News ArticlesExcerpts of Key News Articles in Major Media
Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news articles on dozens of engaging topics. And read excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.
Alzheimer's ... afflicts nearly seven million Americans, about one in every nine people over the age of 65, making it a leading cause of death among older adults. Up to 420,000 adults in the prime of life – including people as young as 30 – suffer from early-onset Alzheimer's. The annual number of new cases of dementia is expected to double by 2050. Yet despite decades of research, no treatment has been created that arrests Alzheimer's cognitive deterioration, let alone reverses it. Over the past 25 years, Alzheimer's research has suffered a litany of ostensible fraud and other misconduct by world-famous researchers and obscure scientists alike. These deceptions have warped the trajectory of Alzheimer's research and drug development, prompting critical concerns about how bad actors, groupthink and perverse research incentives have undermined the pursuit of treatments and cures. This may have jeopardized the well-being of patients. I asked a team of brain and scientific imaging experts to help me analyze suspicious studies by 46 leading Alzheimer's researchers. Collectively, the experts identified nearly 600 dubious papers from the group that have distorted the field – papers having been cited some 80,000 times. Many of the most respected Alzheimer's scholars – whose work steers the scientific discourse – repeatedly referred to those tainted studies to support their own ideas. This has compromised the field's established base of knowledge.
Note: Top leaders in the field of medicine and science have spoken out about the rampant corruption and conflicts of interest in those industries. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on corruption in science.
Children on top of rubble… playing with ammunition casings. A close look reveals where they come from -- printed on the side: USA... DOD for the Department of Defence. Hala Rharrit was an American diplomat who ... worked on human rights and counterterrorism. Part of her job was to monitor Arab press and social media to document how America's role in the war was perceived in the Middle East. Daily reports Rharrit sent to senior leadership in Washington [contained] gruesome images: Hala Rharrit: "I would show the complicity that was indisputable. Fragments of U.S. bombs next to massacres of ... mostly children. And that's the devastation. It's been overwhelmingly children ... I would show images of children that were starved to death. I was basically berated, 'Don't put that image in there. We don't wanna see it.'" Three months into the war ... she was told her reports were no longer needed. The U.S. has sent $18 billion in American military assistance to Israel since the war began, largely in the form of taxpayer-funded weapons. Most of the bombs come from America. Most of the technology comes from America. And all of the fighter jets, all of Israel's fixed-wing fleet - comes from America. Andrew Miller was the deputy assistant secretary of state for Israeli-Palestinian affairs. He ... has since become the highest ranking Biden administration official to go public with his concerns about the U.S. role in the war. The State Department issued a report saying it is "reasonable to assess" that Israel may have used American weapons in violation of international law. Hala Rharrit: "Protests began erupting in the Arab world ... with people burning American flags. We worked so hard after the war on terror to strengthen ties with the Arab world."
Note: A new study shows that death feels imminent for 96% of children in Gaza. War destroys, yet these powerful real-life stories show that we can heal, reimagine better alternatives, and plant the seeds of a global shift in consciousness to transform our world.
Water hyacinths are native to South America, but were introduced as an exotic ornamental to many other countries. They've since taken over freshwater environments and are labeled an alien invasive species on every other continent aside from Antarctica. As well as their impact on biodiversity and livelihoods, the floating plant can clog hydroelectric and irrigation systems, meaning that one does not need to live in their proximity to be affected. It's the highest-profile example of an invasive aquatic plant crisis that has cost the global economy tens of billions of dollars historically, and now more than $700 million annually. Now a Kenyan company is addressing the problem as well as the country's plastic pollution issue by turning the invasive plant into a bioplastic. HyaPak Ecotech Limited, founded by Joseph Nguthiru, began life as a final year project by the former Egerton University civil and environmental engineering student. Nguthiru's bioplastic is made from dried water hyacinth combined with binders and additives, which is then mixed and shaped. The product, which biodegrades over a few months, was first used as an alternative for plastic packaging. HyaPak has gained widespread attention, winning the Youth category at the East Africa Climate Action Awards, a prize at UNESCO's World Engineering Day Hackathon, and a Prototype for Humanity Award 2023 announced at the COP28 climate conference.
