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School Vaccine Mandates for COVID Are Not Happening
For the third summer in a row, school leaders are facing the question of what — if anything — they’re going to do to stop the spread of COVID-19 when students return to classrooms. One thing is clear: Almost none of them will be requiring vaccines.
Just 31% of children between 5 and 11 in the U.S. have been fully vaccinated, and 61% of 12- to 17-year-olds have been. (Only about 3% of children under 5 had received a first dose by July 20.)
Still, no state in the country is planning to require student vaccinations, a marked turnaround from where things seemed to be headed last winter when multiple states and school districts suggested vaccine mandates were coming soon. Only Washington, DC, has announced a mandatory school vaccine policy this fall, for students 12 and older.
Other mitigation measures — from masks to ventilation — may also be on their way out. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will likely soon recommend easing school testing, quarantine and social distancing requirements, CNN reported last week. (Many schools often disregarded CDC guidelines, but the update is a sign of how expectations have shifted.)
Colorado Mother Sues Facebook, Alleges Daughter’s Addiction to Platform Has Caused Mental Health Problems
A mother in Colorado is suing Facebook, alleging that the social media platform has contributed to her daughter’s mental health issues. Cecelia Tesch, the mother of 13-year-old R.P., whose full name isn’t revealed in court documents, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Denver, according to FOX 5.
Court documents describe R.P. as a heavy user of Facebook who began showing addictive behavior when she began using the platform at the age of 7.
Tesch is suing Facebook for negligence, fraud and liability, as well as intentionally inflicting emotional distress, as well as other reasons.
Attorneys for Tesch said that the 13-year-old daughter developed several health issues after becoming addicted to Facebook. The attorneys also claim that the social media giant has a design that allows “children and adolescents to use, become addicted to and abuse their product without the consent of the users’ parents, like Cecelia Tesch.”
Amazon Bought the Company That Makes the Roomba. Anti-Trust Researchers and Data-Privacy Experts Say It’s ‘the Most Dangerous, Threatening Acquisition in the Company’s History’
After Amazon on Friday acquired iRobot, the company that creates Roomba vacuums, data privacy experts and anti-trust researchers quickly raised alarms over the tech giant using the purchase to “vacuum up” personal information from inside users’ homes.
Advanced Roomba vacuums have internal mapping technology that learns the floor plan of users’ homes. The devices can also “adapt to and remember” up to 10 different floor plans “so users can carry their robot to another floor or a separate home, where the robot will recognize its location and clean as instructed,” according to press releases by iRobot. Some models have low-resolution cameras to avoid obstacles and aid in mapping.
“People tend to think of Amazon as an online seller company, but really Amazon is a surveillance company. That is the core of its business model, and that’s what drives its monopoly power and profit,” Evan Greer, director of the nonprofit digital rights organization Fight for the Future, told Wired.
“Amazon wants to have its hands everywhere, and acquiring a company that’s essentially built on mapping the inside of people’s homes seems like a natural extension of the surveillance reach that Amazon already has.”
Kicked off Their Cruises, COVID-Positive Tourists Are Going Home on Alaska Flights and Ferries
Anchorage Daily News reported:
COVID-positive travelers say they were not allowed to board their cruise ship in Skagway this week. Instead, they say that Holland America helped them book travel on a state ferry and then an Alaska Airlines flight out of Juneau — the day after their positive tests.
Diana and Larry Lehrer were supposed to set sail from Skagway on Holland America’s Koningsdam after a bus tour through the Interior and Canada. But they tested positive for COVID-19 when they reached Skagway on Tuesday.
You don’t have to test negative to board one of the state’s ferries or Alaska Airlines flights, but they both have a policy that you should not travel if you are sick.
Canada’s Airlines and Railways Exempted 1,700 Travelers From Vaccine Requirements
In the first five months that unvaccinated Canadians were banned by the federal government from boarding planes and trains, rail operators and airlines granted roughly 1,700 exemptions to allow the unvaccinated to travel.
The information is contained in a government affidavit, filed in response to two lawsuits against the federal government’s travel vaccination mandates, announced in the lead-up to the 2021 election and brought into effect on Oct. 30, 2021.
