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WEST PALM BEACH, FLORIDA — President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday sided with key supporter and billionaire tech CEO Elon Musk in a public dispute over the use of the H-1B visa, saying he fully backs the program for foreign tech workers opposed by some of his supporters. 

Trump’s remarks followed a series of social media posts from Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, who vowed late Friday to “go to war” to defend the visa program for foreign tech workers. 

Trump, who moved to limit the visas’ use during his first presidency, told The New York Post on Saturday he was likewise in favor of the visa program. 

“I have many H-1B visas on my properties. I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great program,” he was quoted as saying.  

Musk, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in South Africa, has held an H-1B visa, and his electric-car company Tesla obtained 724 of the visas this year. H-1B visas are typically for three-year periods, though holders can extend them or apply for permanent residency. 

The altercation was set off earlier this week by far-right activists who criticized Trump’s selection of Sriram Krishnan, an Indian American venture capitalist, to be an adviser on artificial intelligence, saying he would have influence on the Trump administration’s immigration policies. 

Musk’s tweet was directed at Trump’s supporters and immigration hard-liners who have increasingly pushed for the H-1B visa program to be scrapped amid a heated debate over immigration and the place of skilled immigrants and foreign workers brought into the country on work visas. 

On Friday, Steve Bannon, a longtime Trump confidante, critiqued “big tech oligarchs” for supporting the H-1B program and cast immigration as a threat to Western civilization. 

In response, Musk and many other tech billionaires drew a line between what they view as legal immigration and illegal immigration. 

Trump has promised to deport all immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally, deploy tariffs to help create more jobs for American citizens, and severely restrict immigration. 

The visa issue highlights how tech leaders such as Musk — who has taken an important role in the presidential transition by advising on key personnel and policy areas — are now drawing scrutiny from his base. 

The U.S. tech industry relies on the government’s H-1B visa program to hire foreign skilled workers to help run its companies, a labor force that critics say undercuts wages for American citizens.  

Musk spent more than a quarter of a billion dollars helping Trump get elected in November. He has posted regularly this week about the lack of homegrown talent to fill all the needed positions in American tech companies. 
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WASHINGTON — Changes are coming to the cold and cough aisle of your local pharmacy: U.S. officials are moving to phase out the leading decongestant found in hundreds of over-the-counter medicines, concluding that it doesn’t actually relieve nasal congestion.

Phenylephrine is used in popular versions of Sudafed, Dayquil and other medications, but experts have long questioned its effectiveness. Last month the Food and Drug Administration formally proposed revoking its use in pills and liquid solutions, kicking off a process that’s likely to force drugmakers to remove or reformulate products.

It’s a win for skeptical academics, including researchers at the University of Florida who petitioned the FDA to revisit the drug’s use in 2007 and again in 2015. For consumers it will likely mean switching to alternatives, including an older decongestant that was moved behind the pharmacy counter nearly 20 years ago.

Doctors say Americans will be better off without phenylephrine, which is often combined with other medicines to treat cold, flu, fever and allergies.

“People walk into the drugstore today and see 55,000 medicines on the shelf and they pick one that is definitely not going to work,” said Dr. Brian Schroer of the Cleveland Clinic. “You take away that option and it will be easier for them to self-direct toward products that really will help them.”

Why is FDA doing this now?

The FDA decision was expected after federal advisers last year voted unanimously that oral phenylephrine medications haven’t been shown to relieve congestion.

Experts reviewed several recent, large studies indicating that phenylephrine was no better than a placebo at clearing nasal passageways. They also revisited studies from the 1960s and 1970s that supported the drug’s initial use, finding numerous flaws and questionable data.

The panel’s opinion only applied to phenylephrine in oral medications, which account for roughly $1.8 billion in annual U.S. sales. The drug is still considered effective in nasal sprays, though those are much less popular.

Phenylephrine wasn’t always the top choice for cold and allergy products. Many were originally formulated with a different drug, pseudoephedrine.

But a 2006 law required pharmacies to move pseudoephedrine products behind the counter, citing their potential to be processed into methamphetamine. Companies such as Johnson & Johnson and Bayer decided to reformulate their products to keep them readily available on store shelves — and labeled many of them as “PE” versions of familiar brand names.

What are some alternatives for congestion?

Consumers who still want to take pills or syrups for relief will probably need to head to the pharmacy counter — where the pseudoephedrine-containing versions of Sudafed, Claritin D and other products remain available without a prescription. Purchasers need to provide a photo ID.

