The results of the audit of the 2020 presidential election results in Arizona’s Maricopa County are expected to be released Monday.
The audit was ordered by the Republican-led state Senate to look into potential voting irregularities in the state’s largest county and was conducted by the Florida-based company Cyber Ninjas.
The draft report will be given to state GOP lawmakers, who plan to review the finding, a process that could take days or weeks, according to CNN.
The audit will review roughly 2.1 million ballots.
Democratic President Joe Biden won the once-reliable red state over then-President Donald Trump by 10,000 votes, out of roughly 3.3 million ballots.
The result of the audit will not change the outcome of the election but has served to draw attention to voting irregularities and potential voting fraud in 2020, with the expectation that voting officials across the country will take steps to further secure their state election systems.
Republican lawmakers in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin are making efforts to have similar audits.
Erika D. Smith of the Los Angeles Times just penned a column that’s getting quite a bit of attention. It’s titled, “Larry Elder is the Black face of white supremacy. You’ve been warned.”
The fact that Smith also is black underscores the breadth of pushback that Elder — a conservative political commentator — has been receiving since he announced his candidacy in the recall election of California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
TheBlaze on Friday noted that left-wing political groups are shocked and horrified that Newsom, a Democrat, could actually lose the recall to upstart Elder.
What did the columnist write?
Smith pulled no punches in her attempted takedown of Elder, pointing out his “smug smile of a Black conservative” and saying nothing angers her more “than watching a Black person use willful blindness and cherry-picked facts to make overly simplistic arguments that whitewash the complex problems that come along with being Black in America.”
“Like a lot of Black people, though, I’ve learned that it’s often best just to ignore people like Elder,” Smith added in her column. “People who are — as my dad used to say — ‘skinfolk’ but not necessarily kinfolk.”
More from her piece:
It’s not just that Elder would be a Trump fanboy Republican trying to run a state dominated by Democrats. Or that he has zero experience in elected office and clearly doesn’t have the temperament for governance. (He can’t even take questions from journalists without losing his cool.)
It’s that — perhaps out of spite or perhaps out of an insatiable need for attention — Elder opposes every single public policy idea that’s supported by Black people to help Black people. This has been true for decades, but it’s particularly problematic given the racial reckoning following the murder of George Floyd.
“We have been having a series of real uncomfortable discussions about systemic racism in institutions across this state,” state Sen. Sydney Kamlager (D-Los Angeles) said, according to Smith. “About how to really peel back the layers of ignorance or ineptitude so that we can deal with them in very real ways. And Larry Elder is someone who just fundamentally doesn’t believe that [systemic racism] exists.”
She added that Elder “apparently doesn’t believe that racial profiling exists,” that he “scoffs at the many efforts to reform the criminal justice system and to root out racial bias in policing by requiring more transparency and accountability from officers” — but that he uses stats showing “that Black people are particularly prone to murdering one another.”
“Do we still have the phenomenon where a young Black man is eight times more likely to be killed by another young Black man than a young white man?” Smith quoted Elder as saying to Orange County Republicans. “If the answer to those series of questions is yes, I submit to you that systemic racism is not the problem.”
More from her column:
Elder mocks critical race theory, though I’m not sure he understands what it actually is. That doesn’t bode well for ethnic studies in California.
If he’s elected, the task force studying reparations for Black Californians would be toast. As would yet unsigned bills to allow police officers to be decertified for misconduct and to support community-based alternatives to 911.
Smith also ripped Elder’s stance on vaccine mandates, promising that as governor he’ll “repeal those before I have my first cup of coffee — and I don’t drink coffee.”
Anything else?
She added that Elder’s “candidacy feels personal. Like an insult to Blackness,” and that “Black people know better than anyone how dangerous Elder is. He is the O.G. troll that no one was supposed to feed. But here we are.”
In this election, it is imperative that leaders show they recognize the reality of China as a rising, antagonistic superpower with which we can no longer endeavour to be partners. Also crucial is that they articulate a well-designed plan to handle Beijing as it continues to make the international order more unpredictable.
