CBS NEWS – Brad Moline, a fourth-generation Iowa turkey farmer, saw this happen before. In 2015, a virulent avian flu outbreak nearly wiped out his flock.
Barns once filled with chattering birds were suddenly silent. Employees were anguished by having to kill sickened animals. The family business, started in 1924, was at serious risk.
His business recovered, but now the virus is back, again imperiling the nation's poultry farms. And this time, there's another pernicious force...
FOOD SAFETY NEWS – It costs the USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) more than $1 billion a year for close to 10,000 inspectors to provide their services at more than 6,200 locations where the private sector produces meat and egg products.
For the past two years, a few executives in Washington D.C., especially the four who report their meetings with people outside the federal government, claim to be managing this mammoth structure only...
ARS TECHNICA – A mushrooming COVID-19 outbreak in North Korea has reached over 1.7 million cases, with nearly 233,000 new cases reported on Wednesday alone, according to state media reports.
It's a startling rise given that North Korea claimed to have zero COVID-19 cases a week ago.
But now the secretive, authoritarian country is acknowledging that the pandemic virus has been spreading "explosively" since late April.
Many experts have interpreted the admission as a sign of a...
FORTUNE – The world finds itself awash in COVID-19 vaccines, but governments can’t get them into arms fast enough, as hesitancy and logistical hurdles threaten to indefinitely extend the pandemic.
Shots that were once rare are now piling up and even expiring, a problem on the agenda of a second global COVID-19 summit the U.S. is co-hosting on Thursday.
President Joe Biden kicked off the first summit eight months ago by announcing the U.S. would donate...
FOX 13 Seattle - Billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates tested positive for COVID-19, he announced Tuesday on Twitter.
Gates wrote in a series of tweets:
"I've tested positive for COVID. I'm experiencing mild symptoms and am following the experts' advice by isolating until I'm healthy again.
"The Gates Foundation is coming together today for the first time in two years, and I am lucky to be on Teams to see everyone and thank them for their hard...
The White House has been asking Congress for $22.5 billion in emergency aid to continue responding to the pandemic, but Republicans have insisted on a much lower number.
THE BOSTON GLOBE – Seven Massachusetts counties now have “high” community levels of COVID-19 and people in those areas should wear masks in indoor public spaces, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says.
The counties are Berkshire, Franklin, Worcester, Middlesex, Suffolk, Norfolk, and Barnstable, according to the CDC’s website, which rates virus levels in US counties as “a tool to help communities decide what prevention steps to take.”
Hampshire, Hampden, Essex, Plymouth, Dukes, and...
May 5 (Reuters) - The Omicron variant of the SARS-CoV2 virus is intrinsically as severe as previous variants, unlike assumptions made in previous studies that it was more transmissible but less severe, a large study in the United States has found.
"We found that the risks of hospitalization and mortality were nearly identical between periods," said four scientists who conducted the study based on records of 130,000 COVID-19 patients, referring to times in the past...
AP – What happens if I get COVID-19 while traveling?
Depending on your destination, it could result in an unexpected change in plans, such as being required to stay isolated in a hotel.
It's why the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that you have backup plans ready if you're traveling abroad. You might have to stay longer than planned if you test positive.
In some places, you won't be able to board flights until...
THE NEW REPUBLIC – The world is teeming with animals that have never met before.
They clamber under dripping green canopies in rainforest, they crouch in the rough recesses of mountain caves, they scamper through your backyard.
Usually, they stick to what they know, living in the same ecosystems that have supported their kind for millennia. In normal times, they may never encounter the species that live in the mountain or valley or forest next to...
Improved airflow provides an additional layer of protection — and can be a vital tool for people who have not been fully vaccinated, people with weakened immune systems, and children too young to be immunized.