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China’s official count 0 2.5 million 83,150 deaths Model based on Shanghai outbreak 1.6 million deaths LOW ESTIMATE HIGH ESTIMATE Estimate using travel patterns 970,000 deaths Estimate using recent testing data 1.5 million deaths Estimate based on U.S. death rates 1.1 million deaths China’s official count 0 2.5 million 83,150 deaths Model based on Shanghai outbreak 1.6 million deaths LOW EST. But China’s official Covid death toll for the entire pandemic remains strikingly low: 83,150 people as of Feb. 9. Four separate academic teams have converged on broadly similar estimates: China’s Covid wave may have killed between a million and 1.5 million people. Why official data underrepresents China’s outbreak83,150 deaths China’s official count on Feb. 9 0 2.5M 83,150 deaths China’s official count on Feb. 9 0 2.5 millionChina has a narrow definition of what counts as a Covid-19 death. But the work was unwavering in its ultimate conclusion: Ending the “zero Covid” policy was likely to overwhelm the health care system, producing an estimated 1.6 million deaths.

☆ Law student's family says he went missing after visiting NYC gay bar
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Nbc New York | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +1 min

A New York City law student has been missing for nearly two weeks, and his brother said his last known location was a gay bar in Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood. Jordan Taylor, 29, a first-year law student at the City University of New York, was reported missing by his family on Jan. 8, according to his brother and the New York City Police Department. According to the NYPD, Taylor was last seen in the borough of Queens, where he resides, on the afternoon of Jan. 6. Like, I don’t want to think about it, but I can’t rule it out either,” he told NBC New York. For the full story, visit NBC New York.

☆ Nearly 1 in 4 U.S. hospitalized patients experience a harmful event, study finds
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-11 | by ( Kaitlin Sullivan | Kaitlin Sullivan Is A Contributor For Nbcnews.Com Who Has Worked With Nbc News Investigations. She Reports On Health | Science | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +7 min

The stark findings underscore that, despite decades of effort, hospitals in the United States still have a long way to go to improve patient safety, experts say. A total of 222 adverse events were considered preventable, meaning an error resulted in patient harm. Twenty-nine people, or 1% of the total of those admitted, experienced serious preventable adverse events that resulted in serious harm. The most common adverse events overall (nearly 40%) were related to medications given in the hospital. It used data from patients hospitalized in New York state in 1984, and found that only about 4% of hospitalized patients experienced harm.

☆ New guidelines for treating childhood obesity include medications and surgery for first time
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-09 | by ( Kaitlin Sullivan | Kaitlin Sullivan Is A Contributor For Nbcnews.Com Who Has Worked With Nbc News Investigations. She Reports On Health | Science | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +8 min

Intensive behavioral and lifestyle changes should be the first-line approach, but the AAP also includes recommendations for anti-obesity medications and surgery for the first time. The guidelines say that pediatricians should offer weight-loss drugs for children age 12 and up with obesity. She also acknowledged that these lifestyle changes can be really hard to adopt, especially for overworked and low-income parents. The more adverse the environment around you, the harder it is to live a healthy lifestyle,” Hassink said. Medications and surgery are expensive, and asking overstretched parents to implement lifestyle changes is not always realistic.

New York City's Department of Education announced a ban on the wildly popular chatbot ChatGPT — which some have warned could inspire more student cheating — from its schools’ devices and networks. It was not immediately clear if the ban applied to the City University of New York system. In New York public schools, ChatGPT can still be made available upon request to classes studying artificial intelligence. In an email statement responding to the New York City public schools ban, a spokesperson for OpenAI said the company "doesn't want ChatGPT to be used for misleading purposes in schools or anywhere else." We’ve always called for transparency around the use of AI-generated text," the spokesperson said.

This year brought a fascinating and eclectic number of books by Latino authors to store shelves and online selections, spanning different genres and earning high praise from readers and reviewers alike. Below is our list of 10 very distinctive works by U.S. Latino authors. The compelling novel has been recognized as one of the top 10 books of 2022 by The New York Times and The Washington Post and as one of the best books of 2022 by Time, NPR, Vogue, Oprah Daily and others. Although Villanueva's life took a different turn, many of his followers and their children, known as "Inca Jews," are still in Israel. She writes about how an abortion saved her life and candidly details her experiences dealing with suicidal thoughts and depression.

☆ An NYC group wants to keep homeless college students dropping out so they can achieve "a gateway to the middle class"
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-21 | by ( Jason Lalljee | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

A New York City non-profit is piloting a program to pay for students' housing so they can complete their degrees. The New York Times spoke with one student who was on the verge of dropping out before receiving this benefit. According to one 2019 reported from The Hope Center for College, Community, and Justice, almost three in five college students reported experiencing housing insecurity the previous year. 18% of two-year college students and 14% of four-year students reported experiencing homelessness at some point, the researchers found. Homeless students reported lower GPAs and higher dropout rates, according to a report by the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools.

