Category Archives: Progress

Country

United States of AmericaUS Virgin IslandsUnited States Minor Outlying IslandsCanadaMexico, United Mexican StatesBahamas, Commonwealth of theCuba, Republic ofDominican RepublicHaiti, Republic ofJamaicaAfghanistanAlbania, People's Socialist Republic ofAlgeria, People's Democratic Republic ofAmerican SamoaAndorra, Principality ofAngola, Republic ofAnguillaAntarctica (the territory South of 60 deg S)Antigua and BarbudaArgentina, Argentine RepublicArmeniaArubaAustralia, Commonwealth ofAustria, Republic ofAzerbaijan, Republic ofBahrain, Kingdom ofBangladesh, People's Republic ofBarbadosBelarusBelgium, Kingdom ofBelizeBenin, People's Republic ofBermudaBhutan, Kingdom ofBolivia, Republic ofBosnia and HerzegovinaBotswana, Republic ofBouvet Island (Bouvetoya)Brazil, Federative Republic ofBritish Indian Ocean Territory (Chagos Archipelago)British Virgin IslandsBrunei DarussalamBulgaria, People's Republic ofBurkina FasoBurundi, Republic ofCambodia, Kingdom ofCameroon, United Republic ofCape Verde, Republic ofCayman IslandsCentral African RepublicChad, Republic ofChile, Republic ofChina, People's Republic ofChristmas IslandCocos (Keeling) IslandsColombia, Republic ofComoros, Union of theCongo, Democratic Republic ofCongo, People's Republic ofCook IslandsCosta Rica, Republic ofCote D'Ivoire, Ivory Coast, Republic of theCyprus, Republic ofCzech RepublicDenmark, Kingdom ofDjibouti, Republic ofDominica, Commonwealth ofEcuador, Republic ofEgypt, Arab Republic ofEl Salvador, Republic ofEquatorial Guinea, Republic ofEritreaEstoniaEthiopiaFaeroe IslandsFalkland Islands (Malvinas)Fiji, Republic of the Fiji IslandsFinland, Republic ofFrance, French RepublicFrench GuianaFrench PolynesiaFrench Southern TerritoriesGabon, Gabonese RepublicGambia, Republic of theGeorgiaGermanyGhana, Republic ofGibraltarGreece, Hellenic RepublicGreenlandGrenadaGuadaloupeGuamGuatemala, Republic ofGuinea, RevolutionaryPeople's Rep'c ofGuinea-Bissau, Republic ofGuyana, Republic ofHeard and McDonald IslandsHoly See (Vatican City State)Honduras, Republic ofHong Kong, Special Administrative Region of ChinaHrvatska (Croatia)Hungary, Hungarian People's RepublicIceland, Republic ofIndia, Republic ofIndonesia, Republic ofIran, Islamic Republic ofIraq, Republic ofIrelandIsrael, State ofItaly, Italian RepublicJapanJordan, Hashemite Kingdom ofKazakhstan, Republic ofKenya, Republic ofKiribati, Republic ofKorea, Democratic People's Republic ofKorea, Republic ofKuwait, State ofKyrgyz RepublicLao People's Democratic RepublicLatviaLebanon, Lebanese RepublicLesotho, Kingdom ofLiberia, Republic ofLibyan Arab JamahiriyaLiechtenstein, Principality ofLithuaniaLuxembourg, Grand Duchy ofMacao, Special Administrative Region of ChinaMacedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic ofMadagascar, Republic ofMalawi, Republic ofMalaysiaMaldives, Republic ofMali, Republic ofMalta, Republic ofMarshall IslandsMartiniqueMauritania, Islamic Republic ofMauritiusMayotteMicronesia, Federated States ofMoldova, Republic ofMonaco, Principality ofMongolia, Mongolian People's RepublicMontserratMorocco, Kingdom ofMozambique, People's Republic ofMyanmarNamibiaNauru, Republic ofNepal, Kingdom ofNetherlands AntillesNetherlands, Kingdom of theNew CaledoniaNew ZealandNicaragua, Republic ofNiger, Republic of theNigeria, Federal Republic ofNiue, Republic ofNorfolk IslandNorthern Mariana IslandsNorway, Kingdom ofOman, Sultanate ofPakistan, Islamic Republic ofPalauPalestinian Territory, OccupiedPanama, Republic ofPapua New GuineaParaguay, Republic ofPeru, Republic ofPhilippines, Republic of thePitcairn IslandPoland, Polish People's RepublicPortugal, Portuguese RepublicPuerto RicoQatar, State ofReunionRomania, Socialist Republic ofRussian FederationRwanda, Rwandese RepublicSamoa, Independent State ofSan Marino, Republic ofSao Tome and Principe, Democratic Republic ofSaudi Arabia, Kingdom ofSenegal, Republic ofSerbia and MontenegroSeychelles, Republic ofSierra Leone, Republic ofSingapore, Republic ofSlovakia (Slovak Republic)SloveniaSolomon IslandsSomalia, Somali RepublicSouth Africa, Republic ofSouth Georgia and the South Sandwich IslandsSpain, Spanish StateSri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic ofSt. HelenaSt. Kitts and NevisSt. LuciaSt. Pierre and MiquelonSt. Vincent and the GrenadinesSudan, Democratic Republic of theSuriname, Republic ofSvalbard & Jan Mayen IslandsSwaziland, Kingdom ofSweden, Kingdom ofSwitzerland, Swiss ConfederationSyrian Arab RepublicTaiwan, Province of ChinaTajikistanTanzania, United Republic ofThailand, Kingdom ofTimor-Leste, Democratic Republic ofTogo, Togolese RepublicTokelau (Tokelau Islands)Tonga, Kingdom ofTrinidad and Tobago, Republic ofTunisia, Republic ofTurkey, Republic ofTurkmenistanTurks and Caicos IslandsTuvaluUganda, Republic ofUkraineUnited Arab EmiratesUnited Kingdom of Great Britain & N. IrelandUruguay, Eastern Republic ofUzbekistanVanuatuVenezuela, Bolivarian Republic ofViet Nam, Socialist Republic ofWallis and Futuna IslandsWestern SaharaYemenZambia, Republic ofZimbabwe

