Coronavirus deaths in the U.K. have passed those in Italy. Workers in the intensive care unit at the Royal Papworth Hospital in Cambridge are shown gearing up to care for COVID-19 patients.; Credit: Neil Hall/AP

Over 32,000 people have died from the new coronavirus in the United Kingdom, according to the Office for National Statistics, marking the first time in the pandemic that it has led Europe in the number of deaths.

The country has surpassed Italy in COVID-19 deaths. The U.S. still leads the world in the highest number of coronavirus deaths; over 70,270 had died from the disease as of Tuesday.

The number of total deaths recorded in the U.K. is "higher than we would wish, I think is all I can say," Angela McLean, chief scientific adviser of Ministry of Defence said during the country's press briefing Tuesday.

McLean also emphasized that deaths in U.K. care homes have been steadily rising and said the trend was something the country "need[s] to get to grips with."

"I don't think we'll get a real verdict on how well countries have done until the pandemic is over," British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said Tuesday. "And particularly until we have comprehensive international data on all causes of mortality."

Since different countries collect and report coronavirus data using different methods, the comparisons between regions are not perfect. As more time passes and more tests are conducted and more data comes in, coronavirus death rates will become more precise.

The peak in deaths comes as other European countries, including Italy and Spain, are easing shelter-in-place restrictions, while U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson is expected to modify Britain's orders in the next week.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Remdesivir, an experimental antiviral drug made by Gilead Sciences, has been authorized by the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use in treating severely ill COVID-19 patients.; Credit: Ulrich Perry/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

Now that the Food and Drug Administration has authorized remdesivir for emergency use in seriously ill COVID-19 patients, the experimental drug is another step closer to full approval. That's when most drugs get price tags.

Gilead Sciences, which makes remdesivir, is donating its initial supply of 1.5 million doses, but the company has signaled it will need to start charging for the drug to make production sustainable. It's unclear when that decision might be made.

"Going forward, we will develop an approach that is guided by the principles of affordability and access," Gilead CEO Daniel O'Day told shareholders during the company's annual meeting Wednesday.

In a quarterly financial filing made the same day, Gilead said its investment in remdesivir this year "could be up to $1 billion or more," much of it for scaling up manufacturing capacity.

The company also acknowledged that it's in the spotlight. "[G]iven that COVID-19 has been designated as a pandemic and represents an urgent public health crisis, we are likely to face significant public attention and scrutiny about any future business models and pricing decisions with respect to remdesivir," Gilead said in the quarterly filing.

How will the company balance its business calculations with the drug's potential value to society?

"Gilead has not yet set a price for remdesivir," company spokeswoman Sonia Choi wrote in an email to NPR. "At this time, we are focused on ensuring access to remdesivir through our donation. Post-donation, we are committed to making remdesivir both accessible and affordable to governments and patients around the world."

Among potential treatments for COVID-19, remdesivir, an intravenous drug that was once studied for Ebola, is one of the furthest along.

"It's hard to imagine a situation in which there will be more public scrutiny," said Michael Carrier, a professor at Rutgers School of Law who specializes in antitrust and pharmaceuticals. "On the one hand, Gilead will try to recover its R&D in an atmosphere in which it is able to potentially make a lot of money. On the other hand, the pressure will be intense not to charge what's viewed as too high a price."

Breaking with its usual practices, the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review, or ICER, an influential nonprofit that analyzes drug pricing, issued an expedited report on remdesivir.

"Under normal circumstances, we would be unlikely to do a report when the evidence is this raw and immature," ICER President Steven Pearson said in an interview with NPR. "But it was quite clear that the world is moving at a much quicker pace."

If the price is based just on the cost of making the drug, then a 10-day course of remdesivir should cost about $10, according to the ICER report. (Gilead said results of a recently completed study suggest a five-day course of treatment may be just as effective.)

But if the drug is priced based on the drug's effectiveness, ICER estimates it should cost around $4,500 — assuming the drug is proven to have some benefit on mortality. If it doesn't and the drug only shortens hospital stays, that value-based price goes down to $390.

Results from a federally funded study described by Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, suggested that remdesvir could reduce recovery time by a median of four days — 11 days to recovery for patients treated with remdesivir compared with 15 days for those who got a placebo. A potential survival benefit is less clear.

Rutgers's Carrier said he expects Gilead to set the remdesivir price somewhere between the $10 and $4,500 that ICER estimated. The company has already shown that it can respond to public pressure when it asked the FDA to rescind the orphan drug status it won for remdesivir, he pointed out.

"When you see that $10 figure, that sets a benchmark for a figure that is eminently affordable," Carrier said. Ultimately, he said a price more than $1,000 per treatment course would be unpopular.

Gilead "will be watched very carefully," he said, because of its prior history of pricing. He referred to two other Gilead drugs that drew scrutiny over high price tags. The company charged $1,000 per pill for Sovaldi, a cure for hepatitis C. And its HIV drug Truvada can cost $22,000 per year.

But there is such a thing as pricing remdesivir too low, said Craig Garthwaite, who directs the health care program at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management.

"We don't think this is the only drug we need," he said, adding that remdesivir doesn't appear to be a "home run" against the coronavirus, based on existing data. "The thing that would worry me the most is that we're somehow telling people that if you take the risky bet to try, and you'll go after a coronavirus cure and you do it, you're not going to get paid."

Instead, he said he would like to see acceptance of a generous price for remdesivir to send the message to drug companies that the best thing they can do is "dedicate every waking moment to trying to develop that cure, and that if they do that, we will pay them the value they create," he said.

During a Gilead earnings call on April 30, analysts asked executives whether they could expect similar financial returns on remdesivir as they've seen with Gilead's other drugs.

"There is no rulebook out there, other than that we need to be very thoughtful about how we can make sure we provide access of our medicines to patients around the globe," Gilead CEO O'Day said. "And do that in a sustainable way for the company, for ... shareholders, and we acknowledge that."

