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USC Study Finds Coronavirus Far More Widespread In L.A. County Than Reported  By Tristan Justice

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://thefederalist.com/2020/04/21/usc-study-finds-coronavirus-far-more-spread-in-l-a-county-than-reported/

A new study unveiled Monday from the University of Southern California (USC) with the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health discovered infections of the novel Wuhan coronavirus to be far more widespread with a lower fatality rate than initially thought.

The California researchers conducted rapid antibody testing of a representative sample of adults and found that approximately 2.8 to 5.6 percent of L.A. County’s adult population already had coronavirus antibodies present, translating to 221,000 to 442,000 past-infected people. The new estimate dwarfs the nearly 8,000 cases that had been reported at the time the study took place April 10-11. There are now nearly 14,000 confirmed cases of the virus and more than 600 deaths officially reported in the county as of this writing, according to L.A. County Department of Public Health.

“We haven’t known the true extent of COVID-19 infections in our community because we have only tested people with symptoms, and the availability of tests has been limited,” said the study’s lead investigator and USC Professor Neeraj Sood in a statement. “The estimates also suggest that we might have to recalibrate disease prediction models and rethink public health strategies.”

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Senate Intel Committee Still Running Interference For Russia Collusion Nonsense By Mollie Hemingway

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://thefederalist.com/2020/04/21/senate-intel-committee-still-running-interference-for-russia-collusion-nonsense/

The report is yet another reminder of how the committee helped Democrats and other critics of President Donald Trump perpetuate the now-debunked theory that Trump was a secret Russian agent.

A year after Special Counsel Robert Mueller concluded there was no evidence President Trump colluded with Russians to steal the 2016 election, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence issued its fourth of five reports in a slow-moving and muted investigation into the same matter. While the committee asserted in July 2018 that it agreed with a disputed Obama-era finding on Russia’s motivation for interfering in the 2016 presidential election, its highly redacted report on the intelligence community’s January 2017 claim was finally released Tuesday morning.

The report is yet another reminder of how the committee helped Democrats and other critics of President Donald Trump perpetuate the now-debunked theory that Trump was a secret Russian agent. The Senate’s Intelligence Committee is ostensibly chaired by Richard Burr, a North Carolina Republican who is currently avoiding questions about why he dumped stocks after receiving private briefings about coronavirus threats.

In practice, the committee has largely been run by Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va. The committee’s major and perhaps only contribution to the Russia collusion storyline was to employ a high-level staffer tasked with handling classified information who was convicted of lying to the FBI about leaks of classified information to reporters he was having affairs with. Both Burr and Warner begged a judge to be lenient with their former employee. The judge sentenced him to two months in prison.

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White House, Congress reach deal to replenish small business loan program By Morgan Chalfant,Brett Samuels and Alexander Bolton

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/493910-white-house-congress-reach-deal-to-replenish-small-business-loan

The White House and Congress have reached a deal on a new funding package that will replenish a lending program meant to aid small businesses impacted by the novel coronavirus outbreak, two administration officials confirmed on Tuesday.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows struck an agreement on the core components of the deal with Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (N.Y.) and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) early Tuesday morning.

Schumer announced the deal during an interview on CNN shortly after 8 a.m. Tuesday and White House officials confirmed after 1 p.m.

Final details of the package are forthcoming but it is expected to total more than $450 billion and provide roughly $300 billion for the Small Business Administration’s popular Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), and $50 billion for the Economic Injury Disaster Loan program, $25 billion for testing and $75 billion for hospitals.

Schumer announced that $125 billion of the money for PPP will be set aside for “under-banked” small businesses that don’t have strong relationships with local banks, such as small restaurants and hair salons.

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Russian planes probing U.S. airspace for vulnerabilities amid COVID-19 crisis: U.S. general By Mike Glenn

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/apr/21/russian-planes-probing-us-airspace-vulnerabilities/?utm_source=onesignal&utm_campaign=pushnotify&utm_medium=push

The Air Force general charged with protecting the U.S. from an invasion said he expects additional incidents of Russian probing of American airspace as a result of the nation’s focus on the coronavirus pandemic.

Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy, who leads both U.S. Northern Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command, said the Russian military has always been interested in gauging the U.S. response to their provocations.

