Several large parties were held at former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, where attendees didn't wear masks or properly socially distance in the days before the resort was partially closed because of a COVID-19 outbreak, The Daily Beast reported.
Now, a 500-person fundraiser for the charity Place of Hope scheduled for Sunday - a $375-a-head, invite-only party - will still take place at the Trump resort.
A Trump organization spokesman confirmed to Insider on Friday that the facility was partially closed following a coronavirus outbreak. Service at the Beach Club and à la carte Dining Room were closed after some staff reportedly tested positive for the virus.
Members received an email that said the club had taken "all appropriate response measures," and sanitized affected areas," according to a report by The Associated Press. Banquet and event services however remained open.
Palm Beach realtor Valentina Aved, who helped organize the Sunday event, told the Daily Beast it will feature vintage cars, Lamborghinis, Ferraris, and "everybody playing by the pool."
"It will be a very exciting event," she told The Daily Beast. "The most beautiful cars, people, good friends."
The event will be held outside following the outbreak.
Insider has reached out to Aved and the Trump Organization for comment.
Aved also told The Daily Beast that she attended two large events over the last week to raise funds for Big Dog Ranch Rescue, for which Trump's daughter-in-law Lara Trump serves as a chair. The two events were hosted in the Grand Ballroom, and images from the events show few attendees wearing masks or socially distancing.
Images and videos from the event show women screaming as a male model walked down the runway and in others Trump himself can be seen hugging people and maskless.
Miami philanthropist Angela Bird, who is a board member for the Big Dog Ranch Rescue, told the Beast that no one who attended the events tested positive for COVID-19.
<p>Veteran Bollywood actress Sharmila Tagore took her first dose of COVID-19 vaccine on Saturday (March 20). Her daughter Saba Ali Khan took to social media to inform the fans about the same. She shared a picture of the ‘Amar Prem’ actress wherein she can be seen receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Tagore flaunted the ‘peace sign’ while striking a pose for the camera.</p> <p>The ‘Aradhana’ actress sported a face mask as a precautionary measure against the virus. Saba posted the photo along with the caption, “Bravo bravo.” She revealed that her mother received the vaccine in Gurgaon in her post on Instagram story. Check it out!</p> <p><br /><img src="https://ift.tt/2ORWJq2" /></p> <p>Saba Ali Khan treated the fans with an adorable throwback photo of her family members on her Instagram story. The picture featured Saif Ali Khan, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Soha Ali Khan and Kunal Kemmu. Saif be seen carrying Taimur Ali Khan in his arms in the cute snap.</p> <p>Saif and Kareena welcomed their second child on February 21, 2021. Considering Sharmila Tagore is currently stationed at Gurgaon, the actress is yet to meet her newborn grandson. Saifeena, as fondly called by fans, shifted to a new house in Mumbai before the arrival of their second baby boy. </p> <p>Bebo shared a glimpse of her little munchkin on International Women's Day 2021. Saif and Kareena are yet to reveal the name of their newborn child.</p> <p>Earlier this month, <a href="https://ift.tt/3vLfSKV Ali Khan was spotted outside a vaccination centre</a> in Mumbai. The ‘Adipurush’ actor has reportedly received his first dose of COVID-19 vaccine.</p> <p>Several tinsel town celebs including Hema Malini, Anupam Kher, Neena Gupta, Paresh Rawal, Rakesh Roshan, Kamal Haasan and Johnny Lever have received a dose of COVID-19 vaccine.</p> <p>Veteran actor Dharmendra shared a cute video from the hospital to inform his fans that he has been vaccinated. The ‘Sholay’ star requested his followers to maintain social distancing and wear a mask to keep the virus at bay.</p>
Oregon Ducks guard Chris Duarte is introduced before the team's matchup against the Oregon State Beavers during the Pac-12 Conference semifinals on March 12, 2021.
Ethan Miller/Getty Images
The NCAA canceled a first-round men's tournament game between Oregon and VCU on Saturday.
The NCAA declared the matchup "no-contest" after VCU failed COVID-19 protocols.
Oregon automatically advances to the second round, and plays the winner of Iowa and Grand Canyon.
