Category Archives: Progress

Unexpectedly favorable weather conditions overnight Tuesday helped firefighters make good progress in containing the Oak Fire near Willits, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection reported Wednesday morning.

(Tuesday) night went really well, said Cal Fire spokeswoman Tricia Austin. We didnt see the high winds (that were expected), and the temperatures were lower than expected.

However, Austin said the fire was in very rugged terrain with lots of ravines that are hard to access, and the poor air quality and low visibility meant that no aircraft could be used to help suppress the fire as of mid-morning Wednesday.

The latest update from Cal Fire that morning had the fire at 863 acres with 10-percent containment. Two structures had been destroyed and 800 homes were still threatened.

The fire was reported around 12:15 p.m. Sept. 7, and the cause is still under investigation. As of Wednesday, the areas of Third Gate Road, Spring Creek, Schow Road, Ryan Creek Road, and Sleepy Hollow were under evacuation orders. The areas of Irmulco Road, Sherwood Rancheria, Shimmins Ridge Road, Hearst Willits Road, String Creek and the Willits Valley north of Highway 20 were under evacuation warnings. To see a map of these areas go to: https://tinyurl.com/MendoEvac

On Wednesday morning, a section of Highway 101 remained closed in both directions at Highway 162 to the north of the fire, and at the Willits bypass to the south of the fire. Around 11:30 a.m. Sept. 9, the California Highway Patrol reported that the latest estimate was that the highway would be closed for at least another 24 hours minimum, and that currently only certain vehicles were being escorted though the closure.

However, by 9:30 p.m. Wednesday, the roadway was reopened to traffic in both directions.

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Firefighters make progress on Oak Fire near Willits; Highway 101 now open - Ukiah Daily Journal

As much as Hollywood has pushed diversity in the past couple of years, there is still a long way to go considering the magnitude of tone-deaf mistakes the film and TV industry has made since its inception. Strides are being made, but no one is going to step in and snap their fingers like Iron Man to make an equal playing ground for everyone who works in film and TV. This is very evident in the new report which dove deep into a comprehensive and intersectional look at film. The annual report from Professor Stacy L. Smith and the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative at USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism examined 57,629 characters in 1,300 top films from 2007 to 2019 to see where movies stand in terms diversity and inclusion.

The country is in the middle of a civic uprising and a reckoning when it comes to the treatment of marginalized communities especially the Black community. That said, the movies and characters studied in the report aptly titled Inequality in 1,300 Popular Films shows a lack of inclusive representation of those from underrepresented racial/ethnic groups, girls and women, the LGBTQ community, and individuals with disabilities.

After 13 years, it is not clear what might convince entertainment companies to change, said Dr. Smith. Despite public statements, the data reveal that there is still apathy and ambivalence to increasing representation of speaking characters overall in popular films. This is both the easiest representational gap to address and one that is essential to strengthen the pipeline to more prominent roles.

The study comes after the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced its attempt to bolster diversity and inclusion at the Oscars by setting new standards of representation and inclusion to win the coveted Best Picture trophy standards that have been met with praise and skepticism.

The report clocked an increase in leading and/or co-leading characters from underrepresented racial/ethnic groups, from 27 films in 2018 to 32 films in 2019. It was found that 17 movies featured a girl or woman from an underrepresented group as a lead or co-lead in 2019 compared to just 11 in 2018, 4 in 2017 and 1 in 2007. In 2019, 43 of the 100 top films had a girl or woman in a leading or co-leading role which is up from 39 in 2018 and a major gain from 20 in 2007. However, only 3 films had a leading or co-leading role filled by a woman aged 45 or older, and only one of these roles went to a woman of color.

As far as speaking female-identifying characters, things have been pretty stagnant for 13 years. The percentage has not meaningfully increased since 2007, reaching only 34% in 2019. Similarly, 34.3% of speaking characters were underrepresented, which is below the U.S. population and a slight decrease from 2018.

