Trump tries to ease concerns of a nation increasingly rattled over coronavirus

WASHINGTON – For the third time in three days, President Trump addressed the nation from the White House in an effort to address growing fears about the pandemic caused by the coronavirus, which has now infected about 3,200 Americans and killed more than 60. Beautiful day outside,” Trump said at the very outset of his remarks, referring to the nice weather that had residents of Washington, D.C., and other northeastern areas taking to the outdoors. With movie theaters, arts venues and—increasingly—restaurants and bars closed, and with large gatherings like sports events now canceled, there was little else to do.

Seven family members fatally shot in North Carolina

Seven members of a family were fatally shot over the weekend in North Carolina, the Chatham County Sheriff's Office said Monday. The suspect is among the dead, sheriff's office spokeswoman Lt. Sara Pack told NBC News. Pack said the incident is a suspected murder-suicide but authorities are still investigating a possible motive.

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  Family of 7 dead in suspected Chatham County murder-suicide

  WTVD – Raleigh/Durham
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  Deputies investigating apparent murder-suicide in Chatham County

  WTVD – Raleigh/Durham

Just Let the Patriot Act Die, Rights Groups Tell Senate

It's Monday morning and three sections of the Patriot Act—or, as most on Capitol Hill prefer to call it, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)—have expired. As in 2015, the expiration came after the Senate couldn't pass a reauthorization after factionalizing between those who want more safeguards against the government's ability to grab Americans' data and those who don't. In the absence of “meaningful reforms,” coming in the way of amendments that several privacy-focused senators of both parties seek to propose, Color of Change, Demand Progress, Indivisible, and Free Press Action want senators, “in particular Democrats,” to oppose the cloture bill that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will put on the floor.

New coronavirus cluster linked to South Korean church

A new coronavirus cluster linked to a South Korean religious group emerged on Monday, with 46 cases at a church near Seoul that defied calls to suspend services. The Grace River Church in Seongnam, south of the capital, finally closed its doors on Sunday after nearly a third of its 135 worshippers tested positive -- including the pastor and his wife. It continued holding services despite repeated government requests for the public to avoid group activities, including religious meetings.

The first trial of a potential coronavirus vaccine just started in Washington state. It will take at least a year to know if the vaccine works.

A volunteer on Monday received an experimental coronavirus vaccine in the first clinical trial with people. The potential vaccine — developed by Moderna, a small Massachusetts biotech company — has had a speedy development: Moderna went from sequencing the virus' genetic information to shipping a vaccine candidate to US health officials in 42 days. The company's CEO, Stephane Bancel, told Business Insider the quickness came from using its novel vaccine technology that requires only the virus' genetic code instead of the virus itself.

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  Seattle techies get the first shots in Kaiser Permanente’s coronavirus vaccine trial

  GeekWire
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  Coronavirus Vaccine Trial Begins, Biotech Competition Heats Up

  Zacks

62 Home Office Ideas That Will Inspire Productivity

These office design ideas will actually make you want to sit down and complete your to-do list Originally Appeared on Architectural Digest

'Dead Sea Scrolls fragments' at Museum of the Bible are all fakes, study says

When Steve Green paid millions of dollars from his family fortune for 16 fragments of the ancient Dead Sea Scrolls, it seemed the perfect addition to their new Museum of the Bible in Washington DC. Confirmation of the hoax came in a report published online by a team of five art fraud investigators, after a two-day conference at the museum focusing on the comprehensive testing of the supposed scroll fragments was canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. The experts spent six months analyzing each fragment, concluding a study born from 2017 revelations that the lucrative international trade in Dead Sea Scroll pieces was awash in suspected forgeries and indications that at least five pieces bought by Green, the museum's chairman, for an undisclosed amount ahead of its opening that year, were fake.

Several African nations roll out measures to fight virus

Several African countries have announced sweeping restrictions to try to contain the steady spread of the coronavirus, which has reached at least 25 of Africa's 54 countries. South Africa, Kenya, Senegal and Mauritania are among the countries that have imposed travel restrictions and closed schools. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa declared a national state of disaster.

