Free Republic

RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israeli strikes on the southern Gaza city of Rafah overnight killed 22 people, including 18 children, health officials said Sunday, as the United States was on track to approve billions of dollars of additional military aid to Israel, its close ally. Israel has carried out near-daily air raids on Rafah, where more than half of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million has sought refuge from fighting elsewhere. It has also vowed to expand its ground offensive against the Hamas militant group to the city on the border with Egypt despite international calls for restraint, including from...

Leading U.S. health officials on Sunday cautioned Americans against jumping to conclusions about the COVID-19 omicron variant as numerous countries outside of South Africa, where it was first detected, report cases of the strain. Experts stressed that the data on the omicron variant is extremely limited and data on whether or not it can evade vaccine immunity should come out in the next few weeks, providing a clearer picture on how countries should be addressing omicron.

There is a public health crisis in America and it’s not the pandemic. The public health crisis in the U.S. is a lack of faith in the credibility of public health experts and officials whose double standards, misinformation, and selective adherence to certain “facts” have caused widespread confusion, resentment, and fright in millions of people.This should have been a time for the CDC, the NIH, and especially, Dr. Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to step up and shine. But politics and a spectacularly inept public outreach program that should have calmed fears and explained what was...

US health officials have warned of the dangers posed by the latest deadly dare sweeping the internet: The Fire Challenge. Those taking part in the challenge douse themselves in flammable liquids and set fire to themselves, then extinguish the flames as quickly as they can, uploading the videos onto sites including YouTube and Facebook. Santa Clara county health officials in California have warned of the dangers posed by the game, and say that several taking part in it have suffered severe burns as a result. “A number of kids have suffered second- and third-degree burns across the country,” said Joy...

Just before Christmas, the American Civil Liberties Union launched another salvo against people of faith. On Dec. 22, the ACLU sent a letter to federal health officials urging the government to force US Catholic hospitals to perform abortions in violation of their core moral commitment to protecting the unborn. They're counting on sympathetic Obama rationing czar Donald Berwick to dictate which religious principles hospital operators can and can't follow. The ACLU reiterated its call for a federal probe of Catholic hospitals nationwide that refuse to provide "emergency" contraception and abortions to women. The Catholic Church makes clear that it is...