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As COVID-19 hospitalizations rates surge across the country, the American Red Cross and other groups say the U.S. blood supply is dangerously low.
It’s a new record high in the U.S. as more COVID-19 hospitalizations are in place than at any other point in the pandemic. As those in healthcare scramble to care for these patients, another danger lurks: dangerously low life-saving blood supplies.
“The crisis is the worst we’ve seen in over a decade,” says Chief Medical Officer of the Biomedical Services of the American Red Cross, Dr. Pampee Young.
The American Red Cross says several factors are behind this, including surging COVID-19 cases; severe winter storms; declines in donor turnout; blood drive cancellations; and staffing problems have all led to shortages across the U.S.
“We are challenged to collect enough blood to meet hospital needs and sometimes up to 25 percent of a hospital’s need might not be met,” said Dr. Pampee.
Some blood centers across the country are reporting less than a day’s supply of certain types of blood and it’s causing major surgeries for some patients to be postponed.
“We encourage anyone who is healthy and feeling well to roll up their sleeves and make an appointment,” said Dr. Pampee, “…we require masks for all of our staff and donors and anyone associated with the blood drive, so the donation process is very safe.”
U.S. Blood Shortage
The New York Blood Center is asking donors of all blood types, but especially Type O, to make an appointment now to give in the weeks ahead.
If you’re interested in donating, you can find a blood drive close to you or make an appointment online at donate.nybc.org or by calling 800-933-2566.
In 30 seconds, an entire nation was changed forever. The aftershocks of an earthquake can last anywhere from minutes to weeks, but for Haitians across the globe, the aftershock of the 2010 earthquake has lasted 12 years.
“This has been a defining moment for Haiti and Haitians in so many ways, this earthquake happened on January 12th and we haven’t stopped shaking,” said Elsie Saint Louis, the CEO of Haitian Americans United for Progress (HAUP).
Wednesday, Jan. 12, on the National Day of Remembrance, leaders in the Haitian Catholic community are reflecting on how the Diocese of Brooklyn took action to help.
“There’s a strong Catholic presence, the Diocese of Brooklyn was there to help out and the church of Brooklyn is always present in the lives of Haitians especially in times of trouble,” said Father Hilaire Belizaire, director of the Haitian Apostolate in the Diocese.
But also the earthquake’s power to destroy not only government buildings and cathedrals but the country’s infrastructure and society, giving way for corruption, political violence and poverty.
“We’ve lost almost everything, we’re living in a land of lawlessness. Our kids can’t go to school, we’re kidnapping, we’re killing people, kidnapping priests and pastors and missionaries. That’s not who we are,” said Elsie.
“There is no security, no order, no peace, it’s a result of the earthquake and the corruption that has happened,” Father Hilaire said.
This past year, the world watched as tens of thousands of Haitians fled to the U.S. border in Del Rio, Texas. The COVID-19 pandemic, political violence and poverty once again seeped into their new homes in South America. Many were deported, but for those who made it through, the reverberations of the 2010 earthquake followed them to another uncertainty.
“They were no longer able to give us the same support they were giving us before so there goes your mass exodus, all of these are direct effects of the earthquake,” Elsie said.
Community leaders say today cannot be a day of remembrance because Haitians live January 12, 2010 every day.
“When we have this day of remembrance, we need to look at the entire country and look at what needs to be done,” said Father Hilaire.
As Haiti continues to recover and struggle Haitians says – behind a crumbling facade – there’s resilience and faith.
The Diocese of Brooklyn currently has the city’s only remote learning option.
The St. Thomas Aquinas Online Catholic Academy is a completely virtual kindergarten through eighth grade school for students.
The program first began in September of 2020 after COVID forced students to go remote.
Some 2,400 students enrolled.
After schools began to open again, the diocese realized the needs for this kind of online learning were still there and so they made the academy permanent.
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — The COVID-19 pandemic calls for an urgent reality check against baseless information and for increased efforts so everyone has access to vaccines, medicines and diagnostic tools, Pope Francis told diplomats from around the world.
