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714 lines
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<title>13 April, 2022</title>
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<title>Daily-Dose</title><meta content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" name="viewport"/><link href="styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><link href="../styles/simple.css" rel="stylesheet"/><style>*{overflow-x:hidden;}</style><link href="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.css" rel="stylesheet"/><script src="https://unpkg.com/aos@2.3.1/dist/aos.js"></script></head>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-down" id="daily-dose">Daily-Dose</h1>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" data-aos-anchor-placement="top-bottom" id="contents">Contents</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><a href="#from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-vox">From Vox</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-sports">From The Hindu: Sports</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-the-hindu-national-news">From The Hindu: National News</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-bbc-europe">From BBC: Europe</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-ars-technica">From Ars Technica</a></li>
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<li><a href="#from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</a></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-new-yorker">From New Yorker</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Prisoners in a Cellar in the Ukrainian Village of Novyi Bykiv</strong> - A pattern of indiscriminate violence committed by Russian forces appears to have taken hold in a number of towns and villages in the Kyiv region. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/dispatch/the-prisoners-in-a-cellar-in-the-ukrainian-village-of-novyi-bykiv">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Surviving the Standoff with the Republic of Texas</strong> - Twenty-five years ago, an armed militia tried to secede. When will it happen again? - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-the-southwest/surviving-the-standoff-with-the-republic-of-texas">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Complexities of Memory in “The Reëducation of Ji Zhihao”</strong> - In his youth, Zhihao spent nine years far from home doing mandated labor during the Cultural Revolution. Returning to the site provokes a mix of mourning and nostalgia. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-new-yorker-documentary/the-complexities-of-memory-in-the-reeducation-of-%20ji-zhihao">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>A Morning of Horror in New York City’s Subway</strong> - During rush hour in Sunset Park, at least ten people were shot, five of whom were critically injured, and six others were treated for smoke inhalation, shrapnel, and shock. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-local-correspondents/a-morning-of-horror-in-new-york-citys-subway">link</a></p></li>
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<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>The Most Popular Chess Streamer on Twitch</strong> - The former chess prodigy Hikaru Nakamura was widely disliked on the professional circuit. Then he started streaming. - <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/rabbit-holes/the-most-popular-chess-streamer-on-twitch">link</a></p></li>
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</ul>
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<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-vox">From Vox</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><strong>The IRS has a big opportunity to fix the way Americans file taxes</strong> -
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<figure>
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<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/thumbor/ILnfKxQRgLljl7_OgdV37JWXtN8=/34x0:2701x2000/1310x983/cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/69720273/GettyImages_1332144820_copy.0.jpg"/>
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<figcaption>
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Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen oversees the IRS and could lead tax filing reform efforts. | Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
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</figcaption>
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</figure>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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You shouldn’t need TurboTax to file your taxes. The IRS can and should make its own service.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9ULmIO">
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As of this writing, Joe Biden’s big spending dreams are in limbo, if not completely dead. There’s still some hope of pulling out a narrow deal with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) on <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/04/dems-party-line-spending-manchin-00022362">deficit reduction and climate mitigation</a>, but Democrats’ dreams from summer 2021 of <a href="https://www.vox.com/22577374/reconciliation-bill-
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biden-medicare-climate">a $3.5 trillion, 10-year spending package</a> appear over.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="yqzwwW">
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That means that Congress still hasn’t passed one of the Biden administration’s most important, if least sexy, spending priorities: a budget increase for the IRS.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="CCwwNs">
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Last year, the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/27/business/economy/biden-american-families-plan.html">administration proposed an $80 billion funding boost</a> to the agency over 10 years as part of its “American Families Plan,” an <a href="https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxvox/will-bidens-plan-reduce-tax-gap-increasing-irss-budget-
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raise-300-billion">increase of more than 50 percent</a> to the agency’s normal budget. The <a href="https://www.cbo.gov/publication/57620">Congressional Budget Office</a> estimates that this would increase revenue by $207 billion, paying for the IRS spending while producing $127 billion to spend paying down the deficit or on other priorities. The Biden team is more optimistic, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/18/us/politics/taxes-wealthy-
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natasha-sarin-treasury.html">estimating that could raise nearly $700 billion</a>, paying for itself nine times over.
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</p>
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<figure class="e-image">
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<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/thumbor/83u3NKgeu24U2iEWWzHpFWXuQQc=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22779318/GettyImages_1300545680_copy.jpg"/> <cite>Stefani Reynolds-Pool/Getty Images</cite>
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<figcaption>
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President Biden delivered remarks on the need for his administration’s proposed $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief legislation alongside Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen in February 2020.
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</figcaption></figure></li>
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</ul>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1PSsgG">
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But it could also pay for an improvement to the tax system itself. While no one in the administration or Congress seems to be making much noise about this, a successful Biden push to fund the IRS could be a golden opportunity to force the agency to join the rest of the world in offering a free, easy-to-use service that all Americans can use to file their taxes.
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</p>
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<div class="c-float-right">
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<div id="zUkbwG">
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<div>
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</div>
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</div>
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</div>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WtlGXX">
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The timing is auspicious for such an endeavor. As you may know, if you make $72,000 or less, you’re eligible for a free return through the <a href="https://apps.irs.gov/app/freeFile/browse-all-offers">IRS Free File</a> program, including software provided by Intuit, the company that operates TurboTax. If you make more, you’re eligible for <a href="https://www.irs.gov/e-file-providers/free-file-fillable-forms">Free File Fillable Forms</a>, an Intuit product.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nBdWZ0">
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That system is now falling apart. Intuit is pulling out of its arrangement with the US government, which could mean the end of the only online tax filing systems available free of charge to all Americans.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IKDKjr">
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But this collapse may present an opportunity.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lHhQkK">
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For decades, the tax prep industry has <a href="https://www.vox.com/2016/4/13/11417676/elizabeth-warren-tax-return-free-filing-tax-day-intuit-hr-
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block-turbotax-automatic-simple">succeeded in preventing the IRS</a> from doing what the tax authority in just about every other country does: providing a free, effective, easy-to-use online service where all taxpayers can file their taxes. But it’s doing so just as the Biden administration is attempting to pour billions in new funding into the IRS.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vjqskf">
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The end of Free File and the conversations in Congress around IRS funding could make this the perfect moment to dismantle our broken tax filing system and build something better.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="z3K4cm">
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Right now, Biden’s IRS spending plans don’t look in great shape. But Congress should revive them. Funding the IRS could not only pay for other priorities close to Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s (D-AZ) hearts (like deficit reduction); it could help make taxes easier for everyone.
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</p>
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<h3 id="Nq9YaZ">
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How to file your taxes for free, explained
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</h3>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="B80gtO">
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Right now, if you’re an American who wants to file your taxes without paying any additional fees to a private company or preparer, you have three options (besides limited “simple return” promotions by the big companies).