Note: Explore more positive stories like this on healing the Earth and technology for good.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook has done "too much censorship" as he revealed the social network is scrapping fact-checking and restrictions on free speech as President-elect Donald Trump prepares to return to the White House. The 40-year-old tech tycoon – who dined with Trump at Mar-a-Lago the day before Thanksgiving and gave him a pair of Meta Ray Ban sunglasses, with Meta later donating $1 million to his inaugural fund – claimed on Tuesday that the dramatic about-face was signal that the company is returning to an original focus on free speech. The stunning reversal will include moving Meta's content moderation team from deep-blue California to right-leaning Texas in order to insulate the group from cultural bias. "As we work to promote free expression, I think that will help build trust to do this work in places where there's less concern about the bias of our team," the Meta boss said. Facebook will do away with "restrictions on topics like immigration and gender that are just out of touch with mainstream discourse," Zuckerberg said. "What started as a movement to be more inclusive has increasingly been used to shut down opinions and shut out people with different ideas," he said, adding: "It's gone too far." In late July, Facebook acknowledged that it censored the image of President-elect Donald Trump raising his fist in the immediate aftermath of the assassination attempt in Pennsylvania.
Note: Read a former senior NPR editor's nuanced take on how challenging official narratives became so politicized that "politics were blotting out the curiosity and independence that should have been guiding our work." Opportunities for award winning journalism were lost on controversial issues like COVID, the Hunter Biden laptop story, and more. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship and Big Tech.
Mark Zuckerberg has announced he is scrapping fact-checks on Facebook, claiming the labels intended to warn against fake news have "destroyed more trust than they have created". Facebook's fact-checkers have helped debunk hundreds of fake news stories and false rumours – however, there have been several high-profile missteps. In 2020, Facebook and Twitter took action to halt the spread of an article by the New York Post based on leaked emails from a laptop belonging to Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden. As coronavirus spread around the world, suggestions that the vaccine could have been man-made were suppressed by Facebook. An opinion column in the New York Post with the headline: "Don't buy China's story: The coronavirus may have leaked from a lab" was labelled as "false information". In 2021, Facebook lifted its ban on claims the virus could have been "man-made". It was months later that further doubts emerged over the origins of coronavirus. In 2021, Facebook ... was accused of wrongly fact-checking a story about Pfizer's Covid-19 vaccine. A British Medical Journal (BMJ) report, based on whistleblowing, alleged poor clinical practices at a contractor carrying out research for Pfizer. However, Facebook's fact-checkers added a label arguing the story was "missing context" and could "mislead people". Furious debates raged over the effectiveness of masks in preventing the spread of Covid-19. Facebook's fact-checkers were accused of overzealously clamping down on articles that questioned the science behind [mask] mandates.
Note: Read a former senior NPR editor's nuanced take on how challenging official narratives became so politicized that "politics were blotting out the curiosity and independence that should have been guiding our work." Opportunities for award winning journalism were lost on controversial issues like COVID, the Hunter Biden laptop story, and more. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship and Big Tech.
A decade ago, with the publication of an independent inquiry, Britain confronted the horror of the sexual abuse of children that had taken place in Rotherham over 16 years by organised gangs of men, mostly of Pakistani origin. The 2014 report conservatively estimated that 1,400 children – some as young as 11, many in the care of the state – were raped, abducted and sexually abused in Rotherham by groups of men. There have been many other reviews and inquiries in other towns and cities where children have been subjected to similar abuse by organised groups of men, including in Rochdale, Oxford, Telford and Bristol. Child victims of sexual abuse were not only routinely ignored by those whose job it was to protect them – including social workers and the police – but how young girls were viewed by child protection authorities as complicit in their own rape and abuse, as if it were something they could consent to. A further 2015 review into Rotherham led by Louise Casey was also clear that these abusers could hide behind their race to perpetrate their abuse: she uncovered what she called an "archaic culture of sexism, bullying and discomfort around race", with councillors and staff fearing being labelled racist if they mentioned the ethnicity of perpetrators. In suppressing an issue that should have been dealt with openly and properly, this was a factor in enabling the abuse to go on. As a society, we have a terrible track record of tackling child sexual abuse.