So far, the Conservative Party is the only party that has made this issue part of its detailed platform. In broad terms, the Conservatives seek to completely review and revamp Canada’s approach to foreign affairs to make it more adaptable, putting the focus on protecting our society and institutions from foreign infiltration, self-reliance, and reorienting our geopolitical focus and alliances.
Lamenting that Canadians have “taken our peace, security, and prosperity for granted,” the Tories say their policy will help ensure “Canada is ready and able to defend our national interests and protect our way of life.”
In recent years it has become clearer how our servile posture toward China is often informed by influential elites with connections to Beijing that incentivize them to advocate policies of which the only long-term beneficiaries are coincidentally themselves and the Chinese Communist Party. This has allowed the CCP to deepen its influence in Canada and infiltrate Canadian institutions through partnerships with universities and other business entities.
To address this, the Conservatives are calling for the passing of a Foreign Agents Registry Act that would require “individuals and companies acting as agents of foreign principals” who engage in activities such as lobbying and advertising to register and disclose payments, relationships, and their activities. The platform also boldly puts forth the idea of imposing a ban on senior public office holders (prime ministers, ambassadors, deputy ministers, etc.) that would prevent them from “employment or contracts with China’s government or an entity controlled by China’s government” for five years after leaving office.
Our foreign policy would greatly benefit from such a move as entities such as the Canada-China Business Council have downgraded it with its members’ myopic focus on “economic growth” at the expense of properly defining our national interests and diplomatic objectives.
Standing up to “China’s aggression” in relation to the rights of persecuted groups in China and activists in Hong Kong is also a part of the Tory platform.
“We must stand up to the Communist government of China. Our quarrel is not with the people of China—part of an ancient civilization that has contributed much to humanity,” the platform states. “We stand especially with Chinese Canadians whose contributions to Canada are immeasurable and who are enduring an appalling rise in anti-Asian hate and discrimination. And we stand with Uyghur Muslims, Tibetans, Falun Gong practitioners, Hong Kongers, and Chinese Christians.”
Actions include using Canada’s Magnitsky law to sanction China’s worst human rights offenders and granting asylum to mainland Chinese proponents of freedom and persecuted minorities, including Tibetans, Falun Gong practitioners. The platform also vows to “do everything to ensure that the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics is not a platform for China’s global propaganda.”
When it comes to national security, Canada has relied on the United States for much of its security and strategic thinking, and has become comfortable with the idea that Washington will always be there to fill in the gaps. The Tory platform calls for more self-reliance by improving our military capacity, but it also emphasizes building “Canadian capabilities to contribute to foreign intelligence” to address such threats as foreign interference and economic coercion.
One key aspect of the world order that the platform gets right is the importance of the Indo-Pacific as a hot spot and the need to build alliances with countries in the region. Central to this strategy would be Canada’s participation in the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, a network including the United States, Japan, Australia, and India that emphasizes co-ordination to deter China’s expansionism. This initiative, which would help expand Canada’s alliances, has hitherto been ignored by the Trudeau government.
The Trudeau government’s political posturing has undermined relations with India, thereby alienating an ally who will undoubtedly play a robust role in a Cold War-esque struggle with China. In contrast, if elected the Conservatives claim that deeper ties with India will be a dominant piece of their Indo-Pacific strategy. It’s currently a disquieting time for India, with the resurgence of the Taliban in Afghanistan providing opportunity for both China and Pakistan to extend its influence, isolate India, and intimidate it into making concessions that run counter to its interests. Canada and the West should strengthen relations with India to provide it with more leverage and a network to resist such pressure.
This is only a sample of the ideas for a prudent Canadian foreign policy offered by the Conservative platform. There’s much more to be discussed regarding the complexities of the world in which Canada finds itself and what its specific goals and interests should be, and to this end the Conservatives also wisely suggest the establishment of a National Interest Council.
