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March 25 (UPI) -- A man in China has died after testing positive for the hantavirus, according to Chinese state media. Global Times reported the patient, a migrant worker from southwestern Yunnan Province, died while traveling on a chartered bus to Shandong Province for work on Monday. There is more than one strain of hantavirus, some more harmful than others, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. There is no approved cure or vaccine against hantaviruses in the United States. An inoculation may be available in China. The group of diseases is spread primarily among rodents, and...

A British documentary covering the last months of peace and the first of the war.

Give Joe Biden some credit. On Jan. 27, he published an op-ed in USA Today recognizing that the coronavirus outbreak could become a big problem. But he devoted nearly the entire piece to bashing President Trump -- who was then fighting off impeachment from Biden's old Democratic colleagues on Capitol Hill -- and nearly none of it to explaining what he, Joe Biden, would do to fight the pandemic. Since then, where has Biden been? It's been eight weeks since the Iowa caucuses, when Biden began a terrible stretch at the polls that threatened his presidential candidacy. It's been three...

Democrats indicate they are finally ready to sign the phase three economic stimulus package Wednesday, which includes a measure that prohibits Donald Trump's family businesses from receiving benefits from the coronavirus relief. Senators were finally able to strike a deal overnight on the $2 trillion rescue package to address the fallout from the coronavirus outbreak, after Democrats blocked the first two versions of the GOP-backed bill. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer wrote in a Dear Colleague letter early Wednesday morning that the new bill includes a provision to 'prohibit businesses controlled by the President, Vice President, Members of Congress, and...

After hours of pushback from residents, gun stores, Second Amendment organizations, and even the county attorney, Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva reversed course early Wednesday morning and now says his office is suspending attempts to force firearm retailers to lock their doors. Villaneuva announced the move on social media, saying it will be up to Gov. Gavin Newsom to determine what is, and isn’t, an essential business.

Both the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change are global crises with the power to derail economies and kill millions of people. Society has moved far more aggressively to address the coronavirus than it has the climate crisis. But some experts wonder if the unprecedented global mobilization to slow the pandemic might help pave the way for more dramatic climate action. Leah Stokes, a political scientist at UC Santa Barbara, pointed out that aggressive steps to reduce planet-warming emissions — such as investing in solar and wind power, switching to electric cars and requiring more efficient buildings — wouldn’t be nearly...

LATEST, March 24, 8:43 p.m. Los Angeles County health officials backtracked Tuesday on their announcement that a child died from coronavirus, saying it’s possible the death was caused by something else.

Democratic presidential candidate and former VP Joe Biden has been accused of being out of the limelight as the coronavirus pandemic shuts down the country. So his handlers said set ’em up, Joe, and scheduled a whirlwind of video appearances. So far, they’ve spotlighted his famous knack for stumbling into word salad. Fresh off an online appearance in which he waved off his first point about the pandemic as his teleprompter allegedly malfunctioned, Biden came to The View seeking redemption. He appeared via satellite to reveal how he would handle the current coronavirus crisis.

Neither hurricanes nor 9/11 caused as big a surge in gun sales as Coronavirus - Gun shop owners have never seen such a surge in sales — not after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, not in reaction to mass shootings, not even when Category 5 hurricanes threatened to flatten South Florida. Fear and uncertainty about the impact of the coronavirus pandemic are motivating people to buy guns and ammunition as they seek protection from possible doomsday disintegration into lawlessness, with home invasions, looting, runs on banks, and fights over food, medicine, hospital beds and shelter across the land. "Our sales are...

Coronavirus is frightening. I'm working from home, practicing "social distancing." Experts say it'll help "flatten the curve" so fewer people will be infected simultaneously. Then hospitals won't be overwhelmed. But the infection rate grows. Doctors and hospitals may yet be overwhelmed. It didn't have to get to this point. Coronavirus deaths leveled off in South Korea. That's because people in Korea could easily find out if they had the disease. There are hundreds of testing locations -- even pop-up drive-thru testing centers. Because Koreans got tested, Korean doctors knew who needed to be isolated and who didn't. As a result,...

WASHINGTON - The financial hardship caused by the coronavirus outbreak could fall particularly hard on African Americans and Latinos, undoing economic gains President Donald Trump has touted in his outreach to those key voting blocs ahead of the Nov. 3 election. With job cuts hitting U.S. states as governors and companies order offices and workplaces closed, African Americans and Latinos are particularly vulnerable because they more often have jobs that cannot be done at home. “That will make them more severely impacted by an extended coronavirus shutdown of the economy,” said Jay Shambaugh, a White House economist during Democratic President...