Beyond those products, most of the other options are over-the-counter nasal sprays or solutions.

Saline drops and rinses are a quick way to clear mucus from the nose. For long-term relief from seasonal stuffiness, itching and sneezing, many doctors recommend nasal steroids, sold as Flonase, Nasacort and Rhinocort.

“These medicines are by far the most effective daily treatment for nasal congestion and stuffiness,” Schroer said. “The biggest issue is they’re not great when used on an as-needed basis.”

Nasal steroids generally have to be used daily to be highly effective. For short-term relief, patients can try antihistamine sprays, such as Astepro, which are faster acting.

Phenylephrine-based sprays will also remain on pharmacy shelves.

Why doesn’t phenylephrine work when taken by mouth?

The experts who challenged the drug’s effectiveness say it’s quickly broken down and rendered ineffective when it hits the stomach.

“This is a good drug, but not when it’s swallowed,” said Leslie Hendeles, professor emeritus at the University of Florida’s College of Pharmacy, where he co-authored several papers on the ingredient. “It’s inactivated in the gut and doesn’t get into the bloodstream, so it can’t get to the nose.”

When Hendeles and his colleagues first petitioned the FDA on phenylephrine, they suggested a higher dose might be effective. But subsequent studies showed that even doses 400% higher than those currently recommended don’t treat stuffiness.

The FDA and other researchers concluded that pushing the dosage even higher might carry safety risks.

“If you’re using very high doses, the risk is raising blood pressure so high that it could be hazardous to patients,” said Randy Hatton, a University of Florida professor who co-led the research on phenylephrine.

Because of its cardiovascular effects, the drug is sometimes used to treat dangerously low blood pressure during surgery, Hatton noted.

What happens next?

Oral phenylephrine medicines will still be with us for a while.

Government regulators must follow a public, multistep process to remove the ingredient from FDA’s list of drugs approved for over-the-counter decongestants.

For six months, the FDA must take comments on its proposal, including from consumers and companies. Then, the FDA must review the feedback before writing a final order. Even after that decision is finalized, companies will likely have a year or more to remove or reformulate products.

Drugmakers could further delay the process by requesting additional FDA hearings.

For now, the Consumer Healthcare Products Association — which represents medicine makers — wants the products to stay available, saying Americans deserve “the option to choose the products they prefer for self-care.”

Hatton says he and his colleagues disagree: “Our position is that choosing from something that doesn’t work isn’t really a choice.” 
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A genetic analysis suggests the bird flu virus mutated inside a Louisiana patient who contracted the nation’s first severe case of the illness, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said this week.

Scientists believe the mutations may allow the virus to better bind to receptors in the upper airways of humans — something they say is concerning but not a cause for alarm.

Michael Osterholm, a University of Minnesota infectious-disease researcher, likened this binding interaction to a lock and key. To enter a cell, the virus needs to have a key that turns the lock, and this finding means the virus may be changing to have a key that might work.

“Is this an indication that we may be closer to seeing a readily transmitted virus between people? No,” Osterholm said. “Right now, this is a key that sits in the lock, but it doesn’t open the door.”

The virus has been causing sporadic, mostly mild illnesses in people in the United States; nearly all of those infected worked on dairy or poultry farms.

The patient in the U.S. state of Louisiana was hospitalized in critical condition with severe respiratory symptoms from bird flu after coming in contact with sick and dead birds in a backyard flock. The person, who has not been identified, is older than 65 and has underlying medical problems, officials said earlier this month.

The CDC stressed there has been no known transmission of the virus from the Louisiana patient to anyone else. The agency said its findings about the mutations were “concerning,” but the risk to the general public from the outbreak “has not changed and remains low.”

Still, Osterholm said, scientists should continue to follow what’s happening with mutations carefully.

“There will be additional influenza pandemics, and they could be much worse than we saw with COVID,” he said. “We know that the pandemic clock is ticking. We just don’t know what time it is.”
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Health care organizations may be required to bolster their cybersecurity to better prevent sensitive information from being leaked by cyberattacks like the ones that hit Ascension and UnitedHealth, a senior White House official said Friday.

Anne Neuberger, the U.S. deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging technology, told reporters that proposed requirements are necessary in light of the massive number of Americans whose data has been affected by large breaches of health care information. The proposals include encrypting data so it cannot be accessed, even if leaked, and requiring compliance checks to ensure networks meet cybersecurity rules.