On May 1, the FDA authorized remdesivir for emergency use, meaning it will be easier to administer to hospitalized patients with severe disease during the pandemic, but the drug is not yet officially approved. The federal government is coordinating distribution of the treatment.

Day acknowledged on the recent earnings call that the company "could" charge for remdesivir under an emergency use authorization, but he stressed that Gilead is donating its current supply, which should last through "early summer."

To date, the National Institutes of Health said it has obligated $23 million toward its COVID-19 remdesivir trial. And the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases did some of the early in vitro and animal studies with the medicine prior to the pandemic.

"Taxpayers are often the angel investors in pharmaceutical research and development, yet this is not reflected in the prices they pay," Reps. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, and Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., wrote in a April 30 letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.

Concerned about remdesivir's price, they asked for a full breakdown of taxpayer funds that have gone toward the development of the medicine. "An unaffordable drug is completely ineffective," they wrote in the letter. "The substantial taxpayer investments in COVID-19 pharmaceutical research must be recognized."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

; Credit: /Dani Pendergast for NPR

Friday, March 13, was the last time Alexandra Sullivan saw her fellow yearbook staffers in person.

"We were trying to get as many pictures of people as possible 'cause we knew we wouldn't be able to take any more," Sullivan, 18, says.

Like most U.S. public school students, Sullivan is learning from home now. And much like her lessons, her work on the yearbook continues.

Sullivan is the yearbook profiles editor at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla. She's one of 10 seniors who were also on staff two years ago, when a gunman opened fire at their school. Back then, she and her classmates had to adapt to an unimaginable tragedy. Now, they have to adapt again – this time, to the pandemic.

"This book has to get done and we'll do whatever we have to do to finish it," she says, "which is exactly how we approached the '18 book."

Senior Caitlynn Tibbetts, the yearbook's co-editor-in-chief, was also on staff when the shooting happened. She says there's a collective grief among seniors over what their class — which has already lost so much — is losing now. They won't be able to dance together at prom, or walk across the stage at graduation.

"This class especially has gotten screwed over so much through the past four years," Tibbetts, 18, says. "The last two months were supposed to be the best, and they were supposed to make up for everything that we've been through. And it's really hard on us to kind of just watch it all disappear."

Amid all the uncertainty, she says, one thing is clear: The yearbook must get done, and it must get to students.

High school yearbooks are like time capsules. They record theater productions, which teams went to state finals, who was voted most likely to succeed.

And when a news event makes history – leaving a mark on students and society – it's the yearbook's job to document it. At Stoneman Douglas, that's meant changing plans just weeks before the yearbook is due.

Yearbook advisor Sarah Lerner says, "Having done one under unthinkable circumstances before, I hate to say that we're kind of, you know, used to it, but, for the seniors on staff, we are."

Two years ago, after the shooting, the yearbook staff pivoted to include remembrances of the victims. Tibbetts and Sullivan stepped up to help write them, and anything else that was needed at the last minute, while other yearbook staffers took time to attend funerals.

This year, they're making room for two new spreads about the pandemic.

"One of them is more of a factual-based one, how it's affected our community, including businesses," Tibbetts explains. "The other spread is focused on the effect it's had on us personally, both with online schooling and especially with seniors."

Logistically, putting the yearbook together and writing the new sections has been a challenge. Unlike 2018, they can't be in the same room with each other to finish the design.

"We have to social distance and our parents wouldn't let us go out," Tibbetts says.

They mainly rely on a group chat with everyone on the staff. "It can get hectic," Tibbetts says, "especially when it's all happening at like 12 a.m."

Lerner and her students missed the original deadline to finish the book, on April 6. But the printer, Walsworth, says the company is being flexible with Stoneman Douglas and other yearbook staffs across the country. Lerner says she's aiming to get the book in by the end of April.

Once the printed copies come back, more than 1,200 books will somehow have to be distributed to students. Lerner has some ideas for how to do that safely.

However, there's one important yearbook tradition they may not be able to save.

"We may not actually get to sign books this year," Lerner says. And that's been hard to accept.

"As a teacher, I really like to get my students to sign my book, you know, and I like to sign theirs and I like to see the kids carrying them around at school."

Lerner says she's sad that might not happen this year. But at least this time, the students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School aren't on their own.

"Unlike the 2018 books, this situation is not unique to us," she says. "So there's comfort in knowing that all staffs are going through the same issue. It's not just us."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

No field trips. No game rooms. No teddy bears. These are some of the CDC's guidelines for reopening schools, childcare centers and day camps safely in places where coronavirus cases are on the decline.

The guidance, which also covers restaurants, churches and other public places, was obtained by The Associated Press, which reports that the White House tried to keep it from coming to light. The New York Times quoted Mark Meadows, the chief of staff, as being concerned that the guidelines were "overly prescriptive."

The CDC does not have authority to enforce its guidance, which is intended for public information only; the actual policy decisions are up to state and local governments. Schools are closed through the end of the school year throughout much of the country, with the exception of Montana, which welcomed a handful of students back this week. Child care protocols are different in different states.

But millions of parents need child care so they can work, and socialization and stimulation for children who have been confined to home by lockdowns for weeks on end. This is the guidance that summer camps and day cares have been waiting for to make decisions about reopening safely.

The guidance says that where coronavirus is spreading rapidly, child care should only serve the children of essential workers. This is the case today in much of the country, which the guidelines refer to as "Phase 1".

In Phase 2, programs can expand to serve all children with enhanced social distancing measures, and in Phase 3, with a lower risk, social distancing will continue.

Recommended measures include:

Handwashing;

Cloth masks for staff;

Regular disinfection of all surfaces;

Six-foot distance "if possible," head-to-toe positioning with bedding;

As much outdoor air as possible — open windows, fans;

Restricting mixing of groups;

Restricting visitors, and staggering dropoffs and pickups to reduce contact among parents;

Limiting sharing of materials like art supplies or toys. Disinfecting them in between use.;

Avoiding soft toys that can't be easily disinfected;

Not using common areas like dining halls or playgrounds if possible. If it is necessary, stagger visits and disinfect in between;

Adjust operations based on local health data;

Monitor absenteeism.

