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Weight loss drug Semaglutide may reduce alcohol cravings, heavy drinking and smoking, new study finds

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Semaglutide, a medication widely used for diabetes and weight loss, may offer another unexpected benefit — it could help people drink less alcohol.

A study published in JAMA Psychiatry enrolled 48 adults between ages 21 and 65 who had been diagnosed with alcohol use disorder but were not actively seeking treatment.

Half received semaglutide, a type of GLP-1 receptor agonist, while the other half received no treatment. Over the nine-week trial, participants taking semaglutide started at a dose of 0.25 mg per week, which gradually increased to 1.0 mg in the final week — a much lower dose than what’s typically prescribed for weight loss.

”We found the largest effects for outcomes related to drinking quantity or heavy drinking…[semaglutide] appeared to reduce drinking quantity,” said Christian Hendershot, PhD, the study’s lead author and director of clinical research at the USC Institute for Addiction Science, in an interview with ABC News.

In a controlled lab setting, participants taking semaglutide drank less alcohol. However, outside the lab, their overall drinking days and daily alcohol intake did not change significantly. They did, however, report fewer binge-drinking episodes and reduced alcohol cravings.

Hendershot emphasized that the participants were not actively trying to cut back on drinking or become abstinent, making the drug’s impact particularly interesting.

”The reason why semaglutide may have an effect on addictive behaviors and cravings and may play a role in treating alcohol use disorder is still not entirely clear,” said Dr. Stephanie Widmer, an emergency medicine physician and addiction medicine expert. ”More research needs to be done in order to really get a firm grasp on what the pathophysiology is behind this,” she added.

One possible explanation is that GLP-1 receptor agonists increase feelings of fullness, which could make alcohol less appealing, Hendershot said.

Previous animal studies suggest these medications may also affect the brain’s reward system, reducing the desire for substances like alcohol and nicotine. However, it remains unclear if the same effect holds true in humans.

Interestingly, the medication also appeared to reduce cigarette use in a small group of participants who smoked, hinting at broader effects on addictive behaviors.

”Preclinical studies indicate that GLP-1 receptor agonists reduce not just alcohol intake, but also nicotine self-administration and nicotine-related reward,” Hendershot noted. However, no FDA-approved medications currently exist to treat both alcohol and nicotine dependence.

Another unexpected benefit was that those treated with semaglutide lost 5% of their body weight over the course of the study. While this result is consistent with previous research, Hendershot noted the need to evaluate potential side effects, particularly in individuals with lower BMIs.

The study did have several important limitations. It was small, lasted only nine weeks, and was conducted in a controlled setting that may not fully reflect real-world drinking behaviors.

Additionally, because participants were not actively trying to reduce their alcohol consumption, their motivation—or lack of it—could have influenced the results, Henderson implied.

Still, the findings suggest semaglutide could play a role in reshaping addiction treatment. According to the National Institutes of Health, only three medications are currently FDA-approved to treat alcohol dependence, and many individuals with the condition never receive any treatment.

In 2023, more than 2 million people had alcohol use disorder, yet only about 8% received treatment.

”If semaglutide proves to be a better option than the three FDA-approved drugs that are currently in use, this would be a huge breakthrough for many,” Widmer said.

Dr. Christopher Wachuku is an internal medicine preliminary intern at Lankenau Medical Center and a member of the ABC News Medical Unit.

Trans youth care ban vetoed by Kansas governor again

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(TOPEKA, Kan.) — Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly has vetoed Senate Bill 63, which would have restricted gender-affirming care for transgender youth.

“Right now, the legislature should be focused on ways to help Kansans cope with rising prices,” Kelly said in a statement emailed late Tuesday. “That is the most important issue for Kansans. That is where my focus is.”

The bill would bar health care providers from administering gender-affirming medical care – including puberty suppressants and hormone therapies – for someone under the age of 18, only for the purposes of gender transitioning. The ban would also apply to gender-affirming surgeries.

“Infringing on parental rights is not appropriate, nor is it a Kansas value,” said Kelly in her veto message. “As I’ve said before, it is not the job of politicians to stand between a parent and a child who needs medical care of any kind. This legislation will also drive families, businesses, and health care workers out of our state, stifling our economy and exacerbating our workforce shortage issue.”

