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Googling For Gut Symptoms Predicts Covid Hot Spot, Study Finds..

~1.4 mins read

Googling for Gut Symptoms Predicts Covid Hot Spot, study finds..

Gastrointestinal upsets may be harbinger of pandemic disease

Internet search data may identify hot spots four weeks earlier

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H.K. Study Finds Virus May Replicate in Digestive Tract

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Internet searches on gastrointestinal symptoms predicted a rise in Covid-19 cases weeks later, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital found, demonstrating a novel early warning system for hot spots of the pandemic disease.

Researchers at the top-ranked hospital in Boston compared search interest in loss of taste and appetite, and diarrhea with the reported incidence of Covid-19 in 15 U.S. states from Jan. 20 to April 20. Using Alphabet Inc.â€™s Google Trends online tool, they found the volume of searches correlated most strongly with cases in New York, New Jersey, California, Massachusetts and Illinois -- states with high disease burden -- three to four weeks later.

The research, published in the journal Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, showed that the same approach used to monitor pandemic influenza trends more than a decade ago could be deployed for the coronavirus, the hospital said in a report this month. Patients with Covid-19 often report gastrointestinal symptoms, such as abdominal pain and diarrhea, sparking interest in conducting the study.

Read More: Covid-19 May Cause Prolonged Gut Infection, Scientists Say

â€œOur data underscore the importance of GI symptoms as a potential harbinger of Covid-19 infection and suggests that Google Trends may be a valuable tool for prediction of pandemics with GI manifestations,â€ Kyle Staller, a gastroenterologist and the director of Mass Generalâ€™s gastrointestinal motility laboratory, and colleagues wrote in the study.

Scientists are also testing for traces of the coronavirus in wastewater to identify places where Covid-19 is spreading.

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Letter From Africa: Behind Ghana And Nigeria's Love-hate Affair

~8.3 mins read

A Ghanaian and Nigerian football fans at the Africa Cup of Nations quarter final match between Ghana and Nigeria in Accra, Ghana - February 2008

In our series of letters from African journalists, Ghanaian writer Elizabeth Ohene looks at the fraught relationship between Ghana and Nigeria, which underlies the current tensions over the closure of some Nigerian-owned shops in Ghana.

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Short presentational grey line

We see them as too loud, and abrasive and chaotic and we believe they think they can outsmart everybody, especially Ghanaians.

They think we are too submissive, not very smart, always punching above our weight and nothing upsets them more than Ghana defeating Nigeria, in anything.

The Ghana-Nigeria rivalry has been around for as long as both countries have existed.

When I was a child, there was a Nigerian in every town and village in Ghana.

I went to school with them and there was the Nigerian woman - "Mami Alata" they were called - who sold everything and you could wake her up in the middle of the night to buy three cubes of sugar.

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Quote card. Elizabeth Ohene:

The Nigerians were especially visible in the retail trade sector and in the diamond mining towns.

The two countries do not share borders, but it has always felt like we did. That we are separated by Togo and Benin has never really mattered - we feel like we are neighbours.

Obviously, something to do with the two countries being English-speaking and British colonies in the midst of French-speaking countries.

Letter from Africa: Behind Ghana and Nigeria's love-hate affair

September 13, 2020, 12:51 am

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A Ghanaian and Nigerian football fans at the Africa Cup of Nations quarter final match between Ghana and Nigeria in Accra, Ghana - February 2008

In our series of letters from African journalists, Ghanaian writer Elizabeth Ohene looks at the fraught relationship between Ghana and Nigeria, which underlies the current tensions over the closure of some Nigerian-owned shops in Ghana.

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Short presentational grey line

We see them as too loud, and abrasive and chaotic and we believe they think they can outsmart everybody, especially Ghanaians.

They think we are too submissive, not very smart, always punching above our weight and nothing upsets them more than Ghana defeating Nigeria, in anything.

The Ghana-Nigeria rivalry has been around for as long as both countries have existed.

When I was a child, there was a Nigerian in every town and village in Ghana.

