(ARAB, Ala.) — More than 10 inches of rain pounded northern Alabama over the last 24 hours, leaving some neighborhoods underwater.
A child died as a result of the flooding in Arab, located in northern Alabama, the Marshall County Coroner’s Office said.
In Hoover, near Birmingham, crews have been searching through the night for two people who were in a car that was swept away in the floodwaters. The vehicle is believed to be submerged, officials said, adding that divers are at the scene.
In Pelham, fire officials said they responded to 282 calls for service. Officials conducted 82 rescues from homes and over a dozen rescues from cars.
Schools in Pelham are closed Thursday due to the excessive flooding. A flash flood watch remains in effect through Thursday night.
The flash flooding threat will expand east Thursday into Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina, where more than 3 inches of rain is expected.
Flash flooding is also possible in Tennessee and Florida.
Ariana Grande has been granted a five-year restraining order against the man who showed up at her Hollywood Hills home last month and allegedly threatened her security personnel with a large knife.
Legal documents obtained by The Blast show a judge ordered the fan, previously identified as 23-year-old Aharon Brown, to stay away from the “Positions” singer and her loved ones.
Ariana submitted a statement to a Los Angeles court and expressed that she is “fearful for my safety and for the safety of my family.” She requested the court grant them a protection order, adding that she fears Brown “will continue to come to my home and attempt to physically harm or murder me or members of my family” without one in place.
The restraining order will remain in effect until October 5, 2026.
Ariana previously detailed the incident that precipitated in Brown’s arrest. According to her statement to police, obtained by TMZ, she said, “I am informed that his visits were sporadic at first, but that in the last approximately two to three weeks, (He) has come to my home nearly every day, and sometimes multiple times a day… [A]t approximately 10:20 p.m., while I was home, (he) was again observed near my home. I am informed that he became combative when asked to leave and displayed a large hunting knife.”
During that encounter, Ariana claims Brown threatened to kill her and her security team.
It was previously reported that Brown was arrested following the September incident and was charged with two felony counts of making criminal threats. TMZ reports that Brown is still in custody.
(NEW YORK) — As Americans continue to cook, do laundry and use more electricity at home amid the pandemic, utility bill prices are predicted to rise this winter.
Ken Gurny, a homeowner in New York told Good Morning America their family has tried to conserve energy since the pandemic sent their utility bill sky high.
But even as residents work to lower electricity consumption, the cost to heat homes is going up.
The National Energy Assistance Directors Association predicts gas bills in the U.S. could rise up to 30% this winter.
“Going forward this year, there are no signs of these prices coming down,” executive director Mark Wolfe told GMA.
The Natural Gas Association of America told GMA in a statement that while it does not expect shortages, “natural gas market prices are higher due to the economic recovery, strong natural gas demand from last winter, and slower than anticipated production.”
From January to March last winter, the Gurney family said they paid roughly $2,300 to heat their home which means this year, that number could go up by $700 for a total of $3,000 in the same time period.
Beyond putting on a sweater inside and lowering the thermostat, there are other savings strategies to consider.
A smart thermostat like the Nest lets people program a lowered temperature at specific times of day via a smartphone app. The company estimates it saves users 10-12% on heating costs each year.
Amazon has entered the market with its Alexa-compatible smart thermostat due on the market in November.
The U.S. Energy Department suggests a simpler fix: Swap out an old, dirty filter on the furnace to save between 5 to 15% on a heating bill.
The Natural Gas Association suggests: “if customers have trouble paying their natural gas bills, there are programs that can help.”
Wolfe said the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program is a “federal program that helps people pay their energy bills, they have enough money to do so — but it’s not just for poor people, a family can have to $40,000 a year and still qualify.”
Additionally, experts suggest heat loss can be prevented by checking for cold spots with a thermal gun. Point the device at the ceiling, wall and doors to see where weatherstripping could help, replace insulation or patch up cracks.
More heating and cooling units will also run off electricity rather than gas or oil, providing greater energy efficiency and serving as better options for the environment.
Angelina Jolie is no longer the co-owner of Château Miraval, a French vineyard, which she’d shared with ex-husband husband Brad Pitt.
