most members of his party, ought to be encouraged by Walz’s symbolic gesture, not suspicious of it. Either he’s illiterate about Chinese history or he’s just throwing anything at the wall to see what’ll stick. Maybe it’s both. The GOP has gone all in trying to peddle conspiracy theories that Walz’s many trips to China — first to teach English, and then as a teacher escorting American students on cultural exchange visits — have compromised him somehow. House Republicans are investigating Walz for ties to China, and Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., has hysterically accused Walz of having been covertly co-opted by China, posting on X that Walz is an example of how “Beijing patiently grooms future American leaders.”

But, again, the GOP has gotten everything exactly upside down. Walz’s background and record on China are not liabilities but strengths. There’s nothing known about Walz’s trips there that suggest anything unseemly. His comments on the record — many of which were documented in local papers long before he expressed any political ambitions — show that he has consistently expressed affection for the Chinese people and criticism of their government. “If they had the proper leadership, there are no limits on what [Chinese people] could accomplish,” he told the Alliance Star-Herald in Nebraska in 1990. Walz also speaks Mandarin. This kind of background is not a warning sign. It’s reflective of the kind of cosmopolitan, critically engaged sensibility one wants in a politician who can influence international affairs.

As my colleague Clarissa-Jan Lim has pointed out, Walz’s congressional record suggests he’s far from a pushover when it comes to pointing out China’s problems:

As a member of Congress, he met with Tibetan leaders and Chinese dissidents, and he served on a congressional commission that tracks human rights abuses in China. In 2017, he co-sponsored the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act; Jeffrey Ngo, a senior policy and research fellow at the Washington-based Hong Kong Democracy Council, credited its passage years later to Walz’s early support.

Walz also opposes China’s expansion in the South China Sea but has expressed optimism about “areas of cooperation that we can work on,” and believes the U.S.-Chinese relationship doesn't necessarily need "to be an adversarial relationship.”

As Paul Musgrave, a political scientist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, puts it, Walz’s record is “that of a measured critic of the Chinese Communist Party—prone neither to exaggeration nor accommodation.” In Musgrave's assessment, Walz is a moderate who defies the categories of "hawk" and "dove" on China, and approaches the issue as "a student and a teacher."

Republicans, frantic to find a vulnerability in Walz’s armor as an affable happy warrior from the Midwest, have decided that his China affiliations are a path to taking him down. But the more one learns about those affiliations, the more one realizes that it’s a good thing that someone with his background could soon become the vice president.

This article was originally published on MSNBC.com

UAW chief tells of Belvidere Assembly Plant delayed

If you saw the speech at last night’s Democratic National Convention in Chicago here is the verification of the delay.  Will it ever really happen? Will there be a strike on this issue?

SEE newest updates:   Stellantis confirms Belvidere delay; says union can’t strike (msn.com)

UAW threatens strike, accusing Stellantis of delaying Belvidere reopening (msn.com)

United Auto Workers (UAW) Union Poised for Nationwide Strike (msn.com)

UAW rallies in Belvidere, demands Stellantis keep its promise (msn.com)

Microsoft coming to Boone County?

Microsoft proposes Cherry Valley data center on 300 acres

Story by Jeff Kolkey, Rockford Register Star

• 5h • 3 min read

Aproposed Cherry Valley Microsoft data center at U.S. Route 20 and Wheeler Road in Boone County could bring up to 300 high-tech jobs to the region by 2030.

Microsoft unveiled the proposal on 309-acres of what is now agricultural land during an open house Monday at the Tebala Event Center, 7910 Newburg Road.

The prospect of new high-paying jobs coming to the region attracted the attention of Dino Pandya, a Rockford resident who has one child who studying for a doctorate in physics at Princeton University and another who will soon graduate from Northwestern University with a master's degree in computer science.

"It’s going to be a good thing for the community," Pandya said. "I think we need something like that to bring high-quality jobs to the area, and it will inspire our next generation."

The project will be considered by the Cherry Valley Planning & Zoning Commission at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday.