The guidelines also emphasize keeping attendance at such programs local, to limit children bringing the disease from high to low transmission areas.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Patt Morrison models a headdress from the movie "The Lone Ranger."; Credit: Michelle Lanz/KPCC

Trust me – you’re going to be seeing a lot of these between now and Halloween.

I went to “The Lone Ranger” premiere last month, and outside the theater, Disneyland began selling a version of the Tonto headdress dreamed up by Johnny Depp and his folks for his role in the film, which I found to be a rollicking, ironic version of the classic action adventure with some very sober scenes evoking Native Americans’ tragic history.

The inspiration, Depp says, was artist Kirby Sattler’s interpretive 2006 painting “I Am Crow.”

Depp himself has claimed Native American ancestry, and the bird atop his bean plays a substantial if silent role in the proceedings. It is an interpretive painting, as I said, not a literal rendering of any tribal makeup. In the Sattler painting, the bird is flying above the figure’s head, not perched on it.

But the movie’s invested in storytelling, not the fine points of accuracy. If it had been, it wouldn’t have made the historical solecisms of relocating both Monument Valley and the transcontinental railroad to … Texas.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

LOS ANGELES, CA - SEPTEMBER 29: Yasiel Puig #66 of the Los Angeles Dodgers walks onto the field to start the game against the Colorado Rockies at Dodger Stadium on September 29, 2013 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Lisa Blumenfeld/Getty Images); Credit: Lisa Blumenfeld/Getty Images

There are 162 games in the regular season of a major league baseball team, and I have watched exactly … hm … none. Spring, summer, autumn, as the Dodgers died and rose from the dead, I wasn’t looking.

But now, like almost everyone else in L.A., I will be cheering them in the playoffs, cheering them to their first World Series game since Michael Dukakis ran for president.

I am that deplorable creature: The fair-weather fan.

I like sports just fine, but my sport is football.

They say baseball is a relaxing game. Boy, is it!  You can eat, doze, eat again, and it’s still the fourth inning. I’ve tried to love baseball, I really have. But the diamond can’t beat the gridiron when it comes to football’s built-in thrill advantage: At any possible second, the football can change hands, the defense becomes the offense … and score!

Just about the best time I ever had at Dodger Stadium was watching the pope round the bases in his Popemobile, when he visited L.A. That was the year before the Dodgers won the World Series for the last time. I hear baseball players are superstitious; maybe it’s time to invite the new pope for a return engagement.

Kitty Felde – now there’s a fan. She’s even written plays about baseball! But she’s way back in the nation’s capital, stuck with the Washington Nationals to root for.

A paradox

It’s a paradox, really. I’ve interviewed the former Dodgers owner, Peter O’Malley, who is a truly wonderful man. I’ve interviewed Carl Erskine, the Dodgers pitcher who goes back to the Brooklyn days, and a sweeter guy you could never meet. I know Roz Wyman, the First Fan, the city councilwoman who worked the magic to bring the Dodgers here from Brooklyn.  I interviewed the McCourts, back when they were still a plural. The L.A. Times once sent me to write about Fernando Valenzuela’s hometown in Mexico, back when El Zurdo started burning up the mound at Chavez Ravine. And I sat with that gift of a man, Vin Scully, at Dodger Stadium, as the team warmed up on the jewel-box beautiful field.

None of that made a true baseball believer of me. Instead, I pine like Juliet for a pro football team. O Dodgers, Dodgers, wherefore art thou the Dodgers, and not the Green Bay Packers?

But I would be thrilled if the Dodgers took the whole baseball enchilada – thrilled, because I am an Angeleno, and the Dodgers are that rare civic institution that ties us all together, even if you don’t know a base hit from base ten.

And that makes me as entitled as the next local to put on my Dodger Blue and holler my heart out, and cheer them all the way to the World Series.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

COVID-19 Research and Development Sean's pick this week is COVID-19 Research and Development by MathWorks. We were recently introduced to this page which highlights uses of... read more >>

Pedestrians walk by the Castro Theatre that has a marquee announcing that they are closed due to a statewide ordinance banning gatherings of more than 250 people in San Francisco, California. ; Credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Hollywood has come to a stand still. The film and entertainment industry has been hit hard by the coronavirus outbreak as theaters close, film releases and events are being postponed, and studios are putting a pause on film production.

The gravity of the coronavirus is being felt all throughout the country and Hollywood is not coming out of the outbreak unscathed. Social distancing measures being enforced to help control the outbreak has studios and theatres taking a huge hit. It’s predicted that about 170,000 people in the film industry will lose their jobs. Many of the lowest-paid positions and freelance jobs have been the first to go. From events to films, the industry is trying to strategize around the outbreak with no clear picture on how long these conditions could last. Hollywood unions, activist groups and nonprofits are coming together to help provide some kind of emergency relief for workers who are getting hit the hardest. It’s been a period of economic shock for the entertainment industry and it’s still too early to see what Hollywood could look like after the outbreak is over.

Today on AirTalk, we check-in with people in the entertainment industry who have been impacted by the outbreak and where might Hollywood go from here. If you work in entertainment, we'd like to hear from you! How are you coping as most productions are shut down? Join the live conversation by calling 866-893-5722.

Guest:

Andrew Wallenstein, co-editor-in-chief at Variety; he tweets @awallenstein

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Alex Wolff in Human Capital.; Credit: Vertical Entertainment/Human Capital (2019)

Larry Mantle and KPCC film critics Lael Loewenstein, Claudia Puig and Tim Cogshell review this weekend’s new (streaming and VOD) movie releases.

• "Human Capital" on DirecTV

• "Crip Camp" on Netflix

• "The Platform" on Netflix

• "Blow The Man Down" on Amazon Prime Video

• "Phoenix, Oregon" on film's website

• "The Dog Doc" on Amazon Prime Video

• "Hooking Up" on Xfinity OnDemand

​CORRECTION: The film Human Capital is available on all on-demand platforms as of March 20th.