This is the third time Kelly has vetoed similar transgender youth care bills, but the bill may now have the support to pass.

The bill passed the state legislature with flying colors – passing the House 83-35 and the Senate 32-8.

In 2023, the attempt to override a past trans care ban veto lost in the House 82-43.

State Republicans quickly denounced Kelly’s veto.

“The governor’s devotion to extreme left-wing ideology knows no bounds, vetoing a bipartisan bill that prevents the mutilation of minors,” said State Sen. Ty Masterson in an online statement. “The Senate stands firmly on the side of protecting Kansas children and will swiftly override her veto before the ink from her pen is dry.”

Top national medical associations such as the American Medical Association, American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and American Academy of Pediatrics and more than 20 others argue that gender-affirming care is safe, effective, beneficial, and medically necessary for transgender populations.

Kelly joins governors past and present in Ohio and Arkansas in vetoing bills that targeted gender-affirming youth care. However, both of their vetoes were overridden.

Across the country, trans youth care restrictions have faced legal hurdles in their enforcement.

The battle and debate has most recently made its way to the national stage, with the Supreme Court considering U.S. v. Skrmetti, which will decide if Tennessee’s law banning some gender-affirming care for transgender minors violates the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

Musk staffer ‘mistakenly’ given ability to edit Treasury Department payment system, legal filings say

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — A 25-year-old associate of Elon Musk and former Treasury Department employee was “mistakenly” given the ability to make changes to a sensitive federal payment system, officials with the Bureau of the Fiscal Service disclosed in a series of court filings late Tuesday.

Treasury Department officials said the “error” was quickly corrected, and a forensic investigation into the actions of Marko Elez — who resigned from his position last week after The Wall Street Journal unearthed a series of racist social media posts — remains ongoing.

“To the best of our knowledge, Mr. Elez never knew of the fact that he briefly had read/write permissions for the [Secure Payment System] database, and never took any action to exercise the ‘write’ privileges in order to modify anything within the SPS database — indeed, he never logged in during the time that he had read/write privileges, other than during the virtual walk-through — and forensic analysis is currently underway to confirm this,” wrote Joseph Gioeli III, a deputy commissioner at Bureau of the Fiscal Service.

The high-profile mistake at BFS — which effectively serves as the federal government’s checkbook by disbursing more than $5 trillion annually — comes as a federal judge in New York is weighing whether to continue to block individuals associated with Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department records.

Lawyers with the Department of Justice initially insisted that Elez was strictly given “read-only” access to sensitive records, but the affidavits submitted by BFS employees on Tuesday noted that the 25-year-old was inadvertently given the ability to “read/write” the sensitive system that agencies use to send “large dollar amount transactions” to the Treasury Department.

According to Gioeli, Treasury Department officials also provided Elez with copies of the “source code” for multiple payment systems that he could edit in a digital “sandbox.”

“Mr. Elez could review and make changes locally to copies of the source code in the cordoned-off code repository; however, he did not have the authority or capability to publish any code changes to the production system or underlying test environments,” the filing said.

Elez resigned from his role on Feb. 6, and Gioielli claimed that the 25-year-old former SpaceX and X employee was the “only individual on the Treasury DOGE Team” who was given direct access to payment systems or source code. A “preliminary review” of his digital activity suggests that Elez stayed within the permitted bounds of his role when accessing the payment systems.

“While forensic analysis is still ongoing, Bureau personnel have conducted preliminary reviews of logs of his activity both on his laptop and within the systems and at this time have found no indication of any unauthorized use, of any use outside the scope that was directed by Treasury leadership, or that Mr. Elez used his BFS laptop to share any BFS payment systems data outside the U.S. Government,” the filing said.

The filings also provided new insights into DOGE’s ongoing mission with the Treasury Department, including to identify fraud, better understand how the payments are fulfilled and to enforce Trump’s day-one executive order that significantly cut foreign aid.

According to Thomas Krause — a tech CEO and DOGE volunteer who is leading the cost-cutting effort at the Treasury Department — DOGE is engaged in 4-to-6-week assessment of the Treasury Department’s payment systems. He was placed at Treasury not only to identify potential fraud but also understand how to use the Department’s payment systems to potentially cut funding to other parts of the government, the filing said.

“BFS is well positioned to help agencies and the federal government holistically understand and take stock of the problems [Government Accountability Office] has reported on,” Krause wrote.

