SYDNEY (Reuters) -Extra Australian military personnel may be called in to ensure compliance with lockdown rules in Sydney, the New South Wales state government said on Thursday, as the highly infectious Delta coronavirus variant spreads into regional areas.

© Reuters/JOSH NIXON/PODPEOPLEDOOM Local residents shop at Casey Market Town in Canberra

The move comes as Australia’s capital city, Canberra, 260 km (160 miles) southwest of Sydney, announced a snap one-week lockdown from Thursday evening after reporting its first locally acquired case of COVID-19 in more than a year. Authorities later confirmed an additional three cases, all close contacts of the first case, an unnamed man.

© Reuters/JOSH NIXON/PODPEOPLEDOOM Local residents shop at Casey Market Town in Canberra

Australia is battling to get on top of the fast-moving Delta strain that has plunged its two largest cities – Sydney and Melbourne – into hard lockdowns.

“We are making sure that we do not leave any stone unturned in relation to extra (military) resources,” New South Wales (NSW) state Premier Gladys Berejiklian said at a media conference in Sydney, the state capital.

Some 580 unarmed army personnel are already helping police enforce home-quarantine orders on affected households in the worst-affected suburbs of Sydney, Australia’s most populous city.

Several regional towns scattered across NSW have also been forced into snap lockdowns after fresh cases, raising fears the virus is spreading out of control.

Despite seven weeks of lockdown in Sydney, daily infections continue to hover near record highs. NSW on Thursday reported 345 new locally acquired cases, most of them in Sydney, up from 344 a day earlier.

Lockdown rules were tightened in three more local council areas in Sydney, limiting the movement of people to within 5 km (3 miles) of their homes.

Joe Awada, the mayor of Bayside Council, one of the areas placed under additional restrictions, questioned why more targeted curbs were not introduced.

“I mean to lockdown 200,000 residents because of three suburbs is not acceptable to me,” Awada told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

Officials also reported the deaths of two men in their 90s, taking the total deaths in the latest outbreak to 36. A total of 374 cases are in hospitals, with 62 in intensive care, 29 of whom require ventilation.

© Reuters/JOSH NIXON/PODPEOPLEDOOM Local residents shop at Casey Market Town in Canberra

In Canberra, authorities said the one-week lockdown was needed as they were unsure how the man is his 20s acquired COVID-19.

Canberra has largely escaped any COVID-19 cases since the beginning of the pandemic, and confirmation of a Delta variant saw panic buying at the supermarkets and long lines at testing sites.

Neighbouring Victoria state on Thursday reported 21 new locally acquired cases, up from 20 a day earlier, as 5 million residents of Melbourne, the state capital, prepare to enter a second week of lockdown.

Of the new cases, six spent time outdoors while infectious, a number which authorities have said must return to near zero before restrictions can be eased.

Australia has largely avoided the high coronavirus numbers seen in many other countries, with just over 37,700 cases and 946 deaths, and several states remain almost COVID-free despite the outbreaks in Sydney and Melbourne.

But the rapid spread of the Delta variant in New South Wales and a slow vaccine rollout has left the country vulnerable to a new wave of infections.

Only around 24% of people above 16 years of age are fully vaccinated.

(Reporting by Renju Jose; additional reporting by Colin Packham in Canberra, Editing by Stephen Coates, Richard Pullin and Sam Holmes)

Source:  https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/sydney-to-tighten-covid-19-curbs-australian-capital-to-enter-lockdown/ar-AANdpm1

The post Sydney to tighten COVID-19 curbs, Australian capital to enter lockdown first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The post Rand Paul Tells People to ‘Resist’ COVID-19 Safety Protocols first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

They can’t arrest us all. They can’t keep all your kids home from school. They can’t keep every government building closed – although I’ve got a long list of ones they should.
We don’t have to accept the mandates, lockdowns, and harmful policies of the petty tyrants and feckless bureaucrats. We can simply say no, not again.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi — you will not arrest or stop me or anyone on my staff from doing our jobs. We have all either had COVID, had the vaccine, or been offered the vaccine. We will make our own health choices. We will not show you a passport, we will not wear a mask, we will not be forced into random screening and testing so you can continue your drunk with power rein over the Capitol.