VCU was pulled from the men's NCAA tournament on Saturday after what the school said were "multiple" positive COVID-19 tests within the past two days, ending the Rams' run in college basketball's annual showcase before it began.
Last year's entire tournament was called off because of the pandemic, and the NCAA moved this year's event to Indiana and put teams in what it called a "controlled environment." But those steps weren't enough to ensure every game would be played.
The 10th-seeded Rams' first-round game Saturday against Oregon was declared a no-contest, the NCAA said, sending the seventh-seeded Ducks into the second round without playing.
"We've been tested every day for the past three weeks, but within the past 48 hours we've received multiple positive tests," VCU coach Mike Rhoades said in a statement. "We are devastated for our players and coaches. It has been a dream for all of us to play in the NCAA Tournament."
"We appreciate the care of our doctors and administration this year, and all our efforts and attention will be put into our players at this time," Rhoades added.
The announcement from the Division I Men's Basketball Committee came a little more than three hours before the teams were set to play in the West Region. It didn't offer specific details, citing privacy concerns, and said that the decision came after consultation with the Marion County Public Health Department.
"The NCAA and the committee regret that VCU's student-athletes and coaching staff will not be able to play in a tournament in which they earned the right to participate," the statement said.
VCU was in the field for the ninth time in 10 tournaments. The Rams made it to the Final Four in 2011 as an 11 seed.
"The wait is over! Time for some March Madness!" the school's basketball account tweeted just six hours before the withdrawal was announced.
The Rams were forced to stop practicing or playing on Jan. 2 because of a positive COVID-19 test within their program, forcing a game against Davidson to be postponed. They resumed practice two days later and made it through the rest of the season without further problems.
Led by Atlantic 10 player of the year Bones Hyland, VCU finished second in the conference in the regular season and lost to St. Bonaventure in the A-10 title game. But its body of work, which included a season-opening win over Utah State, was enough to earn Rhoades' team an at-large berth to the tournament.
"This is tremendously disappointing and heartbreaking for the student-athletes who've worked so hard for this opportunity," Atlantic 10 commissioner Bernadette McGlade said in a statement. "During this pandemic, the medical advisory boards have the authority to make this decision for the safety and welfare (for) all of the student-athletes, staff and teams.
"VCU has had an outstanding year, and this setback does not diminish any of their accomplishments."
The Ducks went through their own COVID-19 issues during the season.
They had a pair of long pauses, at one point having just five practices and a single game during a 26-day stretch. The one game they were able to play against Oregon State was without All-American guard Chris Duarte and fellow starter LJ Figueroa.
All told, the Ducks had two games canceled and five that were postponed, including one against fellow NCAA Tournament team UCLA that was postponed three different times.
"I mean, it's been high anxiety for everything," said Kansas coach Bill Self, whose team advanced with a win over Eastern Washington earlier in the day.
"My trainer and my staff, as soon as we get our results back from the test, you know - it doesn't matter if it's 2 o'clock in the morning, soon as we get a text message from the company we'll get group texts going. I'm getting messages from the trainer at 2 o'clock and I'm awake getting ready to get the text."
A demonstrator waves a flag with marijuana leaves on it during a protest outside of the White House calling for the legalization of marijuana on April 2, 2016.
AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana
Several Democrats are criticizing the Biden White House over their marijuana policy for staffers.
Staffers were asked to resign or told to work remotely due to their drug use, per The Daily Beast.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki says the policy only affected a small number of staffers.
Several leading Democrats are criticizing a White House policy that has disqualified or and sidelined staffers for past marijuana use, as first reported by The Daily Beast on Friday.
Sources told The Daily Beast that dozens of young staffers under were suspended, asked to resign, or told to work remotely after informing the White House that they had smoked marijuana recreationally - a marked reversal from President Joe Biden administration's stance of allowing recreational cannabis smokers to apply for open roles.
The rebuke from members of the president's own party represents a major policy rift just days after the successful passage of the Democratic-backed $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package.
Democratic Rep. Jared Huffman of California on Friday shared his displeasure over the policy with The Daily Beast, highlighting that medical cannabis was now the law of the land in most states and Washington DC and expressing that the country had "evolved beyond [former US Attorney General] Jeff Sessions' reefer madness hysteria."