Inflation increased in January, posing obstacle for Trump tariff plans

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Consumer prices rose 3% in January compared to a year ago, ticking up from the previous month and posing an obstacle for Trump administration tariff policies that many economists expect to raise some prices, government data on Wednesday showed. The inflation reading came in higher than economists had predicted.

The fresh data extends a bout of resurgent inflation that stretches back to last year. Two weeks ago, the Federal Reserve opted to hold interest rates steady in part out of concern regarding the stubborn price increases.

Egg prices, a closely watched symbol of rising costs, soared 53% in January compared to a year ago. An avian flu has decimated the egg supply, lifting prices higher.

Beef prices climbed 5% and bacon prices jumped 6% in January compared to a year ago, data showed. By contrast, prices dropped over that same period for bread, rice and tomatoes.

Core inflation — a measure that strips out volatile food and energy prices — increased 3.3% over the year ending in December, ticking lower than the previous month, the data showed. That gauge also sped up from the previous month.

Inflation has slowed dramatically from a peak in June 2022, but price increases remain a percentage point higher than the Fed’s target rate.

Since Trump took office on Jan. 20, he has announced a series of tariffs, which economists say could push prices higher. Tariffs on steel and aluminum announced by Trump this week could raise prices for a set of products that includes refrigerators, beer and automobiles, experts previously told ABC News.

In a post on Truth Social on Wednesday morning, Trump appeared to fault former President Joe Biden for the uptick in inflation, writing: “BIDEN INFLATION UP!”

Biden served during more than half of the month of January, leaving office on Jan. 20. Trump, however, said during the presidential campaign earlier this year that he would bring down prices “starting on day one.”

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

Palestinians hope to return to Gaza, West Bank, while some Israelis want annexation

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(LONDON) — Israel has occupied the Gaza Strip and West Bank since its victory in the Six-Day War in 1967. Palestinians hope that one day both territories will become part of a nation-state they can call their own.

But that dream seems further away than ever following Hamas’ attack on Oct. 7, 2023, and Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in response — which has left the strip destroyed.

The far-right factions in Israel are now advocating for the annexation of the West Bank once and for all.

“We left only with our lives, with our safety,” Palestinian Sana Al Zubeidi told ABC News, after being forced to flee her home with her family amid some of the most intense IDF raids there in decades. “We didn’t take anything with us because it was at that moment and we were leaving and that airplanes in the skies were shooting at us.”

Just days ago, the Al Zubeidi family, comprised of a grandfather, grandmother, and 10 grandchildren, was forced to flee their town of Jenin in the occupied West Bank. Jenin is known as a militant stronghold, a place that has witnessed little to no peace.

Streams of people are fleeing the Jenin refugee camp where they have lived since their displacement in Israel’s founding in 1948. According to the local mayor, 16,000 people have left since the IDF launched “operation iron wall” weeks ago, with the aim to root out terrorism in the West Bank.

Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz stated, “The Jenin refugee camp will not return to its previous condition. After the operation is complete, IDF forces will remain in the camp to ensure that terrorism does not return.” There have been many battles in Jenin, and the families are determined to return to their homes one day.

Meanwhile, many displaced families have sought refuge in Burqin Village. The faces of slain Palestinian fighters throughout the years are visible here. In Israel, they are labeled as terrorists; here, they are viewed as resistance fighters and revered as “martyrs.”

Even Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who orchestrated the attacks on Oct. 7, was displayed prominently in the town square. The IDF claims that “Operation Iron Wall” is different, stating that they are targeting the core of terrorism in the West Bank.

Bulldozers are tearing up the streets, while airstrikes and controlled demolitions are destroying many houses, resulting in a devastating scene.

Roads have been destroyed, restricting movement and cutting off communities from one another across the northern West Bank. Palestinians are routinely stopped and searched.

At least 40,000 Palestinians are impacted by forced displacement due to ongoing Israeli Forces operation in the north.

This war is disrupting almost every aspect of daily life, and there seems to be no end in sight. Jamal Al-Zubaidi has lost two sons in the fighting, another son is injured, and a fourth is in jail.