According to Wall Street Journal, Jolie sold her share of the winery to the group Tenute del Mondo for an undisclosed amount of money. The vineyard is valued around $164 million and is located in Correns, France.
The Eternals actress and Pitt are currently locked in a bitter divorce battle and the two have warred over their winery before, with WSJ reporting that Jolie attempted to sell her stake last month.
Pitt filed suit shortly after and claimed his ex-wife was being “vindictive” by not only cutting him out of the sale, but making a decision that could negatively impact the company that owns Château Miraval. After a few weeks of back and forth, the pair saw eye to eye and a judge allowed Jolie to proceed with the sale on September 23.
The two first bought the winery in 2008 and held their wedding at the location in 2014.
Jolie, 46, and Pitt, 57, divorced in April 2019, but chose to mediate custody and other issues separately via a private judge.
John Tesh is on the mend after his prostate cancer returned for a second time.
Speaking withGood Morning America on Wednesday, Tesh, who is 69, said he knew something was wrong when he began to feel a strange pain in October 2020.
“All of a sudden, I started feeling some really serious pain in my pelvis,” the former Entertainment Tonight co-host recalled, noting that he first ignored it because he thought he had pulled a groin muscle. “Then it got worse and worse… I couldn’t sleep.”
Tesh booked an appointment with his doctor and, after undergoing a scan, discovered “the cancer had returned with a vengeance. The scans showed that there were tumors wrapped around my pelvis and one of [the tumors] was strangling my right kidney. So, it got serious really quickly.”
The Grammy-nominated musician was first diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of prostate cancer in 2015. He revealed that the doctor told him his cancer was terminal and, in order to cope, he turned to alcohol and prescription drugs.
He credits his wife of 30 years, Connie Sellecca, for pulling him out of that dark place over five years ago by “giving me an ultimatum… to get straightened out.”
Tesh explained that overcoming that low point in his life helped him become battle ready when cancer knocked on his door a second time.
Now, he says he is “feeling great” and credits his wife and his faith for helping him ride out the storm.
(NEW YORK) — With the vaccination rate for staffers in New York state’s long-term care facilities jumping from 70% to 92% following a state mandate last week, nursing home advocates are urging the Biden administration to launch a similar mandate for long-term care facilities nationwide — but the federal agency that oversees nursing home standards has yet to provide guidance on the matter.
Biden administration officials announced in August that long-term care staffers would soon have to get vaccinated, but the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has yet to implement the policy. In the meantime, the vaccination rate among long-term care employees nationwide is languishing at just over 65%.
“The federal mandate was welcomed, but the lack of guidance is concerning,” said Michael Wasserman, the past president of the California Association for Long Term Care Medicine and a member of California’s Vaccine Advisory Committee. “Having unvaccinated staff caring for residents will result in the transmission of the virus and therefore deaths.”
“We cannot implement this soon enough,” Wasserman said. “Every day that goes by without guidance will inevitably lead to more deaths.”
CMS officials said in a press release last month that they intend to release emergency vaccine regulations in mid to late October. In the meantime, CMS officials told ABC News, the agency is encouraging staff across all health care settings to get vaccinated, and are encouraging all facilities to “take advantage of the resources available from CMS” to promote the benefits of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Back in August, John Knox Village in Missouri was among the providers that were waiting to get additional guidance from CMS before taking further action, so they could fully understand exactly what the mandate entails. Two months later, they’re still waiting for further guidance.
John Knox Village spokesperson Emily Banyas told ABC News that in the meantime, the facility is continuing with its voluntary biweekly vaccination clinics. The staff vaccination rate at the facility is up 5% over last month — but is still only around 65%.
Overall, only about half the staff in Missouri’s long-term care facilities had been fully vaccinated as of Sept. 19, according to the latest data available from CMS, making Missouri one of the lowest-vaccinated states in the country.
In Oklahoma, where the staff vaccination rate is 51.7%, a long-term care executive told ABC News she’s hopeful the federal mandate will increase staff vaccination rates — especially in rural areas. Mary Brinkley, executive director of the Oklahoma chapter of the elder advocacy group LeadingAge, said that in the meantime, providers in rural areas are making a concerted effort to increase their voluntary vaccination rates, with some nursing home operators achieving rates of 80% to 95%.
