Free Republic

A pandemic of the novel coronavirus has now killed over 200,000 people worldwide. More than 2.89 million people across the globe have been diagnosed with COVID-19, the disease caused by the new respiratory virus, according to data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. The actual numbers are believed to be much higher due to testing shortages, many unreported cases and suspicions that some governments are hiding the scope of their nations' outbreaks.

A White House official ordered a CNN reporter to give up her front-row seat and move to the back of the press room before President Trump’s briefing on Friday, in what appears to be another attempt by Trump to punish a network he calls “fake news.” The reporter, CNN White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins, refused to move, as did a second reporter whose seat in the rear of the room she was ordered to take. The official then suggested the matter would be resolved by the Secret Service, though no action was taken, according to several people involved in the...

I had an idea on how to create a coronavirus vaccine. I am only a layperson but the idea may have merit. The focus of vaccine research has been how to deal with the spike proteins or the "crown" on the coronavirus. These spike proteins provide a pathway for the coronavirus into cells. A vaccine would purportedly initiate an immune response to these proteins. My idea is to modify the coronavirus and make it harmless by removing these spike proteins. Once introduced into the body this spikeless coronavirus should initiate an immune response and thus immunity to the real Covid-19....

A female classmate of Doherty High School senior Hunter Portaleos took her life the first week of April. “I had talked to her a few days before it happened, and she seemed fine,” Portaleos said. “I didn’t see any warning signs. A lot of her friends didn’t, either.” Two El Paso County teens have died by suicide since mid-March, when society began to shut down. “A lot of youth are dealing with anxiety and being socially isolated at home,” 18-year-old Portaleos said. “Along with what’s triggering the anxiety and bad mental health is the fact of not knowing what’s going...

Celebrities during the quarantine are an inspiration to us all. How they talk down to us, telling us how to live, and empathizing on how hard things are as they're trapped on their multi-million dollar estates. And Gal Gadot singing her condescending, cringe worthy version of Imagine is gonna help pull us all through this difficult crisis.

At the end of last week, the Prime Minister was beginning to wonder if the country was taking his advice too much to heart. He asked us to stay at home - and we have. At each daily press conference, medical and scientific advisers talk about the plunge in use of transport and how well rules are being observed. What they don’t say is that this was not quite in their original plan. Government modellers didn’t expect such obedience: the expected workers to carry on and at least a million pupils to be left in school by parents. The deaths...

North Korea ruler Kim Kong-un is dead or gravely ill after a stent procedure went wrong because his doctor's hands were shaking, according to reports, amid questions over his health -- Kim Jong-un is dead or on his death bed after a heart operation went wrong because his doctor's hand were shaking, reports claim. Rumours surrounding the health of the North Korean despot have been rife since he missed a celebration of the birthday of his late grandfather and the country's founder, Kim Il-sung, on April 15. A Japanese weekly magazine, Shukan Gendai, now reports that the leader is in...

As Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak prepares a phased structure to reopen Nevada’s businesses but hesitates to provide hard dates for the reopening, a Nevada brothel owner announces safety procedures that she plans to adopt once the governor gives the go-ahead to reopen the Silver State’s legal bordellos. Madam Bella, owner of Bella’s Hacienda, a legal brothel located in Wells, understands that reopening Nevada’s licensed brothels will be a challenge amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and she intends to meet the challenge head-on with clear guidelines to ensure the safety of the brothel’s sex workers, guests, and staff.

Apple said on Thursday it has found “no evidence” a flaw in their Mail app for iPhones and iPads has been used against customers, and that it believes the flaw does “not pose an immediate risk to our users.” Reuters—iOS email exploitSan Francisco-based cybersecurity firm ZecOps on Wednesday detailed a flaw that it said may have left more than half a billion iPhones vulnerable to hackers. Zuk Avraham, ZecOps’ chief executive, told Reuters he found evidence the vulnerability was exploited in at least six cybersecurity break-ins On Thursday, Apple disputed Avraham’s evidence that the hack had been used against users....

Just enjoy!