The study also found that on-screen representation of characters shown with disabilities and LGBTQ characters is not on par with population norms. In fact, theyre pretty behind. Of the 100 top films of 2019, just 2.3% of characters were shown with a disability, a number consistent over the last five years. In addition, there was a small 1.4% of all LGBTQ-identifying characters in the top films of 2019 even though there has been an increase over the past two years. Across 600 films from 2014 to 2019, only 4 characters were transgender. Not only was representation low with the disabled and LGBTQ community, all the characters did not have an impact on the overall narrative and appear on screen for only 2 minutes in total. Across 600 films and hundreds of hours of storytelling, transgender characters appear on screen for roughly the runtime of a film trailer.

The report also offers up an invisibility analysis to determine how many movies were missing girls and women speaking characters on screen from different underrepresented groups. Of the 100 top films of 2019, the researchers found that 33 films were missing Black/African American girls and women on screen, 55 were missing Asian or Asian American girls or women, 71 were missing Hispanic/Latinas, and 45 were missing girls or women from Multiracial/Multiethnic backgrounds.

Girls and women from other groups were also excluded, including American Indian/Alaskan Native characters (97 movies), Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander characters (99 movies), and Middle Eastern/North African characters (92 movies). Further, 77 films did not portray a single girl or woman with a disability and 94 films were devoid of even one female-identified LGBT character.

The erasure of girls and women from underrepresented racial/ethnic groups, the LGBTQ community, and those with disabilities remains a hallmark of top-performing Hollywood films, explains Dr. Smith. Intersectional inclusion on screen must be an area for targeted intervention.

The report evaluated a total of 3,891 speaking characters were for race/ethnicity and found that nearly two-thirds of the speaking or named characters assessed were White (65.7%) Far behind were the Hispanic/Latino (4.9%), Black (15.7%), American Indian/Alaskan Native (<1%), Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander (<1%), Asian (7.2%), Middle Eastern/North African (1.6%) and Multiracial/Multiethnic (4.4%). In total, 34.3% of characters were from underrepresented racial/ethnic groups. This point statistic was below the U.S. Census (39.9%).

The study also took a look at inclusion behind the camera which saw an good showing of women directors but not so good for underrepresented directors Of 1,447 directors over 13 years, 4.8% were women. Meanwhile, when it came to underrepresented directors 6.1% of directors were Black, 3.3% were Asian, and 3.7% were Hispanic/Latino. There was a significant change in 2018 with an increase in Black directors but then stumbled in 2019. To put things into further perspective, only 13 women of color have directed a top film across 1,300 movies in 13 years.

Dr. Smith pointed out: In contrast to our findings on top-grossing films, 20.7% of Netflix directors of U.S. based films in 2019 were women. The legacy studios may want to take a note out of the streaming giants playbook on how to hire more inclusively behind the camera.

In addition, it unpacked how well legacy studios and distributors performed when it came to indicators of diversity and inclusion. The report also unpacked representation when it came to global box office earnings by studio.

This is a critical moment for the industry to commit to real and substantive change, Dr. Smith said. Too often the results of studies like this one garner attention without action. As protests for racial justice continue, it is imperative that companies move beyond performative statements and commit to take actions that will result in inclusive hiring practices on screen and behind the camera.

Perhaps more studios, decision-makers and gatekeepers in Hollywood will be incentivized by the aforementioned new Academy standards for Best Picture to make these changes happen.

The full annual study from the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative can be found here.

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USC Annenberg Comprehensive Study Shines Glaring Spotlight On Slow Progress Toward Inclusion In Hollywood - Deadline

SHENZHEN, China (Reuters) - Huawei Technologies is expected to respond on Thursday to the latest salvo of U.S. technology restrictions against it and share its progress on developing a system that is seen as its best bet to replace Googles Android mobile operating system.

FILE PHOTO: A view shows a Huawei logo at Huawei Technologies France headquarters in Boulogne-Billancourt near Paris, France, July 15, 2020. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes

Richard Yu, the head of Huaweis consumer business group, will deliver a keynote speech at its annual developers conference in Dongguan, in what is expected to mark the companys first official response to the Trump administrations efforts to bar its access to chips.

In August the U.S. expanded earlier restrictions aimed at preventing Huawei from obtaining semiconductors without a special license - including chips made by foreign firms that have been developed or produced with U.S. software or technology.

