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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="covid-19-sentry">Covid-19 Sentry</h1>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
<ul>
<li><a href="#from-preprints">From Preprints</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-clinical-trials">From Clinical Trials</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-pubmed">From PubMed</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-patent-search">From Patent Search</a></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-preprints">From Preprints</h1>
<ul>
<li><strong>An Autoantigen Profile from Jurkat T-Lymphoblasts Provides a Molecular Guide for Investigating Autoimmune Sequelae of COVID-19</strong> -
<div>
In order to understand autoimmune phenomena contributing to the pathophysiology of COVID-19 and post-COVID syndrome, we have been profiling autoantigens (autoAgs) from various cell types. Although cells share numerous autoAgs, each cell type gives rise to unique COVID-altered autoAg candidates, which may explain the wide range of symptoms experienced by patients with autoimmune sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Based on the unifying property of affinity between autoantigens (autoAgs) and the glycosaminoglycan dermatan sulfate (DS), this paper reports 140 candidate autoAgs identified from proteome extracts of human Jurkat T-cells, of which at least 105 (75%) are known targets of autoantibodies. Comparison with currently available multi-omic COVID-19 data shows that 125 (89%) of DS-affinity proteins are altered at protein and/or RNA levels in SARS-CoV-2-infected cells or patients, with at least 94 being known autoAgs in a wide spectrum of autoimmune diseases and cancer. Protein alterations by ubiquitination and phosphorylation in the viral infection are major contributors of autoAgs. The autoAg protein network is significantly associated with cellular response to stress, apoptosis, RNA metabolism, mRNA processing and translation, protein folding and processing, chromosome organization, cell cycle, and muscle contraction. The autoAgs include clusters of histones, CCT/TriC chaperonin, DNA replication licensing factors, proteasome and ribosome proteins, heat shock proteins, serine/arginine-rich splicing factors, 14-3-3 proteins, and cytoskeletal proteins. AutoAgs such as LCP1 and NACA that are altered in the T cells of COVID patients may provide insight into T-cell responses in the viral infection and merit further study. The autoantigen-ome from this study contributes to a comprehensive molecular map for investigating acute, subacute, and chronic autoimmune disorders caused by SARS-CoV-2.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.05.451199v1" target="_blank">An Autoantigen Profile from Jurkat T-Lymphoblasts Provides a Molecular Guide for Investigating Autoimmune Sequelae of COVID-19</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Genome Profiling of SARS-CoV-2 in Indonesia, ASEAN and the Neighbouring East Asian Countries: Features, Challenges and Achievements</strong> -
<div>
A year after the World Health Organisation declared COVID-19 as a pandemic, much has been learned with respect to SARS-CoV-2 epidemiology, vaccine production and disease treatment. Whole-genome sequencing (WGS) has played a significant role in contributing to our understanding of the epidemiology and biology of this virus. In this paper, we investigate the use of SARS-CoV-2 WGS in Southeast and East Asia and the impact of technological development, access to resources, and demography of individual countries on its uptake. Facilitated by the Nottingham-Indonesia Collaboration for Clinical Research and Training (NICCRAT) initiative, we showcased a bilateral collaboration between the University of Nottingham and the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI/Lembaga Ilmu Pengetahuan Indonesia) to establish WGS of SARS-CoV-2 using Oxford Nanopore Technology(R) in Indonesia. Analyses of SARS-CoV-2 genomes deposited on GISAID from Southeast and East Asian countries reveals the importance of collecting clinical and demographic metadata and the importance of open access and data sharing. Lineage and phylogenetic analyses per 1 June 2021 found that: 1) B.1.466.2 variants were the most predominant in Indonesia, with mutations in the spike protein including D614G at 100%, N439K at 99.1%, and P681R at 69.7% frequency, 2) The variants of concern, B.1.1.7 (Alpha), B.1.351 (Beta) and B.1.617.2 (Delta) were first detected in Indonesia in January 2021, 2) B.1.470 was first detected in Indonesia and spread to the neighbouring regions, and 3) The highest rate of virus transmissions between Indonesia and the rest of the world appears to be through interactions with Singapore and Japan, two neighbouring countries with high degree of access and travels to and from Indonesia. Overall, we conclude that WGS of SARS-CoV-2 using Oxford Nanopore Technology(R) platforms fits well with the Indonesian context and can catalyse the increase of sequencing rates in the country.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.06.451270v1" target="_blank">Genome Profiling of SARS-CoV-2 in Indonesia, ASEAN and the Neighbouring East Asian Countries: Features, Challenges and Achievements</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Human airway lineages derived from pluripotent stem cells reveal the epithelial responses to SARS-CoV-2 infection</strong> -
<div>
There is an urgent need to understand how SARS-CoV-2 infects the airway epithelium and in a subset of individuals leads to severe illness or death. Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) provide a near limitless supply of human cells that can be differentiated into cell types of interest, including airway epithelium, for disease modeling. We present a human iPSC-derived airway epithelial platform, composed of the major airway epithelial cell types, that is permissive to SARS-CoV-2 infection. Subsets of iPSC-airway cells express the SARS-CoV-2 entry factors ACE2 and TMPRSS2. Multiciliated cells are the primary initial target of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Upon infection with SARS-CoV-2, iPSC-airway cells generate robust interferon and inflammatory responses and treatment with remdesivir or camostat methylate causes a decrease in viral propagation and entry, respectively. In conclusion, iPSC-derived airway cells provide a physiologically relevant in vitro model system to interrogate the pathogenesis of, and develop treatment strategies for, COVID-19 pneumonia.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.06.451340v1" target="_blank">Human airway lineages derived from pluripotent stem cells reveal the epithelial responses to SARS-CoV-2 infection</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Investigating the conformational dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 NSP6 protein with emphasis on non-transmembrane 91-112 &amp; 231-290 regions</strong> -
<div>
The NSP6 protein of SARS-CoV-2 is a transmembrane protein, with some regions lying outside the membrane. Besides, a brief role of NSP6 in autophagosome formation, this is not studied significantly. Also, there is no structural information available till date. Based on the prediction by TMHMM server for transmembrane prediction, it is found that the N-terminal residues (1-11), middle region residues (91-112) and C-terminal residues (231-290) lies outside the membrane. Molecular Dynamics (MD) simulations showed that NSP6 consisting of helical structures, whereas membrane outside lying region (91-112) showed partial helicity, which further used as model and obtain disordered type conformation after 1.5 microseconds. Whereas, the residues 231-290 has both helical and beta sheet conformations in its structure model. A 200ns simulations resulted in the loss of beta sheet structures, while helical regions remained intact. Further, we have characterized the residue 91-112 by using reductionist approaches. The NSP6 (91-112) was found disordered like in isolation, which gain helical conformation in different biological mimic environmental conditions. These studies can be helpful to study NSP6 (91-112) interactions with host proteins, where different protein conformation might play significant role. The present study adds up more information about NSP6 protein aspect, which could be exploited for its host protein interaction and pathogenesis.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.06.451329v1" target="_blank">Investigating the conformational dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 NSP6 protein with emphasis on non-transmembrane 91-112 &amp; 231-290 regions</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>A Newcastle disease virus-vector expressing a prefusion-stabilized spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 induces protective immune responses against prototype virus and variants of concern in mice and hamsters</strong> -
<div>
Rapid development of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines and expedited authorization for use and approval has been proven beneficial to mitigate severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) spread and given hope in this desperate situation. It is believed that sufficient supplies and equitable allocations of vaccines are necessary to limit the global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the emergence of additional variants of concern. We have developed a COVID-19 vaccine based on Newcastle disease virus (NDV) that can be manufactured at high yields in embryonated eggs. Here we provide evidence that the NDV vector expressing an optimized spike antigen (NDV-HXP-S), upgraded from our previous construct, is a versatile vaccine that can be used live or inactivated to induce strong antibody responses and to also cross-neutralize variants of concern. The immunity conferred by NDV-HXP-S effectively counteracts SARS-CoV-2 infection in mice and hamsters. It is noteworthy that vaccine lots produced by existing egg-based influenza virus vaccine manufacturers in Vietnam, Thailand and Brazil exhibited excellent immunogenicity and efficacy in hamsters, demonstrating that NDV-HXP-S vaccines can be quickly produced at large-scale to meet global demands.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.06.451301v1" target="_blank">A Newcastle disease virus-vector expressing a prefusion-stabilized spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 induces protective immune responses against prototype virus and variants of concern in mice and hamsters</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>SARS-CoV-2 genome sequencing with Oxford Nanopore Technology and Rapid PCR Barcoding in Bolivia</strong> -
<div>
SARS-CoV-2 genomic surveillance has Illumina technology as the golden standard. However, Oxford Nanopore Technology (ONT) provides significant improvements in accessibility, turnaround time and portability. Characteristics that gives developing countries the opportunity to perform genome surveillance. The most used protocol to sequence SARS-CoV-2 with ONT is an amplicon-sequencing protocol provided by the ARTIC Network which requires DNA ligation. Ligation reagents can be difficult to obtain in countries like Bolivia. Thus, here we provide an alternative for library preparation using the rapid PCR barcoding kit (ONT). We mapped more than 3.9 million sequence reads that allowed us to sequence twelve SARS-CoV-2 genomes from three different Bolivian cities. The average sequencing depth was 324X and the average genome length was 29527 bp. Thus, we could cover in average a 98,7% of the reference genome. The twelve genomes were successfully assigned to four different nextstrain clades (20A, 20B, 20E and 20G) and we could observe two main lineages of SARS-CoV-2 circulating in Bolivia. Therefore, this alternative library preparation for SARS-CoV-2 genome sequencing is effective to identify SARS-CoV-2 variants with high accuracy and without the need of DNA ligation. Hence, providing another tool to perform SARS-CoV-2 genome surveillance in developing countries.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.06.451357v1" target="_blank">SARS-CoV-2 genome sequencing with Oxford Nanopore Technology and Rapid PCR Barcoding in Bolivia</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>T-CoV: a comprehensive portal of HLA-peptide interactions affected by SARS-CoV-2 mutations</strong> -
<div>
Rapidly appearing SARS-CoV-2 mutations can affect T cell epitopes, which can help the virus to evade either CD8 or CD4 T-cell responses. We developed T-cell COVID-19 Atlas (T-CoV, https://t-cov.hse.ru) - the comprehensive web portal, which allows one to analyze how SARS-CoV-2 mutations alter the presentation of viral peptides by HLA molecules. The data are presented for common virus variants and the most frequent HLA class I and class II alleles. Binding affinities of HLA molecules and viral peptides were assessed with accurate in silico methods. The obtained results highlight the importance of taking HLA alleles diversity into account: mutation-mediated alterations in HLA-peptide interactions were highly dependent on HLA alleles. For example, we found that the essential number of peptides tightly bound to HLA-B*07:02 in the reference Wuhan variant ceased to be tight binders for the Indian (Delta) and the UK (Alpha) variants. In summary, we believe that T-CoV will help researchers and clinicians to predict the susceptibility of individuals with different HLA genotypes to infection with variants of SARS-CoV-2 and/or forecast its severity.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.06.451227v1" target="_blank">T-CoV: a comprehensive portal of HLA-peptide interactions affected by SARS-CoV-2 mutations</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Mouse Antibodies with Activity Against the SARS-CoV-2 D614G and B.1.351 Variants</strong> -