Below you will find regular, but not daily, updates on medical and political developments.April 25, 2020 Medical updates Video: The Californian physician Dr. Dan Erickson described his observations regarding Covid19 in a press conference. Hospitals and intensive care units in California and other states have remained largely empty so far. Based on the respective positive test rates, Dr. Erickson calculates that the lethality rate of Covid19 is currently 0.03% in California, 0.05% in Spain, 0.09% in Sweden and 0.1% in New York State, while the lethality rate of the flu in the USA is around 0.13%. (Note: the positive test...

embers of the United States military are inadvertently funding the rise of their biggest 21st Century adversary — China — through their retirement savings, Army Green Beret and Congressman Mike Waltz (R-FL) warned in an interview this week. About $50 billion from the 401k-style plan that U.S. troops put their savings into is invested in an index that includes Chinese firms, some of which build weapons systems for the Chinese military, he said in an interview with Breitbart News on Wednesday. “It’s insane,” he said. “This is the most dangerous adversary we have ever faced.”Waltz said in a video he...

"VAnilla Ice Cream" from She Loves Me

A potential antiviral drug for the coronavirus has reportedly failed in its first randomised clinical trial. There had been widespread hope that remdesivir could treat Covid-19. But a Chinese trial showed that the drug had not been successful, according to draft documents accidentally published by the World Health Organization. The drug did not improve patients' condition or reduce the pathogen's presence in the bloodstream, it said. What do we know about the study? News of the failed trial spread after the WHO posted details on its clinical trials database, before it was removed. The WHO has since confirmed the draft...

Today the hashtag #DropOutBiden is trending on Twitter in response to new information that supports the credibility of Tara Reade’s allegations against him. Here’s Hillary stan Peter Daou saying the party has no credibility if it sticks with Biden: DIFFICULT THREAD — #BIDEN SHOULD WITHDRAW1. I respect the will of the voters.2. But new information has emerged supporting #TaraReade's account of being sexually assaulted by #JoeBiden.3. Credible rape accusations are disqualifying or we have NO moral standards.— Peter Daou (@peterdaou) April 25, 2020 9. This is the ethical position AND the smarter strategy to beat Trump.10. We lose ALL...

This Crap has gone on long enough!

Human tooth shape varies greatly among individuals and populations. Examples of common dental features include the groove patterns in crowns, the relative size of cusps, the number of roots, and the presence or absence of wisdom teeth. These dental traits are heritable, with certain traits commonly observed within families. Some of them occur at different frequencies across populations in a way that is similar to the inheritance and variation of DNA. "Dental traits can be used in population genetic studies when DNA is not available," says Hannes Rathmann. Teeth are the hardest tissue in the human body and individuals' dental...

When the ancestors of modern humans left Africa 50,000 years ago they met the Neandertals. In this encounter, the Neandertal population contributed around two percent of the genome to present day non-African populations. A collaboration of scientists from Aarhus University in Denmark, deCODE Genetics in Iceland, and the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, have conducted the most comprehensive study to date using data obtained from 27,566 Icelanders, to figure out which parts of our genomes contain Neandertal DNA and what role it plays in modern humans. Every person of non-African decent shares around two percent of...

...The Democracy Fund and UCLA Nationscape Project, along with USA Today, quizzed 6,300 Americans from April 2 to 8. Shockingly, their survey found that nearly 50 per cent of respondents refuse to believe the official death toll, which has already soared to more than 54,000 in the US. Des Moines Register said the results showed people have a lot of mistrust in health officials and the government during the pandemic...

Mayor Martin Hicks from Grants, New Mexico broke with the liberal governor and vowed he will reopen his city next week. Mayor Hicks is a Democrat. Hicks had this to say about Democrat Governor Michelle Grisham, “The governor is killing us. She’s totally killing us.” The leftist governor wants businesses to remain closed until the middle of May. New Mexico has seen only 2,660 cases of the coronavirus and 93 deaths across the entire state. The state has seen 44 deaths for every million in population. There is no need to extend the lockdown. The mayor of a small New...