"I want to find out how and why this happened, and obviously I'm going to urge them to change course," he said. "This administration promised a more enlightened approach, but somewhere along the line they reverted to the dogma."
Democratic Rep. Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, the cochair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, was even sharper in his criticism.
"What's happening now is a vivid illustration of unrealistic, unfair, and out-of-touch cannabis policies," he told The Daily Beast. "There is confusion across the country because of out of date laws and the fact that the American public is not waiting for the federal government to get its act together. This is an opportunity for the Biden administration to help end the failed War on Drugs and make a more rational policy for everyone."
He added: "In the meantime, these young people should not be singled out and discriminated against for something that is legal in much of the country and supported by the vast majority of Americans."
White House press secretary Jen Psaki addressed the pushback to the report on Twitter, noting that of the hundreds of staffers hired, just five individuals were no longer serving in the administration.
"The bottom line is this: of the hundreds of people hired, only five people who had started working at the White House are no longer employed as a result of this policy," she wrote.
Psaki didn't specify how many applicants were potentially blocked from actually being hired, but told The Daily Beast that there were other considerations pertaining to individuals affected by the policy.
"In an effort to ensure that more people have an opportunity to serve the public, we worked in coordination with the security service to ensure that more people have the opportunity to serve than would not have in the past with the same level of recent drug use," she said in a statement. "While we will not get into individual cases, there were additional factors at play in many instances for the small number of individuals who were terminated."
Other members didn't bite their tongue in responding to the report, including progressive Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California.
"This is an absurd policy that will block law abiding people - particularly people of color - from pursuing careers in public service," he told The Daily Beast. "It's all the more unjust that many of these staffers applied for their security clearances with the understanding that past marijuana use would not be held against them."
While cannabis is legal in Washington DC and 14 states, possession of the drug remains a federal crime, as it is still considered a Schedule I drug, the "most dangerous class" of substances.
<p>TV actor Mandar Chandwadkar, who is seen playing the role of Bhide in Sony SAB’s ‘Taarak Mehta Ka Ooltah Chashmah’, shared a video to inform his fans that he has tested positive for COVID-19. The actor requested his followers to maintain social distancing to keep the virus at bay. He also urged everyone to wear a face mask as a precautionary measure against Coronavirus.</p> <h3><strong>Mandar Chandwadkar's Instagram Post</strong></h3> <p>The talented actor said that he is following the BMC guidelines after testing positive for COVID-19. He provided a health update and revealed that he is asymptomatic. Small screen’s Bhide went into self-isolation after he was diagnosed with the virus.</p> <p><strong>Also READ:</strong> <a href="https://ift.tt/3vJ97Jn Actor Karanvir Bohra’s Wife Teejay Sidhu Shares Hospital Pic With Her Newborn Daughter Right After Giving Birth!</strong></a></p> <p>He promised to entertain the viewers soon with his rib-tickling comedy in ‘Taarak Mehta’. Mandar wrote, “Guys do take care of yourself plz plz wear mask n maintain social distance.. i am asymptomatic and shall resume work very soon.. till then take care n be safe.”</p> <p>[insta]https://www.instagram.com/p/CMoV9OwHIUh/[/insta]</p> <h3><strong>‘TMKOC’ Co-Stars Pray For Mandar’s Recovery</strong></h3> <p>Ambika Ranjankar and Sunaya Fauzdar dropped comments on Mandar’s post and sent their get well soon messages to him. Ambika, who is seen as Hasmukhi, wrote, “Get well soon, more power.”</p> <p>Sunaya aka new Anjali commented, “Hey well soon...god bless.”</p> <p><br /><img src="https://ift.tt/3f5kplD" /></p> <p>It remains to be seen if the makers of ‘Taarak Mehta’ will introduce a new track in Mandar’s absence or not. Mayur Vakani aka Sundarlal had also contracted the virus. He plays the role of Disha Vakani’s on-screen brother in the popular sitcom.</p> <h3><strong>TV Celebs Who Recently Tested Positive For COVID</strong></h3> <p>Many small screen celebs including Aishwarya Sharma, Neil Bhatt, Manit Joura and Ariah Agarwal have been diagnosed with the virus.</p> <p>‘Bigg Boss 14’ finalist Nikki Tamboli has also tested positive for Coronavirus. She shared a post on social media to inform the fans about the same. The Marathi Mulgi also requested the people, who came in contact with her, to undergo a COVID-19 test.</p> <p>Watch this space for more updates!</p> <p> </p>
Dick's Sporting Goods offered to bring fitness equipment to the NCAA women after viral videos revealed the unequal treatment female basketball players received from the organization compared to the men's teams.
