Special recognition has been paid to a senior foster mom from Maryland: senior because she’s 88 years old, and senior because she’s one of the most experienced long-term foster moms in the American foster home system.
Since opening her home in Montgomery County in the 1980s, she’s fostered over 40 children, and was recently presented with an award for her services to the youth of her state after announcing that she would finally retire from foster care.
Interviewed by ABC News as part of their ‘America Strong’ segment, Emma Patterson said she first became involved when the two children she birthed started to occasionally bring other kids home with them who needed help.
Whether it was food, warm clothes, or a place to safely spend time after school, the two siblings knew their mom was the right person to offer help.
At the time, Patterson had just separated with her children’s father, and along with working at a local university, also had a retail job that offered a discount she used to get the children, hers and not hers, what they needed.
This led her to registering herself and her home in White Oak, Maryland, into the Montgomery County foster home system, where she would occasionally foster infants—born drug-addicted babies who couldn’t go home with their parents—where she would foster up to nine kids at a time—where some would stay with her until they were adults.
Patterson is one of the foster parents in the county who has housed the most children long-term and one of the longest-serving foster parents, a Montgomery County spokesperson confirmed to ABC News.
“This wasn’t something that I ever thought anybody paid attention to. You know, I didn’t do it for the purpose of anybody, give me any recognition,” Patterson told ABC News. “It was always a situation where it was just a boy or girl that didn’t have anybody to care anything about them. And they needed a place to sleep or something to eat.”
Quote of the Day: “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas A. Edison
Photo by: Sara Darcaj
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
Sultan Mehmet köprüsü bridge - credit Mehrdad85 CC 2.0.
36 years ago today, the Fatih Sultan Mehmet Bridge, also known as the Second Bosphorus Bridge was completed over the famous stretch of water that divided Asia and Europe in the Classical Age. The bridge is named after the 15th-century Ottoman Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror, who conquered the Byzantine capital, Constantinople (Istanbul), in 1453. It is a gravity-anchored suspension bridge, with a 1,510 meter deck hanging on double vertical steel cables. READ more about this crazy construction… (1988)
A genetically specific pesticide has shown to be lethal to the destructive Colorado potato beetle while leaving all other tested species, even the beetle’s close relatives, unharmed.
Every year, this native of the Rocky Mountains causes $500 million or more in damages across the Northern Hemisphere—all across which it’s now found as an invasive species.
The company GreenLight Biosciences has developed a spray marketed as Calantha in the USA that uses RNA interference technology to target a gene called PSMB5 that codes for part of the cellular machinery that removes damaged proteins. If removed or inhibited, these dead or broken proteins build up and the larvae die within 6 days.
The potato beetle, which despite its name also damages eggplant, tomatoes, and bell peppers, has already developed immunity to 50 pesticide formulas.
Much like bacteria developing immunity to antibiotics, crop pests have gradually developed resistance or immunity to many kinds of pesticides, keeping pharma and agri-science companies forever at the drawing board figuring out how to combat different worms, beetles, and moths that ravage crops worldwide.
“They were chewing through treated plants like it was nothing,” Andrei Alyokhin, an entomologist at the University of Maine, told Science Magazine’s Erik Stokstad of the moment in 2001 when farmers in Maine noticed the then-new class of pesticides, neonicotinoids, were no longer effective.
RNA interference is considered the Holy Grail of this science, described as both way safer by researchers in the field, and innocuous to insects outside the potato beetle’s genetic relatives, including pollinators, lacewings, and ladybugs.
“You can … hit the insect you want to kill with precision,” said Subba Reddy Palli, an entomologist at the University of Kentucky, also to Stokstad. “You cannot get anything better than this.”
Produced in large batches at around $1 per gram, Calantha was approved by the United States FDA for use after it was found to be harmless to non-target species. In safety trials, GreenLight checked bioinformatics databases to see how different the version of PSMB5 found in the potato beetle was from the same in other insects. Four closely related beetle species had similar copies of PSMB5, and of those four, two were affected.
The pesticide research community is so excited about Calantha that they are already devising strategies and precautions to prevent the potato beetle from developing immunity to it. GreenLight has also applied for FDA approval on a Calantha variant for the varroa mite, a plague species on honeybees, which can resist almost all available pesticides.