“We expect to see continued activity. That’s why we’re always ready to respond,” Gen. O’Shaughnessy told reporters on Tuesday at the Pentagon.

On April 8, F-22 fighter jets assigned to NORAD intercepted a pair of Russian Ilyushin-38 patrol aircraft when they entered an area known as the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone. They were first spotted flying over the Bering Sea north of the Aleutian Islands. The U.S. fighters escorted them out of the area.

“We wanted to make it very clear – which we did by the way we intercepted them – that there are no vulnerabilities as a result of COVID-19,” Gen. O’Shaughnessy said. “We are postured and maintain the ability to respond at a moment’s notice.”

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FDA authorizes first at-home coronavirus test; James Rogers

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://www.foxnews.com/science/fda-authorizes-first-at-home-coronavirus-test

The FDA has authorized the first diagnostic test with a home collection option for COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus.

In a statement released Tuesday, the FDA said that it had reissued an Emergency Use Authorization for LabCorp to COVID-19 RT-PCR Test to permit testing of samples that were self-collected by patients at home using LabCorp’s Pixel by LabCorp COVID-19 Test home collection kit.

“Throughout this pandemic we have been facilitating test development to ensure patients access to accurate diagnostics, which includes supporting the development of reliable and accurate at-home sample collection options,” said FDA Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn.

Coronavirus testing is in the spotlight as America fights to contain the outbreak. Data compiled by the CDC indicate that, since the start of April, up to 140,000 coronavirus tests a day have been conducted in the U.S.

“This reissued EUA for LabCorp’s molecular test permits testing of a sample collected from the patient’s nose using a designated self-collection kit that contains nasal swabs and saline,” explained the FDA, in its statement. “Once patients self-swab to collect their nasal sample, they mail their sample, in an insulated package, to a LabCorp lab for testing.”

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The 2016 election scandal waiting to break: John Crudele

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://nypost.com/2020/04/20/the-2016-election-scandal-waiting-to-break/

The virus isn’t the only thing going on in Washington that Wall Street and investors need to pay attention to.

There is another Black Swan about to take flight that could poop on the markets.

As I’ve been telling you for a long time, there are going to be repercussions from the political scandals of 2016.

The time is coming soon – maybe very soon – when we will find out who will be indicted and what impact these legal actions will have on the 2020 presidential election.

John Durham, the US Attorney in Connecticut, has been investigating whether there was wrongdoing before and after the last presidential election. His focus seems to be on whether warrants were improperly obtained to spy on the Trump campaign.

But over the two-plus years since Durham has been on the case, the probe seems to have expanded. High up intelligence officers in the US seem to be the target.

Durham’s probe could turn very political if his evidence determines that actions were taken by the intelligence community to aid the Democrats.

Recently, Attorney General Bill Barr had this to say about Durham’s probe: “His primary focus isn’t to prepare a report. He is looking to bring to justice people who were engaged in abuses,” Barr said.

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Ruthie Blum Let us remember what the survivors are unable to forget

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://www.jns.org/opinion/let-us-remember-what-the-survivors-are-unable-to-forget/

Yom Hashoah is a day when aging survivors—many of whom are widowed or have no offspring—have the opportunity to be honored and, above all, heard.

Holocaust survivors do not need annual ceremonies to remind them of the Nazi atrocities that they endured or of the family members that Adolf Hitler’s henchmen slaughtered during World War II. No, those memories are just as inked in their hearts and minds as the numbers tattooed on their forearms.

Indeed, it is not those people who require the admonition “Never Forget,” but rather the rest of the world. It is also a mantra for subsequent generations of Jews to repeat and forge a collective memory of events that we did not experience firsthand, but which require our ongoing attention. If, that is, we are to recognize and combat anti-Semitism in all its ideological—and military—manifestations.

The Knesset thus ruled in 1951 that Holocaust Remembrance Day would be marked on the 27th of the Hebrew month of Nissan, which falls between Passover and Israel Independence Day—two celebrations of freedom, victory and a return to the Jewish homeland.