More: Microsoft keeps expanding its Racine-area data center campus. Latest purchases total $14.6 million

A rendering on display during a Microsoft data center open house Monday, Aug. 19, 2024, shows a six-building complex near U.S. Route 20 and Wheeler Road that would employ an estimated 300 people by 2030.© Jeff Kolkey/Rockford Register Star

Microsoft would be 'a very quiet neighbor'

A Microsoft spokeswoman in an email to the Rockford Register Star said the Cherry Valley data center is part of Microsoft’s "broader strategy to expand its datacenter infrastructure to support increasing demand for Azure cloud services."

If the project moves forward, it would begin in summer 2026 and is expected to create hundreds of construction jobs. The first data center building would be complete in summer 2028.

Related video: Multi-million-dollar company looking to build database at the Stateline (WQRF Rockford)

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Additional buildings could be constructed afterward and up to six buildings would be built on the site in all. Each would house servers that help form the backbone of cloud computing services relied for shopping, banking, streaming videos, sending emails, storing files and doing anything else online.

The servers are air-cooled to minimize water use and the operation at full capacity is expected to consume about the same amount of water as 30 homes. Microsoft is promising to utilize 100% renewable energy by 2025 and plans to eliminate the use of diesel generators for backup power by 2030.

Each building utilizes about 50 employees including staff management, environment operation personnel, learning and development staffers, information technology operators, mechanical engineers, electrical engineers, security guards and building maintenance workers.

Plans call for the campus to be surrounded by a 10 to 12-foot berm to cut down on any noise. Mature trees will be planted between the data center campus and its closest neighbor, the East Valley neighborhood, to create a buffer zone that is about 1,500-feet wide, Cherry Valley Village Administrator Jim Claeyssen said.

"They're a very quiet neighbor," Claeyssen said. "Even their new generator systems are much quieter than they used to be and they only run if there's a total dropout of power. They're going to take their power off the ComEd high power grid that runs down the county line. So there's nothing that has to come underground from out of the village."

Microsoft says it will invest in STEM education to prepare residents for high-tech jobs, local infrastructure and local suppliers.

State Sen. Dave Syverson, R-Cherry Valley, said he expects the data center to generate large amounts of property taxes for area taxing bodies and to be a better neighbor than other potential industrial uses that could have come to that land.

"It's one of those things that's good for a community's reputation that you have, a Microsoft cloud here," Syverson said. "Just like Rockford gets to say it has a Hard Rock, so it's one of those things that is really a win-win."

Residents view information boards at a Microsoft data center open house information session Monday, Aug. 19, 2024, at the Tebala Event Center, 7910 Newburg Road.© Jeff Kolkey/Rockford Register Star

Jeff Kolkey writes about government, economic development and other issues for the Rockford Register Star. He can be reached at  (815) 987-1374, via email at jkolkey@rrstar.com and on X @jeffkolkey.

This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Microsoft proposes Cherry Valley data center on 300 acres

Boone County Water Study????

WNIJ News

Boone County water specialist recommends 3-D geological, aquifer mapping

Northern Public Radio | By Maria Gardner Lara

• 
  

Listen • 3:31

Maria Gardner Lara

Dan Kane presents to the Boone County Board, August 2024.

Read in Spanish

Joliet in the coming years will be pulling their water from Lake Michigan. The groundwater underneath the city is estimated to run out in 2030.

In light of the dire situation nearly ninety miles southeast of Belvidere, the Boone County board hired Dan Kane in May to be their water resource coordinator on a part-time basis. Kane stepped out of retirement after serving as the executive director of the Boone County Conservation District for 23 years.

He said recent studies estimate that groundwater levels over the last 40 years have dropped between 100 and 150 feet.

He said the circumstances are not at crisis level but do call for attention.

“It's a, ‘you need to be mindful and thoughtfully prepare and anticipate the effect of this [situation] and that's done through careful planning and implementing those plans," Kane said.

He said Boone County’s water supply comes from several water aquifers, including one shared with Joliet.

“So, it's not just Joliet drawing water,” he said. “They're using the most, because you can see they're the center.”

He’s referring to an aquifer map with orange-red circles around Joliet, which signifies the very low depth of their water source.

Illinois State Water Survey

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Illinois State Water Survey, https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/items/105626

This map describes the changing groundwater levels in the Cambrian-Ordovician Sandstone Acquifers of northern Illinois and was produced by the Illinois State Water Survey.

To have a better understanding of Boone County's water supply, Kane recommends the board approve the completion of a 3-D map of the county’s geology and aquifers.