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="DFb88h">
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You can role-play as someone living in the 1970s and print out the 1040 tax form, along with any associated schedules or forms for tax credits and deductions for which you may be eligible, and compute it all by hand, meticulously collating physical copies of your W-2 and 1099 income statements and any other documentation you need.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ZywAZ9">
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Your second option is only slightly less tedious: You can use <a href="https://www.irs.gov/e-file-providers/free-file-fillable-forms">Free File Fillable Forms</a>, a free service implemented by Intuit that simply copies the physical IRS tax forms and makes them “fillable” so you can type in the numbers. It’ll even do some basic math for you. But you still have to manually enter everything, you can’t import PDFs of your W-2 or other statements, and it’s easy to get confused about exactly which forms you’re expected or required to fill out. I’m an IRS-certified tax preparer, and I gave up using the website this year out of frustration.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="q6CbLh">
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Your final option is only available if you make $72,000 a year or less. In that case, you’re eligible for a free return on private tax software through the <a href="https://apps.irs.gov/app/freeFile/browse-all-offers">IRS Free File</a> program. But careful: You might get a <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-just-tricked-you-
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into-paying-to-file-your-taxes">ton of spam from whatever company you choose</a> trying to upsell you and get you to pay for fancier options. One investigation found that <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-and-others-
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charged-at-least-14-million-americans-for-tax-prep-that-should-have-been-free-audit-finds">14 million Americans were charged by companies</a> for Free File returns that should have cost nothing.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xBTsCH">
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The IRS also <a href="https://www.irs.gov/individuals/free-tax-return-preparation-for-qualifying-taxpayers">funds community tax organizations</a> that can file returns for low-income people, but I can say from experience as a volunteer tax preparer that these groups are underfunded and overworked.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0vIN7S">
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This is an unacceptable state of affairs. Americans should not have to choose between these obviously inadequate and half-baked free options for tax filing and paying a private company. Paying taxes is a legal requirement, and it should be possible to easily do it for free. And it just isn’t possible right now; it’s no wonder that <a href="https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p55b.pdf">over 91 percent of individual returns filed in 2019</a> were filed through a paid preparer or a private online service. The current system almost forces you to pay for the privilege of paying your taxes.
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</p>
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<h3 id="TaByua">
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Intuit, H&R Block, and America’s broken tax filing system
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</h3>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="W4mfd7">
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The Free File and Free File Fillable Forms systems can perhaps best be understood as a kind of peace treaty between the IRS and the private tax preparation industry, specifically Intuit and H&R Block.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="E7A7R9">
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For years, the government leaned on those two companies to provide free tax services to Americans in need. But the basic problem with relying on private sector companies that provide paid tax services to provide free ones is that they will always have an incentive to make the free service worse and to make the paid one more attractive. That’s been the story the past couple of decades.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QFWYzo">
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In 2002, as part of a broader effort to improve government technology to take advantage of the internet, the Bush administration proposed that the IRS develop “an easy, no-cost option for taxpayers to file their tax return online.”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AAAxxC">
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This, as <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-turbotax-20-year-fight-to-stop-americans-from-filing-their-taxes-for-
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free">ProPublica’s Justin Elliott and Paul Kiel reported</a>, led to a massive lobbying push from Intuit, including a coordinated letter from Republican members of Congress demanding that the IRS not “compete” with private companies, with an implicit threat of reduced IRS funding if it did try to offer free filing.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ZeJC9s">
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So the IRS, hamstrung by limited funding to start its own free filing program anyway, negotiated a deal with the tax preparers: The companies would offer low-income Americans free tax prep software, and in exchange, the IRS would promise not to set up a free filing program of its own.
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</p>
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<figure class="e-image">
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<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/thumbor/mZr5rCGBvT_mNTKtWgKVCfdUzkA=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
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cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22778389/479264619.jpg"/> <cite>David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images</cite>
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<figcaption>
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Blame the H&R Block guy for making your taxes suck. Well, not the actor, he’s just doing his job. Blame the CEO, Jeff Jones.
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</figcaption>
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</figure>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5iA82X">
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This is the system that has held from 2002 to the present. The IRS brags that 70 percent of Americans are <a href="https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-
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utl/How%20to%20Free%20File%20Infographic_508%20FINAL.pdf">eligible for Free File</a>, but for the 2019 tax season, <a href="https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/p55b.pdf">only 4.2 million returns out of 157.2 million total</a> were filed through Free File, or 2.6 percent.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="P4Kkqy">
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H&R Block and Intuit succeeded in making the program a non- entity. In 2019, <a href="https://www.propublica.org/series/the-turbotax-trap">Elliott and Kiel</a> began documenting how the two companies were undermining Free File, from <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-
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deliberately-hides-its-free-file-page-from-search-engines">hiding their Free File options from Google</a> results to <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/intuit-turbotax-h-r-block-gutted-free-tax-filing-internal-memo">tricking their clients into paying</a> when they could file for free.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5ebNTG">
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Their reporting led by the end of the year to significant changes to the Free File program. The <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/irs-reforms-free-file-
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program-drops-agreement-not-to-compete-with-turbotax">IRS added an addendum to its deal</a> with tax preparers. The <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6594563-Free-File-MOU-8-Addendum.html">new provisions</a> prohibited companies from blocking Free File search results and tried to reduce deceptive marketing, and, more crucially, dropped<strong> </strong>the ban on the IRS developing its own free file option.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zFXz5M">
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This, perhaps unsurprisingly, led to backlash from the tax prep industry.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pdap9X">
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Last year, <a href="https://news.bloombergtax.com/daily-tax-report/irss-free-file-partners-moving-forward-without-h-r-block">H&R Block became the first preparer to leave the Free File Alliance</a>, meaning it would no longer provide free returns to all low-income Americans through the program. Intuit followed suit this July by <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/turbotax-maker-intuit-will-leave-free-tax-filing-partnership-with-
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irs">announcing it would pull TurboTax from the program</a> as well.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="7DWJYg">
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This doesn’t entirely gut the program — other services like TaxSlayer and TaxAct are still available — but it removes the program’s two most popular service providers. Most importantly, Intuit’s withdrawal throws the future of Free File Fillable Forms, which it develops for the Free File Alliance, into question. The software exists for the 2021 filing season, but it’s not clear it will continue to exist after that.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ZdhNaX">
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This chaos is particularly important for low-income people. Some of America’s most important safety net programs exist as parts of the tax code, in particular the earned income tax credit (EITC) and the <a href="https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/22543868/biden-child-tax-credit-july-15-monthly-
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payment">child tax credit (CTC)</a>; so did the economic impact payments, better known as “stimulus checks,” last year. Having access to a free program to file taxes and access these credits is consequential for a lot of families.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="B2VxIE">
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But this chaos could also provide an opening for something better.
