Given a paragraph, generate a claim that is supported by the given paragraph. 1) The claim must contain information from within the paragraph. 2) A sentence within the paragraph can be used as a claim. 3) The claim should not have contradictions within the paragraph. 4) The claim should be at most one sentence long.
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Question: Since Nov. 1, South Carolina has recorded 86 reported cases of the contagious disease. State Epidemiologist Linda Bell said Monday that’s more than four times what state officials normally expect to see. Over the last 10 years, South Carolina averaged 19 reported cases of hepatitis A annually. Most of the new cases have occurred in Aiken County, and almost half of all cases involve individuals who reported drug use, Bell said. Still, the general population needn’t be overly concerned, she said. “But we are seeing cases higher that what we expect to see,” Bell said. “And so it’s important for us to do our prevention efforts early to reach those high-risk groups, get them vaccinated ... so that we can prevent” a severe outbreak. The State reports the Department of Health and Environmental Control is offering no-cost vaccines to high risk groups including drug users, homeless, formerly incarcerated and sexually-active gay men. Additionally, health officials recommend all children get two doses of the vaccine as part of their immunization schedule. Of the 86 reported cases in South Carolina, 59 have led to hospitalization and one resulted in death, the DHEC said. Hepatitis is a disease characterized by inflammation of the liver. It comes in many forms, including hepatitis A, B and C. As a result, individuals with chronic liver disease, like cirrhosis, are at increased risk of complications if infected and should be vaccinated. The virus-borne infection can be prevented by vaccination and is usually transmitted person-to-person through consumption of contaminated food or water, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Antibodies produced in response to hepatitis A infection last for life and protect against reinfection. Infection usually results in sickness in two to six weeks after exposure. Symptoms include fatigue, loss of appetite, stomach pain, nausea, and yellowing of the eyes and skin. Symptoms usually resolve within two months of infection, according to the CDC. State public health officials in February declared an outbreak in Aiken County after an employee at a second restaurant in Aiken tested positive for the virus, the DHEC said. Bell, though, stressed transmission by food or beverage is uncommon. “Most transmission in the United States is through person-to-person contact,” Bell said. “Good hygiene - diligently washing your hands - is a good way to prevent hepatitis A, as well as not sharing personal items,” including drug equipment, she said, adding the state has received reports of hepatitis A from people using various drugs, “everything from marijuana to meth.” Residents can schedule an appointment for a vaccination at their local health department by calling 855-472-3432 or going to http://bit.ly/2HhEsM8 . ___ Information from: The State, http://www.thestate.com

Answer: South Carolina declares hepatitis outbreak.