I went to school with them and there was the Nigerian woman - "Mami Alata" they were called - who sold everything and you could wake her up in the middle of the night to buy three cubes of sugar.

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Quote card. Elizabeth Ohene:

The Nigerians were especially visible in the retail trade sector and in the diamond mining towns.

The two countries do not share borders, but it has always felt like we did. That we are separated by Togo and Benin has never really mattered - we feel like we are neighbours.

Obviously, something to do with the two countries being English-speaking and British colonies in the midst of French-speaking countries.

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Map showing Ghana and Nigeria

Until independence, we had the same currency and airline, and the same apex court settled all judicial matters.

There were regular sporting competitions between our Achimota School and their Kings College.

I know of one lasting marriage that came out of those sporting meetings.

Then in 1955, came the 7-0 thrashing by Ghana of the Red Devils, as the Nigerian national football team was called at that time.

It is the stuff of legends, and for years, it hung there behind every conversation, every argument, private or national, between our two countries.

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Nigeria gained independence three years after Ghana, marking the occasion with huge celebrations

Then Ghana got her independence in March 1957 and our Nigerian cousins got theirs in October 1960.

This did not feel right - for many Nigerians, they were bigger and should have got their independence before small Ghana.

They might be bigger, but at the time, Ghana felt and was richer than Nigeria - before oil was discovered.

Mass expulsions

We kept up the neighbourly rivalries and friendships.

Then came the Progress Party government's Aliens Compliance Order of November 1969, which ordered all undocumented aliens to leave Ghana.

Even though there were Togolese, Burkinabes, Ivorians, Nigeriens and other West Africans in the country, Nigerians, mostly ethnic Yorubas from the south-western states of Nigeria, formed the majority of the foreign population in Ghana then.

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The expulsions of undocumented foreigners by Nigeria in 1983 led to chaotic scenes at border posts

Some of them had been living here for years and were into their second and third generations. It felt like the exercise was aimed at Nigerians and their journeys home were not pleasant.

Then oil came to Nigeria and as they became rich, Ghana's economy collapsed and from around 1974, the exodus to Nigeria was on.

University professors, architects, engineers, carpenters, masons, tailors, hairdressers, maidservants and our classrooms were emptied of all teachers from kindergarten, primary, secondary and tertiary.

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If you were a Nigerian family of any worth, you had to have a Ghanaian nanny, a Ghanaian maidservant, a Ghanaian cook, a Ghanaian gardener and your children were likely to have a Ghanaian teacher at school or as a private tutor.

Then in 1983 the Nigerian government announced the expulsion of all undocumented aliens.

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These kind of plastic bags are still known in West Africa as "Ghana Must Go" bags

Since Ghanaians constituted the majority of the aliens, it felt like this was aimed at Ghanaians.

The unofficial name for the exercise, and for the plastic bag that the desperate departing Ghanaians used to carry their possessions, became "Ghana Must Go".

It was not a pleasant journey back to Ghana. We were at our lowest ebb and we were mocked mercilessly as we shopped for toilet roll and cooking oil to take home.

The Nigerians would never admit it, of course, but it did feel like the hurt of the Ghanaian 1969 Aliens Compliance Order had been finally assuaged.

Diplomatic stand-off

Gradually, we went back to building a relationship, because we really couldn't do without each other.

The West African regional organisation, Ecowas, had come into being in 1975 and as the two major English-speaking countries in the group, we needed each other to make things work.

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Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari (L) and his Ghanaian counterpart Nana Akufo-Addo in happier times at an Ecowas meeting last year

Things were stable for as long as we recognised their "seniority". That we were the poor relations was firmly established.

They brought Ghana to a halt in 1982 by stopping the special terms for selling us oil. We went to beg, and it was restored.

Nigeria's leader in the 1990s, General Sani Abacha, sent a suitcase full of $2m, some say $5m, to his Ghanaian counterpart Flt Lt Jerry Rawlings.