Analysts said the restrictions threaten Huaweis crown as the worlds largest smartphone maker, and that its smartphone business would disappear entirely if it could not source chipsets.

With U.S.-China relations at their worst in decades, Washington is pushing governments around to world to squeeze out Huawei, arguing it would hand over data to the Chinese government for spying. Huawei denies it spies for China.

Huawei will also reveal its progress in developing its proprietary Harmony operating system, which it has billed as an multi-device platform across watches, laptops and mobiles, rather than as a like-for-like challenger to Googles Android mobile operating system. It unveiled the system for the first time at last years developers conference.

We will introduce the community to a range of new technology developments, including HMS Core 5.0 and EMUI 11, and provide opportunities to discuss directly and openly with our engineers and management these new technologies and market opportunities, a Huawei spokesman said, noting that it has 1.6 million developers onboard worldwide.

Huaweis addition to the U.S. entity list in May last year barred Google from providing technical support for new Huawei phone models using Android, and from Google Mobile Services (GMS), the bundle of developer services upon which most Android apps are based.

The company is likely to focus on HarmonyOSs application in devices like wearables and smartscreens, rather than in the smartphone business that is being heavily affected by the U.S. action, said Will Wong, an analyst with consultancy IDC.

It will not want to present HarmonyOS as a genuine Google alternative ahead of the U.S. election in November, in the hope that it might regain access to Google after that, he said.

A key challenge for Huawei is to show that its proprietary AppGallery and Huawei Mobile Services can integrate local apps from different countries and regions, said Tarun Pathak, an industry analyst with Counterpoint.

The lack of Google services seriously impacts these devices appeal against competitors running a full commercial version of Android, he said.

Reporting by David Kirton; Editing by Kim Coghill

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China's Huawei to share progress of Google Android OS rival amid U.S. tensions - Reuters

I think someone at InXile Entertainment has watched Honey, I Shrunk the Kids a few too many times.

Wasteland 3 has grenades that shrink your foes. Enemies have them, too. The studios previous role-playing game, The Bards Tale IV: Barrows Deep, has spells that turn the baddies into pipsqueaks. And in that one, they have tiny voices and look ridiculous in combat. I shrunk my foes in so many battles.

This time, the enemy shrunk me.

I was storming an apartment, where the landlord thought someone was brewing bombs. Turns out they were creating clones and these copies were insane. So when I blew up the door and stormed in, they responded with stark-raving mad shrieks and by lobbing shrink grenades.

This encounter is just one example of the wild, wooly West that awaits you in the postapocalyptic Colorado in Wasteland 3, InXiles latest entry in the series. Its on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One, and its the final RPG from the studios independent days of funding projects on Kickstarter, before Microsoft acquired it in 2018. Deep Silvers the publisher.

It picks up where Wasteland 2s story leaves off. The Arizona Rangers are in shambles after defeating the Cochise AI and setting off a nuke. But a powerful person reaches out to offer your succor the Patriarch, the leader of Colorado. He needs your help with his kids, all who want to take over his rulership over Colorado Springs and the surrounding area. And all of them, to paraphrase Hank Hill, just aint right. From there, you clean up the mess, build up your forces, and learn just whats happening in the Rockies these days.

Heres what I think after more than 10 hours with Wasteland 3.

My everlasting takeaway from Wasteland 2 is that despite it being a fantastic RPG, the turn-based combat is too challenging at lower levels. The foes come across as too powerful to me.

Wasteland 3 feels better-tuned at earlier levels. While I did lose some troops a few times, I didnt feel like I was a group of grunts storming no-mans land getting mowed down by machine guns. Cover plays into this. InXile has thrown cover in strategic points around battlefields in a manner that both makes sense and is exploitable Ive been able to find some fantastic killzones thanks to the layout of some encounters. You can also destroy a great deal of cover. Chewing away at a wall with your machine gun makes an enemy more vulnerable without forcing you to expose your adventurers.

I dig one encounter in the remains of a mall parking lot. Your party starts in a chokepoint, which widens as you make progress. The baddies are on a higher level, with two ramps on either side of the map leading to their perch. Thankfully, you have a great deal of cover (concrete barriers, empty oil drums, and more) to help you advance as the villains fire away. You also face some foes on the ground below, but a few well-placed rockets, blowing up an oil drum, or other strategies pay off. By the time I had chewed my way through the henchmen, I got to the main baddie with three characters still alive, and the dead one happened only because I left her exposed to melee attacks.

