(FREE) PAINE IN THE MORNING: 11 things you need to know this Tuesday – December 21, 2021

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Despite at least 94% of players vaccinated, the NBA, NFL, and NHL forced to cancel games, change COVID-19 protocols, and welcome unvaccinated players during latest spike of cases – The major professional sports leagues in the U.S. are being forced to cancel a slew of games, alter COVID-19 protocols, and allow a once-shunned unvaccinated superstar to return to action because of a rash of COVID-19 cases amongst the players, despite being nearly 100% vaccinated against coronavirus.

Despite 94.6% of NFL players being fully vaccinated, there were 58 players who tested positive for COVID-19 between Nov. 28 and Dec. 11. NFL personnel are 100% vaccinated, but there were 50 cases in the same time period. – READ MORE

South Africa: Only 1.7% Hospitalised From Omicron – South African Health Minister Joe Phaahla said today that only 1.7% of COVID cases in the current Omicron wave are being hospitalised compared to 19% in the previous wave and that the vast majority of cases are “fairly mild.”

“In the current wave, only 1.7% of Covid cases are being hospitalized, an average of fewer than 350 cases daily over the past two weeks, versus an average of more than 800 in the previous wave, at an average of 19%,” reports Business Tech based on Phaahla’s statement. – READ MORE

Cornell University Admits ‘Virtually Every Case’ of Omicron in Fully Vaccinated Students – Almost “every case” of the Omicron variant of the Chinese coronavirus at Cornell University has occurred in fully vaccinated students, some of whom have also received the booster shot, the university revealed this week.

The Ivy League school has experienced a spike in cases in the last week, reporting 1,345 cases from December 9-15, according to the university’s coronavirus dashboard, which also revealed that 97 percent of the campus — students, faculty, and staff — are vaccinated. Students attending on-campus for this academic year, 2021-2022, are required to be vaccinated, with exceptions for religious or medical reasons. – READ MORE

Michigan schools with mask mandates have ‘similar’ COVID case rates as schools with no mandate – Data released by the state of Michigan this week showed that coronavirus transmission rates among school-age children have reached comparable levels regardless of community mask mandates.

Michigan – which last week reported the second-highest case rate among pediatric populations in the country – has seen a consistent increase in COVID-19 cases in school-age kids since the first day of school in September. – READ MORE

NY Bill Would Allow Gov. To Unilaterally Force Confinement In Med Facility To Anyone “Potentially Dangerous To Public Health” – A piece of New York legislation to be voted on next year would “amend the public health law” and allow the governor or his or her delegates to detain a person who presents a “significant threat to public health.”

“AN ACT to amend the public health law,” the bill, filed January 2 of this year reads, “in relation to the removal of cases, contacts and carriers of communicable diseases who are potentially dangerous to the public health… The provisions of this section shall be utilized in the event that the governor declares a state of health emergency due to an epidemic of any communicable disease.” – READ MORE

School district warns parents of ‘sudden cardiac arrest’ in students – Amid concerns about COVID-19 vaccines causing serious heart inflammation in young people, a school district on Long Island in New York informed parents it is hiring a physician to comply with new regulations requiring them to treat and monitor students who exhibit symptoms of sudden cardiac arrest.

A parent who received the email from Eastport-South Manor Central School District in Suffolk County, New York, contacted The Gateway Pundit. The timing was suspicious, the parent said, because New York state is close to mandating the COVID shot for students to attend school. – READ MORE

Refugees not vaccinated because drugmakers fear injury lawsuits – A global vaccine program is denying tens of millions of refugees and other country-less people COVID-19 shots because some major drug manufacturers are concerned about getting sued by people claiming to have suffered adverse effects.

The United Nations says COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers have required that countries relieve them of any legal liability. – READ MORE

Email: Collins asked Fauci to attack ‘fringe’ Harvard, Stanford, Oxford epidemiologists – A new release of emails shows outgoing National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins asked White House coronavirus adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci to carry out a “quick and devastating published takedown” of the Great Barrington Declaration.

“This proposal from three fringe epidemiologists who met with the Secretary seems to be getting a lot of attention – and even a co-signature from Nobel Prize winner Mike Leavitt at Stanford,” Collins wrote in an Oct. 8, 2020, email posted on Twitter by researcher Phillip W. Magness. – READ MORE

Report: Amazon Ring Doorbells May Begin Using Biometric Data to Spy on Your Neighborhood – Amazon reportedly filed a patent recently that suggests its Ring doorbell cameras may soon be able to identify “suspicious” people by scanning their skin texture, walking style, and voice. This represents the latest in Amazon’s growing push into biometric data collection.

Business Insider reports that e-commerce and tech giant Amazon recently filed a patent for its Ring doorbell cameras that describes new tech enabling the devices to identify “suspicious” people based on their skin texture, walking style, and voice. – READ MORE

Members Of Congress And Their Families Traded Over $630 Million In Stocks This Year – Members of Congress and their immediate families exchanged more than $630 million in stocks this year.

A report from The New York Times’ DealBook — based upon research conducted by Capitol Trades — revealed that asset purchases amounted to $267 million, while sales amounted to $364 million – READ MORE

Fentanyl overdoses become No. 1 cause of death among US adults, ages 18-45: ‘A national emergency’ – Fentanyl overdoses have surged to the leading cause of death for adults between the ages of 18 and 45, according to an analysis of U.S. government data.

Between 2020 and 2021, nearly 79,000 people between 18 and 45 years old — 37,208 in 2020 and 41,587 in 2021 — died of fentanyl overdoses, the data analysis from opioid awareness organization Families Against Fentanyl shows. – READ MORE