Category Archives: Covid-19

Before my world was reduced to a two-mile radius from my house, I never realised how interesting other peoples front gardens could be. When your life is confined to the same four walls, with each journey to the kitchen an odyssey, the world outside takes on a whole new allure. I now find myself entranced by all the different varieties of privet hedge, intrigued by peoples choice of gravel size and paving pattern, captivated by the clusters of cacti perched on windowsills. Front doors have become a new form of entertainment, as have the subtleties of window-mouldings and architraves. Who knew there could be so many varieties of mortar on a single street?

Theres nothing like six weeks of house arrest to give you an elevated awareness of your surroundings. And its a phenomenon that hasnt gone unnoticed at the nations grand repository of objects, the Victoria and Albert. The pandemic has this weird way of bringing to the fore objects you would never have thought about, says Brendan Cormier, senior design curator at the London museum. Everything becomes heightened.

With future exhibitions on hold and collecting in limbo, Cormier has turned his teams attention to thinking about how the coronavirus has reframed the everyday, casting familiar objects in a very different light. Which is why the V&A is just about to launch Pandemic Objects, an online series examining how a range of unremarkable items have become charged with new meaning and purpose.

There are so many designed objects and inventions coming out of the pandemic, says Cormier, citing all the hands-free door openers and 3D-printed face visors. But its going to take time to work out which ones are actually useful. He thinks theres a danger that some much-touted innovations might end up being vapourware flashy concepts that catch the attention of design blogs, but never come to fruition.

The V&A design department has made headlines with its Rapid Response Collecting, an initiative that has snapped up such zeitgeisty objects as the Liberator 3D-printed handgun, the plans for which were released online in 2013, and one of pink knitted pussyhats worn by half a million attendees at the Womens March in Washington DC in 2017. But with everything now changing so rapidly, curators have decided theres some value in slowing down. Instead of rushing out to collect Covid ephemera, Cormier thinks the museums time would be better spent looking afresh at whats right under our noses. Is the pandemic revealing anything new, he asks, about things we take for granted?

One of the first things to catch his attention was the wealth of hastily drawn homemade signs cropping up in shop windows around the world, explaining new delivery services and warning people to keep 2m apart. It seemed to say something about our relationship with technology and public messaging: the 1990s craze for inkjet printers promised everyone the professional finish of a publishing house in the comfort of their own home. Yet, three decades on, most of us seem to have thrown out our printers, sick of clogged-up, eye-wateringly expensive cartridges, and have embraced the paperless society. In the moment of need, when the situation is changing so rapidly, says Cormier, weve gone back to pen and paper.

Putting signs in windows quickly spread to the home, too, as a means of both expressing community solidarity and keeping the kids occupied. Headteachers encouraged pupils to paint hopeful rainbows and stick them in windows, fuelling neighbourly rivalry with evermore elaborate formations, ranging from chalk to neon paint and Lego bricks. It wasnt long before this homespun movement was co-opted by the art world, with Damien Hirst offering his own butterfly-wing rainbow to download.

Catherine Flood, co-curator of the V&As Food exhibition last year, will examine how the pandemic has changed perceptions of certain kitchen-cupboard staples. Flour and yeast, more used to being spilled on surfaces and swept into bins, have become sought-after luxuries, as we all try to channel our inner bakers. Instagram has become the Sourdough Olympics, awash with competitive posts, while flour mills are working around the clock to fulfil demand as wheat prices surge and well-stocked shelves become a rarity.

Traffic to the BBCs basic bread recipe has risen faster than a cob in a 250-degree oven, with numbers up by 875%. But need does not seem to be whats driving demand, as bread is still readily available in shops. Its the therapeutic quality of baking thats the attraction, Cormier thinks, the tactile and meditative quality of the process, along with a desire to feel self-sufficient.

Flour is now a privilege, he says, and he doesnt just mean being able to find it in shops. To bake bread, you need to be able to work at home, and have time to invest. Its probably not frontline key workers who have the pleasure of rediscovering the miracles of baking.

As research for a potential future exhibition on accessibility in design, curator Natalie Kane has been looking at the door handle a seemingly innocuous part of the built environment that has become a villain in the age of coronavirus. Since early March, when it was first announced that the virus could survive on surfaces for up to three days, weve been elbowing and toeing our way through doors, suddenly aware of just how often we use our hands to navigate through the world. Could the pandemic finally force society to accept what disability groups have been campaigning about for decades that such things are obstacles rather than aids?

Meanwhile, as travel has been curtailed, the online realm has offered one of the few options for escapism. Some have turned to Google Street View to sate their wanderlust, whiling away hours touring the side streets of far-flung locations or panning through 3D cityscapes. The Canadian artist Jon Rafman has revived his project The Nine Eyes of Google Street View. Begun in 2008 when the medium was still novel, the projects trawls the globes virtual streets for alarming scenes from a moose careering down a highway to a gun-toting gang caught mid-heist, to naked bodies sprawled across the pavement.

Now, these unruly snapshots seem like glimpses of another time, glitches in the lockdown matrix. V&A curator Ella Kilgallon will examine the Street View phenomenon, putting it in the context of such earlier documentary initiatives as the National Photographic Record Association), established in 1897 in an attempt to create a comprehensive record of British life. Taking advantage of the expansion of photography as an increasingly popular hobby at the turn of the century, the association planned to form a countrywide memory bank to foster national pride. It culminated in 5,883 photographs by 1910. In the last 12 years, Google has captured 10 million miles of the Earths surface in 360-degree images, equivalent to circling the planet more than 400 times.

