Dee Lee

An order by Pennsylvania’s acting health secretary that requires masks inside K-12 schools and child care facilities was thrown out Wednesday by a state court that said she lacked the authority. The Wolf administration said lawyers were directed to file an immediate appeal. Commonwealth Court sided 4-1 with the ranking Republican in the state Senate and others who sued to challenge the masking order that took effect in early September as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf’s spokesperson said Health Department lawyers were directed to file an appeal to the state Supreme Court on Wednesday, a move his administration said would effectively put the new decision on hold. Kamil Esteves, 6, and Laynette Padilla, 6, make thank you cards to be sent to healthcare workers. Recently, a Pennsylvania court tossed out a mask mandate for schools.  (Ben Hasty/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images) VERMONT STANDARDIZED TEST SCORES TANK COMPARED TO PRE-CO...

NEW You can now listen to Fox News articles! The American Medical Association recently released a guide on “Advancing Health Equity” that promotes how to fight for critical race theory, includes a list of words not to say and their “equity-focused alternatives,” and criticizes concepts like “meritocracy,” “individualism” and the “‘free’ market.” The 55-page document released on Oct. 28 cites a guide by the organization Race Forward for how to advocate for critical race theory (CRT), which is called “Guide to Counter-Narrating the Attacks on Critical Race Theory.” The health equity guide argues physicians cannot eliminate “health inequities” by “focus[ing] only on individuals, their behavior or their biology.” It says they instead must focus on language and collective political circumstances of certain groups.  “Given the deep divides that exist between groups in the United States, understanding and empathy can be extremely challenging for many because of an inabilit...

NEW YORK — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 756,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering. Just 68.4% of Americans ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Latest headlines: -US surgeon general releases guide to combating COVID-19 vaccine misinformation -Pfizer to request OK for boosters to all adults: Source -US reopens borders to vaccinated travelers Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern. Nov 09, 2:42 pm Aaron Rodgers: ‘To anybody who felt misled … I take full responsibility’ Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers says he takes full responsibility for anyone who felt mislead by his comments about his vaccination status. “I do realize I am a role model,” Rodgers said on “The Pat McAfee Show” Tu...

Sometimes, the joy of hockey is overshadowed by the anguish that can take place in the real world. Sometimes, the competitive bubble of sport is blown apart by the unpredictable and the indefensible.  And sadly, we saw an example this week of the fragility of life, when the bet-at-home ICE Hockey League suffered a double-blow in ways they could never have imagined. The first blow came on Nov. 3, when Slovakian forward Boris Sadecky collapsed on the ice during an Austrian League game and subsequently passed away. Sadecky is believed to have died of a heart attack, but nothing has been confirmed, and the team he played for – the Bratislava Capitals – is keeping quiet by and large.  All we know is a 24-year-old talented athlete was suddenly taken from us, and the game of hockey and everyone Sadecky encountered is now poorer for not having him around any longer. Unfortunately, Sadecky’s untimely passing was followed only two days later by Capitals GM Dusan Pase...

Editor’s note: This is a live account of COVID-19 updates from Tuesday, November 9, as the day unfolded. It is no longer being updated. Click here to see all the most recent news about the pandemic, and click here to find additional resources. In an attempt to get the vaccine mandate for private employers back on track after it was halted by a federal court, the Biden administration said the mandate was a matter of life and death. Blocking the mandate would only prolong the pandemic and lead to the loss of more lives, the administration said in its filing in response to the court-ordered pause. Meanwhile, health officials in Japan reported no COVID-19 deaths on Sunday for the first time in 15 months. As COVID-19 cases in the country continue to decline, officials eased entry restrictions for fully-vaccinated foreign students, employees and business travelers. We’re updating this page with the latest news about the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on the Seattle area, the U.S...

The recent news on Covid in Georgia appears quite good – cases, hospitalizations and deaths have all dropped to a low plateau, state health officials said Tuesday. But the number of vaccinations has also shown a recent decline, with the rate of Georgia residents fully vaccinated now hovering at about 50 percent. During October, vaccinations dropped 30 percent to 40 percent. That could change since recent approval of the Pfizer vaccine for children ages 5 to 11. Yet Cherie Drenzek, the state epidemiologist, told the Georgia Department of Public Health’s board that she remains cautious about what lies ahead. “This virus does nothing but surprise us,’’ she said. Nearly all the recent hospitalizations and deaths have occurred in unvaccinated individuals, she said. The virus is surging in some states in the West, and also in Europe, Drenzek said. California, New Mexico and Colorado, along with some Northern states, have seen case numbers rise over the past two weeks, according to dat...

LAURINBURG — Scotland County Schools Child Nutrition staff will be seeing a bonus in 2022. During Monday night’s Board of Education meeting, Richard Jacobs Director of Child Nutrition spoke to the board about the incentive, which will help retain and recruit child nutrition staff. “We have our ESSER2 School Nutrition PRC174 fund and those are funds are to be used for the retention and recruitment of child nutrition employees,” Jacobs said. “The total funds is $38,965 and what we’re requesting of the board this evening is to be able to use those funds as an end of the year bonus to each child nutrition employee.” The bonus would be around $500 and given to all employees — full and part-time — in May. “It currently totals all the employees we have now but we’re always looking for new employees,” Jacobs said. “So we would cover any additional employees with child nutrition funds. Board Attorney Stephen Rawson added the board should add a date that the employees need to still be empl...

Left to right: Filipino American health care workers Karen Cantor, Karen Shoker, and John Paul Atienza were among many who cared for COVID patients in the early days of the pandemic. Rosem Morton hide caption toggle caption Rosem Morton Left to right: Filipino American health care workers Karen Cantor, Karen Shoker, and John Paul Atienza were among many who cared for COVID patients in the early days of the pandemic. Rosem Morton In the spring of 2020 Glenn Magpili, 42, got sick with COVID. The first wave of the pandemic had flooded New York area hospitals and Magpili, an emergency room nurse in Manhattan, fell ill in the same hospital where he’d been caring for patients sick with the coronavirus. Then, he was intubated. “When I woke up, I thought I was just asleep for a couple of days,” he recalls. “They told me it was almost four weeks.” Magpili recovered but counts himself “one of the lucky ones. There were so many Filipino nurses who got sick,” he says. I wo...