Fall is prime tree planting season, but what about next spring’s cicada eruption?

not conducive to egg-laying. The small-tree damage is a shame, because the cicada is otherwise not only harmless, but its appearance is also one of life’s great occasions, akin to the occurrence of a total solar eclipse or the arrival of a comet in the night sky, but far more tangible. Seventeen- and 13-year periodical cicadas appear in many states east of the Great Plains, but they are staggered from calendar year to year by brood. Next year’s Brood X covers one of the largest geographic areas and is known as the Great Eastern Brood. For the gardener, the impending reality of this phenomenon poses a quandary. The general advice from horticultural extension agents is to delay planting a tree or shrub in the spring before the hatch, and that advice might also apply to woody plants put in now. Early fall is the optimum period for most tree planting, because it allows the plant to overcome transplant shock and grow some roots before the stresses of the following growing season. As the saying goes: The best time to plant a tree was 30 years ago, and the next best time is now. Who wants to delay tree planting another year? I would go ahead and plant this year, and take your chances, but with some precautions. Plastic or nylon netting sold to keep birds off fruit trees and shrubs will do the trick, but only if the mesh size is small enough to keep the cicadas out — something less than half an inch, said Emily Zobel, a senior extension agent for the University of Maryland in Cambridge, Md. Bird netting is typically available from mass merchandisers, garden centers, farm stores, mail-order seed companies and online retailers. It might be worth obtaining the netting now before everybody gets the same idea next spring, though the product has its issues. One is that it’s plastic, and as an arborist friend points out, the world has enough plastic already. The other is that a sheet of netting needs to be tied together carefully, in a way that keeps the cicadas and other creatures out, especially where it meets the lower trunk. Another is that birds, snakes and other creatures can get ensnared in the netting with horrible results. Another option is to wrap a tree in the type of fabric row cover or insect barrier that is used for vegetable crops;


As wildfire smoke becomes a part of life on the West Coast, so do its health risks

on indoor activities — the smoke is still creating short- and long-term health risks for everyone exposed, health experts say. The particles from wildfires are dangerously small, less than a micron wide, or 10 to 30 times smaller than the diameter of a human hair. Their size lets them slip past the body’s usual defenses and lodge deep inside the lungs, passing into the bloodstream and reaching the heart and the brain. The fires aren’t just burning trees but are also destroying houses, power lines and other infrastructure. The smoke is a complex mixture of volatile organic chemicals, ozone, nitrogen oxides and trace minerals, but it is the particulates less than 2.5 microns in size that worry experts the most. Exposure can lead to immediate problems such as headaches, coughing and wheezing, and a person can become short of breath and experience a racing heartbeat. The dense smoke is a bigger danger for anyone with a respiratory ailment such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or asthma, and long-term exposure can contribute to heart attacks, strokes and, possibly, depression and anxiety, said Michael Jerrett, a professor at the Department of Environmental Health Sciences at the University of California at Los Angeles. “At these levels, even healthy people will start feeling symptoms,” said Gopal Allada, an associate professor of medicine focusing on pulmonary and critical care at the Oregon Health & Science University School of Medicine in Portland. The air in Portland was again the worst in the world on Wednesday, according to IQAir, which tracks air pollution levels globally. The EPA reported an AQI of 314 in the city as the Riverside Fire burned more than 135,000 acres in Oregon’s Clackamas County, roughly 50 miles away. Patients complaining of respiratory issues came into emergency rooms in the Portland area and sought help where they could find it. On Monday, near downtown Portland, an aid group set up tents in the parking lot of the Lloyd Center mall. They handed out inhalers and masks. Medics treated irritated eyes. One man showed up struggling to speak, his voice hoarse and his lips dusky. He told a medic, Tyler Cox, that he had COPD. Homeless, he had lost access to his nebulizer, a tool used for administering asthma medication. Cox, an intensive care unit nurse volunteering in his free time, said he worried the temporary treatment might not be enough. “He could die


Athlete protests are now celebrated. One Olympian says she’s still paying for hers.

for a year for her action. Then, she said, she got a call came from the USATF Foundation, telling her it did not support her and not to do it again. Within months, Berry said, one major corporate sponsor dropped her. As the climate shifted in the spring, Berry, who finished 14th in the hammer throw at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, still went without financial support. USA Track & Field, Berry said, has supported her “100 percent,” with officials frequently calling to check on her. But Berry remains bothered by the USATF Foundation, which is a separate entity. “They made me feel like I’m the problem and they’ve helped me so much and I’m wrong for calling them out for defunding me,” Berry said. “That’s typical corporate White. That’s typical.” USATF Foundation CEO Tom Jackovic said the organization’s financial support did not waver because of Berry’s protest. Jackovic emailed The Washington Post copies of two checks to Berry provided after her protest, one in late August 2019 for $4,000 and the other in December 2019 for $1,500. Berry declined a $5,000 donation this year, Jackovic said, after the USATF Foundation did not offer her its largest grant. “While we understand Gwen’s disappointment for not receiving our largest grant award this year, there are only 25 of them for over 40 events,” the USATF Foundation said in a statement. “In a perfect world, the Foundation would give all of our grantees more money, but the demand exceeds the need at this point as we have over 250 applicants. Gwen’s allegation that her stance from the podium at the Pan-Am Games adversely affected our grant-making decisions in 2020 is inaccurate.” When Nike, which had sponsored Berry since 2017, chose not to renew Berry at the end of 2019, she said she was not given a reason. Nike has used images of protest in its commercials, and it has a multimillion-dollar endorsement contract with Kaepernick. In the space of its Twitter bio, Nike posted only, “#blacklivesmatter.” Berry finished the season ranked third in the world, but she did not medal at the world championships in the fall. She surmised Nike may not have had enough money in its hammer budget for both her and the throwers who had won medals. “Nike has a long history of supporting causes important to athletes and in line with our values,” Nike said in


Trump did listen to experts on the pandemic. They just failed him.

A narrative has taken hold since the release of Bob Woodward’s latest book that President Trump was told in late January that the coronavirus was spreading across America at pandemic rates but ignored the dire warnings of government experts. That narrative is wrong and unfair. The truth is that during the crucial early weeks of the pandemic, the government’s public health leaders assured Trump that the virus was not spreading in communities in the United States. They gave him bad intelligence because of two catastrophic failures: First, they relied on the flu surveillance system that failed to detect the rapid spread of covid-19; and second, they bungled the development of a diagnostic test for covid-19 that would have shown they were wrong, barred commercial labs from developing tests, and limited tests to people who had traveled to foreign hot spots or had contact with someone with a confirmed case. As a result, according to former Food and Drug Administration chief Scott Gottlieb, they were “situationally blind” to the spread of the virus. In an interview Sunday on CBS News’s “Face the Nation,” Gottlieb said officials at the Department of Health and Human Services “over-relied on a surveillance system that was built for flu and not for coronavirus without recognizing that it wasn’t going to be as sensitive at detecting coronavirus spread as it was for flu because the two viruses spread very differently.” Officials were looking for a spike in patients presenting with flu-like respiratory symptoms at hospitals. But there was a lag of a week or more in reporting data, and because many of those infected with the novel coronavirus didn’t develop symptoms, or did not present with respiratory illness, they were not picked up by this monitoring. As a result, officials concluded “therefore, coronavirus must not be spreading.” They also failed to detect the spread, Gottlieb said, because for six weeks, they “had no diagnostic tests in the field to screen people.” That is because the FDA and HHS refused to allow private and academic labs to get into the testing game with covid-19 tests of their own. The FDA issued only a single emergency authorization to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — and then scientists at the CDC contaminated the only approved test kits with sloppy lab practices, rendering them ineffective. The results were disastrous. How badly did the system fail? Researchers at the University


infected people in the United States who were not identified, isolated and traced, “you would have almost an exponential spread of an infection of which we are all looking out for. We have not seen that, so it is extremely unlikely that it is happening.” Fauci said the “pattern of what we’re seeing argues against infections that we’re missing.” It was not until Feb. 26 that the first possible case of suspected community spread was reported. Even then, senior health officials played down the danger. On Feb. 29, CDC director Robert Redfield said at a White House press briefing: “The American public needs to go on with their normal lives. Okay? We’re continuing to aggressively investigate these new community links. … But at this stage, again, the risk is low.” It was not until early March that the experts realized just how disastrously wrong they had been. So, when Trump told the American people on Feb. 25 that “the coronavirus … is very well under control in our country. We have very few people with it,” he was not lying or playing down more dire information he was being told privately. He was repeating exactly what experts such as Fauci, Redfield and Messonnier were telling him. Trump did make serious errors of his own during this early period. On deputy national security adviser Matthew Pottinger’s advice, he barred travel by non-U.S. citizens from China on Jan. 31. But he did not also shut down travel from much of Europe, as Pottinger recommended, until March 11 — almost six weeks later — because of objections from his economic advisers. The outbreak in New York, the worst of the pandemic, was seeded by travelers from Italy. But the main reason we were not able to contain the virus is that for six critical weeks, the health experts told the president covid-19 was not spreading in U.S. communities when it was, in fact, spreading like wildfire. They were wrong. The experts failed the president — and the country. Read more Marc A. Thiessen: If Trump lied, so did Fauci Erin N. Marcus: A Roger Stone protege is interfering in important CDC reports. It’s appalling. Karen Tumulty: Trump seems to believe in magic over science Leana S. Wen: The key difference between the covid-19 risks at protests and Trump rallies Jennifer Rubin: Trump should be held accountable for any reckless endangerment at his rallies