In the early 2000s Ghana's President John Kufuor went to see Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo to tell him the Ghana Police Service had 100 vehicles to its name and Nigeria gave us vehicles for our police.

But we remained a favourite destination for their rich and famous, and they send their children to school here in Ghana.

The Black Stars also did not often play according to the script and every now and again, defeated the Super Eagles, as Nigeria's national football team were now known.

The current tensions between the two countries are being blamed on bilateral trade differences.

There is a law that restricts foreigners from retail trade - and Ghanaian traders do not want the Nigerian traders in the markets.

Ghana's law and the current crisis:

Foreigners in Ghana can't run small retail shops, but they can own wholesale firms or other businesses in which around $1m (Â£782,000) has been invested

The law is intended to protect smaller local traders and those running small business like barbers or beauty salons, but is not always enforced

Market traders have sometimes taken the law into their own hands, which prompted the authorities to do an audit of retail shops in August and close some Nigerian-run stalls

Foreigners married to a Ghanaian are exempt from the laws - as are those in a business partnership with a Ghanaian

As the trade ministry try to resolve things, matters have assumed diplomatic dimensions.

The Nigerian federal information minister has spoken some strong words.

The Ghana information minister has issued a comprehensive rebuttal.

The Nigerian foreign minister has been busy on his Twitter account complaining about "the forceful closure of the shops of Nigerian traders in Ghana" and ascribing reasons for the closure.

Our foreign minister felt her counterpart had overstepped the mark and summoned the Nigerian high commissioner to her office to tell her some choice, straight words.

The speaker of our parliament stepped into the fray and invited the speaker of the Nigerian House of Representatives to Ghana.

He came with a strong delegation and after four days of meetings he pronounced that "the issue at hand is basically a misconception and misinformation".

There have been stories in the Nigerian media that Nigerians own most of the buildings in the fancy parts of Ghana's capital, Accra, and that might well be true.

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Ghana wants to protect the jobs of smaller traders

They are talking about the number of Nigerian banks in Ghana and there are suggestions they have enough economic muscle to squeeze us where it hurts.

The Ghana retail traders might not have 100% support among their compatriots about wanting the Nigerian traders out of the markets.

Because, like the "Mami Alata" in days of yore, the Nigerian trader would stay open for one would-be buyer and not close up for three days to go to a funeral.

We are all holding our breath and the feeling is maybe we should learn to do without these cousins of ours.

But we are yet to learn how the tongue learns to do without the teeth.

More Letters from Africa:

Does Kenya have one of the world's best constitutions?

Why a Somali-born fighter is being honoured in Rome

'How I helped put Gambians on Google Maps'

The country where black people are called slaves

'The racist questions I was asked at Eton'

Follow us on Twitter @BBCAfrica, on Facebook at BBC Africa or on Instagram at bbcafrica

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ï¿¼WEATHERï¿¼WATCH Dixie State University Now Awarding Scholarships Based Solely On Students' GPAs

~1.0 mins read

Dixie State University now awarding scholarships based solely on studentsâ€™ GPAs (Photo: DSU){p}{/p}

(KUTV) â€”

Dixie State University is now awarding freshman academic scholarships based exclusively on studentsâ€™ unweighted high school GPAs.

The new system for awarding scholarships, which goes into effect immediately for those applying for the 2021-2022 academic year, no longer factors in studentsâ€™ ACT or SAT test scores, but focuses solely on studentsâ€™ performance in their high school classes.

Jay Sorensen, director of admissions at Dixie State, said in a prepared statement:

Research has shown that studentsâ€™ propensity for success in college can be best predicted by their high school GPAs, By basing scholarship awards only on studentsâ€™ GPAs, Dixie State can reward students for dedicating themselves to hard work, studying hard and succeeding in classes for four years.

The new system aligns with DSUâ€™s commitment to offering an open education.