President Biden — we will not accept your agencies’ mandates or your reported moves toward a lockdown. No one should follow the CDC’s anti-science mask mandates. And if you want to shutdown federal agencies again — some of which aren’t even back to work fully — I will stop every bill coming through the Senate with an amendment to cut their funding if they don’t come to work.

No more.

Local bureaucrats and union bosses — we will not allow you to do more harm to our children again this year. Children are not at any more risk from COVID than they are for the seasonal flu. Every adult who works in schools has either had the vaccine or had their chance to. There is no reason for mask mandates, part time schools, or any lockdown measures.

Children are falling behind in school, and are being harmed physically and psychologically by the tactics you have used to keep them from the classroom last year. We won’t allow it again.

If a school system attempts to keep the children from full-time, in-person school, I will hold up every bill with two amendments. One to defund them, and another to allow parents the choice of where the money goes for their child’s education.

Do I sound fed up to you? That’s because I am.

I’m not a career politician. I’ve practiced medicine for 33 years. I graduated from Duke Medical School, worked in emergency rooms, studied immunology and virology, and ultimately chose to become a surgeon.

I have been telling everyone for a year now that Dr. Anthony Fauci and other public health officials were NOT following science, and I’ve been proven right time and time again.

But I’m not the only one who is fed up. I can’t go anywhere these days — from work, to events, to airports and Ubers, restaurants and stores, without people coming up to me thanking me for standing up for them.

For standing up for actual science. For standing up for freedom. For standing against mandates, lockdowns, and bureaucratic power grabs.

I think the tide has turned, and more and more people are willing to stand up. I see stories from across the country of parents standing up to teacher unions and school boards.

I see members of Congress refusing to comply with Petty Tyrant Pelosi.

We are at a moment of truth and a crossroads. Will we allow these people to use fear and propaganda to do further harm to our society, economy, and children?

Or will we stand together and say, absolutely not. Not this time. I choose freedom.

Source:  http://www.ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2021/august/04/sen-rand-paul-mask-mandates-and-lockdowns-from-petty-tyrants-no-not-again-choose-freedom/

The post Sen. Rand Paul: Mask mandates and lockdowns from petty tyrants? No, not again. Choose freedom first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia’s New South Wales state on Friday reported its biggest daily rise in new COVID-19 cases this year, prompting a tighter lockdown in Sydney and a request for additional vaccine doses which was rebuffed by other state leaders.

State premier Gladys Berejiklian characterized the escalating virus outbreak as a “national emergency” and raised the likelihood that stay-home orders for the country’s biggest city would be extended beyond the current end-date of July 30.

“There is no doubt that the numbers are not going in the direction we were hoping they would at this stage,” Berejiklian said as she announced 136 new cases in the New South Wales.

The state had urged the federal government to divert additional vaccine doses to Sydney, a request Prime Minister Morrison turned down following a national cabinet meeting with all state heads.

Australia boasted another record day for COVID-19 vaccination with almost 200,000 doses delivered in one day. Morrison, who on Thursday apologized for the slow pace of inoculation, said the latest data signaled the country’s vaccination rollout had turned a corner.

“We are not going to disrupt the vaccination programme around the rest of the country,” Morrison told reporters in Canberra on Friday.

Total infections in Australia’s worst outbreak this year have jumped to just over 1,900 since the first case was detected in a Sydney limousine driver transporting international flight crews in mid-June.

Crucially, at least 53 of the new cases in Sydney were infectious in the community before being diagnosed. Authorities have said that figure needs to be near zero for the to be lifted.