Pope Francis greets George Poulides, the ambassador of Cyprus to the Holy See and dean of the Vatican diplomatic corps, as he arrives for an annual meeting with diplomats accredited to the Holy See, at the Vatican Jan. 10, 2022. In his address, the pope called for an urgent reality check against misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. (Photo: CNS/Vatican Media)
He urged individuals, governments and the international community to recognize the effectiveness and importance of immunizing as many people as possible as part of fighting the pandemic, which he called a “grave moment in the life of humanity.”
“Vaccines are not a magical means of healing, yet surely they represent, in addition to other treatments that need to be developed, the most reasonable solution for the prevention of the disease,” the Holy Father told ambassadors from the 183 countries that have diplomatic relations with the Vatican.
At his annual meeting with the diplomatic corps Jan. 10, the Holy Father also told them that facing today’s challenges “will require humanity to join together as one great family that, starting from different viewpoints, should prove capable of finding common solutions for the good of all.”
In his speech, the Holy Father highlighted his hopes and concerns regarding the state of the world, ongoing wars and violence, the arms trade, today’s “cancel culture,” the treatment of migrants, the importance of increased funding for education and the need to step-up efforts for universal vaccinations for COVID-19.
Recalling the passing of Archbishop Aldo Giordano, a well-respected Vatican diplomat who died of COVID-19 in December, the pontiff told the ambassadors the fight against the pandemic still calls for “significant effort” by everyone — on a personal, political and international level.
Effective vaccination campaigns have decreased the risk of the “severe repercussions of the disease,” he said. “It is therefore important to continue the effort to immunize the general population as much as possible.”
Individuals have a duty to care for themselves and their health, which includes “respect for the health of those around us,” he said. But “sadly we are finding increasingly that we live in a world of strong ideological divides” where people let themselves be influenced by ideologies built upon “baseless information or poorly documented facts.”
“Every ideological statement severs the bond of human reason with the objective reality of things,” he said. “The pandemic, on the other hand, urges us to adopt a sort of ‘reality therapy’ that makes us confront the problem head on and adopt suitable remedies to resolve it.”
Governments can help by engaging citizens more and fostering constructive discussion, he said. “The lack of resolute decision-making and clear communication generates confusion, creates mistrust and undermines social cohesion, fueling new tensions. The result is a ‘social relativism’ detrimental to harmony and unity.”
Another area of concern, he said, is the field of multilateral diplomacy, which is undergoing “a crisis of trust” due to the reduced credibility of many institutions.
When social or governmental agencies make important resolutions or decisions “without a genuine process of negotiation in which all countries have a say,” the imbalance generates disaffection toward these groups and makes them “less and less effective in confronting global challenges,” he said.
The pontiff also criticized a “form of ideological colonization” that “leaves no room for freedom of expression.” He said it “is now taking the form of the ‘cancel culture’ invading many circles and public institutions.”
“Under the guise of defending diversity, it ends up cancelling all sense of identity, with the risk of silencing positions that defend a respectful and balanced understanding of various sensibilities,” he said.
Effective and respectful multilateral diplomacy is possible, he said, but it calls for mutual trust, the willingness to listen and share different views and to come to agreement and walk together.
The pontiff lamented the ongoing conflicts or tensions in Syria, Yemen, Libya, Sudan, Ethiopia, Ukraine and Myanmar, among other places.
And he encouraged Israel and Palestine to “rebuild mutual trust and resume speaking directly to each other, in order to reach the point where they can live in two states, side by side, in peace and security, without hatred and resentment, but the healing born of mutual forgiveness.”
He told the diplomatic corps these conflicts are worsened by the abundance and ready availability of weapons. “We deceive ourselves into thinking that these weapons serve to dissuade potential aggressors.”
Autonomous weapons’ systems must come under international scrutiny and nuclear arms must be abolished, he said, saying they “are an inadequate and inappropriate means of responding to security threats” and their possession “is immoral.”
Pope Francis also called for increased funding of education, which is critical for young people’s spiritual, moral and social growth.
