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President Donald Trump on Thursday denied the massive death toll estimate in Puerto Rico caused by Hurricane Maria last year, claiming without evidence that Democrats invented the numbers "to make me look as bad as possible." "3,000 people did not die in the two hurricanes that hit Puerto Rico. When I left the Island, AFTER the storm had hit, they had anywhere from 6 to 18 deaths," Trump tweeted Thursday morning. "As time went by it did not go up by much. Then, a long time later, they started to report really large numbers, like 3,000." Trump added that, "This...

George Washington University is standing behind a study produced by university researchers that determined Hurricane Maria led to the deaths of nearly 3,000 Puerto Ricans. The statement backing up GW's study comes hours after President Trump on Thursday morning called into question the death toll, claiming it was inflated by Democrats. "We stand by the science underlying our study which found there were an estimated 2,975 excess deaths in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria," reads the statement from GW's Milken Institute School of Public Health, obtained by NBC. "We are confident that the number - 2,975 - is the most...

Death tolls are the primary way we understand the impact of a disaster. And for nearly two weeks after Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico, as a humanitarian crisis was intensifying, the death toll was frozen at 16. “Sixteen people certified,” Trump said on October 3 during his visit to the island, repeating a figure confirmed by the territory’s governor. "Everybody watching can really be very proud of what's taken place in Puerto Rico." It was a moment that crystallized two conflicting narratives about the Puerto Rico disaster. The first one, from the federal government and Puerto Rico’s governor, is of...

An overcrowded bus plunged into a gorge in southern India on Tuesday, killing at least 55 people and injuring several more, in one of the worst such accidents this year, authorities said. The bus, part of the state-run network in Telangana, was returning from a hilltop temple in the district of Jagtial, about 190 kms (118 miles) from Hyderabad, the state capital, a district official said. "The driver lost control and the bus skidded off the road and fell into the valley," a top district official, G. Narendhar, told Reuters. "The majority of the passengers have suffered severe injuries."

Violence erupted over the Labor Day weekend in Chicago with shootings killing at least six people and wounding 23 others. In all, more than 1,000 people have been shot since Memorial Day, the Chicago Tribune reported, and while total shootings are down slightly from the same period in 2017, many Chicagoans have said the deadly gun violence remains a major problem that the city desperately needs to fix.

Two teens who had been reported missing were among the four people killed and 54 people shot this weekend in Chicago, as the city's gun violence epidemic continued unabated. The weekend tally was up compared to the same weekend in 2017, which saw 48 people shot and five killed, officials told Fox News on Monday. Raysuan Turner, 16, and Darnelle Flowers, 17, were found Sunday night at about 11:57 p.m. shot to death in a field on the Far South Side of the city, police said. They had vanished day earlier, FOX 32 Chicago reported. Earlier Sunday night, five people...

Several trailers filled with donations for Hurricane Maria victims were found rotting at a state elections office in Puerto Rico this week. The New York Times reported Friday that at least 10 trailers full of food, water and baby supplies were broken open and overrun with rats. The Times noted that local radio station, Radio Isla, published a video showing cases of items such as beans, Tylenol and water covered in rat and lizard droppings. According to the Times, the Puerto Rico elections commission offices were used as a collection center for donations from private entities and nonprofit groups after...

The Puerto Rican government acknowledged in a new report in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria that more than 1,400 people likely died on the island because of the storm, roughly 20 times the previous number that had been provided. The government on Thursday published a report titled "Transformation and Innovation in the Wake of Devastation," which outlines the island's response to the storm and what it intends to do to strengthen its economy and infrastructure moving forward. It also includes new estimates on the death toll. “Although the official death count from the Puerto Rico Department of Public Safety was...

Good grief, this is horrific. ABC News Chicago is reporting that over 60 people have been shot, with 9 killed, in Chicago just this weekend (Friday through Sunday). (Chicago) Dozens of people were wounded in shootings across Chicago since Friday, police said. One paramedic described the evening as “a war zone.” Since midnight, police said 43 people have been shot, six fatally. Since Friday at 5 p.m., 60 people have been shot, nine fatally, in shootings in Chicago. 34 of the shootings and five deaths occurred between 10 a.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. Sunday, according to police. During one two-and-a-half...

More than a hundred people have been killed in a suicide bombing in Pakistan as tensions rise in the country ahead of an election on July 25. At least 128 people died in the explosion at an election rally in the southwestern province of Baluchistan. Siraj Raisani, a candidate running for a provincial assembly, was among those killed in the town of Mastung. It was the deadliest attack in Pakistan in four years. Hours after the bombing, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was arrested after making a high-profile return to the country. Sharif was given a 10-year prison sentence in...