☆ Private-equity firms are coming around to the idea of using more data in the investment process. It's still an uphill battle.
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-20 | by ( Dan Defrancesco | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Take Blackstone, which recently expanded a data tool it originally built for its real-estate business to be used across its PE portfolio. As recently as just a few years ago, PE firms were just starting to warm to the idea of building out data-science teams. But that tech has been a hard sell for PE firms as well, until recently. Many PE firms are just now waking up to the possibilities of the public cloud. To be fair to PE firms, figuring out how to incorporate data analysis into the investing process is no easy task.

It’s quite remarkable.”In his first five-year term on the Standing Committee, Wang ran the party's secretariat, an organ responsible for day-to-day affairs. In Xi's third leadership term, Wang is on track to be in charge of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, an advisory body. "All the major slogans, from Jiang Zemin to Hu Jintao to Xi Jinping, seem to have come from Wang Huning," Lam said. 'AMERICA VS. AMERICA'Where most Standing Committee members have experience such as running a major city or province, Wang is an academic. During 1989's pro-democracy student protests, Wang told Xia not to stand with the students, a warning Xia did not heed.

☆ You may pay nearly $8 for a McDonald's Big Mac in Massachusetts versus $3 in Oklahoma. Here's why costs can vary — even for locations across the street from one another.
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-07 | by ( Nancy Luna | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Until that happens, he's taken on the unofficial position of "fast-food data scientist," thanks to his latest side project, the Fast Food Index. Fast Food IndexAccording to the Fast Food Index, the most expensive Chipotle chicken burrito is sold for $11.10 in Manhattan's garment district. Other Fast Food Index findings:At $7.89, a McDonald's in Lee, Massachusetts, is home to the most expensive Big Mac. The most expensive Taco Bell crunchy taco is sold in a small town in California. Chipotle menu prices increased by 4% in August, and the company has raised prices for delivery.

The move was criticized by some mental health professionals who said the city should focus on long-term solutions and avoid treating people who refuse. New York Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Donna Lieberman also condemned the plan. New York City continues to contend with crime on public transit. Instead, he said, the city needs sustained engagement, housing, health care support and financial assistance for those in need. “In an ideal situation, you want mental health crisis teams to be the front line.

☆ Climate justice gets harder as world population passes 8 billion
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-15 | by ( Gloria Dickie | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

These are also among the countries most vulnerable to climate impacts, and most in need of climate finance. "A SIGN OF HUMAN SUCCESS"Globally, the 8 billion population milestone represents 1 billion people added to the planet in just the last 11 years. Even while the global population reaches ever-new highs, demographers note that the growth rate has fallen steadily to less than 1% per year. "A big part of this story is that this era of rapid population growth that the world has known for centuries is coming to an end," Wilmoth said. Rapid population growth combined with climate change is likely to cause mass migration and conflict in coming decades, experts said.

☆ The US never banned asbestos. These workers are paying the price.
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-23 | by ( Kathleen Mcgrory | Neil Bedi | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +39 min

But protocols failed to match reality at the Niagara Falls plant, according to more than a dozen workers. In addition to those signature diseases, which are rare even among asbestos workers, the tiny strands can harm the body in other ways. In the 15 years that followed, congressional attempts to ban asbestos would continue to fall short. OSHA declined to make an official available for an on-the-record interview or comment on ProPublica's findings at the Niagara Falls plant. At the OxyChem plant in Wichita, union president Keith Peacock said he was comfortable with the way asbestos was handled.

Now free from large monthly payments, Nadal will redirect his monthly payments toward building his kids' future. PSLF forgives the student loans of public school teachers and other nonprofit workers after 120 "qualifying payments" (about 10 years of consistent payments). At year five of making payments, Nadal called his student loan servicer to make sure he was on the right track. Finally, weeks later, his student loan account showed a zero balance and he received a letter saying $124,572 of his student loans had been completely forgiven. He says, "Before, it was a different feeling because I just had to pay off my student loans, and I couldn't save money.

☆ How getting dog food delivered to your door explains the inefficient, sometimes absurd, extremely convenient way online orders are shipped
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-19 | by ( Emma Cosgrove | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Industry analysts predict that the amount of dog food ordered online will surpass what's bought in stores by 2025, a shift accelerated drastically by the coronavirus pandemic. Of course, it's not just dog food increasingly being bought online. Even with all those extra vehicles, it's tough to compare the emissions generated by online orders with those of in-store shopping. The mess of overlapping networks that bring our dog food to our doorsteps is always evolving in search of greater efficiency. The mess of overlapping networks that bring our dog food to our doorsteps is always evolving in search of greater efficiency.