The outbreak of the fast-moving Delta variant was carried to Victoria and South Australia states, forcing authorities to put more than half the country’s population in lockdown. That has shut down large sectors of the economy, even as other parts of the world, including Britain and the United States, open up..

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Friday suspended for at least eight weeks the so-called “travel bubble” with Australia that allows movement between the two countries without quarantine.

The Trans-Tasman bubble was a rare quarantine-free arrangement in Asia, where countries have kept their borders mostly closed during the pandemic.

Berejiklian said her health officials have advised that the situation in Sydney was a “national emergency,” which would typically unlock federal funding and other assistance and would have to be formally declared by the federal government.

There are 137 COVID-19 cases in hospital in New South Wales, with 32 people in intensive care, 14 of whom require ventilation.

Providing some relief, Victoria state officials reported a fall in new daily cases on Friday to 14, adding that 10 of those were in quarantine during their entire infectious period.

Stay-home orders in both Victoria and South Australia are expected to be lifted on July 27.

VACCINE ROLLOUT

With just over 32,500 COVID-19 cases and 916 deaths, Australia has fared much better than many other developed economies, but stop-and-start lockdowns and a sluggish vaccine rollout have frustrated residents.

About 15% of adult Australians have been fully vaccinated, a rate that is well behind many other developed nations, partly after health advice changed over the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine due to rare cases of blood clots among some recipients.

The government is targeting full vaccination of the adult population by the end of the year.

The vaccine programme could be further complicated after New South Wales health authorities said they may need to push out the interval between doses of Pfizer from three to six weeks, in order to free up more first doses, a stance Morrison backed on Friday afternoon.

Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt on Friday said the country’s drug regulator has approved the use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine in children aged 12 to 15.

(Reporting by Renju Jose; additional reporting by Swati Pandey and Colin Packham; editing by Richard Pullin and Jane Wardell)

Source: https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/australian-officials-tighten-sydney-lockdown-230850807.html

The post Sydney’s COVID-19 outbreak throws harsh spotlight on Australia vaccine rollout first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Wearing masks and gloves as a precaution against coronavirus is ineffective, unnecessary for the vast majority of people, and may even spread infections faster, experts said Tuesday.

While near-total lockdowns have been imposed in Italy, Spain and now France, the World Health Organization’s advice has remained unchanged since the start of the global outbreak: wash your hands, don’t touch your face, and keep your distance.

The WHO says it is advisable to wear a protective mask in public if you suspect you are infected or someone you are caring for is, in which case the advice is to stay home whenever possible.

“There are limits to how a mask can protect you from being infected and we’ve said the most important thing everyone can do is wash your hands, keep your hands away from your face, observe very precise hygiene,” said WHO’s emergencies director Mike Ryan.

The advice is all the more urgent given the WHO’s estimate that health workers worldwide will need at least 89 million masks every month to treat COVID-19 cases.

There are already shortages of masks for medical professionals around the world, a problem that could get worse as the pandemic drags on.

But the message about masks hasn’t reached everyone.

“I’m surprised to see through the window in my ministry lots of people in the street wearing masks when that doesn’t correspond to our recommendations,” French health minister Olivier Veran said Monday.

Mariam, 35, told AFP that she was wearing a mask because she has an elderly mother.

“Just in case,” said Mariam, who was also sporting latex gloves.

Mariam, who didn’t want to give her last name, said she got her mask from “a friend’s mother who works in a hospital”.

Contaminated masks

As well as hoovering up stocks sorely needed by medical professionals, experts say masks can give people who wear them a false sense of security.

For example, many people who wear them don’t follow the official advice of washing their hands thoroughly first, ensuring it’s air-tight and not to touch it once it’s on.

“People are always readjusting their masks and that has the potential to contaminate them,” said France’s head of health, Jerome Salomon.

“If someone has come across the virus, it’s surely going to be on the mask.”

Gloves, similarly, don’t greatly heighten protection and could even end up making you sick.

