• Lifestyle

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

April 13, 2020

Texas Nursing Home Patients with COVID-19 Given Unproven Drug

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A nursing home in Texas has been using an unproven drug to treat people who have tested positive for COVID-19, according to NPR.

A doctor at The Resort at Texas City, a nursing home in Texas City, reportedly distributed the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine to many of the elderly patients diagnosed with COVID-19. The drug, which has not been officially approved for the treatment of the coronavirus, is being used by the physician and he is tracking the outcomes in what he’s calling an “observational study.”

The drug has been mentioned several times by President Donald Trump as a game-changer, yet, the nation’s leading health experts don’t yet agree with the assessment Trump has levied about the drug in its fight against COVID-19. As reported by NPR, “Some of the nation’s most respected health officials have said there is insufficient evidence showing that the 80-year-old drug, which is typically used to stave off malaria or treat lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, is a viable treatment in battling the new virus.” In addition, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has not approved hydroxychloroquine for the treatment of COVID-19.

Robin Armstrong, a physician and the medical director of the nursing home, has made the controversial decision to administer hydroxychloroquine last week. “It’s actually going well. People are getting better,” Armstrong told NPR, stating that after just a couple of days, some of the 39 patients on the medication are showing signs of improvement.

Scientists and health officials are concerned about the drug as it is known to have serious negative health impacts. “To be clear, no one is worse than when they started,” Armstrong said emphatically. “From my perspective, it’s irresponsible to sit back and do nothing. The alternative would have been much much worse.” 

People are also concerned about the political connections Armstrong had in getting the drugs. Armstrong called Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and he reached out to Texas state Sen. Bryan Hughes, also a Republican, who knew someone on the board of the New Jersey-based company Amneal Pharmaceuticals. The company, which makes and distributes the drug, has donated more than a million tablets nationwide, including to the states of Texas and Louisiana.

Armstrong has also acknowledged that some of the families were not aware their relatives were being given the drug, saying that “for the most part,” he consulted with each nursing home resident prior to giving them the tablets.

• News

by Moguldom

April 13, 2020

French Doctors Say COVID-19 Vaccines Should Be Tested On Poor Africans

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There outrage all across Africa after two well-respected French doctors went on a live TV show and suggested that coronavirus vaccines be tested on poor Africans.

The two doctors said during a segment broadcast on the French TV channel LCI that the testing should be done in Africa, “where there are no masks, no treatment, nor intensive care,” reported Business Insider.

One of the doctors, Jean-Paul Mira, went further and compared Africans to prostitutes who were the focus of past AIDS testing. “We tried things on prostitutes because they are highly exposed and do not protect themselves,” he said.

Of course, these suggestions were immediately called out as racist, especially by several African notables such as former Chelsea Football Club star Didier Drogba and former Barcelona striker Samuel Eto’o who tweeted their outrage at the two medics’ remarks.

Drogba, who is from Ivory Coast, tweeted: “It is totally inconceivable we keep on cautioning this. Africa isn’t a testing lab. I would like to vividly denounce those demeaning, false and most of all deeply racists words.”

Former Chelsea striker Demba Ba, who is from Senegal, tweeted, “Welcome to the West, where white people believe themselves to be so superior that racism and debility become commonplace Time to rise.”

Mira is head of the intensive-care department at the Cochin Hospital in Paris. The other doctor, Camille Locht, is the research director at the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research, known as Inserm.

“If I can be provocative,” Mira said on the TV show, “shouldn’t we do this study in Africa where there are no masks, no treatment, no intensive care? A bit like we did in some studies on AIDS. We tried things on prostitutes because they are highly exposed and do not protect themselves.”

Locht agreed. “You are right. We are actually thinking of a parallel study in Africa to use with the same kind of approach with BCG placebos,” he said, referring to vaccination against tuberculosis that Inserm says has appeared to protect children against infections, particularly respiratory ones.

“We will, in fact, think seriously about it,” he said.

Africa is the continent with the lowest number of reported COVID-19 cases, with nearly 7,500 cases and more than 320 deaths, Al Jazeera reported.

Bienvenue en occident , la où le blanc se croit tellement supérieur que racisme et débilité deviennent banalité. TIME TO RISE ✊🏿 pic.twitter.com/R08R7K9QAw

— Demba Ba (@dembabafoot) April 2, 2020

It is totally inconceivable we keep on cautioning this.
Africa isn’t a testing lab.
I would like to vividly denounce those demeaning, false and most of all deeply racists words.