Guests:

Claudia Puig, film critic for KPCC and president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA); she tweets @ClaudiaPuig

Lael Loewenstein, KPCC film critic and film columnist for the Santa Monica Daily Press; she tweets @LAELLO

Tim Cogshell, film critic for KPCC, Alt-Film Guide and CineGods.com; he tweets @CinemaInMind

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Kunjue Li (L) and Hing Chi-Lee (R) in Tigertail.; Credit: Netflix/Tigertail (2020)

Larry Mantle and KPCC film critics Claudia Puig, Tim Cogshell and Charles Solomon review this weekend’s new movie releases and share their recommendations for what to binge-watch while you’re stuck at home during COVID-19.

• "Tigertail" on Netflix

• "School Life" on Netflix

• "Love. Wedding. Repeat." on Netflix

• 'Stray Dolls" on VOD (AppleTV, Google Play Redbox * FandangoNOW

• "Sea Fever" on VOD (Spectrum On Demand, AppleTV, Google Play, Vudu, Redbox & FandangoNOW)

• "Strike" on VOD (Redbox, FandangoNOW & Vudu)

• "The Main Event" on Netflix

Guests:

Claudia Puig, film critic for KPCC and president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA); she tweets @ClaudiaPuig

Tim Cogshell, film critic for KPCC, Alt-Film Guide and CineGods.com; he tweets @CinemaInMind

Charles Solomon, film critic for KPCC, Animation Scoop and Animation Magazine

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Brad Bird accepts the Best Animated Feature Award for Incredibles 2 during The National Board of Review Annual Awards Gala at Cipriani 42nd Street on January 8, 2019 in New York City. ; Credit: Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images for National Board

Brad Bird has made a name for himself as the director of new age, animated classics, like “The Iron Giant” and “The Incredibles”. Now he’s teaming up with Turner Classic Movies to share his picks for classic movie watching that will keep you busy and entertained while you’re stuck at home.

Bird has curated a list of his favorite films which will air on this season’s “The Essentials” with TCM Primetime host Ben Mankiewicz. Every Saturday from May up to January of next year, TCM will air one of twenty movies chosen by Bird. His list includes big-name classics that any movie buff will recognize, like “Casablanca” and “Dr. Strangelove”. But Bird throws in a few surprises, one being that there are no animated films on his list. Another surprising thing viewers will notice is that about a third of the films included are musicals, like “Singin’ In The Rain” and “Guys And Dolls”. With TCM’s seemingly infinite library of movie classics to choose from, Bird says narrowing it down to only twenty favorites was a challenge. According to Bird, his list comprises movies that are not only entertaining but “transcend time” and “speak in a language that is still in many ways current”.

“The Essentials” was filmed in early December, but Bird’s list is coming out during a time when movie-going is looking very different these days. The virus has put the entire film industry on pause, with studios halting production and theaters closing their doors indefinitely. In lieu of new movie releases and regular theater-going, many are taking the opportunity to revisit the classics and Bird’s list provides a starting guide for which ones should be on your watch-list.

Today on FilmWeek, Brad Bird joins us to talk about his favorite movies, what projects he has lined up, and his thoughts on how the film industry is adjusting to and getting through the pandemic.

TCM’s “The Essentials” will air on Saturdays at 8 p.m. beginning May 2. For the full list and schedule of films, click here.

Guest:

Brad Bird, animator, director and screenwriter whose directing credits include Pixar’s “Ratatouille” and “The Incredibles” films and Disney’s “The Iron Giant”; he tweets at @BradBirdA113

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Michelle Obama in "Becoming".; Credit: Netflix/"Becoming" (2020)

Larry Mantle and KPCC film critics Claudia Puig, Peter Rainer and Christy Lemire review this weekend’s new movie releases.

• "Becoming" on Netflix

• "Rewind" on VOD (iTunes) & on PBS May 11th (check your local listings)

• "Spaceship Earth" on virtual cinemas (Laemmle's & The Frida), streaming on Hulu, and VOD

• "Arkansas" on VOD (Spectrum On Demand, DirecTV on Demand, iTunes, Vudu, Google Play, FandangoNOW & Amazon Prime)

• "Natalie Wood: What Remains Behind" on HBO & Amazon Prime

• "Driveways" on VOD (Amazon Prime and Google Play)

• "Walkaway Joe" on VOD (iTunes, Google Play, FandangoNOW & Vudu)

• "Intrigo: Dear Agnes" on VOD (iTunes, Google Play, FandangoNOW & Vudu)

• "Valley Girl" on VOD (iTunes, Google Play & Amazon Prime)

• "On a Magical Night" on virtual cinemas, including Laemmle's & The Frida

• "The Delicacy" on SOMM TV

Guests:

Claudia Puig, film critic for KPCC and president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA); she tweets @ClaudiaPuig

Christy Lemire, film critic for KPCC, RogerEbert.com and co-host of the ‘Breakfast All Day’ podcast; she tweets @christylemire

Peter Rainer, film critic for KPCC and the Christian Science Monitor

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

A still from "Spaceship Earth".; Credit: Neon/"Spaceship Earth" (2020)

Two months is a long time to be quarantined in one place. Just ask, well, pretty much anyone in the era of COVID-19. But imagine if you were quarantined for two years instead of two months, all in the name of science, and it was by choice!

In 1991, eight researchers did exactly that in Oracle, Arizona as part of a first-of-its-kind mission called BIOSPHERE 2. No, there was no failed BIOSPHERE 1 mission -- BIOSPHERE 1 is planet Earth. The mission’s goal was to create a living ecosystem inside a massive glass and steel facility to show that human life could be sustained in outer space. The idea was that whenever humanity finally did gain the ability to travel deeper into space and colonize another planet, a biosphere would need to be built first so that life could be sustained. But what started as a science experiment quickly evolved into a cultural phenomenon, and while some watched with bated breath to see whether the researchers could really create a living ecosystem in a controlled environment, others saw the project and those who were involved as a cult of sorts. Director Matt Wolf explores BIOSPHERE 2  the researchers (“biospherians”) who carried the mission out, what ultimately happened and the good and bad ways in which it became a cultural phenomenon.