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</p>
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<h3 id="p41J32">
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How Biden and the IRS can fix tax filing
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</h3>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="eofg69">
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The IRS desperately needs to put together an easier-to-use, simpler way for people to file their taxes and access benefits free of charge. Accomplishing that, of course, is easier said than done. The IRS has been underfunded for decades and does not have sufficient in-house technical expertise to build a free file system on its own.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WyWTRN">
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But there are signs suggesting that the limitations keeping the IRS from enabling free filing are falling away.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oZhFeN">
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First, the agency removed the ban limiting it from offering such a product in 2019. Then the Biden administration made increased funding to the agency one of its top domestic spending priorities, as well it should — <a href="https://www.nber.org/papers/w27571">funding the IRS increases tax revenue and pays for itself several times over</a>. While the provision fell out of the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-
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biden-business-government-and-politics-bills-4da016e1ab4d2331a0310391ecbc4d73">bipartisan infrastructure deal over Republican opposition</a>, it’s set to be used as a pay-for in <a href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-business-
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government-and-politics-personal-taxes-c80b07740f63853c78d41d900b265ed2">Democrats’ $3.5 trillion spending package</a>.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="j8i6Ar">
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That could provide the funding necessary for the IRS to make free filing a reality — and Intuit’s withdrawal from the Free File program could provide some sense of urgency. “The problems with Free File lead me to conclude that it is time for IRS to develop the technology that will allow individuals to access our tax system with minimal burden,” Leslie Book, a professor of tax law at Villanova, told me, in a judgment that echoes many tax law experts I’ve spoken with.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="hgJtc1">
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In the near term, the IRS will need a stopgap measure for free tax returns next spring, especially if no provider in the Free File Alliance steps up to replace Intuit in running Free File Fillable Forms. The IRS will likely not have funding and staffing in time to set up an in-house program by then, which means that on a temporary basis it will likely have to repeat the Free File formula of relying on private preparers.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RG36ab">
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Daniel Hemel, a professor of tax and constitutional law at UChicago, has proposed a simple temporary fix: have the US government pay TaxSlayer, TaxAct, or any of the other remaining Free File companies on a per-return basis to prepare returns for taxpayers, at least low-income ones.
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</p>
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<div id="kavob9">
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<blockquote class="twitter- tweet">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" dir="ltr" lang="en">
|
||
Congress would say: “Hey TaxSlayer, FreeTaxUSA, & anyone else who wants to get in on the game: We’ll pay you $10 for every valid Form 1040 w/adjusted gross income <$100k e-filed via you, provided you also allow the taxpayer to file a free state return” 2/
|
||
</p>
|
||
— Daniel Hemel (<span class="citation" data-cites="DanielJHemel">@DanielJHemel</span>) <a href="https://twitter.com/DanielJHemel/status/1417936528836268040?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 21, 2021</a>
|
||
</blockquote>
|
||
</div>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rdY6dO">
|
||
Hemel notes that while this isn’t the same as having the IRS do things in-house, it’s also an improvement on the Free File model, in which tax preparers aren’t compensated at all for Free File returns and thus have tremendous incentive to upsell. “Under Free File, companies have literally nothing to lose if they try to upsell & then you quit,” <a href="https://twitter.com/DanielJHemel/status/1417936536570638336">Hemel writes</a>. “Now, they’d be losing out on real revenue.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="bg6SSE">
|
||
In the long run, though, there’s no reason to compensate private firms on a per-return basis. What the government could do instead is build its own free-to-use software for tax filers.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="rCRf51">
|
||
Nina Olson, who served from 2001 to 2019 as the national taxpayer advocate, a position in the IRS advocating for taxpayers and for improved customer service, has been proposing this for years, and today argues for it as executive director of the non-government <a href="https://taxpayer-rights.org/">Center for Taxpayer Rights</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="A7jg0i">
|
||
Here’s how it would work: The IRS would start by putting out a request for proposals (RFP) for a new system to be built by private software/IT firms. That RFP could lay out a replica of today’s system, with full-featured software for low-income people and Free File Fillable Forms for others. But it could also just make the full-featured software available to everyone — and should, in my opinion.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oFmqVr">
|
||
It could also create a simplified system for people who don’t owe taxes but are owed the earned income tax credit or child tax credit, to keep the IRS updated on how many children they have and what they’re earning so they can receive their full benefits.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HKSuFL">
|
||
As part of this process, the government would likely lean heavily on some in-house technical expertise. Groups like the <a href="https://www.usds.gov/">US Digital Service</a>, housed in the White House, and <a href="https://www.gsa.gov/about-
|
||
us/organization/federal-acquisition-service/technology-transformation-services">Technology Transformation Services</a>, a division of the General Services Administration (GSA) that provides technical assistance to federal agencies are home to software engineers and project managers who can help with designing the RFP and the procurement process.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="i0ZYTo">
|
||
“What Intuit’s leaving has done is created the momentum. There’s a vacuum now. The IRS is going to have to take some action. It’s an opportunity for US Digital Services etc. to see if they can be of assistance,” Olson told me in an interview last year.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="w2Tp0C">
|
||
A world without tax returns
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="KaG9uH">
|
||
The IRS could also go a step further from just free filing and experiment with pre-filled returns, an idea that has been floating around tax policy circles for decades.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="JzBMug">
|
||
The actual work of doing your taxes mostly involves rifling through various IRS forms you get in the mail. There are W-2s listing your wages, 1099s showing miscellaneous income like from one-off gigs, etc. The main advantage of TurboTax is that it can import these forms automatically and spare you this step.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oo6xuD">
|
||
But here’s the thing about the forms: The IRS gets them, too. When Vox Media sent me a W-2 telling me how much it paid me in 2020, it sent an identical one to the IRS. When my bank sent me a 1099 telling my wife and me how much interest we earned on our savings account in 2020, it also sent one to the IRS. If I’m not itemizing deductions (like 70 percent of taxpayers), the IRS has all the information it needs to calculate my taxes, send me a filled-out return, and let me either send it right back to the IRS if I’m comfortable with their version or else do my taxes by hand if I prefer.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<figure class="e-image">
|
||
<img alt="A California ReadyReturn document" src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/OgDshcZYMQ1BogDj_Rc__pVlJ3I=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22778395/Screen_Shot_2021_08_12_at_11.49.25_AM.png"/> <cite><a class="ql-link" href="https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/200607goolsbee.pdf" target="_blank">Via Austan Goolsbee/Brookings Institution</a></cite>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
A sample return from California’s ReadyReturn pilot, which allowed for pre-filled returns to be mailed to most Californians, sparing them from filing themselves. ReadyReturn has since been folded into <a class="ql-link" href="https://www.ftb.ca.gov/file/ways-to-file/online/calfile/index.asp" target="_blank">California’s CalFile software</a>.