Environmental groups have demanded that lessons should be taken from past examples and that Calantha trials should be made to include many other species that share the habitat of a potato farm. Furthermore, the formula that keeps the RNA stable inside the spray is confidential, and having spent decades seeking compensation for glyphosate poisoning, they are unlikely to be easily satisfied, and neither should they be.
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Vatican City - Photo by DAVID ILIFF. License CC BY-SA 3.0
Vatican City – Photo by DAVID ILIFF. License CC BY-SA 3.0
There’s no country anywhere on Earth that’s entirely powered by renewable energy every day, but that’s soon to change.
In a letter released on June 21 entitled “Brother Sun” Pope Francis announced his intention to transition Vatican City onto 100% renewable energy using solar panels.
The apostolic letter issued “motu proprio,” or on his own initiative, detailed the pontiff’s plan to use the Vatican’s multi-purpose land holdings 11 miles outside of Rome in an area called Santa Maria di Galeria.
Here, along with some agriculture, is the infrastructure needed for broadcasting Vatican Radio, and the area is large enough to accomodate enough solar panels to power the whole of the Holy See.
For many years the Pope has urged nations to take the climate crisis more seriously. In 2022, the Vatican joined the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, a global agreement among nations to address “dangerous human interference with the climate system,” but he has been more vocal individually than as the head of state of the world’s smallest country.
“The pope identifies the burning of fossil fuels as the primary driver of climate change…” The New York Times reported in 2023. “He dismisses those who deny the crisis, and accuses wealthy individuals, corporations and countries of selfishly turning a blind eye.”
Brother Sun was released on the Solstice, a day which ironically saw rain and clouds over much of Italy, particularly the north.
In South Africa, biologists and scientists have developed a novel way of disincentivizing poaching that will allow rhinos to keep hold of their horns.
Previously it was widespread practice to capture and de-horn rhinos to disincentivize poachers from killing them, but the lack of a horn deeply interfered with the animals’ social structures.
Instead, rhinos at a nursery in the northern province of Limpopo have had radioactive isotopes embedded into their horns. The idea is that the radiation given off by these isotopes will mark out anyone at any border crossing as having handled a rhino horn.
It’s a superior form of tracking because even if the tracker is removed the radiation remains on the horn, as well as anything that touches it.
Nuclear researchers at the University of the Witwatersrand’s Radiation and Health Physics Unit in South Africa injected 20 live rhinos with these isotopes.
“We are doing this because it makes it significantly easier to intercept these horns as they are being trafficked over international borders because there is a global network of radiation monitors that have been designed to prevent nuclear terrorism,” Professor James Larkin who heads the project told Africa News. “And we’re piggybacking on the back of that.”
Larkin adds that innovation in poaching prevention is urgently needed, as all existing methods have limitations, and South Africa still loses tens of rhinos every year.
Professor Nithaya Chetty, dean of the science faculty at Witwatersrand, said the dosage of the radioactivity is very low and its potential negative impact on the animal was tested extensively.
While poaching elephants for their ivory yields a unique material for sculpture and craft, rhino horn is trafficked to criminal groups in Asia who sell it for the incorrect belief that it contains therapeutic properties.
WATCH the story below from Africa News…
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Tarrant County Sheriff's Office, retrieved from Facebook
Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office, retrieved from Facebook
In Fort Worth, a derelict litter of puppies was rescued by police officers from roasting in the heat of a 100-degree day.
Left by their previous owner closed in a carrier without water, they were fortunate enough to be found by a good Samaritan who called the authorities. Tarrant County police and animal control arrived to take custody and get some fluids into the pups.
The police noted that the parking lot where the puppies were found lacked the necessary security camera coverage to ascertain the identity of whatever pathological owner left them there.
“The puppies that were rescued from a carrier in 100-degree weather by Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office are doing much better,” the department shared on Facebook, complete with a picture of Officer Haley Drew smiling with her arms overloaded with furballs.
Silcox Center believes the puppies to be some kind of shepherd mix, and named each one after a famous chip brand, including Frito, Dorito, Ruffles, Cheeto, Lays, Pringle, and Itz.