Whats nice about this set up is that I was able to take advantage of cover, lay down fire to protect for my close-in fighters, and take out the enemy on the top level, all while feeling like I had the tools to do so. I dont remember any of the battles in Wasteland 2 feeling this tactical.

Above: This feels like a Jonathan Coulton song come to life.

Image Credit: GamesBeat

InXile peppers Wasteland 3 with exploding pigs, bad accents, silly puns, and weird foes with bad outfits (along with the shrink grenades). This is the sort of humor I live for in RPGs (and in books, TV, and movies as well. Im a cheesy fella). Im long past the the world is ending, we have to save it stories that emphasize drama over laughs.

The Bizarre stands out as a bastion of this silliness. You end up clearing out the lower levels of a mall for this areas capo, Flab the Inhaler. Hes a grotesque, obese play on a vampire lord. He speaks in a horrible accent out of the worst bloodsucker flicks. It turns out this place is under siege by a gang that dresses up as clowns and turns pigs into bombs. As you go down into the tunnels underneath the mall, you find not just a silly band of baddies but also a good dungeon to crawl through. And thats what I love about the humor; its important, but it doesnt detract from the game, its mechanics, and its design.

My favorite laugh so far might be MacTavish. He affects a Scottish persona, with an accent cheesier than Scottys and an outfit to match. You end up finding a cassette that shows its all a fake the recording has him practicing the accent, and when he fails, you hear him complaining in an even worse Texan drawl. Whats more, after you figure this out and capture him, he sticks to it in jail, even after you both know the accent is a fake.

In Wasteland 2, you end up dealing with an evil AI and another nuke. So far, your adventures in Colorado feel more homey. Youre taking care of bad people and making it safer for those who just want to live in peace. Youre fighting The Patriarchs wild kids. Yes, some of it is a bit over-the-top and gross, and I do have a great deal more of the story to dig into. Yet rebuilding the Rangers and making Colorado safer just feels comforting.

This doesnt mean Wasteland 3 lacks moral choices. Ive already had to decide if I want to side with corrupt cops or gangsters that appear to have a good heart. Another choice involves killing a man and those who helped him after you learn he let a bloody gang into Colorado Springs. As a kicker, you also deal with whether you want to help one of your companions take vengeance on them for that gang slaughtering her family. Sure, were not dealing with nukes, but the stakes are still there. Theyre more personal this time around.

Above: This might be the first time in my decades of playing RPGs that Ive found cat litter loot.

Image Credit: GamesBeat

Now, I may find out that one of these power-mad kids is going to blow it all up with a nuke. That certainly would change the stakes. But so far, I like just how much of Wasteland 3 is about dealing with the locals and their problems.

Wasteland 3 feels different from both its predecessor and other RPGs coming out right now, such as Pathfinder: Kingmakers definite edition. It still has a big scope that weve come to expect from InXile, but it feels more intimate as well. Its more welcoming than other games.

And so far, it doesnt have that freight train momentum you sometimes feel from other RPGs, where the story gains so much steam you feel like you need to blitz through it, missing out the sidequests and other tidbits that gives games character. Wasteland 3 isnt asking me to hurry up; it wants me to stay awhile, crack open a beer, and take it on at my pace. And that might be its greatest strength so far.

And nothing can shrink that.

Score: Pending

Wasteland 3 is out now for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. Its also a part of Xbox Game Pass. Deep Silver sent GamesBeat a Steam code for the purposes of this review.

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Wasteland 3 review-in-progress Colder, but more intimate - VentureBeat

Doing calculations with a quantum computer is a race against time, thanks to the fragility of the quantum states at their heart. And new research suggests we may soon hit a wall in how long we can hold them together thanks to interference from natural background radiation.

While quantum computing could one day enable us to carry out calculations beyond even the most powerful supercomputer imaginable, were still a long way from that point. And a big reason for that is a phenomenon known as decoherence.