â€œDSU is dedicated to a better vision of higher education, and we believe that everyone deserves the chance to succeed,â€ Sorensen said in a news release. â€œIt is our dedication to being open-access and inclusive that drives us to adopt a scholarship model that reflects this commitment.â€

To learn more about scholarships at Dixie State University, visit scholarships.dixie.edu

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Tecno Is Hardly The Most Recognizable Name In The Global Smartphone Market, But In Certain Regions It's Among The Biggest Players.

~0.6 mins read

That's why its latest flagship, Tecno Camon 16 Premier, is enjoying quite some interest and we felt a review is in order.

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The Camon lineup is the camera-oriented family in the Tecno portfolio. The Camon 16 Premier is the mightiest device of new series with unusual camera setup design - an extremely big rectangle, with four cameras and one LED aligned as one big plus.

The phone looks similar to the Infinix Zero 8, another regional star, and that's no accident. The two brands are owned by the same company, but the devices are aimed at different markets.

ï¿¼ ï¿¼Tecno Camon 16 Premier front and back

The retail box brings the device in a fine Silver color that feels a bit plasticky in our hands. It is also not the lightest phone out there as could be expected given its 6.9â€ LCD and 4,500 mAh battery.

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16 Dragons Recognized As National Merit Semifinalists ï¿¼Â ï¿¼Â ï¿¼Â ï¿¼

~1.2 mins read

Carroll ISD is excited to celebrate 16 Dragons who have been named National Merit Semifinalists.

Recently, officials of the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) announced the names of approximately 16,000 Semifinalists in the 66th annual National Merit Scholarship Program. These academically talented high school seniors have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 7,600 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $30 million that will be offered next spring.

To be considered for a Merit ScholarshipÂ® award, Semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. Over 90 percent of the Semifinalists are expected to attain Finalist standing, and more than half of the Finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit ScholarÂ® title.

The following Dragons have been recognized as National Merit Semifinalist:

Beres, Alexander E

Chappel, Wyatt E

Chari, Vivek N

Chuang, Stephen L

Doby, Carter S

Grubbs. William R

Hallenbeck, Luke B

Lau, David W

Lock, Preston L

Lopez, Adam J

Schaunarnan, Logan M

Sweeney, Joseph G

Tadlaoui, Darya

Yang, Jessica L

Zaluckyj, Peter M

Zhou, Isabella

NMSC, a not-for-profit organization that operates without government assistance, was established in 1955 specifically to conduct the annual National Merit Scholarship Program. Scholarships are underwritten by NMSC with its own funds and by approximately 400 business organizations and higher education institutions that share NMSCâ€™s goals of honoring the nationâ€™s scholastic champions and encouraging the pursuit of academic excellence

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Rapper TI Named In Federal Investigation Of Cryptocurrency Fraud

~0.6 mins read

ATLANTA â€” An Atlanta film producer has been indicted on federal charges connected to a cryptocurrency investment scheme. Heâ€™s accused of raising millions from investors and spending the money on personal items and using several others including Atlanta rapper T.I. to help promote his business.

The U.S. Attorneys office says Ryan Felton misled investors who thought they were funding an entertainment streaming platform and a new cryptocurrency.

Prosecutors say Felton instead used that money for personal use including a $1.5 million home, and a 2007 Ferrari that he paid $180,000 cash for.

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Felton also posed as a potential investor using fake names on internet forums and social media to build excitement for his business and after the initial coin offering he sold thousands of coins on secondary crypto-markets to artificially inflate prices, prosecutors say.

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Bitcoin On Ethereum Is Booming: Closing In On $1 Billion In Value

~2.0 mins read

Bitcoin holders continue to move the value of their digital gold onto the Ethereum blockchain, defying recent price drops in both currencies.

By Alexander Behrens

3 min read

Sep 11, 2020

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Close to 80,000 Bitcoin have now been transferred to the Ethereum blockchain, as DeFi protocols attract value back to their liquidity pools following an early September crypto market correction.

Even as prices for Bitcoin and Ethereum fell starting September 1, BTC transferred onto the Ethereum blockchain has already increased nearly 37% so far this month, according to data from Dune Analytics.