He said such a map would help the community answer questions like:

“Where does water replenish? How does precipitation and snow melt, and all the things that happen at the surface?” Kane said. “Only a portion of that water infiltrates and becomes groundwater. So where is that most likely to happen? And do we need to do anything to protect it?”

The map would be conducted by the Illinois State Geological Survey, which is part of the University of Illinois, and would cost the county $491,917 dollars.

The 3-D mapping entails a helicopter flying across most of the county.

“They're going to go back and forth 100 times, between the north end of the county and the south end the county,” he said. “They're going to have data that covers the entire area, looking at a scan that goes down into the earth about 1000 feet.”

Belvidere and other urban areas of the county would not be included in the mapping.

“The geophysical tool does not penetrate through the buildings and roads,” Kane said. He explained that their construction interferes with the sensors of the mapping tool.

Once the 3-D Mapping is complete, it will provide a detailed assessment of the layers beneath the surface, the materials they are made of and give a better understanding of how water is absorbed and reaches the aquifer.

The county already has a map that identifies the likely recharge areas, which are places where water seeps into the ground. Drawn in 2019, the map is based off data collected in 1980s. Kane said the 3-D mapping will give more detailed and accurate information.

Boone County

Boone County Sensitive Aquifer Recharge Areas map. The map was drawn in 2019 and relies on data collected in the 1980s, according to Dan Kane.

“It's going to fill so many data gaps,” he said.

And Kline added, the 3-D mapping provides necessary data -- especially as development grows in the community.

“Having a sound understanding of where our water supply comes from and how to make it sustainable going forward is an absolute economic tool because it tells you up front - you can do this, this, and this, and you're not going to have any negative influence on your water supply.”

Earlier this month, Kane presented a handful of recommendations for the board to consider in its water preservation efforts, which included the 3-D mapping.

Board members were receptive to the project, but also drew questions about costs.

“I guess my head goes to funding,” said Boone County Board member Tom Walberg, “and from that aspect, working with our neighboring counties - Rockford, Winnebago County, McHenry that are around us.”

The Boone County Board is expected to decide whether to approve funding for a 3-D Geological mapping at its next finance meeting on Aug. 15.

-----The final vote on the issue is at Committee of the Whole on Thursday August 22, 2024

Johns Hopkins 8-1-2024 COVID and other medical things

Roundup and analysis of the top headlines on health security, pandemic preparedness, COVID-19, and other news from the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security

Please note that some links may require subscription or registration.

August 1, 2024



TOP NEWS

Poor surveillance likely missing human H5N1 cases, study suggests; UKHSA raises risk assessment; WHO launches mRNA vaccine development initiative

Poor surveillance has likely missed H5N1 avian influenza infections among farmworkers who were exposed to sick dairy cattle, a preprint study posted on medRxiv this week suggests. The research, which is under review for publication by a leading infectious disease journal, showed that neutralizing antibodies against H5N1 were found in 2 blood samples taken from 14 farmworkers who were recently symptomatic but not previously tested. That amounts to a nearly 15% detection rate from a small sample of workers on only 2 dairy farms out of nearly 175 herds with outbreaks in 13 states this year. The researchers called for stepped up efforts to collect more comprehensive epidemiological data from cattle farms to design interventions and implement mitigation measures.

The US CDC’s bird flu test, the only one currently available for clinical use, reportedly has faced some flaws in ability to detect H5, but the agency has found a workaround to fix the shortcomings. Still, the mishap raises concerns and is reminiscent of dysfunctional tests made by CDC at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Current situation

As of July 26, the CDC reports 13 human cases of avian influenza A(H5) infection in 3 states since April 2024. Of these cases, 4 are associated with exposure to sick dairy cows, while 9 are linked to infected poultry. The agency announced on July 25 that 3 additional cases were confirmed in Colorado poultry workers involved in culling infected chickens. Colorado—which has reported all 9 human cases associated with poultry, as well as one human case associated with dairy cattle, in the current outbreak—recently launched a data table to track human avian flu cases detected in the state.