Note: Read more about the organized pedophile gangs that operated with impunity for decades in the UK. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on sexual abuse scandals.
As the special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction since 2012, my staff and I have audited and investigated U.S. programs and spending to rebuild Afghanistan. We have detailed a long list of systemic problems. One general told us that he faced a challenge: How to spend the remaining $1 billion from his annual budget in just over a month? Returning the money was not an option. Another official we spoke to said he refused to cancel a multimillion-dollar building project that field commanders did not want, because the funding had to be spent. The building was never used. The entire system became a self-licking ice cream cone: More money was always being spent to justify previous spending. Important information for measuring the success of initiatives was – at times deliberately – hidden from Congress and the American public. Since 2021 the United States has funneled $3.3 billion to Afghanistan through public international organizations, mainly United Nations offices, for humanitarian purposes. Some of this money helps the Afghan people, and some goes to the Taliban. Between the American withdrawal in August 2021 and this past May, U.S.-funded partners paid at least $10.9 million in taxes and fees to Taliban authorities. In July, we reported that two out of five State Department bureaus were unable to show that their contractors working in Afghanistan in 2022 had been vetted sufficiently to ensure their work was not benefiting terrorist organizations.
Note: The US was involved in human rights abuses including torture in Afghanistan. Learn more about war failures and lies in our comprehensive Military-Intelligence Corruption Information Center. For more, read our concise summaries of news articles on military corruption.
The Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft found that at least 37 members of Congress and their relatives traded between $24-113 million worth of stock in companies listed on Defense and Security Monitor's Top 100 Defense Contractors index. As the Quincy Institute noted: "Eight of these members even simultaneously held positions on the Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees, the committees overseeing defense policy and foreign relations. Members of Congress that oversee the annual defense bill and are privy to intelligence briefings have an upper hand in predicting future stock prices." The analysis found that one Democratic congressman accounted for the vast bulk of defense stock trading in 2024. Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey traded at least $22 million and as much as $104 million worth of shares in companies on the index. The Quincy Institute asserted: "If Congress wants to wash itself of conflicts of interest it can start by passing a stock trading ban. The Ending Trading and Holdings in Congressional Stocks Act, or ETHICS Act, would prohibit members of Congress from trading individual stocks." Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib ... has introduced the Stop Politicians Profiting from War Act, which would ban members of Congress, their spouses, and their dependent children from trading defense stocks or having financial interests in companies that do business with the U.S. Department of Defense.
Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on war and government corruption.
Nine years ago, Cecilia Llusco was one of 11 Indigenous women who made it to the summit of the 6,088 metre-high Huayna PotosĂ in Bolivia. They called themselves the cholitas escaladoras (the climbing cholitas) and went on to scale many more peaks in Bolivia and across South America. Llusco takes enormous pride in being an Indigenous woman and always goes up mountains wearing her pollera, a voluminous traditional floral skirt. Her belief in the strength of others, particularly women, is steadfast and reassuring. Though he cannot speak or hear, Asom Khan has so much to say. When I arrived at his shelter in a Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh, he was quick to dig out his art books so I could see his drawings, to show me the photos he takes with his phone, and to tell me his story through the makeshift sign language he has developed. Photography has allowed Asom to communicate to the world what it is like to live in a refugee camp, where he has now spent almost half of his life. [Human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh's] determination to stand up for victims of injustice in Iran is resolute. For decades she has fought for justice, defending children on death row, child victims of domestic abuse and prominent activists. The government has been relentless in its efforts to crush her spirit, but Sotoudeh refuses to give up hope. Some question how, as a wife and mother, she could risk imprisonment, after she was sentenced to 38 years and 148 lashes for her human rights work in 2019. But her husband and children's support is unwavering: "People say life is precious, don't sacrifice your family life, but human rights and freedom are also valuable and precious."