Helps us save Africa with the current ongoing Covid 19 and flatten the curve. pic.twitter.com/41GIpXaIYv

— Didier Drogba (@didierdrogba) April 2, 2020

This article was written by Ann Brown for The Moguldom Nation.

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

April 12, 2020

California Woman Arrested For Licking Nearly $2,000 in Items

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From the Only in America files comes this latest entry!  The police have arrested a Northern California woman after she allegedly licked $1,800 worth of grocery store items according to Newsweek.

The woman, 53-year-old Jennifer Walker from South Lake Tahoe, had allegedly licked several pieces of jewelry for sale at the store and then placed them on her hands. After doing that, she then started to fill her shopping cart with approximately $1,800 worth of merchandise. She was arrested Tuesday according to a release from the South Lake Tahoe Police Department.

The release stated that “When officers arrived on the scene, a Safeway employee informed them that the suspect put numerous pieces of jewelry from the store on her hands. The suspect licked the jewelry then began to load her cart with merchandise from the store. The employee informed the officers that all the items in the suspect’s shopping cart were deemed unsellable due to the cross-contamination.

“Officers located the suspect, Jennifer Walker, a 53-year-old South Lake Tahoe resident, inside of the store with a shopping cart full of merchandise. An investigation revealed that Walker had no means to purchase any of the items. The approximate value of the items was $1,800.

“Walker was subsequently arrested for felony vandalism and was booked in the El Dorado County jail without further incident.”

Walker was arrested and given a felony charge of “vandalism of more than $400” and booked into the El Dorado County jail. She still she remains in custody, according to the inmate records. The South Lake Tahoe police department did not suggest she had a specific motive. The charge of vandalism over $400 carries possible sentences of up to one year in jail and/or up to $50,000 in subsequent fines. Records show that the suspect’s bail was set at $10,000.

There have been many cases of coronavirus-linked incidents in stores recently around the world. In Australia last week, a man was arrested after being accused of intentionally coughing on packets of noodles after the staff informed him that there was a limit on how many he could purchase.

In Missouri, a 26-year-old man was taken into custody after filming himself wiping his tongue on a row of deodorants in a Walmart store, before he posted the footage to social media. And in Florida, a man was seen spraying a substance on a business door and claimed that it contained the coronavirus.

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

April 12, 2020

There Is Now A National Surplus of Chicken Wings

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Due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic, with the cancellation of sports events, specifically the NCAA basketball tournament, March Madness, there is a serious surplus of chicken wings in the United States according to Yahoo Sports.

Chicken wings are now being sold for a little over $1 per pound according to the Washington Post, which is nearly half of what they were going for around the Super Bowl. There were nearly 1.25 million pounds of chicken wings sold the same week that the NCAA tournament was slated to start last month, per the report.

“The basketball, it’s for real,” said Erik Oosterwijk, president of Fells Point Wholesale Meats in Baltimore, via the Washington Post. “The basketball didn’t happen. People are not going to restaurants and there’s a lot of excess.”

And adding to the chicken wing surplus is the shutting down of some chicken franchises like Buffalo Wild Wings, Hooters and Wingstop, to name a few. These and most restaurants are either completely closed is only available for delivery orders and takeout only.

“Those are millions of pounds of wings that people don’t eat,” Oosterwijk told the Washington Post. “And if [coronavirus] happened in January and February, it would have been the Super Bowl that got hit. There’s no doubt there’s a lot of food out there today.”

Chicken wing producers have been experimenting with a few different options to try to deal with the surplus in recent weeks. Some have thought about closing some processing and packaging plants, restricting the number of chicken eggs allowed to hatch, and also trying to limit the chickens’ food supply so that they grow at a much slower pace. Suppliers have been trying to divert food from restaurants to grocers, too, or even freezing wings in a hope that the market bounces back soon.

“The major wing chains that should be hot this time of year are closed,” said Will Sawyer, an animal protein economist at CoBank said. “The food service side of things, they probably still have wings they bought weeks ago getting ready for March Madness and for people to come watch the games, but they’re not selling them.”