Quote of the Day: “Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness.” – Desmond Tutu
Photo by: Shashank Sahay
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
101 years ago today, Wisława Szymborska was born in Poland. This poet, essayist, translator, and recipient of the 1996 Nobel Prize in Literature penned over a dozen poetry books that won numerous prizes from cultural organizations and civic ones. Her wit and irony belied her Communist education and upbringing, and though her body work remained small by the time she had died in 2012, it was not for want of trying—rather only for the presence of “a trash can” in her house. READ some of her work… (1923)
Ashlee Wallace, Justin Wallace, and their daughter Audrey (right) - supplied by the family to ABC News
Ashlee Wallace, Justin Wallace, and their daughter Audrey (right) – supplied by the family to ABC News
A saga in Australia’s news media has come to a head in the best possible way, as a struggling family and their terminally ill 6-year-old daughter are being moved into special housing ’round the clock care.
ABC News Down Under originally broke the story on June 23rd that 6-year-old Audrey Wallace, who was born with treatment resistant epilepsy, had entered palliative care after a bout of pneumonia saw her condition weaken considerably to the point where she could no longer swallow food or control well her left side.
The doctors aren’t sure how long she has left, but father Justin and mother Ashlee are determined to make the most of it—with a visit to the zoo, or at least a unicorn fairy princess party at home.
Entitled to financial support and assistance in adding accommodations for Audrey’s medical requirements from Australia’s National Disability Insurance Agency, (NDIA) the family’s care team ran straight into a slow “reactive” bureaucracy.
Their duplex apartment wasn’t wheelchair accessible, and the hallways were too narrow for Audrey to be wheeled to her bedroom or the bathroom. Additionally, the hospital care team said it was unsafe to travel in a normal car, but the family cannot afford a wheelchair accessible one.
According to ABC, the NDIA only approached Audrey’s request on June 6th, nearly a month after the initial worsening of Audrey’s condition. It took until the 17th for the department to receive all the necessary medical records to make an evaluation. It wasn’t until the 24th that a meeting and review could take place, which Mr. Wallace wasn’t good enough.
“We feel everyone is reactive instead of proactive… and we feel that this has taken a lot of time away from Audrey and time is something we don’t have,” Mr. Wallace told ABC.
But sunnier days lie ahead for the Gold Coast family, starting when couple Donna Moore and Erica Breitzke read the June 23rd report and offered to loan a wheelchair-accessible van, which they had previously planned to sell, to the Wallaces.
Ms. Moore told the outlet that she had epilepsy as a child, and was moved by Audrey’s plight.
“It’s going to open up so much freedom, just being able to do normal things like take her out to the shops,” Mrs. Wallace said about the van. “It just allows us to have our life back.
Then, after persistent inquiries from ABC News, the NDIA and the Queensland Department of Housing investigated the case and approved a disability-accessible home on the Gold Coast with 24-hour nursing assistance.
The family are busy packing.
“We can actually sit back and be parents, and not be all the hats,” said mom Ashlee. “Now we can focus on her unicorn party that’s happening at the end of July, to give her the best time ever.”
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This week, a giant, 112-foot-long sleeping infant floated above the shores of Lake Michigan.
It wasn’t a collective hallucination—it was “Baby You,” a breathtaking art installation that captured the imagination of Milwaukeeans over the Summer Solstice.
The spectacle celebrated the U.S. launch of Przekrój, an iconic 75-year-old Polish magazine. Known for observing the world with a “kind and playful eye” (and its tagline: Hard to spell, easy to read), Przekrój chose this whimsical installation to symbolize both its rebirth in America and its editorial mission to unleash the untapped potential in American readers.
Needless to say, the awe-struck crowd loved it, with Milwaukee Record reporter Bert Lauderdale calling it “the best thing I saw all year”, one fan telling CBS 58, “I don’t think any of us have seen anything like this before,” and an Instagrammer posting, “I really want them to make The Giant Baby an annual thing.”
Przekrój was a revolutionary Polish magazine that served as a cultural lifeline to the West during the Cold War. To celebrate the launch of its U.S. English-language online edition, they launched a massive, 112-foot-long baby-shaped balloon over the shores of Milwaukee’s Lake Michigan.
Przekrój’s editorial mission is embodied in “Baby You,” a spectacular sculpture of a newborn floating in the air—symbolizing the untapped potential within all people: unlimited, and waiting to be awakened.
