News category, Page 1415

An Iranian court has sentenced a prominent researcher with dual French-Iranian citizenship to six years in prison on security charges, her lawyer said Saturday. Fariba Adelkhah was sentenced to five years for “gathering and collusion” against the country’s security and one year for “spreading propaganda” against the Islamic system, her...

Pennsylvania reported 61 more covid-19 deaths and 989 newly confirmed cases as of Saturday morning, bringing the state’s total number of cases to more than 61,600. Hospitals are treating 1,887 patients with the disease, and 409 of those patients are on ventilators. Another 18 patients are on extracorporeal membrane oxygenation,...

MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Conservative lawmakers in Alabama last year tried to enact the nation’s most stringent abortion ban, but the attempt to outlaw the procedure may have had one ironic twist. An Alabama-based abortion rights group used a flood of donations that poured in from across the country after the...

Five Mexican citizens apprehended this week after illegally entering the United States in remote northern Maine were returned to Canada within hours under a rule put into place as part of the U.S. government response to the COVID-19 pandemic. A similar policy by the Canadian government allows the return to...

LOS ANGELES — The city of Los Angeles and LA County must find shelter for thousands of homeless people who are living near freeways, a federal judge ordered Friday, saying their health is at risk from pollution, earthquakes and the coronavirus. U.S. District Court Judge David O. Carter issued a...

JUNEAU, Alaska — An Alaska lawmaker on Friday defended asking whether stickers that individuals may be asked to wear as part of a Capitol coronavirus screening process will be “available as a yellow Star of David.” Republican Rep. Ben Carpenter of Nikiski said he was serious in making the comment...

NEW YORK — The Big Apple is running out of blood. The blood bank that supplies all of New York City’s public hospitals — as well as nearly 200 private hospitals throughout the state and in parts of New Jersey — is stocked with only enough donations to last the...

DENVER — A parolee suspected of killing a woman in Denver had been released from prison three weeks before the slaying because of concerns over the coronavirus. Cornelius Haney, 40, was released April 15 under powers granted to the Colorado Department of Corrections by Gov. Jared Polis, The Denver Post...

UPMC Shadyside is among 21 hospitals that will receive shipments of remdesivir, the antiviral medication that FDA officials have authorized for emergency use to treat covid-19 patients. The Department of Health distributed the second shipment of the investigative antiviral medication on Friday: 1,548 doses of medication were sent to 21...

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Gov. Gavin Newsom may call California a nation state, but he’s hanging his hopes for avoiding drastic state budget cuts squarely on the federal government. The money may not come easily in a divided Congress, even with two Californians in the top roles in the U.S. House....

OMAHA, Neb. — Nebraska prison officials cannot withhold public records that reveal where they purchased their supply of lethal injection drugs, the state’s highest court said Friday in a ruling that could threaten Nebraska’s ability to carry out executions for the dozen men on its death row. In ordering the...

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Gov. Ron DeSantis said some Floridians waiting on unemployment checks have themselves to blame for not filling out their applications properly. During an exchange with a reporter during a Friday news conference in Jacksonville, DeSantis expressed frustration with news stories that quote Floridians who have been unable...

PORTLAND, Ore. — Voters in metropolitan Portland, Oregon, will be asked Tuesday to approve taxes on personal income and business profits that would raise $2.5 billion over a decade to fight homelessness even as the state grapples with the coronavirus and its worst recession in years. The ballot measure was...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Ja’nayla Johnson worked hard in high school with the dream of being the first in her family to graduate from college, but she started to doubt herself as several colleges rejected her. Then Bennett, a small historically black women’s college in North Carolina, saw Johnson’s potential and...

LAS VEGAS — The cracked main highway between Las Vegas and Reno reopened Friday, 10 hours after a predawn magnitude 6.5 earthquake that a researcher called the largest to strike the remote area of western Nevada in 65 years. No injuries were reported, but officials said goods tumbled from market...

WASHINGTON — Federal health officials are alerting doctors to a potential accuracy problem with a rapid test for covid-19 used at thousands of hospitals, clinics and testing sites across the U.S., including the White House. The Food and Drug Administration said late Thursday it is investigating preliminary data suggesting Abbott...

Contact tracing has been done on infectious diseases for years, but it arguably has never been more discussed or under as much scrutiny as it is now as the world grapples with the coronavirus pandemic and tries to reclaim some amount of normalcy. Pennsylvania officials have identified the simple yet...

WASHINGTON — The United States is on track to meet its commitment to the Taliban to withdraw several thousand troops from Afghanistan by summer, even as violence flares, the peace process is stalled, and Kabul struggles in political deadlock. U.S. officials say they will reduce to 8,600 troops by July...

PARIS — French nurses and doctors faced off with President Emmanuel Macron at a leading Paris hospital Friday, demanding better pay and a rethink of a once-renowned public health system that found itself quickly overwhelmed by tens of thousands of virus patients. “We are desperate. We no longer believe in...

KABUL, Afghanistan — A U.S. official said Friday he is convinced the Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan carried out this week’s horrific attack on a maternity hospital in a majority Shiite Muslim neighborhood in Kabul, killing 24 people, including newborn babies and mothers. Peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad said the U.S....

LAS VEGAS, Nev. — The main highway between Las Vegas and Reno was damaged and closed early Friday following a magnitude 6.5 earthquake in a remote area of Nevada. Nevada Highway Patrol photos showed cracks on U.S. 95 that Trooper Hannah DeGoey said were caused by the temblor a little...

NEW YORK — The New York Police Department, criticized over instances of harsh social distancing enforcement, will step back from ticketing people for gathering in small clusters or for failing to wear a mask, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Friday. The police will continue to disperse large gatherings that are...

WASHINGTON — Democrats began pushing Congress’ biggest coronavirus relief bill yet toward expected House passage Friday, a $3 trillion behemoth they said a beleaguered country badly needs but that Republicans called a bloated election-year wish list. Democratic leaders were pressing ahead despite grumbling from party moderates leery of the measure’s...