News category, Page 1247
Worries about vaccine rollout rise as New York finds coronavirus variantVideo
ALBANY, N.Y. — In an effort to speed up what has been a sluggish rollout of the coronavirus vaccine, New York’s governor threatened Monday to fine hospitals up to $100,000 if they don’t finish their first round of inoculations by the end of the week. Gov. Andrew Cuomo made the...
Prosecutor: Wisconsin pharmacist thought covid vaccine was unsafeVideo
PORT WASHINGTON, Wis. — A Wisconsin pharmacist convinced the world was “crashing down” told police he tried to ruin hundreds of doses of coronavirus vaccine because he believed the shots would mutate people’s DNA, according to court documents released Monday. Police in Grafton, about 20 miles north of Milwaukee, arrested...
Urging calm, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser calls in National Guard for protestsVideo
Bracing for possible violence, the nation’s capital has mobilized the National Guard ahead of planned protests by President Donald Trump’s supporters in connection with the congressional vote expected Wednesday to affirm Joe Biden’s election victory. Trump’s supporters are planning to rally Tuesday and Wednesday, seeking to bolster the president’s unproven...
South Africa testing whether vaccines work against variant
JOHANNESBURG — Scientists in South Africa are urgently testing to see if the vaccines for covid-19 will be effective against the country’s variant virus. The genomic studies come as Britain’s health minister, Matt Hancock, and other experts in the U.K. have said they worry that vaccines may not be effective...
In farewell, DeVos urges Congress to reject Biden’s policies
In a farewell letter to Congress on Monday, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos urged lawmakers to reject President-elect Joe Biden’s education agenda, while imploring them to shield Trump administration policies that Biden has promised to eliminate. DeVos does not explicitly acknowledge President Donald Trump’s election defeat nor does she refer to...
U.K. prime minister orders new virus lockdown for England
LONDON — Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced on Monday a new national lockdown for England until at least mid-February to combat a fast-spreading new variant of the coronavirus, even as Britain ramped up its vaccination program by becoming the first nation to start using the shot developed by Oxford University...
Federal judge rejects lawsuit seeking to overturn Trump loss
MADISON, Wis. — A federal judge on Monday rejected a lawsuit filed by two Republican Wisconsin lawmakers, voting rights groups and others seeking to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in Wisconsin and four other swing states where Democrat Joe Biden defeated President Donald Trump. U.S. District Judge James Boasberg,...
Prosecutor says Wisconsin pharmacist thought vaccine was unsafe
PORT WASHINGTON, Wis. — A Wisconsin pharmacist told police he tried to ruin hundreds of doses of coronavirus vaccine because he felt the medicine wasn’t safe, a prosecutor said Monday. Police in Grafton, about 20 miles north of Milwaukee, arrested the Advocate Aurora Health pharmacist last week following an investigation...
Harvard professor believes asteroid was actually old alien techVideo
It would appear that one man’s rock is another alien’s outdated cellphone. Avi Loeb, an Israeli-American theoretical physicist and professor at Harvard University, theorizes in his upcoming book “Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth” (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) that a rock that entered our solar system in September...
California’s covid-19 numbers grow with hospitals swamped
LOS ANGELES — California’s coronavirus death toll has topped 26,500 and confirmed cases have neared 2.4 million since the pandemic began, health officials said. The state’s swamped hospitals held more than 22,000 covid-19 patients, including nearly 4,700 in intensive care units, the Department of Public Health said Monday. Gov. Gavin...
France charges an alleged organizer of giant New Year’s rave
PARIS — An alleged organizer of an illegal New Year’s Eve rave that at least 2,500 people attended for more than a day in western France was charged Monday with endangering lives amid a coronavirus curfew and other restrictions. The 22-year-old man also faced property damage and drug charges among...
Amazon’s Bezos tops list of richest charitable gifts in 2020
SILVER SPRING, Md. — The world’s richest person made the single-largest charitable contribution in 2020, according to The Chronicle of Philanthropy’s annual list of top donations, a $10 billion gift that is intended to help fight climate change. Amazon’s founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos, whose “real-time” worth Forbes magazine estimates...