Meaning “to cut through,” Przekrój (pronounced p-SHEH-crooy) got its name from the fused pages characteristic of older magazine binding techniques which required the reader to cut through and separate the pages with a letter opener. It has run for 80 years.
Photo by: Brian Slawson Photography
“We share knowledge because we believe in the unlimited potential within each of us,” said Tomek Niewiadomski, the chairman of the board of the Przekrój Foundation, which publishes Przekrój. “Our goal is to support every reader on their path of personal growth and self-discovery, whether they are searching for the meaning of life or simply seeking to find joy, relax, and appreciate the present moment.
Building “Baby You” took—aptly—nine months of work with a crew of engineers, designers, and sewers across Europe. Przekrój Foundation partnered with artist Bart Van Peel to troubleshoot the aesthetic, technical, and aeronautical elements needed to make the large balloon airworthy.
New techniques were developed to distribute air throughout the baby’s internal structure, the most challenging being the head. The tan fabric balloon’s colors change with the light, reflecting the many hues of human skin.
WATCH the baby’s inaugural flight below…
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One of the culinary world’s most prized fish, and one of the sea’s fastest most accomplished predators, has left regulators stunned at the power of its recovery.
A target for the pan-Pacific stock of bluefin tuna has already been reached a decade in advance, with one federal fisheries policy analyst suggesting the world isn’t far away from abundant harvests and perpetual population growth at the same time.
Coveted for its richness, combination of fattiness, firmness, and ability to hold a sear, bluefin tuna is the most desired of its genus. When caught by fishermen and brought to harbor in Japan, mature bluefins are auctioned right there on the wharf, with prices ranging from $40 a pound to $4,900 a pound.
In fact, the “Ferrari of Tuna” as it’s sometimes called, has set auction records of $1.8 million for 489-pound adult fish in 2013, and an astounding $3 million for a 612-pound fish in 2019.
One of the fastest fish in the sea, these accomplished predators who spawn in the Pacific between Japan and the Philippines but grow up along the coasts of Mexico and the Western United States, can migrate back to the Indo-Pacific waters—a distance of 6,000 miles—in just 55 days of swimming.
In 2022, a coalition of national fisheries managers and intergovernmental agencies conducted a survey of the population of Pacific bluefin tuna measured by their ‘unfished spawning stock biomass’—the theoretical amount of fish there would be in the absence of fishing.
These included the American National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, (NOAA) the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission, (IATTC) and the International Scientific Committee for Tuna and Tuna-Like Species in the North Pacific Ocean (ISC).
The NOAA reports that overfishing in the late 1990s and 2000s reduced the estimated bluefin biomass to a historic low of 2% of its potential unfished level in 2009–2012.
credit – Beth Macdonald – Unsplash
At first the goal was to rebuild to at least 20% of the spawning stock biomass by 2034. In 2016, the NOAA Fisheries bureau received a petition to put the bluefin tuna on the Endangered Species List because of this collapse, but opted not to, reasoning that the 1.6 million fish were enough to prevent extinction.
This allowed fishing of the Ferrari of Tuna to continue, and during a recent population assessment, it was found that the 2034 target of spawning stock biomass had already been reached and exceeded. The number of spawning bluefin reached 23.2% of the potential unfished spawning stock.
“There is a point where you can find a balance between abundant harvest while also allowing the stock to grow in perpetuity, and we’ve now exceeded that point,” said Celia Barroso, a Fishery Policy Analyst at the NOAA Fisheries West Coast Region.
Now in July, this coalition is set to meet in Japan to decide tuna catch and recovery targets up to 2025 and beyond, armed with the knowledge that the nearly 500 million people between the US and Japan can continue to enjoy this fish long into the future.
“The recovery of Pacific bluefin tuna shows what we can achieve when scientists, managers, and the fishing industry work together in the international arena in pursuit of a common objective,” said Ryan Wulff, Assistant Regional Administrator for the NOAA Fisheries West Coast Region. “We’ll continue this effort to ensure the sustainable harvest of bluefin for decades to come.”
GNN has reported recently on several other fishing stocks that have seen significant recoveries. The number of overfished stocks in salt and freshwaters in the US has reached all time lows, for starters, led by mackerel and snapper.