Today on FilmWeek, “The Frame” host John Horn talks with Wolf about the making of the film and what can be learned from the biospherians about our current situation staying at home because of COVID-19.

Guest:

Matt Wolf, director of the documentary “Spaceship Earth"

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

CCleaner is a program that will scan your computer for temporary files or private browser information and deletes it from your computer.  This allows you to keep your computer running efficiently, while protecting your sensitive information. [...]

AdwCleaner is a free program that searches for and deletes Adware, Toolbars, Potentially Unwanted Programs (PUP), and browser Hijackers from your computer. By using AdwCleaner you can easily remove many of these types of programs for a better user experience on your computer and while browsing the web. [...]

Understanding the impacts of human activities on Marine and Coastal is important to ensure their sustainability. New research has indicated that seafloor ecosystems are less likely to recover from fishing if they are in rocky or reef habitats and if dredging and bottom trawling equipment is used for shellfish and various fish species. When fishing is combined with the extraction of aggregate for mineral resources, the impacts are even more damaging.

Although a total of 1.3 per cent of global marine areas is currently within Marine Protection Areas (MPAs), this is far from the Convention of Biodiversity's (CBD) 10 per cent target. Significant progress has been made over the last few years, but a new report suggests there is room for improvement as MPA coverage is very uneven and not all eco-regions and habitats are represented. The report makes several recommendations for maximising the effects of MPAs.

Data from studies monitoring the amount of plastic eaten by seabirds suggest that levels in the North Sea are well above targets established for the North East Atlantic Ocean by OSPAR (the Oslo and Paris Convention). For the most recent monitoring period, the target amount was exceeded in well over half the birds studied.

Scientists have produced a list of seafloor characteristics to determine the health status of the ecosystem it supports. These indicators could improve the quality and consistency of marine conservation efforts across Europe, particularly where the impact of human activities is high.

The importance of coral reefs in supporting diverse fish communities has been highlighted in a recent study. However, the effects of damaging fishing techniques were also observed in video footage of the reefs studied, located off the coast of Ireland.

Populations of otters, grey seals and sea eagles are slowly recovering in Sweden, which is likely to be thanks in part to a ban on organochlorine chemicals, such as PCBs and DDT, in the 1970s, according to a new study. However, the research shows that negative effects of these chemicals on the reproductive health of female animals persisted for more than 15 years after the ban was introduced.

The lack of clear international regulations is putting ???animal forests??? at risk, a recent analysis concludes. The research examined threats to these important seafloor habitats, and suggests that collective responsibility and coherent ecosystem-based management are needed to prevent their loss.

Some Marine and Coastal have been altered over long periods of time, resulting in a loss of knowledge of their true healthy state, new research suggests. In this UK study, researchers used historical records, samples of sediment and present-day diving surveys to reconstruct the true history of shellfish beds on the east coast of Scotland.

The effects of seafloor trawling can extend further than the immediate fishing grounds, affecting delicate deep-sea ecosystems, new research suggests. In this Mediterranean study, the researchers demonstrated that clouds of sediment from trawling reached deeper habitats, increasing water-borne sediment particle concentrations to a hundred times that of background levels.

Seabed fishing grounds in the UK are made up of intensively fished core areas surrounded by more rarely used marginal areas, new research shows. Excluding these margins, which contain only 10% of the total fishing activity, approximately halves the total area of fishing grounds. Thus reducing the fishing footprint by closing the marginal areas will disproportionately reduce the seabed impact of fishing activity.

4 awesome discoveries you probably didn't hear about this week -- Episode 31

4 awesome discoveries you probably didn't hear about this week -- Episode 32

The National Science Foundation: Creating knowledge to transform our future

Will Davidson and his Minecraft creation, modeled off the Santa Cruz Mission; Credit: Steve Henn

Minecraft is a deceptively simple video game. You're dropped into a virtual world, and you get to build things. It's like a digital Lego set, but with infinite pieces.

Its simplicity makes it a big hit with kids, like 10-year old Will Davidson. Last year, Will built a Spanish mission for a school report. He modeled his off the Santa Cruz Mission. "I made a chapel over here," Davidson says. "I also have a bell tower."

After he turned in his report, he added a few things. Like skeleton archers. "And zombies ... and exploding things, and spiders, that try to kill you," he said.

Minecraft is popular with kids because they're free to create almost anything, says Ramin Shokrizade, a game designer.

Also, kids aren't manipulated into clicking buttons to buy add-ons within the game. In other games, designers give players a special power for free at first, then take it away and offer it back at a price.

Zynga, the creator of Farmville, calls this fun pain, according to Shokrizade. "That's the idea that, if you make the consumer uncomfortable enough, and then tell them that for money we'll make you less uncomfortable, then [they] will give us money," he says.

Kids, Shokrizade says, are especially susceptible to this — and Minecraft has a loyal following, in part, because it doesn't do it.

Susan Linn, from the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, agrees. She says a big reason she likes Minecraft is because after you purchase the game upfront, that's it.

"Parents don't have to worry that their kids are going to be targeted for more marketing," Linn says. "How forward-thinking!"

But Linn is worried. Microsoft bought Mojang, the company that created Minecraft, on Monday for $2.5 billion, and she says that any time a large company spends billions to acquire a smaller company, executives are bound start looking for new ways to get even more money out of it.

A job seeker fills out an application during a career fair at the Southeast Community Facility Commission on May 21, 2014 in San Francisco; Credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

California employers added 44,200 jobs in August, the largest gain of any state in the country. The state's unemployment rate stood still at 7.4 percent, compared to 6.1 percent nationwide.