• News

by Derek Major

April 12, 2020

Kamala Harris Joins Joe Biden In Fundraising Effort

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Sen. Kamala Harris joined presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden Wednesday for a virtual fundraiser and the effort led many to believe Harris would be the best pick for vice president.

“Joe Biden has a way of working on these issues, not only to improve the lives of all Americans, but to improve their ability to believe that everything is going to be OK,” Harris said to donors, according to Essence.

Harris’ effort was part of a joint fundraising operation within the Democratic National Committee. She also fundraised on her own on Thursday, with $2,800 raised going toward campaign debts acquired prior to her exiting the race. Harris announced she would support Biden in early March after dropping out of the race in December.

Since she dropped out of the race, speculation has been building about Harris being a potential vice president pick. House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.) urged Biden to pick a black woman as his running mate in early March.

Clyburn said Biden should “reward” black women for their loyalty to the Democratic Party if he is the Democratic presidential nominee. Following the virtual fundraising appearance, social media crowned the former Attorney General for California, the best person to accompany Biden on a presidential ticket.

During an interview on The View earlier this week, the former AG explained why she chose to support Biden.

“I have a great deal of affection for him, and I believe that he is going to be an extraordinary president and the kind of president that we need at this moment,” Harris said. “Someone who has the ability to hold that office with a sense of dignity and a sense of kindness and empathy, but also address the challenges.”

While Biden hasn’t chosen a running mate, many on social media believe Harris should be the nominee as she became the top trending topic on Twitter Wednesday. On Thursday, Harris called President Trump a “drug pusher” for touting an unproven drug as a medicine for those infected with the coronavirus.

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

April 11, 2020

NBA Players Chris Paul and Trae Young Headline NBA HORSE Challenge

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The lack of basketball activities have sports enthusiasts clamoring for some type of action to feed their hunger for sports activity. Well, the National Basketball Association has a short term answer with the upcoming NBA HORSE Challenge.

ESPN, the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA) announced that they are introducing the new NBA HORSE Challenge to feed their audience with some basketball activity. 10-time NBA All-Star Chris Paul of the Oklahoma City Thunder, 2020 NBA All-Star Trae Young of the Atlanta Hawks and newly elected Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Famer Tamika Catchings are headlining the list of eight NBA and WNBA players and legends who will participate in the new NBA HORSE Challenge. The tournament will be shown exclusively on ESPN and can also be streamed on the ESPN App.

Starting on Sunday, April 12 at 7 p.m. ET, Paul, Young, Catchings, Chicago Bulls guard Zach LaVine, three-time WNBA All-Star Allie Quigley of the Chicago Sky, Utah Jazz guard Mike Conley Jr. and NBA Finals MVPs Chauncey Billups and Paul Pierce will match shots against each other in a single-elimination HORSE competition from their respective, isolated home courts. ESPN NBA commentator Mark Jones will be the official host of the challenge.

NBA HORSE Challenge participants will be divided into two groups of four. The winners of the first two games in each group will meet in the semifinals and then the winner from each group will move on to the championship round.  The four quarterfinal games will air on Sunday. The semifinals and the championship game will be played on Thursday, April 16, beginning at 9 p.m. ET.

The rules for the challenge will start with a coin toss at the start of each game, which will determine who shoots first, with the more senior player calling heads or tails. Players must describe each shot attempt, specifying the type of score they intend to make before taking a shot, such as a bank shot or swish. Dunking is not allowed. The first player in each game to accumulate the letters “H-O-R-S-E” after failing to match five shots is automatically eliminated from the challenge.

State Farm will donate more than $200,000 on behalf of the participants to charities that are specific to coronavirus response efforts. This donation builds on the more than $74 million that has been contributed by the NBA Family to date to support coronavirus relief efforts through its NBA Together campaign.

NBA HORSE Challenge Presented by State Farm participants:

 ESPN NBA HORSE Challenge Presented by State Farm schedule:

ESPN will televise the NBA HORSE Challenge as it continues its commitment to bring the sports community together through its #oneteam initiative.

• Lifestyle

by Derek T. Dingle

April 11, 2020

MLK Helped Influence Earl G. Graves Sr.’s Fight For Racial Justice [WATCH]

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From demanding corporations to expand procurement opportunities for Black-owned companies to advocating for the elevation of African American executives to C-Suite and corporate board positions, Black Enterprise Founder and Publisher was the nation’s strongest voice for leveling the business playing field. He also served, however, as one of the driving forces for racial justice over the past five decades.