<div>
With the rapid spread of SARS-CoV-2 variants, including those that are resistant to antibodies authorized for emergency use, it is apparent that new antibodies may be needed to effectively protect patients against more severe disease. Differences between the murine and human antibody repertoires may allow for the isolation of murine monoclonal antibodies that recognize a different or broader range of SARS-CoV-2 variants than the human antibodies that have been characterized so far. We describe mouse antibodies B13 and O24 that demonstrate neutralizing potency against SARS-CoV-2 Wuhan (D614G) and B.1.351 variants. Such murine antibodies may have advantages in protecting against severe symptoms when individuals are exposed to new SARS-CoV-2 variants.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.05.451203v1" target="_blank">Mouse Antibodies with Activity Against the SARS-CoV-2 D614G and B.1.351 Variants</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Vaccination willingness for COVID-19 among health care workers in Switzerland</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Aims of the study: Vaccination is regarded as the most promising response to the COVID-19 pandemic. We assessed opinions towards COVID-19 vaccination, willingness to be vaccinated, and reasons for vaccination hesitancy among health care workers (HCWs). Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional, web-based survey among 3,793 HCWs in December 2020 in the Canton of Solothurn, Switzerland, before the start of the national COVID-19 vaccination campaign. Results: Median age was 43 years (interquartile range [IQR] 31-53), 2,841 were female (74.9%). 1,511 HCWs (39.8%) reported willingness to accept vaccination, while 1,114 (29.4%) were unsure, and 1,168 (30.8%) would decline vaccination. Among medical doctors, 76.1% were willing, while only 27.8% of nurses expressed willingness. Among 1,168 HCWs who would decline vaccination, 1,073 (91.9%) expressed concerns about vaccine safety and side effects. The willingness of HCWs to be vaccinated was associated with older age (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] 1.97, 95%Cl 1.71-2.27) and having been vaccinated for influenza this year (aOR 2.70, 95%Cl 2.20-3.31). HCWs who reported a lack of confidence in government were less likely to be willing to be vaccinated (aOR 0.58, 95%Cl 0.40-0.84), and women were less willing to be vaccinated than men (OR 0.33 (0.28-0.38). Conclusion: Less than half of HCWs reported willingness to be vaccinated before the campaign start, but proportions varied greatly depending on the profession and workplace. Strategies with clear and objective messages that particularly address the concerns of HCWs are needed if their willingness to be vaccinated is to be increased.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.04.21255203v1" target="_blank">Vaccination willingness for COVID-19 among health care workers in Switzerland</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Drug offence detection during the COVID-19 lockdown: a spatiotemporal study of change in a street-level drug market</strong> -
<div>
The COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent introduction of strict government orders to `stay-at-home’ has led to a significant decline in most crime types–except, notably, illicit drug detections. However, the impact of these restrictions on open-air, or street-level, drug markets has been neglected in the study of COVID-19. In this paper, we use data from the state of Queensland, Australia, to explore how COVID-19 restrictions may have impacted the open-air drug market of Fortitude Valley in Brisbane. Using a spatiotemporal generalised additive model (GAM), we find that drug detections did not change in the Fortitude Valley region (despite significant increases across the whole state) but that this finding masked considerable reductions in and around the Fortitude Valley train station as well as in the vicinity Brunswick Street mall. It seems that any COVID-19-related decrease appears to have been offset by increases elsewhere, particularly to the streets north and south west of the main street market. These results highlight the limitations of city-wide aggregate analyses of crime during the pandemic and highlights the need for future research, including with qualitative and ethnographic methods to better understand the lived experiences of drug sellers/users and the law enforcement officers who policed these areas.
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/2x53n/" target="_blank">Drug offence detection during the COVID-19 lockdown: a spatiotemporal study of change in a street-level drug market</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Randomized, double blind, placebo controlled, clinical trial to study co-administration of Ashwagandha on safety, immunogenicity, and protection with COVID-19 vaccine: A Study Protocol</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Introduction The government of India has rolled out COVID-19 vaccine program for individuals who are 18 years of age and above and priority is being given to the elderly, and individuals with morbidity. Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine (COVISHIELD) is most widely used in India. A large number of Indian people have been consuming various traditional medicines in the hope of better protection against COVID-19 infection. Several studies have reported immunological benefits of Ashwagandha and its potential as vaccine adjuvant. We plan to study co-administration of Ashwagandha with COVISHIELD vaccine on safety, immunogenicity and protection. Methods and analysis We designed a prospective, randomized, double blind, parallel group, placebo controlled, two arm, exploratory study on healthy volunteers receiving the COVISHIELDTM vaccine. In addition to the two dose schedule of COVISHIELD vaccine as per national guidelines, participants will be administered 8gm Ashwagandha or placebo tablets respectively per day. Primary outcome measure is immunogenicity as measured by SARS-CoV-2 spike (S1) and RBD-specific IgG antibody titres. Secondary outcome measures are safety, protective immune response and quality of life measures. Adverse event following immunization will be monitored at each time throughout the study. Participants will be tracked on a daily basis with a user friendly mobile phone application. Following power calculation 600 participants will be recruited per arm to demonstrate superiority by a margin of 7% with 80% power. Study duration is 28 weeks with interim analysis at the end of 12 weeks. Ethics and dissemination Ethical approval was obtained through the Central and institutional Ethics Committees. Participant recruitment is expected to commence by August 2021. Results will be presented in conferences and published in preprint followed by peer-reviewed medical journals. Registration details Clinical Trial Registry India (CTRI) Registration Number: CTRI/2021/06/034496. Date of Registration June 30, 2021.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.02.21259886v1" target="_blank">Randomized, double blind, placebo controlled, clinical trial to study co-administration of Ashwagandha on safety, immunogenicity, and protection with COVID-19 vaccine: A Study Protocol</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Application of nasal spray containing dimethyl sulfoxide (DSMO) and ethanol during the COVID-19 pandemic may protect healthcare workers: A randomized controlled trials</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Background: Coronavirus pandemic has affected a large population worldwide. Currently, the standard care for individuals who are exposed is supportive care, symptomatic management, and isolation. The aim of our study was to evaluate effects of combined use of ethanol and DMSO as a nasal spray in preventing COVID-19. Methods: We conducted a randomized controlled trial on volunteer healthcare workers of medical centers that were at the forefront of the fight against COVID-19 in Shahroud, Iran. Two hundred and thirty-two participants were randomly assigned to intervention and control groups to receive DSMO/ethanol or routine care, respectively. The subjects were followed for 4 weeks to determine the incidence of COVID-19 infection in each group based on the RT-qPCR test. Finally, absolute risk difference and relative risk were calculated to evaluate the effect of DSMO in prevent COVID-19. Results: The results showed that the incidence of COVID-19 in the control group and intervention group were 0.07 and 0.008, respectively. The relative risk (RR) was 0.12 (0.9-0.02) according to the incidence rate in the two groups. Conclusion: combined application of DSMO and ethanol in healthcare providers can considerably prevent COVID-19.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.06.21259749v1" target="_blank">Application of nasal spray containing dimethyl sulfoxide (DSMO) and ethanol during the COVID-19 pandemic may protect healthcare workers: A randomized controlled trials</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Comorbidity accounts for severe COVID-19 risk, but how do we measure it? Retrospective assessment of the performance of three measures of comorbidity using 4,607 hospitalizations</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Background: Comorbidity burden has been identified as a relevant predictor of critical illness in patients hospitalized with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). However, comorbidity burden is often represented by a simple count of few conditions that may not fully capture patients9 complexity. Purpose: To evaluate the performance of a comprehensive index of the comorbidity burden (Queralt DxS), which includes all chronic conditions present on admission, as an adjustment variable in models for predicting critical illness in hospitalized COVID-19 patients and compare it with two broadly used measures of comorbidity. Patients and methods: We analyzed data from all COVID-19 hospitalizations reported in eight public hospitals of Catalonia (North-East Spain) between June 15 and December 8 2020. The primary outcome was a composite of critical illness that included the need for invasive mechanical ventilation, transfer to ICU, or in-hospital death. Predictors included age, sex, and comorbidities present on admission measured using three indices: the Charlson index, the Elixhauser index, and the Queralt DxS index for comorbidities on admission. The performance of different fitted models was compared using various indicators, including the area under the receiving operating characteristics curve (AUC). Results: Our analysis included 4,607 hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Of them, 1,315 experienced critical illness. Comorbidities significantly contributed to predicting the outcome in all summary indices used. The AUC for prediction of critical illness was 0.641 (95% CI 0.624-0.660) for the Charlson index, 0.665 (0.645-0.681) for the Elixhauser index, and 0.787 (0.773-0.801) for Queralt DxS. Other metrics of model performance also showed Queralt DxS being consistently superior to the other indices. Conclusion: In our analysis, the ability of comorbidity indices to predict hospital outcomes in hospitalized COVID-19 patients increased with their exhaustivity. The comprehensive Queralt DxS index may improve the accuracy of predictive models for resource allocation and clinical decision-making in the hospital setting.
</p>
</div>
<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.02.21259898v1" target="_blank">Comorbidity accounts for severe COVID-19 risk, but how do we measure it? Retrospective assessment of the performance of three measures of comorbidity using 4,607 hospitalizations</a>
</div></li>
<li><strong>Lockdowns exert selection pressure on overdispersion of SARS-CoV-2 variants</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
The SARS-CoV-2 ancestral strain has caused pronounced superspreading events, reflecting a disease characterized by overdispersion, where about 10% of infected people causes 80% of infections. New variants of the disease have different person-to-person variations in viral load, suggesting for example that the Alpha (B.1.1.7) variant is more infectious but relatively less prone to superspreading. Meanwhile, mitigation of the pandemic has focused on limiting social contacts (lockdowns, regulations on gatherings) and decreasing transmission risk through mask wearing and social distancing. Using a mathematical model, we show that the competitive advantage of disease variants may heavily depend on the restrictions imposed. In particular, we find that lockdowns exert an evolutionary pressure which favours variants with lower levels of overdispersion. We find that overdispersion is an evolutionarily unstable trait, with a tendency for more homogeneously spreading variants to eventually dominate.