More here:

Preventing falls is important for all ages | Pontotoc Progress | djournal.com - Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal

WHO / Noor- Tanya Habjouqa

As COVID-19 spread across the occupied Palestinian territory, the Hugo Chavez Hospital was turned into the COVID-19 treatment and isolation centre for patients from Ramallah District. Dr Bassel Bawatneh, the hospitals Acting Director, found himself both serving as a medical professional and performing social care to help fill the gap in hospital staff to carry out all the necessary duties.

In March 2021, Dr Bawatneh found his retired Arabic language teacher, Mohammed Mhanna, critically ill in one of the wards. He visited Mohammeds bedside regularly, providing friendship, comfort and kindness until Mohammed succumbed to the disease. Despite the tragic circumstances, Dr Bawatneh knew that Mohammed was pleased that one of his former students was looking after him.

More than half my time is given to social support for elderly people. Its hard for them to understand why their children cant visit. If we dont focus on the social aspect of our elderly patients, we might lose them. I cannot lose a patient with respiratory problems just because of lack of social support, so we try to control all other aspects in order to give them the medical care they need, said Dr Bawatneh.

WHO, through the Universal Health Coverage Partnership (UHC Partnership), is working closely with the Ministry of Health to support the development of the hospital sector. This is part of overall efforts to strengthen the health system, enhance linkages to primary health care (PHC), and make progress towards Universal Health Coverage (UHC).

Hospitals are crucial for achieving UHC

Hospitals, combined with effective PHC, are essential in achieving UHC. In practice, this means that an effective PHC system, operating within or closer to communities, serves as the first point of contact of patients and their pathway to hospital care. This can be improved through strengthening the referral system, which will send patients from PHC to hospital and vice versa.

A renewed focus on hospital roles, functions and operations through an integrated and people-centred lens is critical. It brings a fresh perspective on the features of hospitals that are needed to meet present and future challenges to health and health systems. The experience of COVID-19 shows the importance of hospital care when needed.

Social care is one of the many important functions that the health system needs to provide. The gaps in this area demonstrate how much the hospital sector in the occupied Palestinian territory struggles to meet all the needs of patients.

Strengthening the hospital sector

Drawing on the WHO regional framework for action in the hospital sector, WHO, through the UHC Partnership, has provided technical support to the Ministry of Health in the occupied Palestinian territory to strengthen its hospital sector development and policy. At least 53 hospitals in the West Bank with around 520,000 annual patient admissions, as well as 34 hospitals in Gaza, will benefit from improved services once the hospital sector policy is implemented. This effort strengthens the capacity of the occupied Palestinian territory to ensure that more people receive the health services they need, even in the face of conflict and pandemic.

The occupied Palestinian territory is among the 115 countries and areas to which the UHC Partnership helps deliver WHO support and technical expertise in advancing UHC with a PHC approach. The Partnership is one of WHOs largest initiatives on international cooperation for UHC and PHC. It is funded by the European Union (EU), the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, Irish Aid, the Government of Japan, the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs, the United Kingdom Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, Belgium, Canada and Germany.

Read more:

The occupied Palestinian territory reforms its hospital sector to make progress towards universal health coverage - World Health Organization

In the depths of a massive rebuild, Orioles fans know its unwise to look to the win-loss record for signs of progress. Thats fortunate, because the Orioles dont have many wins to speak of. But of course there have been positives, particularly down the seasons final stretch, where the Orioles have looked, for the most part, like a competent baseball team ever since ending that miserable 19-game losing streak in August.

The performance of the teams starting staff as of late has been highly encouraging. The unit owns a 4.89 ERA in the month of September, their best mark for any single month this season. Whats even better is the fact that most of the starts have been made by players that the organization is hoping to keep around past 2021.

Staff ace John Means has rediscovered his mojo, sporting a 2.76 ERA in September to go with .609 OPS against in the month. Zac Lowther had the best start of his major league career just last week (5.0 IP, 0 R, 3 H, 2 BB, 7 SO vs. TEX). Alexander Wells has tossed five innings in back-to-back starts. Keegan Akin has allowed one or fewer runs in three starts of 5+ innings since August 26. Not to mention Chris Ellis looking good just about every time hes gone to the mound for the Os since being claimed off of waivers last month.

If the Orioles are going to climb their way out of the big league cellar in 2022, its going to require the pitching to be much more effective. That will probably necessitate at least some level of outside talent being added, but getting more out of the players they already have is a massive boost.

On the offensive side of things, it has been reassuring to see some of the teams top hitters finish off the year strong.

Everyone has been waiting for Cedric Mullins to cool off, but it just hasnt happened. The Orioles center fielder just crossed the 30 home run/30 stolen base threshold and has a .917 OPS in September, not far off the .932 OPS he featured back in April.

Ryan Mountcastle has scuffled a bit in the years final month, producing a .712 OPS, but he has kept hitting home runs (six in September), and looks every bit like a run-producing bat in the middle of this teams lineup for years to come.

But perhaps the most encouraging development has been the output of Austin Hays. The talented outfielder has been able to stay healthy while smacking eight home runs and posting a .977 OPS. Its a small sample size, but this was the sort of production that seemed possible when the Jacksonville University product was rocketing through the Os minor league system a few years ago.