“I want to tell you something very clear: We are part of the resistance to an illegitimate occupation,” Jamal Al-Zubaidi said. “The military occupation is the biggest terror. The only terrorists are the occupation and the Israeli Army that kill us, that displaced us, that took our land in 1948, that is preventing us from achieving our rights and our self-determination.”

In a statement to ABC News, the IDF reported that they had thwarted 2,000 attempted terrorist attacks since Oct. 7. They described the West Bank as having a “complex security reality” where they are dealing daily with terrorism and violent disturbances.

The statement goes on to assert that the IDF “follows international law” and claims that “terrorist operatives” have exploited civilian infrastructure.

As the raids expand, tragedy unfolds — mourners gather at the funeral of a 2-year-old child, Laila Al-Khatib, who was reportedly killed by gunfire during an Israeli raid on Jenin, according to Palestinian officials.

Security footage from Tulkarm captures the moment the IDF shot 10-year-old Sadam Hussein Rajab on Jan. 28. He was left in critical condition and died just over a week later.

The IDF has confirmed that they know both incidents and have initiated investigations. Israel asserts that this is just the beginning.

“You pay a heavy price for freedom,” Jamal Al-Zubaidi said. “And nothing comes without a price. And we are going to, and we are willing to, pay the price for our rights.”

Another storm hitting Midwest, East Coast as Mid-Atlantic digs out from major snowfall

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — As the Mid-Atlantic digs out from a significant snowstorm, a new winter storm is underway in the Plains that will move through the Midwest before reaching the East Coast.

On Wednesday morning, the second storm is hitting Kansas City, Missouri, and Des Moines, Iowa.

The storm will reach Chicago later in the morning, dropping 4 to 6 inches of snow.

An ice storm warning has been issued for Toledo, Ohio, where ice accumulation could cause power outages.

The storm will move into the Northeast on Wednesday evening, bringing mostly rain to the Interstate 95 corridor and an icy mix to New England and upstate New York.

On the southern end of the storm, heavy rain could bring flash flooding from Louisiana to North Carolina.

Strong tornadoes are possible in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

This comes after another snowstorm walloped the Mid-Atlantic on Tuesday.

Virginia recorded more than 14 inches of snow and West Virginia recorded 13 inches. Trees are toppling in Virginia due to the coating of snow and ice and over 170,000 customers in the state are without power on Wednesday morning.

Public schools are closed on Wednesday in Washington, D.C., where there’s more than 6 inches of snow on the ground.

Philadelphia saw 2.6 inches of snow and New York City saw 1.4 inches.

What will dismantling the Education Department mean for your student loans?

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — The Trump administration is gearing up for major changes to the Department of Education, which, among its other functions, oversees a $1.6 trillion portfolio of student loans — the third largest source of household debt in the U.S.

Those loans belong to over 44 million Americans, many of whom are wondering what it would mean to abolish the department that manages their debt.

It depends on which policies the Trump administration actually implements — and which survive legal challenges. But some of the policy plans that have been floated include moving the government’s student loan portfolio over to the Treasury Department, changing the repayment plans that are available to borrowers and, in the most extreme possible change, privatizing the entire student loan system.

Above all, borrowers should expect a halt to student debt relief programs implemented and expanded under former President Joe Biden. The former president’s efforts resulted in $188.8 billion in student loan forgiveness for 5.3 million borrowers during his presidency. Republicans have derided the efforts as an abuse of executive authority, and some have even argued for clawbacks of some of that relief — though that’s considered unlikely.

The relief was concentrated in expansions or fixes to forgiveness programs that already existed, like Public Service Loan Forgiveness and income-driven repayment plans, after efforts at wide scale debt relief were halted by Republican-led lawsuits.

Moving the student loan system to a new home
Conservatives who advocate for the Department of Education to be dismantled often suggest moving the Office of Federal Student Aid (FSA) to the Treasury Department, where it would continue to carry out the regular duties of doling out federal loans and recouping them.

FSA, which is an office within the Department of Education, is where people apply for federal student loans, grants and work-study funds, using the Free Application for Student Aid, or FAFSA, and it’s also the office that manages the repayment process.

Some legal experts have posited that moving FSA into a different government agency would require congressional approval. But Trump could continue pushing the limits of executive authority, as he has with other agencies, to test that hypothesis, ultimately leaving it up to the courts to decide.

Rick Hess, a senior fellow and director focused on education policy at the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute, says FSA would be a better fit for the Treasury Department because it’s “essentially a mega-bank.”