</p>
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<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.06.30.21259771v1" target="_blank">Lockdowns exert selection pressure on overdispersion of SARS-CoV-2 variants</a>
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<li><strong>Social inequalities in COVID-19 vaccine acceptance and uptake for children and adolescents in Montreal, Canada: a cross-sectional study</strong> -
<div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Background. The success of current and prospective COVID-19 vaccine campaigns for children and adolescents will in part depend on the willingness of parents to accept vaccination. This study examined social determinants of parental COVID-19 vaccine acceptance and uptake for children and adolescents. Methods. We used cross-sectional data from an ongoing COVID-19 cohort study in Montreal, Canada and included all parents of 2 to 18-year-olds who completed an online questionnaire between May 18 and June 26, 2021 (n=809). We calculated child age-adjusted prevalence estimates of vaccine acceptance by parental education, race/ethnicity, birthplace, household income, and neighbourhood, and used multinomial logistic regression to estimate adjusted prevalence differences (aPD) and ratios (aPR). Social determinants of vaccine uptake were estimated for the vaccine-eligible sample of 12 to 18 year-olds (n=306). Results. Intention to vaccinate children against COVID-19 was high, with only 12.4% of parents unlikely to have their child vaccinated. Parents with younger children were less likely to accept vaccination, as were those from lower-income households, racialized groups, and those born outside Canada. The percent of parents whose child was vaccinated or very likely to be vaccinated was 18.4 percentage points lower among those with annual household incomes &lt;$100,000 vs. &gt;=$150,000 (95% CI: 10.1 to 26.7). Racialized parents reported greater unwillingness to vaccinate compared to White parents (aPD=10.3; 95% CI: 1.5, 19.1). Vaccine-eligible adolescents from the most deprived neighbourhood were half as likely to be vaccinated compared to those from the least deprived neighbourhood (aPR = 0.48; 95% CI: 0.18 to 0.77). Interpretation. This study identified marked social inequalities in COVID-19 vaccine acceptance and uptake for children and adolescents. Efforts are needed to reach disadvantaged and marginalized populations with tailored strategies that promote informed decision making and facilitate access to vaccination.
</p>
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<div class="article-link article-html-link">
🖺 Full Text HTML: <a href="https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.08.21256831v2" target="_blank">Social inequalities in COVID-19 vaccine acceptance and uptake for children and adolescents in Montreal, Canada: a cross-sectional study</a>
</div></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-clinical-trials">From Clinical Trials</h1>
<ul>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Cognitive and Psychological Disorders After Severe COVID-19 Infection</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   COVID 19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Diagnostic Test: Cognitive assessment;   Diagnostic Test: Imaging;   Diagnostic Test: Routine care;   Other: Psychiatric evaluation<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   Central Hospital, Nancy, France;   Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Besancon;   University Hospital, Strasbourg, France;   Centre Hospitalier Régional Metz-Thionville;   Centre hospitalier Epinal;   Hopitaux Civils de Colmar<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Phase 1 Study to Assess Safety, Tolerability, PD, PK, Immunogenicity of IV NTR-441 Solution in Healthy Volunteers and COVID-19 Patients</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Drug: NTR-441;   Drug: Placebo<br/><b>Sponsor</b>:   Neutrolis<br/><b>Recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>COVID-19 Vaccinations With a Sweepstakes</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Intervention</b>:   Behavioral: Philly Vax Sweepstakes<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   University of Pennsylvania;   Philadelphia Department of Public Health<br/><b>Active, not recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Covid-19 Virtual Recovery Study</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Behavioral: Strength RMT;   Behavioral: Strength RMT and nasal breathing;   Behavioral: Endurance RMT;   Behavioral: Endurance RMT and nasal breathing;   Behavioral: Low dose RMT<br/><b>Sponsor</b>:   Mayo Clinic<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>A Study to Evaluate MVC-COV1901 Vaccine Against COVID-19 in Adolescents</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19 Vaccine<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Biological: MVC-COV1901(S protein with adjuvant);   Biological: MVC-COV1901(Saline)<br/><b>Sponsor</b>:   Medigen Vaccine Biologics Corp.<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Efficacy of Inhaled Therapies in the Treatment of Acute Symptoms Associated With COVID-19</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Drug: inhaled beclametasone;   Drug: Inahaled beclomethasone / formoterol / glycopyrronium<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   UPECLIN HC FM Botucatu Unesp;   Chiesi Farmaceutici S.p.A.<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Study on Sequential Immunization of Inactivated COVID-19 Vaccine and Recombinant COVID-19 Vaccine (Ad5 Vector)</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   COVID-19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Biological: Recombinant SARS-CoV-2 Ad5 vectored vaccine;   Biological: Inactive SARS-CoV-2 vaccine (Vero cell)<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   Jiangsu Province Centers for Disease Control and Prevention;   CanSino Biologics Inc.<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Efficacy of Amantadine Treatment in COVID-19 Patients</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Patients With Moderate or Severe COVID-19<br/><b>Intervention</b>:   Drug: Amantadine<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   Noblewell;   Medical Research Agency (ABM);   Leszek Giec Upper-Silesian Medical Centre of the Silesian Medical University in Katowice<br/><b>Recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Dapsone Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 Trial (DAP-CORONA) COVID-19</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   COVID-19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Drug: Dapsone 85 mg PO BID;   Drug: Placebo 85 mg PO BID<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   McGill University Health Centre/Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre;   Pulmonem Inc.<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Covid-19 Patients Management During Home Isolation</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Procedure: Oxygen therapy and physical therapy;   Device: Oxygen therapy<br/><b>Sponsor</b>:   Cairo University<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Ivermectin Versus Standard Treatment in Mild COVID-19</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Intervention</b>:   Drug: Ivermectin Tablets<br/><b>Sponsor</b>:   Assiut University<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>SCALE-UP Utah: Community-Academic Partnership to Address COVID-19 Testing Among Utah Community Health Centers</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Behavioral: Text-Messaging (TM);   Behavioral: Patient Navigation (PN)<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   University of Utah;   Association for Utah Community Health;   Utah Department of Health;   National Institutes of Health (NIH)<br/><b>Recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>SCALE-UP Utah: Community-Academic Partnership to Address COVID-19 Vaccination Rates Among Utah Community Health Centers</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Behavioral: Text-Messaging (TM);   Behavioral: Patient Navigation (PN)<br/><b>Sponsors</b>:   University of Utah;   Association for Utah Community Health;   Utah Department of Health;   National Institutes of Health (NIH)<br/><b>Recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Chinese Herbal Formula for COVID-19</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Interventions</b>:   Drug: mQFPD;   Drug: organic brown rice<br/><b>Sponsor</b>:   University of California, San Diego<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Remdesivir- Ivermectin Combination Therapy in Severe Covid-19</strong> - <b>Condition</b>:   Covid19<br/><b>Intervention</b>:   Drug: Ivermectin<br/><b>Sponsor</b>:   Assiut University<br/><b>Not yet recruiting</b></p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-pubmed">From PubMed</h1>
<ul>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Kynurenic acid may underlie sex-specific immune responses to COVID-19</strong> - Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has poorer clinical outcomes in males than in females, and immune responses underlie these sex-related differences. Because immune responses are, in part, regulated by metabolites, we examined the serum metabolomes of COVID-19 patients. In male patients, kynurenic acid (KA) and a high KA-to-kynurenine (K) ratio (KA:K) positively correlated with age and with inflammatory cytokines and chemokines and negatively correlated with T cell responses. Males that…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Pacemaker-related <em>Candida parapsilosis</em> fungaemia in an immunosuppressed renal transplant recipient</strong> - Renal transplant recipients are at risk for opportunistic infections due to their immunosuppressed state. We describe the case of a 59-year-old renal transplant recipient who presented with sepsis and bilateral pulmonary emboli due to Candida parapsilosis She was treated with intravenous caspofungin and had a transoesophageal echocardiogram, which revealed vegetations on her pacemaker leads. She then underwent surgery to replace her pacemaker; however, her blood cultures remained positive for C….</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Re-Du-Ning injection ameliorates LPS-induced lung injury through inhibiting neutrophil extracellular traps formation</strong> - CONCLUSION: These findings demonstrate that RDN ameliorates LPS-induced ALI through suppressing MAPK pathway to inhibit the formation of NETs.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies: Longevity, breadth, and evasion by emerging viral variants</strong> - The Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) antibody neutralization response and its evasion by emerging viral variants and variant of concern (VOC) are unknown, but critical to understand reinfection risk and breakthrough infection following vaccination. Antibody immunoreactivity against SARS-CoV-2 antigens and Spike variants, inhibition of Spike-driven virus-cell fusion, and infectious SARS-CoV-2 neutralization were characterized in 807 serial samples from 233 reverse…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Human immunoglobulin from transchromosomic bovines hyperimmunized with SARS-CoV-2 spike antigen efficiently neutralizes viral variants</strong> - Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants with amino-acid substitutions and deletions in spike protein (S) can reduce the effectiveness of monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) and may compromise immunity induced by vaccines. We report a polyclonal, fully human, anti-SARS-CoV-2 immunoglobulin produced in transchromosomic bovines (Tc-hIgG-SARS-CoV-2) hyperimmunized with two doses of plasmid DNA encoding the SARS-CoV-2 Wuhan strain S gene, followed by repeated immunization with…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Two Inhibitors Against the 3C-Like Proteases of Swine Coronavirus and Feline Coronavirus</strong> - Coronaviruses (CoVs) are important human and animal pathogens that cause respiratory and gastrointestinal diseases. Porcine epidemic diarrhoea (PED), characterized by severe diarrhoea and vomiting in pigs, is a highly lethal disease caused by porcine epidemic diarrhoea virus (PEDV) and causes substantial losses in the swine industry worldwide. However, currently available commercial drugs have not shown great therapeutic effects. In this study, a fluorescence resonance energy transfer…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Umbilical Cord-derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells modulate TNF and soluble TNF Receptor 2 (sTNFR2) in COVID-19 ARDS patients</strong> - CONCLUSIONS: These observations suggest that sTNFR2 plays a mechanistic role in mediating UC-MSC effect on TNFα and TNFβ plasma levels, determining a decrease in inflammation in COVID-19 ARDS.