New coronavirus cases in US declining
The number of Americans newly diagnosed with the coronavirus is falling — a development experts credit at least partly to increased wearing of masks — even as the outbreak continues to claim nearly 1,000 lives in the U.S. each day.
About 43,000 new cases are being reported daily across the country, down 21% from early August, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Although the U.S., India and Brazil still have the highest numbers of new cases in the world, the downward trend is encouraging.
The virus is blamed for more than 5.7 million confirmed infections and about 178,000 deaths in the U.S.
Trump taps acting secretary to lead homeland security
President Donald Trump said Tuesday he will nominate acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf to the top spot in the agency.
The president made the announcement on Twitter, praising Wolf ’s leadership of an agency that plays a major role in the key Trump administration policy areas of immigration and crime.
Wolf’s prospects for Senate confirmation are unclear. There is a narrow window for him to be confirmed before the Nov. 3 election, with the Senate away until Labor Day and then scheduled to recess in mid-october.
Wolf, named acting secretary in November 2019, has been a vocal advocate of an administration decision to use DHS to protect federal property and monuments from protesters.
Tuscaloosa closes bars because of university virus cases
The city of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, is closing bars for two weeks after what University of Alabama officials call an unacceptable rise in coronavirus cases on campus.
Tuscaloosa Mayor Walt Maddox announced the closures along with the end of bar service at restaurants during a news conference with campus officials.
School officials didn’t offer numbers, but say there’s been a rapid rise in cases, particularly among fraternities and sororities. The university on Friday announced a moratorium on student gatherings both on and off campus.
Maddox says an unchecked spread of the virus threatens to overwhelm the health care system and sink the local economy if students are sent home for the semester for remote learning.
Gail Sheehy, author of ‘Passages,’ dies at 83
Gail Sheehy, the journalist, commentator and pop sociologist whose bestselling “Passages” helped millions navigate their lives from early adulthood to middle age and beyond, has died. She was 83.
Sheehy, widow of New York magazine founder Clay Felker, died Monday of complications from pneumonia in Southampton, New York, according to her daughter, Maura Sheehy.
“Passages: Predictable Crises of Adult Life” was published in 1976 and immediately caught on with a generation torn by the cultural revolution of the time, sorting through midlife struggles, marital problems, changing gender roles and questions about identity. As Sheehy noted in the book’s foreword, close studies of childhood and old age were widely available, but far less scrutiny had been given to the prime years of work and relationships.
Philippines pins attacks on vengeful Abu Sayyaf militants
Abu Sayyaf militants might have carried out the suicide bombings that killed 14 people in order to avenge the death of a Filipino leader of the Islamic State group in the southern Philippines following a clash with troops last month, the army chief said Tuesday.
Commanding general Cirilito Sobejana said Hatib Hajan Sawadjaan was wounded in a July 6 gunbattle in a jungle near Patikul town in Sulu province and probably died a few days later. Troops have been searching for his buried remains, he said.
Military officials accused Sawadjaan’s nephew, Mudzrimar “Mundi” Sawadjaan, of plotting Monday’s bombings.