“It’d make more sense to have it overseen by officials at Treasury who work closely with financial institutions and oversee federal revenue collection,” Hess wrote in a recent post.

Hess, in an interview with ABC News, said that he doesn’t predict any impact on student loan borrowers if FSA moved homes — the process would carry on, he said.

“I would be surprised if it’s noticeable in any way compared to anything the borrowers have experienced in the last 4 years,” Hess said, referring to the tumultuousness of the moratorium on payments during the pandemic, the restart, and then the stop-and-start that resulted from lawsuits over Biden’s forgiveness efforts.

That optimistic view would be a deviation from the learned experience of most borrowers, Persis Yu, deputy executive director and managing counsel of the Student Borrower Protection Center, which advocates for debt relief, said.

“No transitions in the student loan system have ever gone well, historically, and we have never tried to move the entire portfolio,” Yu said.

The student loan system is “messy” in its current state, Yu said.
Millions of borrowers still haven’t started repaying their loans since the Covid-era pause ended, and a lawsuit holding up a Biden-era student loan repayment plan, called SAVE, has put nearly 8 million borrowers in forbearance while they await further guidance.

“Having a huge shift is certainly not going to make things better,” she said.

Yu also raised concerns that the Department of Education oversees the loan system with an emphasis on borrower rights, adhering to the Higher Education Act of 1965, while the Treasury Department would do so as a debt collector, which she said could create a “philosophical” difference in how borrowers will be treated.

“I am not here to defend [the Department of Education’s] track record because we’ve obviously had a lot of critiques of their performance in the past,” Yu said. “But this is a move that will in fact hand the portfolio to people even less qualified to run it.”

Changing the ways borrowers repay their loans
There is also a subset of the Republican Party that wants much more significant changes to the student loan system beyond just rehoming offices to make the overall department smaller.

Project 2025, the conservative blueprint of policy ideas written for the Trump administration, calls for privatizing the student loan system entirely and moving all of the government-owned loans to private loan servicers.

Doing so would be a significant change in the way higher education is funded — more than 92% of people relied on federal loans in 2024, rather than private loans, according to the Education Data Initiative, and offloading the $1.6 trillion in federal student loans the government already has — or ceasing to offer loans going forward — would require congressional approval. (Project 2025 acknowledges that privatizing the system may not be “feasible.”)

It also calls for all federal loan repayment plans, of which there are many options, to be consolidated into just one option, and for an end to Public Service Loan Forgiveness, or PSLF, which grants relief to people who work in public service, like nurses and firefighters, after they’ve paid their loans for 10 years.

But the program, first introduced by Republican President George W. Bush in 2007, was authorized by Congress, and would have to be eliminated by Congress, too, which remains unlikely.

Trump could significantly reduce access to the program, though, returning it to its less-effective form during his first term.

The forgiveness plan was massively expanded under Biden, but at one point in Trump’s first term, the Education Department rejected 99% of PSLF applications, a report from the Government Accountability Office found.

When Biden was in office, the number of people who had qualified for PSLF throughout the program’s history rose from 7,000 to over 1 million.

Full Ukrainian liberation from Russia ‘unrealistic,’ Hegseth tells allies

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(LONDON and THE PENTAGON) — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth appeared at his first meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group on Wednesday to tell allies that the liberation of all Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory “is an unrealistic objective.”

“The bloodshed must stop and this war must end,” Hegseth said, in one of the most detailed delineations of the Ukraine-Russia peace deal envisioned by President Donald Trump’s new administration.

“President Trump has been clear with the American people — and with many of your leaders — that stopping the fighting and reaching an enduring peace is a top priority,” Hegseth said at the meeting, which was led by the U.K., marking the first time the group has not convened under U.S. leadership.

“He intends to end this war by diplomacy and bringing both Russia and Ukraine to the table,” Hegseth said. “We will only end this devastating war and establish a durable peace by coupling allied strength with a realistic assessment of the battlefield.”

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his government in Kyiv have demanded full territorial liberation — whether by military or diplomatic means — per the country’s internationally-recognized 1991 borders. Among Ukraine’s other demands are binding Western security guarantees, ideally in the form of full NATO membership and Article Five protection.

Hegseth rejected such ambitions, at least in the near term.

