Monday, August 23, 2021

And another day of full approval, vaccine mandates, doctor walkouts, pregnant women and vaccinations, professor firings, TX pushing ahead on voting bill, rewriting recent history, rainbow-colored squad cars, the shipping crisis, and sitting 8 hours a day comes to a close: 

“When, if ever, will congressional Democrats be as united in voting for what working families need as congressional Republicans are in voting against what they need?” — Robert Reich

Deaths

US: 646,667 (+1609)

World: 4,453,639 (+9169)

Cases

US: 38,814,596 (+269,452)

World: 213,301,061 (+713,645)

US regulators give full approval to Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. The Pentagon promptly announced it will press ahead with plans to force members of the military to get vaccinated amid the battle against the extra-contagious delta variant. The University of Minnesota likewise said it will require its students get the shot, as did Louisiana’s major public universities, including LSU, though state law there allows broad exemptions...Never before has the FDA had so much evidence to judge a shot’s safety.

President Biden calls on more companies to require COVID vaccine for workers now that the Pfizer shot has full FDA approval: "Vaccination requirements have been around for decades...It only makes sense to require a vaccine to stop the spread of COVID-19".

NYC mandates vaccinations for public school teachers, staff. The new policy marks the first no-option vaccination mandate for a broad group of city workers in the nation’s most populous city, though Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Friday that coaches and students in football, basketball and other “high-risk” sports would have to get inoculated before play begins.

A group of around 75 South Florida doctors staged a walkout on Monday to protest the number of unvaccinated COVID-19 patients flooding their hospital in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, MSNBC's Morning Joe reports. The frustrated doctors want people to "ignore the nonsense and the absurdities that you're hearing people say at public meetings and recognize the value of what a vaccine will do.”

Pregnant and recently pregnant people are at an increased risk for severe #COVID19 when compared with non-pregnant people. But getting an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine during pregnancy reduces these risks—and may also provide some protection for breastfed babies.

United Airlines workers required to get vaccinated sooner following FDA approval of Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine.

WHO chief calling for two-month halt on vaccine boosters. World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Monday called for a two-month moratorium on COVID-19 booster shots as many low- and middle-income countries still struggle to provide enough vaccine doses for their citizens.

Mariners fans will need their hat, glove and mask to go to games the rest of the season. The Mariners announced Monday morning they will follow this mandate at T-Mobile park, telling fans they must wear a mask in all indoor areas of the park.

UW-Stout professor fired for not wearing mask on campus. The University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents last month fired a UW-Stout engineering professor for failing to wear a mask while on campus last year, according to documents obtained by the Wisconsin State Journal. A disciplinary investigation file released this week shows Regents on July 8 voted unanimously to adopt an order of dismissal for UW-Stout engineering professor Pavel Bizyukov because he didn’t wear a mask in the classroom on Sept. 9, 2020, as required by UW-Stout and the board, and because he did not follow a process to obtain an exception to the mask requirement.

With Democrats back, Texas GOP pushes ahead with voting bill. Texas Republicans brought back their voting bill Monday with no changes as some Democrats returned to the Capitol for the first time since ending their holdout, making it clear that the bill is on track to become law after their 38-day walkout...Senate Bill 1 would make mail voting a stricter process, increase liberties for poll watchers, and prohibit 24-hour and drive-thru voting, two ways Harris County — which includes Houston and where 44% of the nearly 5 million residents are Latino and 20% are Black — expanded options for voters and also offered protections against the coronavirus.

Fact check: Trump administration officials try to rewrite their own Afghanistan history. In public statements this past week, former Vice President Mike Pence, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, and former Acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller have all slammed Biden in one way or another for the chaos that has unfolded in Afghanistan this month. While some of that criticism has been accurate, much of it has inaccurately tried to rewrite the Trump administration's own history on Afghanistan -- denouncing Biden while also misleadingly omitting the actions taken by Trump and his administration.

Not even Donald Trump can control the monster he created. This is Frankenstein's monster come to life in the year 2021. Trump has created a following that even he can't control anymore. Consider how we got to that moment on Saturday night.

UK police are facing heavy criticism for a new fleet of rainbow-coloured squad cars they claim will boost “confidence” among the LGBT+ community.

New York just outlawed child marriage thanks to survivor activism — but 44 states still allow it.

Apple Has Reportedly Been Scanning Your iCloud Mail for Child Abuse Images Since 2019.

The shipping crisis is getting worse. Here's what that means for holiday shopping. More than 18 months into the pandemic, the disruption to global supply chains is getting worse, spurring shortages of consumer products and making it more expensive for companies to ship goods where they're needed.

Today, the student debt crisis reached $1,839,738,655,408.

Study shows how sitting for 8 hours a day can affect your stroke risk. People who reported sitting eight or more hours daily and were not very physically active otherwise were seven times more at risk of having a stroke than people who spent fewer than four hours being sedentary and at least 10 minutes exercising each day.

Aerosmith is selling its huge catalog to Universal Music Group — even the chunk that’s currently released by Sony.

Life’s short. Live, love, create, and help others.

Until next time, my friends. Stay safe and stay sane. Good night.