Question: But one theory about the epic undertaking reserves a special place for a nearby river, now known as the Frome, that may have served as a conduit for ferrying some of the smaller megaliths toward the site on rafts. Today, the placid waterway is once again playing a supporting role in a grand vision, albeit one its architects want to etch in the statute books, not in stone. Frome, a market town in the county of Somerset, is petitioning the British government to grant the River Frome “legal personhood” – in effect, giving it human rights. In throwing down this gauntlet, the town has joined a global “rights of nature” movement linking river basins in New Zealand to rainforests in South America and towns in the U.S. Midwest. In each case, communities are reimagining ways to harness the law to defend the Earth’s living tissues, and the places they call home. Some have dubbed it Mother Earth’s MeToo moment. In practical terms, supporters hope that granting the Frome rights will give lawyers a new avenue to seek redress whenever its waters are sullied by runoff from pig and dairy farms or overflowing sewers. Last month, one of the River Frome’s tributaries turned an unnatural shade of neon blue – highlighting wider concerns over water quality in British rivers. But Peter Macfadyen, an undertaker who redrew Frome’s political map by leading a band of independent candidates to take over the town council, wants to do more than protect one river. In an era of accelerating climate change, Macfadyen and his allies see their quest as part of a struggle to reset the balance between nature and the modern world. “This is much bigger than just wanting to punish people for doing something wrong,” said Macfadyen, who also served as Frome’s mayor. “It’s about trying to change a mindset about the environment in which we live.”   Supporters of the nature’s rights movement see Frome as the first test case for the concept in Europe. Nevertheless, the town has been waiting for months for the government to respond. And just as critics have questioned the effectiveness of campaigns in other countries, some in Frome have their doubts. Neil Howlett, a lawyer who lives by the river in Frome, says he backs many of the community-building steps taken by Macfadyen and other independent local politicians. But he sees the council’s vision for a “river’s rights” bylaw as a distraction. “Having a law which is completely outside the cultural basis of the society in which you pass the law doesn’t make for law that works,” Howlett said. “It’s lovely as an idea. But it’s only lovely as an idea.”   “PROGRAMMED FOR SELF-DESTRUCTION”   Although indigenous peoples have long shared the intuition that rivers, mountains and lakes are in some sense living, sentient beings, American legal scholar Christopher Stone framed the idea in contemporary legal terms. In his 1972 book, “Should Trees Have Standing?”, Stone argued that voiceless natural features would be best protected by granting them the kinds of legal protections and access to courts usually reserved for two-legged plaintiffs. The argument was a novel twist on the long-established principle in the United States that companies can enjoy “legal personality” to distinguish their legal obligations from those of their directors and shareholders. The idea is starting to spread. Campaigners won what is hailed as the first “rights of nature” courtroom victory in Ecuador in 2011 when judges stopped a road-widening project from dumping gravel in the Vilcabamba River. Around the same time, Bolivia enshrined a far-reaching vision of nature’s rights in a statute known as “The Law of the Rights of Mother Earth.”  In 2017, New Zealand’s parliament became the first legislature to acknowledge a river’s legal personhood when it passed a bill recognising the rights of the Whanganui River as an “indivisible and living whole.”  That same year, a high court in India declared the Ganga and Yamuna rivers legal entities – along with two Himalayan glaciers and their meadows, waterfalls and forests. Colombia’s constitutional court made a similar move for the Atrato River basin, where riparian communities face illegal gold mining and paramilitary violence. This summer, Bangladesh recognised the rights of all its rivers. Although legal systems in many developing countries were implanted during colonial times, nature’s rights campaigns in Europe and North America represents a role reversal in which “eco-cratic” indigenous worldviews are enjoying a revival. Advocates see this new “Earth jurisprudence” as a skeleton key to unlock a shift away from the endless pursuit of economic growth, regardless of the ecological consequences. “The current system is programmed for self-destruction, and the legal system is the enabler,” said Mumta Ito, a lawyer and founder of Nature’s Rights, a Scotland-based advocacy group, which is advising Frome town council. “The only way we’ll be able to change things is by creating a new operating system with nature’s rights at its core.”  Although the quest to win legal personhood for the River Frome was started barely a year ago, the roots of the campaign stretch back to a meeting at the Griffin pub in Frome one evening in 2011. Fed up with party divisions hobbling the town council, Macfadyen and a group of like-minded collaborators resolved to stand as independents at the next elections. Nestling in a shallow bowl of hills and noted for picturesque cobbled lanes, Frome has long been a magnet for free thinkers. But in a town of almost 27,000 people, the mavericks had never attempted a takeover. Surprising even themselves, the Independents for Frome movement won 10 seats on the 17-seat council with their model of a new participatory form of decision-making. In 2015, the Independents swept all 17 seats, prompting the Frome Times to dub the town “The People’s Republic of Frome.” In elections this May, independents won almost 80% of the vote. On a recent afternoon, Macfadyen led Reuters on a tour of some council-backed projects grouped loosely along the river, whose green-brown waters curve gently through the town. Wildflowers, nettles and brambles had been deliberately allowed to run riot on its steep, shaded banks. Near the bridge in the town centre, Frome’s “share shop” allows people to rent items such as power tools, musical instruments or camping gear at low rates. Nearby, a community fridge means nobody’s excess fresh vegetables need go to waste. The town council also backed a new renewable energy cooperative, which raised £300,000 from locals to put solar panels on buildings such as the health centre and football club. Macfadyen laid out step-by step instructions for running a town council in his book “Flatpack Democracy” – a play on the idea that thriving localism could be replicated at scale like  self-assembly furniture. Inspired by Frome’s example, independents have taken over more than 20 other town councils and have strong representation on another 20, Macfadyen says. Jamie Kelsey Fry, a contributing editor at the New Internationalist magazine, co-founded a similar initiative in the neighbouring county of Devon. He sees the campaigns as part of a “new municipalism” movement reshaping politics in cities as diverse as Barcelona in Spain, Jackson in Mississippi and Valparaiso in Chile – their organisers often driven at least in part by concerns over climate change. “These groups are going to become exceptionally valuable, because as society functioning in its normal, business-as-usual way begins to collapse, we’re going to have to be in a position to look after ourselves,” Kelsey Fry said. Although the rights of nature movement is growing fast, turning its aspirations into effective restraints on commercial interests remains a challenge. In the United States, the city of Toledo, Ohio, voted in February to amend its charter to state that the giant Lake Erie, plagued by toxic algae blooms, had a right to “exist, flourish, and naturally evolve.” This summer, state lawmakers quashed the move, saying nature did not have appropriate standing. In the case of Frome, legal practitioners would be astonished if the government approves the town’s draft bylaw, partly because there are already laws protecting the river. For example, in 2017, a court in the nearby city of Bath fined a Somerset farmer £22,000 for allowing slurry to spill into the water. The contamination had turned the River Frome brown and foul-smelling and killed at least 1,700 fish. Frome town council said the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government informed it last week that a decision on its application was still pending. The ministry did not respond to a request for comment. With the world’s water bodies facing growing pressure from the extremes of heat, drought and rainfall driven by climate change, Macfadyen argues that any initiative that helps people to look at nature with fresh eyes is worthwhile. “We’re in the situation we’re in because we’ve misunderstood our position in the ecosystem,” Macfadyen said. “And unfortunately, we were wrong. We can’t do what we like. If we pour poison over everything, it comes back to bite us.”