Note: Explore more positive and inspiring human interest stories.
A British woman has said a stroke left her with an Italian accent and the ability to speak the language, despite having never visited the country. Althia Bryden, 58, was found unresponsive by her husband Winston one evening after suffering a stroke. Mr Bryden described finding his wife "staring and unable to talk" as "terrifying" and said he immediately called an ambulance. The grandmother of two remained in hospital for nine days. On July 30, Mrs Althia was admitted back into hospital for surgery ... and, after three months being unable to speak, awoke with an Italian accent and the ability to say words in the language. It is thought that she has foreign accent syndrome, which is a rare medical condition that causes a person's speech to sound as though they have a foreign accent, even if they have not acquired it. Mrs Althia ... said: "I spent three months after my stroke thinking I'd never be able to talk again... I felt like a shell of the person I once was. "A nurse came to my hospital bed do a routine check and completely out of the blue, I just started speaking. She looked as shocked as I did. "Firstly, I couldn't believe it was me talking, but I also didn't recognise the sound of my voice. To my amazement, I'm also able to speak Italian... a language I've never learnt or spoke ever before. "Without realising, I will say an Italian word mid-conversation, which is the Italian word for what I'm trying to say in English. "I have no idea I'm about to do it – my brain just converts the English word into Italian."
Note: Explore more positive stories like this on the mysterious nature of reality.
In 2017, the drug industry middleman Express Scripts announced that it was taking decisive steps to curb abuse of the prescription painkillers that had fueled America's overdose crisis. Why hadn't the middlemen, known as pharmacy benefit managers, acted sooner to address a crisis that had been building for decades? One reason, a New York Times investigation found: Drugmakers had been paying them not to. For years, the benefit managers, or P.B.M.s, took payments from opioid manufacturers, including Purdue Pharma, in return for not restricting the flow of pills. As tens of thousands of Americans overdosed and died from prescription painkillers, the middlemen collected billions of dollars in payments. The P.B.M.s exert extraordinary control over what drugs people can receive and at what price. The three dominant companies – Express Scripts, CVS Caremark and Optum Rx – oversee prescriptions for more than 200 million. The P.B.M.s are hired by insurers and employers to control their drug costs by negotiating discounts with pharmaceutical manufacturers. They often pursue their own financial interests in ways that increase costs for patients, employers and government programs, while driving independent pharmacies out of business. Regulators have accused the largest P.B.M.s of anticompetitive practices. In addition ... P.B.M.s sometimes collaborated with opioid manufacturers to persuade insurers not to restrict access to their drugs.
Note: A former DEA agent has said that Congress helped drug companies create the opioid epidemic. Read how pharmacy benefit managers inflate the price of medications behind the scenes. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Big Pharma corruption.