“If people cannot stop touching their face, gloves will not serve a purpose,” Amesh Adalja, from Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, told AFP.

One 2015 study in the American Journal of Infection Control found that people touch their face on average 20 times an hour.

The novel coronavirus is transmitted via skin contact, transferring infected globules of mucus via the ears, eyes or nose.

“Gloves are not a substitute for washing your hands,” said Adalja, adding that surgical gloves should only be used in a medical setting.

Plus, said Veran: “If you’re wearing gloves you’re not washing your hands.”

For one Paris resident, Oriane, 32, this is not a problem.

“I wash my gloves,” she said, gesturing to her bright blue surgical mitts.

Source: https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-03-masks-gloves-dont-coronavirus-experts.html

The post Masks, gloves don’t stop coronavirus spread: experts first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The good news is that we observed the Feast of Tabernacles at all planned locations, save California, which apparently is still in “lockdown,” per the all-knowing governor’s orders.  Services were still held on the Holy Days at an undisclosed location.  Not many churches are claiming Constitutional protection, thinking it safer to cooperate with the local “authorities,” lest preachers be hauled away in handcuffs.  We don’t want to sue or see anyone arrested, but we will obey the mandates from on High long before some governor, drunk on his own “authority.”  These vain dictators never wielded this kind of power before, but they’re clearly enjoying telling everyone what they can and can’t do.  Constitution?  What Constitution!

Incredible news broke this week which suggests the foreign policy interests of the United States have been sold for a relative pittance, in relation to the actual stakes at hand.  Not once, but several times.  That is, unless all the documents and photographic evidence are false.  The social media giants have gone full 1984 this week, behaving now as the “Ministry of Truth.”  They’ll decide what’s true or false.  Their subscribers are simply not qualified to make such judgments and must be protected from all information that disputes the carefully crafted narrative that all mainstream media outlets embrace.  Geeks peering through thick lenses, having worked hand in glove with the most woke of politicians, have determined that their narrative must be protected from any and all information that might undermine what they’ve decided we must believe.

It’s not just the twits at Twitter or the self-righteous frauds at Facebook.  The big three on-air networks have paid zero attention to the bombshell news, backed up by voluminous (were talking tens of thousands) e-mail communications and documents.  No, this stuff might be made up to do damage their darling just weeks away from the most important election in history.  No way the mainstream networks or tech titans can allow distribution of information that might not be accurate!

Maybe they think we forgot about the misery they drowned us in with their Russian Collusion nonsense.  How many years have we suffered false “information” from the news media and the tech geeks?  They pumped it out 24/7, making certain no one on planet earth could avoid their non-stop crusade to convince us all that our President was a puppet of the Russians.  They purportedly had him black-mailed and all policy decisions were crafted on the basis of what was good for Russia!  Russia!  Russia!  After years of investigations by some of the most dedicated political types imaginable, the only thing they came up with was egg on their faces.  But the bad actors still appear on friendly outlets to demand that their accusations were accurate.  They don’t get their accounts frozen for sliming the United States or the President.  That’s approved for distribution, true or otherwise.  Mostly otherwise.

You can’t even watch the news anymore.  The mainstream media, as if with one voice, has determined that the time to panic is NOW.  The pandemic is setting records, they tell us every day.  There’s a new outbreak!  There are “clusters!”  More people are infected than ever before, and you better OBEY and fall in line before we’re all dead!

It has to be the height of irony that the very organizations that first told us masks were useless (like trying to stop a mosquito from flying through a chain-link fence), then demanded mask mandates, are busy clarifying their positions.  This week a CDC official insisted the agency had never suggested that masks provide any protection to one wearing the mask.  The mask you are wearing only provides a modicum of protection to others if you are sick!  That’ll be news to the masked population.  Another shocking bit of news that somehow slipped through the media cracks is that 85% of all who got infected wore masks nearly all the time.  Whether that information been cleared by the mainstream Ministry of Truth, we’ll have to see.  It would seem to indicate that masks aren’t much (if any) help, and you know they won’t let that stand.

