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Cynthia-VT
@cynthia-vt.bsky.social
"you are not alone,
the poem said,
in the dark tunnel"

--Louise Gluck
⬇️
US Weekly COVID update: Dec 15, 2025

🔸1 in 63 Actively Infectious
🔸772,000 New Daily Infections
🔸4,730,000 Infections In The Past Week
🔸228,000,000 Infections in 2025
🔸237,000 to 950,000 Weekly Long COVID Cases
🔸1,400 to 2,400 Weekly Deaths

Source: pmc19.com/data/
December 16, 2025 at 12:30 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
US Weekly COVID update: Dec 15, 2025

🔸1 in 63 Actively Infectious
🔸772,000 New Daily Infections
🔸4,730,000 Infections In The Past Week
🔸228,000,000 Infections in 2025
🔸237,000 to 950,000 Weekly Long COVID Cases
🔸1,400 to 2,400 Weekly Deaths

Source: pmc19.com/data/
December 16, 2025 at 12:01 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Three children dead in Ottawa, Eastern Ontario region after flu-related complications. Medical officers of health warn of rapid rise in influenza-A, urge vaccination ahead of holidays, by @kkirkup.bsky.social www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/artic... via @theglobeandmail.com
Three children dead in Ottawa, Eastern Ontario region after flu-related complications
Medical officers of health warn of rapid rise in influenza-A, urge vaccination ahead of holidays
www.theglobeandmail.com
December 16, 2025 at 12:05 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Strange Horizons will be open to general fiction submissions for 48 hours beginning January 19th, 2026 at 3 p.m. UTC and ending January 21st, 2026 at 3 p.m. UTC.

There will be no cap.

See our fiction submission guidelines for more information on how to submit:

strangehorizons.com/submit/ficti...
December 15, 2025 at 6:04 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
"At Walmart, recalled products were found in stores across 21 states.

In a letter to Target, the health regulator said officials in Arkansas found the company offering a $2 discount on the recalled formula from November 16 to November 22. Target had the formula in stores across 20 states."
US FDA sends warning letters to Walmart, Target for selling recalled baby formula
The FDA said four major retailers continued to sell baby formula linked to a nationwide outbreak of bacterial illness in infants even after the products were recalled.
www.reuters.com
December 15, 2025 at 11:50 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Vandals decapitated and smashed the statue of Mary in an Evanston church’s outdoor Nativity scene Friday, and the church responded by replacing it with a sign saying Mary was beaten & dragged away in front of her son and is being held in immigration detention.
www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/15/n...
Nativity smashed, Mary figure ‘beaten’ at Evanston church: ‘God’s on the side of the vulnerable’
Vandals destroyed Lake Street Church of Evanston’s Nativity. It replaced Mary with a sign saying she’s in immigration detention.
www.chicagotribune.com
December 15, 2025 at 11:39 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
When you make health decisions for your children based on medical misinformation, it costs lives.

A baby died from an extreme alkaline diet.
The children were hospitalized for rickets (due to Vit D deficiency), osteopenia. They also had developmental delays.

🧪 www.usatoday.com/story/life/h...
A 5-month-old's shocking death and the dangers of extreme diets, medical misinformation
The alkaline diet in particular has become a dangerous, yet widespread, piece of misinformation.
www.usatoday.com
December 15, 2025 at 5:04 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Oh ma gawd, I was waiting for the sanism! We were all doing so good describing Trump having a black hole where his heart should be & gloating over Reiner's murder before they started reverting to the easy ways, calling him insane.
December 15, 2025 at 3:38 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Whatever his mental state, Trump is cruel by choice. Why can’t ppl focus on the fact that he consistently chooses cruelty? That has nothing to do with whatever armchair diagnosis they’re issuing & we can ALL agree it.
December 15, 2025 at 4:13 PM
"idea came to him that the best thing he could do by way of calling public attention to the horror of this report, would be by writing a story rather than an article. 'Something that would strike the heaviest blow in my power that would come down w sledgehammer force"
www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTHA...
The origins of A Christmas Carol
YouTube video by British Library
www.youtube.com
December 15, 2025 at 4:13 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Two things:
*They are only cutting these funds in seven states that lean Democratic
*Support for people with disabilities was a relatively bipartisan position. Trump has repeatedly made clear he does not see them as people worthy of support or dignity.
"A program for deafblind children helped 3-year-old Annie Garner, born with poor vision and no ears, learn to communicate. The Trump administration cut the program’s funding over diversity goals."