The club has even gotten some good news in the dugout. It was reported last week that manager Brandon Hyde will return to his position with the Orioles in 2022. The secrecy with which the extension was handed out is quite odd, but the outcome is that the front office does not need to dedicate any resources to finding a skipper in what is sure to be a unique offseason with ongoing CBA negotiations and (hopefully) some level of free agent talks for the Orioles.

Opinions on Hydes performance are split. Clearly, the team has not won many games under his watch. But the rosters he has been handed have also been rather bereft of talent. And he has overseen some substantial breakouts from Means and Mullins while Mountcastle has acclimated himself well to the major leagues. At the very least, its fair to give Hyde another season at the helm.

Clearly, there will still be plenty of holes on this roster when 2022 begins, but GM Mike Elias recently said that top prospects Grayson Rodriguez and Adley Rutschman will both have a shot to make the teams Opening Day roster next year. Now, is that actually going to happen? The odds feel long, but the pair will be in Baltimore at some point in 2022 along with other notable prospects, and their presence alone should give the team a handful of wins.

Expectations for the Orioles next season will remain low. Making a playoff push or something similar is unlikely. But that doesnt mean there wont be pressure. The rebuild is nearing the point where some level of big league success is going to be required by both fans and the media. What success looks like is up for interpretation, but some of the positives signs down the stretch make whatever it is seem more attainable.

See more here:

The Orioles are showing progress in the seasons final month - Camden Chat

Lashunta Wafford watched as her third grade son lost gains in the months spent learning from their Dallas home, away from a real classroom and the extra supports the school provided for his ADHD and autism.

He was really struggling in certain areas that he had already went over and we had done drilled in, she said.

Jayce returned to school at Paul L. Dunbar Learning Center as soon as the campus reopened last fall. But weeks into this more normal year, Wafford is waiting to see whether teachers can fill the chasms that COVID-19 created.

The Wafford family is among thousands across Dallas grappling with the fallout from the pandemic and its disruptions to education. State officials estimate COVID-19 erased a decade of academic gains in math and five years of progress in reading.

In Dallas, which was often praised for its swift academic rise in recent years, those losses are especially painful. DISD serves some of the citys most vulnerable children kids who need school to be a refuge and to set them up with their best chance at success.

Unfortunately, were still a tale of two cities and if we lose this generation, this whole city is going to go backwards, Superintendent Michael Hinojosa said. Weve made a lot of progress in the last few years, but weve still got a long ways to go and this gave us a setback. And so I think everybody oughta care.

Altogether, more than 55,000 Dallas ISD students did not pass or take at least one of their state tests last year. Thats more than one-third of the total student body.

Before the pandemic, Dallas had made marked improvements in recent years, particularly helping the kids most in need and raising up failing schools. Nonprofits and industry banded together with area school districts, charters and others to address pressing needs, such as expanding early childhood education. But challenges have been persistent as Dallas ISD generally lags behind other major urban districts across the country, including those in Houston and Miami.

DISD is the center of the citys complex educational universe that also includes charter networks, neighboring suburban districts and private schools. Some see it as a pioneer, willing and able to try new things and disseminate what works to others across Texas. The district has championed reforms such as a pay-for-performance compensation structure, which informs its work to funnel the best teachers into the neediest schools.

Officials are proud of the results. In recent years, the number of failing DISD schools has plummeted. In the 2013-14 school year, more than 31,000 students were enrolled at campuses that missed state academic standards. Five years later, that dropped to about 4,200 children. And now, more students than ever are earning college credit and even associates degrees while still in high school.

But to some, the district appears burdened with bureaucratic bloat and facing socioeconomic challenges that it alone cannot rectify. They see DISD and its lagging student performance holding the city back.

The challenges DISD faces are massive and complex, many of them linked to the citys historically racist policies.

Dallas ISD as an institution has been trying to deal with that sort of quandary of being susceptible to housing segregation and what that means for putting kids who are racially segregated in a community into a school district thats not supposed to be racially segregated, said Jerry Hawkins, executive director of the nonprofit Dallas Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation. Dallas ISD is trying to do its best in that system.

Dallas was deliberate in slowing any efforts for school desegregation, a process that took four decades of legal wrangling and was never fully realized. Once Black students were allowed onto previously all-white campuses, many white families fled to the suburbs, with the district losing as many as 50,000 white students in the decade after a court ordered desegregation in the 1970s.

Today, a little more than 5% of the districts students are white, compared with nearly 60% in 1970. By comparison, roughly 29% of Dallas residents are white.

Immigrants, many of them from Mexico and Central America, moved in throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Now, 47% of the districts students are learning English and 86% are from poor families.

These are the students hit hardest by the pandemic and its ripple effects. DISD kids saw their parents lose jobs and mourned for loved ones taken by COVID-19.

District administrators know how vital it will be to help students recover academically and emotionally from the pandemic disruptions, not only for their futures but for the citys.

The kids were educating today in Dallas are Dallas of the five,10, 15, 20, 25, 50 years in the future, DISD board President Ben Mackey said.

The pandemic exacerbated Dallas academic challenges but they arent new.

When Toyota picked Plano over Dallas as the location for its new national headquarters in 2014, then-Mayor Mike Rawlings pointed to the citys school system as the reason for the loss.

We dont get Toyota in Dallas because of the school system, he said in a radio interview.

Then just four years and many school system reforms later, Amazon passed on the city when choosing the site of its second headquarters. The decision meant Dallas would not receive thousands of high-paying jobs.

Some speculated that the mammoth company passed over the city because of its relative lack of home-grown science, engineering and technical talent. Pundits saw it as a rebuke of the areas pre-K to college educational ecosystem.

