Free Republic

For the first time in South Korea, a nursing assistant who was paralysed after receiving a COVID-19 vaccine was recognised as a victim of an industrial accident, making her eligible for government benefits and compensation. The nursing assistant, who has not been identified, received AstraZeneca's (AZN.L) shot on March 12 and later suffered from double vision and paralysis and was diagnosed with acute encephalomyelitis, the state-run Korea Workers' Compensation & Welfare Service said on Friday. The service said in a statement the woman did not have underlying conditions and there seemed to be a "a reasonable causal link between the...

"The spread of polio around the world has become so serious it is now an international public health emergency, the World Health Organization warned today. The agency said the problem could grow in the next few months and unravel the nearly three-decade effort to eradicate the crippling disease. It described current polio outbreaks in Asia, Africa and the Middle East as an 'extraordinary event' that required a coordinated international response. It was the first-ever international alert on polio. 'Until it is eradicated, polio will continue to spread internationally, find and paralyze susceptible kids,' Dr Bruce Aylward, who leads WHO's polio...

BENTONVILLE -- The father of a 17-year-old girl found his daughter's boyfriend hiding inside her bedroom closet Tuesday, beat him bloody with a pool stick, then left the room to fetch a gun. The daughter and boyfriend blocked the door with a dresser, so the father shot through the closed door, hitting the boyfriend in the back and paralyzing him, police said. George David Reed, 48, posted a $150,000 bond and was freed from jail Wednesday afternoon as Michael Austin Guzman, 19, underwent surgery to treat a bullet lodged in his spinal cord. Three of Guzman's vertebrae are fractured and...

FRIENDSWOOD, Texas -- A motorist injured in a crash lay paralyzed in the middle of a freeway with a broken neck for 36 hours before he was rescued. Ed Theisen's body was blocked from view by Gulf Freeway traffic barricades in this Houston suburb. The 46-year-old survived a night alone on the concrete, unable to move or summon help. "Someone riding in the back of a pickup truck spotted him and called police," Debora Rodeffer-Theisen, his wife, said Monday after her husband emerged from surgery. "The officer poked him with a nightstick thinking he was a dead body, but he...