Corporate media is heralding the fall of Bashar al-Assad and the emergence of Abu Mohammed al-Jolani as the new leader of Syria, despite his deep ties to both al-Qaeda and ISIS. CNN portrayed him as a "blazer-wearing revolutionary." In 2013, [CNN] labeled him one of "the world's 10 most dangerous terrorists," known for abducting, torturing and slaughtering racial and religious minorities. Western governments consider Jolani's new organization, HayĘĽat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), as one and the same as Al-Qaeda/Al-Nusra. Jolani – whose real name is Ahmed Hussein al-Shar'a ... was captured by the U.S. military and spent over five years in prison, including a stint at the notorious Abu Ghraib torture center. While in Iraq, Jolani fought with ISIS and was even a deputy to its founder. Immediately upon release in 2011, ISIS sent him to Syria with a rumored $1 billion to found the Syrian wing of al-Qaeda. While both journalists and politicians in the U.S. are scrambling to change their opinions on Jolani and HTS, the reality is that, for much of its existence, Washington has enjoyed a very close relationship with al-Qaeda. The organization was born in Afghanistan in the 1980s, thanks in no small part to the CIA. Between 1979 and 1992, the CIA spent billions of dollars funding, arming, and training Afghan Mujahideen militiamen (like Osama bin Laden) in an attempt to bleed the Soviet occupation dry. The Bush administration would use [the 9/11] attacks as a pretext to invade both Afghanistan and Iraq, claiming that America could never be safe if al-Qaeda were not thoroughly destroyed. And yet, by the 2010s, even as the U.S. was ostensibly at war with al-Qaeda in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was secretly working with [al-Qaeda] in Syria on a plan to overthrow Assad. The CIA spent around $1 billion per year training and arming a wide network of rebel groups to this end. As National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a leaked 2012 email, "AQ [al-Qaeda] is on our side in Syria."
Note: As recently as 2016, Syrian militias armed by the Pentagon were fighting with Syrian militias armed by the CIA. Read more about how radicalized Iraqis were swept into US military detention at Camp Bucca–a notorious facility often called a "terrorist university"–where they forged alliances that directly led to the rise of ISIS.
An independent review found Father Thaddeus Kotik, who died in 1992, lured young girls and boys into the monastery garden, where he would sexually abuse, including rape, them over the course of many years – and that leaders within the order and abbey repeatedly failed to report allegations of his abuse to authorities. Father Jan Rossey, who last year became the Abbot of Caldey Abbey, which sits on an island off the coast of Pembrokeshire in west Wales and is home to Cistercian Order monks, admitted that "it is clear opportunities were missed to stop the abuse of children" on Tuesday after he commissioned the review into alleged historical child sex abuse by monks. The review, led by former assistant police and crime commissioner at South Wales Police, Jan Pickles, examined allegations dating from the late 1960s to 1992, made by people who experienced abuse on the remote Welsh island as children, some who lived there and others who visited. The review concluded that Kotik, who sexually abused girls and boys while he was a monk at the abbey, used a tortoise and "other attractive treats" to entice children into the monastery garden, where he would sexually abuse them. The report also said he "groomed" parents by "overwhelming" them with attention, offering babysitting help and giving small gifts. The abuse in the case of some victims persisted over a period of many years, as children returned to Caldey with their families for holidays.
Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on sexual abuse scandals.
Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority. However, as many AI ethicists warn, this blinkered focus on the existential future threat to humanity posed by a malevolent AI ... has often served to obfuscate the myriad more immediate dangers posed by emerging AI technologies. These "lesser-order" AI risks ... include pervasive regimes of omnipresent AI surveillance and panopticon-like biometric disciplinary control; the algorithmic replication of existing racial, gender, and other systemic biases at scale ... and mass deskilling waves that upend job markets, ushering in an age monopolized by a handful of techno-oligarchs. Killer robots have become a twenty-first-century reality, from gun-toting robotic dogs to swarms of autonomous unmanned drones, changing the face of warfare from Ukraine to Gaza. Palestinian civilians have frequently spoken about the paralyzing psychological trauma of hearing the "zanzana" – the ominous, incessant, unsettling, high-pitched buzzing of drones loitering above. Over a decade ago, children in Waziristan, a region of Pakistan's tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, experienced a similar debilitating dread of US Predator drones that manifested as a fear of blue skies. "I no longer love blue skies. In fact, I now prefer gray skies. The drones do not fly when the skies are gray," stated thirteen-year-old Zubair in his testimony before Congress in 2013.
Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on AI and military corruption.