While the number of Dallas campuses deemed failing by the state dropped tremendously in the past decade, a look at the Nations Report Card shows student performance still lags when compared with urban districts across the country.

The National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP, offers a standardized look at how students are performing across decades.

Results from 2019 show that 15% of DISD eighth graders were proficient on the NAEP math exam and roughly 13% of eighth graders met the same standard on the reading test. In math, almost two times the percentage of eighth graders met that standard in Miami-Dade public schools, a significantly larger school system with similar demographics.

And even compared to Houston, the only Texas district with a larger enrollment, Dallas eighth graders lagged in math by roughly 10 percentage points.

Hinojosa has said that just looking at raw NAEP scores doesnt take into account how many students DISD serves who are learning English and from poor families.

When you break it down for the level of poverty, we do pretty well, Hinojosa said after the latest tranche of results was released. But NAEP just puts scores out in larger comparisons, without disaggregating.

His point is backed up by an analysis from the Urban Institute, a Washington think tank that looked at 2017 scores in a subset of urban districts and attempted to level the playing field by controlling for student characteristics like poverty.

After researchers adjusted Dallas scores, the districts performance jumped closer to the top of the chart for urban school achievement.

When comparing scores, you have to realize that not all students start from the same place, Urban Institute expert Kristin Blagg said.

Without a strong foundation built in grade school, students can struggle after graduating, both in pursuing a degree or earning a living wage.

Inside the boundaries of Dallas ISD, about 1 in 3 people older than 25 have a bachelors degree. Only 19.6% of DISD graduates score high enough on exams or earn postsecondary credit in high school to be considered college ready, lagging just behind the state average of 21.1%.

The median income in the district is a little more than $55,000, although wealth is concentrated in small pockets.

To put more students on track for livable wages, DISD has partnered with Dallas College and businesses to offer early college and P-TECH programs where students can earn postsecondary credit in high school.

Through P-TECH, 18 high schools offer career-focused pathways ranging from computer science to health to engineering to education in which students can receive more hands-on experience in an industry through campus partnerships with businesses.

On a more micro-level, some parents are voting with their feet and enrolling their children in schools outside of DISD.

Nearly one-quarter of students inside the districts limits dont attend a Dallas ISD campus, instead opting for other options. Last school year, the district lost nearly 40,000 kids to neighboring districts and charter schools.

What we see is that people will move to Dallas, then theyll have a family, and then theyll move to the suburbs, Mackey said. No one should feel like they need to leave because of an education system. In fact, I think it would be a real feather in the cap to say, Actually, Im going to move to Dallas for Dallas ISD.

The school that has attracted the largest number of Dallas ISD defectors about 10,000 in total last school year is Uplift Education, which now has 11 campuses across the city.

The network, which was part of Texas first generation of charter schools, has expanded throughout the area in the past 2 decades. Its most recent add in Dallas was in 2016 at Uplift Wisdom Preparatory in South Dallas.

Five years ago, South Dallas still had a lot of challenges in terms of having high-quality schools for that community, Uplift CEO Yasmin Bhatia said. Families were open to more choice options and the philanthropic community [was] also paying more attention to South Dallas.

Uplift has no immediate plans for more growth here, the CEO noted. Charters, Bhatia said, are a political football in Dallas and the network faced uphill battles in front of the City Council. Proposed charters receive pushback from city leaders when attempting to open a school.

A decade ago, DISD was losing about 25,000 students to nearby charters. That number has increased to nearly 36,000. Fewer students translate into less funding for the district because state formulas are tied to attendance.

DISD leaders have fought back against charter expansion. Last summer, Hinojosa and trustee Maxie Johnson stood near a proposed new campus for KIPP and accused the network of trying to bully its way into South Dallas.

Charters have long drawn from students in South Dallas, where families historically have had few alternatives to their neighborhood campuses. Most of the students whove left DISD for charters live south of Interstate 30.

But Hinojosa has conceded that charters forced the district to act. Talking about KIPPs expansion, he said: We saw what they did, and it shocked us. But instead of whining about it, we dusted ourselves off and did something about it.

To stem the tide, Dallas ISD embraced innovative new programs and reforms in a bid to improve student performance and keep kids enrolled. For example, the district replicated one of its most lauded school models from Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts at Martin Luther King Jr. Learning Center, south of downtown.

Competition in any industry makes us all better, Bhatia said. DISD getting stronger makes Uplift better and vice versa.

Decades before charters began expanding in Dallas and enrollment dropped, the district gained a reputation as a system willing to try new things.

Fifty years ago, to aid with desegregation efforts, DISD opened Skyline High School as the nations first magnet school. The district has since embraced all kinds of choice schools.

Students can attend one of 26 early college programs, new career institutes or a number of other innovative school models, including Montessori and arts-focused programs.

Dallas is somewhat an example for the rest of the country, Hawkins said, noting that some of its recent changes to its discipline policies became national news.

DISD was one of the first in the country to develop a racial equity department. Its focus on eliminating racial disparities in school suspensions led the district to be among the first in Texas to ban discretionary out-of-school suspensions for students in second grade and younger, a concept that later became state law. Recently, the district expanded that idea across all grade levels, the first large district in the nation to do so.

State leaders often hold up Dallas as a district the rest of the state can emulate. The historic 2019 school finance overhaul drew from the districts signature school turnaround model and pay-for-performance system. The district credits the program Accelerating Campus Excellence, or ACE with helping to bring a steep drop in the number of failing campuses.

ACE-like programs have been replicated in districts across Texas, including Fort Worth, Richardson and Garland.