But in Montana, where the staff vaccination rate is 59.8%, the federal mandate could be the only way the state will see a big increase in employee vaccinations. Due to a state law that bans employers from requiring vaccinations, Montana Health Care Association Executive Director Rose Hughes said that unless a federal mandate is implemented to create an exception for long-term care providers, there’s “nothing else they can do” other than to “continuously try to convince staff to get vaccinated through education and information.”
However Hughes also told ABC News that she expects a “significant number” of staff to resign when the federal mandate takes effect. Some facilities have already reported losing staff amid the looming order, Hughes said.
In Kentucky, where the vaccination rate among long-term care staff is just 56.2%, a spokesperson for the Kentucky Association of Health Care Facilities said that despite concerns about possible staff resignations, the organization supports employer vaccine mandates and is hopeful that Biden’s mandate will result in a significant increase in COVID-19 vaccinations among staff.
As of Sept. 19, about a month after the Biden administration announced plans to require long-term care facilities to vaccinate their staffs or lose Medicare and Medicaid benefits, the national staff vaccination rate had only risen 4.3%, from 61.1% to 65.4%, according to CMS data. The previous month, it had risen by 2.5%.
Eric Carlson, a long-term care expert with the advocacy group Justice in Aging, says that the mandate is needed “in order to prevent deaths and to keep nursing facilities open to visitors.”
“The COVID vaccines have been game-changers in nursing facilities,” Carlson told ABC News. “We know that COVID is particularly deadly for nursing facility residents, and that broad vaccination can reduce COVID rates to close to zero. No one should be waiting for someone else in order to do the right thing.”
Lisa Sanders, a national spokesperson for LeadingAge, says it is “highly likely” that an increase in workplace vaccine mandates will lead to an overall increase in the vaccination rate.
“What’s needed now — urgently — is both the actual rule and guidance for implementation,” she said.
In Tennessee, where the staff vaccination rate is just under 54%, Tennessee Health Care Association spokesperson Jay Moore told ABC News that while a few long-term care facilities have voluntarily imposed their own mandate, many providers are waiting for the national guidance because “the landscape is changing so rapidly, and there will always be unexpected nuances when the CMS rules are finally promulgated.”
Moore said it’s a “fair assessment” to say that the lack of additional CMS guidance has put providers in limbo, but that the federal agency is just being careful because it knows that the mandate will have a “tremendous impact on individuals working in health care, the facilities, and the patients in need of services.”
“CMS hopefully is just trying to get it right,” Moore said.
The Spice Girls‘ Mel B took to Instagram on Wednesday to reveal that she’s recovering after contracting COVID-19.
“In my head I’m here @youandmemaldives ahhhh what a beautiful place, sunshine crystal clear sea being totally spoilt rotten in my private villa named after me but in reality right now I’m curled up in bed getting over the final long haul of COVID,” Mel — a.k.a. Scary Spice — shared, along with a montage of photos from a recent vacation.
She added the hashtags, “#itsbeen5weeksnow #takemeback to #paradise #covidisnojoke #mydogs #thebestsnuggler thank god for #netflix.”
Meanwhile, Mel B hinted of a Spice Girls reunion tour in 2023 that could even include Victoria Beckham, who sat out their last tour, according to the Daily Mail.
Mel C, who’s currently competing on ABC’s Dancing with the Stars, isn’t ruling out a reunion sometime this season. “It’d be rude not to, right?” she joked when Entertainment Tonight posed the question ahead of the DWTS season 30 premiere.
The Spice Girls have graced the DWTS stage before — they performed on the show in 2007 when Mel B competed on season five. Mel C says she really hopes they’ll be able to do that again this season.
(SAN JOSE, Calif.) — A juror was excused from Elizabeth Holmes’ trial Wednesday, citing religious beliefs.
“I am a Buddhist, and so I practice for compassion, you know, for loving and forgiveness,” juror No. 4 told U.S. District Judge Edward Davila.
She told the court that she had become anxious anticipating how Holmes would be “punished by the government” if she were to find Holmes guilty.
“I keep thinking about this every day,” she added. She was excused per prosecution’s request; the defense did not object.