Local Digest: Police identify man who drowned in College Park lake

THE DISTRICT A man was killed by gunfire, and a second man was critically wounded during a stabbing in separate attacks Wednesday, D.C. police said. Homicide detectives are investigating the fatal shooting of a man who police said was shot in the 5300 block of Call Place SE about 3:29 p.m., said Officer Hugh Carew, a spokesman. The victim, who was found unconscious at the scene, was taken to a hospital and later pronounced dead, police said. About three hours later, police responded to the Chinatown area, where a man was found unconscious and not breathing in the 600 block of I Street NW, Carew said. The victim was taken to a hospital. Police said they were looking for a black woman who is 5-foot-3 to 5-foot-4 and was seen wearing a light-blue hooded sweatshirt, Carew said. Investigators said she may have been armed with a knife. — Clarence Williams VIRGINIA Fairfax County has voted to remove a monument marking the spot where the first Confederate soldier died in the Civil War. The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors voted 9-to-1 at its Tuesday meeting to remove the stone marker and two cannons placed on either side of it on the grounds of the county courthouse. The monument marks the spot where Capt. John Marr of the Warrenton Rifles was killed in the Battle of Fairfax Court House on June 1, 1861. The six-ton granite monument was unveiled in 1904 and bears a simple inscription noting that it marks the scene where Marr died. The monument will be placed in storage. The county estimates the removal cost at $20,000. Numerous Confederate monuments have been removed across Virginia after the General Assembly passed a law earlier this year relinquishing state control over the process. — Associated Press


Maine wedding ‘superspreader’ event is now linked to seven deaths. None of those people attended.

Only about 65 close family members and friends were on the guest list for a bride and groom’s rustic wedding celebration in a small Maine town in early August. But the nuptials began an outbreak now traced to more than 175 reported novel coronavirus infections and also to the deaths of seven people, the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday. The cluster of coronavirus infections that originated from the Big Moose Inn outside Millinocket on Aug. 7 continues to grow in Maine, state health officials said, after guests flouted social distancing and mask guidelines. Now people who have no association with the party have died, including six residents of the Maplecrest Rehabilitation and Living Center in Madison, Maine CDC Director Nirav Shah said in a news briefing Tuesday. State officials issued an “imminent health hazard” citation last month to the venue, whose operators acknowledged in a statement that they “did make an error in the interpretation” of the rules governing capacity but that employees wear masks and have increased cleaning. The Millinocket wedding is not the only rule-defying celebration linked to a growing number of cases, as contact tracers and public health officials across the country continue to track down infections that stem from summer “superspreader” gatherings, including a motorcycle rally in South Dakota and a choir practice in Washington. The exposure among non-attendees can multiply exponentially, especially if attendees live or work in communities where social distancing and mask-wearing are not enforced, said Michael Small, a professor at the University of Western Australia who has studied superspreader events. “These superspreaders can be bad without bound,” Small told The Washington Post. Earlier this year, a leadership conference for the biotech company Biogen in Boston made headlines when infections were initially tracked among the attendees who fanned out across several states. Months later, researchers sequenced genetic errors of the virus, linking the outbreak with infections among Boston’s homeless population. The outbreak among company executives that led to infections among homeless people is a reminder of how interconnected social networks can be, causing further spread of the virus, Thomas Tsai, an assistant professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, told The Post. “You can’t just think of these individuals or even clusters alone. They’re sort of clusters of clusters,” Tsai said. Even where communities may not seem as interwoven, such as in a sparsely populated Maine


to track down infections that stem from summer “superspreader” gatherings, including a motorcycle rally in South Dakota and a choir practice in Washington. The exposure among non-attendees can multiply exponentially, especially if attendees live or work in communities where social distancing and mask-wearing are not enforced, said Michael Small, a professor at the University of Western Australia who has studied superspreader events. “These superspreaders can be bad without bound,” Small told The Washington Post. Earlier this year, a leadership conference for the biotech company Biogen in Boston made headlines when infections were initially tracked among the attendees who fanned out across several states. Months later, researchers sequenced genetic errors of the virus, linking the outbreak with infections among Boston’s homeless population. The outbreak among company executives that led to infections among homeless people is a reminder of how interconnected social networks can be, causing further spread of the virus, Thomas Tsai, an assistant professor at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, told The Post. “You can’t just think of these individuals or even clusters alone. They’re sort of clusters of clusters,” Tsai said. Even where communities may not seem as interwoven, such as in a sparsely populated Maine town, the coronavirus can strike. “It’s a real cautionary tale that even in a relatively rural area in Maine that there was still fuel for a fire to erupt,” Tsai said. Between 10 and 20 percent of infected people are responsible for 80 percent of the coronavirus’s spread, Maria Van Kerkhove, technical lead for the World Health Organization’s Health Emergencies Program, said at a news briefing Thursday. Maine health officials have continued to track several outbreaks and are investigating if some clusters are related to each other, Shah said. “The virus favors gatherings,” Shah said. “It does not distinguish between happy events, like a wedding celebration, or a sad farewell, like funerals. It is everywhere.” Shah said the spread of the virus beyond those who attended the wedding, killing people unrelated to the gathering, is an indication of “how virulent the disease can be and how far-reaching the effects can be.” Though Shah noted the state’s low hospitalization rates, he said the spread of the virus in the state was disturbingly ubiquitous. He said residents should not assume the virus has not reached their community, as it’s already probably there. “I’m concerned about where we are,” Shah said. “Maine CDC


The Energy 202: California's fires are putting a huge amount of carbon dioxide into the air

have led the state to put forest health and wildfire readiness programs on hold. “After two days spent spinning less than 150 miles off the coast of Alabama, Florida and Mississippi, Sally finally made its move to come ashore Wednesday morning, unleashing up to 30 inches of rain, 100 mph wind gusts and a six-foot storm surge,” our colleagues Andrew Freedman, Jason Samenow and Matthew Cappucci report. The National Hurricane Center described “historic and catastrophic flooding” across the Florida Panhandle and southern Alabama and warned that the flood threat will spread inland. Sally made landfall as a Category 2 hurricane near Gulf Shores, Ala., at 5:45 a.m. Although Sally weakened to a tropical storm with 60 mph winds by Wednesday afternoon, the heavy rains and threat of flooding continued. Our colleague Matthew Cappucci was dispatched Monday night to the Gulf Coast to cover the hurricane’s landfall. On Wednesday morning, as the hurricane’s eyewall battered Alabama, Cappucci described waking up to the sound of crashes. “My phone clock read 3:32 a.m. The wind was screaming, a pressure washer of wind and rain battering the building. Not a light was visible anywhere, but the silhouettes of trees could be seen flailing wildly, as if frantically trying to get someone’s attention,” Cappucci writes. Not long after that, he was standing in the eye of the storm, “an oasis of calm surrounded by meteorological hostility.” The lawsuit targets two Trump administration rules, published last month, that rescind methane emissions standards and industry requirements for preventing and detecting methane leaks. The suit, announced Tuesday, comes after 20 states also sued the agency over the methane rules rollback, the Hill reports. The Business Roundtable, a group whose members are CEOs of major U.S. companies, threw its weight behind efforts to combat climate change in a statement released Wednesday on its website, Politico reports. The group endorsed the goals of the 2015 Paris agreement, including a goal of reducing U.S. net greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent from 2005 levels by 2050. The statement did not endorse a specific mechanism for achieving these goals, but it expressed support for a price on carbon “where it is environmentally and economically effective and administratively feasible.” The statement of support from companies with combined annual revenue of $7 trillion shows a stark divide between the business community and the Trump administration, which has downplayed the risks posed by climate change.


Transcript: The Road to Recovery: Global Solutions

therapeutics, that is, the drugs, because again if we had more money going behind that, systematically, we could have a database where we're tracking all of that. Some of that is happening. I do think there are some chances that an antibody will be found that can be manufactured and given to people. So that is the one probably that looks the most promising at this point. But, again, we need to have good data. Even on the plasma in the United States, you know, we haven't seen good randomized controlled data, whereas you do see that data coming out of the U.K. It's data that helps us, and transparency, know where to pivot and what tools might or might not work because you're going to hit dead ends with drugs or vaccines and cancel those candidates and then move forward with new products. But it's that transparency that we need, and the openness. MS. SELLERS: Well, then tell me what role technology, sorry, technology could play with--in combatting the virus and rebuilding economies around the world. MS. GATES: Well, technology can play a huge role. I mean, we're already seeing it. The mobile phone gives us the opportunity to reach people when the vaccine is available, to tell them where they go, even if they live in a remote, rural area. It gives us the chance to reach people with digital cash transfer payments. People are using even old--what you would consider old technology, radio announcements. A hundred percent of the population of Kenya knew about COVID-19 very, very quickly because the government knew to put messages on the radio. Now they've switched to broadcast, and they're saying, okay, on our broadcast TV stations, let's do real education as if kids were in school because our schools aren't open. The digital technology in the United States and in Europe--kids with laptops, yeah, they're not learning the same amount that they would learn in person, but they are learning some. But, again, you've got to get the technology and the broadband distributed equitably so that kids can learn online. But those are all opportunities that are being accelerated, and we're starting to learn how to do some of that with finesse. MS. SELLERS: So, you talk in the report about three things the world should collaborate on to move ahead. Can you talk to us about those three elements and