Ahead of the 2019 legislative session, Gov. Greg Abbott said lawmakers needed to hear about proven strategies before allocating funding. Texas Education Commissioner Mike Morath a former Dallas schools trustee and other influential leaders stood firmly behind DISDs approaches.

Under House Bill 3, Texas awards eligible districts ranging bonuses up to $32,000 for high-performing teachers who elect to work on campuses in impoverished or rural communities.

This law codified Dallas ACE program statewide and created a sustainable funding source so the model can continue for years to come.

Dallas ISD leaders say they must throw everything they have at catching up struggling students.

Theyll have a huge infusion of resources to help them do it. The federal coronavirus relief package allocated more than $700 million to DISD, which officials plan to use to give students more time in the classroom.

Roughly 1 in 5 campuses extended their academic calendars by several weeks. District leaders hoped more schools would adopt a longer year but remain optimistic about how the thousands of additional minutes in front of a teacher will impact youngsters. Hinojosa predicted those schools would see a big difference in their data by the end of the year.

We almost have a quasi-treatment group and a quasi-control group with the five schools that had complete school day redesign, Hinojosa said. Well have 41 schools that have data on [intersession calendars] and then well be able to compare them to everybody else who stayed on the traditional calendar.

Even more campuses are adding after-school programming with the district prioritizing chronically low-performing schools for the expansion. Roughly 60 schools will offer three hours of after-school programming every weekday, with time set aside for tutoring, athletics and arts.

Tutoring also plays an essential role in the districts recovery plans. DISD is planning to spend millions to ensure students get one-on-one time and accelerate their learning.

Too often, educators know, private tutoring is accessible only for students whose families have the means to pay for it.

Wafford hopes her son Jayce will be one of the kids matched with a tutor, one who specializes in helping children with autism.

Thats the key, she said.

But shes also still searching for schools that are focused on serving students with special needs and accessible from her South Dallas home, which could lure her family outside of DISD.

Were just trying to see whats the best option at this point, she said.

Note: This article is part of ourState of the City project, in whichThe Dallas Morning Newsexplores the most critical issues facing our communities. Find more topics in coming days as we examine the issue of public education.

Stay connected to the latest in education by signing up for our weekly newsletter.

The DMN Education Lab deepens the coverage and conversation about urgent education issues critical to the future of North Texas.

The DMN Education Lab is a community-funded journalism initiative, with support from The Beck Group, Bobby and Lottye Lyle, Communities Foundation of Texas, The Dallas Foundation, Dallas Regional Chamber, Deedie Rose, The Meadows Foundation, Solutions Journalism Network, Southern Methodist University and Todd A. Williams Family Foundation. The Dallas Morning News retains full editorial control of the Education Labs journalism.

Read more from the original source:

Dallas schools were on the rise, praised for progress and reform. And then the pandemic hit - The Dallas Morning News

Firefighters are gaining the upper hand on a forest fire that displaced thousands of people near Shasta Lake in Northern California

By Associated Press

September 26, 2021, 5:39 PM

3 min read

REDDING, Calif. -- Firefighters were gaining the upper hand Sunday on a forest fire that displaced thousands of people and destroyed more than 100 buildings near Shasta Lake in Northern California.

Lighter winds and cooler temperatures slowed the Fawn Fire as it moves toward the shores of California's largest man-made lake and away from populated areas north of the city of Redding, allowing crews to increase containment to 35%, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said in a statement.

The fire at one point threatened 9,000 buildings, but the number dropped to 2,340 on Sunday.

Light rain was in the forecast for Monday. Fire officials said crews will begin taking advantage of the calmer weather to conduct back burns near the lake to expand the control lines, the Record Searchlight reported.

Were going to hold it. Its going to be done this week, Bret Gouvea, chief of CalFire's Shasta-Trinity unit, said at a community meeting Saturday night.

Initial assessments found that 131 homes and other buildings had burned, CalFire said. That number was likely to change as teams go street by street surveying the destruction.

Authorities have arrested a 30-year-old woman on suspicion of starting the blaze that erupted Wednesday and grew explosively in hot and gusty weather in the region about 200 miles (322 kilometers) northeast of San Francisco.

Alexandra Souverneva, of Palo Alto, was charged Friday with felony arson to wildland with an enhancement because of a declared state of emergency in California, Shasta County District Attorney Stephanie Bridgett said.

Souverneva pleaded not guilty. She is also suspected of starting other fires in Shasta County and throughout the state, Bridgett said. It wasnt immediately known if she has an attorney who could speak on her behalf.

The Fawn Fire has charred more than 13 square miles (34 square kilometers) of heavy timber.

Its the latest destructive blaze to send Californians fleeing this year. Fires have burned more than 3,750 square miles (9,712 square kilometers) so far in 2021, destroying more than 3,200 homes, commercial properties and other structures.

Those fires include a pair of big forest blazes burning for more than two weeks in the heart of giant sequoia country on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada. More than 1,700 firefighters battled the KNP Complex Fires, which covered 70 square miles (181 square kilometers) by Sunday.

Nearby, the Windy Fire grew significantly Saturday as it made uphill runs and winds blew embers that ignited spot fires. The blaze ignited by lightning on Sept. 9 has scorched 122 square miles (317 square kilometers) of trees and brush on the Tule River Indian Reservation and in Sequoia National Forest. Containment shrunk from 5% to 2% Sunday.

A historic drought in the American West tied to climate change is making wildfires harder to fight. It has killed millions of trees in California alone. Scientists say climate change has made the West much warmer and drier in the past 30 years and will continue to make weather more extreme and wildfires more frequent and destructive.

Read the original here:

Progress made on California fire that displaced thousands - ABC News

REDDING Firefighters were gaining the upper hand Sunday on a forest fire that displaced thousands of people and destroyed more than 100 buildings near Shasta Lake in Northern California.