Further entries in the Pandemic Objects series will shine a spotlight on toilet paper, streaming services, cardboard packaging, balconies and more, one of the more triumphant stories being the revival of the sewing machine. Despite all the hype around distributed manufacturing and downloadable customised designs, not many of us have a 3D-printer at home, says Cormier. Yet the great 19th-century invention of the sewing machine is still a ubiquitous household item.

Sales of sewing machines have rocketed in the pandemic, recalling the Make Do and Mend movement of the second world war, as people join the effort to mass-produce face masks. One of the chief obstacles to such community craftivism, says Cormier, is managing production and distribution. After the recent bush fires in Australia, an international callout for people to knit koala mittens and wombat pouches triggered a tidal wave of marsupial mitts, far more than could possibly be used. As thousands of companies and hobbyists have sign up to produce face-shields in the great national struggle for PPE, it remains to be seen how effectively they can be distributed to where they are needed most.

Whether its a newfound respect for loo roll, a growing suspicion of excessive cardboard packaging, or a phobia of door handles, when the pandemic finally subsides, we may never look at everyday objects in the same way again.

Pandemic Objects is at vam.ac.uk/blog/

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Museum of Covid-19: the story of the crisis told through everyday objects - The Guardian

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This piece was originally published in Gristand appears here as part of our Climate Desk Partnership.

It was late one night in January 2009, and Jonathan Epstein was standing on the roof of an abandoned storage depot near Khulna, Bangladesh, with the writer and journalist David Quammen along with a small team of veterinarians. The group was in Bangladesh on a strange errand: They were catching bats.

It had been more than a decade since the first outbreak of the Nipah virus in Malaysia. Nipah, named after the home village of one of its earliest victims, causes respiratory distress, inflammation of the brain, and seizures. Its mortality rate is staggeringly highbetween 40 and 75 percent of those who contract the disease ultimately die. (The virus depicted in the now all-too-prescient 2011 film Contagionwas basedon Nipah.)

In Malaysia, the initial outbreak of Nipah in 1998 had infected 283 people and killed 109. Scientists eventually discovered that the virus had been passed from bats to local pig farms; the government slaughtered over 1 million pigs in an effort to stop the spread. But Nipah kept coming back, popping up in new places around the world, killing hundreds. Epstein and his colleagues were in that storage depot in Bangladesh trying to understand if the bats there were also carriers of the virusand if they might pass it to humans again.

Epstein, a veterinarian and disease ecologist at the nonprofit EcoHealth Alliance in New York City, has been all over the world identifying and tracing viruses that could makea deadly jump from animals to humans, helped by sprawling cities, clear-cut forests, and other human encroachment into the natural world. He helped trace the first outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, in 2003 to horseshoe bats in China; the outbreak of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, or MERS, in 2013 to camels and bats; andwhen its safe to travel againhe will return to China to help pinpoint the source of the current coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2. Bats are, once again, the main suspects.

There are always two pivotal questions, Epstein said by phone from his home in Queens. How did this happen? And could it happen again?

Sixty percent of new infectious diseasesdiseases that, like COVID-19, have never before reached humansoriginate in domesticated animals and wildlife, often bats, rodents, or non-human primates. Scientists estimate that there are as many as 800,000 of these so-called zoonotic viruses lurking in the natural world that could infect humans. The animals carrying these viruses often dont get sick; instead, they serve as reservoirs, amassing pathogens as they eat, sleep, and socialize. Its a good deal for the viruses: They get a free ride, while they wait for a chance to make a cross-species leap.

The problem is that those deadly leaps are becoming more common. Population growth andenvironmental and habitat destruction are bringing humans into more frequent contact with certain speciesand the viruses that they carry.

Every future viral threat that people could get already exists and is circulating in those animalsalways has been, said Dennis Carroll, an expert on zoonotic infectious diseases and the former head of the emerging threats division of the United States Agency for International Development, or USAID. Its just that now were bumping into them with a frequency that enables spillover to occur.

As COVID-19 spreads across the globe, infecting almost 3 million people worldwide and killing over 200,000, public health officials, policymakers, and journalists areanalyzing what went wrong. Why was the world so unprepared? Should countries have higher national stockpiles of ventilators, masks, ICU beds? Should stay-at-home orders have been issued earlier?

These are all measures for after an epidemic has begun,afteran enterprising virus has leapt from an animal to a human (a phenomenon scientists call spillover). But a small group of ecologists, epidemiologists, and veterinarians have spent the last decade attacking pandemics from another angle. Epstein and other researchers have been out in the field, testing bats in Bangladesh and pigs in West Africa, trying to catalog a huge number of viruses in the hopes of preventing a spillover into human populations. Because theres no outbreak if the virus never makes the jump.

In 2005, a strain of avian influenza called theH5N1 virusbegan spreading across Southeast Asia towards Eastern Europe. The disease was rare, but it could be fatal: Roughly 60 percent of those infected died. Experts were concerned that they could be looking at a potentially historic event.

At the time, Carroll was at USAID as a senior infectious disease specialist working on the organizations response. His focus was on malaria and tuberculosis, diseases that are well-knownif not well-managedeverywhere in the world. Luckily, H5N1 did not turn into a global pandemic, but the experience changed Carrolls perspective on the risks. In the 1960s, there were a few hundred million poultry produced in China; by the 2000s, when the countrys population had nearly doubled, China was producing billions of chickens, ducks, and turkeys every year. Carroll realized that as the human population grew, so would the odds of a deadly pandemic. It was really a profound eye-opener for me, he said.

Carroll suspected that there were many more viruses like the avian flu lying in wait, looking for a chance to make the jump to humans. But at the time, there was little understanding of how many dangerous viral illnesses existed. It was an open question of what the viral dark matter circulating in wildlife was, he said. Are we talking about a hundred viruses? Or something different?