US CDC response

In response to the growing outbreak, the CDC has implemented several measures, including this week announcing US$10 million for additional efforts. The agency will supply US$5 million to organizations such as the National Center for Farmworker Health to educate and train workers on protecting themselves against bird flu. It will provide an additional US$5 million to a campaign to vaccinate livestock industry workers against seasonal flu. Those shots will not protect workers directly against H5N1. The rationale is to reduce the risk of coinfection with human and avian flu viruses, which could lower the risk of genetic reassortment that could potentially lead to a more transmissible virus strain. Some experts maintain that the US should offer avian flu-specific vaccines to farmworkers at risk of infection, as Finland is doing. Furthermore, officials are so far not planning to vaccinate cows either.

UKHSA risk assessment

The CDC maintains that the risk to the general public remains low. Notably, however, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) recently quietly updated its risk assessment for H5N1, specifically the 2.3.4.4b B3.13 genotype currently circulating in US dairy cows, raising it from level 3 to level 4 on a 6-tier scale. This increase was made with moderate confidence, citing ongoing transmission despite biosecurity measures and the potential for undetected mild zoonotic cases in humans. The UKHSA noted high uncertainty regarding the outbreak's trajectory and emphasized that this higher risk level indicates the virus may be an increasing human health threat due to either increased opportunities for evolution or evidence of ongoing evolution.

WHO mRNA vaccine initiative

WHO this week launched a new initiative to accelerate the development of mRNA-based vaccines against human H5N1 infections, with a focus on supporting research in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Led by Argentinian manufacturer Sinergium Biotech, the project aims to create proof-of-concept for mRNA-based H5N1 vaccines through preclinical trials and then share the technology, materials, and expertise with a network of manufacturers in LMICs. The initiative is part of WHO's broader mRNA Technology Transfer Hub and marks the first time a vaccine developer has volunteered know-how to the hub. The initiative could help improve vaccine access in LMICs as well as speed vaccine production during another pandemic.

Mpox cases up 160% in Africa over last year, with little access to treatments, vaccines; Kenya, CAR, Burundi, Rwanda latest nations to report cases

In 2024, mpox cases and deaths have risen by 160% and 19%, respectively, in Africa compared to the same period in 2023, the Africa CDC said this week, warning the risk of further spread is high given a lack of treatments or vaccines on the continent. Kenya and the Central African Republic (CAR) this week declared new outbreaks of mpox. In Kenya, a case was detected in a person traveling from Uganda through Kenya to Rwanda at a border crossing in the south of the country. CAR officials said they are “very concerned” about the cases there, as the outbreak extends to the capital city of Bangui.

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) remains the worst affected country on the continent, with 13,791 cases and at least 450 deaths reported this year, according to the Africa CDC. Most of the cases in DRC are among children, with at least 130 cases detected among youth in displacement camps around Goma. The East African Community regional bloc issued an alert to member states about the disease in DRC, which borders 5 countries in the region as well as 4 others. Burundi and Rwanda, 2 of these neighboring countries, have both recently reported mpox cases for the first time.

Most of these cases are the result of cross-border travel to DRC and are clade I monkeypox virus (MPXV), which can cause more severe illness and higher mortality than the clade II virus that caused the 2022 global mpox outbreak. Complicating these outbreaks is a novel strain of clade Ib MPXV, which has genetic mutations that appear to be facilitating community transmission through sexual transmission and other forms of close contact and that can evade detection by some existing tests. The case fatality rate (CFR) for the clade I outbreaks ranges between 3–5%, but up to 10% among children with severe illness. South Africa has reported 22 cases of clade II MPXV with 3 deaths since May 2024.

A new research consortium established earlier this year to help counter mpox outbreaks in Africa is seeking funding. MpoxReC is focusing its response on new outbreaks in endemic countries as well as previously unaffected countries in Africa. CEPI announced the launch of a clinical trial in DRC and other countries in Africa to assess whether post-exposure vaccination of Bavarian Nordic’s MVA-BN® mpox vaccine could reduce the risk of secondary mpox cases, or, if a person contracts mpox, could reduce their severity of illness. In June, Bavarian Nordic announced a donation of 15,000 doses of mpox vaccine to DRC and other countries experiencing mpox outbreaks.