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>A bivalent recombinant vaccine targeting the S1 protein induces neutralizing antibodies against both SARS-CoV-2 variants and wild-type of the virus</strong> - The emerging variants of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) in pandemic call for the urgent development of universal corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccines which could be effective for both wild-type SARS-CoV-2 and mutant strains. In the current study, we formulated protein subunit vaccines with AS03 adjuvant and recombinant proteins of S1 subunit of SARS-CoV-2 (S1-WT) and S1 variant (K417N, E484K, N501Y, and D614G) subunit (S1-Mut), and immunized transgenic mice…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Target-based drug discovery, ADMET profiling and bioactivity studies of antibiotics as potential inhibitors of SARS-CoV-2 main protease (M(pro))</strong> - A recent outbreak of a new strain of Coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) has become a global health burden, which has resulted in deaths. No proven drug has been found to effectively cure this fast-spreading infection, hence the need to explore old drugs with the known profile in tackling this pandemic. A computer-aided drug design approach involving virtual screening was used to obtain the binding scores and inhibiting efficiencies of previously known antibiotics against SARS-CoV-2 main protease…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Laser-facilitated epicutaneous immunization of mice with SARS-CoV-2 spike protein induces antibodies inhibiting spike/ACE2 binding</strong> - The skin represents an attractive target tissue for vaccination against respiratory viruses such as SARS-CoV-2. Laser-facilitated epicutaneous immunization (EPI) has been established as a novel technology to overcome the skin barrier, which combines efficient delivery via micropores with an inherent adjuvant effect due to the release of danger-associated molecular patterns. Here we delivered the S1 subunit of the Spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 to the skin of BALB/c mice via laser-generated…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Phytotherapic Drugs For Covid19 Treatment: A Scoping Review</strong> - CONCLUSION: Altogether, the review presents the action mechanism of plant extracts rich in bioactive compounds and depicted potential antiviral activity against SARS-CoV-2. These plant bioactive compounds can serve as lead molecules to develop phytomedicine, ensuring all safety regulations in the clinical trials to treat or prevent COVID19 viral infections.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Mechanistic Aspects of Medicinal Plants and Secondary Metabolites against Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)</strong> - CONCLUSION: Medicinal plants and/or their bioactive compounds with inhibitory effects against SARS-CoV-2 support the human immune system and help in fighting against COVID-19 and rejuvenating the immune system.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Triangle of cytokine storm, central nervous system involvement, and viral infection in COVID-19: the role of sFasL and neuropilin-1</strong> - Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV2) is identified as the cause of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), and is often linked to extreme inflammatory responses by over activation of neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs), cytokine storm, and sepsis. These are robust causes for multi-organ damage. In particular, potential routes of SARS-CoV2 entry, such as angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), have been linked to central nervous system (CNS) involvement. CNS has been…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Protein S: function, regulation, and clinical perspectives</strong> - PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Protein S (PS) is an essential natural anticoagulant. PS deficiency is a major contributor to acquired hypercoagulability. Acquired hypercoagulability causes myocardial infarction, stroke, and deep vein thrombosis in millions of individuals. Yet, despite its importance in hemostasis, PS is the least understood anticoagulant. Even after 40 years since PS was first described, we are still uncovering information about how PS functions. The purpose of this review is to highlight…</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Boswellic acids/Boswellia serrata extract as a potential COVID-19 therapeutic agent in the elderly</strong> - The most severe cases of COVID-19, and the highest rates of death, are among the elderly. There is an urgent need to search for an agent to treat the disease and control its progression. Boswellia serrata is traditionally used to treat chronic inflammatory diseases of the lung. This review aims to highlight currently published research that has shown evidence of potential therapeutic effects of boswellic acids (BA) and B. serrata extract against COVID-19 and associated conditions. We reviewed…</p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-patent-search">From Patent Search</h1>
<ul>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Differential detection kit for common SARS-CoV-2 variants in COVID-19 patients</strong> - - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=AU328840861">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>SARS-CoV-2 anti-viral therapeutic</strong> - - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=AU327160071">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>A POLYHERBAL ALCOHOL FREE FORMULATION FOR ORAL CAVITY</strong> - The present invention generally relates to a herbal composition. Specifically, the present invention relates to a polyherbal alcohol free composition comprising of Glycyrrhiza glabra root extract, Ocimum sanctum leaf extract, Elettaria cardamomum fruit extract, Mentha spicata (Spearmint) oil and Tween 80 and method of preparation thereof. The polyherbal alcohol free composition of the present invention possesses excellent antimicrobial properties and useful for oral cavity. - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=IN325690740">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>新型冠状病毒B.1.351南非突变株RBD的基因及其应用</strong> - 本发明属于生物技术领域，具体涉及新型冠状病毒B.1.351南非突变株RBD的基因及其应用。本发明的新型冠状病毒B.1.351南非突变株RBD的基因，其核苷酸序列如SEQIDNO.1或SEQIDNO.6所示。本发明通过优化野生型新型冠状病毒南非B.1.351南非突变株RBD的基因序列，并结合筛选确定了相对最佳序列，优化后序列产生的克隆表达效率比野生型新型冠状病毒B.1.351南非突变株RBD序列表达效率大幅提高，从而，本发明的新型冠状病毒B.1.351南非突变株RBD的基因可以用于制备新型冠状病毒疫苗。 - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=CN328990628">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>检测新型冠状病毒中和抗体的试剂盒及其应用</strong> - 本发明涉及生物技术领域，具体而言，提供了一种检测新型冠状病毒中和抗体的试剂盒及其应用。本发明提供的检测新型冠状病毒中和抗体试剂盒，具体包括（a）或（b）两种方案：（a）示踪物标记的RBD三聚体抗原，包被在固体支持物上的ACE2，以及，含有0.2‑10mg/mL十二烷基二甲基甜菜碱的工作液；（b）示踪物标记的ACE2，包被在固体支持物上的RBD三聚体抗原，以及，含有0.2‑10mg/mL十二烷基二甲基甜菜碱的工作液；其中，RBD三聚体抗原利用二硫键将刺突蛋白的RBD与S2亚基完全交联得到。十二烷基二甲基甜菜碱会显著提高RBD三聚体抗原与新冠中和性抗体结合速度，提升阳性样本平均发光强度，缩短检测时间。 - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=CN328990376">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>一种检测SARS-CoV-2的引物组合物及其应用</strong> - 本发明涉及一种检测SARS‑CoV‑2的引物组合物及其应用。所述引物组合物包括SEQ ID NO:1~SEQ ID NO:12所示的核酸序列。本发明利用所述引物组合物进行逆转录巢式PCR，并结合Sanger测序，能够快速、准确地获取SARS‑CoV‑2基因信息，从而能够实现快速检测SARS‑CoV‑2以及判断SARS‑CoV‑2突变株，且具备良好的准确性、灵敏度、特异性以及重复性。 - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=CN328990422">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>一种新冠病毒肺炎重症化预测系统及方法</strong> - 本发明涉及疾病预测技术领域，公开了一种新冠病毒肺炎重症化预测系统及方法，包括以下步骤：步骤一，采集患者血常规信息和用户信息；步骤二，将患者血常规信息按照用户信息进行等级分类；步骤三，将已经等级分类的患者血常规信息与对应等级的标准信息进行比较；步骤四，当患者血常规信息在标准信息范围内则判定患者为轻症患者，当患者血常规信息在标准信息范围外则判定患者为重症患者。本发明能够准确快速地区分轻症和重症。 - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=CN328308318">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>MEDIDOR DE SATURACION</strong> - - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=ES325874099">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>폐마스크 밀봉 회수기</strong> - 본 발명은 마스크 착용 후 버려지는 일회용 폐마스크를 비닐봉지에 넣은 후 밀봉하여 배출함으로써, 2차 감염을 예방하고 일반 생활폐기물과 선별 분리 배출하여 환경오염을 방지하는 데 그 목적이 있다. - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=KR325788342">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>백신 냉각 및 해동 기능을 갖는 백신 보관장치</strong> - 본 발명은 백신 냉각 및 해동 기능을 갖는 백신 보관장치에 관한 것으로, 상, 하부하우징의 제1상, 하부누출방지공간에 냉각물질이 충입된 냉각파이프를 설치하되, 제2상, 하부누출방지공간에 가열물질이 충입된 가열파이프를 설치하여, 구획판부에 의해 구획된 백신냉각공간 및 백신해동공간 각각을 냉각 및 가열하고, 보조도어를 통해 백신냉각공간 내에 수용된 백신을 구획판부의 백신출구도어를 통해 백신해동공간으로 이동시켜, 백신해동공간 내에서 백신을 해동함으로써, 즉시 사용이 가능한 백신을 인출도어를 통해 인출할 수 있다. 본 발명에 따르면, 냉각파이프에 저장된 냉매에 의해 백신냉각공간 내의 온도가 극저온 상태로 변화되고, 극저온 상태를 유지하는 백신냉각공간 내에 백신을 저장하여, 안전하게 보관 할 수 있으며, 백신냉각공간 내의 백신을 백신해동공간 내로 이동시켜, 백신해동공간 내에서 백신을 해동할 수 있고, 이 해동된 백신을 인출도어를 통해 인출한 후 즉시 사용할 수 있어 백신을 해동하는 시간이 단축되며, 보조도어를 통해 백신냉각공간 내의 백신을 백신해동공간으로 이동시켜, 백신이 외기에 노출될 우려가 없으며, 백신냉각공간 내의 백신을 백신해동공간으로 이동시키거나 또는 인출도어를 통해 백신 인출시 정렬장치가 백신을 보조도어 및 인출도어 직하방에 자동 위치시킨다. - <a href="https://patentscope.wipo.int/search/en/detail.jsf?docId=KR327274025">link</a></p></li>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="daily-dose">Daily-Dose</h1>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
<ul>
<li><a href="#from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-vox">From Vox</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</a></li>
<li><a href="#from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</a></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</h1>
<ul>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Why Did the Police Shoot Matthew Zadok Williams?</strong> - Outside Atlanta, a mother and five sisters look for answers. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/us-journal/why-did-the-police-shoot-matthew-zadok-williams">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>What’s Next for the Campaign to Break Up Big Tech?</strong> - A judge recently dismissed two antitrust cases against Facebook. But what appeared to be a setback for the effort may actually provide a road map for how it can succeed. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/whats-next-for-the-campaign-to-break-up-big-tech">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>What We Need to Learn from the Tragedy in Surfside</strong> - It is possible that South Florida, where climate change is a particularly acute problem, is nearing a point at which even the best-constructed buildings are under threat. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/07/12/what-we-need-to-learn-from-the-tragedy-in-surfside">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>This July 4th, Can We De-Adapt from the Pandemic and Trump at the Same Time?</strong> - Although 2021 is only half over, it has brought about two major restart moments—one in politics and the other in public health. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/this-july-4th-can-we-de-adapt-from-the-pandemic-and-trump-at-the-same-time">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Sifting Silently Through Surfside’s Rubble</strong> - Sinead Imbaro and her Belgian Malinois’s quest for hints of life. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/dispatch/sifting-silently-through-surfsides-rubble">link</a></p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-vox">From Vox</h1>
<ul>
<li><strong>Did anyone actually want more Gossip Girl?</strong> -
<figure>
<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/uym-ww7r5Vv1fmidyjAlbQIpWKU=/88x0:1496x1056/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/69550166/evan_mock_thomas_doherty_emily_alyn_lind_eli_brown_jordan_alexander_savannah_smith_zion_moreno.0.jpeg"/>
<figcaption>
Evan Mock, Thomas Doherty, Emily Alyn Lind, Eli Brown, Jordan Alexander, Savannah Smith, and Zion Moreno in HBO Max’s <em>Gossip Girl</em>. | Karolina Wojtasik/HBO Max
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
HBO Max’s Gossip Girl reboot is an expensive, tired retread.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ovXYsx">
It’s hard to imagine that anyone was craving more <em>Gossip Girl</em>.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="G4fvqN">