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="45RqU3">
|
||
This <a href="http://qz.com/628020/filing-your-income-taxes-is-a-pain-and-that-is-not-an-accident/">isn’t a purely hypothetical proposal</a>. Countries like Denmark, Sweden, Estonia, Chile, and Spain already offer <a href="https://www.oecd.org/tax/administration/36280368.pdf">”pre-populated returns”</a> to their citizens. <a href="https://priceonomics.com/the-stanford-professor-who-fought-the-tax-lobby/">California has experimented with a version called ReadyReturn</a>, in the face of intense tax prep industry opposition. While true pre-populated returns are over in the state, it does offer free filing software called <a href="https://www.ftb.ca.gov/file/ways-to-
|
||
file/online/calfile/index.asp">CalFile</a> that can pre-fill some information for taxpayers.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="9zlmRE">
|
||
Olson notes that an RFP from the IRS could demand that a free-file option enable pre-filled returns or, at the absolute least, automatically import forms that have been sent to the IRS associated with your or a family member’s Social Security number.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ZMnb0A">
|
||
The steps needed from here are simple.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="QjO2pO">
|
||
Congress needs to authorize more funding for the IRS. It also ideally would pass the <a href="https://www.vox.com/2016/4/13/11417676/elizabeth-warren-
|
||
tax-return-free-filing-tax-day-intuit-hr-block-turbotax-automatic-simple">Tax Filing Simplification Act</a>, a proposal dating from 2017 and championed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) that would order the IRS to put together a free-filing system and to offer pre-filled returns.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="qhOH5M">
|
||
The hardest steps toward simplification would involve fixing the tax code itself. In 2019, Olson in her capacity as national taxpayer advocate enlisted Book and other experts to <a href="https://www.taxpayeradvocate.irs.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/JRC20_Volume3.pdf">propose changes to make tax code benefits easier to access</a>. They proposed simplifying the earned income tax credit so it was paid out without reference to how many kids a worker has, which could make it easier to pay out over the course of a year rather than at tax time. In exchange, the child tax credit would be enhanced and made bigger, repeating the experiment of 2021’s bigger child credit.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0i5ckx">
|
||
A reform like this could make tax filing totally unnecessary for most low-income people. Eliminating breaks like the mortgage interest and charitable deductions would make returns unnecessary for most middle- and upper-middle-class people too.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="BPjXui">
|
||
But those are heavy lifts. A huge first step would be to simply fund the IRS adequately, have it pay private tax preparers to process returns for now, and have it hire a software firm to build a real free-file system with pre-filled returns. That would eliminate the tax prep industry’s stranglehold on our tax system and make the entire process vastly easier for Americans, especially low-income Americans.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="d9SaWA">
|
||
<em>Update, April 13, 2022: This story has been updated to reflect developments in the news.</em>
|
||
</p>
|
||
<ul>
|
||
<li><strong>The CDC’s new Covid-19 guidelines are facing their first test with BA.2</strong> -
|
||
<figure>
|
||
<img alt="" src="https://cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/thumbor/rvgWDL9D16an0JetJHR1AjOYYMw=/75x0:5170x3821/1310x983/cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70743804/GettyImages_1264183293t.0.jpg"/>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
People walk by a CDC billboard in New York City on August 5, 2020. | Noam Galai/Getty Images
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
How will we know if they pass or fail?
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IdHhYX">
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ra0r98">
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="aTqeKa">
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tLFF81">
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="tVwote">
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="0NNep6">
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="jEv2g4">
|
||
In late February, the CDC made big changes to its recommendations for monitoring and responding to Covid-19 surges. Now, as US cases are once more <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/04/12/world/covid-19-mandates-cases-vaccine?name=styln-
|
||
coronavirus&region=TOP_BANNER&block=storyline_menu_recirc&action=click&pgtype=Interactive&variant=show&is_new=false#experts-
|
||
say-it-is-unclear-whether-rising-cases-in-the-northeastern-us-are-the-start-of-a-larger-surge">on the rise</a>, these recommendations face their first test. But how will we know if they are working?
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="EfpkbK">
|
||
The CDC used to prioritize cases and positive tests to determine the Covid-19 threat level. Starting in February, the agency placed more weight on hospitalizations. The move invited a lot of <a href="https://www.vox.com/22959093/cdc-roll-back-mask-
|
||
mandates-pandemic-restrictions">scrutiny</a>, and it reflected changes in the CDC’s pandemic response goals: The agency is moving away from trying to eliminate transmission of the virus and toward reducing deaths and health care system strain.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="A5IvYD">
|
||
The hard truth, several public health experts tell Vox, is that determining whether they are effective will be difficult.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="VFeFQY">
|
||
Even in the best-case scenario, where institutions follow the guidelines and the latest wave recedes, it would be hard to prove that the CDC’s framework deserves the credit.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="RgAS9A">
|
||
“We’ll certainly know if it fails,” said <a href="https://physiciandirectory.brighamandwomens.org/details/13177/jeremy-faust-emergency_medicine-boston">Jeremy Faust</a>, an emergency doctor and health policy expert in Boston. The guidelines face the same challenges many public health initiatives do: Failures are easier to spot than successes.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="OiMcVT">
|
||
As a <a href="https://www.vox.com/coronavirus-covid19/2022/4/7/23012166/covid-19-ba2-variant-us-cases">new wave begins</a>, it’s worth setting some expectations about what these guidelines can reasonably do, and how easy or hard it will be to measure their success. Ultimately, we might never know how well the guidelines work — and even if they do work, the CDC might not get any credit.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="7AeJEH">
|
||
What the new CDC guidelines changed, and why experts like them
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Ngs9QP">
|
||
For the first two years of the pandemic, there were two main metrics for determining the pandemic’s severity: case counts and test positivity.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="x8AsIF">
|
||
Case counts were determined by summing up the positive results of PCR tests conducted in a given time period. And test positivity was determined by calculating the percentage of positive PCR tests. Together, these provided a rough, real-time picture of the Covid-19 threat, which public health agencies and institutions used to guide rollouts of testing programs, mask and vaccine requirements, and other public health measures.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Yda939">
|
||
For as long as PCR testing remained vastly more accessible than home-based testing, this approach made sense. However, at-home tests became <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7113e1.htm">more widely available</a> over the latter half of 2021; because reporting those tests’ results <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/test-positive-home-covid-kit-local-
|
||
health-department-wants-know-rcna10109">is not mandatory</a> the way reporting PCR test results is, PCR results have become increasingly unrepresentative of the actual state of play.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="HAMQoT">
|
||
The proliferation of home tests rendered the CDC’s key metrics “almost functionally meaningless,” said <a href="https://www.brown.edu/academics/public-
|
||
health/news/2021/11/new-leaders">Jennifer Nuzzo</a>, an epidemiologist and pandemic preparedness expert at Brown University’s public health school. And so, Nuzzo explained, the CDC needed to find a new method for taking the temperature of the pandemic in real time.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="kJZKax">
|
||
The February guidelines did just that, introducing <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/community-levels.html">a new way</a> of estimating each county’s Covid-19 burden. The calculation is still partially based on the rate of new cases over the past week, but now it is based largely on the number of new hospital admissions due to Covid-19 and the percent of hospital beds occupied by Covid-19 patients. From this, the CDC assigns each county a “low,” “medium,” or “high” level of burden.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<div>
|
||
<figure class="e-image">
|
||
<img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/v31SGJVkV-
|
||
qsGO0Gj71UrzSckBs=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23385262/Screen_Shot_2022_04_12_at_4.13.56_PM.png"/> <cite>CDC</cite></figure></div></li>
|
||
</ul>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
The CDC’s guidelines for various Covid-19 transmission levels.
