sigh…
Category: Money, Class, and Poverty,
Donald Trump Has Stake In Hydroxychloroquine Drugmaker
Donald Trump Has Stake In Hydroxychloroquine Drugmaker: Report
Why would he be interested in any solution he does not have an interest in?
Trump Administration Ordered Land Taken Out Of Trust, Tribal Chairman Says
Yes, this has been coming for some time, but still, fucking assholes!
The Coronavirus’s Unique Threat to the South
Kaiser’s at-risk group includes all people over 60 years old and all adults younger than 60 who also have heart disease, cancer, lung disease, or diabetes. In each state, older people are the majority of the people considered to be at risk of complications. But the Deep South and mid-South form a solid bloc of states where younger adults are much more at risk. In Arkansas, Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, and Mississippi, relatively young people make up more than a quarter of the vulnerable population. Compare that with the coronavirus’s beachhead in Washington State, where younger adults make up only about 19 percent of the risk group.
…Southerners are more likely to suffer from chronic diseases than other Americans—even as Americans are more likely to suffer from chronic diseases than citizens of other countries with comparable wealth. According to Neuman, these estimates don’t include people with cancer or who are immunocompromised—groups that are also at high risk for serious illness from COVID-19. And cancer mortality rates are highest in southern states.
…These differences are not innate to southerners; they are the result of policy. Health disparities tend to track both race and poverty, and the states in the old domain of Jim Crow have pursued policies that ensure those disparities endure. The South is the poorest region in the country. The poor, black, Latino, or rural residents who make up large shares of southern populations tend to lack access to high-quality doctors and care. According to the State Health Access Data Assistance Center, Mississippi, North Carolina, Texas, Florida, Georgia, and Louisiana all spend less than $25 per person on public health a year, compared with $84 per person in New York. Nine of the 14 states that have refused to expand Medicaid to poor residents under the Affordable Care Act are in the South.
…Advocates have drawn attention to the extreme vulnerability of people in prison to the coronavirus—and the South incarcerates a larger proportion of its population than anywhere else in the United States. …Southern states have some of the lowest ratios of active physicians to patients in the country.
The Coronavirus’s Unique Threat to the South – The Atlantic
Sigh…
In the Midst of the Coronavirus Pandemic, Construction Is Set to Resume on the Keystone Pipeline
So here’s the situation: in the middle of a pandemic, construction workers will move into isolated rural communities with already strained hospital resources. The “man camps” where many such workers in the industry live are associated with violence against women and other crimes, even in the best of times. Now, with the pandemic, many of the Native communities that live along the pipeline route fear for the worst. “This causes eerie memories for us with the infected smallpox blankets that were distributed to tribes intentionally,” Faith Spotted Eagle, a leader of the Yankton Sioux Tribe, said. (The coronavirus is already wreaking havoc on isolated reservations in other parts of the country, and the chronically underfunded Indian Health Service is struggling to meet the crisis.)
…I don’t know if corporations can be evil—I don’t think so, even if the Supreme Court insists on describing them as people. But this is capitalism at its most naked, willing to endanger people in the covid-19 crisis and to heat the earth in the climate crisis, all in search of a bit more profit. In a world running right now on bravery and love, it’s hard to imagine anything much darker.
hmmmmm
Trump rejects Obamacare special enrollment period amid pandemic
Trump rejects Obamacare special enrollment period amid pandemic – POLITICO
…Because eh’s a maniacal, satanic, asshat.
Actually Satanists are better people than that. They tend to support science and are pro separation of church and state. Sorry Satanists! Shouldn’t have insulted you, so!
Coronavirus leads to class warfare in Hamptons
Every aspect of life, most crucially medical care, is under strain from the sudden influx of rich Manhattanites panic-fleeing, bringing along their disdain and disregard for the little people — and in some cases, knowingly bringing coronavirus.
…“We’re at the end of Long Island, the tip, and waves of people are bringing this s–t,” says lifelong Montauker James Katsipis. “We should blow up the bridges. Don’t let them in.”