Stanford sports performance coach Ali Kershner shared photos comparing the setups for men and women provided by the NCAA. The men's room was full of weights and professional equipment, while the women's space appeared to only have yoga mats and small dumbbells.
A post shared by Ali Kershner, MS, CSCS (@kershner.ali)
Teams playing in the March Madness NCAA tournaments will be in a bubble for three weeks sharing hotels and workout spaces in Indianapolis until the sweet sixteen.
Critics have pointed out other discrepancies in the organization's treatment of male and female athletes, from different food to even different types of daily COVID-19 tests.
Fans, players, and members of the media called further attention to the discrepancy on social media.
On Friday, sports retailer Dick's Sporting Goods tweeted "Our teammates have worked quickly to get truckloads of fitness equipment ready" to bring to the women's workoutroom, with photos of U-Hauls.
Orange Theory also tweeted that it will make studios available for female athletes to train.
The NCAA has also since released a statement. "We acknowledge that some of the amenities teams would typically have access to have not been as available inside the controlled environment. In part, this is due to the limited space, and the original plan was to expand the workout area once additional space was available later in the tournament" NCAA vice president for women's basketball Lynn Holzman said in a statement to the media.
"However, we want to be responsive to the needs of our participating teams, and we are actively working to enhance existing resources at practice courts, including additional weight training equipment."
<p><strong>Mumbai:</strong> Maharashtra Minister Aditya Thackeray on Saturday tested positive for the novel Coronavirus. Shiv Sena Chief Uddhav Thackeray's son took to Twitter and made the annoucement. </p> <p>Aditya also informed that he has tested positive with mild Covid-19 symptoms and urged everyone who came in contact with me to get themselves tested. </p> <p>"On having mild symptoms of COVID, I had myself tested and I am COVID positive. I request everyone who came in contact with me to get themselves tested. I urge everyone to realise that it is extremely important to not let your guard down. Please follow COVID protocols & stay safe," he tweeted.</p> <p>[tw]https://twitter.com/authackeray/status/1373257151032872970[/tw]</p> <p>Aditya tested positive for the deadly contagion as Maharashtra ranks among top in the list of eight states that are showing a rising trajectory in daily number of positive Covid-19 cases.</p> <p>Maharashtra alone accounts for more than 50 per cent of active cases in the country. State's overall Covid-19 caseload surged past 24 lakh mark on Friday with Mumbai crossing the daily count of 3,000-plus Covid-19 cases for the first time since the pandemic hit the country.</p> <p>Adding 25,681 new cases - compared with highest 25,833 new patients on Thursday, the state tally as of March 19 stands at 24,22,021.</p> <p><strong>ALSO READ | <span style="color: #e03e2d;"><a style="color: #e03e2d;" href="https://ift.tt/3eVMN9C Extended In Nagpur Till March 31 As Covid-19 Cases Surge - Check Fresh Guidelines</a></span></strong></p> <p>Similarly, Mumbai added another 3,063 new cases and the city total jumped to 355,914, sending shockwaves among the civic health authorities.</p> <p>The state death rate was 2.20 percent, the recovery rate stood at 90.42 percent, with the number of active cases, jumping to 177,560 now, with the highest figure of patients in Pune, Mumbai and Thane, respectively.</p>
<p><strong>Nagpur:</strong> On the backdrop of significantly surging cases of Coronavirus in Maharashtra's Nagpur, the district administration on Saturday decided to extend the ongoing lockdown in the city till March 31. A complete lockdown was imposed in Nagpur city from March 15 to March 21, which was again extended today.</p> <p>As per the fresh guidelines issued by the local administration, all schools and colleges will remain closed while local markets have been allowed to operate till 4 pm across the city.</p> <p><strong>ALSO READ | <span style="color: #e03e2d;"><a style="color: #e03e2d;" href="https://ift.tt/3tC0ONO CM Uddhav Thackeray's Son Aditya Tests Positive For Coronavirus</a></span></strong></p> <p>Maharashtra minister Nitin Raut, who is also the district gurdian minister, said that the curbs were imposed in Nagpur amid the rise in COVID-19 cases will continue March 31, but with some relaxations.