The NAACP Spingarn Medal recipient used his role as a bully pulpit to speak out against racial injustice, including economic, educational and healthcare disparities. Throughout the years, he rallied millions of readers with his Publisher’s Page column to fight for such issues as voting rights and corporate divestment from Apartheid-era South Africa, among other matters. In fact, he had been arrested in protests against policy brutality after the 1999 shooting death of Amadou Diallo, an unarmed black man who was killed after four New York City police officers fired a total of 41 shots.

One of the major influences that fueled his unyielding advocacy was one of the founding fathers of the Civil RIghts Movement : Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Graves passed away on April 6 — two days after the  52nd anniversary of King’s death.

When Graves graduated from Morgan State University in 1958 —three years after the seminal Montgomery Bus Boycott on Alabama—King delivered what was described as a rousing speech to the school’s graduates. Graves was inspired by King’s powerful oratory. Framing his speech that a “New Age” of activism was chipping away at Jim Crow in America, King charged the MSU graduates  to “work passionately and unrelentingly for first-class citizenship…and go out, not as detached spectators, but individuals in the struggle, ready to cooperate with God, ready to cooperate with the forces of the universe, and make the new world a reality.”

After a decade of stirring the national conscience with his message of nonviolent change and playing a pivotal role in the passage of landmark civil rights and voting rights legislation, King had been slain by an assassin’s bullet in 1968. By then an administrative assistant for Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, Graves was assigned to assist Corretta Scott King, in transporting the body of the widow’s husband from Memphis to Atlanta as well as help with funeral arrangements. Two months later, he would escort Scott King to Kennedy’s funeral after the senator was assassinated during his run for the US presidency.

He wrote of the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize recipient in a 2012 Publisher’s Page column: “I know intimately the personal sacrifice that King made based on the promise of future generations.”

In the following video clip from Our World with Black Enterprise on the 40th anniversary of the civil rights leader’s death That aired in 2008, Graves offers his personal reflection on King and his lasting impact. 

• News

by Derek Major

April 11, 2020

Trump Says He’s Amazed Barack Obama Hasn’t Endorsed Joe Biden

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President Trump again used his coronavirus press briefings to attack those he sees as enemies, questioning why former President Barack Obama has not endorsed his former vice president, Joe Biden.

“I don’t know why President Obama hasn’t supported Joe Biden a long time ago,” Trump said, Wednesday according to NBC. “He feels something is wrong. … It does amaze me that President Obama hasn’t supported Sleepy Joe. It just hasn’t happened. When’s it gonna happen? Why isn’t he? He knows something that you don’t know, that I think I know, that you don’t know.”

Trump added that Obama would have to “come out at some point” and show support for his former VP because “he certainly doesn’t want to see me for four more years.”

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

April 11, 2020

‘Do It For Your Big Momma’: Surgeon General Pleads with Black Americans to Stop Smoking, Drinking or Taking Drugs to ‘Slow the Spread’

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At the beginning of this pandemic, it was rumored and spread around like wildfire that black people couldn’t get the coronavirus. Now, after several months of the crisis hitting the United States in a way not imagined, it turns out that, in most cases, the majority of deaths are black people. According to The Daily Mail, twice as many black and brown Americans have died of COVID-19 compared to their white counterparts, government data shows.

Surgeon General Jerome Adams, who just happens to be black, has pleaded with the African-American community and other communities of color to follow the government’s guidelines. The stay-at-home orders and social distancing suggestions were made to ‘slow the spread’ of the coronavirus, as those communities are being disproportionately hit by the pandemic. 

‘We need you to do this if not for yourself than for your abuela. Do it for your granddaddy, do it for your big momma, do it for your pop pop,’ the nation’s top doctor said Friday at the daily coronavirus taskforce briefing – later defending his use of slang.

‘But let me be crystal clear, we do not think people of color are biologically or genetically predisposed to get COVID-19, there is nothing inherently wrong with you,’ Adams said. ‘But they are socially pre-disposed to coronavirus exposure and have a higher incidence of the very diseases that put you at risk for severe complications of coronavirus.’

