curated news excerpts & citations
… trying to ‘unbury the lede’
Katelyn Jetelina @ Your Local Epidemiologist:
Plague in Russia? Plus flu, common cold, a new opioid, and good news
Last week, the Moscow Times (a non-state-controlled news organization) reported that a 28-year-old civilian anti-plague lab worker in Siberia died on October 1 after being exposed to the plague. Nearly 200 of her contacts are quarantined. Beyond that, …
Plague? Like the Black Death? Kind of. Plague is a rare but serious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, the same bacterium behind the Black Death in the 1300s. It lives in wild rodents and their fleas. Thankfully, it’s much less of a problem today because of improved hygiene and living conditions. There are three forms: bubonic (the most common, which causes painful swollen lymph nodes), septicemic (in the bloodstream), and pneumonic (in the lungs). Pneumonic plague is the most dangerous and the only form that spreads person to person.
If early accounts are correct, this story is about the pneumonic plague. It’s concerning, as any lab accident/leak is, but the risk of this becoming a Covid-19 pandemic is very, very low for a few reasons:
- Pneumonic plague is not traditionally efficient at spreading. …
- We have antibiotics. …
- The response seems very rapid. …
- This didn’t happen in a crowded megacity. …
Two things would raise concern, and many biosecurity analysts and epidemiologists will be trying to wade through the noise (and political chatter) to ensure these aren’t happening:
- More cases. …
- If the pathogen she died from was altered. …
All of this underscores something so important: Biosecurity and public health are essential infrastructure investments, not “nice to haves.” And this is why. Without them, we won’t have rapid responses, resources for immediate action, or early detection. It’s that simple.
(Katelyn Jetelina @ Your Local Epidemiologist more…)
Mitch Jackson:
A Plague Lab Worker Is Dead. Russia Calls It Pneumonia.
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Megan Janetsky @ Associated Press:
Nicaragua torture victim imprisoned for second time after being deported by USA Nicaraguan exile who was imprisoned and tortured after protesting against the government was deported by the U.S. back to his country, where he was immediately imprisoned once again by authorities, family members and his lawyer confirmed Monday.
Upon climbing off the U.S. deportation flight in Managua, Nicaragua’s capital, last week, 35-year-old Jeffrey Jarquín was taken by authorities back to the same prison where he was once tortured, confirmed one family member.
A member of Jarquín’s family, who asked not be identified, told WLRN, they have “no idea if he will ever walk out of that prison alive again.”
(Megan Janetsky @ Associated Press more…)
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Bill McKibben:
thoughts on the AI moment… There are a series of profound pragmatic reasons to worry about the rapid growth of AI, some of which I’ve described before. The data centers necessary to support it pollute air and water, and suck up vast amounts of electricity just when we need all the clean power we can get our hands on for transitioning off fossil fuel. AI represents a remarkable threat to the jobs on which many of us depend … there’s one more set of reasons to be rattled by this rapidly approaching meteor, albeit one that is harder to describe. That involves its impact on what it means to be human.
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James Eagle:
The $2 trillion Anthropic wager
(James Eagle more…)
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Kareem Abdul-Jabbar:
And Justice for None“Most people approve of capital punishment, but most people wouldn’t do the hangman’s job.”
― George Orwell (1903-1950), English novelist, essayist, and critic
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Dean Obeidallah:
Is Pete Hegseth building a military more loyal to him than to even Trump?!
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Michele Hornish:
Inside, they cheered. Outside, they protested.Jennifer Rubin:
Words & Phrases: A Crazy Rant Isn’t a ‘Speech’ or an ‘Interview’EN Today:
Fuel industry warns truck stops not to sell red dye diesel after Trump lifts restrictionsHeather Cox Richardson:
Letters from an American – October 6, 2026Judging from his social media posts, Trump is panicking.
…This afternoon, at a rally in Maryland, Trump called out Director of the Office of Management and Budget Russell Vought, a key author of Project 2025, saying: “We have some big surprises coming up in another few weeks, right Russ? He’s gonna be one of the very important people in the history of our country in my opinion. He’s got some great things happening.”
(Heather Cox Richardson more…)
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Mike Ludwig @ truthout: ICE Says 51 People Died in Custody Under Trump. Experts Say That’s an Undercount.
ICE Accountability Project
Sergio Martínez-Beltrán, Ximena Bustillo, Jasmine Garsd @ NPR: Deaths of migrants in ICE custody hit record high under Trump
- September 18: Carlos Josue Marchena Marchena
- August 31: Pierre Damas Bel
- August 1: Edwin Lopez-Cornejo
- July 19: Jose Chajon-Raxon
- July 14: Juan Jairo Coronilla Duran
- July 13: Joan Sebastian Guerrero
- July 7: Lorenzo Salgado Araujo
- June 4: Mamuka Artmeladze
- April 16: Aled Damien Carbonell-Betancourt
- March 25: Jose Guadalupe Ramos-Solano
- March 16: Royer Perez-Jimenez
- March 14: Naseer Paktiawil
- February 25: Nurul Amin Shah Alam
April 1 – Jennifer Peltz and Jake Offenhartz @ AP: Death of a refugee left at a Buffalo doughnut shop by Border Patrol is ruled a homicide - January 24: Alex Pretti
- January 14: Heber Sanchaz Dominguez
- January 14: Victor Manuel Diaz
- January 9: Parady La
- January 7: Renée Good
- January 6: Luis Beltran Yanez-Cruz
- January 5: Luis Gustavo Nunez Caceres
- January 3: Geraldo Lunas Campos
- December 31, 2025: Keith Porter
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