The superpowers of quantum computers rely on holding the qubitsquantum bitsthat make them up in exotic quantum states like superposition and entanglement. Decoherence is the process by which interference from the environment causes them to gradually lose their quantum behavior and any information that was encoded in them.

It can be caused by heat, vibrations, magnetic fluctuations, or any host of environmental factors that are hard to control. Currently we can keep superconducting qubits (the technology favored by the fields leaders like Google and IBM) stable for up to 200 microseconds in the best devices, which is still far too short to do any truly meaningful computations.

But new research from scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), published last week in Nature, suggests we may struggle to get much further. They found that background radiation from cosmic rays and more prosaic sources like trace elements in concrete walls is enough to put a hard four-millisecond limit on the coherence time of superconducting qubits.

These decoherence mechanisms are like an onion, and weve been peeling back the layers for the past 20 years, but theres another layer that left unabated is going to limit us in a couple years, which is environmental radiation, William Oliver from MIT said in a press release. This is an exciting result, because it motivates us to think of other ways to design qubits to get around this problem.

Superconducting qubits rely on pairs of electrons flowing through a resistance-free circuit. But radiation can knock these pairs out of alignment, causing them to split apart, which is what eventually results in the qubit decohering.

To determine how significant of an impact background levels of radiation could have on qubits, the researchers first tried to work out the relationship between coherence times and radiation levels. They exposed qubits to irradiated copper whose emissions dropped over time in a predictable way, which showed them that coherence times rose as radiation levels fell up to a maximum of four milliseconds, after which background effects kicked in.

To check if this coherence time was really caused by the natural radiation, they built a giant shield out of lead brick that could block background radiation to see what happened when the qubits were isolated. The experiments clearly showed that blocking the background emissions could boost coherence times further.

At the minute, a host of other problems like material impurities and electronic disturbances cause qubits to decohere before these effects kick in, but given the rate at which the technology has been improving, we may hit this new wall in just a few years.

Without mitigation, radiation will limit the coherence time of superconducting qubits to a few milliseconds, which is insufficient for practical quantum computing, Brent VanDevender from PNNL said in a press release.

Potential solutions to the problem include building radiation shielding around quantum computers or locating them underground, where cosmic rays arent able to penetrate so easily. But if you need a few tons of lead or a large cavern in order to install a quantum computer, thats going to make it considerably harder to roll them out widely.

Its important to remember, though, that this problem has only been observed in superconducting qubits so far. In July, researchers showed they could get a spin-orbit qubit implemented in silicon to last for about 10 milliseconds, while trapped ion qubits can stay stable for as long as 10 minutes. And MITs Oliver says theres still plenty of room for building more robust superconducting qubits.

We can think about designing qubits in a way that makes them rad-hard, he said. So its definitely not game-over, its just the next layer of the onion we need to address.

Image Credit: Shutterstock

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Could Quantum Computing Progress Be Halted by Background Radiation? - Singularity Hub

With the installation of the Magnetic Resonance Imaging units, the Loma Linda University Medical Center and Childrens Hospital tower construction project has reached a significant milestone. Completion efforts now focus on completing the buildings interior, including furnishings, equipment, supplies and all the small touches necessary to make the buildings ready to receive patients.

Below is a look back on the status of this massive effort in the months of August over the five years of work. With just a few months to go until patients move into this new building, this retrospective shows just how much has been accomplished by construction workers, Loma Linda University Health leadership, and the generous support of thousands of donors to the project.

August 18, 2015: Early signs of change start appearing as work gets underway. Utilities need rerouting. Streets need to be redirected. And the entire parking lot east of the cloverleaf tower building needs to be broken up and removed it will serve as the site for the new facility.

August 9, 2016: The buildings foundation and space for two lower floors will be underground. To create the foundation pit, workers will remove 110,000 yards of soil, or 7,857 truckloads. Then the bottom of the pit was covered with 1,400 yards of concrete four inches thick. On that slab, workers put together 5.1 million pounds of steel rebar, which reinforced another 15,230 yards of concrete.

August 11, 2017: Anyone standing on the foundation floor on this date would still see the cloverleaf tower dominating the campus skyline. But having dug down, workers were ready to start building up. First task? Anchoring 126 base isolators into place to support the entire building and protect it in case of an earthquake.