“It pains me, then, to acknowledge that in different educational settings — parishes and schools — the abuse of minors has occurred,” he said. “These are crimes, and they call for a firm resolve to investigate them fully, examining each case to ascertain responsibility, to ensure justice to the victims and to prevent similar atrocities from taking place in the future.”
The pontiff also thanked those who work to ensure that migrants “are welcomed and protected, and to support their human promotion and integration in the countries that have received them.”
Some states face great difficulties with a large influx of people, he said, and “no one can be asked to do what is impossible for them, yet there is a clear difference between accepting, albeit in a limited way, and rejecting completely.”
“There is a need to overcome indifference and to reject the idea that migrants are a problem for others” and, instead, to adopt coherent and comprehensive ways to coordinate policies on migration and asylum, the pontiff said.
“The issue of migration, together with the pandemic and climate change, has clearly demonstrated that we cannot be saved alone and by ourselves,” he said, calling for people to recover “our sense of shared identity as a single human family.”
ROME (CNS) — Pope Francis took an evening ride in a white Fiat 500 to visit a record store he used to go to when in Rome as a cardinal.
Letizia Giostra, the store owner, told the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera that the surprise visit Jan. 11 was “an immense thrill.”
“The Holy Father is passionate about music and was already our client, years ago, when he was still a cardinal and would pass through Rome. Then, of course, we never saw him again. And now he came to visit us, to say ‘hello,'” she said.
Asked about the record he was holding under his arm when a Vatican reporter happened to see the pope emerge from the store, Giostra said, “It’s a gift we gave him, a record of classical music.”
Located right across from the Pantheon, the family-owned store, Stereo Sound, specializes in a wide variety of music, particularly opera and classical, on vinyl records and CDs.
The store’s streetside display still showcased Christmas music albums, decorations and a small white Christmas tree adorned with 45 RPM records and cassette tapes when the pope was caught on camera by Javier Martínez-Brocal, a Vatican reporter and director of Rome Reports news agency.
Martínez-Brocal posted the video and photos on Twitter and explained he had been in the neighborhood when he saw the white Fiat with Vatican license plates and some police cars parked in front of the store around 7 p.m. He said the pope was inside for about 12 minutes, visiting with the owner, her daughter and son-in-law.
Just one week ago, the store’s Instagram feed posted an autographed copy of Patti Smith’s “Land” CD, to mark her Dec. 30 birthday and reminisce about the American songwriter-singer’s many visits to the store.
“It was an immense joy, I was so excited, darned shyness that blocks your speech, that I couldn’t say anything to her, only if she could kindly autograph my CD. There were no smartphones back then to capture the moment, I’m left only with the memory in my mind and my (heart emoji),” the @discoteca.pantheon post said.
The pope has made it a fairly frequent habit to get in a car and go visit people or — less frequently — to a store to conduct his own business.
His first full day as pope March 14, 2013, he went to his hotel, picked up his luggage, paid his bill and thanked the staff. He went to drop off his eyeglasses for a new pair of lenses in 2015 at an optician in the city center and he stopped by a store specializing in orthopedic wear not far from his Vatican residence in 2016.
In a 2016 interview with “La Voz del Pueblo,” the pope said he missed being able to go out and walk or go to a pizzeria.
“I could order it, but it is not the same. It’s nice to go there,” he told the Argentine news outlet.
“I’ve always been big on walking,” he said, saying it is “enchanting” to just move along the city streets or ride the subway.
He admitted he is known for being “undisciplined. I don’t really follow protocol very much, it feels cold. But when it is for official business, I totally stick to it.”
As the investigation continues into that deadly fire in the Bronx, the city is coming together to help the victims.
The Tremont neighborhood is also coming together in prayer. A Mass was held last night at St. Simon Stock Church, which is just around the corner from the building.
President Biden is speaking today in Atlanta, renewing his push for new voting rights measures.
A community shaken and in mourning came together in prayer. Calls for a thorough investigation into the deadliest fire in New York City since 1990 took a pause Monday night for Mass held at St. Simon Stock to pray for all those affected by Sunday’s tragic fire.