The lawsuit was launched by Karl Harrison and Shaun Rickard. It was joined with another suit launched by People’s Party of Canada Leader Maxime Bernier, former Newfoundland premier Brian Peckford, and others. All challenge the constitutionality of the travel mandates, arguing they infringe upon charter rights to mobility, life, liberty and security of the person and equality rights.
Yet, when the travel mandate came into effect last October, the government ensured there were exemptions so that travelers could move around the country, including for those who live in remote communities.
Thousands Stranded in China Resort City Amid COVID Lockdown
Some 80,000 tourists are stranded in the southern Chinese beach resort of Sanya, after authorities declared it a COVID-19 hot spot and imposed a lockdown.
The restrictions came into force on Saturday morning, as authorities sought to stem the spread of COVID-19 in the city on tropical Hainan Island. There were 229 confirmed cases on Friday and an additional 129 on Saturday.
China’s ruling Communist Party sticks steadfastly to a “zero-COVID” approach that is increasingly at odds with the rest of the world. A recent outbreak in Shanghai spread so widely that authorities locked down the entire city, China’s largest, for two months, trapping millions of people and dealing a blow to the national economy.
Railway authorities banned all ticket sales in Sanya and all flights were also canceled on Saturday.
Hong Kong Cuts COVID Quarantine Stay for Incoming Travelers
Hong Kong will shorten the COVID-19 hotel quarantine period for all arrivals to three days from seven, taking another step to gradually unwind stringent pandemic rules that have isolated the Asian financial hub.
The measures will be effective from Friday, the city’s leader, John Lee, told a news conference on Monday.
Arrivals will need to self-monitor for a further four days, during which they will be forbidden to enter such premises as restaurants and bars. People in quarantine will be issued a red code on a government-mandated app. This will change to a yellow code once they leave quarantine, signifying they may not enter crowded premises.
Quarantine was formerly as long as three weeks. Currently, all arrivals must spend at least a week in hotel quarantine and comply with frequent testing orders, provide fecal samples for babies and fill out multiple forms.
‘End the CCP’: Twitter Co-Founder Jack Dorsey Calls for Fall of the Chinese Communist Party
Jack Dorsey isn’t a fan of the Chinese Communist Party. On Saturday, Twitter‘s co-founder and former CEO voiced his apparent support for the ending of the Chinese Communist Party after the nation implemented stricter COVID-19 policies.
Dorsey retweeted an early June post from a Beijing-based CNN reporter detailing China’s stringent measures that she had to follow, which include constant testing and a mandatory health app that authorities can track people through. In the video, the CNN reporter said that “this surveillance will stay long after COVID is gone.”
As CBS News reported, the health app decides where you can go and if you’re allowed to go there — a green light means a user is COVID-free and can enter public places. Yellow means there is a danger of infection and red indicates that a person needs to isolate or quarantine.
‘Risks Posed by AI Are Real’: EU Moves to Beat the Algorithms That Ruin Lives
Politicians in the European Union are now planning to introduce the first comprehensive global template for regulating artificial intelligence (AI), as institutions increasingly automate routine tasks in an attempt to boost efficiency and ultimately cut costs.
Depending on the EU’s final list of “high risk” uses, there is an impetus to introduce strict rules around how AI is used to filter job, university or welfare applications, or — in the case of lenders — assess the creditworthiness of potential borrowers.
EU officials hope that with extra oversight and restrictions on the type of AI models that can be used, the rules will curb the kind of machine-based discrimination that could influence life-altering decisions such as whether you can afford a home or a student loan.
But one of the biggest dangers is unintentional bias, in which algorithms end up denying loans or accounts to certain groups including women, migrants or people of color.
Your Secret Twitter Account May No Longer Be Secret
If you have a secret Twitter account, we’ve got some bad news for you. On Friday, Twitter disclosed information about a security vulnerability that allowed someone to find out whether a specific email address or phone number is tied to existing Twitter accounts.
The vulnerability was a result of Twitter’s code update in June 2021, and Twitter says it “immediately” investigated and fixed it. At the time, Twitter says it has no evidence to suggest someone had taken advantage of the vulnerability.
But a seven-month window in which the vulnerability was “live” appears to have been long enough for someone to figure it out and try to profit from it. Twitter says that, in July 2022, it “learned from a press report” that someone has gathered this info and was trying to sell it online. Twitter reviewed a sample of the data and realized that this person was indeed selling the real thing.