August 10, 2018: The pit is just a memory, as the steel structure for the two towers begins to rise. The Childrens Hospital tower ultimately topped off at nine stories, while the Medical Center reached 16 floors, and has a new helipad on the buildings roof.

August 12, 2019: Work on the exterior is nearing completion. Two outside elevator hoists served the project delivering workers and supplies to the various floors. But the hoist on the side of the Childrens Hospital tower is no longer needed and is in the process of being removed. And on the other side of the building, the process of installing the glass walls for the 16th-floor conference center began at this same time.

August 12, 2020: Late afternoon sun appears to crown the new Medical Center, casting a long shadow on the east side of the building. The new hospital is the tallest hospital in the state of California and the tallest building in San Bernardino County. But while its size is impressive, whats truly exciting is the impact this facility will have in the region as it advances our ability to continue providing excellent healthcare. The new Medical Center tower is more than a building; it's a beacon of hope for brighter, better tomorrows in this community.

We're sharing photographic updates of the hospital construction work on a periodic basis. Watch for special emphasis on some of the behind-the-scenes-views and untold stories at the Vision 2020 website.

This vignette is adapted from a blog by Dennis E. Park, which appears on the website http://www.docuvision2020.com.

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Five years of progress on new Medical Center - Loma Linda University Health

Wildfires in California and other western states are getting worse every year, but is climate change all to blame? We explain. USA TODAY

Firefighters continued to gain ground Sunday against thenearly two dozen wildfires blazing inCalifornia including the two complex fires in the San Francisco Bay Area that have burned more than 750,000 acres and forced hundreds of thousands of evacuations.

"Overall, firefighters [are] making great progress. We'll continue to see containment efforts go up," Cal Fire spokesman Daniel Berlant said on Twitter.

Evacuation orders have been lifted or downgraded to warningsfor the LNU Lightning Complex Firein the state's wine country in the Napa Valley, north of San Francisco. But more than 60,000 people remain under mandatory evacuation throughout the state.

The LNU Lightning Complex Fire, which began Aug.17,hasburned 375,209 acres, destroyed over 1,200 homes and killed five people, according to Cal Fire. It was56% contained as of 2 p.m. PT Sunday.

California's air quality is worse than India's: That's not good in a pandemic

Meanwhile, theSCU Lightning Complex Fire, east of San Jose, has burned 377,471 acres across five counties since igniting on Aug. 18. It was 50% contained.

A third complex fire near Santa Cruz, the CZU, had burned nearly 85,000 acres and was 35% contained as of Sunday afternoon.

California fire officials are cautiously optimistic after cooler, foggy weather has rolled into fire zones, while they assess the damage from hundreds of wildfires that have scorched more than 2,000 square miles across the state. (Aug. 27) AP Domestic

Cooler weekend weather helped fire crews, Cal Fire said. But temperatures are forecast to reach nearly 100 degrees this week, with gusty winds that can lead to "critical fire weather conditions," the National Weather Service said.

The NWS issued a red flag warning with gusty winds and low relative humidity expected in interior Del Norte County and far northeast Humboldt County in Northern California from5 p.m. Sunday local time through 11 a.m. Monday.

Over the next week or two we will be at the climatological peak of fire weather season in northwest California, and fuel conditions are near or exceeding critical thresholds over much of our area, the weather service said.

Contributing: The Associated Press

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California fire crews, aided by cooler weather, report 'great progress' against LNU, SCU lightning complex fires - USA TODAY

The next win determines progress.

As the Stars streaked past the Colorado Avalanche on Sunday night bombarding them early and hanging on late during a 5-4 win in Game 4 they set themselves up for a shot at evolution.

On Sunday, the Stars grabbed a sizable 3-1 lead in the second-round series, and Dallas is now one win away from advancing to the Western Conference Finals for the first time since 2008, which would mark the first time this core has won two playoff rounds. The Stars did it with another episode of their dominance in spurts.

The Stars controlled the first period, racing to a 3-0 lead as Colorado needed more than 18 minutes to test Anton Khudobin with a shot on goal. In a series defined by runs from each team, Dallas opened Game 4 with one and built enough cushion to withstand Colorados comeback attempts in the second and third periods.

