Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Interceptor7, Magnifico, annetteboardman, jck, and Besame. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Man Oh Man, wader, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck (RIP), ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
We begin this week with news of COVID-19. We’ll begin with this, from NPR:
An older person receives their first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine in Thika, Kenya. The vaccine's manufacturer, Serum Institute of India, announced this week that it will freeze all exports of the vaccine through the end of this year — leaving 20 million people in Africa without a source for their second dose.
Patrick Meinhardt/Bloomberg via Getty Images
When COVID cases surged in Malawi in January, Alinafe Kasiya's family was hit hard. The disease killed his sister — a healthy, gregarious woman who was the heart and soul of their clan — just before her 44th birthday. Then another sister who had cared for the first came down with symptoms. Then Kasiya's 13-year-son got sick while at boarding school. Kasiya wasn't even allowed to visit the boy while he recovered.
From CBS News:
Russia's Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine is already being used by multiple countries, but scientists and foreign health regulators have raised questions about the shot's quality, safety, and efficacy. Brazil rejected the vaccine in April and the European Union's health regulator still hasn't approved it. Carlo Martuscelli, reporter covering health care for Politico in Europe, joins "CBSN AM" to discuss.
From Reuters:
RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) -The death toll from COVID-19 in Latin America and the Caribbean passed 1 million people on Friday, according to a Reuters tally, with the pandemic worsening in the part of the world with the highest per capita death rate.
A different but related bit of news from the Washington Post:
As new plans roll out from the European Union and non-E.U. members to accept foreign travelers, a summer vacation on the continent is looking more promising for vaccinated Americans.
Eduardo Santander, executive director of the European Travel Commission, an association that represents the E.U.’s national tourism organizations, says while news as of late has been “absolutely amazing,” he acknowledges travelers will be confused while countries iron out reopening details.
Other medical news, from People Magazine:
The man’s right leg was amputated above the knee instead of his left, Freistadt Clinic said, “as a result of a sequence of unfortunate events”
Doctors at an Austrian hospital amputated the wrong leg of an elderly man, they said Thursday, in a "tragic mistake."
The 82-year-old patient was supposed to have his left leg removed on Tuesday, but doctors instead amputated his right leg above the knee, which the hospital, the Freistadt Clinic in northern Austria, blamed on "human error."
From NBC News:
The graves contained as many as 40 bodies. "The central axis of the investigation is sexual violence," prosecutor Graciela Sagastume told reporters.
By Reuters
El Salvador officials said on Thursday they were excavating graves discovered at the house of a former police officer that contained as many as 40 bodies, most of them believed to be women.
Exhuming all the bodies could take another month, authorities said. The remains of at least 24 people have been recovered so far at the house in the municipality of Chalchuapa, about 48 miles (78 km) northwest of the capital, San Salvador.
From Reuters:
Myanmar's junta-appointed election commission will dissolve Aung San Suu Kyi's political party for vote fraud in a November election, local media reported on Friday, citing a commissioner, who threatened action against "traitors" involved.
News sites Myanmar Now and the Irrawaddy said the announcement was made at a meeting on Friday with political parties that was boycotted by many, including Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD).
From the National Catholic Reporter:
ROME — Pope Francis significantly widened the scope of the next planned meeting of the world's Catholic bishops, postponing the event by one year to allow for periods of consultation in every local diocese and at the continental level before the opening of the usual Vatican gathering of prelates.
In an unexpected announcement May 21, the Vatican said the pontiff had chosen to take the move so that the next Synod of Bishops would better involve "listening to all of the baptized."
From MSN.Com:
BRUSSELS (AP) — Hundreds of specialized forces kept hunting Friday for a heavily armed Belgian soldier who is on a federal anti-terror watch list and was seen early this week near the home of a person he had threatened.
Jurgen Conings, 46, an expert marksman known for his extreme-right sympathies, was still thought to be hiding in a vast nature park in northeastern Belgium that over 400 soldiers and police officials have combed for three straight days.
From Reuters:
Nigeria's army chief, Lieutenant General Ibrahim Attahiru, died in a plane crash on Friday on an official visit to the northern state of Kaduna, which has had security challenges in recent months, the presidency said.