The alternate juror slated to replace juror No. 4, however, also expressed anxiety. “She’s so young,” the alternate told Davila, referring to Holmes.
“It’s my first time in this situation and it’s her future,” she said. “I don’t know if I’m 100% ready to participate in something like this.”
Davila elaborated on how the process would work, and how jurors would have no part in Holmes’ sentencing — adding that “punishment” should not be at all considered as the jury deliberates. Neither lawyers objected to her remaining on the jury, and the judge ruled she was fit to take juror No. 4’s place. She took the place of juror No. 4 Wednesday morning.
Now that juror No. 4 is excused, there are 15 jurors remaining: 12 active and three alternates.
Wednesday marked only the 12th day of Holmes’ trial — which was previously delayed multiple times due to the COVID-19 pandemic and Holmes’ pregnancy. Davila expects the trial will conclude in December, but the schedule is already delayed a day, due to a false alarm coronavirus scare amongst the jury in the trial’s first week.
Holmes founded Theranos in 2003 and claimed the company was developing blood testing technology that could perform hundreds of blood tests using only a few drops of blood. Holmes and former Theranos COO Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, also Holmes’ ex-boyfriend, face a dozen charges of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with what prosecutors call a multi-million-dollar scheme to defraud investors and patients.
Originally, the pair were to be tried together, but in December of 2019, the trials were severed due to allegations of abuse by Balwani against Holmes, which Balwani has denied.
Both this week and last, jurors heard from former Theranos lab director Dr. Adam Rosendorff, who claims he warned Holmes about Theranos device failings. He told the court he attempted to delay the company’s Walgreens launch, pleading with a “nervous” Holmes, who went forward nonetheless. In cross-examination, defense attorney Lance Wade attempted to discredit Rosendorff.
(ATLANTA) — Over 140,000 children have experienced the loss of a parent or caretaker since the COVID-19 pandemic started, according to a new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published Thursday.
The study, which considered data from April 2020 until June 2021, quantified an under-discussed issue of the pandemic: the magnitude of trauma children who’ve lost guardians have suffered at home, even as the virus continues to largely target adults.
It also found that the burden of grief has fallen hardest on children of color.
Nearly one in 500 children have lost a mother, father or grandparent who cared for them since April of 2020, the study found. But the majority of children, almost seven out of every 10 who have lost parents or caretakers during the pandemic, are Black, Hispanic or Native American.
The authors of the study called for federal attention and resources to address the trauma, which will continue to grow as long as the pandemic continues. Already, the authors estimate the number of children who’ve experience loss is higher than 140,000, because of the delta variant surge that hit the U.S. over the summer after the study concluded.
One of out of every 168 American Indian and Alaska Native children have lost a parent or grandparent who cared for them. During the same time, one out of every 310 Black children have faced such loss. For white children, the risk is lower; one out of every 753 children have lost a parent or caregiver.
The study showed the highest burden of death occurred in Southern border states for Hispanic children, Southeastern states for Black children, and in states with tribal areas for American Indian/Alaska Native populations.
“We were quite disturbed by the racial and ethnic disparities that were appearing in our data,” Susan Hillis, the lead author on the CDC study, told ABC News.
The CDC didn’t collect data to explain why those disparities exist, but research over the course of the pandemic has shown grave inequities in health care have led to higher death rates for communities of color. The CDC study published Thursday also found that parents generally had more children in demographics that were hit hardest by loss.
During the research period, Hillis said she was picturing a group of first-graders, all from different backgrounds and parts of the country.
“In my mind’s eye, there’s five children standing together and having such an extreme difference in their risk of having to face the death of the very person who is supposed to provide their love, security, education and care,” she said.
“We’re compelled to mount a response that’s effective for them — for all of them,” she said.
The data suggests that the country needs to build an “urgently needed” pillar into its COVID-19 response, specifically for children, Hillis said.
While she was working on the research, Hillis met a 16-year-old girl named Katie who had lost her dad to the virus.
“She said, ‘People with COVID in our country, most of them do recover, even though my daddy didn’t. However, I will never recover,'” Hillis recalled. “I will not have my daddy with me when I go to the prom, to take pictures beforehand, he will not walk me down the aisle, he will never be with me for another special event in my whole life. I need people to understand, recognize, see and help people like me.”