We’re going to come under more pressure in the weeks and months ahead.  In addition to the mandates and regulations handed down so far by state “authorities,” there will be calls for a vaccination “MANDATE.”  The vaccine debate has already proven to be one of the most emotional subjects in play.  Those who believe in their effectiveness are utterly dismissive of those who believe they’ll make you sick, and visa versa.  You think the disagreements so far have been heated?  Just wait ’till a vaccine against the dreaded COVID-19 comes available.  The gloves will really come off.

When you consider the recent past, and the fact that every good and decent tradition known to man was being subjugated to the dictates of political correctness, it seemed that EVIL had won.  The miracle of Western freedom would be squelched for the “greater good” of all mankind.  The hard-earned wealth of freedom would be redistributed around the world in the name of equality and fairness.  It just wasn’t FAIR that free people had prospered, while those under socialist/communist systems went hungry in their poverty.  The only FAIR thing to do was “level the playing field.”  In other words, make the West poor in the name of equality.  The justification was that we’re all a bunch of racists anyway, and the whole prosperous West deserved to be destroyed in retribution.

We’re not facing an election.  We’re facing a revolution!  The media, the large corporations, even the sports franchises have determined that we’re all a bunch of racists in a racist “system,” and that we can either admit they’re right or face the consequences.  They’ve taken off their masks.  Those of us who are swimming upstream must be banished from society so they can build a new system based on fairness, equality and all the other balderdash of political correctness.  It’s Marxist philosophy, it’s not new.  This is merely the latest invocation of the nonsense of the ’60s and the ’90s.  But this time they’ve got their ducks in a row with the media, entertainment and corporate giants all preaching from the same manifesto.

It took a miracle to save the Western world from what would have been a death-blow the last time around.  We’re going to need another one unless every bit of blight imaginable is to dictate the futures of those we love.  On the other hand, we might just slide into a modern French Revolution.  It may be our last chance to take a stand against a totalitarian future.  May God’s Will be done.

Mark

Source: http://www.intercontinentalcog.org/fridayupdates.php

The post Weekly Update by Mark Armstrong – 16 October 2020 first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

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Brandon Waltens

Brandon serves as the Managing Editor and Capitol Bureau Chief for Texas Scorecard. After managing successful campaigns for top conservative legislators and serving as a Chief of Staff in the Texas Capitol, Brandon moved outside the dome in order to shine a spotlight on conservative victories and establishment corruption in Austin.

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Source: https://texasscorecard.com/federal/new-data-suggests-coronavirus-lockdowns-didnt-work/

[Disclaimer]

The post New Data Suggests Coronavirus Lockdowns Didn’t Work first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Oh no!  A second wave has hit.  Who saw this coming?  “New York Eyes New Shutdown,” reads the NBC headline.  Of course they do, we were sure they would.  Every time there’s some hint that the pandemic may be waning, there’s another media-wide panic attack.  Anchors and reporters are all but coming out of their skin with pained concern.  This time there is another frightening term, delivered by masked reporters.  You can’t be sure what they’re saying, but at least you can see the alarm in their eyes.  This time we have something brand new to the media, “clusters.”  The “clusters” will see to it that we hang on their every word to see if it’s safe to go outside again.

Over recent months this Update has assured you that there would be a “second wave,” and there’ll probably be a third, fourth and fifth wave.  The media loves this stuff, they love lecturing and bringing on officials and health experts so they can nod sagely about the justified panic we all share.  They pretend to speak for us, and all rational people everywhere who leap at the opportunity to follow each new mandate, and make sure you do too.

