CDC is also on the edge over the regulation of rent moratorium. the reason they are canceling at the end of July is because landlords are taking it to the supreme court and they know they (the CDC) don't have the authority. They're getting their ass kicked left and right.
Florida keeping COVID cases secret like they were Matt Gaetz's underage girlfriends... As the aggressive COVID Delta variant spreads, Floridians don’t know where it is and how to avoid it https://www.sun-sentinel.com/corona...0210624-all2i57ocrg5znpn557oae3dvy-story.html As the dangerous Delta variant of the coronavirus makes its way through Florida, those who live in and visit the state will not know where it lurks. Should you vacation in Fort Lauderdale with unvaccinated children? Should you venture to amusement parks where masks are not required? Those decisions must be made without the full picture of where variants of concern are proliferating in the state. “There are all kinds of databases, but no information available about which counties have cases,” said Marco Salemi, professor of Experimental Pathology at the University of Florida College of Medicine. “That is the information people really need to know.” “We had zero cases of Delta in March and now we have over 100,” Salemi said, “Whether that continues depends on which areas of the state the cases are in and whether vaccination levels are at a higher or lower rate.” Researchers and health officials say Delta, also known as B.1.617.2, is more contagious and could trigger more serious illness, posing a threat to counties with low vaccination rates. But the Florida Department of Health is not making public the locations where the variants are spreading. Other states such as Michigan and Missouri reveal that information. Florida’s weekly COVID report shows 24 Florida counties have vaccination rates below 40%, leaving residents vulnerable to Delta. Marin County in California announced Tuesday the region has seen two recent outbreaks tied to the highly contagious Delta variant and while dozens were infected, officials said the situation would have been more severe if 90% of the residents had not received at least one dose of a vaccine. Along with Delta, four additional COVID variants of concern are circulating in Florida — Alpha (from the UK), Beta (from South Africa), Gamma (from Brazil), and Epsilon (from California). Without a comprehensive state tracking system, individual county health departments are choosing whether to share information with the public about local cases of COVID variants. At the federal level, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention offers the only public variant tracker available to Floridians to monitor the spread. The tracker includes statewide estimates of the proportion of variants in Florida from a sampling of cases. What Floridians don’t see are the details: whether variant cases appear in people hospitalized, vaccinated, symptomatic, or of a certain age group. RELATED: Fast-spreading, aggressive Delta variant of COVID now reported in Florida » “The state likely is getting more granular level data behind the scenes, but it is not sharing it in any meaningful way,” said Kelly Wroblewski, director of infectious disease programs for the Association of Public Health Laboratories, which contributes to the CDC tracker. “Right now we are not seeing variants cause more illness, and vaccines appear to still be effective, so from a public perspective there’s not much action to take.” When the Florida Department of Health moved its COVID-19 reports from daily to weekly earlier this month, some data disappeared from public view, including the number of variant cases in the state. Some Florida universities and private labs are trying to create their own surveillance for the COVID variants. Under contract with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Helix Labs randomly tested about 60,000 positive COVID samples in Florida between Jan. 1 and June 1. Of those, the lab identified 13,544 variant cases. Helix found the Delta variant in 62 counties in Florida in 13% or more of the samples collected through May 1. RELATED: Nearly all COVID-19 deaths in US are now among unvaccinated » Helix spokeswoman Amy Fisher said while the lab identified the growth of specific variants, it doesn’t know whether variants infect people who are vaccinated and whether every strain is in every county — key measures to predict future levels of spread. “We track trends within our own data, but we may not have sufficient coverage across all regions of Florida,” Fisher said. “We do not have individual-level vaccination information so we cannot identify which positive cases would be classified as breakthrough infections, but our reporting to (the Florida Department of Health) should allow local public health officials to identify these cases.” So far, declining new COVID cases and test positivity rates nationwide indicate vaccines offer adequate protection against Delta and other variants now circulating in Florida. “In the real world, vaccines are working,” said Dr. David Andrews, an associate professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the Miller School of Medicine who leads a pilot program to track variants. “If we see breakthroughs, there will be a lot of concern about variants with a property that has an immune escape. But for the time being that has not been seen or identified.” Here are the variants of concern in Florida and what is known about how vaccines measure up: Alpha,first detected in the U.K. This variant is most present in Florida at this time but that could change in the coming weeks. All three vaccines have been found to offer protection from Alpha. Beta,first detected in South Africa. This strain surfaced in Florida at least two months ago. The CDC says it spreads more easily spread than earlier versions but Beta remains one of the least represented variants in the state. In a Qatar study published inThe New England Journal of Medicine,researchers found Pfizer’s shot was between 72% and 75% effective at preventing infection caused by Beta at least two weeks after the second dose. Moderna found its vaccine was slightly less potent against this variant than the