That question became the basis of PREDICT, a kind of catch-and-release project for viruses that Carroll championed from within USAID. The program, launched in 2009, included scientists and researchers from the University of California, Davis and EcoHealth Allianceall with the singular goal of discovering new viruses before they spill over into people.

Global Health Program workers sample bumble bee bat in Kjwe Min Gu Cave in Myanmar.

PREDICT

It was an enormous undertaking. With an annual budget of around $20 million, researchers identified potential viral hotspots around the world, contacted local governments, and surveyed key species that could be carrying novel diseases. They also began training locals in more than 30 countries around the world, including in Sierra Leone, Uganda, and Bangladesh. On-the-ground experts like Epstein, the wildlife veterinarian, taught locals to capture animals, take blood samples to test for novel viruses, and release them back into the wild.

Its really grunt work, Carroll said. This is not a technological challenge. You go out and capture bats, you go out and capture rodents.

Based on PREDICTs early work, Carroll and other researchersestimatedthat there are around 1.67millionyet-undiscovered viruses circulating in mammals and birds, the animals most likely to transmit disease to humans. Of those, between 631,000 and 827,000 have the potential to make the leap to humans.

The good news is that the proportion of those 600,000-plus viruses that could cause serious illness is very small. Most microbial infections in people are inconsequential, Carroll said. They dont have adverse effects. So researchers dont need to worry about all potentially zoonotic virusesjust the ones that could turn deadly.

Jonna Mazet, the organizations global director from its inception until last year, said that PREDICT and its collaborators collected 168,000 samples from people and animals and identified more than 900 new viruses. Of those, 160 were coronavirusesin the same family as SARS-CoV-2.

But sampling animals by climbing through trees, setting up nets on warehouse roofs, and crawling into bat-infested caves was only part of the challenge. There are about as many pathways for transmission as there are viruses. And so the group wasnt only cataloging potential diseases. They were also searching for hidden patterns, looking for the unexpected risky behaviors that could allow a virus to spill over into humans.

The first case of the global Ebola outbreak in 2013 was traced to a toddler in the West African country of Guinea, who had been playing under a tree housing a family of bats, likely displaced by the destruction of surrounding forests by foreign mining and timber companies. (Scientists still arent sure exactly how close contact with those bats led to the child getting infected). In Malaysia, the first outbreak of Nipah was linked to pigs that had eaten pieces of fruit dropped by nearby bats and then spread the disease throughout industrial pig farms.

But some types of spillover are known, common, and preventable. Lets take, for example, live animal markets, Epstein said. People are still bringing wild animals, particularly bats, rodents, and non-human primates, from their natural environment into urban settings. These species not only have contact with each other, under very stressful and unhygienic conditions where theres opportunity to trade viruses, but theyre also being handled and butchered by people.

That close contact provides an opportunity for people to become exposed. The SARS outbreak in 2003 likely originated from a wildlife market in the Chinese province of Guangdong. And the suspected source of the novel coronavirus currently gripping the planet is a market in Wuhan.

Epstein explained that certain interventionsmaking wildlife markets more hygienic, or preventing wild animals from being sold at allcould dramatically lower the possibility of spillover. But he emphasized that the work has to be done in a culturally sensitive way, by building local partnerships. This isnt about a group of Westerners imposing their idea of whats safe on cultures that have been doing something for generations, he said.

Students in Guinea listen to a school presentation on living safely with bats.

PREDICT

Some have taken a harder line. The World Conservation Society has calledfor a global ban on the trade of wildlife, citing pandemic risks. Anthony Fauci, the United States top infectious disease specialist,told Fox Newsthat the Chinese government should immediately ban so-called wet markets. It boggles my mind how, when we have so many diseases that emanate out of that unusual human-animal interface, that we just dont shut it down, he said.

Trading wildlife is only one of many human behaviors that can set off a spillover. When Epstein and colleagues were on the roof of that storage depot in Bangladesh, they were studying another outbreak of Nipah, one that appeared to be passed to humans when they ate sap from date palm trees. Locals collected the sap in small clay pots, tapped to the palms and left open to the airand to any fruit bats that might want to take a sip.

That was the immediate cause of the outbreak: sap contaminated by bat urine and feces. But for Epstein and other scientists, the lesson was much larger. Mowing down forests for large-scale agriculture, harvesting timber, and sprawling citiesall these activities were forcing bats into close quarterswith people. Its not the animals fault for carrying these diseases, he said. These are things thatwedo to the environment around us.

Over the past century, the human population has exploded. At the height of the 1918-1919 Spanish flu pandemic, the global population was around 1.8 billion, less than a quarter of what it is today. In the past century, millions of humans have spent years slaughtering wildlife; cutting down trees; placing cows, chickens, and pigs in close contact with wild animalsproviding ample opportunity for viruses to make a deadly leap.

Even in the face of enormous environmental changes, Epstein and other scientists are convinced that it wouldnt take much to make a big difference, whether its shuttering wildlife markets or bat-proofing pots for date-palm sap with a small screen. These are wholly human-made, human-driven events, and knowing that is hopeful, because we can actually focus on changing the way we do things, Epstein said. These pandemics are preventable.

Last September, the PREDICT program ran out of money. It had passed through two five-year funding cycles but wasnt renewed by USAID.

Some of those involved were deeply disappointed. It was a genius, visionary program that USAID took a big risk to fund, and its a crying shame it was canceled, Peter Daszak, president of EcoHealth Alliance,told the Guardian.