How trucking eels is reviving a river

CONOWINGO, Md. — A pandemic rages. Wildfires are blazing. ‘Murder hornets’ invade. For those looking for it, Steve Minkkinen of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has some rare happy news. “Actually, 2020 was a good year for something,” he says. He’s talking about American eels. They’re having a good year — a good decade, in fact — continuing their unlikely comeback in the largest river on the East Coast, with help from daily truck rides. For more than a decade, biologists have been trapping baby eels in the Susquehanna River and trucking them past four hydroelectric dams to release them in freshwater creeks upstream. Dams interrupt the natural migration routes of the eels, which are born in the Chesapeake Bay and then swim upriver, sometimes hundreds of miles, into freshwater streams, where they grow into adulthood before eventually returning to the bay. The idea of trapping and physically relocating a species — in this case, moving eels around physical obstacles — is gaining new interest as the planet warms and causes some plant and animal species to struggle in their native habitats. Moving them to a more hospitable home, also known as assisted migration, may be one way to save some species as the climate changes. Minkkinen says his trap and haul program, which he’s dubbed the “eelway,” is reviving the watershed ecosystem. Mark Schwartz, a conservation biologist at the University of California at Davis, says this type of assisted migration is helping inform similar programs aimed at responding to climate change. “We’ve thought for a century about heavy-handed ways to alleviate the problem of dams,” Schwartz said. “And now it’s led us to heavy-handed things for our other conservation problems.” At the Conowingo Dam, about nine miles north of the Chesapeake Bay, this summer’s trap and haul operation was on pace to reach a 240,000-eel milestone, more than double last summer’s numbers, despite a three-week delay this summer because of the pandemic. “I don’t think there would be any eels in the Susquehanna River watershed if we hadn’t done this project,” says Minkkinen, a broad-shouldered federal scientist with a salt-and-pepper goatee. The movement of eels up river is like the pumping of blood through veins. Stop it and the rest of the body soon deteriorates. That is essentially what happened to the Susquehanna River watershed starting in 1928, when the first and largest of four still-operational dams was


Transcript: Fighting Food Insecurity

jobs during COVID as compared to their male counterparts, making them and their children more susceptible to hunger. And older adults without enough to eat are also likely to be women. So, more work to do here, Ray. MR. SUAREZ: Well, as the pandemic as deepened and made the economic crisis worse, one of the most frequent images you now see as a sign of what's going on in America are long lines at food banks, that snake on for block after block. Other efforts, trying to keep up with by the charity sector, but are they equal to the task? Can the charitable sector do this on its own? MR. GUARDIA: Well, the charitable sector is doing their best, and they continue to play a critical role in fighting hunger. You know, we work very closely with those communities and so we know firsthand how hard the magnitude of this problem is for them. And this is why strengthening our existing and proven federal nutrition programs are so important, like the ones I mentioned earlier, like SNAP. And, for example, for every one meal that the Feeding America food bank network puts out, SNAP can provide nine. And this is the kind of scale we really need to address hunger in the U.S. At the same time, it's important to note that for every $1 spent on SNAP benefits, it generates $1.50 to $1.80 in economic activity, very quickly and very locally. And, Ray, this is something our country raises right now. MR. SUAREZ: You know, a lot of people, Luis, will recognize the name SNAP. They may have even been on it or remember the old name was used to call it, food stamps. But many people may not realize that school nutrition, breakfast and lunch at school, are also federal nutrition programs. How is the government ensuring that millions of low-income children, who rely on free and reduced-price school meals, are getting the nutrition they need when so many schools are closed or not opening regularly? MR. GUARDIA: That's absolutely right. At the onset of the pandemic, we worked really closely with policymakers and helped put together some policy innovations to address this issue of the school closings. One program that's been really effective has been to provide families with children an EBT card, with money to purchase food, to cover the school means that their kids


New movies to stream this week: ‘All In: The Fight for Democracy,’ ‘The Devil All the Time’ and more

which the world seems indifferent. Directed by Antonio Campos (“Christine”), who co-wrote the adaptation with his brother Paul Campos, it’s a gripping, dark and deeply ambivalent narrative. Call it hillbilly noir: an Appalachian-set story of good and evil in which there seems to be an unhealthy preponderance of the latter. R. Available on Netflix. Contains violence, bloody and disturbing images, sexuality, graphic nudity and crude language throughout. 138 minutes. — M.O. In “Blackbird,” Susan Sarandon plays a woman who calls her family together — including her husband (Sam Neil), two daughters (Kate Winslet and Mia Wasikowska) and other loved ones — to say farewell and announce that she is ending her long battle with ALS. Nerves fray, and there’s said to be a twist near the and of this seriocomic family drama, but the Guardian says, “It seems unnecessary, like an extra hurdle planted at a track-race finish line just to see if another runner or two can be made to stumble.” R. Available on various streaming platforms. Contains strong language, some drug use and brief sexual material. 98 minutes. The documentary “A Chef’s Voyage” follows David Kinch, the award-winning chef at the restaurant Manresa in California, as he and his staff prepare to travel to France to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the three-star Michelin restaurant with a collaboration with three French chefs. “It’s a feast,” according to the New York Times, “not just for the food shown in exquisite detail, but for the images of the countryside, the shore and the streets and markets.” Unrated. Available at afisilver.afi.com. 90 minutes. John Lennon, Bruce Springsteen, Keith Richards, Steve Van Zandt, Joe Perry and Alice Cooper are among the musicians celebrating the life and music of Chuck Berry in the documentary “Chuck Berry: The Original King of Rock ‘n’ Roll.” PG. Available at themiracletheatre.com. 97 minutes. Joe Pantoliano stars in “From the Vine,” the story of a CEO in midlife crisis who travels back to the Italy of his youth in search of new purpose. Unrated. Available at afisilver.afi.com. In English and Italian with subtitles. 97 minutes. In the Israeli film “God of the Piano,” a pianist (Naama Preis) struggles to accept her deaf child. “The true hero in this film is music,” according to Tikkun. “It is everywhere — a young boy plays for the family, a grandfather shares his first masterpiece, a famous performer writes a piece for


NCAA delays start of basketball season two weeks, plans no changes to postseason tournament

Tip-off for the men’s and women’s Division I college basketball seasons was moved to Nov. 25, a delay of more than two weeks from the original start date, for precautionary reasons amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, the NCAA announced Wednesday night. The move comes after the NCAA Division I Council met to discuss guidelines for the 2020-21 season, in which safety protocols are at the forefront as campuses continue to deal with the impact of the virus. “This new season start date near the Thanksgiving holiday represents the optimal opportunity to successfully launch the basketball season,” said Dan Gavitt, the NCAA senior vice president of basketball. “It is a grand compromise of sorts and a unified approach that focuses on the health and safety of student-athletes competing toward the 2021 Division I basketball championships.” The council, following recommendations from the NCAA men’s and women’s basketball oversight committees, also voted to prohibit scrimmages and exhibition games this season and to allow preseason practices to begin Oct. 14. This move provides a 42-day window in which to conduct at most 30 practices. During this time, players may work out up to 20 hours per week and four hours per day and must take one day off. In addition, the council approved a transition period for practice between current out-of-season activities and preseason practice. This period takes place Sept. 21 through Oct. 13, during which time teams may participate in strength and conditioning activities, meetings and skill instruction for up to 12 hours per week. There is an eight-hour limit on skill instruction, and players must have two days off per week during the transition period. Another change prohibits games or practices on the first Tuesday after Nov. 1 every year, including this Election Day on Nov. 3. Pushing back the start of the season from its original Nov. 10, according to the NCAA, accommodates initial competition “when at least three-quarters of Division I institutions will have either concluded their fall terms or moved remaining instruction and exams online creating a more controlled and less populated campus environment that may reduce the risk of covid-19.” The return of students to campus has yielded a spike in positive cases within the athletic departments at schools such as Virginia Tech and North Carolina State, each of which postponed football games recently with infections climbing among team members. The Hokies’ season-opening contest against Virginia, originally scheduled


One man killed, another critically wounded in separate attacks

A man was killed by gunfire and a second man critically wounded during a stabbing in separate attacks Wednesday, D.C. police said. Homicide detectives are investigating the fatal shooting of a man who police believe was shot in the 5300 block of Call Place SE about 3:29 p.m., said Officer Hugh Carew, a police spokesman. The victim, who was found unconscious at the scene, was taken to a hospital and later pronounced dead, police said. About three hours later, police responded to the Chinatown area where a man was found unconscious and not breathing in the 600 block of I Street NW, Carew said. The victim was taken to a hospital. Police said they were looking for a black woman who is between 5-foot-3 and 5-foot-4 and was seen wearing a light blue hooded sweatshirt, Carew said. Investigators said she may have been armed with a knife.