The Stars power play scored twice in the first period. They allowed two Colorado goals in the second period, including one late in the period during an Avs 5 on 3 power play. But Dallas answered with two goals to push Colorado to the brink of elimination.

Nine Stars recorded points, led by Radek Faksas goal and two assists. Roope Hintz and John Klingberg each had a goal and an assist, while Jamie Benn and Denis Gurianov also scored. For the sixth time in the last nine games, the Stars scored at least five goals. They scored at least five goals in a game just five times throughout the entire regular season.

Khubodin started his eighth straight game in place of the injured Ben Bishop and stopped 33 of 37 shots on goal.

The continued offensive explosion gives the Stars three chances to close out the Avalanche, with the first coming in Game 5 at 8:45 p.m. Monday.

Were a confident group, and tomorrows going to be the hardest game, Klingberg said. It always is when you can close out a series. We expect Colorado to be even better tomorrow.

The Stars have matched where they got to last season: within one victory of the NHLs final four.

Last May, they had two chances to eliminate the St. Louis Blues and couldnt, leading to a summer of what-ifs as St. Louis won the Stanley Cup. They entered this season with regret and remorse, and maybe some fear that 2019 could have been their year. One more win this week would signal that the Stars are past that stage and moving forward with a core that has needed years to percolate.

The next win would put the Stars halfway to the required 16 wins needed to lift the Stanley Cup and would give more credence to Jim Nills roster, one that is still missing its starting goaltender and has won six of its last seven games.

Between the round robin and the first round, this postseason could have been viewed as a seminal moment for the Stars.

They had the big contracts of Benn and Tyler Seguin without the superstar results. They had aging scorers such as Joe Pavelski and Alexander Radulov on the books for multiple seasons. Defenseman Miro Heiskanen remained on a cheap entry-level contract for one more season. Khubodin was free to walk after this one. And then, of course, theres the situation behind the bench, where Rick Bowness still wears an interim tag.

An early exit (or maybe even just matching last years results) could have served as an inflection point for the franchise that hadnt qualified for two straight postseasons for a decade before the last two seasons. Would the Stars want to keep this core together? Could they break it up if they tried? How would the next coach fare with the personnel?

Instead, the Stars seem poised to bounce the favored Avalanche and sign up for another two weeks in the Edmonton bubble. One more win, and progress is tangible. One more win, and Dallas has evolved into a true, top-shelf, real-life, not-dreaming Stanley Cup contender.

The next win determines progress.

Were keeping our composure, Benn said. We know how hard that Game 6 was against Calgary. Obviously, we didnt get off to a good start at all. Well sit on this one for a couple hours and then move on and get right back at it tomorrow.

Find more Stars stories from The Dallas Morning News here.

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Making progress: The Dallas Stars need one win to eliminate Avalanche, but that victory could mean so much - The Dallas Morning News

BEREA, Ohio -- The Cleveland Browns are expecting big things from rookie Jedrick Wills. The Cleveland Browns used the 10th overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft to select Jedrick Wills to anchor the Cleveland Browns left tackle position.

However, left tackle is a tough position to just step in at the NFL level and play well, let alone dominate, as Joe Thomas did. Couple that, with the fact that the rookie from Alabama is set to open the season in less than two weeks against one of the best defenses in the NFL in the Baltimore Ravens.

After Sunday's practice at FirstEnergy Stadium, Wills was asked how he thinks he's progressing.

Wills feels he's making the transition to left tackle pretty well.

It is going well," Wills said. "The transition is hard for anybody in any position no matter the position, whether you are a skill player or not. Really just coming in, improve the things I need to work on in practice, and just get ready for the next two weeks.

I think I have made a lot of progress, especially like you said since the past few weeks," he said. "Moving along very quickly and just trying to get better.

Offensive line coach Bill Callahan said all rookies are behind.

I think rookies across the league are behind the curve," Callahan said. "I think what our goal has been is to bring him up to speed as fast as we can. We have really inundated him with techniques and walkthroughs. We have gone through several measures in the classroom showing him different players doing the techniques that we are asking of him. I think the progress has been positive, but you just do not know until you go up against live competition."