Aside from providing a refreshing and well-thought-out vision, the Conservatives’ platform will hopefully force Justin Trudeau to defend his record, which has, if anything, emboldened our adversary in Beijing. When it comes to positioning Canada as a leading force in any coalition meant to contain China, the Conservatives have convincingly presented themselves as the party most prepared to take on that task.
WTI crude oil snaps 7-day losing streak rising to the $65 per barrel level
U.S. stock indexes battled to record highs Monday as investors looked ahead to a key Federal Reserve event that could lay out the framework for the central bank to begin tapering its asset purchases.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 215 points, or 0.61%, while the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.85% and 1.55%, respectively. The rally has both the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq trading at all-time highs.
Both the Dow and the S&P 500 last week posted their biggest weekly declines in two months after minutes from the most recent Federal Reserve meeting out last week showed the central bank could begin scaling back its asset purchase program before the end of the year. 4
The Fed’s Jackson Hole Symposium will take place virtually Thursday and Friday and could provide clues as to when the Fed could end the emergency measures put in place during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and begin raising interest rates.
In stocks, energy-linked names, including Chevron Corp, Kinder Morgan Inc. and Haliburton Co., outperformed as West Texas Intermediate crude oil jumped $3.50 to $65.62 a barrel. The gain, which was the largest in five months, snapped WTI’s seven-day losing streak.
Uber Inc., Lyft Inc. and DoorDash Inc. were in focus after a California judge ruled that Proposition 22, a voter-approved measure that classified drivers as independent contractors, was unconstitutional.
PayPal Inc. announced customers in the U.K. will be allowed to buy, sell and hold the cryptocurrencies bitcoin, ether, litecoin, and bitcoin cash beginning this week. Separately, bitcoin rose to the $50,000 level, a three-month high.
Meanwhile, the COVID-19 vaccine produced by Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE has become the first to receive Food and Drug Administration approval.
Separately, Pfizer said it would buy the remaining shares of Trillium Therapeutics Inc. that it does not already own for $18.50 apiece, a 204% premium to Friday’s closing price. The agreement values the cancer drugmaker at $2.26 billion.
In earnings, Chinese e-commerce company JD.com reported earnings and revenue that exceeded Wall Street estimates as the number of active customer accounts climbed by 27.4%.
Overseas markets rallied across the board.
France’s CAC 40 paced the advance in Europe, trading up 0.86%, while Britain’s FTSE 100 and Germany’s DAX 30 advanced 0.3% and 0.28%, respectively.
In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 1.78%, China’s Shanghai Composite added 1.45% and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index gained 1.05%.
This is not embellishment, nor is it an exaggeration. This is actually happening.
The Australian government is going to seize 24,000 children from it’s citizens and place them in a stadium quarantine camp to be forcibly vaccinated. Parents will not be allowed to attend.
As was reported by the Daily Expose in the United Kingdom and Red State in the United States, Australia’s Brad Hazzard, the Minister for Health and Medical Research, has told parents in a press conference that 24,000 children will be sent to a stadium to get the experimental Covid-19 vaccine, and parents will not be allowed to be present. Hazzard insisted to parents that their children would be “well looked after.”
Red State reported that “It should be noted that Australia has had strict vaccination laws since at least 2018. Parents can receive heavy fines and lose welfare benefits if they refuse to comply with the traditional vaccination schedule.”
🚨WTAF🚨👀
24,000 children will be vaccinated in a stadium in Australia next week. No parents will be allowed access. pic.twitter.com/plYeuEG2SZ
Citizens will be charged with “on the spot” excessive fines up to $5,000 per infraction if they violate the tyrannical COVID-19 rules as their children get sent away to get forcibly vaccinated despite their protest as Australia conducts one of the most authoritarian military lockdowns to date.
Australian residents have received a letter from the Australian Government detailing how an “accommodation facility” will be used for mandatory quarantine “accommodation” called the Centre for National Resilience, Melbourne (the Centre) built at 135 Donnybrook Road. The first 500 beds will be completed by the end of 2021 and the facility will be equipped to increase to 3000.