The original version of the show, a glossy and cold-hearted soap about the glamorous foibles of wealthy Manhattanite teens, was a sensation when it first premiered on the CW in 2007. It was the coolest new show on TV, and watching it felt like grabbing a boozy brunch with your perfectly coiffed friend who flies into town once a month to recuperate in between threesomes in Paris and coke binges in Berlin: Oh, so <em>that’s</em> how the other half lives.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9xGDPJ">
But by the time it ended in 2012, six seasons and countless love triangles later, <em>Gossip Girl</em> had grown stale and exhausting. It began repeating its stories over and over again; with each iteration, they seemed to get a little colder. The show’s ratings fell off a cliff. In its final season, it <a href="https://tvseriesfinale.com/tv-show/gossip-girl-season-six-ratings-24920/#:~:text=Final%20season%20averages%3A%200.5%20rating,demographic%20with%20900%2C000%20total%20viewers.">regularly pulled under a million viewers</a> per episode, down from a peak of <a href="http://yourentertainmentnow.com/2008/09/02/broadcast-tv-ratings-for-monday-september-1-2008/">3.38 million in 2008</a>.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RGvJld">
Nevertheless, on July 8, <em>Gossip Girl</em> will be back on HBO Max under the auspices of Josh Safran, a writer-producer on the original show. Watching it feels like that same glamorous old friend has called you up for brunch again, ready to repeat the same handful of stories they’ve already told you a thousand times, and oh, would you mind footing the bill, too? Times aren’t what they used to be.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zHtNu7">
The new <em>Gossip Girl</em> is, loosely speaking, an in-universe continuation of the old, taking place at the same viciously rich Upper East Side high school with a new set of students, nine years after the original show ended. Our new queen bee is Julien (Jordan Alexander), an Insta-famous influencer who mouths platitudes about how she doesn’t believe in hierarchies while maintaining a white-knuckled grip on the school’s social scene. Her chief rival in that effort is her estranged half-sister, middle-class Zoya (Whitney Peak), who transfers into the school and immediately captures everyone’s attention with her punk rock refusal to bow to the whims of high school authority.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HckZAl">
This dynamic is — as you will note if you watched the original <em>Gossip Girl</em>, and which the show self-consciously lampshades — very Serena and Blair redux. It’s one of many ways the new <em>Gossip Girl</em> feels less like a continuation than like a remix: The exact same set of characteristics that animated the original cast have been scattered merrily through a new and photogenic cast of newcomers, who are, in keeping with the times, less white and less straight than the originals.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1nCA9z">
Which means very little about <em>Gossip Girl</em> feels new. It’s just the same old show with a face-lift and a bigger, streaming-friendly budget.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="XK4ULw">
Cross Dan’s judgy social conscience with Nate’s prince of the Upper East Side status and you get Obie (Eli Brown), the wealthy anti-gentrification activist torn between Julien and Zoya. Julien combines Blair’s killer social instincts with Serena’s effortless fashion sense, while Blair’s ice princess primness goes to Julien’s best friend Audrey (Emily Alyn Lind). You could practically <a href="https://www.vulture.com/2021/06/gossip-girl-reboot-cast.html">draw a graph</a>.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Fetxsw">
Frankly, the original <em>Gossip Girl</em> did not really have enough personality traits to sustain its first cast, let alone a new one. (Disclosure: I come to this new show as a viewer who found the original to run a maddening spectrum of nearly brilliant to unwatchably awful, but I also watched almost every episode, with the exception of the final season.) The new show is reiterating the same set of tired tropes as the first, so even four episodes in, it has acquired an exhausting sameness. You feel you’ve already seen all of it before.
</p>
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<aside id="HNRXEp">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jXtaOS">
The biggest difference between the new <em>Gossip Girl</em> and the old is also perhaps the show’s most wackadoodle plotline. Now as then, our cast of teens is tormented by an anonymous and omniscient blogger, the titular Gossip Girl, who is tasked with revealing everyone’s scandalous secrets at the most inconvenient possible time, and with providing a thematic voiceover at the end of each episode to explain how all of the show’s subplots are secretly about the same thing. (She’s still voiced by Kristen Bell, who I hope to god is being paid well for the word salad she keeps purring in her most scandalized voice.)
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Vnxp6n">
While original <em>Gossip Girl</em> never planned to reveal the Girl’s identity, however, the new <em>Gossip Girl</em> has made her central to the show, in an absolutely bonkers way.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WcwA14">
The new students of Constance Billiard School, we learn, are terrorizing their underpaid teachers with bitchy quips about their Zara wardrobes and threats to get them fired for giving out bad grades.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NvSTME">
But it wasn’t always like this, one teacher explains. Back in 2009, all the students were well-behaved model pupils who respected authority because they were all being terrorized into submission by Gossip Girl. And doesn’t that story just give the new teachers an idea!
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GdxWHt">
Before long, the teachers are happily filming their underage students changing in front of windows, digging up smut on all the cool kids, and publishing the results on Instagram for all the world to see. In exchange, they get to revel in a more respectful, more thoughtful school environment.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="SwkrCT">
None of it makes any sense from top to bottom, but <em>Gossip Girl</em> has always been at its most fun when it stopped clinging to such old-fashioned constraints as “coherent plotting” or “character motivations that make sense.” Gossip Girls United Against the Bullying of Teachers comes from the same well of nonsense that birthed such plotlines as Serena Kills a Guy and Blair Becomes Princess of Monaco, and as such it breathes some welcome life into the new series. It’s also a window into what the new variation on the show does pretty well.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="f1ZdUu">
The chief architect of the new Gossip Girl plan is English teacher Kate Keller, played by the writer, editor, and proto-influencer Tavi Gevinson. Gevinson is not a natural actress, but her very presence functions as a campy, smirking wink to the audience: Unlike the old CW <em>Gossip Girl</em>, the new HBO <em>Gossip Girl</em> will understand the social currency of the internet. Or at least, the wealthy New York media personality corners of the internet.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="m7Q7Vx">
When <em>Gossip Girl</em> can unite its camp ridiculousness with its meticulous understanding of what Manhattan clout looks like in the age of Instagram, it starts to soar. Like when Princess Nokia backs out of a private performance at one of Julien’s parties because Julien’s been canceled for a fat-shaming tweet she wrote at 13, but then has to agree to perform after all when Julien rebrands the party as a fundraiser for lupus research in honor of her dead mother. Or when the gang goes to see the new <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2019/12/5/20961826/slave-play-broadway-2019-review">Jeremy O. Harris</a> play at the Public, and then Harris asks 14-year-old Zoya — who, chicly, has her doubts about <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/21305967/hamilton-debate-controversy-historical-accuracy-explained"><em>Hamilton</em>’s racial politics</a> — to come party with him in the VIP area because he’s so interested in her thoughts on how Broadway needs to evolve. All those moments are the kind of silly, soapy fun at which this show knows how to excel.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yZHkGN">
Yet while <em>Gossip Girl</em> has savviness galore when it comes to the complexities of clout-chasing, when it comes to making its characters feel like real and interesting people, it has no idea what it’s doing. Which wouldn’t be so bad if <em>Gossip Girl </em>didn’t have aspirations to make you care about its characters and to develop some sort of heart.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jRZhXn">
It wants you to root for Zoya and Julien to become friends as well as sisters, even as it revels in the sudsiness of their on-again-off-again rivalry. It wants you to care about lothario Max (Thomas Doherty) and his fraught relationship with his two dads, even as it shows him seducing his classics teacher in the school showers. It even demonstrates a touchingly naive belief that its audience will take Julien’s decision to drop filters and makeup for a day as a sign of her revolutionary honesty, and not as a classic iteration of an influencer with good bone structure flexing on her audience with a #nomakeup #nofilter selfie.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bca06F">
The new <em>Gossip Girl</em> careens back and forth between giving its audience frothy, minutely observed rich-people hijinks, and serving up shopworn and sentimental clichés about teen soap archetypes with the apparent belief that viewers will embrace them with a ready hand.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="FAWxFo">
That’s a problem the original <em>Gossip Girl</em> ran into over and over again, too. Except in that case, the show had a secret weapon: Leighton Meester. Meester was cast as Blair, original <em>Gossip Girl</em>’s ice queen, but she developed into the beating heart of the show, memorably described by another character as a “95-pound, doe-eyed, bon-mot-tossing, designer-label-whoring package of girly evil.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="NZEOBM">
The exhaustive <em>Gossip Girl</em> recappers at Daily Intel used to joke that Blair had access to another, better writers’ room than the rest of the characters did, but what they meant was that Meester was capable of making even bad jokes sound clever.<em> </em>She could make you cry or make you cringe in delicious sympathy with whichever of Blair’s minions she was cutting down to size for buying her shoes at a discount, and it’s thanks to Meester’s efforts that the show ever worked as well as it managed to.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DIebtl">
So really, <em>did</em> anyone ever want more <em>Gossip Girl</em>? Or did they just want more of Leighton Meester saying bitchy things in a variety of fetching headbands?
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hbTtbn">
That’s not something the new <em>Gossip Girl</em> can provide. And without Meester or her equivalent talent on its side, it simply doesn’t have the skill to pull off what it’s trying to pull off. Which makes it feel, in the end, like the worst thing a reboot possibly could be: unnecessary and unexciting.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0Qc3Gb">
You don’t have to keep meeting your exhausting, toxic frenemy for brunch to hear the same handful of stories another thousand times, even if they’ve promised to sprinkle in a few new bon mots. It’s time to unfriend and unfollow.
</p></li>
<li><strong>Sha’Carri Richardson and the last gasp of the war on marijuana</strong> -
<figure>
<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/Rt_Vjq0l2GpKW1cBGtSoa-9SoW8=/124x0:4988x3648/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/69549927/1325144581.0.jpg"/>
<figcaption>
Sha’Carri Richardson looks on after winning the women’s 100-meter final on the second day of the US Olympic Track and Field Trials for the Tokyo Games on June 19, 2021, in Eugene, Oregon. | Patrick Smith/Getty Images
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Public attitudes around marijuana have shifted. Policy at all levels is taking time to catch up.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7DHbwc">
What would have happened if Sha’Carri Richardson were suspended from the Olympics for marijuana use in the 1980s?
