Made the mistake of glancing at the news before going to bed, this evening. I got an eyeful of how the incoming prime minister is on track to cause thousands of excess deaths this winter, as *two thirds* of the UK population is predicted to have trouble making ends meet due to the cost of heating their homes this winter. People will be forced to choose between paying for basic necessities (e.g. food) and keeping their living space warm enough to avoid the respiratory & cardiovascular problems caused by a chronically cold environment.

And why? Because tax cuts.

Seriously.

Eat The Rich.

Happy suffrage day!

On August 26th, 1920, the U.S. Secretary of State certified ratification of the 19th amendment, granting women the right to vote in all elections. (A number of states, predominantly west of the Mississippi River, had already granted womens’ suffrage within their own jurisdictions.)

Tisha b’Av is today, delayed from its calendar date in order to avoid conflict with Shabbat.

If you’re observing, may you have a meaningful fast.

I keep coming back to how China Miéville described so much of what's wrong with the present-day U.S. in an aside from _Perdido Street Station_.

One of the major characters, Yagharek, is a gerudo who translates his un-title as "too-abstract individualist"—someone unwilling or unable to accept restriction of their own liberties in order for others to have an equal degree of liberty. Applicability to the reactionary side of the political spectrum is obvious, but the attitude and stances of excessively-abstract individualism also seem to have poisoned our progressive and (various) leftist movements.

Damn if I know what to do about it. I'm just in awe of an author tossing that kind of observation-from-uncommon-perspective into a story as almost a throwaway line.

A preprint article submitted to the Lancet, "Asymptomatic Monkeypox Virus Infections Among Male Sexual Health Clinic Attendees in Belgium" describes retroactive testing of samples from men who went to a large sexual health clinic for STI screening during the month of May, 2022. Of samples submitted by 224 patients, 4 tested positive for monkeypox DNA, but only 1 developed symptoms. None of the other 3 peoples' close contacts tested positive for monkeypox, but given delay between sample collection & follow-up, that isn't necessarily proof that asymptomatic = non-contagious. Especially since monkeypox is known to be an airborne infection, spread via respiratory droplets as well as skin contact and contaminated objects.

Keep in mind that this is a *pre-print* version of the article. Peer review is in progress, and the current version may be amended before publication.

Sources
Lancet pre-prints: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4142074
MedRXiv: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.07.04.22277226v1