“We want, like you, a sovereign and prosperous Ukraine, but we must start by recognizing that returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective,” he told allies. “Chasing this illusionary goal will only prolong the war and cause more suffering.”

“The United States does not believe that NATO membership for Ukraine is a realistic outcome of a negotiated settlement,” Hegseth continued. “Instead, any security guarantee must be backed by capable European and non-European troops.”

“If these troops are deployed as peacekeepers to Ukraine at any point, they should be deployed as part of a non-NATO mission and they should not be covered under Article Five,” he added. “There also must be robust international oversight of the line of contact.”

“To be clear, as part of any security guarantee, there will not be U.S. troops deployed to Ukraine,” Hegseth said.

Trump has repeatedly vowed to end the war by forcing both Moscow and Kyiv back to the negotiating table after nearly three years of full-scale war.

Hegseth suggested that Trump’s domestic energy policies would help pressure the Kremlin. “Lower energy prices coupled with more effective enforcement of energy sanctions will help bring Russia to the table,” he said.

Hegseth delivered a broader warning to European allies of a lighter U.S. footprint on the continent. They, he said, will need to “provide the overwhelming share of future lethal and non-lethal aid to Ukraine.”

He said the “stark strategic realities” of competition with China in the Indo-Pacific and the U.S. focus on securing its domestic borders “prevent the United States of America from being primarily focused on the security of Europe.”

Hegseth called on allies to donate more ammunition and equipment to Ukraine, expand their industrial bases and explain to citizens that the Russian threat necessitates “spending more on defense and investing strategically.”
That will include increasing defense spending beyond the 2% of GDP target agreed by allies in 2014. The threshold — which many NATO allies have still not achieved — “is not enough,” Hegseth said.

“President Trump has called for 5% and I agree,” he added. “Increasing your commitment to your own security is a down payment for the future.”

The defense secretary warned that while the U.S. “remains committed to the NATO alliance and to partnership with Europe,” America “will no longer tolerate an imbalanced relationship which encourages dependency.”

“Rather, our relationship will prioritize empowering Europe to own responsibility for its own security,” he added. “Honesty will be our policy going forward.”

In response to Hegseth’s remarks, British Defense Secretary John Healey said, “We hear you.”

“We hear your commitment to NATO, to Article Five, to a sovereign Ukraine and to your defense partnership with Europe,” Healey said. “We also hear your concerns.”

“On stepping up for Ukraine, we are and we will,” Healey continued. “On stepping up for European security, we are and we will.”

“You’ve just spoken about peace through strength,” Healey said. “We are 50 nations strong here, all determined to put an end to [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s war, to do so together.”

Rat birth control and ‘Rat Walks’ among new initiatives to curb NYC’s rat population

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — New York City is known for its towering skyscrapers and bustling streets, but lurking beneath the glitz and glamour of the city that never sleeps are 3 million resilient rats that have cemented their place as native New Yorkers.

According to Orkin, the pest control service, New York has been ranked as the third rattiest city in the country behind Los Angeles and Chicago. Now local officials are taking up the battle against the city’s furry rodents.

In 2023, New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced the city’s first Rat Czar, drawing national attention. Since then, many citywide initiatives have been explored.

Director of Rodent Mitigation Kathleen Corradi, aka the Rat Czar, is taking on the task of educating fellow New Yorkers with a new program called Rat Walks. It’s a program available in all boroughs where attendees learn everything about rats, their habits, and what human behaviors encourage the rodents to stick around.

In October, Corradi told participants attending a rat walk, “We’re doing a lot in this administration to make sure we’re containerizing, make sure we’re changing behaviors around waste management.”

Given a $3.5 million budget, Corradi is tasked with reducing the city’s rat population. Still, she says it’s up to New Yorkers, too, “The only way we are successful is getting an educated public change in behaviors and addressing those conditions that support rats. Extermination will always be a part of the conversation, but we know the long-term success relies on front-end equation, and that’s where we’re really focusing and empowering New Yorkers,” she told ABC News.

Several New Yorkers living in rat mitigation zones spoke to ABC News about seeing rats in their neighborhood. “The rats were all over the place, like just ‘Ratatouille,'” Shea Sullivan, a NYC resident, told ABC News. Samir, a superintendent, told us the situation in some of his apartment buildings was getting so out of hand that he had to drown rats himself, “I drowned them in water and killed them. This is ridiculous. It has to be changed completely.”