Contrary toreportsfrom the Los Angeles Times and other outlets, however, theres no evidence that the decision to end PREDICT was political. Though the White House has previously proposeddecreasing fundingfor USAID and other global health programs, Carroll said that its unlikely anyone high up in the Trump administration even knew the program existed. (They might now. On April 1, PREDICT was granted a $2.6 milliontemporary funding extension, so the project and its partners can help identify the animal hosts of SARS-CoV-2.)

The scientists involved in PREDICTrecently launched the Global Virome Project, which they hope will operate at a much larger scale. It aims to identify and assess all major viral threats within 10 yearsat a cost of around $1.6 billion.

Its expensive, said Mazet, the former director of PREDICT. But its much less expensive than even 10 percent of big epidemics in the past, and its going to be minuscule compared to this one.

For perspective, the U.S. government spentmore than $2 billion trying to tamp down Ebola epidemics between 2014 and 2016and the CARES Act, passed last month to support an economy in freefall, costs around $2 trillion.In comparison, the cost of warding off viral outbreaks is pennies on the dollar, Epstein said.

PREDICT team members in Sierra Leone.

Simon Townsley / PREDICT

Its hard to say whether the project would have been able to prevent the COVID-19 pandemic. Although PREDICT identified 160 new coronaviruses in its decade of operations, none of them was SARS-CoV-2. Mazet said that PREDICT had partnered with a scientist at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, but the region just wasnt a top priority for USAID, which was more focused on funding research into disease outbreaks in Southeast Asia. For her, this doesnt suggest that the approach was wrongjust that any new effort needs to widen the area under surveillance.

Carroll thinks that the Global Virome Project and the foundation laid by PREDICT provide at least a place to start: a way to tackle the viral dark matter running through our planet, a potentially life-saving (and economy-saving) stopgap against future pandemics.

For now, those who have spent their careers warning of zoonotic diseases are sheltered in place like the rest of us. Many said that the pandemic should not be considered a black swan eventsomething random and unpredictable. The fact is, it was started by exactly the kind of spillover they had been warning about for decades. But that doesnt make watching their fears play out any easier.

Before COVID-19, the team was struggling to get policymakers attention, fighting against competing funding priorities and short-term thinking. We were raising the flag and waving itto our own exhaustion, Mazet said. We hope the world is listening now.

See more here:

These Scientists Saw COVID-19 Coming. Now They're Trying to Stop the Next Pandemic Before It Starts. - Mother Jones

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention illustration of coronavirus.(Photo: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.)

LANSING Greater Lansing saw no further COVID-19 deaths reported Sunday, with a single new case in Ingham County.

At 5:40 p.m., Ingham County Health Officer Linda Vail reported 506 cases of COVID-19, one more than the 505 reported Saturday. The number of deaths remainsat 13, while 168 of the patients have recovered.

The total number of Eaton County cases and deaths remained at the 136 and 6 respectively, reported Saturday,according to information on the Barry-Eaton District Health Department website. As of Sunday, 92 patients had recovered.

The Mid-Michigan District Health Department last updated it's COVID-19 information on Friday, with 118confirmed cases for Clinton County and 10 deaths. State data posted Sunday reported the same numbers.

Between the three counties, COVID-19 has killed 29 people.

The state reported 29 new COVID-19 deaths Sunday, marking the lowest number of deaths in a single day since March. The total sits at 4,049, with 43,754 confirmed cases, an increase of 547 cases since Saturday.

Nearly 36%, or 15,659 people across the state have recovered, according to state data. The death rate for COVID-19 cases sits at 9%.

The average age of those who died from the coronavirus was 74.9 years old, while the range of those who have died runs from 5 to 107, according to state data.

Contact Mark Johnson at 517-377-1026 or atmajohnson2@lsj.com.Follow him on Twitter at@ByMarkJohnson.

Read or Share this story: https://www.lansingstatejournal.com/story/news/2020/05/03/greater-lansing-sees-one-more-covid-19-case-no-further-deaths/3075606001/

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Greater Lansing sees one more COVID-19 case and no further deaths - Lansing State Journal

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MOC Municipal Office Center, February 2020(Photo: Brian Wells/Times Herald)

Port Huron could end its budget year in a deficit June 30, but city staff are being offered voluntary furloughs to help endure the financial impact of the coronavirus.

Our strongest revenue source, local income tax, is expected to lose in excess of $750,000 in the fourth quarter of the fiscal year, City Manager James Freed wrote City Council members in an email Friday night. The citys next first year begins July 1.

We also anticipate state revenue sharing will be significantly reduced, as well, he said. This will put a significant strain on our ability to operate as an organization.

The city first closed in-person services at the Municipal Office Center, events at McMorran Place and programs through the parks and recreation department in mid-March after the states first COVID-19 cases were confirmed. Like most other communities, administrative orders were also preventing water shut-offs if residents were unable to pay utility bills because of the virus.

But this spring, as the city prepares its budget for next year, theres still a lot of unknowns that officials said they cant yet account for.

Freed told officialshis goal was to achieve a 15-percent staff reduction within the next few weeks. The furloughs are something being offered to some employees, including police and fire officials, voluntarily now to provide some more immediate financial relief to city operations," he said.

Port Huron City Manager James Freed discusses measurements being taken by the city to prevent the spread of coronavirus during a media briefing Thursday, March 12, 2020, in the Municipal Office Center in Port Huron.(Photo: Brian Wells/Times Herald)

With the passage of the (federal) CARES Act and the additional level of unemployment benefits, some employees may find this to be a desirable option, he wrote.

Mayor Pauline Repp said furloughs arean option, which also allows employees to continue their health insurance to make sure theyre covered that way, that she hoped would keep Port Huron financially static and prevent layoffs later in 2020.