The Mediterranean stock of hake—a species that for Spanish cuisine is a must but which is rather absent on American plates—has returned to sustainable levels, with both population and catch limits growing in tandem.
In 2021, GNN reported that 4 other tuna species had had their classifications on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature improved. This included albacore and yellowfin tuna moved from Threatened to Least-Concern, and Atlantic bluefin tuna moved from Endangered to Least Concern.
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In a fairly rare cosmic occurrence this month, two annual meteor showers will appear to ‘peak’ at the same time on the night of July 30th.
Both will appear in the southern sky, and though they will radiate out from different constellations, it will be difficult to tell which shooting stars belong to which constellation.
The first and much grander of the two is the Southern δ-Aquariid meteor shower, believed to be the tailings of the comet 96P Machholz.
At its zenith, some writers are suggesting you should be able to see 25 shooting stars per hour under a clear sky. To see them, look to the southeast region of the sky toward the constellation Aquarius.
However, Aquarius is a very difficult constellation to find, and even with this 12-minute YouTube guide, the host said she needed “years” before she felt comfortable finding it.
On the bright side, you don’t have to identify the Water Bearer to see the shooting stars, if you find Capricornus, Aquila, or Pices—all surrounding Aquarius and easier to find—you’re looking in the right direction.
On the same night, the α-Capricornid shower will also peak, and as just mentioned, Aquarius and Capricornus sit beside each other. The Capricornids should produce an additional 5 per hour for a total viewing pleasure of around 1 every two minutes—perhaps just enough to keep the attention of a young child.
The best viewing will come from either the Southern Hemisphere, or the southerly latitudes of the of the Northern Hemisphere.
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Quote of the Day: “Education is the movement from darkness to light.” – Allan Bloom
Photo by: Rubén Rodriguez
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
18 years ago today, the Qinghai-Tibet Railway line was opened, connecting the northwestern Chinese city of Xining in Qianghai Province with the capital of Tibet, Lhasa. It is the highest railway line on Earth, with over 960 km (600 mi) of track being more than 4,000 meters (13,123 ft) above sea level. It’s considered one of China’s greatest 21st-century successes, as the railway faced numerous engineering challenges. READ all about the world’s highest line… (2006)
Howard Wicks wrote a book despite having locked-in syndrome – SWNS
Howard Wicks wrote a book with just his eyes – SWNS
An Englishman living with rare locked-in syndrome has completed a 50,000 word autobiography, using just his eyes.
Howard Wicks suffered a serious stroke as a teenager in Devon, leaving every muscle in his body paralyzed, except for his eyes.
The book chronicles the years leading up to and after his stroke, and was completed using an Eyegaze computer, a machine that tracks his eye movements.
The software allows the 29-year-old to communicate with others and to write his novel, which took 18 months to complete.
“It was a cathartic experience,” said Howard using the Eyegaze device. “I enjoyed writing it especially the parts I personally enjoyed living myself.
But, like for many authors, it soon became an all-consuming and challenging experience.
“It became a source of stress, as I felt I couldn’t truly enjoy myself until the book was completed.”
“The initial chapter introduces the reader to my life before the stroke, allowing them to understand who I was,” he told the BBC. “The book concludes with my transition from the hospital setting to community life.”
This stroke was a gift, not a curse. You’ve just got to shut out all the negativity and see out the heartbreak, then own what happens next. – excerpt from Howard Wicks
Howard hopes that the book will raise awareness for the nonprofit he founded in 2020, dedicated to supporting other people suffering from locked in syndrome.
“I have established a charity called the Locked in Trust dedicated to empowering individuals in a locked-in state to embrace the fullest potential of their lives,” said Howard.
But, in its first four years, the charity hasn’t achieved the reach or impact he envisioned, which was another motivation behind completing the book—“to propel the charity to the forefront of society.”
The global pandemic plunged the entire world into economic free fall and societal unrest. Since then, one notable country has emerged successfully to stabilize global markets and calm fears—it’s the United States, which has maintained the lowest inflation rate of any major nation.
Let’s look at measurements from ten major metrics that demonstrate how the American Recovery has benefited the lives of millions since the pandemic.
