Friday, February 25th, 2022
Europe War Zone, Worldwide Protests & Largest Family Tree
All the news you need in around 10 min:
This episode is brought to you by Seed.com/newsworthy and Zocdoc.com/newsworthy
Story Summaries
All the news stories mentioned in today's episode are listed with links below, so you can spend as much -- or as little -- time as you want reading the latest happenings...
War in Ukraine
Russia is now settling into a war on Ukraine from the land, sea, and air. Almost every corner of Ukraine is now under attack. Ukrainian authorities posted videos showing intense fighting around the country with downed aircraft and damaged tanks, as well as armored troops from both sides. More than 100 Ukrainians, both service members and civilians, died in the first full day of fighting. Russia’s President Putin justified the war, saying it was needed to protect civilians in Eastern Ukraine from a threat the U.S. says is made up. President Biden says this conflict was about “Putin’s desire for empire… by any means necessary.”
Read more: BBC, AP, WSJ, Reuters, CNN, Pres. Zelensky
More Sanctions/Trade Bans for Russia
Leaders from all over the world condemned Russia for launching a war in Ukraine, and several have responded with new, tougher economic sanctions. The Biden administration says it's sanctioning nearly 90 Russian banks, including the two largest ones. President Biden says that will target trillions of dollars in Russian assets. Biden also met with leaders of the G7 nations who all agreed to limit Russia’s ability to do business in dollars, euros, pounds, and yen, making it difficult for Russia to be part of the global economy. Other sanctions will restrict high-tech trade with Russia.
Read more: ABC News, CNBC, Fox News, CNN, Treasury Dept.
US Economic Impact
In reaction to the crisis in Ukraine, the U.S. stock market has been volatile. Wall Street started yesterday with a sharp drop, then recovered. That’s because, in the second half of the day, investors were going big on growth and technology stocks. Oil prices went down, too, after President Biden said the U.S. and other nations are thinking about releasing oil from the strategic reserve. The U.S. dollar also strengthened while the Russian ruble weakened to a record low. Still, President Biden warns there could be some tough days ahead for Americans since this could impact the already-struggling supply chain.
Read more: CNBC, Reuters, Fox Business, USA Today
Protests Around the World
People around the world have been showing solidarity with Ukraine. Protests have popped up from Tokyo to London, New York City to Los Angeles, and many cities in between. Huge crowds are rallying against Russia’s attacks, and in some cases, they’re calling on their own governments to do more. Many protests have been peaceful, but the most volatile ones were in Russia. Thousands of Russians showed up in dozens of cities around the country to make it clear they don’t want war. However, that’s risky in that country because spontaneous mass demonstrations like that are illegal. More than 1,700 protesters were arrested yesterday.
Read more: NY Times, AP, Al Jazeera, WaPo, Reuters
How to Donate: Army SOS, United Help Ukraine, Red Cross, Revived Soldiers Ukraine
Sean Penn in Ukraine for Documentary
As battle rages in Ukraine, Oscar-winning actor Sean Penn is getting a first-hand look. He’s reportedly been working on a documentary about tensions rising there for a few months now, and he flew out to Ukraine earlier this week. Just yesterday, Ukraine’s president posted a video in an Instagram story showing him meeting with the actor. Then, the presidential office’s Facebook page posted in Ukrainian that Penn “came to the country specifically to record all the events taking place in Ukraine and to tell the truth about Russia invading our country.”
Read more: Variety, AP, Fox News, Newsweek
CDC’s New Mask Guidelines
The CDC is expected to come out with new, more relaxed guidelines about masks today. Several news outlets cited sources who say the recommendations will move away from using just the number of Covid-19 cases to decide when to take precautions. Until now, the guidance has said masks should be universal indoors in places with substantial or high transmission rates. That’s still 95% of the U.S. So now, the guidelines are still expected to consider caseloads, but also hospitalizations and hospital capacity.
Read more: Axios, NBC News, AP, CNN
More MN Police Officers Convicted
Three more former Minneapolis police officers have been convicted for the death of George Floyd. They were there the day then-officer Derek Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes, and Floyd died at the scene. Even though Chauvin was the one who did it, the jury agreed the other officers’ actions resulted in Floyd’s death, too, since they didn’t intervene. They were found guilty on federal civil rights charges. They all face a separate state trial this summer on charges of aiding and abetting murder.
Read more: ABC News, Fox News, WSJ, Axios, WaPo, DOJ
MLB Spring Training Postponed
Major League Baseball’s spring training was supposed to happen this weekend, but it’s been pushed back because of the ongoing lockout. Negotiations have been going on for three months, but so far, there is no deal. Besides spring training, the MLB says it will start canceling regular-season games if owners and the player’s union can’t agree to a new collective bargaining agreement by Monday. If that happens, players won’t get paid for those games, and the MLB says they won’t be rescheduled.
Read more: WaPo, AP, ESPN, MLB
DNA Reveals Biggest-ever Human Family Tree
Scientists at the University of Oxford created the world’s largest family tree that links 27 million ancestors. The research combines human genomes from both ancient and modern DNA to better understand human history and evolution. Until now, a big challenge has been combining genome sequences from many different databases and coming up with algorithms to handle data this big. Now, the researchers say they can combine it, going back to prehistoric data. Now, they can work with millions of sequences to find out where and who we all came from.
Read more: CNN, Gizmodo, Phys, Science
Feel Good Friday: Teens Step Up During EMT Shortage
Small-town teenagers and young adults are being recognized for stepping up during an EMT shortage. When the pandemic hit, a lot of older people left their posts as volunteers with the Sackets Harbor Fire Department and Emergency Crew in New York State. When a group of high school students heard about that, they joined the department. Now, the entire EMS workforce is under 21 years old. When word of their good examples took off, a GoFundMe page popped up for their department, and so far, it’s raised nearly $5,000.
Read more: CBS News, NPR, Newsweek, WWNY, SHFC, GoFundMe