Washington State Is Investigating Potential Outbreak at Facility

Washington State officials are investigating a potential outbreak of coronavirus at a health facility that cares for elderly, vulnerable patients, after two people at the facility were infected.

Two people at a LifeCare nursing facility in Kirkland, Washington, were diagnosed with the virus, health officials there said Saturday. One is a health-care worker in her 40s, and is in satisfactory condition at a local hospital. The other is an female resident of the facility in her 70s, and is in serious condition at the same hospital, local health authorities said

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-02-29/washington-state-is-investigating-potential-outbreak-at-facility?

BIRTH OF A VIRUS …

As I watched my neighbor put her dog’s poop in a single-use plastic baggy, I thought about split pants in China.

When my wife and I got off the plane, 18 years ago, to adopt our first daughter, we were taken aback by the split pants. Split pants are (or at least were, back then) pants the children wear that are open in the crotch area. That allows them to urinate or defecate unobstructed, onto the street or wherever they may be. The theory is that eventually they will learn to “aim it at the toilet” or something to that effect.

Either way, I distinctly remember my brand new Nike slip-ons (probably made not far from where I was standing) sloshing into a mix of urine and who knows what else, and continuing to do so for the next three weeks.

As I started feeling the cough coming on, I remember one of the women in our group saying, at one of the airports (as she too, stepped into urine) “The people in this country probably have built up antibodies inside them our bodies have never even thought about.”

I replayed that line in my head for the next three weeks, as I descended into night sweats, fevers and a cough like I’ve never experienced.

https://regiehammblog.wordpress.com/2020/02/27/birth-of-a-virus/?fbclid=IwAR3d47n7EEcZc87V1daifzC2Vsot7qMlxPHgojxjzn-h80hHU1yDteAmJFg

Turkey to ‘open the gates’ and allow millions of migrants unrestricted passage into Europe

The Turkish government on Thursday said that it would open its border with Syria and permit any and all migrants from the Middle East to pass through to reach Europe.

The senior Turkish official said that Erdogan’s government has decided to no longer allocate resources to stopping Syrian migrants from reaching Europe by land or sea, Reuters reports.

According to the senior official’s announcement, Turkish police, coast guard, and border security officials have been ordered to stand down.

The move, which Recep Erdogan has been threatening to take for a long time now, comes allegedly due to imminent wave of nearly 1 million Syrian migrants who’ve been displaced from Idlib.

https://voiceofeurope.com/2020/02/turkey-to-open-the-gates-and-allow-millions-of-migrants-unrestricted-passage-into-europe/

Number of US coronavirus cases with unknown origin rises to 4

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has reported two new cases of the coronavirus that do not appear to be travel-related, bringing the total number of suspected cases with unknown origins to four.

One case was reported in Oregon and the other in Washington state, the CDC announced late Friday. The new untraceable cases follow California health officials on Friday reporting a second case of coronavirus in a person who had no previous connection to anyone with the disease.

The cases have raised concerns among health officials about so-called community spread, in which an illness spreads in communities despite the source of the infection being unknown. The first suspected case of community spread was announced in California on Wednesday.

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/public-global-health/485267-number-of-us-coronavirus-cases-with-unknown-origin

U.S.-Taliban sign landmark agreement in bid to end America's longest war

The U.S. has agreed to withdraw all forces from Afghanistan within 14 months and pull out of five bases in 135 days.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taliban-sign-landmark-agreement-bid-end-america-s-longest-war-n1145166?fbclid=IwAR2alDieSwaSXV9vipmj3OmColS3lSrzobuVHD0ssKCJlNBlQaN-nolQ37s

U.S. cases rose to 66, including four instances of community spread.

This is a developing story. Please refresh for updates.

1:06 p.m. 1st known US death from coronavirus confirmed

The first known death in the United States from coronavirus has been confirmed. According to health officials in Washington State, there has been one death from COVID-19 in Kings County, Washington, and new cases. Officials will provide an update during a press conference on Saturday afternoon.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/high-school-student-washington-latest-coronavirus-community-spread/story?id=69301655

Person in Washington state first in US to die from new virus

Officials in Washington state say a person has died of COVID-19, the first such death in the United States.

BREAKING NEWS UPDATE

Health officials in California, Oregon and Washington state worried about the novel coronavirus spreading through West Coast communities after confirming three patients were infected by unknown means.

The patients — an older Northern California woman with chronic health conditions, a high school student in Everett, Washington and an employee at a Portland, Oregon-area school — hadn’t recently traveled overseas or had any known close contact with a traveler or an infected person, authorities said.

https://apnews.com/f175d89567a26d59cab27725c9e8a0d7?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=A