Callahan said going up against the Browns pair of Pro Bowl defensive ends has helped speed up his growth.

"Having the looks that we are getting in practice from No. 54 (Olivier Vernon) and No. 95 (Myles Garrett) certainly helps that," Callahan said. "He has obviously lost a share and he has won a share of his reps, but that experience of getting out against quality and premier pass rushers is invaluable. Every day, it is a learning experience for him, and we are trying to bring him up to speed as fast as we can.

Wills said the work against those two has helped him significantly.

It has been a great competition between me and Myles and also Olivier Vernon on the other side, which is who I see mostly," he said. "It definitely would have helped to get these things moving along way back in OTAs, if we would have had those with this COVID thing going on. It would have definitely helped, but we have to adjust now and just keep moving forward.

Wills admitted he has been a bit discouraged when Vernon, Garrett, or another pass rusher gets the best of him.

Of course because you come from a place in college where I just dominated everybody I went against," he said. "It was easy and it was a walk in the park, and now you are going against these guys who are Pro Bowlers and some of the best pass rushers in the league. It gets frustrating at times, but you just have to learn from your losses.

Callahan said part of his coaching is helping Wills from not getting discouraged.

I think for all the rookies in our league and especially on our team, they need to learn the cycle of the snap, and they need to get the mindset prior to the play in the pre-snap," he said. "Then of course when the snap is over, good bad or indifferent, they need to process that quickly and find out or learn what they did good, what they did bad and what they could do better, and then move on to the next play.

"That ability to change the mindset of the next play and going to the next play is critically important for a young player," he said. "Sometimes, they have the tendency to dwell because they want to do so well that it kind of feeds into that cycle of overthinking, paralysis and things of that nature. We have worked really hard at trying to get a mindset for Jedrick and all of our players of getting on and getting forward with the next play.

Wills said the different looks have helped him the most.

Really just seeing different things every day from the guys on the other side of the ball," Wills said. "Really mastering your technique and being ready for all the kinds of moves.

"Really, just trying to do what I need to do day in and day out to get to that stage of comfort because there are always things you can improve on.

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Cleveland Browns Bill Callahan Calls Jed Wills Progress Positive - 247Sports

FILE PHOTO: Emergency Medical Technicians (EMT) leave with a patient at Hialeah Hospital where coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patients are treated, in Hialeah, Florida, U.S., July 29, 2020. REUTERS/Marco Bello/File Photo

GENEVA (Reuters) - More than 90% of countries have seen ordinary health services disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, with major gains in medical care attained over decades vulnerable to being wiped out in a short period, a World Health Organization survey showed.

The Geneva-based body has frequently warned about other life-saving programs being impacted by the pandemic and has sent countries mitigation advice, but the survey yielded the first WHO data so far on the scale of disruptions.

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on essential health services is a source of great concern, said a report on the study released on Monday. Major health gains achieved over the past two decades can be wiped out in a short period of time...

The survey includes responses from between May and July from more than 100 countries. Among the most affected services were routine immunizations (70%), family planning (68%) and cancer diagnosis and treatment (55%), while emergency services were disturbed in almost a quarter of responding countries.

The Eastern Mediterranean Region, which includes Afghanistan, Syria and Yemen, was most affected followed by the African and Southeast Asian regions, it showed. The Americas was not part of the survey.

Since COVID-19 cases were first identified in December last year, the virus is thought to have killed nearly 850,000 people, the latest Reuters tally showed.

Researchers think that non-COVID deaths have also increased in some places due partly to health service disruptions, although these may be harder to calculate.

The WHO survey said it was reasonable to anticipate that even a modest disruption in essential health services could lead to an increase in morbidity and mortality from causes other than COVID-19 in the short to medium and long-term. Further research was needed.

It also warned that the disruptions could be felt even after the pandemic ends. The impact may be felt beyond the immediate pandemic as, in trying to catch up on services, countries may find that resources are overwhelmed.

Reporting by Emma Farge; Editing by Mark Heinrich

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COVID-19 can wipe out health care progress in short order: WHO - Reuters