Is COVID losing its fangs and becoming more like the flu?
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Today’s hyper-transmissible strain of the COVID-19 virus has sent cases soaring across the country. But rising deaths — the grim marker of earlier dangerous surges — haven’t kept pace, and the average risk of dying from an infection is dropping to levels almost as low as seasonal influenza, leading epidemiologists say.
Is the COVID virus — that has killed more than 1 million Americans — losing its fangs?
George Lemp, an infectious disease epidemiologist who has analyzed California public health data through the pandemic, thinks so. He said death rates have fallen consistently over the last two and a half years.
“COVID-19 case fatality rates are substantially lower and are rapidly approaching that of the annual flu,” said Lemp, former Director of the California HIV/AIDS Research Program at the University of California, Office of the President.
—The Mercury News
Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s troubles continue, this time for what he didn’t do
WASHINGTON — If Rep. Madison Cawthorn doesn’t turn in his campaign finance report by Sunday, federal election regulators will deem it so late that there’s no hope of receiving it.
And the regulatory agency has already put Cawthorn on notice that he’s racking up a hefty fine for taking his time.
Debbie Chacona, assistant staff director with the Federal Election Commission, addressed the matter with Cawthorn in a letter dated Aug. 1. Normally, such a letter would go to a candidate’s treasurer, but Cawthorn, a one-term congressman, gave himself that position not long after he lost his reelection in the May primary.
“The civil money penalty calculation for late reports does not include a grace period and begins on the day following the due date for the report,” Chacona told Cawthorn.
The report was due on July 15.
—The News & Observer
Walgreens fueled San Francisco's opioid crisis with thousands of 'suspicious orders,' judge rules
Walgreens helped fuel the opioid epidemic in San Francisco by shipping hundreds of thousands of "suspicious orders" of prescription drugs to its pharmacies, a federal judge ruled Wednesday.
More than 100 million prescription opioid pills were dispensed by Walgreens in the city between 2006 and 2020, and during that time, the pharmacy giant failed to investigate hundreds of thousands of orders deemed suspicious, U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer wrote in his 112-page opinion in a lawsuit filed by San Francisco against major prescription-drug sellers.
How much the company will have to pay will be determined at a later trial date. "Walgreens has regulatory obligations to take reasonable steps to prevent the drugs from being diverted and harming the public," Breyer wrote. "The evidence at trial established that Walgreens breached these obligations."
The public nuisance lawsuit, filed by the city in 2018, also included claims against Johnson & Johnson, Allergan, Purdue Pharma, Teva Pharmaceutical Industries and Endo International, as well as McKesson Corp., AmerisourceBergen Corp. and Cardinal Health — three of the biggest drug distributors in the country.
—Los Angeles Times
Reports: 4th member of IS 'Beatles' terror cell arrested in UK
LONDON — A man alleged to be the fourth member of a terror cell known as The Beatles has reportedly been arrested in the U.K. on terror charges.
Aine Davis, 38, was arrested on Wednesday evening after arriving at Luton airport on a flight from Turkey, according to BBC News.He was arrested in relation to offenses under sections 15, 17 and 57 of the Terrorism Act, 2000. Davis was arrested by officers from the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command and taken to a police station in south London, the BBC reported.
Davis is said to have denied he was part of the Beatles cell — so nicknamed because of their English accents — which tortured and beheaded Western hostages in Syria.
Cell ringleader Mohammed Emwazi, widely known as Jihadi John, was killed in a drone strike in 2015. Londoner Alexanda Kotey was jailed in the U.S. in April for his part in the torture and murder of American hostages.
—dpa