"When the national numbers came out for August, and we saw a significant slowdown in job creation, we were a little bit concerned that we'd see the same thing happening here," said economist Kimberly Ritter-Martinez of the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation. "But in California, we stayed pretty much on track, outpacing the nation in terms of job creation." 

The construction sector was a huge contributor to California's job growth in August, with a gain of 13,600 jobs.  The other sectors with large gains were Education/Health Services (+12,200), and Professional/Business Services (+10,600). 

"We've been seeing steady increases in construction employment for some time, but it has been a slow steady increase," said Tom Holsman, CEO of the Associated General Contractors of California.

"Recent increases are attributable to many projects that have been in the early stages of startup gaining momentum," Holsman added, citing LA County Metro transit projects and the new Wilshire Grand Hotel construction project as local examples.

In Los Angeles County, the unemployment rate also stayed flat at 8.1 percent, but it remains far lower than the 9.9 percent of August of 2013. In the last twelve months, the L.A. County Metro area has gained 6,600 construction jobs, a rate of 5.6 percent.

Ritter-Martinez, of the LAEDC says other economic indicators support a boost in construction jobs at the Los Angeles and statewide levels: permits for new housing construction, remodeling, and non-residential construction are all on the rise. 

"Builders and developers are reporting that they're having trouble finding some skilled labor for construction," Ritter-Martinez said. "It's taken so long for that sector to come back, a lot of construction people have gone off and found other kinds of jobs or moved out of the region." 

In Orange County, the unemployment rate was 5.4 percent, down from 5.7 percent in July. The unemployment rate in the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario area was 8.7 percent in 
August 2014, down from a revised 9.3 percent in July 2014.

Remdesivir, an experimental antiviral drug made by Gilead Sciences, has been authorized by the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use in treating severely ill COVID-19 patients.; Credit: Ulrich Perry/POOL/AFP via Getty Images

Now that the Food and Drug Administration has authorized remdesivir for emergency use in seriously ill COVID-19 patients, the experimental drug is another step closer to full approval. That's when most drugs get price tags.

Gilead Sciences, which makes remdesivir, is donating its initial supply of 1.5 million doses, but the company has signaled it will need to start charging for the drug to make production sustainable. It's unclear when that decision might be made.

"Going forward, we will develop an approach that is guided by the principles of affordability and access," Gilead CEO Daniel O'Day told shareholders during the company's annual meeting Wednesday.

In a quarterly financial filing made the same day, Gilead said its investment in remdesivir this year "could be up to $1 billion or more," much of it for scaling up manufacturing capacity.

The company also acknowledged that it's in the spotlight. "[G]iven that COVID-19 has been designated as a pandemic and represents an urgent public health crisis, we are likely to face significant public attention and scrutiny about any future business models and pricing decisions with respect to remdesivir," Gilead said in the quarterly filing.

How will the company balance its business calculations with the drug's potential value to society?

"Gilead has not yet set a price for remdesivir," company spokeswoman Sonia Choi wrote in an email to NPR. "At this time, we are focused on ensuring access to remdesivir through our donation. Post-donation, we are committed to making remdesivir both accessible and affordable to governments and patients around the world."

Among potential treatments for COVID-19, remdesivir, an intravenous drug that was once studied for Ebola, is one of the furthest along.

"It's hard to imagine a situation in which there will be more public scrutiny," said Michael Carrier, a professor at Rutgers School of Law who specializes in antitrust and pharmaceuticals. "On the one hand, Gilead will try to recover its R&D in an atmosphere in which it is able to potentially make a lot of money. On the other hand, the pressure will be intense not to charge what's viewed as too high a price."

Breaking with its usual practices, the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review, or ICER, an influential nonprofit that analyzes drug pricing, issued an expedited report on remdesivir.

"Under normal circumstances, we would be unlikely to do a report when the evidence is this raw and immature," ICER President Steven Pearson said in an interview with NPR. "But it was quite clear that the world is moving at a much quicker pace."

If the price is based just on the cost of making the drug, then a 10-day course of remdesivir should cost about $10, according to the ICER report. (Gilead said results of a recently completed study suggest a five-day course of treatment may be just as effective.)

But if the drug is priced based on the drug's effectiveness, ICER estimates it should cost around $4,500 — assuming the drug is proven to have some benefit on mortality. If it doesn't and the drug only shortens hospital stays, that value-based price goes down to $390.

Results from a federally funded study described by Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, suggested that remdesvir could reduce recovery time by a median of four days — 11 days to recovery for patients treated with remdesivir compared with 15 days for those who got a placebo. A potential survival benefit is less clear.

Rutgers's Carrier said he expects Gilead to set the remdesivir price somewhere between the $10 and $4,500 that ICER estimated. The company has already shown that it can respond to public pressure when it asked the FDA to rescind the orphan drug status it won for remdesivir, he pointed out.

"When you see that $10 figure, that sets a benchmark for a figure that is eminently affordable," Carrier said. Ultimately, he said a price more than $1,000 per treatment course would be unpopular.

Gilead "will be watched very carefully," he said, because of its prior history of pricing. He referred to two other Gilead drugs that drew scrutiny over high price tags. The company charged $1,000 per pill for Sovaldi, a cure for hepatitis C. And its HIV drug Truvada can cost $22,000 per year.

But there is such a thing as pricing remdesivir too low, said Craig Garthwaite, who directs the health care program at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management.

"We don't think this is the only drug we need," he said, adding that remdesivir doesn't appear to be a "home run" against the coronavirus, based on existing data. "The thing that would worry me the most is that we're somehow telling people that if you take the risky bet to try, and you'll go after a coronavirus cure and you do it, you're not going to get paid."

Instead, he said he would like to see acceptance of a generous price for remdesivir to send the message to drug companies that the best thing they can do is "dedicate every waking moment to trying to develop that cure, and that if they do that, we will pay them the value they create," he said.

During a Gilead earnings call on April 30, analysts asked executives whether they could expect similar financial returns on remdesivir as they've seen with Gilead's other drugs.