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
|
||
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GyPG1e">
|
||
For each level, the guidelines offer a set of recommendations for institutions and public health departments, and a separate one for individuals. The specifics of the recommendations range from ensuring testing and vaccine access on the low end to calling in backup health care staff on the high end.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Vl8gvD">
|
||
Some people <a href="https://www.vox.com/22959093/cdc-roll-back-mask-mandates-pandemic-restrictions">balked</a> at the change, in part because hospitalizations are a lagging indicator of transmission intensity, rising one to two weeks after cases increase. However, the model used to create the guidelines accounted for that lag and deliberately set hospitalization thresholds at a level to allow institutions a few weeks to prepare for a rise in deaths.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mL5BfK">
|
||
The new framework also reflected <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/downloads/science/Scientific-Rationale-
|
||
summary-COVID-19-Community-Levels.pdf">a change in the CDC’s pandemic goals</a>. No longer would the agency focus on eliminating transmission; instead, it would aim to prevent severe illness and death, minimize the burden on the health care system, and protect vulnerable people by using vaccines, therapeutics, and prevention strategies. The new estimates would help accomplish this by focusing on metrics that actually quantified the main indicators of health care system strain and setting the alarms to go off early enough to let public health authorities act.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<div class="c-float- right">
|
||
<figure class="e-image">
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/gmtt-
|
||
se3UtbnlIwYAs7TK21sNyA=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23385625/US_COVID_19_Community_Levels_of_All_Counties.png"/> <cite>CDC</cite></p>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
The CDC’s analysis of Covid-19 levels across the country, as of April 7.
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
</div>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ohpU9Q">
|
||
Many public health experts felt the shifts were necessary, and organizations representing state, local, and county health officials reported <a href="https://www.vox.com/22959093/cdc-roll-back-mask-mandates-pandemic-
|
||
restrictions">broad support for the changes</a> among their membership.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Jtln6S">
|
||
“A focus on hospitalizations makes a lot of sense right now,” said <a href="https://sph.unc.edu/adv_profile/justin-lessler-phd/">Justin Lessler</a>, an epidemiology professor at the University of North Carolina’s public health school. He expects that with increasing population immunity, each wave’s severity will likely decrease, making case numbers less relevant. As case numbers do an increasingly bad job of predicting hospitalizations and deaths, there’s just less incentive to focus on them.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="wUcRAF">
|
||
“We’d love to prevent infections, but that’s the hardest game of whack-a-mole,” said Nuzzo. However, she said, we can prevent severe illness and death, and “we can prevent our hospitals from becoming overwhelmed, and that is absolutely critical.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="W6gIU8">
|
||
How we’ll know if the guidelines are failing
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lxKaHB">
|
||
At the moment, the CDC’s US outbreak severity map shows most counties in green, indicating they have a low community burden of infections.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pmde87">
|
||
But within the last month, a handful of counties have changed color to yellow or orange, indicating medium or high Covid-19 levels. Those color changes are intended to provoke public health authorities to make changes, like ramping up testing programs for asymptomatic people and restricting visitation in high-risk settings like nursing homes and prisons. Mask requirements are also on the menu, Nuzzo said.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lwGK5u">
|
||
The timing here is key: The color change is intended to happen early enough to provoke policy changes in time to prevent hospital bed shortages.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="D2Bd4b">
|
||
Here, we could see clear signs if the guidelines were failing.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5zOuxm">
|
||
If a county goes from green to orange, there should be time to flatten the curve before there’s a big strain on resources. “If we see hospitals overflowing and the CDC’s mask thresholds had not been met, that would be straightforward, incontrovertible proof that [the guidelines] failed to achieve the objective,” said Faust.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<figure class="e-image">
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt="A hospital corridor with a person in scrubs in the foreground writing on a pad." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/IwRqqpOug5QbxpXNn7PNYYEW1mU=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23385317/GettyImages_1384427724t.jpg"/> <cite>Mario Tama/Getty Images</cite></p>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
A lab technician working at the Providence St. Mary Medical Center on March 11, 2022, in Apple Valley, California.
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="ZpFJke">
|
||
Other red flags would include signs that state and local public health authorities and policymakers are not using the metrics to make decisions. That could suggest a number of problems, including a lack of health department resources, burnout among key personnel, a lack of trust in the CDC’s methods, or insufficient political will to follow the metrics and implement the changes the guidelines suggest.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="xdUdmV">
|
||
After all, while the CDC’s guidelines are authoritative, they are not requirements; ultimately, state and local governments can do what they want.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vKZKCQ">
|
||
“It’s not the metrics, necessarily, that I think are the thing to test, but it’s how we choose to respond to a change in the metrics,” said Nuzzo. “That’s the wild card.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="kjrPWl">
|
||
Why detecting the guidelines’ success is harder
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="gluRJd">
|
||
To determine whether the guidelines are doing their job, we first need to define what it would mean for them to be successful — and that’s currently an open question, said Lessler.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Ocbyx0">
|
||
For the CDC’s recommendations to be successful, state and local public health authorities need to use them as the basis for their policy recommendations; policymakers need to act on those recommendations; people and institutions need to follow those recommendations; and the recommendations need to have the desired effect of reducing transmission and increasing access to vaccination and treatment.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="4wI7zn">
|
||
But just knowing where the guidelines are being implemented and where they are not is a challenge due to the decentralization of our public health system. Although Covid-19 <a href="https://www.kff.org/report-section/state-covid-19-data-and-policy-
|
||
actions-policy-actions/#policyactions">policy</a> <a href="https://www.multistate.us/issues/covid-19-policy-
|
||
tracker">trackers</a> exist, differences in the particulars and the enforcement of different policies impede connecting the dots between mitigation efforts and outcomes. There are 3,006 counties in the US, and it’s hard to keep track of the policies in place in all of them.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="eWUx9w">
|
||
“One of the arguments for a diverse public health system is it becomes a laboratory,” said Lessler, “but that’s only true if there’s some sort of central tracking and good reporting of what’s actually being trialed.” In a sense, the CDC’s new guidelines are an experiment in which results cannot be compiled in one place.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<figure class="e-image">
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><img alt=" " src="https://cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/thumbor/-mmjyhDqGnajNPhUA2IG6z1W10A=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/23385338/GettyImages_1366126418t.jpg"/> <cite>Spencer Platt/Getty Images</cite></p>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
People walk through Grand Central Terminal in Manhattan on January 21, 2022, in New York City.