</p> <p>He further informed that a separate standard operating procedure will be issued for the festival of Holi, which will be observed on March 28-29.</p> <p>Shops selling essential commodities will be permitted to operate till 4 pm as opposed to the earlier timing of 1 pm, while restaurants and eateries, which had been ordered to remain shut, can function till 7 pm, the minister said.</p> <p>Meanwhile, food delivery services will be allowed till 11 pm.</p> <p><strong>ALSO READ | <span style="color: #e03e2d;"><a style="color: #e03e2d;" href="https://ift.tt/3f0ymRE 2nd Wave: Odisha Curbs Holi Celebrations Amid Spike In Cases, Check Restrictions In Other States</a></span></strong></p> <p>According to reports, hundreds of citizens of the district were seen not wearing face masks and flouting Covid-19 protocols which reportedly led to the surge in daily Coronavirus cases.</p> <p>The minister also informed that the Police department has been directed to take strict action against those violating the norms. Nagpur recorded 3,235 new Covid-19 cases on Friday, taking the count of infections to 1,85,787, one of the highest in Maharashtra.</p>
With the passage of President Joe Biden's COVID relief package containing new incentives for expanding Medicaid, states that have refused to deliver healthcare to millions of Americans are quickly running out of excuses.
For more than a decade, politicians in the deepest of red states have twisted themselves into knots trying to justify their denial of lifesaving care to essential workers, small business employees, farmers, and others who earn too much to qualify for Medicaid and too little to afford private insurance.
The preferred argument of Medicaid expansion opponents since the passage of the Affordable Care Act has been that expanding the program would simply cost their state too much - despite the fact that expansion states have always received at least $9 back from the federal government for every dollar they spent, a hefty 900% return on investment.
Now, with President Biden signing the COVID relief bill, the incentive for states to act has become even more generous. Outright budget savings are now being offered to any Medicaid expansion holdout that is willing to say yes to healthcare for essential workers, the return of state tax dollars, and increased economic activity for their local communities and businesses. Not to mention critical funding that can help keep rural hospitals open.
'It's too expensive' won't cut it
Take Missouri, for example. Voters in that state approved Medicaid expansion last year, which is set to begin on July 1, 2021. The COVID relief package's added funding for newly expanding states will save Missourians an estimated $1.7 billion over the next two years. Those savings alone will cover the state's cost for Medicaid expansion for nearly a decade.
It's not just Missouri that will benefit, either. Any state that hasn't expanded Medicaid will get the same deal, receiving a 5% boost in the federal contribution to their overall Medicaid program for two years. The change means that moving forward it's going to be impossible for politicians to credibly argue that Medicaid expansion is too expensive for a state to pursue.
The number of holdout states has already been shrinking in recent years as voters in red and purple states have rebelled repeatedly against political leaders who blocked the passage of the popular policy. Since 2017, Maine, Utah, Idaho, Nebraska, Oklahoma and the above-mentioned Missouri have all expanded Medicaid through ballot initiatives.
A lot of attention has been given to the fact that a handful of Republican governors are still refusing to advance the issue, but it's clear that voters across the political spectrum are on the side of Medicaid expansion. Pressure is building in the 12 holdout states, and it's becoming impossible to ignore. If state politicians continue to block progress, these incentives make it even more likely that voters will pass new ballot measures in 2022.
Expanding the program has repeatedly led to a wide range of health outcome improvements like earlier cancer detection, greater access to diabetes medication, and increased access to mental health and addiction treatment. Medicaid also covers about four in 10 births in the US, and access to Medicaid coverage would allow more women to access prenatal and postpartum coverage. It's estimated that an additional 141 infant lives could be saved each year if the remaining states expanded Medicaid.