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="KPoZx2">
In the era of Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” mantra, as the country barreled further into its war on drugs, much of the public likely would have backed the move to block the sprinter from competing after a failed drug test. Politicians on the right and left, many of whom worked together to enact punitive anti-drug laws, would have said the suspension sends the right message to the public about the dangers of drug use — while news shows hosting these politicians’ messages cut to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_Is_Your_Brain_on_Drugs">“This Is Your Brain on Drugs” commercials</a> showing an egg frying on a pan.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qYbmuz">
The story is very different today. Prominent figures on the left and right, ranging from <a href="https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1411063289350610947">Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez</a> to <a href="https://twitter.com/DonaldJTrumpJr/status/1411132442254118912">Donald Trump Jr.</a>, condemned the decision. For Americans now living in states where marijuana is legal (including Oregon, <a href="https://www.oregonlive.com/sports/2021/07/shacarri-richardson-used-marijuana-legally-in-oregon-now-out-of-olympic-100-meter-race-after-drug-test.html">where Richardson used it</a>), the question is obvious: Why should this drug get anyone banned any more than other legal recreational substances, such as alcohol or tobacco? Even President Joe Biden, who as a senator <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/4/25/18282870/joe-biden-criminal-justice-war-on-drugs-mass-incarceration">helped write</a> anti-drug laws in the ’80s and has taken <a href="https://www.vox.com/22387746/biden-marijuana-weed-legalization-schumer-polls">a more conservative stance</a> on marijuana legalization, <a href="https://twitter.com/BoKnowsNews/status/1411415593417326595">suggested</a> — while also acknowledging that “the rules are the rules” — that the rules should change.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JfQ0O0">
Yet Richardson remains suspended, making her the latest victim of the global war on drugs.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="T8ThRc">
There’s no good evidence that marijuana enhances a sprinter’s ability to compete — pot, after all, is not exactly known for making people faster or more energetic. As a founder of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/olympics/2021/07/03/shacarri-richardson-marijuana-olympics-doping-ban/">told the Washington Post</a>, marijuana’s inclusion as a banned substance was rooted in the fact that it was, and still is, illegal in much of the world.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="adOXkh">
“We were a little diffident about saying, ‘Even though these things are prohibited by criminal law, we don’t care,’” Dick Pound, also a member of the International Olympic Committee, said. “That just looked bad. But I think as thought has been given to these things over the years, they’re really not performance-enhancing.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="MkjDU1">
In fact, the US over the years has pledged financial support to the Olympics to help wipe out drug use, both performance-enhancing and recreational, from the competition. The White House drug czar under former President Bill Clinton, Barry McCaffrey, was explicit: “We raise Olympic athletes up on international pedestals for all the world’s children to look up to as role models — it is vital that the message they send is drug-free. The goal of this whole effort must be to prevent Olympic medals and the Olympic movement from being tarnished by drugs.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mQysVU">
To put it another way: The war on drugs — which was fostered by US foreign policy and also led to international treaties that <a href="https://www.vox.com/world/2018/10/17/17968234/canada-marijuana-legalization-sales-stores">still ban recreational marijuana use</a> — pushed the influential WADA to prohibit recreational marijuana use among athletes, a ban it continues to enforce.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="MCfBaY">
The problem for the Olympics is that attitudes around marijuana have shifted dramatically over the past few years. Eighteen states and Washington, DC, <a href="https://www.vox.com/2021/4/12/22371929/marijuana-legalization-connecticut-biden">have legalized marijuana for recreational use</a>. <a href="https://www.vox.com/world/2018/10/17/17968234/canada-marijuana-legalization-sales-stores">Canada</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/identities/2018/8/20/17938416/marijuana-legalization-world-uruguay-canada-netherlands">Uruguay</a> have also legalized cannabis, even as it puts them in conflict with international law; other countries are considering similar moves, with several dozen already legalizing marijuana for medical uses. In many nations, including in the US, public opinion is strongly behind these changes.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bQIuCr">
The Olympics have now been put in a position of effectively condemning something that much of the competition’s viewership no longer rejects and, in fact, would like to see their governments relax the rules around. Richardson is not just a victim of the war on drugs: She’s a victim of an approach that no longer matches much of the public’s views of drugs.
</p>
<div class="c-float-right">
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<h3 id="FP2Yog">
Americans’ views toward marijuana have softened
</h3>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dA8rpN">
It really can’t be understated how quickly views around marijuana have changed in such a short time.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xEPjDq">
One decade ago, marijuana wasn’t legal anywhere in the world — not even in the Netherlands, which takes a soft approach to marijuana but technically still prohibits it. But then Colorado and Washington state legalized marijuana, opening the floodgates to a broader movement. Since then, 16 other states have followed suit, as well as the nations of Canada, Uruguay, and, perhaps soon, Mexico.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="BDeYVG">
In the US, public attitudes have often been ahead of the change. In 2000, just 31 percent of the country backed legalization while 64 percent opposed it, <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/1657/illegal-drugs.aspx">according to Gallup</a>. By 2020, the numbers flipped: In the <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/323582/support-legal-marijuana-inches-new-high.aspx">most recent Gallup poll</a> on the topic, 68 percent of respondents supported legalization and 32 percent were against it.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0adbsd">
It is, after all, voter-approved initiatives in Colorado and Washington that enabled the first two US states to legalize.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="o974HN">
This support extends to Republicans, who typically take more conservative views on drugs. Gallup found that a slim majority of Republicans supported marijuana legalization in <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/221018/record-high-support-legalizing-marijuana.aspx">2017</a>, <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/243908/two-three-americans-support-legalizing-marijuana.aspx">2018</a>, and <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/267698/support-legal-marijuana-steady-past-year.aspx">2019</a>; a majority were opposed to it in <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/323582/support-legal-marijuana-inches-new-high.aspx">2020</a>, but the difference was within the margin of error, and a sizable minority of 48 percent still backed it. Pew also <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/11/14/americans-support-marijuana-legalization/">found</a> a majority of Republicans — 55 percent — backed legalization in 2019.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="m0d1lb">
And of the four Republican-dominated states where marijuana use has come up to a vote, it’s won in three: Alaska, Montana, and South Dakota, losing only in North Dakota. Marijuana legalization is 3-1 in solid red states.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9r5lIu">
Marijuana remains illegal at the federal level. But even that stands to change in the near future as public opinion moves ahead rapidly, and more prominent Democrats like Chuck Schumer and Bernie Sanders introduce legislation to end federal prohibition.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zEEE3a">
Why the shift? There are many likely explanations: The failure of war on drugs to stop widespread drug addiction (see: the <a href="https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/8/3/16079772/opioid-epidemic-drug-overdoses">opioid epidemic</a>) and backlash to racially uneven, punitive policies have left Americans wanting a new approach. The public <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2014/04/02/americas-new-drug-policy-landscape/">now tends to view</a> marijuana use as not so bad, or at least not as harmful as using alcohol or tobacco. The internet <a href="https://www.vox.com/2015/12/22/10621810/internet-marijuana-legalization-drugs">likely sped up</a> many of these conversations, as well as experiments around legalization that began with medical marijuana and have now spread to recreational use.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pN4wAC">
Some sports leagues reflect this change, with the NFL and MLB <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/news/561362-shacarri-richardson-suspension-prompts-outrage">relaxing punishments</a> for athletes who test positive for the drug. But while the Olympics and the WADA have raised the banned threshold for marijuana to genuinely high levels, it still suspends athletes who surpass that limit, and marijuana was the ninth-most flagged drug in 2019.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OndY6p">
It’s in this context that many Americans and their leaders have viewed the suspension of one of their athletes over marijuana as absurd.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="3iT4vX">
The reaction, however, hints at a potential sign of hope: While Richardson is the latest victim of the war on marijuana, she may soon be among its last. Because with the pace of change happening around the world regarding cannabis, it seems likely that suspensions like hers could soon become a historical footnote — a reflection of an era gone by when the world tried an overly punitive approach to a relatively harmless drug.
</p></li>
<li><strong>Why do we buy what we buy?</strong> -
<figure>
<img alt="A white Americana-looking family walks out of a strip mall with shopping bags circa 1965. " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/wOl0K1xcbUShhe2Drqvv5gNrRNU=/0x68:3691x2836/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/69549861/GettyImages_3228051t.0.jpg"/>
<figcaption>
According to one sociologist, our spending habits are a product of the people we put on pedestals. | Lambert/Getty Images
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
A sociologist on why people buy too many things.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="N6Tc3T">
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="BKd6bg">
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="b9y8k3">
What’s at the root of modern American consumerism? It might not just be competition among the brands trying to sell us things, but also competition among ourselves.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="CAXndq">
An easy story to tell is that marketers and advertisers have perfected tactics to convince us to purchase things, some we need, some we don’t. And it’s an important part of the country’s capitalistic, growth-centered economy: The more people spend, the logic goes, the better it is for everybody. (Never mind that they’re sometimes spending money they don’t have, or the implications of all this production and trash for the planet.) People, naturally, want things.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vRIsXQ">
But American consumerism is also built on societal factors that are often overlooked. We have a social impetus to “keep up with the Joneses,” whoever our own version of the Joneses is. And in an increasingly unequal society, the Joneses at the very top are doing a lot of the consuming, while the people at the bottom struggle to keep up or, ultimately, are left fighting for scraps.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="dZEjUG">
I recently spoke with Juliet Schor, a sociologist at Boston College, about the history of modern American consumerism — what it’s rooted in, how it’s evolved, and how different groups of people have experienced it. Schor, who is the author of books on consumerism, wealth, and spending, has a bit of a unique view on the matter. She tends to focus on the roles of work, inequality, and social pressures in determining what people buy and when. In her view, marketers have less to do with what we want than, say, our neighbors, coworkers, or the people we follow on social media.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="TlZWle">
Our conversation, edited for length and clarity, is below.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0mzhiE">
<strong>When I think of the beginning of what I perceive as modern American consumerism, I tend to go back to the 1950s and post-World War II, people moving to the suburbs in the cookie-cutter homes. But is that the right place to start?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="8asCd9">
Scholars differ on how to date consumerism. I would say we need to go back a bit earlier to the 1920s, which is when you get the development of mass production, which is what makes mass consumption possible. This perspective differentiates the 20th century from the earlier period, in which you have shopping and you have consumer fads. But what changes beginning in the 1920s is that the production technologies make it possible to produce things cheaply enough that eventually you can get a majority of the population consuming them.