original strain although “above levels that are expected to be protective.” Johnson & Johnson said a phase 3 study found there was 64% overall efficacy and 82% efficacy against severe disease in South Africa, where the Beta variant was first discovered. Delta,first identified in India. The first case of Delta emerged in Florida in April and nowthe state has more than 100 confirmed cases, says Salemi, the UF professor. Health officials say being fully vaccinated with two doses makes a difference in protection from Delta. Researchers believe Pfizer and Moderna COVID vaccines offer adequate protection from the Delta variant. A spokesman for Johnson & Johnson said the manufacturer feels confident its vaccine will work against Delta, too. “We are monitoring the B.1.617 (Delta) variant through our ongoing trials, and are testing whether the immune response elicited by our COVID-19 vaccine is also targeting this strain,” the spokesman said. “We expect to have data later this year.” Epsilon,first detected in California. The CDC says vaccines may be less effective against this variant, but not much clinical data exists. This is the variant with the least number of reported cases in the state since early May. Gamma,first detected in Brazil. Gamma is the second most prevalent variant in Florida as of June 23 and researchers say there continues to be an uptick. Salemi says he is just as concerned about Gamma as Delta. Vaccines offer slightly reduced protection from Gamma than the original strain so the variant needs to be watched closely, he said. “Mutations are making the virus slightly more resistant to vaccines,” he said. “But overall vaccinations are working.” Andrews, at the University of Miami, says he has identified emerging strains in Florida from Colombia and Mexico that have not yet reached the CDC’s definition of “variant of concern.” However, Andrews said, he feels confident if a vaccine-resistant variant were to proliferate, the manufacturers of mRNA vaccines like Pfizer and Moderna could respond quickly to create a booster to target the strain. (More information at above url)
I find it odd that CDC is involved in rent issues or even dabbled in that rather than HUD who still has limited reach into private landlord/tennant relations. It is really up to the State legislature since state courts enforce eviction notices.
I disagree with this CDC decision. It is long overdue to stop eviction moratoriums, which are abusive to landlords, in the current economy with many available jobs. The people not paying rent at this point -- are for the most part -- just deliberately abusing the system. In the early days of COVID, the eviction moratorium made sense to avoid having additional homeless people who lost jobs from wandering the streets when COVID restrictions were in place. But now with readily available vaccinations and plentiful jobs -- it no longer makes sense. Extending it for a month merely allows another month of abuse. CDC extends eviction moratorium a month, says it's last time https://www.wral.com/biden-administration-extends-eviction-moratorium-for-30-days/19741182/ The Biden administration has extended the nationwide ban on evictions for a month to help tenants who are unable to make rent payments during the coronavirus pandemic, but it said this is expected to be the last time it does so. Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, extended the evictions moratorium from June 30 until July 31. The CDC said Thursday that “this is intended to be the final extension of the moratorium.” The White House had acknowledged Wednesday that the emergency pandemic protection, which had been extended before, would have to end at some point. The trick is devising the right sort of off-ramp to make the transition without massive social upheaval. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the separate bans on evictions for renters and mortgage holders were “always intended to be temporary.” This week, dozens of members of Congress wrote to President Joe Biden and Walensky calling for the moratorium to be not only extended but also strengthened in some ways. The letter, spearheaded by Democratic Reps. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, Jimmy Gomez of California and Cori Bush of Missouri, called for an unspecified extension in order to allow the nearly $47 billion in emergency rental assistance included in the American Rescue Plan to get into the hands of tenants. Ending the assistance too abruptly, they said, would disproportionately hurt some of the same minority communities that were hit so hard by the virus itself. They also echoed many housing advocates by calling for the moratorium’s protections to be made automatic, requiring no special steps from the tenant in order to gain its protections. “The impact of the federal moratorium cannot be understated, and the need to strengthen and extend it is an urgent matter of health, racial, and economic justice,” the letter said. Diane Yentel, president of the National Low Income Housing Coalition, called an extension of the eviction ban “the right thing to do — morally, fiscally, politically, and as a continued public health measure.” But landlords, who have opposed the moratorium and challenged it in court, are against any extension. They have argued the focus should be on speeding up the distribution of rental assistance.
Tsing Tao will shortly be pushing this as "facts" and asking us to debunk it. This was recently pushed again by one of the clowns who also pushes COVID-denier graph nonsense on social media. This particular "gun deaths" graph demonstrates many the misleading attributes of the fabricated COVID graphs pushed on social media --- including altering the axis to give false impressions, adding a label for an event while not providing overall context, focusing on a single item causing an increase/decrease in deaths while ignoring everything else, plus a host of other inconsistencies.
CRT is the latest make-believe fantasy to trigger cons, that much is clear by now. QOP'ers and fox coordinate either directly or indirectly to peddle nonsense that scores well in their fucked up focus groups. This has gotta be the 50th "stay mad" con fox has run on this rubes.