Transcript: A Conversation with Sen. Marco Rubio

and others of xenophobia and criticized for doing that. I thought that was the right move. Look, I'm not telling you it's easy. This is a complex geopolitical situation where it's a broad relationship with China that has implications that are too extensive to cover in one interview. That said, I think they've been pretty aggressive about it in hindsight. I think early on, it would have been important to sort of demand. Look, what I would have preferred to see is that early on, it would have been said that there is this virus. We have no idea the extent, but it's spreading. We have no notion of--they're not sharing information about the viral markers that will allow research to begin to work on it. There's no doubt that like any totalitarian regime, the default position of the Chinese government is to try to cover up, protect their image. Also true of totalitarian regimes is that bad news is not rewarded. You are not rewarded for being the mayor or the local official that goes to Beijing and warns about this outbreak. There's no reward for that built into the system, and the result is that the world has paid a price for it. Now, China actively told--they bullied countries around the world to not implement travel bans. They threatened them, and as a result, we know that infected people got on airplanes and returned after the Chinese New Year to countries all over the world and helped spread that pandemic. They've already been held to account for that by the reputational damage they suffered all over the world and by the rebalancing that many countries are now considering in terms of their supply chains and their relationships with China. Would I have liked to see more aggressive action on that in January and February? Absolutely. But I also recognize two things. The president would have been criticized for it, although that's the price of leadership, and I also don't think it takes away from the things they've done right like mobilizing our industrial base to wipe out what at the time was a very severe concern about a shortage, for example, of ventilators. We didn't have enough, and the president was able to rally the private sector to create a ventilator surplus now in this country that actually allowed us to share those with other countries. MR. COSTA:


Britain’s Brexit drama comes to Washington

You’re reading an excerpt from the Today’s WorldView newsletter. A pandemic distracted some Britons from the looming problems of Brexit, but they were just on the back burner Now, Brexit threatens to undermine British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s efforts to stake out an ambitious new role for a “Global Britain” on the world stage. A key player in that effort, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, is in Washington this week, where he told reporters there were issues “from Hong Kong to Libya” to discuss. Raab’s trip coincides with a resurgence in American interest in Brexit negotiations — or rather, their renewed breakdown. The visit highlights how a globally ambitious Britain remains bogged down in insular Brexit negotiations and under the influence of its oversize transatlantic partner. Political disagreements over Brexit felled two prime ministers since the 2016 vote to leave, but Johnson initially moved decisively: After winning a large parliamentary majority in December, he secured domestic political backing for an E.U. exit deal. For much of 2020, Brexit seemed a done deal. Johnson’s battle against the virus, both personal and political, looked to be the biggest threat to his leadership. Then last week, Johnson’s government threatened to override parts of the Brexit withdrawal agreement he himself had negotiated and signed. It is an unusual move — as one government minister bluntly acknowledged in Parliament, it appears to break international law — and though many interpret the move as simply a hard-line negotiation tactic, designed to push E.U. leaders ahead of a potential trade deal before the end of the year, the implications are bleak. “Through its own choices, Britain has put itself in such a weakened position that it has finally resorted to either threatening or actually breaking international law to reassert some strength,” the Atlantic’s Tom McTague wrote. Scorched-earth negotiating tactics aren’t necessarily frowned upon in President Trump’s Washington. The big issue is Northern Ireland. Johnson’s deal with the E.U. included provisions to prevent a hard border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. In practice, this may result in some kind of tariffs system between Britain and Northern Ireland, where certain E.U. rules could remain after Britain leaves at the end of this year. E.U. leaders argued that the arrangement was necessary to maintain the fragile peace established after the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, a deal that ended the worst violence of the Troubles. But some in Britain


Contact-tracing challenges hurt D.C.’s efforts to control virus’s spread, health officials say

and people are still dying.” The mayor also placed the onus on the public to help the city eliminate the virus threat. Bowser said the city is approaching $1 billion in pandemic-related costs and that it has limited capacity to offer additional relief to businesses struggling to keep their doors open. “We know we won’t be able to locally fill all of those gaps, and that’s why having real federal stimulus and sustained federal stimulus is what our businesses need,” she said. The seven-day rolling average of new infections in D.C. stood at 54 on Thursday. That’s up from 40 one week ago, but well below the early-May peak of about 190 daily confirmed cases. The city averages about one virus-related death each day. In a sign of a slow return to normalcy in the nation’s capital, the Smithsonian Institution’s American Art Museum, the National Portrait Gallery, the National Museum of African American History and Culture, and the Renwick Gallery will open Friday amid the gradual reopening of the world’s largest museum complex. The Smithsonian made the announcement Monday, saying the successful reopening two months ago of the National Zoo and the National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly gave it the confidence to reopen more museums. No staff members have tested positive for the coronavirus, officials said. The greater Washington region on Thursday reported 1,779 new coronavirus infections and 44 additional deaths. Virginia had 1,101 new cases and 36 deaths; Maryland had 631 new cases and six deaths; D.C. had 47 new cases and two deaths. Virginia’s death toll was well above average for a third consecutive day, lifting its seven-day average number of fatalities to 30 — up from eight to start the week. The state reported a record 96 deaths Tuesday, citing a reporting backlog that included deaths that occurred over the past month. Virginia health officials said that backlog was also a factor in higher numbers Wednesday and Thursday, when 27 of the state’s 36 daily fatalities were attributed to the backlog. In Maryland, the test positivity rate in Baltimore dropped below 2 percent for the first time. The rolling seven-day average positivity rate statewide stood at 3.3 percent. Across the region, the average number of new infections stood at 1,679 on Thursday. That number has increased slightly in recent days but is mostly unchanged since late August. While the economic fallout


5 beer-friendly recipes to bring Oktoberfest home

This year, we might not be celebrating the large-scale, vibrant and gregarious fun that is the modern-day Oktoberfest. So, have a smaller celebration with the people already in your home! Step 1: Grab some good beer. Step 2: Scroll down for the recipes from our Recipe Archives for something tasty alongside it. Soft Pretzels Classic Sauerkraut. Chicken Schnitzel With German Potato Salad Bratwurst Cooked the Right Way Pork and Cabbage With Mustard Cream Sauce More from Voraciously: Embracing quinoa’s nutty flavor is the key to unlocking its potential Gochugaru transforms this one-pan chicken dish into something truly exciting Start Rosh Hashanah on a sweet note with tishpishti, an orange-scented semolina cake


Health-care workers make up 1 in 7 covid-19 cases recorded globally, WHO says

said Amesh Adalja, a senior scholar at Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security. “It underscores the fact that we still have testing problems six months into the pandemic.” Some experts said high covid-19 rates among health-care workers probably has more to do with the high-risk nature of their work and limited protections. “At some level it’s not surprising. If you work in an environment with a lot of covid-19, then your rate of infection is going to be higher,” said James McDeavitt, senior vice president and dean of clinical affairs at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. “Health-care workers are at higher risk of contracting covid-19, and that is not simply down to testing differences,” said Angharad Davies, a clinical associate professor at Swansea University who has advocated for widespread testing of British doctors. McDeavitt and Davies both pointed to a study published in the Lancet this summer that looked at 100,000 front-line health-care workers in Britain and the United States, and found their risk of infection compared with people in the general community was three times greater, even after taking differences in testing into account. Another recent study conducted in Britain found that intensive care staff had a lower rate of infection when compared with general medical and housekeeping staff. “Although at first sight this may seem odd, possible explanations could include that by the time patients are unfortunate enough to be admitted to an intensive care unit, they are past the period of maximum infectiousness, and because PPE use on intensive care units is likely to be very stringent,” said Davies. When covid-19 began spreading through Western nations early this year, health-care workers faced critical shortages of personal protective equipment, also known as PPE. Even now, well over half a year into the pandemic, there are shortages of tests: The British government is planning to ration covid-19 tests to ensure there are enough for health-care workers and teachers, the Guardian reported Thursday. Covid-19 infection is only one risk factor for health workers during the pandemic. Many also face overwork and financial problems. Some health officials have reported receiving death threats in response to their coronavirus-related policies and recommendations. Speaking on Thursday, Tedros noted that the WHO’s data did not make clear whether health-care workers had been infected at health-care facilities or at home. He said the organization would be launching a charter on health worker safety that


Hyping the cyberthreat sabotages policymaking, ex-British intelligence official says

damage where none has been caused,” he said. “Our democratic processes are at risk of strategic harm from outside interference, but they’re also much more robust than they’re often given credit for, and it’s in our interests to say that and retain public confidence in them.” His remarks come two months after a parliamentary report accused the British government of having “actively avoided looking for evidence that Russia interfered” in the Scottish referendum, the Brexit vote and the 2017 general election in Britain. Martin, who now teaches at Oxford University and advises the Paladin investment firm, is among a number of cybersecurity experts urging avoidance of doomsday metaphors in discussing the array of digital threats that confront governments and the private sector. American analysts have been making a similar argument. “It’s easier to imagine a catastrophe than to produce it,” James A. Lewis, a cybersecurity policy expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, wrote last month. The California wildfires are a catastrophe and so is covid 19, especially in countries with inadequate responses, Lewis wrote. To achieve mass effect, he argued, either a few central targets — such as an electric grid — need to be hit, or multiple targets would have to be hit simultaneously, which is an operational challenge. Martin noted that on Thursday there were media reports in Germany of a woman with underlying health conditions dying in an ambulance because a ransomware attack on a hospital resulted in her being sent to a more distant hospital. If confirmed, the tragedy would be the first death resulting from cyberattack, he said. He noted, however, “it would have been caused inadvertently by criminals seeking money, not an act of state aggression.” Martin said after 6½ years running the NCSC, he observed that the harms caused by cyberattacks fall into three categories: getting robbed, getting weakened and getting hurt. Understanding the differences should help policymakers fashion the most effective deterrents, he said. North Korea robs banks, Russian criminals steal money, and China filches intellectual property and databases full of personal information — all using cyber-means, he noted. Adversaries seek to weaken opponents through political interference, he said. Hacktivists weaken firms by doing things such as defacing websites to embarrass a company. Destructive attacks cause serious harm on targets of critical importance, he said. In 2015, a Russian cyberattack left a quarter-million Ukrainians without power for several hours


U.S. prepares to reimpose U.N. sanctions against Iran despite objections from most other countries

nuclear deal expires next month. “The October deadline matters,” said Behnam Ben Taleblu, an Iran analyst with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. “On the first sale or transfer of weapons, Washington will immediately have to come down on the entity or bank that facilitated this transfer. So Washington will be in an interesting place as it uses unilateral sanctions to enforce multilateral purposes. It will have to, until more countries believe the United States is entitled to engage in snapback or Iran’s behavior merits it.” The European Union, which shares U.S. concerns about Iran’s ballistic missile testing and support for militants in the region, fears the resumption of all sanctions could doom the nuclear agreement with Iran entirely. Josep Borrell, the E.U.’s foreign policy chief, said last month that the United States is not a participant and has no right to impose snapback sanctions under the deal it left. “I will continue to do everything possible to ensure the preservation and full implementation of the JCPOA by all,” he said, using the acronym for the nuclear deal’s official name, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. “The JCPOA remains a key pillar of the global nonproliferation architecture, contributing to regional security.” Abrams said details on how the United States plans to enforce the sanctions will be rolled out in coming days. “We will have some announcements over the weekend and more announcements on Monday, and then subsequent days next week as to exactly how we are planning to enforce these returned U.N. sanctions,” he said. “And whether those countries will in fact ignore the U.N. sanctions remains to be seen,” he added. In the short term, the ramifications are likely to be minimal. “Due to the breadth of U.S. sanctions on Iran, and some of the remaining E.U. restrictions on Iran, it’s not clear how much trade is going to be affected,” said Kelsey Davenport, director of nonproliferation policy at the Arms Control Association. “I think this is a very symbolic move by the United States that’s part of a concerted effort to kill the JCPOA.” Although Tehran has threatened several retaliatory steps, including walking away from the nuclear agreement and ramping up its nuclear program again, President Hassan Rouhani on Wednesday described Iran’s overwhelming opposition to Washington’s move as a “victory of the Iranian nation and the disgraceful defeat of the United States in activation of the snapback mechanism.”