Saudi Arabia to lift Qatar embargo, open airspace and border
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Kuwait’s foreign ministry on Monday announced that Saudi Arabia will lift a years-long embargo on Qatar, opening its air and land borders in the first steps toward ending the Gulf crisis. The state-run Kuwait News Agency reported the announcement, saying that Saudi Arabia would open...
Kentucky officers in Breonna Taylor face termination hearing
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Two Kentucky police detectives involved in the raid that left Breonna Taylor dead, including the one who shot her, were scheduled Monday to face a termination hearing. Detectives Myles Cosgrove and Joshua Jaynes received notice last week from Louisville Police interim Chief Yvette Gentry that she intends...
Judge weighing disputed ballots in undecided N.Y. House race
ALBANY, N.Y. — A judge in upstate New York on Monday was reviewing 2,500 challenged ballots that could determine the winner of the nation’s last undecided U.S. House race. Entering the new year, former U.S. Rep. Claudia Tenney, a Republican, had a 29-vote lead over the incumbent Democrat, U.S. Rep....
Pa. will get more covid vaccine this week, availability to general public still ‘months’ away
Thousands more doses of covid-19 vaccines are set to arrive in Pennsylvania this week, with more than half reserved for health workers awaiting their second dose of the two-dose vaccination, Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine said Monday. So far, 135,044 people across the state have received the vaccine in...
Tanya Roberts, Bond girl and ‘’70s Show’ star, hospitalized
LOS ANGELES — Tanya Roberts, who captivated James Bond in “A View to a Kill” and later played Midge Pinciotti in the sitcom “That ’70s Show,” has been hospitalized after falling at her home. The actor had mistakenly been reported dead by her publicist earlier Monday. Roberts’ publicist Mike Pingel...
Pennsylvania reports 7,800 more covid cases, 122 deaths over 2 days
The Pennsylvania Department of Health’s latest report, released Monday, shows another 7,805 more cases of covid-19 over the past two days. While still a high number of cases, the latest figures were nearly 10% less than were reported a week ago (8,663). Officials said the case counts are atypically low...
Vaccination campaign picks up speed around the world
The campaign to vanquish the coronavirus is picking up speed, with Britain beginning to dispense the second vaccine in its arsenal Monday. But authorities in France and elsewhere in Europe are coming under fire for slow rollouts and delays. In the U.S., meanwhile, government officials reported that vaccinations have accelerated...
Lava spatters, flows inside crater of Hawaii volcano
HONOLULU — Lava spattered and flowed over the weekend inside the crater of a Hawaii volcano that began erupting in December. The Hawaiian Volcano Observatory said the lava is confined to the summit crater of Kilauea, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported Sunday. The eruption began Dec. 20 within Hawaii Volcanoes National...
Restaurants, gyms, casinos reopen as latest covid-19 restrictions expireVideo
Restaurants, bars, gyms and casinos reopened Monday morning at a still-limited capacity when Pennsylvania’s most recent set of covid-19 restrictions expired at 8 a.m. The restrictions, started Dec. 12, barred restaurants from allowing indoor dining and shut down gyms and casinos in the face of a post-Thanksgiving surge in virus...
Hundreds demonstrate over fatal Minneapolis police shooting
MINNEAPOLIS — Hundreds of protesters marched in Minneapolis to demand justice in the fatal police shooting of a 23-year-old man, the city’s first police-involved death since George Floyd died after being restrained by officers in May. As many as 1,000 demonstrators marched and chanted Sunday near the site where Dolal...
Iran starts 20% uranium enrichment, seizes tanker in Strait of HormuzVideo
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Iran began enriching uranium Monday to levels unseen since its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers and also seized a South Korean-flagged tanker near the crucial Strait of Hormuz, a double-barreled challenge to the West that further raised Mideast tensions. Both decisions appeared aimed at...
U.K. judge refuses extradition of WikiLeaks founder Assange
LONDON — A British judge on Monday rejected the United States’ request to extradite WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to face espionage charges, saying he was likely to kill himself if held under harsh U.S. prison conditions. District Judge Vanessa Baraitser rejected allegations that Assange is being prosecuted for political reasons...
Don’t draw military into U.S. election, ex-defense chiefs say
All 10 living former U.S. defense secretaries called for a peaceful transition of power this month and warned that any effort to involve the military in resolving election disputes “would take us into dangerous, unlawful and unconstitutional territory.” Three days before Congress meets to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s victory, the...