Lighter winds and cooler temperatures slowed the Fawn Fire as it moves toward the shores of Californias largest man-made lake and away from populated areas north of the city of Redding, allowing crews to increase containment to 35%, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said in a statement.

The fire at one point threatened 9,000 buildings, but the number dropped to 2,340 on Sunday.

Light rain was in the forecast for Monday. Fire officials said crews will begin taking advantage of the calmer weather to conduct back burns near the lake to expand the control lines, the Record Searchlight reported.

Were going to hold it. Its going to be done this week, Bret Gouvea, chief of CalFires Shasta-Trinity unit, said at a community meeting Saturday night.

Initial assessments found that 131 homes and other buildings had burned, CalFire said. That number was likely to change as teams go street by street surveying the destruction.

Authorities have arrested a 30-year-old woman on suspicion of starting the blaze that erupted Wednesday and grew explosively in hot and gusty weather in the region about 200 miles northeast of San Francisco.

See original here:

Progress made on fire that displaced thousands | News | avpress.com - Antelope Valley Press

By Kim Brawn

Technology is a form of progress and a double-edged sword, a perpetual one step forward, two steps back. For all that we can do with a smartphone, tablet, or laptop for all the convenience, information, and connectedness it gives us it has created inequities and incredible challenges, like the ability to spread misinformation at startling speed.

Those of us at the Thompson Free Library in Dover-Foxcroft do our best every month to level that playing field by offering free public access computers and Wi-Fi. Printing, copying, faxing, and scanning services are also available. Our website features many great resources including a Wakelet collection that Librarian Michelle Fagan compiled early in the pandemic, to help recognize and combat misinformation. Sinan Arals (MIT data scientist and entrepreneur) Ted Talk is especially eye-opening, leaving the audience with this powerful warning: We have to be vigilant in defending the truth against misinformation with our individual responsibilities, decisions, behaviors and actions.

Progress is generally forward moving and takes many forms which makes it an engaging topic for TFLs Philosophy Circle on Friday, Oct. 1 at 3:30 p.m. under the tent. Library Director Jon Knepp says the focus will be on, What actually is progress? How do we measure it? What is its end goal? I thought it might be a good way to tie some of our other discussions together.

Time to trade in your Thinker pose for the ultimate in head banger moves! Heavy metal fans and those who dare to explore are invited to Exit Light: Metallicas Black Album at 30 with author Ben Apatoff online via Zoom on Thursday, Oct. 7 at 6 p.m. Apatoff will discuss his new book Metallica: The $24.95 Book (a playful nod to The $5.98 Metallica EP!).

Metal Life calls it, an incredibly well written history of the band, told in chapters dedicated to each album, each band member and influences. Each chapter tells a story instead of just rehashing dates and events like a calendar this book allows you, fan or not, to understand and appreciate who Metallica is and more importantly, WHAT Metallica is. While working on his book during the pandemic, Apatoff found comfort and inspiration in watching the Metallica Mondays shows (concerts the band released on YouTube), It kept me grounded and helped me. Contact TFL for the Zoom link or find it in our Facebook event.

A sharp turn finds us back under the tent on Thursday, Oct. 14 at 6 p.m. for TFLs Reading Group. This months featured selection is Thunder Dog: The True Story of a Blind Man, His Guide Dog & the Triumph of Trust at Ground Zero by Michael Hingson with Susy Flory. From Kirkus Reviews: The chilling account of how the two (Hingson and his guide dog Roselle) worked in tandem to safely descend 78 stories and 1,463 steps, while simultaneously helping others remain calm is truly-awe-inspiring. . . a tragic, inspirational and enlightening memoir. Copies available at TFL.

Switching gears again, lets have some ghostly and bewitching fall fun as TFL Under the Tent presents a classic movie about getting slimed and chasing paranormal entities with Bill, Dan, Harold, and Ernie on Friday, Oct. 22 at 6 p.m.

Next up: what if The Rose, Carrie Bradshaw, and Sister Mary Patrick made a Halloween-themed movie together? Abracadabra, they did! And you can watch it on Thursday, Oct. 29 at 6 p.m. under the tent. Both films are free, open to the public, and family friendly. Michelle told me, There will be snacks (possibly hot cocoa). Be sure to check the forecast and dress accordingly. We do have blankets though.

Random acts of kindness are awesome but lets start an intentional acts of kindness movement with the focus on what we can do to keep each other safe and healthy while recognizing each others humanity. Please get vaccinated, mask up where required and when recommended, and be mindful of others. Many of us who work with the public have been thrust into an unenviable yet necessary public health role during the pandemic. Thank you to our patrons and visitors the vast majority of whom follow our protocols and policies and appreciate us (and dont even get mad when we remind them to put their mask over their nose!).

TFL is open to the public Tuesday to Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturday 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. We currently require masks indoors. For information on events, visit our website (https://www.thompson.lib.me.us), Facebook page, or contact us at thompsonfreelibrary@gmail.com or 207-564-3350. Find us on Instagram @tf_library.

More articles from the BDN

Original post:

Making progress with Thompson Free Library - Bangor Daily News

John OliverScreenshot: Last Week Tonight

You know how one political party (out of two) is systematically setting the stage to undemocratically destroy voting rights, specifically the rights of those people (the not-white ones) who overwhelmingly sent Donald Trump packing in 2020? John Oliver sure does, as his Sunday main story saw the Last Week Tonight host delving into the Republican war on voting rights. Honestly, as Oliver proved in acidly funny lockstep, it really isnt necessary to do any delving, as GOP hypocrisy, fringe conspiracy logic, and outright racial oppression at the voting booth is just lying all out in the open.