1. WAGE GROWTH IS RISING FASTER THAN INFLATION
Incomes for workers are at an all-time high and have been rising for four years. Last year marked the largest average wage increase in recorded US history, with salary increases exceeding inflation for the first time since 2020, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Employers reported an average salary increase of 4.4% in 2023, during a year when annual inflation rose 3.1%—and they plan to give raises of 4.0% this year, while many experts predict inflation will dip below 3%.
Another notable trend was uncovered by the Economist, which recently exclaimed in a headline that “Gen Z are now wealthier than any previous generation.”
2. ‘MADE IN THE USA’ – A MANUFACTURING BOOM
A manufacturing boom is taking hold across America: in two years, companies have announced hundreds of billions of dollars in manufacturing investments—many in technology and renewable energy—which are bringing back supply chains from overseas and creating good-paying jobs, many of which don’t require a four-year degree.
Since 1990, the US went went from producing nearly 40% of the world’s semiconductor chips to near 0 percent in 2022. Thanks to investments in the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act of 2022, that global share could rise to 28% in eight years.
When the pandemic shut down the semiconductor chips factories overseas, the prices of so many products went up because these chips power so much of our lives—from smartphones to dishwashers and cars. That semiconductor shortage drove one third of the surge in inflation in 2021, according to the White House, and caused long wait lines for all kinds of products—which is why the Democrats in Congress joined Republicans in passing the CHIPS and Science bill.
The leaders of Samsung Foundry Business and Semiconductor R&D Center / Samsung. Released
$825 billion in private-sector investments have been pledged to U.S. semiconductor manufacturing, advanced packaging facilities, and creating a chipmaking ecosystem. [Micron is building factories in New York and Idaho; in Arizona, TSMC is building in Phoenix; Samsung is building in Taylor and Austin, Texas; Intel is building in Arizona, Ohio, New Mexico, and Oregon; Global Foundries will expand in New York and Vermont; Microchip Technology is erecting in Colorado and Oregon; Polar Semiconductor is expanding in Minnesota—and BAE Systems is springing up in New Hampshire.]
3. LOWEST UNEMPLOYMENT IN HALF-CENTURY
The unemployment rate has stayed below 4 percent for two years straight, the best such record since the 1960s.
The Bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 invested $300 billion into repairing and rebuilding America’s roads and bridges—the largest investment since President Eisenhower—which contributed to the total of nearly 15 million jobs created since 2021, including 750,000 manufacturing jobs.
4. CRIME DROPS TO HISTORIC LOWS
Crime in the US has been falling fast—all kinds of crime—and nearly all over the country. Recent FBI Uniform Crime Reporting surveys show rates of murder and rape have dropped by more than 25% in 2024—and property crime also decreased by over 15 percent in data collected from more than 18,000 city, county, state, tribal, university and federal law enforcement agencies.
For instance, Detroit is on pace to have the fewest murders since 1966, and Baltimore and St Louis are tallying the fewest murders in each city in nearly a decade. Chicago was also hailing double-digit percentage declines in the number of homicides and shootings. More broadly, in more than 180 cities murder was down around 20% in 2023, compared to the previous year.
5. STOCK MARKET BREAKING RECORDS
Millions of Americans have invested their savings and retirement pensions in the stock market—which keeps breaking all-time records. The Dow Jones Industrial Average in December broke 37,000 for the first time, and today it’s over 39,000. One analyst described it as “33% percent higher than any sustained peak in US history—and 5-10 times higher than where it was for most of the last half century.” The S&P 500 broke 32 all-time records this year, while the Nasdaq also climbed to a record high, reaching 17,000 for the first time in June—and it keeps surging.
6. HEALTH AND PRESCRIPTION DRUG COSTS
Despite the absence of universal health care, the US has managed to slash its uninsured rate to 7.7 percent, the lowest in its history and a steep decline from 14.5% in late 2020. And now the government is muscling down drug prices.
For the first time, Medicare is negotiating the price of certain high-cost drugs. Another improvement is that Medicare beneficiaries now pay $0 out-of-pocket for recommended adult vaccines like the shingles shots. Also in 2024, Medicare seniors’ out-of-pocket expenses at the pharmacy will be capped at $2,000 per year, for the first time ever.
A month’s supply of insulin for seniors is now capped at $35 nationwide—and inhalers are now capped at $35—saving everyday people hundreds of dollars per month.