"There is no rulebook out there, other than that we need to be very thoughtful about how we can make sure we provide access of our medicines to patients around the globe," Gilead CEO O'Day said. "And do that in a sustainable way for the company, for ... shareholders, and we acknowledge that."

On May 1, the FDA authorized remdesivir for emergency use, meaning it will be easier to administer to hospitalized patients with severe disease during the pandemic, but the drug is not yet officially approved. The federal government is coordinating distribution of the treatment.

Day acknowledged on the recent earnings call that the company "could" charge for remdesivir under an emergency use authorization, but he stressed that Gilead is donating its current supply, which should last through "early summer."

To date, the National Institutes of Health said it has obligated $23 million toward its COVID-19 remdesivir trial. And the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases did some of the early in vitro and animal studies with the medicine prior to the pandemic.

"Taxpayers are often the angel investors in pharmaceutical research and development, yet this is not reflected in the prices they pay," Reps. Lloyd Doggett, D-Texas, and Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., wrote in a April 30 letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar.

Concerned about remdesivir's price, they asked for a full breakdown of taxpayer funds that have gone toward the development of the medicine. "An unaffordable drug is completely ineffective," they wrote in the letter. "The substantial taxpayer investments in COVID-19 pharmaceutical research must be recognized."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to block Congress from seeking the materials, saying, "The government will suffer irreparable harm absent a stay."; Credit: Andrew Harnik/AP

The Supreme Court has temporarily put on hold the release of redacted grand jury material from the Russia investigation to a House panel.

The Trump administration is trying to block the release.

Last October, a district court judge ruled the Justice Department had to turn over the materials, which were blacked out, from former special counsel Robert Mueller's report into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

An appeals court upheld the decision, but the Trump administration, hoping to keep the evidence secret, appealed to the Supreme Court.

Chief Justice John Roberts' order temporarily stops the process. Lawyers for the House Judiciary Committee have until May 18 to file their response to the Justice Department's attempts to keep the materials from the House panel.

The Justice Department had until Monday to turn over the material following the appeals court order. But on Thursday, the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to block Congress from seeking it, saying, "The government will suffer irreparable harm absent a stay."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

The Census Bureau says it will continue its relaunch of limited field operations for the 2020 census next week in some rural communities in nine states.; Credit: Matt Rourke/AP

The Census Bureau says it is continuing the gradual relaunch of limited field operations for the 2020 census next week in nine states where the coronavirus pandemic forced the hand-delivery of paper forms in rural areas to be suspended in mid-March.

On May 13, some local census offices in Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Washington are scheduled to restart that fieldwork, according to an updated schedule the bureau published on its website Friday.

All workers are expected to be trained in CDC guidance in preventing the spread of COVID-19, and besides a new reusable face mask for every 10 days worked and a pair of gloves for each work day, the bureau has ordered 2 ounces of hand sanitizer for each census worker conducting field operations, the bureau tells NPR in an email.

The announcement means more households that receive their mail at post office boxes or drop points are expected to find paper questionnaires left outside their front doors soon. In areas where access to the online census form at my2020census.gov can be spotty, paper forms help ensure that all homes can participate in the once-a-decade head count of every U.S. resident.

The results are used to determine how many congressional seats and Electoral College votes each state gets through 2030. They also guide the redrawing of voting districts and the distribution of an estimated $1.5 trillion a year in federal funding for schools, roads and other public services in local communities.

The Census Bureau also announced on Friday that fingerprinting for newly hired census workers will pick up again next week in and around Philadelphia, Seattle, Portland, Ore., and Pittsburgh. With responses from close to 86 million households bringing the national self-response rate to just over 58% as of Thursday, the federal government is relying on staffing up with enough door knockers to complete the count. They're currently scheduled to make in-person visits to unresponsive homes starting in August.

Last month, Census Bureau officials asked Congress to consider pushing back the legal deadlines for delivering census data used to reapportion House seats and reshape voting maps by four months because of the delays brought on by the coronavirus.

In a letter to U.S. Senate leaders released on Friday, more than a dozen Democratic senators led by Brian Schatz of Hawaii are calling for the next COVID-19 relief package to include more funding and requirements for the Census Bureau "to keep both field workers and the public safe while conducting this constitutionally required enumeration."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

The Supreme Court justices heard oral arguments remotely this week, and for the first time the arguments were streamed live to the public.; Credit: Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images

For the first time in its 231-year history, the Supreme Court justices heard oral arguments remotely by phone and made the audio available live.

The new setup went off largely without difficulties, but produced some memorable moments, including one justice forgetting to unmute and an ill-timed bathroom break.

Here are the top five can't-miss moments from this week's history-making oral arguments.

A second week of arguments begin on Monday at 10 a.m. ET. Here's a rundown of the cases and how to listen.

1. Justice Clarence Thomas speaks ... a lot

Supreme Court oral arguments are verbal jousting matches. The justices pepper the lawyers with questions, interrupting counsel repeatedly and sometimes even interrupting each other.

Justice Clarence Thomas, who has sat on the bench for nearly 30 years, has made his dislike of the chaotic process well known, at one point not asking a question for a full decade.

But with no line of sight, the telephone arguments have to be rigidly organized, and each justice, in order of seniority, has an allotted 2 minutes for questioning.

It turn out that Thomas, second in seniority, may just have been waiting his turn. Rather than passing, as had been expected, he has been Mr. Chatty Cathy, using every one of his turns at bat so far.

Thomas broke a year-long silence on Monday in a trademark case testing whether a company can trademark by adding .com to a generic term. In this case, Booking.com.

"Could Booking acquire an 800 number, for example, that's a vanity number — 1-800-BOOKING, for example?" Thomas asked.

2. The unstoppable RBG

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg participated in Wednesday's argument from the hospital. In pain during Tuesday's arguments, the 87-year-old underwent non-surgical treatment for a gall bladder infection at Johns Hopkins Hospital later that day, according to a Supreme Court press release.