You know, like in Georgia, which is represented by one Burt Jones, seen in a clip asserting that voting is a privilege that certain people should have to really work for. (Possibly by overcoming the state closing polling places in non-white areas and then forbidding good samaritans from handing out water to the Black people stuck in eight-hour voting lines in the Georgia heat.) Or in Arizona, where, just this week, even the Republican-led, farcically shady audit of Joe Bidens presidential victory there not only proved what every rational human being knew already, but also made Bidens margin over GOP cult leader and twice-impeached seditionist Donald Trump just a hair wider. (Oh, dont worry, Republicans are still recommending further voting restrictions to fix the non-existent voter fraud problem they themselves showed doesnt exist.)

In all, Oliver showed how some 18 states have passed 30 laws since the 2020 Democratic, voter-approved takeover of the presidency, House, and Senate, and thatstrangelyevery single one of those laws intended to make it harder for certain people to vote was spearheaded by the Republican Party. Oh, and that the GOPs furthest-right lobbying wing, the Heritage Foundation, is just as busy undermining American democracy, as Oliver showed a Heritage executive (one Jessica Anderson) bragging about those kooky, woman- and gay-hating white supremacists managing to slip through some Iowa voting suppression laws (which Heritage wrote) without anybody noticing. You know, like with all truly fair and vetted democratic policies.

Oliver, as is his way, made time throughout his concise history of Republican voter suppression and outright racist bullshit to go on some theoretically illustrative tangents involving unusual sexual practices. (No kink-shaming, those currently fantasizing about either the Wheel Of Fortune wheel or lobsters.) Painting a starkly chilling portrait of how the current Republican Party is ginning up solutions for a problem it itself manufactured, Oliver summed up this in-progress, democracy-threatening authoritarianism thusly: Use bullshit claims to stir up baseless fear to pass unnecessary restrictions to target particular groups.

Showing Texas Lt. Governor and major asshole Dan Patrick using the legally un-actionable fuzzy logic that GOP voter suppression tactics are necessary because voters have lost faith in an election system Patrick himself has been working overtime to slander and undermine ever since the Republicans Glorious Leader appeared ready to loose bigly on Election Night, Oliver let Patricks nonsense hang itself. Although Oliver did note that Patricks showboating stunt offering a Texas-style $1 million bounty for every provable instance of voter fraud has seen the bloviating Texas lieutenant liar dodge fellow Lt. Gov John Fettermans call for the cash, having offered up the case of a Pennsylvania Trump voters trying to vote for their dead moms. Who are no doubt very disappointed in them.

As for solutions, Oliver, as ever, had sort of a good news-bad news thing going. There are two proposed laws (the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom To Vote Act) that would, between them, halt this Republican campaign of partisan ratfuckery by ensuring everything from early and drive-up voting, to automatic voter registration, to making Election Day a national holiday. And would restore the key tenets of the Supreme Court-gutted, racist-thwarting 1965 Voting Rights Act, something shown as deeply necessary in how GOP legislators keep trying to procedurally ban any talk of racism from the debate over their 100 percent racist voter suppression. In this weeks example of representative villainy, Oliver showed Representative Travis Grantham (R-AZ) telling Black lawmaker Reginald Bolding to, almost verbatim, sit down and shut up when Bolding brought up how the Arizona GOPs proposed laws are blatantly intended to disenfranchise voters of color. (Oh, Grantham used the words colored people in his rant, just for some of that old-timey racist flavor.)

G/O Media may get a commission

On the other hand, Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has promised that his GOP minions will filibuster any bill intended to make it harder for them to suppress votes among those communities (not-white ones) where they know theyre shit out of luck, historically and increasingly. And while Oliver threw shade at Democratic(-ish) Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) for saying hed join his Republican pals in robbing certain people of their voting rights, the host also told the other Joe (Biden) that his folksy entreaty for people to just out-organize this out-in-the-open racist rigging is woefully out of touch with just how determined the GOP is to steal elections. Showing Biden praising Americans for turning out in record numbers (during a pandemic, no less) to make sure Donald Trump wound up on unemployed and making paid appearances for sketchy cults, Oliver noted in exasperation that that doesnt cut it when Republicans are trying to shut out those very voters. Seriously, Joe.

See the original post:

John Oliver lays out the GOP's in-progress racist voter suppression blitz - The A.V. Club

The Covid pandemic has caused the biggest decrease in life expectancy in western Europe since the second world war, according to a study.

Data from most of the 29 countries spanning most of Europe, the US and Chile that were analysed by scientists recorded reductions in life expectancy last year and at a scale that wiped out years of progress.

The biggest declines in life expectancy were among males in the US, with a decline of 2.2 years relative to 2019 levels, followed by Lithuanian males (1.7 years).

Life expectancy losses exceeded those recorded around the time of the dissolution of the eastern bloc in central and eastern Europe, according to the research, led by scientists at Oxfords Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science.

Dr Jos Manuel Aburto, a co-lead author of the study, said: For western European countries such as Spain, England and Wales, Italy, Belgium, among others, the last time such large magnitudes of declines in life expectancy at birth were observed in a single year was during the second world war.

The findings are contained in a paper published in the International Journal of Epidemiology after the analysis of the 29 countries for which official death registrations for last year had been published. A total of 27 experienced reductions in life expectancy.

Last week, the Office for National Statistics estimated that life expectancy for men in the UK had fallen for the first time in 40 years because of the impact of Covid-19. A boy born between 2018 and 2020 is expected to live until he is 79, down from 79.2 for the period of 2015-17, according to the ONS.

Aburto said the scale of the life expectancy losses was stark across most of those countries studied, with 22 of them experiencing larger losses than half a year in 2020.