7. CONTINUOUS BUSINESS GROWTH
America’s economy has been the “envy of the world”, and in 2023 was growing faster than any other county. As inflation keeps falling, healthy consumer spending—almost 70% of nominal GDP—is continuously supported by real wage growth.
Another sure sign of its strong economy is the unprecedented small business boom. A record number of small business applications in the past three years have seen an unprecedented number of entrepreneurs open up shop in their homes or on Main Streets across America.
U.S. Census Bureau data, which has tracked business formations since 2004, showed that nearly 16 million new business applications recorded since the start of 2021, the most ever counted in a multi-year period.
8. OPTIMISM AND VIBES
And people are starting to feel the good vibes. Americans are feeling better about the economy for the first time in four months.
US consumer sentiment rose markedly toward the end of March, supported by strong stock-market gains and expectations that inflation will continue to ease.
The University of Michigan’s sentiment index climbed to 79.4 from 76.5 earlier in the month, reaching the highest since 2021.
Citizens in Southern border states may become more optimistic, now that the flow of undocumented immigrants over the Mexican border has dramatically slowed. The U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported that the number of undocumented migrants crossing into the U.S. dropped by 50% in January. And in the three weeks since the new White House executive order took effect, the Border Patrol’s 7-day encounter average has decreased more than 40% to under 2,400 encounters per day.
9. RENEWABLE ENERGY IS SURGING
With new projects coming online this year, solar power generation is expected to increase 75% this year, with wind power growing by 11%.
In 2023, renewable energy sources—wind, solar, hydro, biomass, and geothermal—accounted for 22% of the total electricity generated, and surpassed coal generation for the first time in 2022.
“More records were broken in March as wind plus solar produced more electricity than either nuclear power or coal—and solar was on the verge of overtaking hydropower,” executive director Ken Bossong of the nonprofit SUN DAY Campaign, told Electrek. “The mix of renewables provided almost 30% of US electrical generation in March and seems likely to surpass that level in the coming months.”
A win-win for job creation, the Department of Energy reports there are just over 8 million jobs in renewable energy today, and in 2021 and 2022, energy jobs grew faster than overall U.S. employment.
10. HIGH SCHOOL RATES OF GRADUATION UP, SMOKING AND PREGNANCY DOWN
And, finally, despite challenges, today’s youth in America are making some good decisions.
The high school graduation rate is the highest ever recorded.
Compulsive eating and obesity may be triggered by a specific gut bacteria, suggests a new study—and the breakthrough may lead to new treatments to address the problem of food addiction.
The bacteria identified by an international research team is associated with both humans and mice developing an addiction to food that can lead to obesity. They also identified bacteria that play a beneficial role in preventing food addiction.
“A number of factors contribute to food addiction, which is characterized by loss of control over food intake and is associated with obesity, other eating disorders, and alterations in the composition of bacteria in the gut microbiome,” said Professor Elena Martín-García, of Pompeu Fabra University, Spain.
“Until now, the mechanisms underlying this behavioral disorder were largely unknown.”
Professor Rafael Maldonado, who leads the university’s Laboratory of Neuropharmacology, said: “These results from our study may allow us to identify new biomarkers for food addiction and, most importantly, to evaluate whether the beneficial bacteria could be used as potential new treatments for this obesity-related behavior, which, at present, lacks any effective therapeutic approaches.
“Potential new treatments could involve using beneficial bacteria and dietary supplementation.”
The team used the Yale Food Addiction Scale to diagnose food addiction in both mice and humans. It contains 35 questions for people to answer, and these can also be grouped into three criteria for use in mice: persistent food-seeking, high motivation to obtain food, and compulsive behavior.
Within the gut bacteria of mice that were and were not addicted to food, researchers found an increase in bacteria belonging to a group called the Proteobacteria phylum and a decrease in bacteria belonging to the Actinobacteria phylum in the food-addicted mice.
Those mice also had a decrease in the amount of another type of bacteria called Blautia from the Bacillota phylum.
88 patients were classified into those who were addicted or not addicted to food. Similar to the findings in mice, decreases in Actinobacteria phylum and Blautia were seen in humans who were food-addicted, along with increases in Proteobacteria phylum.
