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Sub-title: If you've ever wanted to tickle your brain, now is your chance. Rite Aid came out with its do-it-yourself COVID-19 test in April. This is a viral test, meaning it will tell you if you have the virus. It is not an antibody test. And when Rite Aid first made the announcement, the test was only for those with COVID-19 symptoms. You had to fill out an online questionnaire to determine your eligibility. And I had no symptoms, so I wasn’t eligible. But just recently, Rite Aid changed its policy. Now, anybody can sign up for the test. And...

When dining rooms in Washington start to reopen in the coming months, restaurants will not be required to record customers’ contact information after all. In a walk-back of a controversial component of the restaurant reopening guidance issued earlier this week, Gov. Jay Inslee’s office issued a statement on Friday evening “clarifying” that the state will not require customers to provide their contact information when they go out to eat. Instead, businesses are asked to maintain a list of customers who voluntarily do so.

I. Respiratory Specimens Nasopharyngeal swab: Insert a swab into nostril parallel to the palate. Swab should reach depth equal to distance from nostrils to outer opening of the ear. Leave swab in place for several seconds to absorb secretions. Slowly remove swab while rotating it. Oropharyngeal swab (e.g., throat swab): Swab the posterior pharynx, avoiding the tongue. Nasopharyngeal wash/aspirate or nasal aspirate Collect 2-3 mL into a sterile, leak-proof, screw-cap sputum collection cup or sterile dry container.

When Jim Batdorf tried to pick up hand sanitizer last week, he was greeted with bare shelves. The rush on grocery stories and pharmacies since the first death caused by COVID-19 in Washington state wiped out stocks of disinfectants across the region. Batdorf, a chemical engineer turned head distiller at Richland-based Solar Spirits, wanted to help in his own way to curb the spread of the disease. So he put together a kit so people can make their own hand sanitizer. “Keeping our hands clean is a key factor in the national fight against the spread of the coronavirus,” he...

CHICAGO — For centuries, 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit was said to be the average, normal body temperature. It’s not.

Seattle will provide $800 each in vouchers to more than 6,000 families to help them buy food, cleaning supplies and other household goods at Safeway supermarkets during the coronavirus pandemic, Mayor Jenny Durkan said Monday. Pending City Council approval this week, the funding will come from Seattle’s sugary beverage tax revenues, the Mayor’s Office said. “We know that working families in Seattle are already struggling because of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Durkan said in a statement, referring to the illness caused by the virus. “As schools and child care facilities close, we need to do everything we can to support families...

Repatha cut by 20 percent the combined risk of having either a heart attack, stroke or a heart-related death. That happened to nearly 6 percent of people on Repatha versus more than 7 percent on the dummy drug. The benefit grew with longer use, and was 25 percent the second year, said Sabatine, who consults for Amgen and other drugmakers. The drug cut by 15 percent a broader set of problems — the ones above plus hospitalization for chest pain or an artery-opening procedure. Nearly 10 percent of folks on Repatha had one versus more than 11 percent on the...

Colton Harris-Moore asked the public for $125,000 to pay for his flight training. The folk-celebrity fugitive, on the lam for more than two years, stole and crashed three planes before being arrested in the Bahamas. The idea was shot down, at least for now, before it could really take flight. “Barefoot Bandit” Colton Harris-Moore, who eluded police for two years while committing a string of break-ins and thefts, started a GoFundMe page to raise more than $125,000 for private and commercial pilot-license training and helicopter certification. As a folk-celebrity fugitive, Harris-Moore stole and crashed three planes during his well-documented exploits....

It’s a case that’s inspired intense news coverage, one that’s led to fierce debate about religious freedom versus protection from discrimination, and one that could have far-reaching legal implications. And on Tuesday, more than 3 1/2 years after it was set in motion by an interaction in a Richland floral shop, the Arlene’s Flowers case heads to the Washington State Supreme Court. Oral arguments start at 9 a.m. at Bellevue College. Attorneys for both sides will be on hand, along with supporters, journalists and the three people at the heart of the case — Barronelle Stutzman, who owns the...

Flying a bit under the radar in August, the federal National Institute on Drug Abuse wrote an explainer to a significant longitudinal study involving young twins and marijuana pointing out that marijuana did not cause a decrease in IQ. In the explainer titled "Study Questions Role for Marijuana in Teen Users' IQ Decline," the agency wrote: "In a recent study sponsored by NIDA and the National Institute of Mental Health, teens who used marijuana lost IQ points relative to their nonusing peers. However, the drug appeared not to be the culprit." Instead, the culprit for the differences in IQ between...

Israa Ali was restless. The 19-month-old toddler, dressed in pink to match her mother Amani’s pink hijab, whined and tugged at a box of sterile gloves on the medical exam table, demanding attention. Her father, Kareem Ali, shushed Israa as he watched over her sleeping infant sister, Sarah. Amani Ali was one of 15 patients who had come to the Muslim Association of Puget Sound, or MAPS, mosque in Redmond on Sunday for the launch of a new health clinic. Amani, who is originally from Palestine, does not have health insurance. The Community Clinic is hosted by MAPS and the...