But she was ferocious on Wednesday morning, calling in from her hospital room in a case testing the Trump administration's new rule expanding exemptions from Obamacare's birth control mandate for nonprofits and some for-profit companies that have religious or moral objections to birth control.

"The glaring feature" of the Trump administration's new rules, is that they "toss to the winds entirely Congress' instruction that women need and shall have seamless, no-cost, comprehensive coverage," she said.

3. Who flushed?

During Wednesday's second oral argument, Barr v. American Association of Political Consultants, a case in which the justices weighed a First Amendment challenge to a federal rule than bans most robocalls, something very unexpected happened.

Partway through lawyer Roman Martinez's argument time, a toilet flush could be distinctly heard.

Martinez seemed unperturbed and continued speaking in spite of the awkward moment.

The flush quickly picked up steam online, becoming the first truly viral moment from the court's new livestream oral arguments.

4. Hello, where are you?

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, considered one of the most tech-savvy of the justices, experienced a couple of technical difficulties with her mute button.

In both Monday and Tuesday arguments, the first time she was at bat, there were prolonged pauses, prompting Chief Justice John Roberts to call, "Justice Sotomayor?" a few times before she hopped on with a brief, "Sorry, Chief," before launching into her questions.

By Wednesday she seemed to have gotten used to the new format, but the trouble then jumped to Thomas, who was entirely missing in action when his turn came. He ultimately went out of order Wednesday morning.

5. Running over time

Oral arguments usually run one hour almost exactly, with lawyers for each side having 30 minutes to make their case. In an attempt to stick as closely as possible to that format, the telephone rules allocate 2 minutes of questioning to each justice for each round of questioning.

Chief Justice John Roberts spent the week jumping into exchanges, cutting off both lawyers and justices in the process, to keep the proceedings on track. Even so the arguments ran longer than usual.

But in Wednesday's birth control case, oral arguments went a whopping 40 minutes longer than expected.

Justice Alito, for his part, hammered the lawyer challenging the Trump administration's new birth control rules for more than seven minutes, without interruption from the chief justice.

Referencing a decision he wrote in 2014, Alito said that "Hobby Lobby held that if a person sincerely believes that it is immoral to perform an act that has the effect of enabling another person to commit an immoral act, the federal court does not have the right to say that this person is wrong on the question of moral complicity. That is precisely the question here."

Christina Peck is NPR's legal affairs intern.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

Birth control pills in 1976 in New York. The birth control pill was approved by the FDA 60 years ago this week.; Credit: /Bettmann/Getty Images

Updated at 9:44 a.m. ET

As a young woman growing up in a poor farming community in Virginia in the 1940 and '50s, with little information about sex or contraception, sexuality was a frightening thing for Carole Cato and her female friends.

"We lived in constant fear, I mean all of us," she said. "It was like a tightrope. always wondering, is this going to be the time [I get pregnant]?"

Cato, 78, now lives in Columbia, S.C. She grew up in the years before the birth control pill was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, on May 9, 1960. She said teenage girls in her community were told very little about how their bodies worked.

"I was very fortunate; I did not get pregnant, but a lot of my friends did. And of course, they just got married and went into their little farmhouses," she said. "But I just felt I just had to get out."

At 23, Cato married a widower who already had seven children. They decided seven was enough.

By that time, Cato said, the pill allowed the couple to avoid having more babies — and she eventually was able to go on to college.

"It was just like going from night to day, as far as the freedom of it," Cato said. "And to know that I had control, that I had choice, that I controlled my body. It gave me a whole new lease on life."

Loretta Ross, an activist and visiting women's studies professor at Smith College, was among the first generation of young women to have access to the birth control pill throughout their reproductive years.

Ross, now 66, said by the time she came of age around 1970, the pill was giving young women more control over their fertility than previous generations had enjoyed.

"We could talk about having sex – not without consequences, because there were still STDS ... but at the same time, with more freedom than our foremothers had," Ross said. "So it changed the world."

For all it's done for women, Ross said that the pill has a complex and controversial history; it was first tested on low-income women in Puerto Rico. Ross said the pill also has limitations; she'd like to see it made available over the counter, as it is in some countries – not to mention, a pill for men.

When the pill was approved in 1960, women had few relatively few contraceptive options, and the pill offered more reliability and convenience than methods like condoms or diaphragms, said Dr. Eve Espey, chair of the Department of Ob/Gyn and Family Planning at the University of New Mexico.

"There was a huge, pent-up desire for a truly effective form of contraception, which had been lacking up to that point," Espey said.

By 1965, she said, 40% of young married women were on the pill.

For Pat Fishback, now 80 and living in Richmond, Va., the newly-available pill allowed her to delay having children in her early 20s until she'd been married for a couple of years.

"It also made having children a positive experience," Fishback said. "Because we had actually, emotionally and intellectually, gotten to the point where we really desired to have children."

It took a bit longer for unmarried women to gain widespread access to the pill and other forms of contraception: Linda Gordon, 80, a historian at New York University, remembers the stigma around single women and contraception at the time.

"When I was in college, a number of women had a wedding ring – a gold ring –that we would pass around and use when we wanted to go see a doctor to get fitted for a diaphragm," Gordon said. "In other words, there were people finding their way to do that, even then."

The pill also gave rise to a variety of other forms of hormonal contraception, many of which are popular today, Gordon said. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 13% of American women of reproductive age use the pill — making it the second most popular form of contraception, after female sterilization.

Gordon said that 60 years after the pill's approval, contraception remains a contentious political issue.

Just this week, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in a case involving the birth control mandate in the Affordable Care Act. A decision on whether some institutions with religious or moral objections can deny contraceptive coverage to their employees is expected in the months to come.

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

The technical update on the asset, which Wheaton Precious Metals owns a production stream on, is explored in a CIBC report.

With the supply/demand balance moving in favor of miners, the outlook for uranium stocks is the brightest it has been in years, according to McAlinden Research Partners.