Arrested for Violating Coronavirus Stay-at-Home Mandates: Police Jail Alleged Scofflaws
COVID-19's Unique Threat to the South ; SCOTUS Just Made It Easier for Police to Pull You Over ; and More Picks
Florida Saw a Pandemic Coming and Prepared. Then State Leaders Started to Cut. (Reader Steve)
From the Tampa Bay Times: “As health officials warned Floridians were at ‘grave risk,’ the state dismantled the defenses it built against a coronavirus-like crisis.”
Taiwan’s Coronavirus Response Is Among the Best Globally (Russ)
The author writes, “Taiwan has a world-class health care system, with universal coverage. As news of the coronavirus began to emerge from Wuhan in the run up to the Lunar New Year, officials at Taiwan’s National Health Command Center (NHCC) — set up in the wake of SARS — moved quickly to respond to the potential threat.”
The Coronavirus’s Unique Threat to the South (Mili)
The author writes, “Health disparities tend to track both race and poverty, and the states in the old domain of Jim Crow have pursued policies that ensure those disparities endure. The South is the poorest region in the country. The poor, black, Latino, or rural residents who make up large shares of southern populations tend to lack access to high-quality doctors and care. … And many of those states are led by Republican leaders who have imitated President Donald Trump’s dallying and flip-flopping, and now find themselves flat-footed. The slow response from those governors will be even more ruinous in a region with so many challenges.”
The US Supreme Court Just Made It Easier for Police to Pull You Over (Chris)
The authors write, “It has long been too easy for police to stop motorists on the highway — even without sufficient reason to believe that the driver committed a crime. On Monday, the Supreme Court made such stops even easier, ruling 8 to 1 that police may pull over a vehicle because its owner’s driver’s license has been revoked — notwithstanding the fact that it’s common for the driver of a car to be the owner’s spouse, child, neighbor or friend.”
Scientists Use Cold War Nuclear Bombs to Determine Age of Whale Sharks (Chris)
From Courthouse News: “Since carbon-14’s rate of decay is constant, it allows scientists to accurately estimate ages of anything more than 300 years old. As a by-product of nuclear explosions, carbon-14 also moves through the oceans, producing an elevated signature in ocean life.”