As New Yorkers are dealing with rats in their homes or neighborhoods, others are taking a different approach to tackling the issue.
New York City Council Member Shaun Abreu launched Bill 736, or “Flaco’s law.” The bill passed on Sept. 26, 2024, and will implement rat contraceptives in areas where trash is containerized. He told ABC News that rat birth control can help curb rat populations, but only if trash is fully contained so the rodents don’t have anything else to eat.

Two years ago, his office also introduced Rat Mitigation Zones, securing $11.5 million to fund the initiative.

“Through my legislation two years ago, the city established five rat mitigation zones, and in these rat mitigation zones citywide rat sightings have gone down by 14%, at least, based off of 311 complaints,” Abreu told ABC News.
In 2024, his office also introduced a residential pilot program to containerize trash in Harlem, an area largely infested with rats. “You have these giant bins out on the street and since we’ve implemented that last September, trash is now in containers. Now they’re not out for a rat buffet anymore. 311 complaints for rat sightings have gone down by 55%. No other intervention has been done this past year,” he told ABC News.

With the passing of Bill 736, rat contraceptives are expected to be rolled out on New York City streets by April 26, 2025.
The company WISDOM Good Works is expected to partner with the city to manage and maintain the distribution of rat birth control. “We’ve been working with City Council offices as well as city agencies that will be enforcing the bill,” the director of operations at WISDOM Good Works, Alaina Gonzalez-White, told ABC News.

She says that the birth control pellets are safer for all wildlife, not just rats. “It’s formulated to target the reproductive system of an animal the size of a rat. Anything that eats that rat will no longer be eating a poisoned meal.” PETA supports the initiative.

Ashley Byrne, senior campaigner for PETA, told us the end of rat poison, known as rodenticide, would mean saving the lives of pets that may come in contact with rats. “Ultimately, slaughtering rats doesn’t work. The only long-term and humane solution is prevention. No animal deserves to experience the slow suffering and miserable death that results from ingesting rat poison.”

Abreu shared his mission to combat rat populations more humanely, saying, “My goal personally is not for rats to go extinct. Our goal is (to) coexist in a way where rats aren’t showing up. I think our message is very much in line with the PETA message. We believe in New York City, we should throw everything we can at the problem from shutting off the food supply, but also targeting rat reproduction at the source.”

Russian held in US to be freed in exchange for Fogel release, Kremlin says

February 12, 2025 by WDNY Radio

(LONDON) — A Russian citizen held in a U.S. prison will be repatriated to Russia following the release of U.S. citizen Marc Fogel, who was returned to the United States on Tuesday, Moscow said.

“In exchange for Fogel, a Russian citizen imprisoned in the United States will be returned to Russia in the coming days,” Dmitry Peskov, a Kremlin spokesperson, said on Wednesday.

Peskov did not disclose which Russian citizen held in a U.S. jail would be repatriated, but said the United States had agreed to the release during negotiations for the return of Fogel, who had been detained in Russia since 2021.

President Donald Trump didn’t disclose on Tuesday the negotiations that led to Fogel’s release or say whether there had been any conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“I can only say this: We got a man home whose mother and family wanted him desperately,” Trump said.

Mike Waltz, the White House national security adviser, said in a statement on Tuesday that Washington had “negotiated an exchange that serves as a show of good faith from the Russians and a sign we are moving in the right direction to end the brutal and terrible war in Ukraine.” His statement did not include details on the exchange.

Trump earlier on Tuesday had been asked if Russia had given the United States anything in return.

“Not much, no,” Trump said. “They were very nice. We were treated very nicely by Russia, actually.”
Peskov on Wednesday declined to say whether additional prisoner exchanges were expected in the future, but said that “contacts between the relevant departments have intensified in the last few days.”

Then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in October 2024 that Fogel, an American teacher, had been “wrongfully detained,” the State Department confirmed to ABC News.

The U.S. tried but was unable to include Fogel in the large prisoner swap in August 2024 that freed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich and former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, a State Department spokesperson said last year.

ABC News’ Joe Simonetti, Michelle Stoddart, Nathan Luna and Meredith Deliso contributed to this report.

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