Losing a parent leads to an increased risk of mental health problems, abuse, unstable housing and poverty, the study said, and for children of single parents, it could mean an immediate need for new housing — whether that is moving in with other family members who can step in and care for them, or going to foster care.
“The critical point to remember is: Not only does it affect the child now, in the short term, but it does really stay with them for the rest of their lives,” Hillis said. “The good news is we do have programs that can help address them, and we have people ready to help implement the programs that work, so I’m encouraged about that.”
(NEW YORK) — It’s the critical aspect of the fight against the pandemic that the U.S. is still figuring out nearly two years after the first documented cases of COVID-19, which has claimed more than 700,000 American lives: coronavirus testing.
At first, testing supply was extremely limited with long lab turnaround times, and only a handful of Americans could access them before things improved as tests became more widely available. Then suddenly, testing demand dropped as mass vaccinations began.
Now, despite billions of dollars in federal investment and more than 20 months into the pandemic, COVID-19 tests are getting harder to find as millions return to offices and schools.
The struggle to keep up with demand also comes amid shifting federal guidance on who should be tested and when as some companies and schools conduct extensive testing, even in situations that may not require it.
The nation’s largest COVID-19 test manufacturers say they have seen a significant increase in the demand for coronavirus tests. Some major test manufacturers — including Abbott Laboratories — scaled back their production in the spring and early summer when daily testing numbers declined.
Many large test-producing companies say their rapid testing products are quickly flying off store shelves nationwide and are out of stock for online shoppers.
“We’ve ramped up our capacity significantly and, by the end of October, we’ll be producing as many or more rapid tests as we were at the height of our production,” said John Koval, an Abbott spokesperson. “To get there, we’ve hired additional employees and have turned on parts of our self-established manufacturing network.”
Although there is a faster result turnaround for rapid antigen tests, they are not as accurate as PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests, which often involve a nasal swab. PCR tests are widely considered the gold standard for COVID-19 testing, due to their sensitivity, as they provide a more definitive answer as to whether someone may have active coronavirus.
More than 51 million coronavirus tests were administered in the month of September only the second time this year, after January, when test numbers were comparably high.
According to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, testing in September increased by a record 82% compared to that period last year when many schools and workplaces were still fully virtual.
The U.S. now conducts nearly 2 million tests a day on average after hitting its peak for the year on Sept. 27 with 3.6 million.
Tests can be administered in a variety of locations, including testing sites, doctor’s offices and even at home and new technology is being developed to make the process easier, more available and cost-effective.
Here’s what we know about the testing landscape in the U.S.:
Return to work and school, in person
The return of Americans to work and school, along with the spread of the delta variant and a small but rising number of breakthrough infections among the vaccinated, created an increase in test demand that many suppliers are only now beginning to catch up with.
“It’s incredibly frustrating that we find ourselves back in this situation that we were in pretty much at the start of the pandemic,” said Dr. Jennifer Nuzzo, lead epidemiologist for the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. “Employers really haven’t pulled back on screening testing that they’re doing even among vaccinated workforce, so that all added together stacks up to a fairly sizable demand for tests.”
Preparing for the return of employees back to the workplace, many U.S. employers have already purchased thousands of COVID-19 tests in bulk.
Prominent investment bank Goldman Sachs, which is based in New York, now requires staff in all of its U.S. offices to take weekly coronavirus tests, even if they’re fully vaccinated.
Other large employers, such as banks, retail stores and supermarkets have begun testing as well, with some using rapid tests and others using self-administered PCR tests.
Labcorb, a U.S. medical diagnostics company, insisted to ABC News that it didn’t reduce its capacity when demand dwindled, and that it has enough supply.
Labcorp sells large quantity collection kits to businesses, which are processed in their labs. Companies can distribute them to their employees to mail in for results.
The company says that equipping businesses both large and small with coronavirus tests is a key priority.
“By making it easier for employees to get tested, we are supporting communities and small businesses across the country,” said Dr. Brian Caveney, chief medical officer and president of Labcorp Diagnostics.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, for example, partnered with Labcorp in March to implement a voluntary COVID-19 testing program for agency employees and contractors doing in-person work at government buildings or elsewhere.