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New York Times Quietly Changes Article Blaming Sean Hannity for Coronavirus Death By Eric Lendrum

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://amgreatness.com/2020/04/20/new-york-times-quietly-changes-article-blaming-sean-hannity-for-coronavirus-death/

The New York Times was forced to make a quiet change to one of its articles over the weekend blaming Fox News host Sean Hannity for a man’s death by the coronavirus, according to Breitbart.

The article was first published on April 18th, under the title “A Beloved Bar Owner Was Skeptical About the Virus. Then He Took a Cruise.” The article focuses on Brooklyn bar owner Joe Joyce, who embarked on a cruise on March 1st, in defiance of lockdown orders and travel bans, and subsequently died of the coronavirus on April 9th.
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The Times interviewed one of his adult children, daughter Kristen, who said that her father “watched Fox, and believed it was under control.” Subsequently, the Times zeroed in on a monologue given by Fox News host Sean Hannity, who said that the measures taken against the coronavirus were “unnecessary,” and a weapon being used by the mainstream media to “bludgeon Trump with this new hoax.” Thus, the Times claimed, blame was to placed on Hannity for encouraging men like Joyce to travel anyway.

However, Hannity’s comments were from the March 9th edition of his show, eight days after Joyce embarked on the cruise. Once this was discovered, the Times added in a disclaimer noting that “his comment about the public being scared by the coverage happened after the Joyces had left on their cruise.” The changes were made the day after the article was first published.

It has since been noted that the author of the Times article, Ginia Bellefante, had previously tweeted in February that she “didn’t understand the panic” about the coronavirus, and claimed that “incidence of the disease is declining in China.”

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America Is Paying the Price for the NYC SuperSpreader Julie Kelly

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://amgreatness.com/2020/04/20/america-is-paying-the-price-for-the-nyc-superspreader/

To bring some much-needed context to the nation’s coronavirus crisis, let’s remove the states of New York and New Jersey from the current totals for a moment. Here, for the sake of argument, are what the numbers would show:

Since early March, roughly 18,700 people have died from COVID-19. That’s about 2,700 deaths per week in the United States since testing began. Some of the most populous states—Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, California—suffered between 1,000 to 2,500 fatalities over the seven-week period. Florida, which is home to a highly vulnerable population and was a destination for thousands of domestic and international travelers before the pandemic began, reports fewer than 1,000 deaths.

Nineteen states and Washington, D.C. each report fewer than 100 deaths.

Tests show about 434,000 Americans have contracted the disease so far. Only a few states indicate COVID-19 symptomatic activity; most of the country now is quiet.

Would those facts frighten you into government-ordered submission? If the United States had a population of 300 million and 48 states, would the fact that 18,000 people—sadly, mostly elderly and already sick patients—succumbed to the virus over a period of nearly two months warrant an ongoing lockdown that is destroying the economy, overwhelming unemployment rolls and food bank lines, shutting down schools and colleges for five months, and bankrupting small businesses?

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While L.A. County reports total of 13,816 coronavirus cases, antibody study shows hundreds of thousands more could have had COVID-19 in the past

Posted By on April 21st, 2020

https://ktla.com/news/local-news/l-a-county-officials-to-provide-latest-update-on-coronavirus-crisis/

While Los Angeles County has reported a total of 13,816 coronavirus cases, early results from an antibody study conducted with the University of Southern California shows that hundreds of thousands more could have had COVID-19 in the past, officials announced Monday.

So far, 863 L.A. County residents have been tested between April 10 and 14 as part of the study.

The study estimates a prevalence of COVID-19 antibodies in the county to be 4.1%, with a range that could be as low as 2.8% and as high as 5.6%, when you factor in the reliability of the tests.

An estimated 221,000 adults to 442,000 adults at the high end may have been infected at some point before April 9 with COVID-19, suggesting that the number of total people in the county with a past or current infection is 28 to 55 times higher than the number of reported positive cases, Dr. Barbara Ferrer, L.A. County’s public health director said Monday.

“Although I report every day that we have thousands of thousands of people that have tested positive, the serology testing lets us know that we have hundreds of thousands of people that have already developed antibodies to the virus because at some point in time over the last couple of months, they have in fact been infected with COVID-19,” Ferrer said.

But having up to that many people who may have already had the illness means that the fatality rate from the virus is much lower than originally believed, Neeraj Sood, the USC scientist leading the study said Monday.