This is not the only COVID-19 camp that the Australian government is using. On the official government website, it says that the Victorian quarantine hub will be “at the site of the existing animal quarantine facility, owned by the Australian Department of Agriculture” and modeled off a similar facility in Howard Springs.
“The master plan for the new hub includes dedicated onsite services, including catering that is tailored to be delivered alongside strong infection control and prevention measures. The first stage of the hub will provide 500 beds, with a second stage doubling capacity a short time later. It is also designed with the ability to increase to up to 3000 beds as part of a scalable build if a larger facility is determined to be required at any point.
The new hub will also be designed with relocatable cabins so that it can be utilised for alternative and future needs, including ongoing quarantine arrangements, crisis accommodation and other emergencies.”
In one shocking video, 3 children had immediately collapsed apparently after getting vaccinated in the camp. “Vaccinate your kids they say…GENOCIDE,” wrote one Twitter user. Officials are seen attempting to stop the man recording.
Australia vaccine stadium for children monitored by the police. Parents not allowed in, 3 children collapsed and 2 are in a coma! Video from a close friend in Australia. Vaccinate your kids they say… GENOCIDE pic.twitter.com/YnMVw5eJiK
A Washington middle school teacher is under investigation for allegedly posting on social media that it would be “lucky” if unvaccinated people “who vote the wrong way” died.
The teacher at Wy’East Middle School in the Evergreen Public Schools district said that “if we’re lucky, we can cut out 30% of the population that votes the wrong way.”
According to a report from KTTH, who did not name the teacher, an investigation was opened after the district received complaints about her social media posts from angry parents.
“I am ready to say let them die. You made a choice to not get your shot for any reason other than a doctors note, you should not be allowed healthcare. You are like the brats in class that ruin it for everyone,” the post said.
KTTH reports:
After a friend responded that she couldn’t agree “to wish ill even on the willingly ignorant,” the teacher doubled down.
“I have no problem with that. If we’re lucky we can cut out 30% of the population that votes the wrong way.”
Then another friend weighed in on the topic, saying if they were to die, there would be “less people using up all the resources.”
“Let the hunger games begin,” the teacher responded.
The teacher has now deleted their Facebook account.
Another teacher in the district commented that “people don’t want their little white, heterosexual, bible bubble popped! This is a public school and if you don’t like it, do your own thing,” according to screenshots obtained by Clark County Today.
“Evergreen Public Schools takes the health and safety of our students very seriously. The district is aware one of our employees posted a message regarding COVID vaccination statuses on her personal Facebook page/account while on summer break,” a spokesperson for the district told KTTH.
“It is being handled by our Human Resources department in accordance with district policies and procedures, and as it is a personnel matter, we cannot provide you any more specific information,” the statement added.
U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy predicts there will be more vaccine mandates in the near future. On Sunday, he said he could see universities and businesses imposing vaccine requirements.
This comes as the FDA announced it officially approved the Pfizer vaccine. The Biden administration now forecasts a greater push to get Americans vaccinated.
“Two potential things may happen (following FDA vaccine approval),” Murthy explained. “One is you may see more people coming forward, those who were perhaps on the fence about getting vaccinated, and this may tip them toward doing so. Second, I think you’ll see more universities and workplaces that were considering putting in requirements for vaccines to create safer places to learn and work, you’ll see more of them likely moving forward.”
Today, FDA approved the first COVID-19 vaccine for the prevention of #COVID19 disease in individuals 16 years of age and older. https://t.co/iOqsxXV1fj
The U.S. Surgeon General went on to support school districts for requiring teachers and staff to get vaccinated while claiming the move is “reasonable.”
Additionally, the Murthy said booster shots may be needed in order for Americans to be better protected from the coronavirus. He explained that while vaccines currently look like a strong defense against the virus, their effectiveness may not stand strong as health officials get more data.