Bye Bye Bernie

For two hours on Sunday night, America took a break from coronavirus news and socially distant Netflix binges to watch what might have been the last Democratic primary debate of the long presidential campaign. After close to 30 candidates, a Super Tuesday and a Mini-Tuesday—not to mention Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina—and 10 debates, the 11th faceoff came down to Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders, each of whom is almost certainly running his last campaign. POLITICO Magazine asked 15 experts, insiders, activists and political professionals to watch and tell us what this debate meant, in particular, for Sanders, who trails Biden in the delegate count and confronts, to put it mildly, an improbable path to the Democratic nomination.

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  Biden leads Sanders by 2-to-1 among Democratic primary voters

  NBC News
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  Biden picks up major teachers union endorsement comprised of sought after demographic

  The Week

Peter Navarro Snaps When CNN Anchor Asks if Trump to Blame for Stock Losses: ‘Let’s Not Do That’

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro did not react well when confronted by CNN anchor Poppy Harlow on Monday morning over sinking stock markets in the wake of a full-blown coronavirus pandemic, insisting that now wasn't the time to talk about whether the president's response to the crisis was causing markets to plummet. After Navarro boasted about everything he and the White House coronavirus task force were doing to try to mitigate the spread of the virus amid mass cancellations and shutdowns, adding that he has the “full force of American business” working with the government, Harlow stopped him short. “I hear you, Peter, but the Dow is off 2,200 points, the S&P is off 8 percent,” she exclaimed.

Lone GOP congressman delays House coronavirus relief bill from moving to Senate

Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, is holding up the House-passed coronavirus relief bill and preventing it from being delivered to the Senate for a vote. The House was expected to make technical corrections Monday to the bipartisan measure, which the House passed early Saturday, but Gohmert is insisting on reading them, a Democratic leadership aide confirmed Monday. The technical corrections package has not yet been finalized, and the House wants to pass it by unanimous consent because it is on recess this week.

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  With the U.S. economy in trouble, Congress seeks to put coronavirus relief bill on a faster track

  USA TODAY
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  Congress' coronavirus relief bill still doesn't actually guarantee paid sick leave for most American workers

  Business Insider

How the Navy's small craft action teams defend US warships at sea

Aboard US Navy warships, small group of sailors are tasked with defending the ship from threats posed by small ships or low-flying aircraft. Members of the Small Craft Action Team have to know how to spot and identify threats as well as handle all the ship's mounted weapons. GULF OF ADEN (NNS) – Aboard the amphibious transport dock ship USS New York (LPD 21), a small group is trained to defend the ship in an emergency situation.

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  A Navy sailor aboard a warship has tested presumptive positive for the coronavirus for the first time

  Business Insider
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  US Navy reports first suspected virus case on ship

  AFP

Alibaba's Ma donates coronavirus test kits to US

Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma has sent the first shipment of surgical masks and coronavirus test kits to the US. Mr Ma is also sending consignments of medical supplies to Europe as he called for international cooperation efforts to combat the pandemic. In his first tweet, Asia's richest person posted photos of a China Eastern Airlines jet being loaded with boxes of coronavirus test kits and face masks as they were shipped to the US.

Iran closes key religious sites as virus death toll hits 853

Iran on Monday closed four key Shiite pilgrimage sites to stop a coronavirus outbreak that has killed over 850 people out of nearly 15,000 cases recorded in the Islamic republic. The holy shrines of Imam Reza in Mashhad, Fatima Masumeh in Qom and Shah Abdol-Azim in Tehran were shut until further notice "upon the orders of the anti-coronavirus headquarters and the health minister," state television said. Qom's Jamkaran mosque also said it would close its doors, the official IRNA news agency reported.