Answer: Mother Earth's MeToo moment: English town joins campaign for 'nature's rights'.


Question: “Independents need to know they can invest their vote in the Democratic Party,” Carter said Tuesday during his annual report at his post-presidential center and library in Atlanta, where he offered caution about the political consequences should Democrats “move to a very liberal program, like universal health care.” That’s delicate — and, Carter acknowledged, even contradictory — advice coming from the 93-year-old former president, and it underscores the complicated political calculations for Democrats as they prepare for the November midterms and look ahead to the 2020 presidential election. “Rosie and I voted for Bernie Sanders in the past,” Carter noted. He was referring to his wife, Rosalynn, and their support for the Vermont senator, an independent who identifies as a democratic socialist, over establishment favorite Hillary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic presidential primary. At another point, he pointed to California’s environmental policies — limits on carbon emissions, stiffer fuel-efficiency standards — as the model for combating climate change. Still, Carter stressed, Democrats nationally must “appeal to independents” who are souring on the current administration. Trump’s job approval rating, according to Gallup, has dipped to 40 percent, mostly because of declining support among independents. Carter alluded to arguments from self-identified progressives that Democrats will sacrifice votes on the left if they don’t embrace the liberal base: “I don’t think any Democrat is going to vote against a Democratic nominee,” and he insisted that he’s not asking the left to sacrifice its goals, only to see that winning elections is necessary to accomplish any of them. There is some historical irony in Carter’s analysis. He came to the White House in 1976 from the moderate wing of the Democratic Party, and he clashed with party liberals, drawing a spirited primary challenge in 1980 from Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy. Carter prevailed, but he was wounded, abandoned by Kennedy’s most liberal supporters and unable to win over independents who helped deliver a landslide for Republican Ronald Reagan. Carter’s latest handicapping comes near the conclusion of a midterm primary season that has seen Democratic primary voters move the party to the left. In some states and districts, that means nominating full-throated advocates of single-payer health care, a $15 minimum wage and abolishing or at least overhauling the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. In other races, it means nominees who back more cautious moves to the left, such as background checks before certain gun purchases, a “public option” health insurance plan to compete alongside private insurance policies, step raises for the minimum wage and an immigration overhaul that offers legal status to some immigrants in the country illegally. Carter did not delve into those distinctions, instead offering a sweeping condemnation of his latest successor to remind Democrats of the stakes. He denounced the administration’s latest environmental policy proposal to make it easier for energy companies to release methane gas that contributes to climate change. He singled out Trump’s policy of separating immigrant families at the border, including those seeking asylum. “America is inherently committed to human rights, and I think in the future we will let that prevail,” Carter said, “but for the next two years, I can’t predict the imprisoned children are going to be any better off — unfortunately.” Carter has previously criticized Trump for his repeated falsehoods, and he’s chided Trump for his hardline support for Israel over Palestinians. Yet Carter has found common ground with Trump on other foreign policy fronts, and did so again Tuesday. While avoiding any mention of the special counsel’s investigation into whether Trump’s presidential campaign coordinated with Russia in the 2016 U.S. election, Carter said he has engaged for years with Russian President Vladimir Putin concerning the ongoing Syrian civil war. “I have his email address,” Carter said, adding that he and Putin share the same Russian river as their favorite spot for salmon fishing. That friendship, Carter said, means when Russia and other nations hold multilateral talks about the Syrian conflict, “Quite often they invite the Carter Center. ... They do not invite the U.S. government.” Carter also praised Trump for meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Carter repeated his frustrations with the last Democratic president, Barack Obama, for not engaging more directly with the insular Asian nation. Carter said he’s not sure Trump has made real progress yet with North Korea, but he endorsed calls for the U.S. to formally declare an end to the Korean War and normalize relations with Pyongyang. “Let them be part of the community of nations,” he said. “I think that would be enough in itself to bring an end to the nuclear program in North Korea.” ___ Follow Barrow on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BillBarrowAP

Answer:
Jimmy Carter cautions Democrats not to scare off moderates.