MORE HEADLINES

Global Pandemic Preparedness Summit highlights dangers of climate change, need to expand research, importance of ensuring equitable access, overall shortcomings in preparedness

Health Policy Watch: Brazil Pandemic Summit Underscores the Global Gaps in Preparedness

PAHO: Addressing health equity is key to ensuring better pandemic preparedness, PAHO Director says

WHO: CEPI and WHO urge broader research strategy for countries to prepare for the next pandemic

See also: MedCity News: What the Ebola Outbreak Reveals about Pandemic Preparedness (opinion)

New White House guidelines aim to protect federally funded research entities from foreign threats

Science: U.S. invests $67 million in national research security centers

American Institute of Physics: White House Issues New Security Rules for Government-Funded Research

See also: New York Times: A.I. May Save Us, or May Construct Viruses to Kill Us (opinion)

US admits ‘missteps’ in communications regarding Chinese COVID-19 vaccines in Philippines

Reuters: U.S. told Philippines it made ‘missteps’ in secret anti-vax propaganda effort

Think Global Health: U.S. Disinformation Plan Put Geopolitics Above Global Health (commentary)

COVID summer wave continues in US, with national wastewater viral activity at high level

CIDRAP: COVID activity continues at brisk pace across much of US

The Guardian: Covid surges in US as unequal access plagues vaccination and treatment rates

Axios: Mapped: COVID summer continues to heat up

ABC News: What to know about the updated COVID vaccines coming this fall

See also: The Nation: Why Covid Keeps Winning (opinion)

Multiple athletes test positive for COVID at Paris Olympics in first Games with no disease-specific restrictions

The Guardian: Covid cluster worsens in Australian Olympic camp as Zac Stubblety-Cook reveals infection

Yahoo Sports: Paris Olympics: Multiple swimmers, including two Americans, test positive for COVID but aren't sent home

See also: Today: Olympic athletes swim in Seine after bacteria levels drop in Paris river

Trust in doctors, medical system declined significantly during COVID pandemic; higher trust increased odds of getting vaccinated

CIDRAP: Americans' trust in doctors, hospitals plunged during pandemic, survey suggests

Washington Times: Study finds declining trust in doctors and hospitals during COVID hurt vaccination rates

“I don’t believe that the lack of trust is primarily the fault of the physicians and hospitals, but the fault of the politicians who first evaded the issue, then abdicated their responsibilities and eventually used the pandemic as just another partisan issue to wield against their political opponents.” – Dr. Amesh Adalja, Center for Health Security Senior Scholar, who was not involved in the study

SARS-CoV-2 spillover from humans to animals widespread, study shows

CIDRAP: SARS-CoV-2 widespread in Virginia wildlife, likely from people

HealthDay News: COVID-19 Virus Is Widespread in U.S. Wildlife

A team from the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, along with partner ministries in Jordan and Iraq, recently held a simulation exercise at 2 border crossings between the nations to develop, assess, and test systems and protocols to respond to a transboundary zoonotic event. Read more about the effort in this LinkedIn post from the Center’s team leader, Senior Scholar Dr. Erin Sorrell.

RSV season begins in Florida; vaccine makers enter second year of shots with narrower market

KFF Health News/Tampa Bay Times: Florida’s RSV Season Has Started, and It’s Coming Soon to the Rest of US. Here’s a Primer.

Fierce Pharma: With new CDC recommendations, RSV market's long-term value falls sharply in US: Airfinity

US records 188 measles cases in 2024 so far, triple last year’s total; most cases among unvaccinated people

Fox News: Measles cases surge to triple last year's — with 5 months to go

NBC News: Measles cases in the U.S. are already triple last year’s total, and it’s only July

See also: Minnesota Dept of Health: Health officials confirm three measles cases in metro area

2024 worst year on record for global dengue cases, with warmer temperatures, overseas travel driving disease spread

Precision Vaccinations: Don't End Summer Vacation With Dengue

The Lancet: Dengue: the threat to health now and in the future (editorial)

MedPage Today: Dengue Fever's Worrisome Surge (opinion)

Early, widespread West Nile virus activity may portend more serious season in US

CNN: Early West Nile activity may point to a once-in-a-decade spike in infections. Here’s what survivors want you to know

San Fran Chronicle: Bay Area county reports first West Nile death in nearly two decades

KHOU: 7 cases of West Nile virus confirmed in Harris County residents; over 500 positive mosquito samples

New York Times: What to Know About the West Nile Virus in New York

As 2 malaria vaccines deployed in African nations, scientists call for urgent, multipronged approach to curb drug-resistant malaria

STAT: Behind the malaria vaccines: A 40-year quest against one of humanity’s biggest killers

STAT: 4 takeaways from STAT’s story on the development of malaria vaccines

Gavi VaccinesWork: How effective are malaria vaccines?