We dont know how this is going to affect us because we dont know how long its going to be, she said of the COVID pandemic and its response. Right now, if people are voluntarily doing it, it (helps).

On Sunday, Freed said he was already getting a sense that close to 30 or 40 employees may volunteer, adding, Its a significant amount of our employees will be taking advantage of it.

Currently, he said the city has about 230 full-time employees and 440 total with part-time staff. However, with the virus and the affect on operations, there was likely additionally 100 seasonal employees that we will not bring on this year.

Weare greatly reducing city operations for the next 90 to 100 days, Freed said.

A sign telling visitors that the playground is closed hangs on the play structure at Pine Grove Park Tuesday, March 24, 2020, in Port Huron. Based on recommendations from state and local health officials, it was ordered that all playground equipment in the city be closed until further notice to help prevent the spread of coronavirus, effective Monday.(Photo: Brian Wells/Times Herald)

Freed said the citys share of state Act 51 revenues, which are financed through a state gas tax, will also be impacted this year, meaning the citys streets division would be among its dramatic reductions in the upcoming budget.

Last Monday, at the end of a regular council meeting, Freedtold officials putting off things like scheduled capital projects may impact the next budget

Additionally, residents will continue to see a lack of in-person programming through parks and recreation. McMorran, which is managed by parks and rec, and city pools are not expected to open this summer because of social distancing orders.

In a news release, Parks and Rec Director Nancy Winzer said suspending face-to-face programming will also include sports, Camp Palmer, arts and nature classes, and most summer efforts.

Parks and rec facilities have already been closed to residents during the pandemic.

It would sadden us far more if you or your family came to harm due to our lack of action, Winzer said in the release. The Port Huron Recreation Department will, however, do all we can to continue to offer opportunities for families.

These opportunities may look differently than what we have seen in the past but will continue to keep our residents engaged in innovative recreational opportunities at this critical time. These new programs will be announced by the end of May.

Freed said there were also still a lot of uncertainties about city programs past this summer. He added, We dont even know if were going to have hockey this fall.

He said they want to maintain essential, core services but advised residents that this city will not be operating back to normal even as state COVID pandemic precautions begin to relax.

Freed said although furloughs were being offered citywide, parks and rec will be heavily impacted.

It would be silly to keep all these staffers when we cant provide the services, he said.

Repp added, Its not something we want to do, but certainly, its needed because we dont know what the impact is going to be financially for a while yet.

Jackie Smith is the local government reporter for the Times Herald. Have questions or a story idea? Contact her at (810) 989-6270 or jssmith@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @Jackie20Smith.

Read or Share this story: https://www.thetimesherald.com/story/news/2020/05/03/port-huron-city-employees-voluntary-furloughs-covid-19/3075044001/

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Port Huron offering city employees voluntary furloughs in wake of COVID-19 - The Times Herald

The coronavirus pandemic has essentially brought the economy to a standstill, causing thousands of businesses to close their doors and resulting in millions of layoffs. The organizations that are fortunate enough to stay open have also faced challenges, many of them experiencing cash flow problems as more Americans are asked to stay home.

As a result of these budget strains, some organizations have opted to slash employee benefits, including 401(k) plans. While some companies have simply suspended employer-matching contributions, others have decided to terminate their plans altogether to save money. Here's what to do if that happens to you.

Image source: Getty Images

The good news is that relatively few organizations are ditching their 401(k) plans entirely. Only around 1.3% of companies said they plan to terminate their 401(k) plan due to COVID-19, according to a recent survey from the Plan Sponsor Council of America. Approximately 16% are temporarily suspending matching contributions, and nearly 77% said they're not planning on making any changes at all to their plans.

However, the not-so-good news is that workers may not be in the clear just yet. Small businesses, in particular, are at a higher risk of facing financial problems as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, so they may be more likely to have to make changes to their 401(k) plans if money gets tight.

Approximately 42% of small businesses might be at risk of eliminating their 401(k) plans due to COVID-19, according to a report from the American Society of Pension Professionals and Actuaries. That's around 216,000 retirement plans that are at risk of termination, the report revealed.

If your 401(k) plan is terminated, or you're concerned it might be in the future, you can still save for retirement. You have other options, and you shouldn't need to put your retirement plans on hold if you lose your 401(k).

You don't need a 401(k) plan to save for retirement, and if you lose your plan through your employer, you have a couple of options: Roll your money into a traditional IRA or Roth IRA, or withdraw your cash.

The option to avoid is withdrawing money from your 401(k). When you withdraw your savings from your 401(k) before age 59-1/2, you're typically faced with a 10% penalty and income taxes on the amount you withdraw. Under the CARES Act, the 10% penalty is temporarily waived, but you'll still need to pay income taxes on your distribution, although you do have three years to pay these taxes, thanks to the new regulations. If you have a significant amount of cash in your 401(k), though, that can be a hefty tax bill.

In addition, by withdrawing your cash now, you're taking away your money's growth potential. Your retirement investments need as much time as possible to compound, and if you stick them in a checking or savings account, you're essentially pressing pause on your retirement strategy.

To avoid withdrawing your savings, you can either roll your money over into a traditional IRA or a Roth IRA. Both are strong options, and they differ in one key aspect: Taxes. With a traditional IRA, you'll get a tax deduction when you make the initial contribution, but you'll have to pay income taxes on your withdrawals. With a Roth IRA, you'll pay taxes now, but your distributions will be tax-free.