In the meantime, the Biden administration is gearing up to rollout booster shots beginning September 20.
U.S. drug regulators on Monday approved the COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer and BioNTech for people 16 and older, making it the first such shot to receive approval in the country.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said the vaccine, which will be known as Comirnaty, proved effective in a clinical trial of approximately 44,000 people.
The shot was 91 percent effective in preventing COVID-19 infection, regulators said, and was also effective in preventing severe disease and hospitalization.
The agency didn’t immediately respond when asked for more details about the trial.
FDA officials said they also reviewed safety data and determined the vaccine’s known and potential benefits outweigh its known and potential risks, including side effects.
“As the first FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccine, the public can be very confident that this vaccine meets the high standards for safety, effectiveness, and manufacturing quality the FDA requires of an approved product,” Dr. Janet Woodcock, the FDA’s acting commissioner, said in a statement.
“While millions of people have already safely received COVID-19 vaccines, we recognize that for some, the FDA approval of a vaccine may now instill additional confidence to get vaccinated. Today’s milestone puts us one step closer to altering the course of this pandemic in the U.S.,” she added.
The FDA issued emergency use authorization to the Pfizer jab and a COVID-19 vaccine from Moderna in December 2020. Several months later, regulators authorized a shot from Johnson & Johnson. But none until Monday had received approval, which has a higher bar than authorization.
The approval “affirms the efficacy and safety profile of our vaccine at a time when it is urgently needed,” Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla said in an emailed statement. “I am hopeful this approval will help increase confidence in our vaccine, as vaccination remains the best tool we have to help protect lives and achieve herd immunity.”
The decision will likely lead to new vaccine mandates, as some officials held off imposing vaccine requirements due to the lack of an approved vaccine.
Approximately 201.4 million Americans have received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose as of Aug. 22, according to federal data. Over 204 million Pfizer doses have been administered.
The approval comes as studiesshow the efficacy of vaccines in preventing CCP virus infection is waning. That prompted a host of officials, including the FDA’s Woodcock, to announce last week that they plan, starting next month, on recommending booster shots, pending FDA authorization. Still, for now, those who get two Moderna or Pfizer shots are considered fully vaccinated.
The approval drew both support and criticism.
“With six months of safety data, the vaccine is still safe, still effective,” Dr. Alok Patel, a pediatric hospitalist in San Francisco, said on ABC News.
President Joe Biden said in a statement that the approval “should give added confidence that this vaccine is safe and effective.”
However, Peter Doshi, the senior editor of the British Medical Journal, said Monday that the FDA should have demanded “controlled studies with long term follow up” before granting the approval.
While the Delta variant of the CCP virus has been blamed for the waning effectiveness, he wrote, it may not be the true cause.
Syringes with the COVID-19 Pfizer vaccine are pictured ready for use at a mobile clinic in Los Angeles, Calif., on July 9, 2021. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images)
Adverse Reactions
While the FDA approved Pfizer’s jab, regulators also said they determined that there are “increased risks” of myocarditis and pericarditis, or heart inflammation, following administration of the shot, particularly within the seven days following the second dose of the two-dose regimen.
“The observed risk is higher among males under 40 years of age compared to females and older males. The observed risk is highest in males 12 through 17 years of age. Available data from short-term follow-up suggest that most individuals have had resolution of symptoms. However, some individuals required intensive care support. Information is not yet available about potential long-term health outcomes. The Comirnaty Prescribing Information (pdf) includes a warning about these risks,” the agency said.
The FDA previously added a warning about the heart inflammation to both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, which both utilize messenger RNA technology, but still maintains that teenagers should get vaccinated.
In clinical studies of people between the ages of 16 and 55, according to the FDA, the most commonly reported adverse reactions were pain at the injection site (88.6 percent), fatigue (70.1 percent), headache (64.9 percent), muscle pain (45.5 percent), chills (41.5 percent), joint pain (27.5 percent), fever (17.8 percent), and injection site swelling (10.6 percent).