Governors and mayors love it, because it has the public hanging on their every word.  It looks bad for President Trump, because as they always say, “It happened on his watch.” Do you think they’ll give it up?  You think Gavin Newsome, Governor Abbot, or Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan are ready to let the coronavirus die a natural death?  Not likely.  It’s been described, accurately, as a creeping medical authoritarianism.  The “experts” will decide what your next move is, and you will forget you ever had any rights or protections under the Constitution, or you might be arrested.  Somebody, call the cops!

If you haven’t seen the video of the lady being tased and arrested at the junior high football game in Ohio, you’ve got to look it up.  What’s disheartening about the whole thing is not only the action of the policeman, but the fact that no one came to the aid of the woman probably 20 or more feet from the nearest humans, outdoors, without her mask.  Why the police would stride into nearly empty stands to manhandle, tase, handcuff and take this lady to jail is inexplicable.  We’re trying to support law enforcement, but this makes no sense.  If not for the video, we might not have believed it.

Some years ago, the realization dawned that we’re being conditioned to go along with things that make no sense, like the need for that lady to wear a mask in the nearly empty bleachers.  In the age of the Internet, most stories require proof before they receive wide acceptance.  That’s still the case, unless something supports or disputes the narrative of the mainstream.  For months, we were denied the details of the case in Louisville.  Finally, while the mob was busy assembling their protest/riot gear, the District Attorney announced details that destroy the media accounts over recent months.  But it’s too late.  The news outlets continue operating on the basis of their original stories, and pretend that the “peaceful” protesters and rioters are justified in their rage.  It’s like, “Hands up, don’t shoot.”  The media flogged that line like there was no tomorrow and never admitted that it never happened.  Here’s a news alert: What’s happening in American cities is not rage, it’s a chance to maraud anonymously with a good chance of acquiring something of value from the local racist businesses.

It’s not just Louisville, or Kenosha, or Portland, or Seattle, or Chicago, or New York or Minneapolis, it’s everywhere.  (Even in our little downtown square, so the paper tells us.  There is no chance we’ll go anywhere near the insanity.).  The media is pushing rage, and then encouraging lawlessness justified by their fake news.

How we get through the upcoming season without a crisis that threatens the very existence of law and order in the United States is a mystery.  The latest accusation is that Trump will refuse to leave office once he loses.  The mainstream media has already decided that he’ll lose.  Never mind those enormous crowds in towns you never heard of in the battleground states.  That means nothing.  It also doesn’t matter that the challenger cannot attract a crowd at all.  He’s ahead in every poll that merits media attention.  But the media’s hair is on fire that Trump won’t concede the election and start planning now to leave office on the 20^th of January.  If that’s too political, Bible prophecy indicates that a global political system will mandate the mark of the beast.  Will that be political, and therefore off limits for discussion?

The media was mortified that Trump wouldn’t demand a national mask mandate.  They all but cried that he wouldn’t institute a national “lockdown.”  They’d have cried, “Dictator!” if he had, but he didn’t.  So maybe they’ll impeach him again for mishandling the Coronavirus response.  But they still call him a fascist and compare him to Hitler and Mussolini.  Maybe they figure if they’ll just say it over and over enough, eventually we’ll all believe it.

Meanwhile Trump has achieved commitments toward peace, both in Eastern Europe and the Middle East.  The Bible tells us, “Blessed are the peacemakers,” and for years it’s been a lost cause particularly in the Middle East.  The Palestinians have been left behind, much to the chagrin of all those talking heads who claimed there could be no peace without their approval.  Like so much that has been accepted dogma, Trump and his team proved that theory, and every commentator for the last 40 years, wrong.

The Presidential election is being set up to drag out for weeks or longer while ballots are harvested, found in the trunks of cars or abandoned warehouses.  They simply cannot allow Trump to win again, and that goes for the social media operators, the media reporters and the outfits that are working overtime to destroy law and order in the United States once and for all.

