Daily Archives: April 23, 2021


CDC Independent Immunization Panel Meets on Johnson & Johnson Vaccine

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Immunization Committee is meeting Friday to consider lifting a pause on use of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.   The pause was widely implemented last week following the discovery of six U.S. cases of a rare and severe type of blood clots in people who had received the shot.   On April 13, the CDC, in a joint statement with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, recommended a pause on use of the vaccine, “out of an abundance of caution” and to …


Norwegian Climber Is 1st to Test Positive on Mount Everest

The coronavirus has conquered the world’s highest mountain.   A Norwegian climber became the first to be tested for COVID-19 in Mount Everest base camp and was flown by helicopter to Kathmandu, where he was hospitalized. Erlend Ness told The Associated Press in a message Friday that he tested positive on April 15. He said another test on Thursday was negative and he was now staying with a local family in Nepal. An ace mountain guide, Austrian Lukas Furtenbach, warned that the virus could spread among the hundreds of other …


India Reports Record Number of COVID Infections, Again

COVID-19 is surging at an astounding rate in India. The South Asian nation’s health ministry said Friday it had counted a record-breaking 332,730 new infections in the previous 24-hour period. The new tally surpasses Thursday’s record daily toll of 314,835 new infections.At least six hospitals in New Delhi, the capital, have run out of, or are on the verge of running out of, oxygen for their patients.The oxygen shortage is so acute that the high court in the capital ordered the national government to divert oxygen from industrial use to …


Biden’s Climate Pledge: Not Easy, Not Impossible

Cutting U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in half is doable but hard, experts say, and some of the biggest barriers are political, not technical.President Joe Biden on Thursday FILE – A wind turbine is pictured, Jan. 13, 2021, near Spearville, Kan.U.S. emissions are declining, but far too slowly to reach Biden’s target. They would have to fall on a scale that has happened only three times since 2005, Rossetti noted, and not for good reasons — during the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2008-09 financial crisis and during an exceptionally mild winter in …


Expedition Hauls Tons of Plastic Out of Remote Hawaii Atolls

A crew returned from the northernmost islands in the Hawaiian archipelago this week with a boatload of marine plastic and abandoned fishing nets that threaten to entangle endangered Hawaiian monk seals and other animals on the uninhabited beaches stretching nearly 2,100 kilometers north of Honolulu.The cleanup effort in Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument lasted three weeks and the crew picked up more than 43 metric tons of “ghost nets” and other marine plastics such as buoys, crates, bottle caps and cigarette lighters from the shores of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.The monument, …


Russians to be Serenaded by Tchaikovsky Music at Olympics After Anthem Ban

Russian Olympic medal winners in Tokyo this year and at the 2022 Beijing Games will be serenaded by Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s music, the country’s Olympic committee said on Thursday, as their national anthem is banned because of doping offenses.Russian athletes are barred from competing at major international events, including the Olympics, under the country’s flag and with their anthem until 2022 following a ruling by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) late last year.Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks at a gala concert of the winners of the 15th International Tchaikovsky …