You can't go wrong with either option, but right now might be a particularly good time to opt for a Roth IRA. You will need to pay income taxes on the amount you roll into your Roth account, but because the stock market has taken a tumble over the past few months, you probably don't have as much in your 401(k) right now as you did a few months ago. That means if you convert to a Roth now, your tax bill will be smaller -- and your retirement withdrawals will be tax-free. If you opt for a traditional IRA, you won't pay any taxes right now, but you may face a higher tax bill in retirement when you start making withdrawals.

COVID-19 has turned the world upside down and affected nearly every aspect of our lives, and it's also having an impact on 401(k) plans. However, even if your 401(k) is eliminated, you don't have to let it derail your retirement. By rolling your money over into a new account, you can ensure your plans stay on track.

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Employers Could Terminate Your 401(k) Plan Due to COVID-19. What to Do if It Happens. - The Motley Fool

More than a million people diagnosed with COVID-19 have now recovered from the disease. Health workers hold signs beside a 16-day-old baby who recovered from COVID-19, as he is discharged from the National Childrens Hospital in Quezon city, Metro Manila, Philippines earlier this week. Nicknamed Kobe, the infant was the first COVID-19 patient to be discharged at the childrens hospital.

Aaron Favila/AP

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Aaron Favila/AP

More than a million people diagnosed with COVID-19 have now recovered from the disease. Health workers hold signs beside a 16-day-old baby who recovered from COVID-19, as he is discharged from the National Childrens Hospital in Quezon city, Metro Manila, Philippines earlier this week. Nicknamed Kobe, the infant was the first COVID-19 patient to be discharged at the childrens hospital.

Aaron Favila/AP

More than 1 million people around the world have recovered from COVID-19, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University.

Around 154,000 people in the United States have recovered from the deadly virus.

Although people who recover from a viral infection often build up an immunity to later contracting the same disease, it remains unclear whether this is the case for COVID-19. The World Health Organization said last week that one-time infection of the coronavirus has not yet been proven to result in immunity.

The U.S. currently has the most confirmed COVID-19 cases of any nation, with more than 1 million. It was just less than a month ago when the disease crossed the 1 million case threshold globally.

Globally, there are more than 3.27 million confirmed cases. Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom, France and Germany have each reported more than 160,000 COVID-19 cases.

Deaths caused by the coronavirus total around 235,000 globally. In the U.S., more than 60,000 people have died because of the coronavirus.

New York City and surrounding areas have been hard-hit by COVID-19: More than 18,000 people have died in the countrys largest city. Other hotspots range from Cook County, Illinois, to Wayne County, Michigan.

The U.S. hit a milestone in testing this week, surpassing 6 million tests administered.

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More than 1 Million People Recover from COVID-19 : Coronavirus Live Updates - dineshr

'); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body #mrd-alert"+ alertCount).append(""+val.title+""); // if (window.location.hostname == "www.kmov.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.kctv5.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.azfamily.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.kptv.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.fox5vegas.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.wfsb.com") { if (val.poly != "" && val.polyimg != "") { $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body #mrd-alert"+ alertCount).append('"+val.ihtml+""); $("#expandable-weather-block .weather-index-alerts").show(); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body h2").css({"font-family":"'Fira Sans', sans-serif", "font-weight":"500", "padding-bottom":"10px"}); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body p").css({"font-size":"14px", "line-height":"24px"}); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body span.wxalertnum").css({"float":"left", "width":"40px", "height":"40px", "color":"#ffffff", "line-height":"40px", "background-color":"#888888", "border-radius":"40px", "text-align":"center", "margin-right":"12px"}); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body b").css("font-size", "18px"); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body li").css({"font-size":"14px", "line-height":"18px", "margin-bottom":"10px"}); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body ul").css({"margin-bottom":"24px"}); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body pre").css({"margin-bottom":"24px"}); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body img").css({"width":"100%", "margin-bottom":"20px", "borderWidth":"1px", "border-style":"solid", "border-color":"#aaaaaa"}); $("#expandable-weather-block .modal-body #mrd-alert"+ alertCount).css({"borderWidth":"0", "border-bottom-width":"1px", "border-style":"dashed", "border-color":"#aaaaaa", "padding-bottom":"10px", "margin-bottom":"40px"}); }); } function parseAlertJSON(json) { console.log(json); alertCount = 0; if (Object.keys(json.alerts).length > 0) { $("#mrd-wx-alerts .modal-body ").empty(); } $.each(json.alerts, function(key, val) { alertCount++; $("#mrd-wx-alerts .alert_count").text(alertCount); $("#mrd-wx-alerts .modal-body ").append(''); $("#mrd-wx-alerts .modal-body #mrd-alert"+ alertCount).append(""+val.title+""); // if (window.location.hostname == "www.kmov.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.kctv5.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.azfamily.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.kptv.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.fox5vegas.com" || window.location.hostname == "www.wfsb.com") { if (val.poly != "" && val.polyimg != "") { $("#mrd-wx-alerts .modal-body #mrd-alert"+ alertCount).append(''); } else if (val.fips != "" && val.fipsimg != "") { // $("#mrd-wx-alerts .modal-body #mrd-alert"+ alertCount).append(''); } // } //val.instr = val.instr.replace(/[W_]+/g," "); $("#mrd-wx-alerts .modal-body #mrd-alert"+ alertCount).append(val.dhtml+"

Instruction

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You don't need an appointment to get tested for COVID-19 at this site on Monday - KMOV.com

In many ways, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a boon to cybercriminals: With unprecedented numbers of people working from home and anxious for news about the virus outbreak, its hard to imagine a more target-rich environment for phishers, scammers and malware purveyors. In addition, many crooks are finding the outbreak has helped them better market their cybercriminal wares and services. But its not all good news: The Coronavirus also has driven up costs and disrupted key supply lines for many cybercriminals. Heres a look at how theyre adjusting to these new realities.