Coronavirus leads to class warfare in Hamptons
hmmmmm
TX Lt. Gov: Older people would rather die than let Covid-19 harm US economy
The lieutenant governor of Texas went on Fox News to argue that he would rather die than see public health measures damage the US economy, and that he believed “lots of grandparents” across the country would agree with him.
…Patrick said he feared that public health restrictions to prevent coronavirus could end American life as he knows it, and that he is willing to risk death to protect the economy for his grandchildren.
“You know, Tucker, no one reached out to me and said, ‘As a senior citizen, are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren?’” Patrick said. “And if that’s the exchange, I’m all in.”
So stupid it is positively evil.
TX Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick Rejects Social Distancing, Seniors Need to Risk Death
[Trump’s] comments are getting perilously close to urging Americans to ignore doctors and scientists, all of whom seem to be saying we need these drastic measures until the virus subsides. The irony, of course, is if Trump gets his way, we’ll clearly have way more deaths than if we were isolated from each other … and what does he think will happen to the economy then?
…The Lt. Gov. of Texas says to hell with social distancing, because old folks should risk death by COVID-19, so the economy can start recovering.
…That would seem to be an odd time to stop doing what every scientist says will prevent the virus from spreading and killing more people.
TX Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick Rejects Social Distancing, Seniors Need to Risk Death
oy….
Elizabeth Warren Is Everywhere On Coronavirus Response
Even before she left the presidential race, Warren had worked to shape seemingly every element of the federal government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic and the steep recession that is almost certainly coming with it. Her proposal to bar companies who receive bailout funds from stock buybacks has been endorsed by even conservative Republicans, and she worked with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to make canceling student debt part of the Democratic Party’s proposed response to the crisis.
She’s peppered seemingly every branch of President Donald Trump’s administration with letters demanding details on how they’re responding, sending more than 25 letters to different branches and agencies, covering everyone from the Federal Communications Commission to the National Institutes of Health to Vice President Mike Pence’s office.
“This is not my first rodeo,” Warren said.
… On Tuesday, she rolled out a list of eight conditions she argued should be placed on any company that receives government funds to help stay afloat during the pandemic, including a permanent ban on stock buybacks, a three-year ban on dividends or executive bonuses and setting aside board seats for employee-elected representatives.
…Warren’s role in the debate shows she’s continuing to function as the Democratic Party’s ideas factory even after her presidential campaign sputtered.
To Warren allies, it makes perfect sense that the second-term senator would grieve the end of her campaign by making policy. Warren’s original rise to political prominence was a result of the similarly complicated and all-encompassing 2008 financial crisis, and Warren released plans to deal with both a pandemic and a financial collapse during her 2020 run for the presidency.
…“If anyone is going to listen to anybody on how to get out of this, it’s going to be Elizabeth Warren,” said Mary Anne Marsh, a Boston-based Democratic strategist.
Why Elizabeth Warren Is Everywhere On Coronavirus Response | HuffPost
hmmmm
Senate Intel chair sold up to $1.6 million in stock before market crash
Senate Intel chair sold up to $1.6 million in stock before market crash – Axios
In a different pre-Trump time, one might have assumed that Burr would end up in jail.
These days? Who knows?
Video emerges showing Trump talking about cutting pandemic team in 2018, despite saying last week ‘I didn’t know about it’
Pretending it is a surprise that Trump undermines the credibility of journalism.
From February 3, 2020: The Trump administration has made the US less ready for infectious disease outbreaks like coronavirus
Over the past three years the administration has weakened the offices in charge of preparing for and preventing this kind of outbreak.
…It has slashed funding for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and its infectious disease research. For fiscal year 2020, Trump proposed cutting the CDC budget by US$1.3 billion, nearly 20% below the 2019 level.
…Every year since taking office, Trump has asked for deep cuts into research on emerging diseases – including the CDC’s small center on emerging and “zoonotic” infectious diseases.
…It manages laboratory, epidemiologic, analytic and prevention programs, and collaborates with state and local health departments, other federal government agencies, industry and foreign ministries of health.
In 2018, Trump tried to cut $65 million from this budget – a 10% reduction. In 2019, he sought a 19% reduction. For 2020, he proposed to cut federal spending on emerging infectious and zoonotic diseases by 20%. This would mean spending $100 million less in 2020 to study how such diseases infect humans than the U.S. did just two years ago.