</p>
<div class="c-float-right">
<div id="7iVGY6">
<div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xdOPVM">
In addition to the things that are happening in factories, the automobile is the leading industry where you move from stationary production to a moving assembly line and big declines in costs. You also have the beginnings of the modern advertising industry and the beginnings of consumer credit.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Zhhg6u">
Then it stalls out, of course, because of the Depression and the war. What happens in the 1950s is the model gets picked up again, this time with major participation by the federal government to spur housing, road building, the auto industry, education, and income. We get into durable goods and household appliances. As we know, that’s really confined to white people post-war.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="TYljOP">
<strong>I imagine it’s changed across the decades, but why do we buy things, often more than we need?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AhEthm">
Scholars have different answers to this question. Economists just assume that goods and services provide well-being, and people want to maximize their well-being. Psychologists root it in universal dimensions of human nature, which some of them tie back to evolutionary dynamics. I don’t think either of those are particularly convincing.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="XWjf9q">
The key impetus for contemporary consumer society has been the growth of inequality, the existence of unequal social structures, and the role that consumption came to play in establishing people’s position in that unequal hierarchy. For many people, it’s about consuming to their social position, and trying to keep up with their social position.
</p>
<div class="c-float-left c-float-hang">
<aside id="FZVtra">
<q>The Joneses at the very top are doing a lot of the consuming, while the people at the bottom struggle to keep up</q>
</aside>
</div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kZuwPF">
It’s not necessarily experienced by people in that way — it’s experienced more as identity or natural desire. But I think our social and cultural context naturalizes that desire for us.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6ghVxm">
If you think about the particular things people want, it mostly has to do with being the kind of person that they think they are because there’s a consumption style connected with that. The role of what are called reference groups — the people we compare ourselves to, the people we identify with — is really key in that. It’s why, for example, I’ve found that people who have reference groups that are wealthier than they are tend to save less and spend more, and people who keep more modest reference groups, even as they gain in income and wealth, tend to save more.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="l3VKy4">
Increases in inequality trigger what I’ve called “<a href="https://bostonreview.net/archives/BR24.3/schor.html#:~:text=My%20term%20is%20%22competitive%20consumption,new%2C%20the%20idea%20is%20not.">competitive consumption</a>,” [the idea that we spend because we’re comparing ourselves with our peers and what they’re spending]. It can be hard to keep up, particularly if standards are escalating rapidly, as we’ve seen.
</p>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="Shoppers in a mall carrying large Disney store bags." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/Zj7vy4ad8KazGYeFIFwnu2Ul3Zo=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22694376/GettyImages_565996007.jpg"/> <cite>Mark Boster/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images</cite>
<figcaption>
Value in American society is connected to what we can buy.
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="usyqUD">
<strong>I want to dig into this idea of competitive consumption. How are we competing with each other to consume?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lfPNvX">
We have a society which is structured so that social esteem or value is connected to what we can consume. And so the inability to consume affects the kind of social value that we have. Money displayed in terms of consumer goods just becomes a measure of worth, and that’s really important to people.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="O2bZKr">
<strong>How do we pick our “reference groups” if it’s not necessarily by wealth?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EliY7d">
We don’t know too much about it. The argument that I made in [my book] <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Overspent-American-Want-What-Dont/dp/0060977582"><em>The Overspent American</em></a><em> </em>was that in the postwar period, we had residentially-based reference groups. So it was really your neighborhood. People moved to the suburbs, and they interacted with people in the suburbs. Those were reference groups of people of similar economic standing because housing is the biggest thing that people buy, and houses tend to cost the same amount roughly within a neighborhood. Family and friends and social networks have always been really important.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EbRYl4">
Then the next big thing that happens is that you get more and more married women going into the workforce. That really changes reference groups, because they go from a flat social structure in the suburbs to a hierarchy in the workplace, particularly if you’re talking about better-remunerated work and white-collar work. People interact with people above and below them in the hierarchy. So people were exposed to the lifestyles of the people above them in the informal socialization that goes on in the workplace.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jEtLEj">
Then there is the impact of media, and increasingly now, social media. It’s the friends that you don’t actually know, the <em>Friends </em>on TV.
</p>
<div class="c-float-right c-float-hang">
<aside id="xiTp6i">
<q>“Everybody they know is getting a house, and then they think, ‘Okay, am I just going to be a renter?’”</q>
</aside>
</div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Kfu4NB">
The reference groups change under different socioeconomic dynamics, but it mostly has to do with who you’re in contact with — what you’re seeing in front of you, so your neighbors, your coworkers, what you’re seeing on TV, in movies, on social media.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6geUYq">
I think the key point here that differentiates this approach from that of many people who think about consumption is that it is not saying that it’s primarily driven by advertising. It’s not a process of creating desire where it didn’t exist. Critics of advertising say it’s just making people want stuff they don’t need and doesn’t have value to them. And you have to think, “Okay, why do they keep doing that? Why do they keep falling for the advertisements?” Many of the things that people desperately want are not particularly advertised. My approach is rooted in really deep social logic.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2tpMDx">
It can be very rational and compelling for people to do something that in the end doesn’t necessarily make them all that better off but that failing to do requires really a major effort and going against the social grain in a very big way.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Xrxjvd">
<strong>People aren’t buying a house because they saw a commercial for it. </strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YFvbEm">
Exactly. It’s because their sibling got one and their best friend got one. Everybody they know is getting a house, and then they think, “Okay, am I just going to be a renter?”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nVqJao">
<strong>How has the role of women evolved in consumerism? Women are often driving what to buy, right?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="z9lvSo">
Men still dominate in certain kinds of purchases, and particularly the big ones. Women were responsible for everyday purchasing: food and apparel and things like that. There’s that old binary that “men produce, women consume,” which comes out of the differences in roles we have in our economy to a certain extent.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nimFoV">
It’s fascinating, though, because I did some work trying to estimate models of differences between men and women and various kinds of consumption, and I never found any gender differences. But if you are looking at data from marketers, you see a disproportionate amount of spending done by women.
</p>
<div class="c-wide-block">
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt="A Black business owner and a white customer on opposite sides of a shop counter in 1965." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/z8cKDqADYN1IENgpjzz2fUrZ7_c=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22694272/GettyImages_1298991403.jpg"/> <cite>Small Business Administration/PhotoQuest/Getty Images</cite>
<figcaption>
Consumption for Black Americans has often been constrained by racist forces.
</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Cqcn8N">
<strong>What about Black Americans? You alluded to this earlier, but they were at least left out of the ’50s version of consumerism.</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qO2Er9">
The literature on Black Americans’ consumption is not large. If you look at it as a whole, you get a couple of things.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GEAHIi">
The biggest takeaway is that Black consumers are not that different from white consumers. Now, they do spend on different things, but it’s not like there are two types of consumers, whites and Blacks, and they have different orientations and dynamics. You have differences that are occasioned by some of the dynamics of structural racism — for example, the lower rates of Black homeownership. You’ve got some particular things that you see in part due to the high urban population. Urban dwellers spend more on shoes because they walk a lot more.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qfr29u">
You have dynamics among Black consumers that are driven in part by racism. So, for example, sartorial choices in which middle-class and upper-middle-class Black people <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=gOD5DwAAQBAJ&amp;pg=PT165&amp;lpg=PT165&amp;dq=cassi+pittman+claytor+black+consumers+%22spend+more%22&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=pS-p1r1R7K&amp;sig=ACfU3U1l9f4qqNYsxU7sRZD5q4FjD1p4cQ&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ved=2ahUKEwimlpGtl6rxAhWsTTABHcGBD-MQ6AEwD3oECBwQAw#v=onepage&amp;q=cassi%20pittman%20claytor%20black%20consumers%20%22spend%20more%22&amp;f=false">will have to spend more</a> on their wardrobes in order to avoid being stigmatized in retail settings, the so-called “shopping while Black phenomenon.” Cassi Pittman Claytor, a sociologist at Case Reserve Western University, wrote a wonderful dissertation [<a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=25892">now a book</a>] on middle-class and upper-class Black people in New York City, and one chapter is on the shopping while Black question.<em> </em>Some of the consumption choices are driven by the attempts to manage racism and stigma in the workplace and outside of it.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EEVOyo">
Another important phenomenon around the racial discourse in consumption goes back to the period of enslavement of Black Americans in which consumption was a prohibited activity. You see the linkages from <a href="https://www.oah.org/tah/issues/2017/may/slave-consumption-in-the-old-south-a-double-edged-sword/">the period of enslavement</a> where you’ve got white moralistic discourses against consumption [by] African Americans. A lot of this is in the context of poverty and poor Black people, and the illegitimacy of their consumption choices. And that’s still present today. It’s a really pernicious line of discourse back to enslavement and the ways in which whites attempted to control consumption [by] enslaved people.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2QJGy0">
<strong>What about anti-consumerism? How has that evolved, the people who try to reject consumerism?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="h54n9B">
There’s a long history of consumer rejectors. You have it in the 19th century as well, and often these were religious groups or sects of people who went into intentional communities, like the Shakers.
</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HqX2wr">
To me what’s interesting about anti-consumerist movements of the current period is that there’s a certain kind of mainstreaming going on of them. They’re growing. My work is focused on the connections between work choices and consumer choices. So with downshifters, these are people who made decisions to work less and consume less, and it was often the decisions around work that were driving them. Many of them were not people who wanted to consume less in and of itself, but they wanted to take control of their time. And they were willing to make that trade-off.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JhW87m">
You do have this minimalist movement now where the stuff is first, though it has a whole story around not getting tied to a burnout job. It’s connected with financial independence and this big <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2020/3/18/21182018/financial-independence-retire-early-fire-early-retirement-mr-money-mustache-pete-adeney">“FIRE”</a> movement — financial independence, retire early — and that’s really mainstream. It has much less of a countercultural aspect of it.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="p2rCHv">
You’ve got people coming from the ecological side of things, like <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/21427525/buy-nothing-gifting-facebook-groups-community-money-borrow-lend-trade">buy-nothing</a> groups, and some of these are really big now. They have an ethic of anti-consumerism.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Vp3slS">
What we’re not sure about is how much participating in one of these actually reduces people’s consumption of new items. But people who participate in buy-nothing groups, most of them don’t buy nothing.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Mgo1t8">
<strong>Has the conversation around consumerism and the environment picked up? Should we be talking about consumerism more in the context of saving the planet?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="izWNgy">
I think we should, and there are two parts to it. One is consuming differently, and the other is not consuming as much. So, volume and composition. To meet climate targets, we need to do both.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="glqkOu">
There are also issues of inequality of consumption. Look at the inequalities of income and wealth, which have led to these really gross disparities — the excess consumption of people at the top and the deprivation of huge numbers of people both domestically and abroad. It’s not just the bottom, it’s a big swath of the population that doesn’t have enough. So the distribution of consumption is really key, and a lot of the discourse around climate ignored that for a long time. The Green New Deal really put it at the center — it doesn’t lead with a critique of consumerism by any means, but it’s about meeting people’s needs and equity. It has a lot of implications about how we live.