One of the more common and perennial cybercriminal schemes is reshipping fraud, wherein crooks buy pricey consumer goods online using stolen credit card data and then enlist others to help them collect or resell the merchandise.

Most online retailers years ago stopped shipping to regions of the world most frequently associated with credit card fraud, including Eastern Europe, North Africa, and Russia. These restrictions have created a burgeoning underground market for reshipping scams, which rely on willing or unwitting residents in the United States and Europe derisively referred to as reshipping mules to receive and relay high-dollar stolen goods to crooks living in the embargoed areas.

A screen shot from a user account at Snowden, a long-running reshipping mule service.

But apparently a number of criminal reshipping services are reporting difficulties due to the increased wait time when calling FedEx or UPS (to divert carded goods that merchants end up shipping to the cardholders address instead of to the mules). In response, these operations are raising their prices and warning of longer shipping times, which in turn could hamper the activities of other actors who depend on those services.

Thats according to Intel 471, a cyber intelligence company that closely monitors hundreds of online crime forums. In a report published today, the company said since late March 2020 it has observed several crooks complaining about COVID-19 interfering with the daily activities of their various money mules(people hired to help launder the proceeds of cybercrime).

One Russian-speaking actor running a fraud network complained about their subordinates (money mules) in Italy, Spain and other countries being unable to withdraw funds, since they currently were afraid to leave their homes, Intel 471 observed. Also some actors have reported that banks customer-support lines are being overloaded, making it difficult for fraudsters to call them for social-engineering activities (such as changing account ownership, raising withdrawal limits, etc).

Still, every dark cloud has a silver lining: Intel 471 noted many cybercriminals appear optimistic that the impending global economic recession (and resultant unemployment) will make it easier to recruit low-level accomplices such as money mules.

Alex Holden, founder and CTO of Hold Security, agreed. He said while the Coronavirus has forced reshipping operators to make painful shifts in several parts of their business, the overall market for available mules has never looked brighter.

Reshipping is way up right now, but there are some complications, he said.

For example, reshipping scams have over the years become easier for both reshipping mule operators and the mules themselves. Many reshipping mules are understandably concerned about receiving stolen goods at their home and risking a visit from the local police. But increasingly, mules have been instructed to retrieve carded items from third-party locations.

The mules dont have to receive stolen goods directly at home anymore, Holden said. They can pick them up at Walgreens, Hotel lobbies, etc. There are a ton of reshipment tricks out there.

But many of those tricks got broken with the emergence of COVID-19 and social distancing norms. In response, more mule recruiters are asking their hires to do things like reselling goods shipped to their homes on platforms like eBay and Amazon.

Reshipping definitely has become more complicated, Holden said. Not every mule will run 10 times a day to the post office, and some will let the goods sit by the mailbox for days. But on the whole, mules are more compliant these days.

KrebsOnSecurity recently came to a similar conclusion: Last months story, Coronavirus Widens the Money Mule Pool, looked at one money mule operation that had ensnared dozens of mules with phony job offers in a very short period of time. Incidentally, the fake charity behind that scheme which promised to raise money for Coronavirus victims has since closed up shop and apparently re-branded itself as the Tessaris Foundation.

Charitable cybercriminal endeavors were the subject of a report released this weekby cyber intel firm Digital Shadows, which looked at various ways computer crooks are promoting themselves and their hacking services using COVID-19 themed discounts and giveaways.

Like many commercials on television these days, such offers obliquely or directly reference the economic hardships wrought by the virus outbreak as a way of connecting on an emotional level with potential customers.

The illusion of philanthropy recedes further when you consider the benefits to the threat actors giving away goods and services, the report notes. These donors receive a massive boost to their reputation on the forum. In the future, they may be perceived as individuals willing to contribute to forum life, and the giveaways help establish a track record of credibility.

Brians Club one of the undergrounds largest bazaars for selling stolen credit card data and one that has misappropriated this authors likeness and name in its advertising recently began offering pandemic support in the form of discounts for its most loyal customers.

It stands to reason that the virus outbreak might depress cybercriminal demand for dumps, or stolen account data that can be used to create physical counterfeit credit cards. After all, dumps are mainly used to buy high-priced items from electronics stores and other outlets that may not even be open now thanks to the widespread closures from the pandemic.

If that were the case, wed also expect to see dumps prices fall significantly across the cybercrime economy. But so far, those price changes simply havent materialized, says Gemini Advisory, a New York based company that monitors the sale of stolen credit card data across dozens of stores in the cybercrime underground.

Stas Alforov, Geminis director of research and development, said theres been no notable dramatic changes in pricing for both dumps and card data stolen from online merchants (a.k.a. CVVs) even though many cybercrime groups appear to be massively shifting their operations toward targeting online merchants and their customers.

Usually, the huge spikes upward or downward during a short period is reflectedby a large addition of cheap records that drive the median price change, Alforov said, referring to the small and temporary price deviations depicted in the graph above.

Intel 471 said it came to a similar conclusion.

You might have thought carding activity, to include support aspects such as checker services, would decrease due to both the global lockdown and threat actors being infected with COVID-19, the company said. Weve even seen some actors suggest as much across some shops, but the reality is there have been no observations of major changes.

Interestingly, the Coronavirus appears to have prompted discussion on a topic that seldom comes up in cybercrime communities i.e., the moral and ethical ramifications of their work. Specifically, there seems to be much talk these days about the potential karmic consequences of cashing in on the misery wrought by a global pandemic.

For example, Digital Shadows said some have started to question the morality of targeting healthcare providers, or collecting funds in the name of Coronavirus causes and then pocketing the money.