…The overall level of appropriations for relevant CDC programs is still 10% below what the U.S. spent in 2016.
…in 2018 the administration disbanded its own global health security team, which was supposed to make the U.S. more resilient to the threat of epidemics.
…[The Trump administration] eliminated the National Security Council’s global health security and biodefense directorate, and reshuffled its team of world-class infectious disease experts. In response, two highly respected leaders in the field – Rear Admiral Tim Ziemer, the NSC’s senior director for global health security and biodefense, and Homeland Security adviser Tom Bossert – left the White House.
…Containing the first major Ebola epidemic in 2014-2016, which killed 11,000 people in West Africa, required an enormous global effort. Only 11 patients were treated for Ebola in the U.S., but that was because President Obama took the threat seriously, appointing an “Ebola czar” to coordinate U.S. preparedness and assistance.
hmmm
From May 23, 2017: Trump’s plan to destroy the US science budget [Foreshadowing Alert!]
His full budget proposal for the 2018 fiscal year requests that billions of dollars be slashed from the agencies tasked with funding and conducting research that drives innovation and keeps Americans healthy and safe.
…Trump intends to cut nearly $5.8 billion in funding from the National Institutes of Health — about 18 percent of the agency’s total budget. It also cuts hundreds of millions of dollars from infectious disease programs at the CDC, and an additional $841 million from the National Science Foundation, which funds basic scientific research.
… The budget proposal calls for $333 million in cuts to three CDC programs aimed at curbing the spread of infectious diseases.
…An additional $136 million in cuts for the CDC Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response — about 10 percent of the office’s budget. This is the CDC office that responds to public health emergencies like outbreaks, epidemics, or “chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear threats.”
An 18 percent cut of $76.3 million to the CDC’s Center for Global Health, which coordinates international public health efforts aimed at eradicating infectious and chronic diseases worldwide.
…Apparently the Trump administration doesn’t believe in protecting American jobs when they’re science jobs.
Here’s Trump’s plan to destroy the US science budget – The Verge
Aggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggh!
From Feb 11, 2018: How will CDC cuts affect health programs abroad and at home? [Overt Foreshadowing Alert!]
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have recently lost hundreds of millions of dollars in funding cuts, including a $750 million cut in December. On Friday, President Trump signed a bill that slashed $1.35 billion from its Prevention and Public Health Fund over the next 10 years.
…December’s tax reform law stripped $750 million dollars from the program, moving that money to the childhood Health Insurance Program, or CHIP, instead. And this week, President Trump signed a bill cutting $1.35 billion from the PPHF over the next 10 years. In addition, funding is not being renewed for global health initiatives which monitor outbreaks overseas[emphasis: Peanut Gallery]
…[PPHF is] a program to promote public health and also keep public and private healthcare costs from rising.
…So in terms of tackling Ebola, there was a supplemental aid package that was passed to try to help build infrastructure in countries to tamp down the outbreak and actually prevent future outbreaks. And so now, what’s happening with cutting that funding, is that it’s actually creating more of a risk in the future. If there’s another outbreak that we don’t have that infrastructure to prevent the outbreak from spreading.[emphasis: Peanut Gallery]
…[Question:] If the PPHF goes away. How much of the overall CDC budget is it?
…[Answer] It’s 12 percent of the CDC budget. So in terms of the fund itself I think in 2017 the fund was allocated about $931 million and about $891 million of that went to the CDC for preventive programs.
How will CDC cuts affect health programs abroad and at home? | PBS NewsHour Weekend
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Trump budget chief holds firm boldface lies about the effect of cuts to the CDC budget amid virus outbreak because, yes they are that classless and delusional
Trump’s 2021 budget request ….proposed cutting Health and Human Services funding by $9.5 billion, including a 15 percent cut of $1.2 billion to the CDC and a $35 million decrease to the Infectious Diseases Rapid Response Reserve Fund’s annual contribution.
Trump budget chief holds firm on CDC cuts amid virus outbreak | TheHill
hmmm
Comments From The Peanut Gallery 