Covid-19

President Joe Biden's administration on Thursday set a January 4 deadline for enforcement of strict rules intended to push tens of millions of American workers into getting Covid-19 vaccines.

The mandates targeting businesses with more than 100 employees, as well as health care workers and federal contractors, represent the most aggressive steps Washington has taken against the virus and its Delta variant, which has hobbled economic recovery.

A ban on face mask mandates and critical race theory in schools were highest-profile laws that were thrown out when the Arizona Supreme Court tossed numerous provisions of the state budget for violating the Arizona Constitution, but the list of new laws that are now off the books is far more extensive than that.

Many of the other rejected laws besides the prohibition on face mask mandates in K-12 schools pertain to the COVID-19 pandemic. Those laws included prohibitions on colleges and universities requiring students to wear masks, get vaccines or submit to regular testing; barring K-12 schools from requiring students to take vaccines that have received emergency approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration; and barring cities and counties from requiring “vaccine passports" or otherwise imposing pandemic-related restrictions on private businesses, schools and churches.

A mother in Ventura, California is furious after her son came home saying she and his father lied to him after his 8th grade history teacher told the class Donald Trump is still president, hospitals steal newborn babies from unvaccinated parents, Hunter Biden's laptop had child pornography on it, and he's never going to get vaccinated ever again.

"He's damaged. He's hurt. He's scared. He doesn't trust his parents now. He thinks we lied to him," Sarah Silikula told CBS affiliate KCAL.

New information is coming out about "unusual muzzling" of Florida professors.

"The University of Florida is embroiled in controversy this week following revelations that, in at least four cases, it denied professors' requests to testify in lawsuits that challenged policy set by Gov. Ron DeSantis and the GOP-controlled Florida Legislature," the Chronicle of Higher Education reports.

The rising number of cases of Covid-19 in Europe is of "grave concern" and the region could see another half a million deaths by early next year, the World Health Organization warned on Thursday.

With 78 million cases in the WHO's European region—which spans 53 countries and territories and includes several nations in Central Asia—the cumulative toll now exceeded that of South East Asia, the Eastern Mediterranean region, the Western Pacific, and Africa combined, the organization said.

More than a quarter of staff in the United States' largest sheriff's department could lose their jobs for refusing to comply with Covid-19 vaccine mandates, the sheriff said Tuesday.

Just half of Los Angeles County Sheriff employees are fully vaccinated, a month after local rules came into force requiring that they get the shot or potentially face the sack.

The United States can now start giving children aged 5-11 the Pfizer-BioNtech Covid vaccine, US health authorities said Tuesday in a move hailed by President Joe Biden as a "turning point" in the fight against the pandemic.

Days after gaining authorization from the Food and Drug Administration, the vaccine was endorsed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, clearing the way for the vaccination of up to 28 million children.

Emerald Robinson, the White House correspondent for far right wing media operation Newsmax was inundated with fact checks and mockery Monday night after she posted a totally false tweet mixing religious right falsehoods with anti-vaxx falsehoods in a fear-mongering message directed to "Christians."

"Dear Christians," she began, "the vaccines contain a bioluminescent marker called LUCIFERASE so that you can be tracked."

One of the leaders of a New York City union resisting vaccine mandates was grilled about the stance during a Tuesday appearance on CNN.

"Hundreds of New York City firefighters are calling in sick this week as a covid vaccine mandate for city employees goes into effect," CNN's Brianna Keilar reported.

Five million people have died worldwide from Covid-19 since the disease first emerged in China nearly two years ago, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP.

Monday's milestone, nearly four months after four million deaths were registered, came even as mortality rates slow thanks to a global vaccine rollout that has seen billions of people injected.

The Texas Medical Board has taken a "corrective action" against Dr. Stella Immanuel, the infamous Trump-loving Houston doctor who has in the past spouted theories about demons impregnating human women during their sleep and about physicians using "alien DNA" to treat their patients.

The Houston Chronicle reports that the board took the action in response to Immanuel prescribing hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for COVID-19 "without adequately explaining the health consequences" to her patients.