The full proposed rule was posted to the Federal Register on Friday, and the Department of Health and Human Services posted a more condensed breakdown on its website.

She said that the health care information of more than 167 million people was affected in 2023 as a result of cybersecurity incidents.

The proposed rule from the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) within HHS would update standards under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act and would cost an estimated $9 billion in the first year, and $6 billion in years two through five, Neuberger said.

“We’ve made some significant proposals that we think will improve cybersecurity and ultimately everyone’s health information, if any of these proposals are ultimately finalized,” an OCR spokesperson told Reuters late Friday. The next step in the process is a 60-day public comment period before any final decisions will be made.

Large health care breaches caused by hacking and ransomware have increased by 89% and 102%, respectively, since 2019, Neuberger said.

“In this job, one of the most concerning and really troubling things we deal with is hacking of hospitals, hacking of health care data,” she said.

Hospitals have been forced to operate manually and Americans’ sensitive health care data, mental health information and other information are “being leaked on the dark web with the opportunity to blackmail individuals,” Neuberger said.
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A U.S. appeals court has halted enforcement of an anti-money laundering law that requires corporate entities to disclose the identities of their real beneficial owners to the U.S. Treasury Department ahead of a deadline for most companies to do so.

The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated late Thursday a nationwide injunction that had been issued this month by a federal judge in Texas who had concluded the Corporate Transparency Act was unconstitutional.

The order marked a change of course for the court. On Monday, a three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit at the urging of the U.S. Department of Justice put the injunction on hold while the government appealed the Texas judge’s decision.

But a different panel will ultimately decide whether to uphold the judge’s ruling, and in Thursday’s order, the court said it decided to keep enforcement of the law paused “to preserve the constitutional status quo while the merits panel considers the parties’ weighty substantive arguments.”

Those arguments will be heard on March 25, the court said Friday. Before Thursday’s order, most companies had faced a Jan. 13 deadline to submit their initial reports to the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).

The injunction had been obtained by the National Federation of Independent Business, which along with several small businesses challenged the law through lawyers at the conservative Center for Individual Rights.

“Given that we have established that the CTA is likely unconstitutional, this intrusive form of government surveillance should be halted until the law’s fate is finally resolved,” Todd Gaziano, the Center for Individual Rights’ president, said in a statement.

FinCEN did not respond to requests for comment.

Under the law, which was enacted in 2021, corporations and LLCs were required to report information concerning their beneficial owners to FinCEN, which collects and analyzes information about financial transactions to combat money laundering and other crimes.

The measure’s supporters said it was designed to address the country’s growing popularity as a venue for criminals to launder illicit funds by setting up entities such as limited liability companies under state laws without disclosing their involvement.

U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant in Sherman, Texas, on Dec. 3 ruled Congress had no authority under its powers to regulate commerce, taxes and foreign affairs to adopt the “quasi-Orwellian statute” and that it likely violated states’ rights under the U.S. Constitution’s 10th Amendment.
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President-elect Donald Trump’s threats of mass deportations are harming the mental health of many immigrants, psychologists and organizations warn.

Click here for the full story in Spanish.

  
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«Якщо ми зараз ведемо бої на території Курської області РФ, то при нашому відході ми переносимо ці дії вже на територію України Сумської області»
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U.S. President-elect Donald Trump made immigration a key focus of his 2024 presidential campaign. His incoming administration is planning stricter enforcement. VOA’s Immigration Correspondent Aline Barros explains what these policies might mean.
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Видання зазначає, що Київ міг сповільнити використання ракет, бо вже спочатку спрямував їх на російські об’єкти, які давно хотів уразити
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Штаб повідомляє про бої на Курахівському напрямку, поблизу Петропавлівки, Слов’янки, Дачного та Курахового, 9 російських атак вже відбили
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Уряд виділив 7,5 мільярдів гривень для створення безпечних умов у закладах освіти та будівництва укриттів
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NEW YORK — Richard Parsons, one of corporate America’s most prominent Black executives who held top posts at Time Warner and Citigroup, died Thursday. He was 76. 

Parsons, who died at his Manhattan home, was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 2015 and cited “unanticipated complications” from the disease for cutting back on work a few years later. 

The financial services company Lazard, where Parsons was a longtime board member, confirmed his death. 

David Zaslav, the president and CEO of Time Warner successor Warner Bros. Discovery, remembered Parsons as a “great mentor and friend” and a “tough and brilliant negotiator, always looking to create something where both sides win.” 