The increase in Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) and other cross-chain Bitcoin lockups has pushed their aggregate value to more than $800 million from less than $600 million at the start of the month. The total value is now equivalent to more than 2% of the entire Ethereum market cap.

The trend is a signal that, despite price volatility in digital assets, the appetite for DeFi returns remains strong even among BTC holders.

Cross-chain transfer protocols like WBTC and renBTC use either trusted third-party custodians or smart contract-controlled wallets to hold one digital asset, in this case Bitcoin, while making a replica token on another blockchain, like Ethereum. The replicated assets, sometimes referred to as wrapped tokens, are pegged to the value of the original token.

The most popular BTC-to-Ethereum cross-chain project is Wrapped Bitcoin, which is responsible for more than 66% of all cross-chain BTC, with nearly 53,000 Bitcoin locked in that system so far. RenBTC, the second-most-popular transfer protocol, has grown steadily, maintaining the same share of the Bitcoin transfer market at approximately 22%.

One large gainer has been Huobiâ€™s HBTC, rising to become the third-most-popular BTC transfer solution with more than 6% of the overall market. The total number of HBTC has increased more than 570% since the beginning of August, when it stood at under 1,000 HBTC; itâ€™s at 4,800 today.

As the amount of Bitcoin transferred to Ethereum has increased, so too have concerns regarding centralization and the role third parties play for the three top transfer solutions, WBTC, RenBTC, and HBTC.

HBTC, which launched on the Ethereum blockchain in February 2020, is the product of Huobi, a centralized crypto exchange based in Singapore. Wrapped Bitcoin, a collaboration between several DeFi protocols, including crypto lending services Maker and Aave, has always used a system of trusted third-party custodians to hold native Bitcoins that back WBTC.

And Ren Protocolâ€™s renBTC was recently caught in controversy after it was publicized that the ostensibly decentralized protocol was (and still is) effectively controlled by members of the Ren development team.

Even Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin has weighed in, calling for increased security from projects holding a large number of native Bitcoin on behalf of users

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Trump's Unemployment Program Pays Up To $1,800 In Extra Benefits To Workers Who Qualify

~0.9 mins read

Most unemployed workers will get up to $1,800 in extra jobless benefits through the Lost Wages Assistance program created last month by the Trump administration.

The program pays a $300-a-week federal subsidy on top of the unemployment benefits workers currently receive. It follows the lapse of a $600 weekly supplement in late July.

States, which had to apply and be approved for the Lost Wages aid, will issue up to six weeks of payments to eligible workers, a spokeswoman for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which is overseeing the program, said Thursday.

"States should plan to make payments to eligible claimants for no more than six weeks from the week ending Aug. 1, 2020," according to the spokeswoman.

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$2,400 in some states

That equates to a maximum $1,800 â€” or three weeks' worth of the prior $600-a-week subsidy, which was enacted by the CARES Act coronavirus relief law in March.

Some states, like Kentucky, Montana and West Virginia, are kicking in an extra $100, for a total of $400 per week. Workers in these states would get up to $2,400 total over the six weeks through the Lost Wages program.

There had previously been questions as to how long unemployed workers would receive the subsidy â€” and therefore how much money they would get.

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Garg

Googling For Gut Symptoms Predicts Covid Hot Spot, Study Finds..

Letter From Africa: Behind Ghana And Nigeria's Love-hate Affair

ï¿¼WEATHERï¿¼WATCH Dixie State University Now Awarding Scholarships Based Solely On Students' GPAs

Tecno Is Hardly The Most Recognizable Name In The Global Smartphone Market, But In Certain Regions It's Among The Biggest Players.

16 Dragons Recognized As National Merit Semifinalists ï¿¼Â ï¿¼Â ï¿¼Â ï¿¼

Rapper TI Named In Federal Investigation Of Cryptocurrency Fraud

Bitcoin On Ethereum Is Booming: Closing In On $1 Billion In Value

Trump's Unemployment Program Pays Up To $1,800 In Extra Benefits To Workers Who Qualify

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