One post on the gated Russian-language cybercriminal forum Korovka laid bare the question of threat actors moral obligation, the company wrote. A user initiated a thread to canvass opinion on the feasibility of faking a charitable cause and collecting donations. They added that while they recognized that such a plan was cruel, they found themselves in an extremely difficult financial situation. Responses to the proposal were mixed, with one forum user calling the plan amoral, and another pointing out that cybercrime is inherently an immoral affair.

Tags: alex holden, Coronavirus, COVID-19, Gemini Advisory, Intel 471, money mules, reshipping mules, Snowden, Stas Alforov

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 30th, 2020 at 2:20 pmand is filed under Ne'er-Do-Well News, Other, Web Fraud 2.0.You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.You can skip to the end and leave a comment. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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How Cybercriminals are Weathering COVID-19 - Krebs on Security

More than 300,000 in the UK may have quit smoking during the coronavirus crisis as evidence mounts that the habit makes them more vulnerable to Covid-19, a survey suggests.

A further 550,000 have tried to quit, while 2.4 million have cut down, according to the joint study by YouGov and the campaign group Action on Smoking and Health (Ash).

The survey of 1,004 people suggested 2% of smokers had quit because of concerns about coronavirus; 8% were trying to quit; 36% had cut down; and 27% were now more likely to quit.

A quarter of former smokers said they were less likely to resume smoking, although 4% said the pandemic had made them more likely to relapse.

The results of the survey were welcomed by several health and anti-smoking organisations in a statement released by #QuitforCOVID Twitter campaign.

Dr Nick Hopkinson, the chairman of Ash who is also a respiratory specialist at Imperial College London, said: Smoking harms the immune system and our ability to fight off infections. Evidence is growing that smoking is associated with worse outcomes in those admitted to hospital with Covid-19.

Quitting smoking also rapidly reduces peoples risk of other health problems such as heart attacks and strokes. Those are bad whenever they happen, so preventing them is an end in itself and is especially important at a time like now when everyone is keen to stay out of hospital.

Ruth Tennant, the tobacco lead for the Association of Directors of Public Health, said: There are so many reasons to quit smoking but never a more important time than right now during the coronavirus pandemic.

The founder of the #QuitforCOVID campaign urged more people to stop smoking during the pandemic and beyond.

Stopping smoking remains the single biggest thing people can do to improve their overall health, said Dr Charlie Kenward, a GP from Bristol. It will improve heart and lung health as well as reducing the chances of developing cancer and even improve wound healing after surgery. There has never been a better time to quit.

Cllr Ian Hudspeth, the community wellbeing board chairman at the Local Government Association, said: Councils can help the government to achieve its ambition of eliminating smoking in England by 2030, through their tobacco control and other public health and support services, but need certainty over their long-term funding to help do so.

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More than 300,000 UK smokers may have quit owing to Covid-19 fears - The Guardian

A new strain of Coronavirus, COVID 19, is spreading around the world, causing deaths and major disruption to the global economy.

Responding to this crisis requires global cooperation among governments, international organizations and the business community, which is at the centre of the World Economic Forums mission as the International Organization for Public-Private Cooperation.

The Forum has created the COVID Action Platform, a global platform to convene the business community for collective action, protect peoples livelihoods and facilitate business continuity, and mobilize support for the COVID-19 response. The platform is created with the support of the World Health Organization and is open to all businesses and industry groups, as well as other stakeholders, aiming to integrate and inform joint action.

As an organization, the Forum has a track record of supporting efforts to contain epidemics. In 2017, at our Annual Meeting, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) was launched bringing together experts from government, business, health, academia and civil society to accelerate the development of vaccines. CEPI is currently supporting the race to develop a vaccine against this strand of the coronavirus.

1. How COVID-19 is affecting the globe

Testing is key in battling COVID-19, but where is testing the most prevalent? According to data from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Iceland, Luxembourg and Estonia have tested more of their population for coronavirus than any other countries.

The lowest levels of testing in OECD countries are in Mexico (0.4), Japan (1.8) and Greece (5.8). The average testing rate for all OECD countries is 22.9 tests per 1,000.

Top officials have welcomed announcements to boost testing including OECD Secretary-General ngel Gurra who said increasing testing capacity was essential to start easing lockdowns and to reduce the risk of new outbreaks.

Diagnostics testing for COVID-19 in OECD countries

Image: OECD

Though passenger planes have seen steep declines, cargo planes are facing a surge in demand to respond to the need for supplies during the COVID-19 crisis. Slowing efforts are a slew of new guidelines, including fast-changing border restrictions and quarantines for crew. Airlines are lobbying for governments to respond with practical exemptions, writes Isobel Fenton, Platform Curator, Aviation & Aerospace, World Economic Forum. A two-week delay for essential supplies is clearly unacceptable, she says.

Looking for an escape? Literature instructor Christine Berberich from the University of Portsmouth shared a selection of books to enjoy during lockdown in a recent article for the Conversation. These books, including Kazuo Ishiguros The Remains of the Day and Rohinton Mistrys A Fine Balance engross their readers in their characters lives and transport them to another world.

On this weeks World Vs Virus podcast, our colleague David Knowles interviews science Journalist Laura Spinney about her book, Pale Rider, an exploration into the history of the Spanish Flu. The flu changed the world in many important ways, says Spinney, and there are some important lessons for how we respond to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic..

The World Versus Virus podcast is available on Apple Podcasts as part of its Essential Listening collection. The podcast is also available on Spotify and Libsyn.

License and Republishing

World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with our Terms of Use.

Written by

Linda Lacina, Digital Editor, World Economic Forum

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

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COVID-19: What you need to know about the coronavirus pandemic on 1 May - World Economic Forum