“All who got a chance to work with him and know him saw that unusual combination of great leadership with integrity and kindness,” Zaslav said, calling him “one of the great problem solvers this industry has ever seen.” 

Parsons’ friend Ronald Lauder told The New York Times that the cause of death was cancer. Parsons stepped down on December 3 from the boards of Lazard and Lauder’s company, Estee Lauder, citing health reasons. He had been on Estee Lauder’s board for 25 years. 

Parsons, a Brooklyn native who started college at 16, was named chairman of Citigroup in 2009, one month after leaving Time Warner Inc., where he helped restore the company’s stature following its much-maligned acquisition by internet provider America Online Inc. 

He steered Citigroup back to profit after financial turmoil from the subprime mortgage crisis, which upended the economy in 2007 and 2008. 

Parsons was named to the board of CBS in September 2018 but resigned a month later because of illness. 

“Dick’s storied career embodied the finest traditions of American business leadership,” Lazard said in a statement. The company, where Parsons was a board member from 2012 until this month, praised his “unmistakable intelligence and his irresistible warmth.” 

“Dick was more than an iconic leader in Lazard’s history — he was a testament to how wisdom, warmth, and unwavering judgment could shape not just companies, but people’s lives,” the company said. “His legacy lives on in the countless leaders he counseled, the institutions he renewed, and the doors he opened for others.” 

Parsons was known as a skilled negotiator, a diplomat and a crisis manager. 

Although he was with Time Warner through its difficulties with AOL, he earned respect for the company and rebuilt its relations with Wall Street. He streamlined Time Warner’s structure, pared debt and sold Warner Music Group and a book publishing division. 

He also fended off a challenge from activist investor Carl Icahn in 2006 to break up the company and helped Time Warner reach settlements with investors and regulators over questionable accounting practices at AOL. 

Parsons joined Time Warner as president in 1995 after serving as chairman and chief executive of Dime Bancorp Inc., one of the largest U.S. thrift institutions. 

In 2001, after AOL used its fortunes as the leading provider of internet access in the U.S. to buy Time Warner for $106 billion in stock, Parsons became co-chief operating officer with AOL executive Robert Pittman. 

Parsons became CEO in 2002 and was named chairman the following year, replacing AOL founder Steve Case, who had also championed the combination. 

The newly formed company’s internet division quickly became a drag on Time Warner. The promised synergies between traditional and new media never materialized. AOL began seeing a reduction in subscribers in 2002 as Americans replaced dial-up connections with broadband from cable TV and phone companies. 

Parsons stepped down as CEO in 2007 and as chairman in 2008. A year later AOL split from Time Warner and began trading as a separate company. 

A board member of Citigroup and its predecessor, Citibank, since 1996, Parsons was named chairman in 2009 at a time of turmoil for the financial institution. Citigroup had suffered five straight quarters of losses and received $45 billion in government aid. Its board had been criticized for allowing the bank to invest so heavily in the risky housing market. 

Parsons, a Republican, previously worked as a lawyer for Nelson Rockefeller, a former Republican governor of New York, and in Gerald Ford’s White House. Those early stints gave him grounding in politics and negotiations. He also was an economic adviser on President Barack Obama’s transition team. 

Parsons, whose love of jazz led to co-owning a Harlem jazz club, served as chairman of the Apollo Theater and the Jazz Foundation of America. He held positions on the boards of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, the American Museum of Natural History and the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. 

Parsons played basketball at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and received his law degree from Albany Law School in 1971. He is survived by his wife, Laura, and their family. 
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The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday its analysis of samples from the first severe case of bird flu in the country last week showed mutations not seen in samples from an infected backyard flock on the patient’s property.

The CDC said the patient’s sample showed mutations in the hemagglutinin (HA) gene, the part of the virus that plays a key role in it attaching to host cells.

The health body said the risk to the public from the outbreak has not changed and remains low.

Last week, the United States reported its first severe case of the virus, in a Louisiana resident above the age of 65, who was suffering from severe respiratory illness.

The patient was infected with the D1.1 genotype of the virus that was recently detected in wild birds and poultry in the United States, and not the B3.13 genotype detected in dairy cows, human cases and some poultry in multiple states.

The mutations seen in the patient are rare but have been reported in some cases in other countries and most often during severe infections. One of the mutations was also seen in another severe case from British Columbia, Canada.

No transmission from the patient in Louisiana to other persons has been identified, the CDC said. 
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