Earlier this week, New York had released data that showed black and Latino people were two times as likely to die from coronavirus than white residents. While in Chicago where 70 percent of the deaths have been black people, yet they only make up 30 percent of the population. Down in Louisiana, with New Orleans being another hot spot, 70 percent of the dead coronavirus victims have been black. while Black people only make up 32 percent of residents in that state. 

The Surgeon General continued his pleas, ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve been carrying an inhaler in my pocket for 40 years out of fear of having a fatal asthma attack,’ said Adams. ‘And I hope that showing you this inhaler shows little kids with asthma all across the country that they can grow up to be Surgeon General one day.’

‘But I more immediately share it so that everyone knows it doesn’t matter if you look fit, if you look young, you are still at risk for getting and spreading and dying from coronavirus,’ he warned.

by Cedric 'BIG CED' Thornton

April 11, 2020

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Name Checks Celebrities For ‘Reckless’ Social Media Posts During Pandemic

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It is well-documented that the coronavirus pandemic has affected everyone from the poor to the rich. The social media posts of celebrities who aren’t suffering in a way that poorer individuals can relate to upsets Los Angeles Lakers legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who wrote an editorial for The Hollywood Reporter chastising some of the elite for their recklessness.

Here are excerpts from Abdul-Jabbar’s piece:

“In times of crises, fame can be a valuable platform for mobilization and inspiration, but COVID-19 has rewritten the rules, and too many famous faces need to stop and think before they post.”

 

“Evangeline Lilly shared a defiant Instagram post (2.3 million followers) on March 16 announcing that, despite President Trump declaring a national emergency three days earlier, ‘Just dropped my kids off at gymnastics camp. They all washed their hands before going in. They are playing and laughing.’ Naturally, there was a vehement backlash, and at first she held her ground, suggesting the virus was just a political ploy: “Don’t abuse this moment to steal away more freedoms and grab more power.” Basically, the kind of nonsense rants you’d expect to find scrawled on a cardboard sign on a freeway off-ramp. Ten days later, she apologized while assuring everyone that she and her family were self-quarantining.”

 

“On March 16, Vanessa Hudgens told her 38.7 million Instagram followers in a live stream, while applying makeup, that estimates that the outbreak might last until July sound like ‘a bunch of bullshit.’ Her estimate, based on her vast knowledge of pandemics, was, “Like, I dunno, I think it’ll last, like, a month?”

 

She added: ‘It’s a virus, I get it. Like, I respect it. But at the same time, like, even if everybody gets it, like, yeah, people are going to die, which is terrible but, like, inevitable?’ Despite her contrived and pandering middle-school sleepover-speak, Hudgens is 32. Like Lilly, she faced an angry backlash and apologized. Still, how many of those 38 million followers, emboldened by her dismissal of the virus, spent the next 24 hours going out, getting infected and infecting others? Death may be inevitable, but did it require her help?”

 

“Justin Timberlake, who has donated generously to the food bank in Memphis, posted a photo to his 58.5 million Instagram followers of his wife, Jessica Biel, and a dog in a beautiful snowscape with the caption: ‘Out here social distancing with the fam and a lot of these [tree emojis]. I hope you guys are staying safe and healthy. We need to stick together and look out for each other during this crazy time.’ To many people in a small space with their whole family or multiple roommates, or standing in line to buy toilet paper, that photo doesn’t feel like we’re all in it together. Celebrities shouldn’t be ostracized for their wealth, but they should be sensitive enough not to rub it in the faces of the fans who enabled that fortune.

 

“The most dangerous and insensitive celebrity of all is former Celebrity Apprentice host and current president of the United States. On March 29, when we had 2,500 deaths from the coronavirus, Trump tweeted about what mostly occupies his mind: ‘President Trump is a ratings hit. Since reviving the daily White House briefing Mr. Trump and his coronavirus updates have attracted an average audience of 8.5 million on cable news, roughly the viewership of the season finale of The Bachelor. Numbers are continuing to rise …’ While the numbers of the dead are rising, he’s giddy about his ratings. At the same time, many news outlets are debating whether or not to carry his briefings live because, according to doctors and health officials, he has ‘repeatedly delivered information that doctors and public health officials have called ill informed, misleading or downright wrong.’

 

“Like it or not, stars with their millions of followers do have the power to affect the course of this pandemic by what they say. Which is why it’s crucial that while they’re self-isolating, they also need to be self-editing. Saying ‘we’re all in this together’ is easy; proving it is the challenge.”