The day of Atonement is coming up Monday, to begin at sundown Sunday evening, and it’s no secret that we fast as commanded on that annual Holy Day.  We’re on the brink of losing the blessings of freedom without God’s help.  Not only in the U. S., because if we lose it here, the Western world loses it everywhere.  We’re well down that road already, with seemingly every wealthy outlet and corporation on board with the destruction of the U. S. system of government, the Constitution and every right and privilege we’ve enjoyed as Americans.  That goes for people of all races.

This day of fasting and prayer comes at a most opportune time.  This one has meaning like we’ve never experienced before.  All these door-front signs say, “Do your part,” which means wear your mask.  All those who love America and love the freedom that we enjoyed are going to need more than a mask.  We’ll need God’s armor, and His protection from the false, fake news that often leads us to erroneous conclusions.  Strong deception is coming out of every mainstream outlet, and we’re witnessing the result.

Mark

Source: http://www.intercontinentalcog.org/fridayupdates.php

The post Weekly Update by Mark Armstrong – 25 September 2020 first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

France reported 3,776 cases in the past 24 hours, its health ministry reported.

All epidemiological indicators are rising, and transmission of the virus is growing, the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health said in a press release. It added that transmission is affecting “all age groups and more particularly young adults.”

Even bigger growth was seen in Spain’s cumulative number of coronavirus cases — which can include test results that were not received quickly enough to be included in the daily total, along with diagnoses made from antibody tests. With those results added, the Spanish Health Ministry reported 6,671 new cases on Wednesday.

Germany reported more than 1,500 coronavirus infections on Wednesday — a daily mark it had not hit in months, according to Germany’s infectious disease agency, the Robert Koch Institute.

“This trend is very concerning,” the agency said. It added that while outbreaks continue in nursing homes and refugee facilities, “the average age of infection has decreased over the past few weeks.”

The trend includes both residents as well as young people who are traveling to Germany. Officials also said that many small outbreaks have been traced to “larger events with family and friends.”

Germany’s 226,914 cases are the fourth-most in Europe, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.

Germany, France, and Spain lifted significant parts of their national lockdowns in June – the same month the European Union began to ease travel restrictions between member nations in hopes of salvaging a summer tourism season.

Despite that early optimism, Spain began imposing or renewing social restrictions in late July, reflecting officials’ alarm at a spate of new cases there.

Spain’s increasingly strict measures – which now include a ban on outdoor smoking and drinking and an expanded face mask mandate – have sparked anger and protests as well as conspiracy theories.

Demonstrators in Spain have invoked a number of implausible culprits to explain the new rise in cases, from the use of 5G wireless technology to the wearing of masks themselves.

“We can’t live like zombies with masks on in the streets,” poet and photographer Ouka Leele told a crowd of fellow protesters over the weekend, as NPR’s Scott Neuman reported.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron said on Wednesday that he is not considering a new lockdown.

“Macron told Paris Match magazine that ‘local strategies’ were preferable to another national lockdown,” France 24 reported, “which he said would cause considerable ‘collateral damage.’ ”

In the EU, France, Spain, and Germany are far from alone in seeing a late-summer rebound in cases: More than a dozen member nations have been seeing week-over-week gains, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.

Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/08/19/903967293/spain-france-and-germany-report-most-coronavirus-cases-since-their-lockdowns

The post Spain, France And Germany Report Most Coronavirus Cases Since Their Lockdowns first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Legal challenges to governors’ coronavirus shutdown orders are piling up nationwide, putting state leaders on the defensive as citizens and businesses itching to get back to normal take their arguments to court — in some cases succeeding at voiding the governors’ actions.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court, for example, struck down Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ “safer at home” order on the grounds that his administration did not have the power to unilaterally impose the restrictions without the input of the state legislature. Evers Monday gave up his effort to reimpose statewide rules to slow the coronavirus’ spread after it became clear he would not be able to come to an agreement with Republican lawmakers.

CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE CORONAVIRUS COVERAGE 

“The Republicans made it very clear they don’t believe a statewide approach is the right way to go at this point in time,” he said. “It doesn’t make a lot of sense spending a lot of time doing something we know isn’t going to be successful.”