</p>
<div class="c-float-right c-float-hang">
<aside id="f4NaGV">
<q>“From 1991 to 2007, the number of pieces of apparel people were buying went from 34 to 67. That number hasn’t budged in 10 years.”</q>
</aside>
</div>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YiOpr5">
The climate situation does compel us to look differently. In <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Plenitude-New-Economics-True-Wealth/dp/1594202540"><em>Plenitude: The New Economics of True Wealth</em></a><em>, </em>a book I wrote which is now 10 years old, one of the things I looked at was the volume of consumption of consumer goods over the decade before the crash [ahead of the Great Recession]. There was a massive speedup in what I call the cycle of acquisition and discard, just the volume of things people were buying. The fast fashion model that we saw in apparel happened in all sorts of other items, too.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YJ0daC">
The crash led to a hangover in which you haven’t seen that acceleration again, but it was just a period that showed how dysfunctional the consumer system has become.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="LGNwga">
<strong>Did the Great Recession change how we’re behaving and what we’re buying?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ROL4fg">
It really slowed down that cycle of acquisition and discard. From 1991 to 2007, the number of pieces of apparel people were buying, on average, went from 34 pieces of new apparel a year to 67. That number hasn’t really budged in the last 10 years.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UNVF26">
We haven’t had a massive discontinuity in how the consumption system is operating, but people had less money. And that’s part of the rejecter dynamic — when it’s more difficult for people to participate in that system, either because of its growing cost or their own incomes stagnating, they are likelier to reject it.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oYlcHV">
It will be interesting to see whether there are any wider impacts of Covid and the fact that people lived with not much more than basic necessities for a while. My own view is that the work patterns are really key in driving consumption. The standard economic view is that it’s the consumer decisions and desires that drive work patterns, and I don’t think that’s the way it works. I think that work patterns actually end up driving consumption.
</p>
<figure class="e-image">
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/HxsyFiXV239SH8yA5Qa6VorfBR8=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22702320/GettyImages_1212445377t.jpg"/> <cite>Mario Tama/Getty Images</cite>
<figcaption>
Shoppers wait in line to enter a Costco Wholesale store on March 14, 2020 in Glendale, California.
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="i076rP">
People make decisions about work, and the hours of work and the incomes associated with them are fixed with the decision. In general, if I decide to take my job as a professor, it has a salary that goes with it, and then that’s what drives my consumption decisions because it drives my income.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ECr1di">
If I can’t work this hard anymore, I’m going to go part-time and my income gets cut in half, then I have to adjust my consumption. And that’s not to say it doesn’t go in the other direction — if I want to buy a house, I am going to work some more. But this is my analysis of how the work and spending sides fit together, which is that the work side is a little more dominant.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fiFGo3">
<strong>So we are entering a moment where lots of people have been sitting at home for a year and a half, and as you said, there’s a lot of pent-up demand. Plenty of people I know are ready to spend. Is it odd that we’re responding to the end of a crisis by spending money?</strong>
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="6wYUky">
We’re just talking about the people who have it. One of the things about the pandemic is that it made the inequalities in income and spending power more visible to many Americans.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QvqIM1">
You had so many people who just were struggling through the pandemic to meet basic needs. If you think of that as a working-class phenomenon, you also had this middle-class phenomenon of people whose salaries continued. They were stuck in their houses, so the money was coming into their bank accounts every month and they didn’t have much to spend it on at all. There are people with considerable disposable income right now. We’re going to see a burst of spending now, and we’ll see how long it lasts.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="TGm1Rq">
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="i6Zh0f">
</p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</h1>
<ul>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Chennaiyin FC signs Debjit Majumder</strong> - Debjit, who represented SC East Bengal in the last edition of the ISL, pulled off 50 saves including two clean sheets in his 15 appearances for the Red &amp; Gold Brigade.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Olympic gold-winning hockey legend Keshav Datt dies</strong> - He was part India’s historic feat at the 1948 Olympics where they beat home team Britain 4-0 at the Wembley Stadium in London to win the first gold post Independence.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Paris Saint-Germain signs Morocco right-back Achraf Hakimi</strong> - The Madrid-born Hakimi came through Real Madrid’s youth academy.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Argentina beat Colombia in shootout to reach Copa America final</strong> - Both sides had chances to win in an intense, end-to-end match punctuated by 46 fouls and 10 yellow cards.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>New Zealand’s ‘Black Caps’ to stage WTC trophy tour</strong> - Kane Williamson’s team won the inaugural WTC title with an eight-wicket victory against Virat Kohli’s India in a thrilling final on June 23.</p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</h1>
<ul>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Delhi High Court refuses to stop further circulation of film purportedly based on Sushant Rajput’s life</strong> - Justice Shakdher said the movie had already been released and since the Bench was available only for today, he was not inclined to hear it or issue notice.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>NCBS lab retracts scientific paper after evidence of data fraud</strong> - We have put in place processes to further improve scrutiny, says Director</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Six Pakistani migrants granted Indian citizenship in Madhya Pradesh under CAA</strong> - State Home Minister Narottam Mishra said these migrants were victims of religious persecution</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>100-day programme to introduce learning management system in colleges, varsities in Kerala</strong> - Open-source platform to be adopted for online learning under ‘Let us go Digital’</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Farmers in KWD concerned over delay in water releases from Sagar</strong> - CM Y.S Jagan Mohan Reddy has written to Union Minister for Jalasakthi, Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, putting forth the violations of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act-2014 by the Telangana government.</p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</h1>
<ul>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Peter R de Vries: Dutch crime journalist wounded in Amsterdam shooting</strong> - Peter R de Vries is fighting for his life after being shot in an Amsterdam street.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Mila affair: Eleven sentenced over online abuse</strong> - Mila, now 18, posted videos criticising Islam and is receiving 24-hour police protection.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Cannes Film Festival rolls out red carpet again after year off</strong> - Stars and photographers cram the red carpet for the first major film festival since the pandemic.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Babaryko case: Belarus jails top Lukashenko critic for 14 years</strong> - Viktor Babaryko was banned from running against the president last year and detained.</p></li>
<li data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Euro 2020: Italy beat Spain on penalties to reach final</strong> - Italy beat Spain on penalties to reach the Euro 2020 final after an enthralling semi-final at a noisy Wembley.</p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</h1>
<ul>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Google Chat review: Terrible as Slack clone, but good as a consumer chat app</strong> - Google’s enterprise-first chat app is only occasionally awkward for consumers. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1773681">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>What the “OLED Model” means for the future of Nintendo Switch</strong> - Who’s it for? Where’s the 4K support? And does Nintendo really need it? - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1778510">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Delta variant slams Missouri as ICUs fill and ventilators run low</strong> - Cases and hospitalizations surge amid the low vaccination rates and the spread of delta. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1778525">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Up to 1,500 businesses infected in one of the worst ransomware attacks ever</strong> - Mass compromise is having cascading effects around the world. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1778479">link</a></p></li>
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>GameStop’s Summer Sale is live with a number of good Switch and PS5 deals</strong> - Dealmaster also has deals on MacBooks, the OnePlus 9, Roku streamers, and more. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1777682">link</a></p></li>
</ul>
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
<ul>
<li><strong>Why did the non-binary prospector move West in 1849?</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Because there was gold up in them/their hills.
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/maxxhock"> /u/maxxhock </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/of8cch/why_did_the_nonbinary_prospector_move_west_in_1849/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/of8cch/why_did_the_nonbinary_prospector_move_west_in_1849/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><strong>A man walks into the pharmacy with his 8-year old son.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
They happen to walk by the condom display, and the boy asks, “What are these, Dad?”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
To which the man matter-of-factly replies, “Those are called Condoms son. Men use them to have safe sex.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Oh I see,” replied the boy pensively. “Yes, I’ve heard of that in health class at school.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
He looks over the display and picks up a package of 3 and asks, “Why are there 3 in this package?”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
The dad replies, “Those are for high school boys, one For Friday, one for Saturday, and one for Sunday.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Cool” says the boy. He notices a 6 pack and asks, “Then who are these for?”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Those are for college men,” the dad answers, “two For Friday, two for Saturday, and two for Sunday.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“WOW!” exclaimed the boy, “then who uses THESE?” he asks, picking up a 12 pack. With a sigh and a tear in his eye, the dad replies.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Those are for married men, son. One for January, one for February, one for March…”
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Genius_Mate"> /u/Genius_Mate </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/oeu9c2/a_man_walks_into_the_pharmacy_with_his_8year_old/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/oeu9c2/a_man_walks_into_the_pharmacy_with_his_8year_old/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><strong>A guy walking down the street sees a woman with perfect breasts. He says to her, “Hey miss, would you let me bite your breasts for $100 dollars?”</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Are you nuts?!” – she replies, and keeps walking away. He turns around, runs around the block and gets to the corner before she does.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Would you let me bite your breasts for $1,000 dollars?” – he asks again.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Listen you; I’m not that kind of woman! Got it?” So the guy runs around the next block and faces her again.
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Would you let me bite your breasts just once for $10,000 dollars?” She thinks about it for a while and says, “Hmm, $10,000 dollars, eh? Ok, just once, but not here. Let’s go to that dark alley over there.”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
So they go into the alley, where she takes off her blouse to reveal the most perfect breasts in the world. As soon as he sees them, he grabs them and starts caressing them, fondling them slowly, kissing them, licking them, burying his face in them, but not biting them. The woman finally gets annoyed and asks, “Well? Are you gonna bite them or not?”
</p>
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
“Nah”, he replies. “Costs too much…”
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/girlSneeze"> /u/girlSneeze </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/offiyq/a_guy_walking_down_the_street_sees_a_woman_with/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/offiyq/a_guy_walking_down_the_street_sees_a_woman_with/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><strong>I’ve asked thousands of people what LGBTQ+ stands for.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
Nobody has given me a straight answer.
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/Silly___Willy"> /u/Silly___Willy </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/oexc2u/ive_asked_thousands_of_people_what_lgbtq_stands/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/oexc2u/ive_asked_thousands_of_people_what_lgbtq_stands/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
<li><strong>My grandfather is addicted to viagra.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
<div class="md">
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
My grandmother is taking it pretty hard.
</p>
</div>
<!-- SC_ON -->
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/02K30C1"> /u/02K30C1 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/of6xzj/my_grandfather_is_addicted_to_viagra/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/of6xzj/my_grandfather_is_addicted_to_viagra/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
</ul>
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