A former 'true atheist' has come forward to tell his story of the dramatic near-death experience that made him a believer and left him with a 'deep sense of love.' Jose Hernandez, from Canada, said his journey to the other side began with a brutal accident as an electrical engineer tending to roadside power lines. When his colleague crashed their utility truck on January 6, 2000, the then 46-year-old Hernandez was left with multiple broken ribs preventing him from breathing as emergency medical technicians raced him to intensive care. Despite his disbelief in the afterlife, Hernandez said that he spent those moments of deep physical pain seeking help from a higher power. Hernandez said his consciousness was soon transported through a dark otherworldly portal that led to a mysterious transitional realm of living light and color. He spent three minutes clinically dead, came back but fell back into the same state for another two minutes, which he said felt like hours as he watched his lifeless body in the hospital. [A] spirit-like figure [offered] him words of comfort as he transitioned to 'the other side.' 'I heard the voice next to me say 'Think of the your body as a car, and that car has like five million miles on it, and there's nothing we can do to fix it anymore. So you have to now say goodbye to your body,'' he remembered. This realm allowed him to reconcile with his deceased father. 'It was even more amazing because me and my father had a very hard relationship,' Hernandez noted. 'We had a lot of clashes and I don't ever remember saying to my father in life, 'I love you,' or he to me.' But all that changed when they met again in this realm. When I met my dad on the other side,' he told the podcast, 'I realized sometimes we may not be able to say something here, [but] we're gonna be able to say it somewhere else.'
Note: Watch a video of Hernandes talking about his experiences. Read more about the fascinating study of near-death experiences. Explore more positive stories like this on near-death experiences.
A spritz of perfume may feel like such a minor chemical exposure compared to the pollutants elsewhere in our environment – microplastics, air pollution, PFAS. But scientists and clinicians are increasingly raising alarm over a group of chemicals used in many personal care products: phthalates. Phthalates – found in popular perfumes, nail polishes and hair care products – have been linked to numerous adverse health outcomes: insulin resistance, cardiovascular disease and impaired neurodevelopment. A study published in JAMA Network Open found that higher urinary concentrations of phthalates from personal care products was linked to a 25 percent increased risk of hyperactivity problems among adolescents. Another study of the same cohort found that increased phthalate exposure was also associated with poorer performance in math. The concerns about childhood exposure to phthalates are high enough that in the United States, certain types of the chemical are banned in children's toys and items such as pacifiers and baby bottles. For Andrea Gore, a professor of pharmacology and toxicology at the University of Texas at Austin ... the harms are clear enough that she advises everyone to try to reduce their exposure, especially parents starting a family and those with young children. "I recommend avoiding added fragrances altogether – in perfumes, scented lotions and shampoos, even scented detergents and antiperspirants," she said.
Note: For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on health and toxic chemicals.
Even for those familiar with parts of the stories about women who were deceived into intimate relationships with undercover police officers, the evidence that has emerged in recent weeks has been shocking. The litany of destructive behaviour either carried out by, or caused by, officers deployed to spy on campaigners, who were mostly active in leftwing causes, is being laid bare as never before: self-harm, heroin use, unprotected sex leading to emergency contraception, coercive control and the sudden abandonment of female partners and children. On Tuesday, Belinda Harvey told the public inquiry how she was manipulated by Bob Lambert, who tricked at least three other women into relationships as well. Next week, Mr Lambert will face questions about who authorised the tactic of targeting and seducing young, female activists – and why he employed it so many times. Last month, another undercover officer testified that Mr Lambert had "bragged" about fathering a child. In their jointly authored book, Deep Deception, five women described how they found out that they had been systematically lied to by former partners – in some cases after decades of confusion and self-doubt. Mr Lambert stands out not only for the number of secret relationships he initiated and his alleged involvement in an arson plot, but also because his five-year deployment as a police spy in the 1980s was treated as a triumph. He was given a commendation and went on to run covert operations.
Note: Read more about the dozens of activists tricked into having romantic relationships with undercover police. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on police corruption.