In studies of people 56 years old or older, the most commonly reported adverse reactions were pain at the injection site (78.2 percent), fatigue (56.9 percent), headache, (45.9 percent), muscle pain (32.5 percent), chills (24.8 percent), joint pain (21.5 percent), injection site swelling (11.8 percent), fever (11.5 percent), and injection site redness (10.4 percent).
Approximately 3,079 people have died after receiving the Pfizer jab, according to Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), a passive reporting system run jointly by the FDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Some 15,268 people have been hospitalized after getting a Pfizer shot, according to VAERS reports. Nearly 3,900 have reportedly suffered a permanent disability.
The system is “not designed to determine if a vaccine caused a health problem, but is especially useful for detecting unusual or unexpected patterns of adverse event reporting that might indicate a possible safety problem with a vaccine,” according to its website.
Anybody can submit reports to the system. Healthcare providers are encouraged to submit reports and vaccine manufacturers are required to report certain adverse events. Federal health officials then review the submissions.
We all know there was funny business during the 2020 election. There is no way 81 million Americans voted for Joe Biden. You’ll never convince me otherwise. The 2020 election was not fair, and Democrats knew how to exploit the COVID crisis to set things in motion. Secretaries of State cannot just change election laws willy nilly. They need the state legislatures to sign off on changes. In Pennsylvania and Michigan, such tweaks were executed without approval from their respective state legislatures for an obvious reason. They were Republican majority bodies. The team gathered to argue the election discrepancies was not good to say the least. The Democrats were able to run out the clock and here we are. So, are you shocked that there are millions of mail-in ballots that are just missing? They’re gone. Around 15 million votes cannot be accounted for. (via Daily Signal):
Almost 15 million mail-in ballots were unaccounted for in the 2020 presidential election, and more than a million more ballots were undeliverable, according to a new study.
The Public Interest Legal Foundation, a conservative watchdog group on election integrity, released a research brief Wednesday assessing the effect of mass mail-in balloting in an election with a close presidential race in key battleground states such as Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin.
“These figures detail how the 2020 push to mail voting needs to be a one-year experiment,” J. Christian Adams, president of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, said in a public statement.
The report found that 1.1 million mail-in ballots were undeliverable for various reasons. Election officials rejected another 560,814 mail-in ballots.
Another 14.7 million mailed ballots met an “unknown” fate, the report says.
Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in the presidential race with an Electoral College victory of 306 to 232 after winning Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin by 0.6 percentage points or less.
A Washington Post analysis in February found that flipping fewer than 43,000 votes across those three states could have changed the election outcome. In the nationwide popular vote, Biden received 81,268,924 votes to Trump’s 74,216,154—a margin of 7,052,770 votes.
It goes beyond that. The GOP was incredibly close to winning everything in 2020. We’re less than 100,000 votes from a unified GOP government, a second Trump term, and a raging river of liberal tears. That Washington Post analysis added that the GOP was 32,000 votes shy of retaking the House and only needed a mere 14,000 votes to keep the Senate. Those aren’t massive shifts. Prior to the 2020 election, in the last four, around 28 million votes were lost.
Civil rights leader Rev. Jesse Jackson—who is fully vaccinated—and his wife, Jacqueline Jackson, have both been hospitalized with COVID-19, according to a statement on Aug. 21.
Jackson, 79, received his first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine in January 2021 during a publicized event and urged others to get the vaccine as soon as possible. It isn’t clear if his wife, who is 77, also got the vaccine.
Both are being treated at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, according to a statement from Jackson’s nonprofit group, the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. The organization didn’t provide an update on their status.
“There are no further updates at this time,” the statement said. “We will provide updates as they become available.”
Doctors, the group said, are “currently monitoring the condition of both” and added that “anyone who has been around either of them for the last five or six days should follow” guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) related to testing and social distancing.
Earlier this year, Jackson underwent surgery after being hospitalized for abdominal pain. In 2017, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, a neurological disorder.