Approximately 3,000 PCR tests a month are expected to be provided to FDA employees over the course of the program’s year-long contract.
As vaccinations increased among the general population in early spring, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) loosened mask policies for vaccinated individuals indoors and said that the vaccinated didn’t have to get tested.
Testing companies heeded that guidance, and significantly rolled back their production as their stock prices dipped in response to the lower demand.
But the rapid spread of the delta variant in the summer coinciding with a lull in vaccinations, compelled the CDC to update its guidelines.
The CDC now advises that vaccinated people who come in contact with others who have a confirmed case of COVID-19 get tested regardless of whether they have symptoms, and quarantine only if their test results are positive.
More than 186 million people — 56% percent of the U.S. population — have been fully vaccinated.
Testing protocols driving demand
Public health experts say that testing protocols for students returning to the classroom, employer testing mandates, in addition to continued spread of the virus, even in a limited way among the vaccinated, is part of what’s driving the demand for COVID-19 tests.
“We’re coming out of a fairly substantial surge of infections, so that has clearly prompted a need for more testing,” said Dr. Nuzzo, from Johns Hopkins. During the summer, the 7-day average of infections surged to levels not seen since the fall and winter spike of last year, when vaccines were not widely available.
When President Biden first took office, he committed to establishing a national pandemic testing board to “massively surge” and guarantee free access to coronavirus testing. But much remains unknown about the goals of the board, particularly when it comes to developing a national testing strategy.
A Health and Human Services spokesperson told ABC News that the board is comprised of officials from across the federal government and “includes a focus on addressing supply issues – the supply group meets regularly to review testing capacity.” Testing strategy has been left largely up to states.
The Biden administration has awarded billions in contracts to private sector companies to surge testing, with the goal of eventually getting those tests widely distributed. But industry experts have observed those actions have not been nearly enough to keep up with the pace of the demand to effectively change the ground game on testing access.
“I don’t know why it wasn’t obvious to everyone that with the fall there would be an increasing demand for testing, particularly because of the push to return kids back to school,” said Nuzzo. “We never had enough tests for that.”
The White House has promised to double the number of rapid tests on the market over the next 60 days with a special focus on reducing test prices, which is still a significant barrier to access for many Americans.
In September, the White House said it plans to spend $2 billion to purchase nearly 300 million rapid tests.
On top of that, the Biden administration recently announced plans for another $1 billion in spending on at-home rapid COVID-19 tests, which officials believe will increase the number of tests available to Americans to 200 million a month, beginning in December.
“The manufacturing is scaling up significantly, doubling across the next couple of months, and we’re just going to keep at it to encourage those manufacturers to increase capacity and to drive down the cost of those tests,” said White House COVID-19 Coordinator Jeff Zients.
Cost a factor
The cost of COVID-19 tests in the U.S. varies, as the price often depends on factors including where you live and the type of labs where tests are processed.
While some COVID-19 tests are free and lowly priced, others are not, and even the insured could be left with a sizable bill.
Many rapid antigen tests, which can provide results in a matter of minutes, cost at least $12 at many U.S. retail stores, compared to prices less than half of that in many European Union countries, including Germany and the U.K.
“We have made a fair amount of progress there. Is it enough? No,” said Mara Aspinall, an advisor to the Rockefeller Foundation and professor of practice in the biomedical diagnostics program at Arizona State University. “It’s still too expensive for many Americans who’ve got two kids to buy $65 worth of tests.”
Many retailers including Amazon, CVS, and Walmart are out of stock of Abbott’s Binax Now COVID-19 antigen self-test, which sells for $24.
Testing experts believe that even amid the current COVID-19 testing supply problems, there are other under-utilized tools that can be applied to mitigate the spread of the virus.
“Our focus is surveillance and then outbreak control, and when you do that, we’ll be doing more wastewater testing, more air monitoring, I think we need to be using more COVID sniffing dogs, and scratch-and-sniff tests,” said Aspinall. “We can’t be short-sighted, we need to be thinking about the U.S. and around the world.”