Jews can’t gather as usual for Rosh Hashanah — and stay safe from covid-19

the highly interconnected nature of our community, the virus quickly spread to New York City and Teaneck, N.J., via a bat mitzvah, then to Lakewood, N.J.; Monsey, N.Y.; Kiryas Joel, N.Y.; and other areas with large Orthodox populations. Although Jewish communal groups urged individuals to take basic precautions such as washing their hands, the holiday of Purim in early March — with its customary crowded readings of the Book of Esther in synagogues and festive meals with family and friends — became a superspreader event. Such a meal or reading was probably where I contracted the virus, as well, as I embraced social distancing in earnest only after the holiday. The pages of Haredi publications and Jewish news outlets were filled this spring with obituaries of the thousands who had died of covid-19, including leading rabbis of our generation — and, soon after, countless stories of those who recovered and had donated plasma containing antibodies. But by now, much of the Orthodox community has slipped into complacency, acting as though we have gained some degree of herd immunity. Though there have been too many instances of enormous weddings and funerals, most people have simply started taking fewer precautions, venturing out for Shabbat meals, traveling to visit relatives or attending scaled-down celebrations. Still, as Natalie E. Dean and Caitlin Rivers have reported, even New York City is far from the positive antibody level needed to achieve herd immunity, making these decisions unwise. I would like to say that I’ve been an exception. And yet, since I tested positive for antibodies in May, which indicated I had previously been infected with the virus without manifesting any symptoms, I’ve slowly been venturing out: I have been working from home since March, wearing a mask in public indoor spaces and greatly minimizing social contact. But I’ve also attended weddings, engagement parties and Shabbat dinners, and I’ve dined with friends at restaurants, both indoors and outdoors. The idea that we’re past the pandemic could be dangerous, Slutkin said: Just because someone has antibodies doesn’t mean they can’t hold virus particles in their nose or lungs to pass on to someone else. As the seriousness of the pandemic became more evident, groups representing both Modern and Ultra-Orthodox Jews urged people not to travel. And thanks to warnings to restrict Passover Seders to immediate households only, we mostly managed to keep Passover, in early April, from spreading


for Shabbat meals, traveling to visit relatives or attending scaled-down celebrations. Still, as Natalie E. Dean and Caitlin Rivers have reported, even New York City is far from the positive antibody level needed to achieve herd immunity, making these decisions unwise. I would like to say that I’ve been an exception. And yet, since I tested positive for antibodies in May, which indicated I had previously been infected with the virus without manifesting any symptoms, I’ve slowly been venturing out: I have been working from home since March, wearing a mask in public indoor spaces and greatly minimizing social contact. But I’ve also attended weddings, engagement parties and Shabbat dinners, and I’ve dined with friends at restaurants, both indoors and outdoors. The idea that we’re past the pandemic could be dangerous, Slutkin said: Just because someone has antibodies doesn’t mean they can’t hold virus particles in their nose or lungs to pass on to someone else. As the seriousness of the pandemic became more evident, groups representing both Modern and Ultra-Orthodox Jews urged people not to travel. And thanks to warnings to restrict Passover Seders to immediate households only, we mostly managed to keep Passover, in early April, from spreading the virus the way Purim had. But now it’s months later. And unlike Passover, which centers on home-based Seders, the High Holidays are built around communal worship. Yet as hard as it may be to limit coming together, the Jewish community can’t allow the massive spread of covid-19 to become the legacy of this holiday season. Experts I spoke to worried less about the sufficiency of precautions at official outdoor services and more about the casual mixing that happens afterward, when fellow congregants might gather in proximity without masks to chat. Indoor services are even more dangerous. While the rabbis who have been holding in-person weekday and Shabbat services, mainly in Orthodox congregations, told me they have seen no confirmed coronavirus cases linked to these gatherings, Slutkin said coronavirus particles can linger in indoor air. If your mask isn’t tightfitting and worn perfectly — and few are — “you’re going to be taking in the air of the room,” he said. “And how infectious the air is depends on everybody else’s mask.” As Derek Thompson has reported in the Atlantic, speaking loudly or singing, as one does during services, is particularly dangerous — and speaking quietly “reduces the risk of


The key difference between the covid-19 risks at protests and Trump rallies

all of her groceries delivered, and she didn’t even see her grandchildren because they attended day care. Yet she felt strongly that she needed take part in an anti-racism protest. She’d lost family members to police brutality, and she was willing to risk her life to show her commitment to the movement. As her doctor, I couldn’t recommend that she participate in an activity that could compromise her health. But since she was going no matter what, it was my job to help her stay as safe as possible. This is the public health concept of harm reduction. Protesting involves risk, but she could still substantially reduce that risk by being outdoors, wearing a mask, avoiding dense crowds, limiting her time there and not using public transportation. My patient chose a protest within walking distance of her house. She made sure to stay at the outer edge of the crowd, where she was able to maintain a six-foot distance from others most of the time. These harm-reduction opportunities continue after an event ends and participants return to their homes. My patient lived alone, but at her protest, those who live with others were instructed to self-quarantine for at least five days and then get tested. During the protests, organizers followed public health guidance to educate participants about how to protect themselves and others. Many cities have helped by offering free testing for protesters. Not everyone follows every guideline, of course, but overall, such harm-reduction practices appear to have worked. A research paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research examined patterns of spread in more than 300 major cities and found “no evidence that net covid-19 case growth differentially rose following the onset of Black Lives Matter protests.” Where are the harm-reduction practices at Trump’s rallies? The most recent events, in Nevada and Arizona, have been held indoors. Compared with those outdoors, indoor gatherings could increase the risk of transmission by 18 to 19 times. Many attendees appeared to not wear masks. Some rallygoers in Michigan called covid-19 a “fake pandemic” and spoke about mask-wearing as an infringement on their rights. Trump himself was not wearing a mask at the rallies. He used his platform to mock public health practices. It seems reasonable, then, to worry that many attendees engage in other risky behaviors, such as hugging and shaking hands. Do they participate in higher-transmission activities before and after


time. These harm-reduction opportunities continue after an event ends and participants return to their homes. My patient lived alone, but at her protest, those who live with others were instructed to self-quarantine for at least five days and then get tested. During the protests, organizers followed public health guidance to educate participants about how to protect themselves and others. Many cities have helped by offering free testing for protesters. Not everyone follows every guideline, of course, but overall, such harm-reduction practices appear to have worked. A research paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research examined patterns of spread in more than 300 major cities and found “no evidence that net covid-19 case growth differentially rose following the onset of Black Lives Matter protests.” Where are the harm-reduction practices at Trump’s rallies? The most recent events, in Nevada and Arizona, have been held indoors. Compared with those outdoors, indoor gatherings could increase the risk of transmission by 18 to 19 times. Many attendees appeared to not wear masks. Some rallygoers in Michigan called covid-19 a “fake pandemic” and spoke about mask-wearing as an infringement on their rights. Trump himself was not wearing a mask at the rallies. He used his platform to mock public health practices. It seems reasonable, then, to worry that many attendees engage in other risky behaviors, such as hugging and shaking hands. Do they participate in higher-transmission activities before and after rallies, such as going to tightly packed bars and indoor restaurants? When they return to home, do they ignore guidance to self-quarantine and get tested? And that’s the key difference between social justice protests and Trump’s political rallies. This is what public health experts should counter with when we come under fire for appearing to support one cause over the other. It’s not our job to judge why people are at an event, but it is our duty to explain — based on science — what makes one event higher-risk than another. To be clear, from an epidemiological perspective, there shouldn’t be any mass gatherings during a pandemic. But let’s not engage in false equivalencies. The reason Trump’s rallies are more dangerous than social justice protests has nothing to do with the purpose of the gatherings and everything to do with the behavior of organizers and participants. The distinction is this: Are attendees going in spite of the risk or in defiance of it?


