Justice Department announces charges against hundreds of alleged COVID-19 fraudsters Hundreds of people have been charged with the theft of more than $830 million in COVID-19 emergency aid following a nationwide operation conducted by federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, the U.S. AP News

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How a mix of natural and human-caused factors cooked up Tropical Storm Hilary's soggy mess Scientists figure a natural El Nino, human-caused climate change, a stubborn heat dome over the nation’s midsection and other factors cooked up Hilary’s record-breaking slosh into California and Nevada. AP News

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Eris, BA.2.86: Do I need to worry about COVID again? Do the new variants make people sicker? Will vaccines protect against new variants? Deena Beasley,Nancy Lapid Reuters

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Scientists race to understand highly mutated coronavirus variant spotted in four countries, including the US | CNN A highly mutated new variant of the virus that causes Covid-19 has countries on alert as scientists scramble to understand how far it has spread and how well our immunity will defend against it. Brenda Goodman CNN

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Only six sequences of BA.2.86 have been reported in four countries, but epidemiologists are worried they could represent many more because worldwide monitoring of variants has dropped off.

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UK posts initial COVID-19 BA.2.86 risk assessment Officials say the rapid appearance in multiple countries in people without travel histories suggests established international spread. CIDRAP

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The newly identified variant has many genetic mutations and is distant from BA.2, its likely ancestor, and currently circulating XBB variants. The similarity of the sequences so far—six samples from four countries—suggests relatively recent emergence and rapid growth, but the HSA said it has low confidence in that assessment, pending the examination of further sequences.

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Florida malaria cases baffle experts “We regularly had this happen every couple of years before [2003]. So it's almost like, why hasn't this happened?" asked one expert. POLITICO

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Incidents of the non-contagious disease — passed on by parasitic mosquitoes — are regularly diagnosed in the U.S., but all are tied to people who are infected when they travel abroad to countries where malaria is present. What makes the Florida and Texas infections so puzzling is that the patients contracted malaria here.

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Prior Omicron infection may not protect against future COVID-19 infection People may assume that a COVID-19 infection protects them the next time they encounter the virus, but that's not necessarily true. Yahoo News

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