Council on Foreign Relations: Is Africa at a Turning Point for Malaria?

VOA News: Urgent action needed to stop spread of drug-resistant malaria, scientists warn

WHO sends more than 1M vaccines for children in Gaza, prequalifies Biological E novel polio vaccine

Reuters: Polio cases 'very likely' in Gaza population, WHO says

Reuters: WHO sends over 1 mln polio vaccines to Gaza to protect children

CIDRAP: WHO prequalifies Biological E novel oral polio vaccine

See also: The Guardian: Children in Gaza are now at risk of polio as well as bombs – we need a ceasefire now (opinion)

Introduced legislation in US House aims to improve indoor air quality in buildings, including schools, childcare facilities, receives endorsement from several entities

Rep. Paul D. Tonko: Tonko, Fitzpatrick Introduce Bill to Improve Indoor Air Quality

ACHR News: IAQ Bill Wins Support

“Unlike drinking water or food, we can’t choose the air we breathe. Thanks to Representatives Tonko and Fitzpatrick’s leadership, the Indoor Air Quality and Healthy Schools Act will ensure that we and future generations all have clean indoor air to breathe.” – Statement endorsing the bill from Center for Health Security Contributing Scholar Dr. Paula Olsiewski

COVID-19 pandemic showed need for enhanced ventilation standards, study says; Australian state launches project to clean indoor air

News Medical: Ventilation must go beyond open windows to prevent airborne diseases, experts urge

ABC (Australia) News: Victoria's new 'clean air' project could help end the COVID pandemic and boost productivity

Melbourne officials investigating legionnaires’ disease outbreak, with 60 confirmed cases

The Guardian: Melbourne’s ‘explosive’ legionnaires’ disease outbreak surges to 60 confirmed cases

The Guardian: Legionnaires outbreak: Australians are contracting the lung disease, what is it and do I need to worry?

See also: WBAL: Another bacteria outbreak linked to Legionnaires' disease found at Baltimore office building

Urgent interdisciplinary research needed to understand risks of, interventions for air pollution exposure; wildfire smoke may pose greater health risk than other types

News Medical: Air pollution: a pressing global health crisis demanding urgent interdisciplinary action

AP: Wildfire smoke may be worse for your brain than other air pollution, study says

As Earth experiences hottest recorded days ever, UN Secretary-General calls for urgent, concerted international efforts to address extreme heat

Euronews: UN Secretary-General calls for action to curb extreme heat

United Nations: Secretary-General's Call to Action on Extreme Heat

The Atlantic: The Global Temperature Just Went Bump

Certain deli meats, produce, pre-packaged foods sold in US recalled due to possible listeria contamination

AP: Boar’s Head expands recall to include 7 million more pounds of deli meats tied to listeria outbreak

Food Safety News: Fresh produce, dips and pre-packaged vegetables sold at Kroger recalled after testing finds Listeria

Forbes: Everything To Know About The Listeria Outbreaks—Including What To Avoid And Who Is Most At Risk

See also: BBC: How fixing food might stop the next pandemic

Center for Health Security Senior Scholar Dr. Caitlin Rivers provides updates on food-related outbreaks and recalls, as well as influenza-like illnesses including COVID-19, in her weekly newsletter Force of Infection. To learn more and sign up, visit: https://caitlinrivers.substack.com/about.

FROM THE CENTER

Center for Health Security publishes meeting report from the 2024 Southeast Asia Strategic Multilateral Biosecurity Dialogue

The Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security this week published a meeting report from the ninth in-person Southeast Asia Strategic Multilateral Biosecurity Dialogue, hosted by the Center in Singapore from April 16–18, 2024. This year’s dialogue included participants from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and the United States.

For the past decade, this dialogue has built and strengthened a network of senior government officials and other experts, dedicated to establishing resilience against the broad scope of biosecurity risks affecting this critical region. Even as countries around the world continue to combat COVID-19 and rebound from the historic impacts experienced in the early years of the pandemic, the 2024 Southeast Asia dialogue pushed participants to look forward, beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, to build on key lessons and strengthen the policies, programs, and capacities necessary at the national and regional levels to combat natural, accidental, and deliberate biological threats.