The air force said in a statement that its plane crashed near Kaduna airport and that it was investigating the cause.
From CNN:
Zamira Rahim and Vasco Cotovio
(CNN) —
A well-preserved ancient Roman bath complex has emerged from the sands of a beach in southern Spain.
The researchers from the University of Cádiz (UCA) found well-preserved Roman baths with walls more than 13 feet high at the Caños de Meca beach in Spain's Andalusia region, the university said in a statement.
News of the Arts
From Forbes:
Stan Prokopenko is an atelier-trained artist and gifted teacher, but these days he is largely focused on his business, the online art instruction site Proko.com. For the past eight years, he has built a following of 2.2 million YouTube subscribers, more than 80,000 of whom pay for additional premium video instruction through his site. The revenues have allowed him to hire a team of producers, instructors and support staff to expand his offerings, and to purchase a studio facility in San Diego.
From Episcopal News Service:
[Episcopal News Service – Cambridge, Massachusetts] If you walked past the Episcopal Chaplaincy at Harvard University on a recent evening, you might have heard chanting, music and bells, smelled incense and gotten a glimpse of robed figures. There was a liturgy going on in the backyard of the chaplaincy’s stately colonial building, but not one of the Eucharistic rites found in the Book of Common Prayer. It was a chaplaincy-staged experimental performance art piece that deconstructs and reassembles the Eucharist through a feminine lens.
From NPR:
Eleven years ago, a now-deceased millionaire hid a treasure and published a riddle that would help hunters find it. The chase spawned partnerships, marriages, but also burglary and even deaths.
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Eleven years ago, a now-deceased millionaire hid a treasure somewhere in the mountains out west and published a riddle that would help hunters find it. The chase spawned partnerships, even marriages, but also inspired hunters to dig up cemeteries, attempt burglary. This even led to five deaths. Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi of our daily economics podcast, The Indicator, has more.
From Fox UP (in Michigan):
MARQUETTE, Mich. (WLUC) - The Lake Superior Art Association is holding a scavenger hunt. Any artist can stop by Madgoodies art studio on Ohio Street in Marquette and pick up a 4X4 canvas for their art.
You can use any medium to create. It’s advised to avoid using oil paints however, as they might not dry in time. The art will then be placed around Marquette for others to find. The Art Association calls it “Art: Lost and Found.”
From Artsy:
Picture yourself scrolling through an Instagram page featuring photographs of immaculate interiors outfitted with bold contemporary artworks such as
Takashi Murakami’s multicolored pillows;
Hajime Sorayama’s shiny, metallic sculptures; and
Emily Mae Smith’s trippy, surrealistic paintings. Though such spaces may seem unattainable to many of us, the founders of the League of Their Own (or League OTO, for short)—an art and lifestyle collective that seeks to educate and encourage young collectors and creators—live with these pieces and use their social media channels to share their collections with others.
From Maui Now:
Hui No’eau Visual Arts Center presents Rose River Memorial, an art installation in collaboration with Artist Marcos Lutyens and the Rose River Memorial project honoring the lives lost to COVID-19 in the State of Hawai‘i. The outdoor installation is on display through Sept. 4, 2021 at the Hui No‘eau’s Makawao campus.
The memorial is part of the grassroots community art movement, Rose River Memorial, that honors and grieves the lives lost during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. The project engages communities to create felt roses as a symbol of grief for every life lost.
From artnet:
Numerous artists are now threatening to sue the school over the incident.
Taylor Dafoe
Dozens of current and former graduate students from the Royal College of Art (RCA) in London are threatening to sue the school after it allegedly threw away or damaged several years’—and thousands of dollars’—worth of work and art supplies during the lockdown.
In the fall of last year, students returned to campus to find their studios cleared and their belongings missing or scattered in hundreds of unlabeled boxes, according to multiple people affected. Artists say they lost completed works, art materials, and personal effects.
From ksn.com (Wichita, Kansas):
by: Claudia Yaujar-Amaro / Planeta Venus
WICHITA, Kan. (Planeta Venus) — Although the pandemic has made us reflect on many things, one issue has become especially obvious. Now more than ever, we understand the importance of mental health.
To have a healthy community, people need to be healthy individuals first.