In 2024 WIRED conducted an investigation uncovering the data of mobile devices belonging to almost 200 of his visitors. How strong was the data? So precise that we followed visitor's movements to and from Epstein Island to within centimeters–tracking their countries, neighborhoods, and even buildings of origin. These digital trails document the numerous trips of wealthy and influential individuals seemingly undeterred by Epstein's status as a convicted sex offender. Little St. James is a private island that is part of the U.S. Virgin Islands, an unincorporated territory of the United States in the Caribbean Sea. Epstein purchased little St. James in 1998 for $7.95 million. It's about 71 acres, the size of 54 football fields. He made the island his primary residence and soon after began welcoming visitors and throwing infamous parties where he was accused of having groomed, sexually assaulted, and trafficked untold numbers of women and girls. The tracking of phones wasn't contained to Little St. James surveillance continued long after the visitors left. The Near Intelligence data we uncovered pinpoints 166 locations throughout the United States and 80 cities across 26 states. Topping the list were Florida, Massachusetts, Texas, Michigan, and New York. Many of the visitors were likely wealthy, as indicated by coordinates pointing to gated communities in Michigan, as well as homes in Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket in Massachusetts.
Note: Read about the connection between Epstein's child sex trafficking ring and intelligence agency sexual blackmail operations. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on Jeffrey Epstein's trafficking and blackmail ring.
With the misinformation category being weaponized across the political spectrum, we took a look at how invested government has become in studying and "combatting" it using your tax dollars. That research can provide the intellectual ammunition to censor people online. Since 2021, the Biden-Harris administration has spent $267 million on research grants with the term "misinformation" in the proposal. Of course, the Covid pandemic was the driving force behind so much of the misinformation debate. There is robust documentation by now proving that the Biden-Harris administration worked closely with social media companies to censor content deemed "misinformation," which often included cases where people simply questioned or disagreed with the Administration's COVID policies. In February the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government issued a scathing report against the National Science Foundation (NSF) for funding grants supporting tools and processes that censor online speech. The report said, "the purpose of these taxpayer-funded projects is to develop artificial intelligence (AI)-powered censorship and propaganda tools that can be used by governments and Big Tech to shape public opinion by restricting certain viewpoints or promoting others." $13 million was spent on the censorious technologies profiled in the report.
Note: Read the full article on Substack to uncover all the misinformation contracts with government agencies, universities, nonprofits, and defense contractors. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on censorship and government corruption.
U.S. government researchers have found that a widely prescribed asthma drug originally sold by Merck & Co, may be linked to serious mental health problems for some patients, according to a scientific presentation reviewed by Reuters. The researchers found that the drug, sold under the brand name Singulair and generically as montelukast, attaches to multiple brain receptors critical to psychiatric functioning. By 2019, thousands of reports of neuropsychiatric episodes, including dozens of suicides, in patients prescribed the drug had piled up on internet forums and in the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's tracking system. Such "adverse event" reports do not prove a causal link between a medicine and a side effect, but are used by the FDA to determine whether more study of a drug's risks are warranted. The reports and new scientific research led the FDA in 2020 to add a "black box" warning to the montelukast prescribing label, flagging serious mental health risks like suicidal thinking or actions. The behavior of montelukast appears similar to other drugs known to have neuropsychiatric effects, such as the antipsychotic risperidone. When the FDA added the black box, it cited research from Julia Marschallinger and Ludwig Aigner. The two scientists told Reuters ... the new data showed significant quantities of montelukast present in the brain. The receptors involved play a role in governing mood, impulse control, cognition and sleep, among other functions, they said.
Note: Reuters reported that the FDA received more than 80 reports of suicides in people taking the medicine. Learn more about how US courts protected Merck from lawsuits regarding Singulair. For more along these lines, explore concise summaries of news articles on mental health and Big Pharma profiteering from reliable major media sources.
Important Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news articles on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.