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="D6AseE">
|
||
Another complication in evaluating the success of the guidelines is that individuals nationwide do what they think makes the most sense for themselves, regardless of local policy. That’s not necessarily a sign of anarchy. The CDC’s guidelines actually recommend that people use the agency’s suggested metrics to guide individual choices.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mbauRa">
|
||
However, individual action tends to happen late in a surge, only “when things are obviously really bad,” said <a href="https://healthpolicy.fsi.stanford.edu/people/joshua-salomon">Joshua Salomon</a>, a health policy professor at Stanford University. For example, people in a county where hospitals are overflowing might choose to wear masks even if their governor has forbidden mask mandates. Individual actions like this happening at a large scale change the outcomes, making it even more challenging to link those outcomes with policies.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="kutsvz">
|
||
It will be hard to know if guidelines are working if the BA.2 wave is small
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="nnPQyY">
|
||
There’s another major challenge to evaluating the new guidelines: If the burgeoning BA.2 omicron subvariant wave of Covid-19 is small, the guidelines may not face a big test at all.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="fy3nDq">
|
||
Cases have been rising in the US, and hospitalizations are now rising in several northeastern states, albeit far <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html">more slowly</a> than during the explosive wintertime omicron BA.1 wave. The sluggishness of BA.2’s spread (so far) may be attributable to the large number of people who have retained some immunity following infection during that earlier wave.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="PK7xd7">
|
||
If BA.2 does not end up producing a large surge of infections in the US, “that will be a welcome surprise,” said Salomon, but “it won’t necessarily be validation of the new community guidance.” Our health care system can’t be threatened — and the CDC guidelines can’t be tested — by a surge that doesn’t happen.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="q7WXi7">
|
||
Of course, a big test might be just over the horizon if a variant worse than BA.2 comes into play.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mwY2bM">
|
||
Even if the CDC’s guidelines help prevent disastrous outcomes, people may see the absence of catastrophe as evidence that the guidelines were unnecessary, not as evidence that they worked. Those situations are just as confusing as when people credit public health policies for good outcomes that would’ve happened anyway.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="lfuXzb">
|
||
“If the CDC throws a mask mandate on and if things appear to get better, even then that will be correlation, not causation,” said Faust. “It’ll be really hard to tease out.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<ul>
|
||
<li><strong>The secrets hidden in sewage</strong> -
|
||
<figure>
|
||
<img alt="The view from inside a pipe with water flowing out to a grassy area with trees." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/NxmqtnG4paSqMbJp1MbutSdacWI=/532x0:5865x4000/1310x983/cdn.vox-
|
||
cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/70743717/GettyImages_1169117045.0.jpg"/>
|
||
<figcaption>
|
||
The potential for human waste to tell us about what is happening with our community’s health extends far beyond Covid-19. | Getty Images/EyeEm
|
||
</figcaption>
|
||
</figure>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
Wastewater can help us monitor Covid-19. What else can it tell us?
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="vF15Kg">
|
||
The first signs of <a href="https://www.vox.com/coronavirus-covid19/2022/4/7/23012166/covid-19-ba2-variant-
|
||
us-cases">the most recent Covid-19 waves</a> have often been <a href="https://bangordailynews.com/2022/04/05/news/nirav-
|
||
shah-wastewater-data-show-covid-may-be-on-the-rise-again-in-maine/">detected in our sewers</a> instead of nasal swabs.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="YBFjE1">
|
||
But in the future, the potential for human waste to tell us about what is happening with our community’s health could extend far beyond <a href="https://www.vox.com/coronavirus-covid19">the novel coronavirus</a>.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UgZhqt">
|
||
“This has been its coming-out party. We’ve realized the power in this pandemic,” John Dennehy, a biologist at the City University of New York who has been assisting with NYC’s wastewater surveillance program, told me. “Now there’s great interest in developing an infrastructure to sustain this capability beyond the pandemic.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="IN5VvB">
|
||
<a href="https://www.vox.com/23005271/sewage-wastewater-surveillance-covid-19-biobot-
|
||
analytics-pandemic">Sewage surveillance</a> is becoming more valuable right now as conventional testing is becoming less transparent. More people have been using rapid at-home tests and might not report results to a public health agency. That means the number of positive cases being reported by official sources might not actually provide a full picture of what’s happening with the pandemic.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="l0bRWh">
|
||
But no matter how or if they’re testing, infected people — whether they have symptoms or not — flush out the virus when they go to the bathroom, leaving viral RNA that can be detected in wastewater samples. It requires careful collection and testing, but sewage can provide a less biased look at the viral trends in a given community.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iwi0L4">
|
||
Science has not yet reached the point where we can say that X amount of viral load in a community’s sewage means Y number of people are infected in that community. But still, knowing which way viral loads are trending is useful. If they are going up, even before the number of positive tests starts increasing, it could in theory allow public health authorities and the local health system to start preparing for a surge. If they are going down, public health officials (and the general public) can be confident that any waning in official case numbers is real and not the byproduct of, say, less testing.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="BfoJ6g">
|
||
So far, health authorities have not been using wastewater levels to trigger a public health response — ordering people to mask up again once viral loads hit a certain level, for example. But experts say a more direct link between sewage surveillance and public health policies might be established in some places in the coming year.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="kM9K5F">
|
||
Covid-19 has shown the value of public health sewage surveillance
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="2ps3tl">
|
||
The pandemic has revealed the potential for wastewater surveillance — and the shortcomings in the current US infrastructure.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="iVYWfB">
|
||
Dennehy told me that his team in NYC had noticed an unusual iteration of the virus back in November, but it wasn’t until South Africa announced the presence of the omicron variant in people there a month later that they realized they had been seeing the mutations that would soon start a new wave of infections worldwide.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="k7LrQX">
|
||
South Africa has been commended for its genomic surveillance system, which is what allowed it to be the first to identify omicron as a threat, even though, as the New York example shows, the variant was likely already present in other parts of the world. The US, on the other hand, <a href="https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/22225012/us-sequencing-covid-19-variants">lagged behind other countries</a> for much of the pandemic in that work, and integrating sewage into that surveillance system remains a work in progress.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="uJsd8J">
|
||
Before the pandemic, using wastewater for disease surveillance was not unheard of, but it was generally limited to monitoring for diseases like polio, where the appearance of any amount of virus would be cause for alarm.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="C7KkpL">
|
||
Covid-19 has shown that wastewater can provide an even more nuanced and varied picture of a community’s health. Since researchers showed the ability to detect the coronavirus in sewage in early 2020, wastewater surveillance has spread across the globe. More than <a href="https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-
|
||
tracker/#wastewater-surveillance">470 sites</a> in the US and <a href="https://ucmerced.maps.arcgis.com/apps/dashboards/c778145ea5bb4daeb58d31afee389082">nearly 3,400 sites worldwide</a> are reporting the amount of virus they are detecting in the waste we flush.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="t2kddS">
|
||
Wastewater has its limitations, including challenges with proper collection and adjusting for the concentration of human waste in the sewage. Some rural areas don’t have a community wastewater system, relying instead on individual homes’ septic tanks, which makes broad monitoring impossible. Across Montana, Wyoming, North and South Dakota, and Nebraska, <a href="https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#wastewater-surveillance">only two wastewater sites</a> are reporting their coronavirus levels to the CDC.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="snDlnz">
|
||
Setting up a strong wastewater monitoring program also requires political support and coordination between public health departments, environmental agencies, and local water authorities, which may not be accustomed to working together.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="CDvQsb">
|
||
In spite of those obstacles, sewage monitoring has become more integrated into the global pandemic response over time. And experts don’t expect it to stop there. They are already imagining how else we might use all the information that can be gleaned from our waste to get ahead of future outbreaks and target public health interventions.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="1i2yPK">
|
||
“Most people believe wastewater testing is not going away,” Marc Johnson, a University of Missouri virologist who has helped lead that state’s wastewater monitoring program, told me. “It’s too nice of a tool. It can give us an unbiased readout of a community’s health, without having to worry about individual patient confidentiality.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<h3 id="ak8HOB">
|
||
All the ways wastewater surveillance could help us improve public health
|
||
</h3>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="5n5nNk">
|
||
For the foreseeable future, sewage surveillance could help the country keep ahead of Covid-19. Not only can the general trends — an increasing or decreasing amount of virus being found — give a warning about emerging or fading waves, but wastewater can also provide scientists clues about new variants that may soon appear.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="WBsJnV">
|
||
After wastewater is collected and taken to a laboratory, scientists run the same kind of test that is conducted for an individual diagnostic PCR test. Beyond identifying whether or not the virus is present, the lab can also determine how much of it there is depending on how many testing cycles they need to run to detect it. (Fewer cycles means more virus.)