Two boats carrying tourists off the coast of Thailand capsized in 16-foot waves near the resort island of Phuket, killing at least 33 people and leaving dozens missing, officials said Friday. One of the boats, the double-decker cruise ship Phoenix PC Diving, was carrying 105 passengers — including 93 tourists, all from China — when it capsized Thursday after leaving Koh Racha, a popular snorkeling spot. Phuket officials said Friday evening that 33 bodies had been recovered so far, all of them Chinese nationals. Twenty-three other people are missing. The second boat, the Serenita, sank Thursday off Koh Mai Thon,...

Five people have died and several others are hurt after a shooting at the Capital Gazette newspaper building in Annapolis, Maryland, local and federal officials say. The names of the dead were not released immediately. The suspected shooter is in custody, and authorities are questioning him, officials said at a news conference Thursday afternoon. "I don't know what to say other than our thoughts and prayers are with them and their families, and we take comfort knowing that they are in God's embrace," Anne Arundel County Executive Steve Schuh said. Injured victims are being treated at R. Adams Cowley Shock...

Rescuers struggled to reach rural residents cut off by a volcanic eruption that killed at 25 people near Guatemala's capital, and authorities feared the death toll could rise with an undetermined number of people unaccounted for. The Volcan de Fuego, Spanish for "volcano of fire," exploded in a hail of ash and molten rock shortly before noon Sunday, blanketing nearby villages in heavy ash. Then it began sending lava flows down the mountain's flank and across homes and roads around 4 p.m. local time Eddy Sanchez, director of the country's seismology and volcanology institute, said the flows reached temperatures of...

Another person has died in Congo of a confirmed case of Ebola, bringing the number of fatalities from the latest outbreak to 12, the country’s health ministry said Sunday. The death happened in Iboko, a rural area in northwestern Equateur province, the health ministry said in a statement. There are also four new suspected cases in the province, the statement reported. Congo now has 35 confirmed Ebola cases. Health workers have identified people who have been in contact with the patients in the confirmed Ebola cases in three areas in Equateur province, Iboko, rural Bikoro and Mbandaka, the provincial capital...

Four new cases have been confirmed as Ebola, said the health ministry in a statement released early Sunday. A total of 46 cases of hemorrhagic fever have been reported in the current outbreak, including 21 confirmed cases of Ebola, 21 probable and four suspected.

At least eight people have been killed in a Texas high school shooting Friday, FOX 26 reported. The suspected shooter was taken into custody and the active shooter situation was said to be over. Police officers responded to Santa Fe High School around 8 a.m. CDT after reports that a shooter opened fire inside. The gunman appears to be a student, KTRK reports, citing a law enforcement official. Further details of the incident were not immediately available.

At least 41 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and 1,960 others were wounded after protesters converged on the razor wire fence between the Gaza Strip and Israel hours before the U.S. Embassy opened in Jerusalem. Monday's march was meant to express anger over U.S. Embassy's inauguration. Tuesday is “Nakba” or Catastrophe Day, when Palestinians observe the 70th anniversary of Israel’s founding. Moving the embassy from Tel Aviv breaks with decades of Washington policy and distances America from its allies.The protest movement started not with a bullet or a bomb, but with a hashtag. “What if 200,000 demonstrators in a...

The Israel Police is preparing for the US embassy's official opening ceremony in Jerusalem with thousands of policeman deployed through the city. At 4:00 PM the official ceremony will take place at the US Consulate in the Armona neighborhood of Jerusalem, which will officially become the US embassy this week. Palestinians throughout the West Bank and Jerusalem were urged to turn out en masse to protest the embassy move..... 3:11 PM Protest death toll rises to 28, Gaza Health ministry reports.......

A family of six launched suicide attacks on Christians attending Sunday services at three churches in Indonesia's second-largest city of Surabaya, killing at least 13 people and wounding 40, officials said. Police said the family who carried out Sunday's attacks were among 500 Islamic sympathizers who had returned from Syria. "The husband drove the car, an Avanza, that contained explosives and rammed it into the gate in front of that church," East Java police spokesman Frans Barung Mangera told reporters at the regional police headquarters in Surabaya. The wife and two daughters were involved in an attack on a second...

Police in Indonesia are promising to crack down on the distribution of bootleg alcohol as deaths this month from drinking illegally produced toxic liquor rose to at least 86... "In the past, bootleg alcohol was found to be a mixture of alcohol and energy drinks. Some are a mix of pure alcohol, carbonated drinks and an ingredient used in anti-mosquito repellent."... Alcohol is legal in Indonesia, but over 100 regional regulations are in place to control consumption. Across the country, the sale of alcoholic beverages containing less than 5% alcohol, such as beer, is no longer allowed in convenience stores...