To access the 2024 Southeast Asia dialogue report, as well as reports from previous meetings, visit the project page: https://centerforhealthsecurity.org/our-work/research-projects/southeast-asia-strategic-biosecurity-dialogue.

Davis Brooks: Opinion on Trump World

Opinion

David Brooks

The Deep Source of Trump’s Appeal

July 11, 2024

Credit...Scott McIntyre for The New York Times

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By David Brooks

Opinion Columnist

There was an extraordinary story in Politico this week. A group of Democratic officials and union leaders told journalists that Donald Trump was competitive in New York State. In 2020, Joe Biden won New York by 23 points. But now, the Democratic Manhattan borough president, Mark Levine, said, “I truly believe we’re a battleground state now.”

If New York is anything remotely like a battleground, then Trump is going to win this election in a landslide. What is going on?

The proximate answer of course is that many voters think Biden is too old. But that doesn’t explain why Trump was ahead even before the debate. It doesn’t explain why Trump’s candidacy is still standing after Jan. 6. It doesn’t explain why America is on the verge of turning in an authoritarian direction.

I’ve been trying to think through the deeper roots of our current dysfunction with the help of a new book by James Davison Hunter, titled “Democracy and Solidarity: On the Cultural Roots of America’s Political Crisis.” Hunter, a scholar at the University of Virginia, is (in my opinion) the nation’s leading cultural historian.

He reminds us that a nation’s political life rests upon cultural foundations. Each society has its own way of seeing the world, its own basic assumptions about what is right and wrong, its own vision of a better world that gives national life direction and purpose. Culture is the ocean of symbols and stories in which we swim.

American culture, Hunter argues, was formed within the tension between Enlightenment values and religious faith. America was founded at the high point of the Enlightenment and according to Enlightenment ideas: a belief in individual reason, that social differences should be settled through deliberation and democracy, that a free society depends on neutral institutions like the electoral system and the courts, which will be fair to all involved.

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But over the centuries many Americans have also believed that America has a covenantal relationship with God — from Puritan leaders like John Winthrop on down. The Bible gave generations of Americans a bedrock set of moral values, the conviction that we live within an objective moral order, the faith that the arc of history bends toward justice. Religious fervor drove many of our social movements, like abolitionism. Religious fervor explains why America has always had big arguments over things like Prohibition and abortion, which don’t seem to rile other nations as much. As late as 1958, according to a Gallup poll, only 18 percent of Americans said they would be willing to vote for an atheist for president.

Each generation, Hunter continues, works out its own balance in the tension between Enlightenment liberty and moral authority. In the 20th century, for example, the philosopher John Dewey emerged as the great champion of Enlightenment values. He believed that religion had been discredited but that a public ethic could be built by human reason, on the basis of individual dignity and human rights. He had great faith in the power of education to train people to become moral citizens. (Dewey’s understanding of education remains influential in the United States.)

The theologian Reinhold Niebuhr thought this was naïve. He believed that Dewey underestimated the human capacity for sin. He believed that you can’t use science to answer questions about life’s ultimate purpose and meaning. He dismissed the idea that with just a little more schooling, we would be able to educate people out of their racism and selfishness or that secularism could address life’s deepest problems. “The religious ideal of forgiveness,” Niebuhr wrote, “is more profound and more difficult than the rational virtue of tolerance.”

Dewey and Niebuhr differed, but they both thought it was important to build a coherent moral order; they both believed there was a thing called the truth; they both believed that capitalism preyed on the vulnerable. In other words, across their differences they both operated within the cultural framework and tension that had long defined America.

And over the decades, most Americans lived with one ear attuned to the doctrine of Dewey and the other ear attuned to the doctrine of Niebuhr. If you want to see these two traditions within one person, look at Martin Luther King Jr. He used a Christian metaphysics to show how American democracy could live up to both Enlightenment and divine ideals.