Wisconsin’s Republican-led Legislature blocked efforts by Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers to reinstitute statewide coronavirus restrictions after the state supreme court struck down his executive order aimed at preventing the virus’ spread. (AP)

TRUMP TELLS GOVERNORS FEDS ‘WILL STEP IN’ IN INF GOVERNMENT DISAGREES WITH STATE REOPENING PLANS

Meanwhile, the Oregon Supreme Court Monday night temporarily blocked a lower court order that would have invalidated all of the state’s coronavirus restrictions. A county circuit judge earlier had ruled that Democratic Gov. Kate Brown needed to get the legislature to sign off on her “stay-at-home” order past a 28-day limit. But the state supreme court ruled that the order would stay in place until the tribunal had a chance to fully review the case, which was brought by a group of churches.

Brown slammed the lower court ruling on Monday before the higher court left her restrictions in place, at least temporarily.

“It is irresponsible to dismiss the health risks and science behind our measures to stop COVID-19,” she tweeted. “We would be faced with the prospect of another mass outbreak without the tools that have proven to be effective in protecting our families, neighbors & loved ones from this disease.”

DEFIANT WHITMER SLAMS ANTI-LOCKDOWN PROTESTS, QUESTIONS POLITICAL MOTIVES BEHIND DEMONSTRATIONS

The looming battle in the Oregon Supreme Court comes as a case is pending before a lower court in Illinois that has the potential to invalidate that state’s coronavirus restrictions implemented by Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker. A judge who ruled against Pritzker’s order as it applied to just one state lawmaker will hear arguments Friday in a case that attempts to undo the order in its entirety, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

Pritzker, according to the Associated Press, blasted the state lawmaker, Darren Bailey, who was behind the initial successful attempt to invalidate his order — although on a much smaller scale.

“It’s insulting. It’s dangerous and people’s safety and health have now been put at risk,” Pritzker said. “There may be people who contract coronavirus as a result of what Darren Bailey has done.”

ILLINOIS JUDGE RULES AGAINST GOV. PRITZKER’S STAY-AT-HOME ORDER BROUGHT BY GOP LAWMAKER

Meanwhile, California alone is facing at least a dozen lawsuits that include claims that the state has unjustly closed down gun shops and religious services. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is up against a lawsuit from Republicans in her state’s House and Senate over her extension of an already-strict emergency order that has regulated residents’ movement and closed businesses. And Kentucky protesters sued officials including Gov. Andy Beshear, also a Democrat, for allegedly violating the First Amendment by banning mass protests.

A group of Ohio gyms sued Republican Gov. Mike DeWine over his reopening order excluding them from those businesses allowed to operate, but it was subsequently announced that they will be allowed to reopen after all.

The widespread spate of suits shows that with governors taking the lead on the coronavirus crisis — and the federal government and state legislatures largely in the backseat — those who disapprove of the nature of the coronavirus lockdowns see the judiciary as their only option for relief from the orders.

A lawsuit against Maryland Republican Gov. Larry Hogan by a group of businesses in western Maryland, some former military members, Republican state lawmakers, and several religious leaders is pending in the U.S. District Court of Maryland, with the government’s most recent filing coming Monday. The initial complaint in the suit said: “Governor Hogan has, respectfully, gone beyond all necessities of the case and continues to invade the domain of Federal authority and our rights secured by the Constitution.”

The suit also alleges that Hogan’s aides “refused to state Del. [Daniel] Cox would not be arrested for speaking at” a rally against the governor’s orders, citing prohibitions against large gatherings.

Governors have had at least some success fending off legal challenges to their coronavirus restrictions. Earlier this month, the U.S. Supreme Court turned back an application asking it to overturn Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s statewide stay-at-home order.

The post Governors face mounting court challenges over coronavirus lockdown orders first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.