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="CTtfsI">
|
||
Then scientists can also take the sample and analyze the genetic make-up of the virus found therein. If it’s different from the most common variant at the time, that may be a signal that another variant is lurking out there with the potential to take over. Johnson said that, in Missouri, his team has seen Covid-19 variants that have not been detected in humans yet. They may have found their way into the wastewater system from animals, he told me, and we know that animal-to-human transmission is one way for new variants to emerge.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="oESWCe">
|
||
US scientists are also starting to use wastewater in more targeted ways to combat Covid-19. Dennehy said an NYC hospital had asked his team if they could start analyzing the sewage coming out of their facility specifically so they could get an early warning if the virus was appearing more frequently in their patients and staff. Continuous diagnostic testing would be expensive to maintain, and this population-level surveillance would allow the hospital to institute more rigorous testing only when the viral load in the wastewater suggests that it’s necessary.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="zxJMGV">
|
||
That kind of creative approach can be applied to other public health problems as well.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="Kia0Nw">
|
||
Johnson described a similar proposal in Missouri prisons that want to monitor for tuberculosis outbreaks. They have asked for their sewage to be regularly tested for TB, which they could use to determine when to conduct individual diagnostic tests, which are both costly and logistically cumbersome.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="moWJrL">
|
||
“They don’t have to waste money on testing when they know there is nothing there,” he said.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="UPWM6y">
|
||
Surveillance programs could watch for other pathogens, too, such as influenza, hepatitis, and norovirus for early warnings of emerging outbreaks. Julianne Nassif, an expert on wastewater surveillance with the Association of Public Health Labs, said we could also monitor for bacteria, viruses, and other microbes that are resistant to current treatments. Public health officials could try to get ahead of an outbreak of antibiotic-resistant bacteria in a nursing home, for example, with the information gleaned from downstream sewage.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="l39bbH">
|
||
Johnson envisioned communities monitoring for narcotics, to better tailor their public health campaigns. Wastewater could be tested to determine whether cocaine or opioid use is rising in a given sewage shed. It could even determine what kind of opioids are being used, which could be helpful to health departments. Widespread heroin use might require a different intervention than diverted prescription opioids or black-market fentanyl.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="pn3lEl">
|
||
The possibilities sound almost endless, extending to research that could help us better understand human health. Dennehy described to me one hypothetical experiment that could be run with sewage monitoring, looking for the viral markers associated with colon cancer. By comparing the results from one community with, say, a nearby nuclear power plant and another community somewhere else, we could get a better understanding of how the surrounding environment affects people’s health.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="mj9oKs">
|
||
But for all of this potential to be realized, these efforts would require sustained support. The CDC bet on the wastewater boom, launching a national Covid-19 surveillance system in the fall of 2020. But dedicated investments in infrastructure and a workforce would be necessary if the country were to begin conducting wastewater surveillance on a more permanent basis.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="AiFE3g">
|
||
In general, the US has not appeared <a href="https://www.vox.com/coronavirus-
|
||
covid19/2021/10/28/22748841/build-back-better-bill-details-covid-pandemic-public-health-funding">willing to make big investments in public health</a>. Scientists working on these programs hope that the same may not be true of wastewater surveillance, given the opportunities it presents.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom" id="GUU2hs">
|
||
“We learned a lot of hard-won lessons with the Covid pandemic. We got caught with our pants down at the beginning. A lot of things that we did were too late,” Dennehy told me. “The hope is we can remember these lessons for the next time this comes around, which may not be that long.”
|
||
</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>Rasputin and Rubik Star please</strong> -</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>Guru sizzles for Summer Friends</strong> -</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>Indian students qualify for the world’s largest paper plane flying competition to be held in Austria</strong> - Chennai hosts the India Finals of the world’s largest paper plane flying competition on a carpeted college runway. Now, the winners take their folding techniques to Salzburg</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>Andrew McDonald named head coach of Australian cricket team</strong> - Andrew McDonald has been named head coach of the Australian men’s cricket team on a four-year contract</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>IPL 2022 | I am still learning as captain, says Jadeja</strong> - The CSK skipper made these remarks after his team opened its account on Tuesday with a 23-run win over RCB</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>Protest in Mysuru seeking Eshwarappa’s arrest</strong> - AAP accuses BJP govt. of not acting on allegations of deceased contractor</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>Akbaruddin Owaisi acquitted in 2012-hate speech cases</strong> - The court observed the evidence was insufficient and the accused was given the benefit of doubt, says the AIMIM leader’s lawyer</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>CS for control rooms to monitor paddy procurement</strong> - Directs officials to formulate action plan for procuring the entire commodity</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>Andhra Pradesh: Paddy procurement begins in Godavari delta</strong> - Govt. sets target of 9.8 lakh MT this Rabi season</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>End of the road for Devaraja Market, Lansdowne Building ?</strong> - District heritage committee feels they have to be demolished to pave way for a new structure in their place</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>Ukraine: The critical fight for ‘heart of this war’ Mariupol</strong> - Russia could be on the brink of fully capturing the city after a devastating, six-week assault.</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>Ukraine: Fugitive Putin ally Medvedchuk arrested - security service</strong> - Viktor Medvedchuk, a Ukrainian tycoon who is accused of treason, was pictured in handcuffs.</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>Ukraine war: What weapon killed 50 people in station attack?</strong> - There’s mounting evidence that cluster weapons, which can cause heavy civilian casualties, are being used in this conflict.</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>BBC reporter: Scale of destruction in Borodyanka, in Kyiv region is extraordinary</strong> - Anna Foster is in Borodyanka showing the scale of damage left behind in the Kyiv region.</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>Marine Le Pen says she opposes sanctions on Russian gas</strong> - The French presidential candidate says she is in favour of sanctions on Russia - except for energy.</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>Titanosaur nesting spot found in Brazil</strong> - Find suggests the titanosaurs didn’t need to migrate to favorable nesting sites. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1847620">link</a></p></li>
|
||
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Slaw Device is back: RH Rotor Pedals rule the skies—for $475</strong> - They may be expensive, but for flight-sim enthusiasts, they’re worth every penny. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1847307">link</a></p></li>
|
||
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Tim Cook delivers speech railing against “data industrial complex,” sideloading</strong> - “Unintended consequences will be profound,” Cook claims. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1847519">link</a></p></li>
|
||
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>As gonorrhea becomes untreatable, a repurposed vaccine may prevent it</strong> - The effectiveness is modest, but could still prevent a massive number of infections. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1847628">link</a></p></li>
|
||
<li><p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"><strong>Russia’s Sandworm hackers attempted a third blackout in Ukraine</strong> - The attack was the first in five years to use Sandworm’s Industroyer malware. - <a href="https://arstechnica.com/?p=1847592">link</a></p></li>
|
||
</ul>
|
||
<h1 data-aos="fade-right" id="from-jokes-subreddit">From Jokes Subreddit</h1>
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<ul>
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<li><strong>Just a friendly reminder to show respect to Ramadan</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
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<div class="md">
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Yes, yes. I know we all like to have a good laugh about certain things. But Ramadan is a very important and sacred time for Muslims. And as a non-Muslim, I have since learned that we need treat it with some respect.