www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/u...
Born Deaf and Blind, She’s Caught in Trump’s Anti-Diversity Crusade
www.nytimes.com
December 15, 2025 at 2:47 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
In DC, Trump officials celebrated the decimation of USAID with a sheet cake.

In South Sudan, USAID budget cuts closed a health clinic in the middle of a cholera outbreak.

Tor Top had to take his sick mother to the hospital, 8 hours away. She died on the way.

www.propublica.org/article/usai...
Trump Officials Celebrated With Cake After Slashing Aid. Then People Died of Cholera.
Behind closed doors in Washington, top advisers made a series of decisions that had devastating repercussions for the poorest country on earth. We went to South Sudan and found people who died as a re...
www.propublica.org
December 15, 2025 at 3:09 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Bluesky is like a virtual windowsill, right? Chanukah sameach to all who celebrate, however you chose to do so in these days.
December 15, 2025 at 12:58 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
December 15, 2025 at 12:05 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
December 15, 2025 at 12:13 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Happy Hanukkah from Boston!
December 14, 2025 at 11:53 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
It’s the first night of Hanukkah and the world seems like a very dark place. But we can bring light to the darkness. We can fight for each other and make goodness, love, and community shine through.

Show me your menorahs and let’s light up the timeline!
December 14, 2025 at 11:39 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Armed ICE agents trapped US citizens in a restaurant and demanded their papers. Federal agents walked into East African restaurants in Cedar-Riverside, MN. They closed and blocked the doors. Then they demanded to see everyone’s papers. Every person present was a US citizen.
Federal agents use chemical irritant on crowd in Somali neighborhood of Minneapolis amid Trump crackdown
Federal agents have used chemical irritant to disperse a crowd in a heavily Somali neighborhood in Minneapolis. This happened Tuesday during a identification checks amid the Trump administration's cra...
www.mprnews.org
December 14, 2025 at 5:54 PM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
It’s a miracle the library survived the ordeal
December 15, 2025 at 12:26 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
I scarcely dare to post such salacious details but here is a preview of the plot.

“The book … depicts a transgender boy who asks his teacher to call him by his chosen name instead of the name on the attendance sheet.”
December 15, 2025 at 12:26 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
The library board wouldn’t remove a picture book about a trans boy so they dissolved the whole board.

“The book has been banned by three school districts — Carmel, Indiana; Palm Beach County, Florida; Stillwater, Minnesota — and nationally by the DoD in military schools”

archive.is/2025.12.14-1...
December 15, 2025 at 12:23 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
*except not getting Covid, of course
December 15, 2025 at 12:38 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
Getting some QTs saying, do this if visiting vulnerable ppl. But this is an everybody need!

• Spread does not stop at your party—it drives community transmission and endangers ppl not attending.

• Science hasn’t found any factor that fully protects against Long Covid*—we’re all vulnerable to that!
Holiday gathering reminder 🎁

If your guests test w/rapids twice before the event, 48 hours apart, it’ll catch 63% of Covid cases even if they have no symptoms. Testing 3x improves that to 79%!

This is how we curb the annual January surge that gave me Long Covid—thanks for protecting yr community 🤍
Study Examines Performance of Serial COVID Testing - News Center
Testing performance of rapid antigen tests for SARS-CoV-2 improved for both asymptomatic and symptomatic patients after testing multiple times in 48-hour intervals, according to findings published in ...
news.feinberg.northwestern.edu
December 15, 2025 at 12:38 AM
Reposted by Cynthia-VT
ICE pepper-sprayed this 1-year-old girl.

Once at the hospital, the doctor had to call in a poison control specialist.

They had never seen anyone that young pepper sprayed.

Another horrific story.

More details below.
December 14, 2025 at 11:31 PM