The unwillingness of a handful of politicians and special interest groups to take action on this issue has never been about the facts, but in the past, opponents at least had a rationale to offer voters for their ideological opposition. Now, even that is gone.
Healthcare for 4 million people and 640,000 essential workers is at stake, and voters in red states are rightfully demanding that politicians put the made-up excuses aside. It's time for the remaining holdout states to stop leaving Americans behind and start saving their constituents' money at the same time.
Jonathan Schleifer is the executive director of The Fairness Project, a national organization that develops and supports Medicaid expansion and other social and economic justice ballot measures across the country.
NHS workers applaud outside King's College Hospital during the Clap for our Carers campaign in support of the NHS as the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) continues, London, Britain, April 16, 2020.
REUTERS/Henry Nicholls
After a year of risking their lives, British NHS staff have been offered a 1% pay rise.
However, the "increase" has been dubbed a real-terms pay cut.
This is a slap in the face to nurses and health workers, many of whom are suffering from PTSD, depression and anxiety in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Parisa Hashempour is a freelance journalist and International Studies lecturer living in the Netherlands.
This is an opinion column. The thoughts expressed are those of the author.
When my little sisters' lips turned blue, I watched my parents sweep her into the car and to the community hospital. I watched as nurses brought her back to life.
I watched my amazing dad dedicate his life to the health service. I watched passionate friends and family members train to become nurses and doctors too. As students, they worked twelve-hour shifts in hospitals, saw patients die, and duly paid up fees for the privilege of caring for them.
This past year, we have all turned our eyes to watch nurses, doctors and healthcare assistants around the world respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.
After a lifetime of watching, I was not surprised to see the bravery and resilience the workforce responded with. And although saddened, this month I was also not surprised to watch my government offer these same workers a slap in the face in the form of a 1% pay rise.
Pay cut in disguise
Founded in 1948, the British National Health Service (NHS) is the beloved backbone of the country's post-Second World War welfare system. While not without its problems, it delivers free and low-cost healthcare for all members of society. Despite a decade of budget squeezing, it remains to be considered one of the best healthcare systems in the world. Put simply, it is the pride of my country.
That pride swelled for all of us during the current pandemic. Yet rather than recompense those that make up its ranks, the government has offered a pay rise which has since been dubbed the equivalent of a pay cut.
Overstretched and underpaid nurses say the offer, which is intended for all except dentists and General Practitioner doctors, will leave them with just an additional £3.50 ($4.88) per week. When inflation is considered, and within the context of an overall £30 billion reduction in healthcare budgets for the next financial year compared with this one, the announcement is more insult than reward.
Keir Starmer and his opposition Labour Party have matched the cry of NHS boss Simon Stevens, who says that staff deserve a 2.1% rise instead. However, for those frontline workers who delivered us through the pandemic, even this call does not go far enough.
NHS England employs around 1.3 million people, meaning that most Brits have a personal connection with the service's workers. Perhaps this is partly why the public response has been overwhelmingly one of outrage. A poll by 38 Degrees found that 83% of the public think the rise is too low, and 53% believe NHS nurses deserve at least a 5% increase.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies agrees that 1% offers far too little to frontline workers who have already had their pay frozen for a year, and are set to face increasing challenges in the coming months due to a backlog in non-COVID-related care.
In response to the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak's proposed budget, which includes the new rise, the institute says: "Between April and December 2020, there were 5.3 million fewer referrals for hospital care in England than over the same period in 2019. At least some of these people will need treatment eventually, which will only add to the 4.5 million already on a waiting list for NHS care."
On account of an uncharacteristically Conservative furlough scheme, Sunak is often depicted as the affable "nice guy" outlier within the government's hardline cabinet. Yet, like Sunak himself and the rest of his party, this image is a far cry from reality. The chancellor's 'Eat out to help out' scheme earlier this year encouraged Brits back into restaurants to recharge the economy. The move likely came at the cost of increased COVID-19 rates and, as such, countless lives, sending more and more people to ICU wards and hospital beds. The Institute for Fiscal Studies asserts that "clearing the backlog created by a year of cancelled and delayed procedures will require billions of additional NHS funding in the years to come."