“There is no way for us to see and think our way through an hour such as this we now face and bring to God all those who are seriously injured and lost everything, that is why we gather this evening,” said pastor, Father Michael Kissane.
Both residents and officials are now searching for answers as to why smoke spread so rapidly through the 120-unit building. The cause of the fire was an electric space heater left on for days – Rep. Ritchie Torres says residents resort to them when buildings are kept at the legal minimum temperature.
“The lesson here is when we disinvest from housing we are putting tenants’ lives at risk,” he said.
The New York Times is reporting the FDNY said smoke from the flames on the third floor traveled up through a door that would not close to the fifteenth floor and caused what’s known as the “flue effect.” The building has a history of Housing Preservation and Development violations including violations related to fire retardant materials in the building as recently as October of last year, according to the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development.
Now the Church, through Catholic Charities of New York, is stepping up to raise awareness and offer counseling, burial services, as well as financial and housing assistance.
“Let’s walk together, let’s educate and learn what can be done at home, the value of these messages from the fire department, this is so important in the action of the Church,” said Bronx coordinator Father Eric Cruz.
Mayor Eric Adams is urging people to learn from this horrific accident.
“This painful moment can turn into a purposeful moment if we can send one simple message of closing the door,” said Mayor Adams.
Catholic Charities has begun its outreach to individual families, so far they are working with about a dozen families. Bronx Park Phase III Preservation LLC, which owns the building, is fully cooperating with the investigation.
Masking, social distancing and of course, vaccination and boosters are the best ways to slow the spread of COVID-19. But knowing whether you’re infected is another weapon against this pandemic. That’s where COVID testing comes in.
“It is troubling to see these numbers to see how high the cases are going,” said U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy.
You may be able to avoid long lines if you have access to a rapid test, have been exposed and don’t have symptoms, but want to know if you’re infected. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) recommends you take the test at or close to day five after you’re exposed to the coronavirus. Five-hundred million free at-home COVID-19 tests will soon be distributed, according to the White House.
“We will set up a free and easy system, including a new website to get these tests out to Americans,” said White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Jeff Zients.
So, how do the tests work? Neurosurgeon Dr. Sanjay Gupta explains.
“So, there’s a swab,” Dr. Sanjay says. “Most of us are familiar with these by now, so about a half to three-quarters of an inch in each nostril and five big circles. Put it in the bottom hole here, shut it and now we wait.”
Read the test results only within the timeframe specified in the instructions.
“Here’s my COVID test results now,” Dr. Sanjay says. “No COVID. So, between this test result and me being fully vaccinated, I already feel a lot safer.”
If the test is positive, the CDC advises isolation to continue for 10 days after symptoms started. If negative, quarantine can stop, but the agency recommends wearing a mask around others until day 10.
Store owner Joe Imbriale is recalling the moment Hobbs Police asked to review security footage from his store after a baby was believed to have been thrown in it.
“What are what are we looking for here?” Joe asked police. “I turned around, she goes, ‘we’re looking for somebody that dumped a black garbage bag in the dumpster.’ And I said ‘please do not tell me it was a baby,’ and she grabbed my shoulder and said, ‘yes.'”
Joe said this should not have happened.
“There’s other ways to give a baby away, but you don’t dump it,” Joe said while holding back tears. “You just don’t. I’m sorry.”
The security video received from Joe lays out what happened on Jan. 7. You can see on the security video it is 2 p.m. when a white car pulls up to the dumpster and a woman exits the driver side of the car, opens the back passenger door, grabs a black bag and throws it into the dumpster. She then proceeds to leave.
“The girl just drives up like it’s a piece of trash, reaches in the back of a car, dumps it,” Joe says, “and just drives off. No remorse.”
Fast forward to 7:42 p.m. when a group of people appear to be looking through the dumpster when they come across a black bag. You can see a woman pull out a baby and begin walking with it.
Minutes later police arrive at the scene.
“Luckily, we had dumpster divers back there,” Joe said, “and they pulled it out and they didn’t even know what was in the bag.”