An independent report in 2015 from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights also backed their position, concluding that there wasn’t evidence to support the incineration of the 43 missing students at the dump. The Ayotzinapa parents have fought with the Mexican government to uncover the involvement of the military in the case. She is an expert on human rights and social justice policy in Mexico and Latin America. “This is not just a militarization of public security, it’s a militarism of parts of Mexican civilian life,” she said. “If you’re looking at the chain of command in any of these human rights cases, who knew what and when becomes important.

☆ Frozen embryos linked to increased risk of hypertensive disorders during pregnancy, study finds
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-26 | by ( Kaitlin Sullivan | Kaitlin Sullivan Is A Contributor For Nbcnews.Com Who Has Worked With Nbc News Investigations. She Reports On Health | Science | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +5 min

Undergoing in vitro fertilization using frozen embryos is linked to a greater risk of hypertensive disorders, including preeclampsia, during pregnancy, according to research published Monday in the journal Hypertension. Overall, the risk of hypertensive disorders was low: about 7.4% in women who used frozen embryos, compared with 5.6% in women who used fresh embryos and 4.3% for women who conceived naturally. In addition, they found, there was no significant difference in risk between the women who conceived naturally and those who did IVF using fresh embryos. The group included 4.4 million naturally conceived pregnancies and compared them to just over 78,000 IVF pregnancies conceived using a fresh embryo and about 18,000 using a frozen embryo. Petersen emphasized that the overall risk for preeclampsia was still low and that the results of the new study should not scare women away from using frozen embryos.

☆ See inside the luxury bunkers where the super-rich reportedly plan to save themselves from a future apocalypse
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-25 | by ( Grace Kay | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: 1 min

Tech billionaires are building luxury doomsday bunkers, according to a tell-all book by Douglas Rushkoff. Vivos installing a shelter Courtesy of VivosRushkoff, who often writes about the future of technology and is known for his association with early cyberpunk culture, said he was invited to a remote resort to talk with five of the world's wealthiest men about the future of the planet. (Rushkoff did not specify who spoke to him at the resort, but said at least two of the men were billionaires.) At the event, the City University of New York professor said he was repeatedly asked about the best ways to survive climate change or societal collapse, as the executives detailed their plans to build underground bunkers and avoid what they called "The Event." Source: The Guardian, "Survival of the Richest: Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires"

☆ Is Biden correct that the pandemic is over? Not exactly.
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-24 | by ( Denis Nash | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +9 min

During a CBS “60 Minutes” interview that aired on Sunday, President Joe Biden said the SARS CoV-2 pandemic was over. If Biden was referring to the emergency phase of the pandemic being over, his statement is in some ways correct — at least for now. If Biden was referring to the emergency phase of the pandemic being over, his statement is in some ways correct — at least for now. The U.K.’s Office for National Statistics (ONS) has had a model long Covid surveillance system in place since February 2021. Displaying long Covid metrics and related trends on the Covid Data Tracker would be helpful.

☆ Cancer death rates continue to fall, driven by new treatments and improved screening
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-21 | by ( Kaitlin Sullivan | Kaitlin Sullivan Is A Contributor For Nbcnews.Com Who Has Worked With Nbc News Investigations. She Reports On Health | Science | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +6 min

Significant strides in cancer treatments, diagnostic tools and prevention strategies continue to drive down cancer death rates, according to a report published Wednesday by the American Association for Cancer Research. Death rates from cancer have been falling over the past two decades, particularly sharply in recent years, the group's annual Cancer Progress Report found. “Cancer cells are mavericks, but they are your own cells. Coussens also highlighted developments in cancer drugs that work by targeting specific DNA mutations in cancer cells but noted that more work is still needed. Catching cancer earlyAlso key to cutting cancer death rates is catching the disease as early as possible.

☆ Some sex assault survivors have to pay thousands of dollars for emergency department visits
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-15 | by ( Carma Hassan | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

Researchers used national data for emergency room visits and found that 16% of victims had to pay out-of-pocket for their emergency department visits in 2019, according to a research letter published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine. The charges averaged $3,551 for most survivors, with those who are pregnant having to pay even more: $4,553 on average, the researchers found. Victims with private health insurance were also still expected to cover approximately 14% of their emergency department costs out-of-pocket. “Such costs may particularly burden low-income women and girls who disproportionately are victims of sexual assault,” the researchers wrote. “The health care system needs to stop enforcing sexism.

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