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  Virus toll in Iran climbs as lockdowns deepen across Mideast

  Associated Press
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  Iran's death toll from coronavirus increases to 853: official

  Reuters

Virus toll in Iran climbs as lockdowns deepen across Mideast

Iran reported another 129 fatalities from the new coronavirus on Monday, the largest one-day rise in deaths since it began battling the Middle East's worst outbreak, which has claimed more than 850 lives and infected a number of senior officials in the country. Businesses in Iran's capital remained open, however, even as other countries in the region grounded planes, sealed their borders and moved toward full lockdowns. The divergent approaches adopted by local authorities reflect continued uncertainty over how to slow the spread of a virus that has infected around 180,000 people worldwide and caused more than 700 deaths.

An influencer filmed herself licking a plane toilet seat for 'clout' on TikTok as part of a 'coronavirus challenge'

Ava Louise / Twitter Influencer Ava Louise filmed herself licking a plane seat toilet, starting a bizarre "coronavirus challenge." "Please RT this so people can know how to properly be sanitary on the airplane," she said. She told Insider she did it because she didn't want coronavirus getting more attention than her.

Joe Biden's pledge to name a woman as running mate fires speculation

Joe Biden has long been expected to pick a woman or a minority figure – or someone who is both – as his pick for vice-president, should he win the Democratic nomination to face Donald Trump in November. During his debate with Bernie Sanders in Washington on Sunday, the former vice-president made it official. He would name a woman as his running mate, he said – and also put an African American woman on the supreme court.

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  Sanders' attacks on Biden are too little, too late

  The Week
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  New Arizona poll shows Biden leading Sanders by 20 points and beating Trump in general election

  USA TODAY

‘No Words’: Seven Family Members Found Dead in Suspected Murder-Suicide

A North Carolina man killed six of his family members over the weekend before turning the gun on himself, authorities said Monday. The Chatham County Sheriff's Office said Larry Don Ray, 66, fatally shot six relatives at multiple homes on the same property Sunday afternoon in Moncure. The six family members who died have been identified as Jeanie Ray, 67; Helen Mason, 93; Ellis Mansfield, 73; Lisa Mansfield, 54; John Paul Sanderford, 41; and Nicole Sanderford, 39.

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  Family of 7 dead in suspected Chatham County murder-suicide

  WTVD – Raleigh/Durham
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  Seven family members fatally shot in North Carolina

  NBC News

Military roadblocks, curfews: Latin America tightens coronavirus controls

Countries around Latin America tightened restrictions on Monday to slow the spread of the new coronavirus, with Peru deploying military personnel on the streets, Costa Rica closing borders and Paraguay imposing a curfew. The region has yet to be hit as hard as Asia or Europe, and countries have moved aggressively to contain the virus that has shut down cities and international transport hubs and battered markets. Nevertheless, not all of them are moving at the same speed, and a diplomatic tiff erupted when El Salvador's president accused Mexico of allowing people with coronavirus to board a flight due to leave Mexico City for San Salvador.

'Not for sale': Germany has reacted furiously to Trump's attempts to poach German scientists working on a coronavirus vaccine

Reuters Germany is furious about reports that President Donald Trump offered German scientists "a billion dollars" for exclusive rights to a coronavirus vaccine to be used "only for the USA." The German government said the reports were accurate. "Germany is not for sale," the country's economy minister, Peter Altmaier, told the broadcaster ARD on Sunday.

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  Germany tries to halt U.S. interest in firm working on coronavirus vaccine

  Reuters
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  Berlin furious at US attempt to strike exclusive deal with German vaccine firm

  Yahoo Finance UK

Ethiopia's missing students: Families' pain and the unsolved mystery

On 4 December last year, an unknown group of people blocked a bus and kidnapped students on board who were leaving for home from Dembi Dolo University in western Ethiopia. The students, mostly ethnic Amharas, were fleeing ethnic violence and threats in the university that is located in Oromia region. A total of 18 students - 14 women and four men - were ordered out of the vehicle at Sudi near Gambela city, about 100km (60 miles) from Dembi Dolo.