State Dept. lifts ‘do not travel’ advisory for Mexico as border closure is due to expire

4 (do not travel) nationwide. Some less-visited regions of Mexico remain classified Level 4 for “crime and kidnapping.” The popular resort areas of Cabo San Lucas, Cancún and Cozumel have been allowing U.S. travelers who fly into the country to visit without required quarantines or coronavirus tests. Instead, Mexican airports have been carrying out health-screening procedures such as temperature checks, according to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico. “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued a Level 3 Travel Health Notice for Mexico due to COVID-19,” the advisory states. “Mexico has lifted stay at home orders in some areas and resumed some transportation and business operations. Visit the Embassy’s COVID-19 page for more information on COVID-19 in Mexico.” Mexico has seen a total of 668,000 coronavirus cases and more than 70,000 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, with daily new cases peaking in August before lowering and holding steady in the range of 4,000 to 6,000 per day since then. The United States has reported more than 6 million total coronavirus cases and 190,000 deaths, with the peak in daily new cases hitting mid-July, at more than 75,000. The change comes soon after some major tourist sites in Mexico reopened, including Teotihuacán, a UNESCO World Heritage Site outside of Mexico City. The only area in Mexico that has a higher covid-19 rate than Mexico City is the tourist-frequented state of Baja California Sur, which includes Los Cabos. Subregions that have earned the World Travel and Tourism Council’s “Safe Travels stamp,” which certifies a locale follows health protocols established by the WTTC, include Los Cabos, Cancun, Riviera Maya, Riviera Nayarit, Yucatán, Jalisco and the islands of Cozumel. “CDC recommends travelers avoid all nonessential international travel to Mexico. Travelers at increased risk for severe illness from COVID-19 should consider postponing all travel, including essential travel, to Mexico,” according to the CDC website. “Local policies at your destination may require you to be tested for COVID-19 before you are allowed to enter the country. If you test positive on arrival, you may be required to isolate for a period of time. You may even be prevented from returning to the United States, as scheduled.” Read more: Where can Americans travel to in the Caribbean? What to know about getting tested for the coronavirus to travel Miami airport officials seize $490,000 stuffed into an accent chair passing through customs


Fighting Food Insecurity

And just ten days before his inauguration on January 10, 2009, President-Elect Barack Obama visited and ate lunch here. After a 61 plus year journey, the Ben’s brand is red hot and is a must-visit restaurant for anyone visiting Washington. Ben’s has also expanded by opening its first new restaurant and bar called Ben’s Next Door in 2008, in addition to outposts at the Nationals baseball Stadium and FedEx Field. In 2014, we opened our third location in Rosslyn, VA, and one year later opened a Ben’s Chili Bowl on H ST in NE and also at Reagan National Airport. Just recently we opened a Ben’s Chili Bowl at Capital One Arena. In 2013, Danielle Nierenberg co-founded Food Tank with Bernard Pollack, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization focused on building a global community for safe, healthy, nourished eaters. Food Tank is a global convener, research organization, and non-biased creator of original research impacting the food system. Danielle is the recipient of the 2020 Julia Child Award. She has an M.S. in Agriculture, Food, and Environment from the Tufts University Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy and spent two years volunteering for the Peace Corps in the Dominican Republic. An unprecedented number of struggling individuals are turning to the federal nutrition programs for assistance in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The latest research commissioned by the Food Research & Action Center finds that between 26-29 million adults, or 11 percent, have reported that members of their households sometimes or often did not have enough to eat in the months following the onset of the pandemic. Black and Latinx households have been hit even harder, with no idea how they will put their next meal on the table. Federal nutrition programs are our nation’s best defense against food insecurity and hunger. Since the onset of COVID-19, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has helped millions more households put food on the table. Summer Nutrition Programs have been extended to help fill the nutrition gap due to school closures. And a new program, Pandemic Electronic Benefits Transfer (P-EBT), has provided critical support for families with children missing out on school meals. Greater investment in these proven programs are critical if the nation is to flatten the curve on hunger and stimulate the economy as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to unfold. (This content was produced and paid for by a Washington Post Live


TSA would screen travelers for fever under new legislation proposed in the Senate

The Transportation Security Administration would do temperature checks of travelers at U.S. airports for signs of fever under new legislation introduced Friday. The bill, sponsored by Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), would require the TSA to set up a 120-day pilot program. Data collected from the pilot project would be used to expand the program to additional airports. Legislation to create a similar program was introduced in the House in July. “Americans deserve all the available tools to fight COVID-19,” Cantwell said in a news release announcing the legislation, referring to the disease caused by the novel coronavirus. “For workers and the traveling public, a temperature check program provides important data. The legislation I introduced would require TSA to use innovative temperature screening technology to better protect passenger and worker health, and build public trust in the aviation system.” For months, U.S. airlines have called on the TSA to conduct temperatures scans, saying such a measure would help build passenger confidence in air travel at a time when many are reluctant to fly because of concerns about the pandemic. But the agency has been reluctant to take on the task, saying that it’s not clear the scans would be an effective strategy for identifying those with the coronavirus. Some people may have the virus but not a fever, and some may have elevated temperatures but may not be infected with the virus, the agency says. The Trump administration recently ended enhanced screening for travelers from a number of countries, including China and more than two dozen European nations. In announcing the decision, officials noted that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the screenings, which included temperature checks, showed “limited effectiveness” at catching sick people. “We now have a better understanding of COVID-19 transmission that indicates symptom-based screening has limited effectiveness because people with COVID-19 may have no symptoms or fever at the time of screening, or only mild symptoms,” the agency said in a statement. A CDC spokeswoman said 675,000 people underwent the screenings and fewer than 15 were identified as having covid-19. Even so, a handful of airports in Hawaii, California, New Jersey and Washington state have begun doing temperature checks. Frontier Airlines also requires passengers to have their temperatures taken before they board their flights. Despite doubts about their effectiveness, the checks are popular with travelers. A recent survey by the


scans would be an effective strategy for identifying those with the coronavirus. Some people may have the virus but not a fever, and some may have elevated temperatures but may not be infected with the virus, the agency says. The Trump administration recently ended enhanced screening for travelers from a number of countries, including China and more than two dozen European nations. In announcing the decision, officials noted that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the screenings, which included temperature checks, showed “limited effectiveness” at catching sick people. “We now have a better understanding of COVID-19 transmission that indicates symptom-based screening has limited effectiveness because people with COVID-19 may have no symptoms or fever at the time of screening, or only mild symptoms,” the agency said in a statement. A CDC spokeswoman said 675,000 people underwent the screenings and fewer than 15 were identified as having covid-19. Even so, a handful of airports in Hawaii, California, New Jersey and Washington state have begun doing temperature checks. Frontier Airlines also requires passengers to have their temperatures taken before they board their flights. Despite doubts about their effectiveness, the checks are popular with travelers. A recent survey by the International Air Transport Association found that 80 percent of travelers said temperature checks made them feel safer when traveling. Under the legislation, the TSA would have 30 days to establish a pilot program at airports that “represent diverse operating” conditions. Data collected from the 120-day pilot, including the most effective technology for conducting the scans, would be used to expand the program, which would be in place until the end of the coronavirus emergency. In addition, TSA officials would be required to develop policies that ensure the privacy of travelers’ personal and medical information, address how to deal with people who may have a fever unrelated to the coronavirus, and accommodate individuals with disabilities or who observe certain religious practices. The measure would allow passengers who are barred from flying to cancel or change their flight at no cost to them. “In addition to passengers, staff and other airport visitors self-screening and staying home if any symptoms develop, temperature checks could provide an added layer of defense against transmission in the air travel system,” said Chris Spitters, health officer for Snohomish Health District in Washington state. “It may not catch every case of covid boarding aircrafts, but it does add


Climate change is killing the farm belt. With a little help, farmers can fix it.

Art Cullen is editor of the Storm Lake Times in northwest Iowa. He is author of the book “Storm Lake: Change, Resilience, and Hope in America’s Heartland.” They call the storm a derecho, and it blasted through Tim Gannon’s central Iowa farm at 100 mph on Aug. 10, wrecking a machine shed and burying his equipment. Fourteen million acres of Iowa crops — about the size of West Virginia — were flattened. Nobody had ever seen anything like it. The derecho followed a parched July. “It was like a blast furnace for two weeks,” Gannon said. “Then it didn’t rain from the derecho [until] Labor Day.” This is our new normal. Climate change — both in Iowa and elsewhere — is making it harder for farmers to turn a profit. It could affect our ability to feed ourselves for generations. Gannon waits for his harvesting equipment to be repaired under skies casting a weird, pinkish-orange hue from West Coast wildfire smoke. Gannon’s corn is bent and parched. He won’t know how badly he is hurt until after the harvest. Some neighbors had it worse. He hopes the farm will break even this year, thanks to crop insurance and government disaster assistance. The Great Plains is in the early throes of prolonged drought. Scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies forecast in 2015 that the drought would set in nearer to 2050. Last April, they updated their findings: This drought, the worst in a millennium, has begun. Already, it has become more difficult growing corn even with irrigation in eastern Kansas. The nights are just getting too hot. Eugene S. Takle, a prominent climate modeler at Iowa State University, reports that corn yields likely will get chopped by 30 percent in a couple of decades if we go on belching out carbon dioxide and nitrogen. That means higher food prices. He warns that by 2050, the number of days of 100-plus degrees in Iowa will reach 67 — triple what it was in the 1960s. Corn cannot survive that kind of heat. Challenged to find water, California dairies are creeping back to the Midwest.The Ogallala Aquifer underlying the Great Plains is being depleted by huge cattle feedlots that dot the old cattle drive route from El Paso to western Kansas. In 20 years, the water will be gone from pockets around the Texas Panhandle. The cattle will have to move