Let's see how things are going for the first cruise ship leaving Florida... All Aboard! 1st post-pandemic cruise ship readies to sail https://www.wral.com/all-aboard-1st-post-pandemic-cruise-ship-readies-to-sail/19744585/ FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The first cruise ship to leave a U.S. port since the coronavirus pandemic brought the industry to a 15-month standstill is preparing to set sail with nearly all vaccinated passengers on board. Celebrity Edge will depart Fort Lauderdale, Florida, at 6 p.m. Saturday with the number of passengers limited to about 40% capacity, and with virtually all passengers vaccinated against COVID-19. Celebrity Cruises, one of Royal Caribbean Cruise's brands, says 99% of the passengers are vaccinated, well over the 95% requirement imposed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A giant greeting was projected on a wall of one of the port buildings: "Someday is here. Welcome back." Passengers arrived with matching T-shirts that read phrases such as “straight outta vaccination” and “vaccinated and ready to cruise." “Words can’t describe how excited we are to be a part of this historic sailing today,” said Elizabeth Rosner, 28, who moved from Michigan to Orlando, Florida, in December 2019 with her fiancé just to be close to the cruise industry’s hub. To comply with both the CDC’s requirement and a new Florida law banning businesses from requiring customers to show proof of vaccination, Celebrity Cruises is asking guests if they would like to share their vaccination status. Those who do not show or say they are vaccinated face additional restrictions. Saturday’s sailing kicks off the cruise lines’ return to business with Carnival vessels already scheduled to depart from other ports next month. “This is an emotional day for me. When I stepped on board the ship, I was proud. It’s a beautiful ship,” said Royal Caribbean Cruises’ CEO Richard Fain, after expressing condolences to the victims of the Surfside building collapse, less than 15 miles (about 24 kilometers) south of the port. Celebrity Cruises had unveiled the $1 billion boat in December 2018 — betting on luxury cruising, offering a giant spa and multifloor suites. The seven-night cruise will sail for three days in the Western Caribbean waters before making stops in Costa Maya, Cozumel and Nassau. The ship will be led by Capt. Kate McCue, the first American woman to captain a cruise ship, who has more than 1 million followers on TikTok. “You can truly feel the palpable sense of excitement and energy amongst the group as we prepare for our welcoming of our first guests,” McCue said. “I've never honestly seen a group so excited to get back to work.” Industry officials are hoping all goes smooth to move past a chapter last year of deadly outbreaks on cruise ships that prompted ships to be rejected at ports and passengers to be forced into quarantine. Some passengers died of COVID-19 at sea while others fell so ill they had to be carried out of the vessels on stretchers. The CDC extended no-sail orders repeatedly last year as the pandemic raged, and came up with strict requirements for the industry that have already been contested in court by the state of Florida. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis says the industry generates billions for the state's economy. On Saturday, officials at Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale said only that port lost more than $30 million in revenue in fiscal year 2020 from the cruise shutdown. During that hiatus, Carnival, Norwegian and Royal Caribbean, the three largest cruise companies, have had to raise more than $40 billion in financing just to stay afloat. Collectively they lost $20 billion last year and another $4.5 billion in the first quarter of 2021, according to Securities and Exchange Commission filings. The pandemic forced Kurt and Carol Budde to cancel their beach celebration wedding aboard the world's largest ship, Symphony of the Seas, in March 2020. COVID-19 halted cruising six days before they were scheduled to tie the knot in St. Maarten. Kurt Budde's part-time gig as a travel agent also dried up. “It's a honeymoon make-up cruise,” said Kurt Budde, sporting matching shirts with the phrase “On Cruise Control." “We are living our best lives post COVID today," he said.
DeSantis saw trump go down the dick route and thinks if he out dicks trump he can get the nomination? Praise him all you want about the way he handled his state and COVID but this shit is fucked up.
DeSantis' lawyers humiliated by federal judge over his 'poorly drafted' social media law https://www.rawstory.com/desantis-social-media-law/ According to a report from the Orlando Weekly, a federal judge in Florida put lawyers representing Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on the spot during a Monday hearing that indicated they had an uphill battle in front of them. At issue is a law the Florida governor fiercely backed that would punish social media companies like Facebook or Twitter that ban users or add warnings to their posts. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 presidential election, popular social media sites began either banning users or deleting posts that spread harmful or blatantly false information. That has led to a central conservative complaint that "Big Tech" is engaging in "cancel culture" that deprives Americans of their 1st Amendment rights. According to Daphne Keller, an attorney and internet law expert, "The First Amendment is a constraint on the power of government. It doesn't apply to Twitter. Twitter is not a state actor." According to Orlando Weekly, "Online-industry groups NetChoice and the Computer & Communications Industry Association this month filed a lawsuit challenging the law," that had its genesis in the banning of former president Donald Trump from Twitter and Facebook. With the bill scheduled to go into effect on Thursday, lawyers representing DeSantis appeared before U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle to explain why the law should not be blocked. With that in mind, Hinkle "peppered lawyers with questions and swiped at the law during a two-and-a-half-hour-long hearing Monday," Orlando Weekly reported. "I won't put you on the spot and ask you if you've ever dealt with a statute that was more poorly drafted," the judge asked. The judge later added, "It just seems to me that you can only make sense out of this statute if you know what the Legislature must have meant, not what it said. And I think that's a hard argument in Florida, where the court says, just read the words."