Neal Katyal: Dropping Charges Is 'Outrageous And Indefensible' | Morning Joe | MSNBC

What did China do about early outbreak?

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-52573137

T he US and other countries have raised questions about whether China was fully transparent when the virus first emerged there.

So what do we know about what happened in China, and what did it say and do about the outbreak?

Here's our timeline:

Republicans threaten to sanction Jordan for not extraditing terrorist

https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/republicans-threaten-to-sanction-jordan-for-not-extraditing-terrorist-627444

This signals an increase in pressure on Jordan to extradite Ahlam Al-Tamimi, who facilitated the bombing of a Jerusalem Sbarro restaurant that killed 15 people, including two Americans, in 2001.

Storm builds around Barr over dropping of Flynn case

https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/496895-storm-builds-around-barr-over-dropping-of-flynn-case

Democrats and other critics are seizing on the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) decision to drop the case against former national security adviser Michael Flynn, arguing it shows how heavily politicized it has become under Attorney General William Barr.

Anger over the extraordinary move by Justice to drop charges even after it secured a guilty plea has created a new political storm around Barr, who had previously angered Democrats for his handling of former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation

Sweden's death rate from COVID-19 surpasses USA

https://www.9news.com.au/world/coronavirus-sweden-death-toll-covid19-rate-greater-than-usa/2ff8dd35-ecdc-42b8-bc89-5da7736f52cd

 

The Scandinavian nation controversially rejected the stricter lockdown approach of other countries in their strategy to overcome the COVID-19 pandemic, keeping most schools open, as well as stores and restaurants.

According to data from John Hopkins University, now Sweden has a death rate of 297.16 for every 1 million citizens, after 3,040 died from coronavirus. There have been 24,623 confirmed COVID-19 cases and so far 4,074 have recovered.

Comparatively the death rate in the US is 226.33 per 1 million citizens, after 74,239 have passed away from the virus.

In Sweden the lockdown-free approach has seen their death toll far exceed that of their Scandinavian neighbours like Denmark (514), Norway (217) and Finland (255) who have imposed strict measures to try and contain the spread of COVID-19.

‘Playing Russian Roulette’: Nursing Homes Told to Take the Infected

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/24/us/nursing-homes-coronavirus.html

California, New Jersey and New York have made nursing homes accept Covid-19 patients from hospitals. Residents and workers fear the policy is risking lives.

Criticized on Virus, Trump Goes to His Playbook: Deflect, Reject and Minimize

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/us/politics/trump-coronavirus-fact-check.html

The president has served up a series of false and misleading statements as he seeks to counter uncomfortable facts about the spread of Covid-19 and questions about his push to reopen the economy.

 

High Court upholds near one million shekel fine for failure to divorce

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/high-court-upholds-near-one-million-shekel-fine-for-failure-to-divorce-627117

 The High Court of Justice has upheld a fine of NIS 5,000 a day issued by the Tel Aviv Rabbinical Court against the father of a recalcitrant husband who has refused to give his wife a divorce for over seven years.

The father has been found by the rabbinical court to be the direct cause behind the son’s refusal to grant his wife a divorce leading to the unprecedented fine against someone who is not a litigant in the divorce suit by the court.

Two men involved in fatal shooting of Ahmaud Arbery face murder charges, GBI says

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/07/us/ahmaud-arbery-arrests-mcmichaels/index.html

Gregory McMichael told Glynn County police that Arbery was suspected in "several break-ins," but no such string of crimes was reported in the weeks before the shooting. Police have yet to clarify whether Arbery is accused of any crime at a home that was being built.

In the more than seven weeks preceding the shooting, there was only one burglary report in the neighborhood, said Glynn County police Lt. Cheri Bashlor. A 9 mm pistol was stolen January 1 from an unlocked truck outside the McMichaels' home, she said.

Hydroxychloroquine Fails to Help Coronavirus Patients in Largest Study of the Drug to Date

https://time.com/5833945/hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-study/

“We don’t think at this point, given the totality of evidence, that it is reasonable to routinely give this drug to patients,” says Schluger. “We don’t see the rationale for doing that.” While the study did not randomly assign people to receive the drug or placebo and compare their outcomes, the large number of patients involved suggests the findings are solid.

 

Observational Study of Hydroxychloroquine in Hospitalized Patients with Covid-19

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2012410

Conclusions

In this observational study involving patients with Covid-19 who had been admitted to the hospital, hydroxychloroquine administration was not associated with either a greatly lowered or an increased risk of the composite end point of intubation or death. Randomized, controlled trials of hydroxychloroquine in patients with Covid-19 are needed. (Funded by the National Institutes of Health.)

 

Justice Department drops criminal case against Michael Flynn

Trump puts political goals above facts in CDC and Flynn dramas

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/07/politics/donald-trump-coronavirus-cdc-michael-flynn-william-barr-russia-investigation/index.html

 President Donald Trump has spent three years discrediting and sidelining institutional sources of facts, truth and trust that threaten his political and personal goals.

Rarely has that mission combined in a single day to such a grave result as it did this week. The White House rejected new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance on safely reopening the country -- with US deaths from the coronavirus surpassing 75,000 -- and the handpicked officials leading the Justice Department dropped charges against former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

Both cases show how Trump disdains government structures meant to dispense independent and fact-based policymaking, science and justice free from corrupting political influences.

Silent hypoxia: Covid-19 patients who should be gasping for air but aren't

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/06/health/happy-hypoxia-pulse-oximeter-trnd-wellness/index.html

 In hospitals around the world, doctors are shaking their heads in disbelief as they watch Covid-19 patients who should be comatose or "seizing" from hypoxia -- a lack of oxygen in the body's tissues -- check social media, chat with nurses and barely complain of discomfort while breathing.

 

Some have dubbed them "happy hypoxics," a terrible misnomer for what could be a long, slow recovery -- or worse.

The proper medical term is "silent hypoxia." It happens when people are unaware they are being deprived of oxygen and are therefore showing up to the hospital in much worse health than they realize.

Typically, these patients have experienced some Covid-19 symptoms for two to seven days before they show up at the hospital complaining of sudden chest tightness or an inability to breathe deeply, said Dr. Richard Levitan, who's been an emergency room physician for some 30 years.

 

There he watched patients come into the emergency room with blood oxygen levels as low as 50%, so low they should have been incoherent, even unconscious. Normal blood oxygen saturation is between 95% and 100%, and anything below 90% is considered abnormal.

 

 

"We found two out of three patients can avoid a ventilator during the first 24 hours by putting them on oxygen and doing these positioning maneuvers, such as laying them prone on their stomach," he said.