Movie theater popcorn sales have tanked, prompting American popcorn farmers to find new markets

theater chains, but more frequently the deals are with the distributors who also deliver Milk Duds, Good & Plenty and soda to theaters every couple of weeks (theaters do not have lots of dry storage space, so it is a “just in time” supply-chain model). Crop progress reports from the federal Farm Service Agency generally say there are about 96 million acres planted in dent corn, compared with about 300,000 acres of popcorn annually. When the pandemic hit, Preferred did not have a retail presence in stores — theaters and events went dark, and the kernels had nowhere to go. And with grocery stores swamped with panicked shoppers, it was not an ideal time to make sales pitches and launch a new retail brand. Time was ticking, and the corn was sitting. It will last about a year, after which it’s too dry: What makes popcorn pop is an internal moisture level of 13.5 percent, stored inside a circle of soft starch. Plucker reached out on Facebook to Misfits Market, a produce subscription service that delivers “ugly” but perfectly edible food as a means of combating food waste. “The food supply chain has been disrupted in meaningful ways by the pandemic. Our goal is to serve a pretty unique purpose in that supply chain,” says Misfits founder Abhi Ramesh. “Movie theater popcorn has been so stable for the past 50 years — growers could easily anticipate how much would be needed based on release dates.” By June, he had bought multiple truckloads of Preferred’s popcorn, 40,000 pounds of kernels. The problem was packaging. “We work with Preferred to repack the giant bags into 28-ounce household bags, branded with Preferred Popcorn as a way to get recognized by consumers,” Ramesh says. He says that while some theaters are reopening, he anticipates it will be many months before movie popcorn sales resume historic numbers. Plucker says the big “butterfly” flakes are usually reserved for movie theaters (those big kernels fill up the tubs quicker), so typically are not directly available to consumers. No word on whether Misfits aims to rescue a lake of “butter-flavored topping” next. This collaboration saves Preferred Popcorn’s farmers, Plucker says. “A lot of them are second- or third-generation farmers,” she says. “It would be excruciating to say we are not going to be able to contract acres with you next year because we have an abundance of popcorn.”


How West Coast cartoonists deliver powerful art from the wildfires

have many friends and family members affected by all of it, particularly in Oregon — entire towns wiped out, and the death toll is vastly understated.” Wildfires in the West have burned more than 5 million acres this season, killing at least 35 people, according to reports, as millions continue to face serious air-quality health risks. Throughout the region, some prominent political cartoonists are also drawing commentary on the fires through a personal lens. “Friends and family up and down the coast who have been sequestered because of covid-19 are now locked indoors because hazardous smoke fills the air,” says David Horsey, the Seattle Times cartoonist who previously worked at the Los Angeles Times. “The usual September of blue skies and sunshine has been obscured by ashy air and the smell of burned forests.” Horsey said he views the region’s future through how it will affect his adult children — a son in the Bay Area, and a daughter in Seattle who has a 2-year-old child. In one recent cartoon by Horsey, global warming teams up with human carelessness for “bigger, hotter fire seasons.” “The fires will come back, year after year,” the Pulitzer-winner said. “I can only hope that enlightened leadership will find ways to mitigate the even worse tragedies to come by taking bold action to put the brakes on the burning of fossil fuels.” Several California-born cartoonists have been reflecting on their ties to the state, which inform their art. “It’s hard to describe how much I love the physical beauty of my home state,” said Steve Breen, the Pulitzer-winning cartoonist for the San Diego Union-Tribune. “I’ve backpacked in the Sierras. I’ve taken my kids on camping trips in the state and national forests and [taken] long walks through the redwoods. It’s incredibly sad to see so much destruction. “I know that part of it is natural, but it’s all being driven by man-made climate change,” added Breen, who has satirized climate-change deniers and depicted the heroism of firefighters. “People should help the most vulnerable and essential workers, like farmworkers and firefighters and first-responders,” said Lalo Alcaraz, the San Diego-born syndicated cartoonist whose art has highlighted the plight of farm laborers working in the dangerously smoky conditions. “This current situation is like the covid-19 pandemic,” said Alcaraz, a Pulitzer finalist this year. “It has exposed big faults in our society.” Mark Fiore, who draws for the Bay


Low-income children are losing out as the pandemic cuts back youth sports

Petula Dvorak’s Sept. 15 Metro column, “Youth sports ‘loopholes’ grow the divide,” described how youth sports is worse during the pandemic for kids whose families can afford to play sports. However, what is even worse is the pandemic’s effect on youths in underserved communities where sports can be a lifeline through programs such as DC SCORES, Friends of Fort Dupont Ice Arena, Washington Nationals Youth Baseball Academy and Washington Tennis & Education Foundation. These and other similar D.C. nonprofits often provide free sports programs for low-income children, along with academic assistance and other critical youth-development supports that make it possible for kids to stay on track in school. These nonprofits employ the sports-based youth-development model that uses the delivery of sport intentionally to achieve positive non-sports-based outcomes — critical pro-social relationship skills such as fair play, respect for one’s opponent and teamwork; better academic performance and educational attainment; and improved health and wellness. Though many of these programs have been using virtual tools during the pandemic to stay connected with their youths — team meetings, one-on-one calls with coaches, training exercises and homework support — engagement with young people is declining. Curriculum Associates estimates only 60 percent of low-income students are regularly logging into online instruction, even as 90 percent of high-income students do. The result is a potential learning loss by low-income students of 12.4 months if in-class schooling is delayed until January. For youths from underserved communities, the lack of in-person sports imposed by the pandemic is a significant social and educational setback for those who can least afford it. Rob Smith The writer is founding executive director of the Youth Sports Collaborative Network. Read more letters to the editor.


What a WeChat ban could mean for millions of U.S. users

politics — and many other topics — disappear from the app. Even an emoji can be intercepted as you send it. When Chinese speakers abroad use the app to read news, they are reading and browsing in a heavily censored news ecosystem, helping Beijing shape communities and conversations. Chinese security personnel also use WeChat to contact, harass and surveil dissidents and exiles, including those in the United States. The Trump administration said the app collects “vast swaths of information from its users,” which could “allow the Chinese Communist Party access to Americans’ personal and proprietary information." In a statement Friday, Tencent spokesperson Meredith Julian defended the company’s security, saying it “has always incorporated the highest standards of user privacy and data security.” It is also used by China’s vast domestic security apparatus to track and surveil citizens. In 2016, a team at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab tested 26,000 keywords on WeChat accounts registered in China, Canada and the United States. It found nearly 200 words that triggered censorship in accounts linked to Chinese phone numbers. Most popular communication apps used in the U.S. are banned in China, including WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and Telegram. Encrypted chat app Signal still works in both countries, and another Tencent app called QQ might be unaffected for now. It’s unknown if going through a VPN will allow WeChat to continue working in its current state on phones in the US. Users in other countries like India that have banned TikTok have effectively used tools like VPNs and switching SIM cards to continue using that app. There are other more technical options dedicated WeChat users could attempt, like installing the app through non app-store channels, called sideloading. It’s easier to do on an Android phone than an iOS device, but on either platform it comes with increased security risks and is not recommended. A U.S. government official told The Washington Post the administration does not intend to prosecute anyone for finding new ways to use the apps. The safest thing to do is back up all contacts and important information from WeChat before the end of the day Saturday. Save contact names, email addresses and phone numbers your phone’s contacts app or even in a spreadsheet. Save any important chats or content that doesn’t exist elsewhere, even if that means just taking screenshots. If you aren’t able to easily find people’s contact info, ask


More than 200 U-Md. students told to restrict activity after outbreak in residence hall

More than 200 students at the University of Maryland in College Park have been ordered to restrict their movement around campus and monitor their symptoms after a recent surge of coronavirus cases in their dorm, officials said Friday. Residents of Denton Hall are not under quarantine, said Natifia Mullings, a spokeswoman for the campus. But “out of an abundance of caution,” they cannot attend face-to-face classes or report to in-person jobs for two weeks, she said. Students in the dorm have been told to stay in their rooms as much as possible and avoid public places. Communal bathrooms in the building can be used by only two students at a time. In the past two weeks, 23 students in Denton Hall have tested positive for the coronavirus, Mullings said. Those students are being isolated, and nine others who came into contact with someone with a positive case have been moved to quarantine housing. The dorm has 247 students. More than 150 people across the campus were in quarantine housing Thursday, the most recent data shows. Students in Denton Hall are allowed to go on outdoor walks and pick up packages. But the guidance from the university prevents them from activities like visiting friends or working out in on-campus gyms. Each student will be provided a case manager and have access to food delivery, Mullings said. U-Md. resumed in-person classes Monday after holding classes online for two weeks, a delay that allowed officials to expand testing, said Darryll J. Pines, the university’s president. “We have now conducted 20,000 tests over a 15- to 21-day period, and our positivity rate is 1.1 percent,” Pines told state lawmakers at a virtual meeting Wednesday. During that time frame, 212 tests came back positive. The university launched a second round of testing this week, which resulted in 39 positive cases, the university’s coronavirus dashboard shows. But the union that represents about 3,400 employees on the College Park campus — including housekeepers, librarians and bus drivers — said it is also worried about more than 190 positive cases reported to the university by students and employees who were not tested on campus. College Park officials call these cases “unconfirmed.” This week, 75 students and faculty reported contracting the virus, the school’s coronavirus dashboard shows. Those cases have not been confirmed by the university. Todd Holden, president of the College Park chapter of the American Federation of