Females in eight countries and males in 11 countries experienced losses larger than a year. To contextualise, it took on average 5.6 years for these countries to achieve a one-year increase in life expectancy recently: progress wiped out over the course of 2020 by Covid-19.

Males experienced larger life expectancy declines than females across most of the 29 countries. Most life expectancy reductions across different countries were attributable to official Covid deaths, according to the paper.

Dr Ridhi Kashyap, another co-lead author, said researchers were aware of several issues linked to the counting of Covid deaths, such as inadequate testing or misclassification. However, she added that the fact that our results highlight such a large impact that is directly attributable to Covid-19 shows how devastating a shock it has been for many countries.

We urgently call for the publication and availability of more disaggregated data from a wider range of countries, including low- and middle-income countries, to better understand the impacts of the pandemic globally.

The ONS estimates from earlier this month showed variations between the different parts of the UK in terms of life expectancy, which refers to the average age to which a newborn would live if current death rates continued for their whole life.

Life expectancy for males has fallen in England, from 79.5 years in 2015-17 to 79.3 years in 2018-2, and Scotland from 77 to 76.8. But it has risen slightly in Northern Ireland from 78.4 to 78.7, while staying broadly unchanged in Wales at 78.3.

More here:

Covid has wiped out years of progress on life expectancy, finds study - The Guardian

Disease control and prevention updates

Sign up to myFT Daily Digest to be the first to know about Disease control and prevention news.

Since the turn of the millennium, 13 countries, including China and Algeria, have declared victory in the war against malaria, joining more than 100 states certified malaria-free by the World Health Organization.

The WHO aims to add at least 25 more countries to the list by 2025. But the arc of progress could yet be thrown off course by climate change.

Theres cause for celebration and concern, says Wakgari Deressa, professor of public health at Addis Ababa University, who has advised the Ethiopian government on malaria prevention.

Ethiopia is one of only half a dozen African nations on course to meet the WHO target of a 90 per cent reduction in malaria case incidence by 2030, compared with 2015 levels. Malaria still kills more than 400,000 people a year worldwide, mostly children under the age of five in Sub-Saharan Africa.

When it moves into a new area, it can be fatal across the whole age range because theres no resistance

Malaria accounted for 10,400 deaths in Ethiopia at its peak in 2000. Now, yearly deaths from the disease are less than half that figure. Infection rates among the at-risk population have fallen from 219 cases per 1,000 in 2004 to 32 cases in 2018.

Mosquito nets and better treatments have reduced malaria prevalence and morbidity in Ethiopia, explains Deressa. But, simultaneously, temperature changes and different rainfall patterns mean malaria is emerging in highland communities previously protected from the disease. He says climate change has made elimination a distant hope.

The ideal conditions for malaria transmission are an average temperature of 20-30 degrees Celsius, monthly precipitation in excess of 80mm, and relative humidity greater than 60 per cent. Changes in Ethiopias climate have brought more regions into this malaria sweet spot.

The same trend is being seen globally: while better public health has contained the risks of malaria, climate change has made the effort more of an uphill struggle, says Rachel Lowe, an associate professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

A research team, of which Lowe was a part, estimated that climate change could lead to at least an additional 3.6bn people being at risk from malaria by 2071, relative to the at-risk population in 1970-99. Lowe fears complacency may creep into the fight against malaria and heighten the risk of re-emergence.

The upshot may be that countries pushing towards elimination never achieve the goal and those declared free of the disease risk the return of malaria, alongside other mosquito-borne diseases such as dengue, says Lowe.

Even parts of Europe, where the disease was officially eliminated in 2015, could see malaria return in the next few decades, warns Alexander More, associate professor of environmental health at Long Island University in New York.

The pathogen itself is not in the environment in the quantity needed for an outbreak yet, he says. But [Europes] proximity to places where the disease is endemic means this is always a possibility from trade and human migration.

Malaria-free areas may also face a higher degree of morbidity if the disease is reintroduced because of a lack of natural immunity, according to Andy Morse, professor of climate impacts at the University of Liverpool. The problem is when it gets introduced to a new area or introduced back, that population is totally susceptible, he says. In Africa, its generally killing children, not breadwinners. But when it moves into a new area, it can be fatal across the whole age range because theres no resistance.

Morse thinks Europe may stave off the worst of malaria transmission unless there is a drastic breakdown in the primary care infrastructure.

However, Lowe points out that the Covid-19 pandemic proves that even well-funded healthcare systems in richer nations can end up at the point of near-collapse.

Its very much about not just waiting for it to happen and dealing with it when it arrives its about doing everything that is possible to prevent that introduction and emergent spread, she says.

More speculates that the world could end up in a footrace between climate change raising the risk of transmission and the development of better treatments and prevention methods.

A study, led by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, which followed 6,800 children aged between five and 17 months for three years, found that combining seasonal malaria vaccinations and prevention drugs reduced the risk of hospitalisation and death by 70 per cent.

Similarly, a University of Oxford team found that their malaria mRNA vaccine was 77 per cent effective in early-stage trials.

More says these results are welcome, but are unlikely to be a silver bullet. Instead, scientists think concerns over increased malaria transmission should focus governments attention on the need to stop fossil fuel use and halt global warming.

Policymakers need to put this issue front and centre because its the easiest way to sell the radical changes that need to happen for us to address climate change because everybody cares about their own health in the end, More says.

Its good policy and its good science, or its good science and its good policy depending on what your priority is.

Where climate change meets business, markets and politics.Explore the FTs coverage here.

Are you curious about the FTs environmental sustainability commitments?Find out more about our science-based targets here

Original post:

Climate change threatens to reverse progress in fight against malaria - Financial Times