Throughout the course of the pandemic, Boris Johnson and his ministers encouraged the public to open up their windows and clap for the NHS, applauding them as they did their utmost to save the country - that applause feels somewhat of a mockery now that their work may not be appreciated accordingly.
A reported 52,000 NHS staff were sick with COVID-19 and over 850 UK healthcare workers are thought to have died of the virus between March and December last year. One new study from King's College London shows that almost half of NHS critical care staff show symptoms of PTSD, depression and anxiety on account of their time caring for COVID-19 patients.
The time for government action
"The NHS is a shambles, and you are too much of a coward to say so. This was the gist of an email I received from an NHS consultant a few weeks ago. I answered -weakly in his eyes -that I couldn't be sure that the NHS was collapsing," writes Richard Smith for the British Medical Journal. His comments are the opening line to a study, exploring whether the NHS is indeed in decline. It is a view commonly held. One million patients are seen by the NHS each day, yet there is a palpable fear that the service is collapsing under the strain of underfunding and overstretched workers.
In non-pandemic times, studies say that a fifth of people must still wait more than six months for hospital admission, and things are set to get worse. The pandemic meant that in December 2020, more than 224,000 people had been waiting for more than a year for hospital care, compared with just 1,500 at the same point in 2019. It will take some time to recover from this over spill.
Under a decade of austerity cuts and a right-leaning Conservative government, the NHS has been far from a priority in the UK.
In 2017, bursaries for student nurses were scrapped, only to be reintroduced two years later. Brexit reportedly sent almost 9000 nurses and midwives back to their EU home countries and now, the exhausted and overworked heroes of the pandemic continue to receive minimal pay. According to Indeed, the average healthcare assistant makes just £16,775 ($23,384) a year. For comparison, the median UK salary is about £31,460.
It is Sunak and those within the government that must also be held accountable for the increasing privatisation of the public health service, a factor in what feels to many like the NHS's worsening state. From 2019 to 2020, NHS commissioners spent £9.7 billion on services delivered by the private sector, an amount that has more than doubled since 2009.
In order to protect the system British people depend upon, the government must reassess their priorities. Rather than insult and undervalue nurses and healthcare workers through performative, and ultimately useless pay rises, the government must enact true change and extend a helping hand.
Better funding and a reorganisation of the service are both needed so that the UK can recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. It's time for Johnson and Sunak to step up and appropriately reward the workers who helped keep them, and all of us, safe.
Parisa Hashempour is a freelance journalist and International Studies lecturer living in the Netherlands.
Drive-thrus are becoming increasingly important for fast food and quick-service restaurants, and some of the most successful have slimmed down menus significantly over the last year. Starbucks, unlike its competition, continues to add to the menu with no signs of cutting it back.
On-the-go orders, meaning drive-thru and pickup orders, made up 80% of Starbucks orders prior to the pandemic, Starbucks told Insider, and increased more than 10% over pre-pandemic levels in the first quarter of 2021. Drive-thrus have been up industry-wide because they are perceived as a "safe way to use the brand" Kalinowski Equity Research founder Mark Kalinowski told Insider.
Companies that rely on drive-thru business have cut items from menus and consolidated size options to make the drive-thru experience faster, Kalinowski says, for example Chick-fil-A removed decaf hot coffee from menus and narrowed options for coffee sizes.
While slimmer menus are the way drive-thru menus are trending, Kalinowski says he doesn't expect that from Starbucks. "They have a ton of customization, and that's not going away. They believe it's a strength" he told Insider.
Customers generally don't expect Starbucks to be as speedy as Wendy's or McDonald's, because they're offering fundamentally different things. In 2020, Starbucks lagged behind coffee competitor Dunkin' in terms of speed, according to QSR's annual drive-thru study. While Starbucks is working to make drive-thrus more efficient, it isn't trying to be the fastest drive-thru around, Kalinowski says. "Customization is much more meaningful for Starbucks," he says, even if it means slightly longer waits.
Starbucks is actually expanding menus right now, most recently with the addition of oat milk and new drinks that incorporate it. With every new product announcement, Starbucks encourages customers to customize it with different milks, syrups, cold foam, and thousands of other potential combinations, sometimes to the chagrin of baristas.