This new pro-Trump talking point is one of their most cynical lies yet

that the focus was more on “malign foreign influence,” i.e., the spreading of disinformation to foment discord and smear Biden. What’s more, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence has also confirmed this, releasing a statement indicating that Russia is using “a range of measures” to denigrate Biden. We also know Russia is trying to interfere in other ways. Microsoft recently revealed that it had evidence that the same 2016 Russian hacking operation has again tried to penetrate the systems of numerous U.S. political organizations and candidates. And last week, the Treasury Department placed sanctions on a pro-Russian Ukrainian official named Andriy Derkach, whom it called “an active Russian agent for over a decade." Derkach, the department said, has been pushing Russian disinformation against Biden. That has entailed working closely with Rudolph W. Giuliani, the president’s personal lawyer, and trying to feed information to Republicans such as Sen. Ron Johnson (Wis.), the chair of the Homeland Security Committee. While Johnson denies taking that information, he’s running a Senate investigation designed to validate similar debunked smears, and will release a “report” on his “findings.” Giuliani is hard at work on the same smears. Trump is also pushing them. Clearly, Russia has the same goal it did four years ago: to help Trump win the election. If it isn’t (yet) succeeding through hacking, one likely reason is that the constant sounding of alarms has pushed us to make our systems more resistant to attack. In other words, our guard is up, and to some degree, this has worked. But McConnell is now saying, in effect, that Democrats should stop sounding that alarm. Meanwhile, intelligence officials appear to be trying to limit the release of information about Russian interference. They recently announced an end to in-person briefings of Congress with the assent of John Ratcliffe, who is the director of national intelligence and a Trump loyalist. This decision was reversed, but notably, only after Democrats raised a huge fuss. Yet, McConnell is now claiming Democrats should stop making so much noise. Four years ago, McConnell quashed an effort by the Obama administration to present a united, bipartisan front against Russian interference. He’s been trying to downplay it for years. This has now hit a new level of absurdity. It’s akin to saying that if we talk too much about bank robbery, it might undermine faith in the security of banks, so it’s


Scapegoating antifa for starting wildfires distracts from the real causes

country burn,” wrote Maclean. In 1919, when the Sound Timber Company, operating in northern Washington, was sued by a neighboring land owner for fire damage, the company argued that it wasn’t at fault because the fire on its property had been started by striking IWW members. Lawyers for the company could only produce one witness to testify that a Wobbly started the fire, and then he changed his story under cross examination. Ultimately, the court ruled that it was probably a spark from the company’s railroad that’d started the blaze. The Sound Timber Company case reveals some of why companies were quick to blame the IWW when forests burned: it distracted from their own role in causing fires. Early 20th-century logging operations were extremely fire prone. Railroad cars and donkey engines — the massive machines used to haul fallen timbers — often ignited piles of logging waste drying out on the forest floor. Companies regularly ignored even basic fire safety precautions, and routinely forced crews to work during hot and dry periods, all in the interest of profits. Blaming Wobblies instead of reforming their harvesting practices was more convenient. Indeed, the reality was that Wobblies weren’t responsible, and they often even worked on firefighting crews to stop the fires. Once, when a fire broke out during a 1916 strike at a Montana mine, Wobblies abandoned the picket lines to assist in containing the blaze. By the 1920s, the IWW’s numbers in the Northwest woods had started to decline. But the tendency to blame radical activists for the Northwest’s fires persisted. In the 1930s, Communist Party activists were sometimes blamed for starting fires. In the 1960s it was antiwar protesters. In the 1980s, rumors circulated in logging towns that members of the radical environmental group Earth First! regularly set fires. And today, antifa gets the blame. As in the past, these rumors do damage by unnecessarily stoking fears and anxieties of activists fighting for meaningful change. These rumors also shift our attention away from the real cause of wildfire. Most foresters and ecologists believe that the large and destructive fires of recent years are the result of climate change and poor forest management. If we’re serious about reducing wildfire risk then we’d all be wise to spend far less time framing radical activists as agents of destruction — they aren’t — and far more time adopting better environmental policies and practices.


The Technology 202: Trump administration block on TikTok downloads raises stakes in negotiations

but that deal is still held up in negotiations. “However, the FCC need not — and should not — wait for Congress to act,” they write. Long-awaited legislation from Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) would require businesses to allow consumers to access, correct, delete or port their data. The bill would also prohibit companies from transferring consumers’ sensitive data without their consent. The protections would be enforced by the Federal Trade Commission. “As COVID-19 increases activity online and opportunities to misuse personal data continue to surge, it is time to pass a uniform, national privacy law,” Wicker said in a statement. “More than ever, we need to stop bad actors and restore consumers’ trust in the internet marketplace.” The legislation, which is being co-sponsored by Sens. John Thune (R-S.D.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), would also require businesses to assess the privacy risks of data processing and be transparent about their use of algorithms. The legislation is already garnering support from trade groups. “BSA applauds Sen. Wicker for his important work toward ensuring that a federal privacy law gives consumers rights in their personal data and places obligations on businesses to handle that data in trusted and responsible ways,” said Craig Albright, vice president of legislative strategy at the software company BSA. But the bill has yet to attract sponsors from the committee The Senate Commerce Committee will hold a hearing on Wednesday to revisit the debate over a national privacy framework that largely stalled during the coronavirus pandemic. The changes will designate which areas of Workplace, the company’s internal communications system, can be used to discuss social and political issues, CNBC reports. The company also says it will strengthen its harassment policies, but it’s unclear how. The guidelines come a day after Google introduced new internal communications policies. Facebook has faced a string of leaks from Workplace and internal employee events recently. What Can I Say to the ‘QAnon Mom’ Next Door? (The New York Times) American Girl’s New Doll ‘Courtney’ Is the Game Developer the ’80s Needed (Slate) Twitter announced several new hires and promotions yesterday. Lauren Culbertson will now lead Twitter’s federal, state and local advocacy efforts across the country as head of U.S. public policy. Todd O The Trump campaign’s most watched YouTube video used 10 video clips in misleading ways — isolating quotes and splicing together clips to mask key context.


Virginia reports first child coronavirus death; Maryland to expand indoor dining capacity Monday

the Washington region has generally done throughout the pandemic. Spokespeople for Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich (D), Prince George’s County Executive Angela D. Alsobrooks (D) and Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman (D) said those jurisdictions won’t be expanding capacity inside restaurants on Monday. Howard County Executive Calvin Ball (D) said his county will expand dining capacity. Still, Anne Arundel officials did announce more restrictions will be lifted next week. Theaters in the county can open at 50 percent capacity or a maximum of 100 people — whichever is less — starting Sept. 25. That measure will bring the county in line with statewide Phase 3 guidance Hogan announced earlier this month. At the state’s flagship university, more than 200 students were ordered Friday to restrict their movement around campus and monitor for possible symptoms after a recent surge of coronavirus cases in their dorm. Residents of the University of Maryland’s Denton Hall are not under quarantine, university spokeswoman Natifia Mullings said, but “out of an abundance of caution,” they cannot attend face-to-face classes or report to in-person jobs for two weeks. Residents in the 247-student dorm have been told to stay in their rooms as much as possible and avoid public places. Communal restrooms in the building can be used by two students at a time. In the past two weeks, 23 students in Denton Hall have tested positive for the coronavirus, Mullings said. Those students are being isolated and nine others who came into contact with someone with a positive case were moved to quarantine housing. More than 150 people across campus were in quarantine housing Thursday, according to university data. U-Md. resumed in-person classes Monday after holding classes online for two weeks, a delay that allowed officials to expand testing, said university President Darryll J. Pines. The greater Washington region on Friday reported 1,847 new coronavirus infections and 37 additional deaths. Virginia had 1,242 new cases and 29 deaths; Maryland had 543 new cases and eight deaths; D.C. had 62 new cases and no additional deaths. Virginia’s death toll was well above average for a fourth consecutive day, lifting its seven-day average number of fatalities to 34 — a jump from eight to start the week. The state reported a record 96 deaths Tuesday, citing a reporting backlog that included deaths that occurred over the past month. Virginia officials attributed 19 of Friday’s deaths to the backlog.


U.S.-Mexico border closure extended days after State Dept. lifts ‘do not travel’ advisory

Mexico announced Thursday that its border with the United States will remain closed for another month to further prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus. The border closure was due to expire on Sept. 21. The Mexican secretary of foreign affairs said that Mexico and the Unites States would continue the terms of that closure, which have been in place since March, until at least Oct. 21. The announcement comes days after the State Department had lowered its travel advisory for Mexico to a Level 3 from a Level 4, the highest on the scale. The border closure terms only apply to land and water crossings, as flights between the United States and Mexico have largely continued since the early days of the pandemic. Until last week, the State Department’s Mexico advisory was a Level 4 (do not travel) nationwide. Some less-visited regions of Mexico remain classified Level 4 for “crime and kidnapping.” The modified travel advisory said U.S. travelers should “reconsider travel to Mexico due to covid-19” as well as “crime and kidnapping.” A border closure restricting nonessential travel has been in place between the United States and Mexico since March 21 in an effort to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus, according to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico. The popular resort areas of Cabo San Lucas, Cancún and Cozumel have been allowing U.S. travelers who fly into the country to visit without required quarantines or coronavirus tests. Instead, Mexican airports have been carrying out health-screening procedures such as temperature checks, according to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico. “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued a Level 3 Travel Health Notice for Mexico due to COVID-19,” the advisory states. “Mexico has lifted stay at home orders in some areas and resumed some transportation and business operations. Visit the embassy’s COVID-19 page for more information on COVID-19 in Mexico.” Mexico has seen a total of 668,000 coronavirus cases and more than 70,000 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, with daily new cases peaking in August before lowering and holding steady in the range of 4,000 to 6,000 per day since then. The United States has reported more than 6.5 million total coronavirus cases and 194,000 deaths, with the peak in daily new cases hitting mid-July, at more than 75,000. Major tourist sites in Mexico have reopened, including Teotihuacán, a UNESCO World Heritage Site