Unfortunately, Hunter notes, this fruitful cultural tension died with King. Starting in the 1960s, America grew less religious. Those who remained religious were told to keep their faith to the private sphere. American public life became largely secular, especially among the highly educated classes, producing what the First Things editor Richard John Neuhaus called “the naked public square.” By 2020, 60 percent of Americans said they would vote for an atheist for president.

At the same time, science and reason failed to produce a substitute moral order that could hold the nation together. By 1981, in the famous first passage of his book “After Virtue,” the philosopher Alasdair Macintyre argued that we had inherited fragments of moral ideas, not a coherent moral system to give form to a communal life, not a solid set of moral foundations to use to settle disputes. Moral reasoning, he wrote, had been reduced to “emotivism.” If it feels right, do it. In 1987, Allan Bloom released his megaselling “The Closing of the American Mind,” arguing that moral relativism had become the dominant ethos of the era.

In other words, Americans lost faith in both sides of the great historical tension and, with it, the culture that had long held a diverse nation together. By the 21st century, it became clear that Americans were no longer just disagreeing with one another; they didn’t even perceive the same reality. You began to hear commencement speakers declare that each person has to live according to his or her own truth. Critics talked about living in a post-truth society. Hunter talks about cultural exhaustion, a loss of faith, a rising nihilism — the belief in nothing. As he puts it, “If there is little or no common political ground today, it is because there are few if any common assumptions about the nature of a good society that underwrite a shared political life.”

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Was there anything that would fill this void of meaning? Was there anything that could give people a shared sense of right and wrong, a sense of purpose?

It turns out there was: identity politics. People on the right and the left began to identify themselves within a particular kind of moral story. This is the story in which my political group is the victim of oppression and other groups are the oppressors. For people who feel they are floating in a moral and social vacuum, this story provides a moral landscape — there are those bad guys over there and us good guys over here. The story provides a sense of belonging. It provides social recognition. By expressing my rage, I will earn your attention and respect.

In public discourse, identity politics is more associated with the left. Progressivism used to be oriented around how to make capitalism just, but now in its upper-middle-class form, it’s oriented around proper esteem for and inclusion of different identity groups.

But as Hunter notes, Donald Trump practices identity politics just as much as any progressive. He tells the story of how small-town, less-educated Christians are being oppressed by elites. He alone is their retribution. That story resonates with a lot of people. In the 1950s, Billy Graham assumed that his faith was central to American life. By the 2020s his son Franklin considered himself a warrior under siege in an anti-Christian culture.

The problem with this form of all-explaining identity politics is that it undermines democracy. If others are evil and out to get us, then persuasion is for suckers. If our beliefs are defined by our identities and not individual reason and personal experience, then different Americans are living in different universes, and there is no point in trying to engage in deliberative democracy. You just have to crush them. You have to grab power and control of the institutions and shove your answers down everybody else’s throats.

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In this climate, Hunter argues, “the authoritarian impulse becomes impossible to restrain.” Authoritarianism imposes a social vision by force. If you can’t have social solidarity organically from the ground up, then you can impose it from top down using the power of the state. This is the menace of Trumpism. If you read my recent interview with Steve Bannon, you’ll see that he talks like a character straight out of Hunter’s book.

Democrats are not immune to this way of thinking. In a 2019 survey, Democrats were more likely than Republicans to admit to occasionally thinking that we’d be better off as a country “if large numbers of the opposing party in the public today just died.” Democrats were more likely than Republicans to believe that their opponents were “evil” and “un-American.”

But in this world, in which politics is seen as a form of total war, Biden looks obsolete. In a nihilistic pseudo-authoritarian world, he’s still one of those old-fashioned liberals who revere the Constitution and his Catholicism. The ideals that animate him and that he uses to give poetry and lift to his speeches fail to inspire millions of American voters. A plurality of voters believe that Biden’s age is a bigger problem than Trump’s authoritarianism because they just don’t see the latter as that big a problem.

The core question in Hunter’s book is: Can you have an Enlightenment political system atop a post-Enlightenment culture? I’d say the answer to that question is: over the long term, no.

The task, then, is to build a new cultural consensus that is democratic but also morally coherent. My guess, and it is only a guess, is that this work of cultural repair will be done by religious progressives, by a new generation of leaders who will build a modern social gospel around love of neighbor and hospitality for the marginalized.

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But the work of building that culture will take decades. Until then, we, as a democracy, are on thin ice.

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