Starbucks has no plans to pare down menus, although available drinks change seasonally, a spokesperson told Insider on a phone call.
Other fast-food chains have cut menus since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in order to keep up with supply chain changes, customer desires, and to make drive-thru waits shorter. McDonald's discontinued all-day breakfast, salads, grilled chicken sandwiches, and chicken tenders in March to "simplify operations in our kitchens and for our crew," Insider reported last spring.
Taco Bell cut more than a dozen items in 2020, including fan favorites like the seven-layer burrito and Mexican pizza. Despite outcry from fans last year, the leaner menu proved to be a smart decision as the chain shifted to more drive-thru orders, and sales grew 5% in the quarter following the menu change.
Starbucks is still making efforts to improve drive-thru efficiency, just not through cutting menus. Baristas can take orders through digital drive-thru screens, which the company says are installed at about 3,800 stores. Starbucks began rolling them out in 2015, and they use AI called "Deep Brew" to recommend food and drinks based on the weather and time of day.
The company is also rolling out handheld devices for baristas to input orders on. Starbucks says they are in 500 stores and were first implemented this past summer. Kalinowski says these newer drive-thru technologies can minimize wait times in drive-thrus.
"In a traditional drive-thru, there's only one place an order can be taken," he told Insider. "That creates huge bottlenecks," compared to having mobile stations where customers can place orders.
Starbucks says it is designing new drive-thru ideas, including double lanes, drive-thru-only stores, and drive-thru plus curbside pickup locations. After learning from experience during the pandemic, drive-thrus will likely continue to get better, Kalinowski says.
If you're surprised that your flight is full, most airlines aren't blocking middle seats, and you have to acknowledge a health declaration before flying, you likely haven't flown in the past year.
Social distancing has proved a tenuous concept to grasp for airlines with policies on the topic changing all the time. And now that vaccinations are up, Americans are returning to the skies and realizing that the photos of empty airplane cabins that they saw from last year are not the reality this year.
Last March and the months following saw the theme of near-empty flights as lockdown and coronavirus fears gripped the country. But those days are long gone and flights are filling up for two reasons.
Airlines have optimized their fleets and schedules to the new realities of air travel. Countless airliners still sit idle in aircraft boneyards while even the most popular routes in the US have seen flight frequencies slashed, meaning more passengers are filling fewer flights.
The Transportation Security Administration is also showing an uptick in daily passenger numbers that started in mid-February. March 12 saw a pandemic record of 1,357,111 passengers depart US airports with consecutive days in March seeing more than one million US flyers.
In 2020, only periods surrounding major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas saw those numbers on a consecutive basis. The trend is likely to continue through the spring and summer as the vaccine rollout accelerates and many Americans receive a $1,400 stimulus check.
Travel data from Hopper shows that searches for domestic flights increased by 3% following President Joe Biden's announcement that the US would have enough vaccine doses by May to inoculate all Americans. Those same searches then increased by 16% just two days after the bill giving Americans stimulus checks passed the Senate.
And airlines are already seeing results. United Airlines expects to end its year-long cash burn and become cash positive in March, Reuters reported.
Welcoming flyers back from a pandemic hiatus with a new set of confusing health and safety practices
More flyers are great for airlines but those returning to the skies will see a landscape drastically different than what they saw in the early days of the pandemic. A traveler boarding a flight in April 2020 would likely be on an empty plane and the middle seats might've been blocked, depending on the airline.
Now, flights are full and only one airline continues to block middle seats, and more pandemic-era protocols are disappearing as the pandemic enters its second year.
Delta is continuing to block middle seats through April. The move is undoubtedly costing the country's second-largest airline millions in lost revenue over spring break but helps solidify Delta's image as a safety-minded airline long after the pandemic ends, which may help it attract more travelers in the long run.
Each airline is handling the pandemic differently and flyers now have to consider health and safety when booking tickets if they're skeptical of returning to the skies as some airlines are doing more than others.
Full flights are the new normal, but that doesn't mean they're not taking other measures like strictly enforcing mask-wearing, boarding from back to front, and offering free flight changes.