PASTOR PATRINELL WRIGHT was just a 20-year-old country girl from Carthage, Texas, who didn’t know what she was getting into when she migrated to Seattle in 1964. She grew up one of seven children in the Walnut Grove community, to be exact, a nearby farming enclave designated for blacks. That’s how it was in Southern towns back then. If you were black, you knew where you belonged, and it sure wasn’t around white people, unless you happened to be working for them. Seattle had its own form of segregation, with blacks clustered mainly in the city’s Central District because of...

A Kennewick man was arrested Monday morning after he allegedly struck a neighbor with the neighbor’s own gun, causing it to fire, following a scuffle over loud music. The 25-year-old neighbor approached Codie Supak, 35, early that morning about the latter’s stereo, which was playing so loudly that it woke other residents in the apartment complex at 2604 W. Bruneau Place, a release said. That’s when Supak became confrontational and started assaulting the neighbor, causing a .40-caliber semi-automatic pistol the neighbor had tucked in his gym shorts to fall to the ground. Supak picked up the gun and pointed it...

UPDATE SATURDAY 8:19 PM- YAKIMA, WA- Yakima Police say they have arrested 26-year-old Manuel Verduzco in connection to the deaths of 27-year-old Karina Morales-Rodriguez and 30-year-old Marta Martinez. Both women were Moneytree employees at the location near Walnut and First Street where the shooting occurred this morning. Yakima police say the two women were confronted by a suspect while they were opening the business Saturday morning. Verduzco was identified as a possible suspect through an investigation. More information came to light later in the day that led to Verduzco's arrest Saturday afternoon. He is booked into the Yakima County Jail...

Just after Uncle Ike's Pot Shop opened in Seattle's Central District, it boasted in an ad, "Our weed cures Ebola." Knowing that merchants in the new industry weren't allowed to make any medical claims about pot, the fine print disclaimer winked: "If you believe this ad, you are a (expletive) moron." That in-your-face Vern Fonk-on-weed sensibility has helped make Uncle Ike's the state's top-selling pot store, with $1.4 million in monthly sales. It's also changing the personality of 23rd Avenue and East Union Street, once a predominantly African-American corner, with neon signs, a wall-mural ad, food truck, sign-waving mannequin and...

Seattle Archbishop J. Peter Sartain: Catholic Church can in no way associate itself with same-sex marriage. Bishop Blanchet High School in Seattle has refused to run an announcement in its alumni magazine for the same-sex marriage of an alumna who once served as student body vice president and homecoming queen. In response to the submission by the 1997 graduate, the school sent her a letter saying, in part, "... the Archdiocese does not permit this type of information to be published in our Catholic school magazine." The reaction has been a much-circulated Facebook post by James Nau, who was student...

She was walking home from school, with traffic rushing all around, when Zion Lourdes Perez tore off her hijab. Feeling like a target at 15 was nothing she'd imagined when she decided, on a lark, to wear the head scarf worn by Muslim women. Perez, raised Catholic, is a co-founder and president of the Muslim Student Association at Franklin High, and while many students tried on the covering for an hour or two during "modesty week," Perez wanted a deeper understanding of what it meant to broadcast religion on one's sleeve - or head, as it were. The experience last...

Say goodbye to tipping at Tom Douglas' Dahlia Lounge, Palace Kitchen and The Carlile Room. The entirety of the 20 percent service charge "will be redistributed to our team through wages, commissions and benefits," Douglas said in a news release. Among the goals of the change, he said, is to "provide greater compensation equity for front of house and back of house." (The company said it based the 20 percent figure on average customer tips over the past three years.) And while Douglas's take on Seattle's $15-an-hour minimum wage has not necessarily been positive in the past, he promised, "We...

Some state-certified marijuana labs testing for microbes such as E.coli and mold appear more friendly to pot merchants than others, according to an analysis by a Woodinville data scientist. Four labs rejected none of the pot they tested over a three-month period last year, according to the analysis by Jim MacRae. Four other labs failed more than 12 percent of samples tested over the same time, with two labs rejecting 44 percent of samples for microbes. “It’s almost impossible for that to happen,” said David Lampach, co-founder of Steep Hill Labs in Tukwila, of the disparity. After sifting through public...

UNION GAP, WA.- The price of marijuana continues to drop in retail shops across the state, so we checked in with two of the local shops in Union Gap to see how they're adapting to the changing times. Even though prices have dropped to an all time low across the state over the past year, local owners say their products are still flying off the shelves. When Station 420, opened their doors in 2014 they were selling a gram for around $40.00. "It was tough, the supply was short, we didn't have very many options and it was expensive," owner...