And another day of big risks, visitor logs, Rs coming for abortion, anti-LGBTQ legislation, refusing to prescribe birth control, the 1% pocketing 63% of all wealth, an important sound you can’t hear, tipflation, and the #1 thing to be happier comes to a close:
“The road to the Handmaid’s Tale world is lined with people telling us to stop overreacting.” — Andrea Junker
Covid Deaths
US: 1,125,541
World: 6,730,560
Covid Cases
US: 103,577,391
World: 671,375,010
‘People aren’t taking this seriously’: experts say US Covid surge is big risk. New sub-variants are causing concern for their increased transmissibility and ability to evade some antibodies, but the same tools continue to curtail the spread of Covid, especially bivalent boosters, masks, ventilation, antivirals and other precautions, experts said. Yet booster uptake has been “pitiful”, said Neil Sehgal, an assistant professor of health policy and management at the University of Maryland School of Public Health. Antiviral uptake has been low, and few mandates on masking, vaccination and testing have resumed in the face of the winter surge, which is once again putting pressure on health systems.
House GOP demands visitor logs in Biden classified docs case. Newly empowered House Republicans on Sunday demanded the White House turn over all information related to its searches that have uncovered classified documents at President Joe Biden’s home and former office in the wake of more records found at his Delaware residence.
Republicans, having learned nothing, are coming for abortion post-midterms-flop. The GOP is using its first week in power to push two antiabortion measures. Meanwhile, the Alabama attorney general says the state can prosecute women who use legal abortion pills to end pregnancies.
Virginia bill would count a fetus as a car passenger in HOV lanes. Reproductive rights activists say the legislation amounts to a thinly veiled attempt by anti-abortion Republican lawmakers to further curtail abortion rights by advancing so-called personhood laws that seek to protect the rights of the unborn through unconventional avenues.
CVS sued by nurse who was fired after she refused to prescribe birth control because of her religious beliefs. CVS Health is facing another lawsuit brought by a former employee who claims the pharmacy chain's decision to fire her after she refused to prescribe birth control to patients violated her religious rights under federal law.
With over 100 anti-LGBTQ bills before state legislatures in 2023 so far, activists say they're 'fired up'. More than 100 bills targeting LGBTQ rights and queer life — from transgender health care to drag shows — have been filed in 22 states for 2023 so far, leading advocates to expect this year will set a new record for anti-LGBTQ legislation. So far, Texas has taken the lead with 36 such bills, according to Equality Texas, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy group. Missouri is next with 26, then North Dakota with eight and Oklahoma with six. The majority of these approximately 120 bills focus on transgender young people, continuing a trend that began about two years ago. -- Because to Republicans, the word “freedom” means “what I will allow you to do.” Such hateful people. No compassion; no empathy; no humanity.
Call for new taxes on super-rich after 1% pocket two-thirds of all new wealth. Oxfam has called for immediate action to tackle a post-Covid widening in global inequality after revealing that almost two-thirds of the new wealth amassed since the start of the pandemic has gone to the richest 1%. In report to coincide with the annual gathering of the global elite at the World Economic Forum in Davos, the charity said the best-off had pocketed $26tn (£21tn) in new wealth up to the end of 2021. That represented 63% of the total new wealth, with the rest going to the remaining 99% of people. -- It’s important to understand these numbers. We are nothing but disposable cogs in a system that can replace us at any moment. All the while, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. This is all by design. Which means the design can be changed.
Spy software found out an employee wasn't working as much as she said. Now she must repay her wages. A Canadian accountant has been ordered to repay her employer for "time theft" after the company's tracking software determined that she was performing personal tasks while she claimed to be working. The court ruling marks one of the first instances in which such technology has been used to order a worker to repay an employer for slacking off on the job.
A sound you can’t hear but may one day change your life. Undergoing clinical trials around the world is a brain surgery that doesn’t need an incision or produce any blood yet drastically improves the lives of people with essential tremor, depression and more. The procedure, known as a focused ultrasound, aims sound waves at parts of the brain to disrupt faulty brain circuits causing symptoms. “Focused ultrasound is a noninvasive therapeutic technology,” said Dr. Neal Kassell, founder and chairman of the Focused Ultrasound Foundation. “We’ve said that focused ultrasound is the most powerful sound you will never hear, but sound that someday could save your life.”
Everyone wants a tip now. Do you have to give them one? Thanks to touchscreens and the pandemic, tipflation is everywhere — and it’s hard to say no. It’s hard to say just how bad this tipflation has gotten because there isn’t much real data to go by. We do know that in the United States, people are generally asked or expected to tip far more and for more types of services than anywhere else in the world, so tipflation is going to be especially bad here.
What's the #1 thing to change to be happier? A top happiness researcher weighs in. Happiness can be hard to quantify, because it can mean something different to everyone. But let's say you could change one thing in your life to become a happier person, like your income, a job, your relationships or your health. What would make the biggest difference?…So, if people could change one thing in their lives to be happier, what does the data say they should choose? "They should invest in their relationships with other people." His study has shown that the strongest predictors for people to maintain their happiness and health throughout the course of their lives were people who described their relationships as having satisfying levels of quality and warmth. And that applies to a wide breadth of interactions in your daily life, from spouses, close friends and colleagues to the barista who makes your morning coffee or the person delivering your mail.
Life’s short. Live, love, create, and help others.
Until next time, my friends. Stay safe and stay sane. Good night.
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