Entrepreneur Elon Musk, President Donald Trump, and New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo have each touted chloroquine, a drug used to treat malaria, as a promising treatment option for those infected with Covid-19. Some media quickly pounced on the president’s statement. The commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, Stephen Hahn, quickly clarified that the agency had not in fact approved the drug as a safe and effective treatment for the new disease, shortly after the president claimed that the drug was “approved very, very quickly and it’s now approved by prescription.” Chloroquine is in fact available for prescription in the...

For one fleeting moment, the Hélica—a plane without wings and an “unsteerable murder machine”—looked like the future of transportation. Good thing it wasn’t. ______________________________________________________________________________________ In 1909, Marcel Leyat, an engineer from the tiny mountain town of Die in southeastern France, designed and built his first airplane. Not long after, he ran out of money. The young engineer had trained in aeronautics, only to find his skillset obsolete in a market controlled by the military; bespoke airplanes were a dying business. Undaunted, Leyat turned his attention to the pursuit of his real dream: building what he called a “plane without wings.”...

Those looking for good news these days can find it in a March 23 Supreme Court decision recognizing that sometimes people really do take actions based on factors other than race. Even better, the court decision was unanimous. Great racial comity may result. In Comcast v. National Association of African American-Owned Media, all nine justices agreed that in a tort lawsuit alleging racial discrimination, the plaintiff must prove that the business decision in question was indeed motivated by — get this — actual racial discrimination. Amazingly, common sense prevails. Of course, for years, at least in contexts other than tort...

On Sunday, the news was that Democrats in the Senate, having worked to draft a bipartisan bill to help Americans through the coronavirus crisis, received orders from Rep. Nancy Pelosi to reject it. On Monday, the Democrats doubled down on that rejection. Also, on Monday, Nancy proposed a 1,100-page bill that did provide some help for America’s workers, small businesses, and corporations. Most of the bill, though, was given over to Democrat wish-list items. If coronavirus had hit America with a Democrat in the White House and a Democrat majority in Congress, by Monday's end, a new law would have...

Nancy Pelosi is not going to let this public health crisis go to waste. The house speaker is holding much-needed economic relief hostage to gain for Democrats something they have long yearned for: more federal control over state elections. In a bill ostensibly intended to save American jobs, Pelosi and her Senate allies crammed a wish list of bad election and voting reforms, including mandatory early voting, mandatory voting by mail, and the legalization of California-style ballot harvesting. Pelosi is taking the country closer to federalized elections than ever before. What’s in it for them? It creates a one-stop shop...

According to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), checks would be cut April 6. Key provisions via Bloomberg: Big Businesses: About $500 billion can be used to back loans and assistance to companies, including $50 billion for loans to U.S. airlines, as well as state and local governments. Small Businesses: More than $350 billion to aid small businesses, including $10 billion in SBA grants of up to $10,000 for small business costs, and $17 billion for SBA to cover six months of payments for businesses with current SBA loans. Hospitals: A $150 billion boost for hospitals and other health-care providers...

A recent report by Chris Stewart has shed new light on some of the educational problems faced by black youth. The report is titled "The Secret Shame: How America's Most Progressive Cities Betray Their Commitment to Educational Opportunity for All." Stewart is a self-described liberal and CEO of Brightbeam, a nonprofit network of education activists who want to hold progressive political leaders accountable. The report asks, "So how do we explain outstandingly poor educational results for minority children in San Francisco -- which also happens to be one of the wealthiest cities in the country?" "The Secret Shame" reports that...

Morning "Betrayest thou the Son of Man with a kiss?" Luke 22:48 "The kisses of an enemy are deceitful." Let me be on my guard when the world puts on a loving face, for it will, if possible, betray me as it did my Master, with a kiss. Whenever a man is about to stab religion, he usually professes very great reverence for it. Let me beware of the sleek-faced hypocrisy which is armour-bearer to heresy and infidelity. Knowing the deceivableness of unrighteousness, let me be wise as a serpent to detect and avoid the designs of the enemy. The...

Amateur radio volunteers from around the world have volunteered to assist University of Florida Professor Sam Lampotang and his engineering team in their quest to rapidly develop an open-source, low-cost patient ventilator that can be built anywhere from such commonly available components as PVC pipe and lawn-sprinkler valves.