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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See, my next door neighbour is a Muslim. Ever since the start of Ramadan, I have been making jokes every time I see him. I’d say things like, “Hey! Lunch is on me today!” and “I bet you’d like a nice juicy steak about now!”. Sometimes I would walk to my car patting my belly after breakfast. When I went to get my mail the other day, I was eating an apple and ran into him. I took a big bite and said “mmm, so good” and laughed my arse off. Now, I though all this was just a bit of friendly banter. Just some ribbing going on between friends. But I clearly took it too far.
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||
</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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See, just today he comes up to me and says “Brother, I just thought I would let you know, this Friday evening my family and all our friends will be breaking fast with a huge barbeque. We will have a goat on a spit. We will be grilling steak and lamb chops all through the night. We will be cooking high quality sausages. We will be using all sorts of spices and marinades. Even with us all there, there will be more meat then we can all eat. You are more than welcome to join us”
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||
</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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Cheeky bastard knows I’m Catholic.
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||
</p>
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||
</div>
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<!--
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SC_ON -->
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/177329387473893"> /u/177329387473893 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u2fncu/just_a_friendly_reminder_to_show_respect_to/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u2fncu/just_a_friendly_reminder_to_show_respect_to/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
||
<li><strong>My girlfriend is one of a kind. She never says no to a shag, has great tits and even swallows.</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
||
<div class="md">
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
But her bird collecting has gone far enough now.
|
||
</p>
|
||
</div>
|
||
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/windowcleaneronmeth"> /u/windowcleaneronmeth </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u2neul/my_girlfriend_is_one_of_a_kind_she_never_says_no/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u2neul/my_girlfriend_is_one_of_a_kind_she_never_says_no/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
||
<li><strong>A young boy says to his father “Dad, our maths teacher is asking to see you.”</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
||
<div class="md">
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
“What happened?” The father asks.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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"Well, she asked me, ‘how much is 7 * 9?’ I answered ‘63’ , then she asked, ‘and 9 * 7?’ So I asked ‘what’s the fucking difference?’
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
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“Indeed, what is the difference?” asks the father. ‘’Sure, I’ll go.’’
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
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The next day, the boy comes home from school and says, “Dad, have you gone by the school?”
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</p>
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<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
“Not yet.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
“Well when you do, come and see the gym teacher also.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
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“Why?” asks the father.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
“Well we had a gym class today, and he asked me to raise my left arm, I did. Then my right arm, I also raised it. Then he asked me to lift my right leg, so I did. ‘Now,’ he says, ‘lift your left leg,’ so I asked, ‘What, am I suppose to stand on…. my cock??’”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
“Exactly,” says the father. “Alright, I’ll come.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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The next day, the boy asks his father “Did you go to the school?” “No, not yet.”
|
||
</p>
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||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
“Don’t bother, I got expelled.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
Surprised, the father asks “Why did you get expelled?”
|
||
</p>
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||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
“Well, they summoned me to the principal’s office, and sitting there were the math teacher, the gym teacher, and the art teacher.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
“The fuck was the art teacher doing there!?” asks the father.
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
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||
“That’s what I said!”
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||
</p>
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||
</div>
|
||
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/AdditionalMaterial10"> /u/AdditionalMaterial10 </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u20odk/a_young_boy_says_to_his_father_dad_our_maths/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u20odk/a_young_boy_says_to_his_father_dad_our_maths/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
||
<li><strong>NSFW My Favorite Gilbert Gottfried joke</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
||
<div class="md">
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
NSFW
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
A man goes to see his wife in the hospital. She has been getting sicker and sicker and is clearly in the final days of her life. He goes to her and holds her hand and stares into his wife’s eyes and asks her if there is anything at all he can do for her. His wife can barely speak and her skin is pale, cheeks sunken. She asks her husband to please, fuck her in the ass. The husband is surprised at her request and asks her if she is sure. With the same weak voice she again asks him to fuck her in the ass. The man is unsure but wants to do as his wife asks. He gets up and closes the door and moves to the bed. He goes to his wife and starts fucking her in the ass. As he is fucking her she starts moaning loudly. The color is returning to her cheeks. She is getting louder and louder screaming out YES! Then suddenly the man gets off her, burying his face in his hands crying. The woman goes to him and tells him she feels amazing and asks what was wrong? The man sobbing, lifts his head and tells her “I could have saved my father.”
|
||
</p>
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
RIP Gilbert, another comedy legend gone.
|
||
</p>
|
||
</div>
|
||
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/CorrectOrder"> /u/CorrectOrder </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u284ou/nsfw_my_favorite_gilbert_gottfried_joke/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u284ou/nsfw_my_favorite_gilbert_gottfried_joke/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
||
<li><strong>So, my girlfriend kicked me out of the house because of my bad Arnold Scharzenegger impressions. But don’t worry</strong> - <!-- SC_OFF -->
|
||
<div class="md">
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom">
|
||
I’ll return.
|
||
</p>
|
||
</div>
|
||
<!-- SC_ON -->
|
||
<p data-aos="fade-left" data-aos-anchor-placement="bottom-bottom"> submitted by <a href="https://www.reddit.com/user/MEforgotUSERNAME"> /u/MEforgotUSERNAME </a> <br/> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u26ssx/so_my_girlfriend_kicked_me_out_of_the_house/">[link]</a></span> <span><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/u26ssx/so_my_girlfriend_kicked_me_out_of_the_house/">[comments]</a></span></p></li>
|
||
</ul>
|
||
|
||
|
||
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