Prevention on the horizon
“The findings in both mice and humans suggested that specific microbiota could be protective in preventing food addiction,” said Prof. Martín-García. “In particular, the strong similarities in the amount of Blautia underlined the potential beneficial effects of this particular gut bacteria.”
“Therefore, we investigated the protective effects of oral administration of lactulose and rhamnose, which are non-digestible carbohydrates known as ‘prebiotics’ that can increase the amount of Blautia in the gut.
“We did this in mice and found that it led to an increase in the abundance of Blautia in mice feces—in parallel with dramatic improvements in food addiction.
“We saw similar improvements when we gave the mice a species of Blautia called Blautia wexlerae orally as a probiotic.
“The gut microbiota signatures in both mice and humans suggest possible non-beneficial effects of bacteria (belonging to the Proteobacteria phylum) and potential protective effects of increasing the abundance of Actinobacterial and Bacillota against the development of food addiction.”
Prof. Martín-García says the findings show how bacteria in the gut influence brain function and vice versa.
“We have demonstrated for the first time a direct interaction between the gut composition and brain gene expression, revealing the complex and multifactorial origin of this important behavioral disorder related to obesity.
“Understanding the crosstalk between alterations in behavior and bacteria in the gut constitutes a step forward for future treatments for food addiction and related eating disorders.”
The crucial link between the gut and the brain
Prof. Martín-García also described work investigating how microRNAs (miRNAs) – small, single-stranded molecules that regulate gene expression and contribute to almost any cellular process – are involved in food addiction.
She says changes in the expression of miRNAs may be involved in the mechanisms underlying the disorder. And the researchers used a technique called Tough Decoy to inhibit specific miRNAs in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) of brains of mice in order to produce mice that were vulnerable to developing food addiction.
They explained that part of the prefrontal cortex is the part of the brain that is involved in self-control and decision-making.
They found that inhibition of miRNA-29c-3p promoted persistence of response and enhanced the vulnerability of the mice to develop food addiction. Inhibiting another miRNA called miRNA-665-3p promoted compulsive behavior and vulnerability to food addiction.
“These two miRNAs could act as protective factors against food addiction,” said Prof. Maldonado. “This helps us to understand the neurobiology of the loss of eating control, which plays a crucial role in obesity and related disorders.
“To understand these mechanisms further, we are now exploring how the gut microbiota and miRNA expression in the brain interact in mice.”
Professor Richard Roche, of Maynooth University, who was not involved in the research, welcomed the new information about food addiction.
“There are many factors that contribute to it, in particular the environment that people live in and the availability of certain types of food. However, we’ve known for some time that there are probably contributing factors for eating disorders.”
The research, which opens the way to developing potential new treatments, was presented on Thursday at the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies Forum in Austria, and published in the journal Gut.
SHARE THE GUT REVELATIONS With Struggling Food Addicts On Social Media…
A Los Angeles man was overwhelmed with emotion after hearing voices clearly for the first time, thanks to a cochlear implant.
Aric Hoffmann has lived with hearing impairment since he was a boy, after contracting meningitis when he was just six months old.
Up until now, the 28-year-old had to communicate by reading lips and using sign language.
As he got older his hearing worsened, pushing him to get a cochlear implant.
“Socializing with people was the most challenging for me before getting my implant because sometimes I don’t understand what people are saying.
“I’m now so excited to hear people talking so clearly, without asking to repeat and be able to keep the conversations going.
“I was very happy, crying, and overwhelmed to hear the sounds that I had never heard so clearly. I felt like a very emotional moment of my life had begun.”
In the video below, his eyes welled up with tears after his audiologist asked him how he was feeling.
“I tried to say something to express how I felt but the words wouldn’t come.”
Immediately after getting his implant on on May 31st, Aric planned to visit one of his favorite places, Disneyland.
“When the Walt Disney Tiki Room show started, I was amazed how animatronic birds and tropical sounds came into my implants. I was happy to hear the whole show and it made me realize what I was missing out on.”
Aric is still adapting to all the new sounds he can hear, especially in his work as a movie entertainment facilities assistant because he hears so many background sounds while someone is talking.
Quote of the Day: “If you don’t think every day is a good day, just try missing one.” – Cavett Robert
Photo by: Jordan Donaldson
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