“Let us all pray for Rev. and Mrs. Jesse Jackson. They need our sincere and intense prayers. Prayer changes things!!!” MSNBC host Al Sharpton wrote on Twitter.
As Jackson was fully vaccinated, his hospitalization is sure to trigger more questions about the vaccines’ efficacy in light of new COVID-19 variants. Last week, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said during a news conference there is “concerning evidence” that mRNA vaccine protection is “waning” against the so-called Delta strain.
In one study published by the CDC and cited by Walensky, the efficacy against infection has plummeted to 53.1 percent for both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. As a result, Walensky said that due to the waning effectiveness, the federal government is “planning for Americans to receive booster shots starting next month,” saying that their initiative is designed to “stay ahead of this virus.”
But the push to provide booster shots drew significant criticism from the World Health Organization, which said the plan would deprive poorer nations of vaccines. Some scientists and medical researchers who were previously vaccinated wrote on Twitter that they wouldn’t get the booster in light of the CDC announcement.
Earlier this month, one of the chief AstraZeneca vaccine developers, professor Andrew Pollard, said that gaining herd immunity with vaccines is “not a possibility” and that researchers and governments need to instead pivot to treatment methods.
Speaking to the UK Parliament, Pollard said that what the CCP virus “will throw up next is a variant which is perhaps even better at transmitting in vaccinated populations,” saying that this is “even more of a reason not to be making a vaccine program around herd immunity.”
The Epoch Times has contacted the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition for additional comment.
Rev. Jesse Jackson Hospitalized With COVID-19 After Being Fully Vaccinated
Civil rights leader Rev. Jesse Jackson—who is fully vaccinated—and his wife, Jacqueline Jackson, have both been hospitalized with COVID-19, according to a statement on Aug. 21.
Jackson, 79, received his first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine in January 2021 during a publicized event and urged others to get the vaccine as soon as possible. It isn’t clear if his wife, who is 77, also got the vaccine.
Both are being treated at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, according to a statement from Jackson’s nonprofit group, the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. The organization didn’t provide an update on their status.
“There are no further updates at this time,” the statement said. “We will provide updates as they become available.”
Doctors, the group said, are “currently monitoring the condition of both” and added that “anyone who has been around either of them for the last five or six days should follow” guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) related to testing and social distancing.
COVID-19 is the disease caused by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus.
Earlier this year, Jackson underwent surgery after being hospitalized for abdominal pain. In 2017, he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, a neurological disorder.
“Let us all pray for Rev. and Mrs. Jesse Jackson. They need our sincere and intense prayers. Prayer changes things!!!” MSNBC host Al Sharpton wrote on Twitter.
As Jackson was fully vaccinated, his hospitalization is sure to trigger more questions about the vaccines’ efficacy in light of new COVID-19 variants. Last week, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said during a news conference there is “concerning evidence” that mRNA vaccine protection is “waning” against the so-called Delta strain.
In one study published by the CDC and cited by Walensky, the efficacy against infection has plummeted to 53.1 percent for both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. As a result, Walensky said that due to the waning effectiveness, the federal government is “planning for Americans to receive booster shots starting next month,” saying that their initiative is designed to “stay ahead of this virus.”
But the push to provide booster shots drew significant criticism from the World Health Organization, which said the plan would deprive poorer nations of vaccines. Some scientists and medical researchers who were previously vaccinated wrote on Twitter that they wouldn’t get the booster in light of the CDC announcement.
Earlier this month, one of the chief AstraZeneca vaccine developers, professor Andrew Pollard, said that gaining herd immunity with vaccines is “not a possibility” and that researchers and governments need to instead pivot to treatment methods.
Speaking to the UK Parliament, Pollard said that what the CCP virus “will throw up next is a variant which is perhaps even better at transmitting in vaccinated populations,” saying that this is “even more of a reason not to be making a vaccine program around herd immunity.”
The Epoch Times has contacted the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition for additional comment.