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Saturday, March 21, 2020

TEXAS GOVERNOR ABBOTT CAVES-ORDERS STATEWIDE BANS & CLOSURES

TEXAS GOVERNOR ABBOTT CAVES-
ORDERS STATEWIDE BANS & CLOSURES
BY LUIS MIGUEL
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research 
purposes:
Texas Governor Greg Abbott walked back his previous decentralized approach of letting localities determine their own coronavirus responses, announcing an executive order on Thursday prohibiting social gatherings of more than 10 people and closing a number of public-facing businesses.
The Republican governor’s order bans eating and drinking at restaurants (although takeout is still allowed), closes gyms and schools, and prohibits visits to nursing homes except for critical care. The measures are currently scheduled to continue through April 3.
“Working together, we must defeat COVID-19 with the only tool that we have available to us — we must strangle its expansion by reducing the ways that we are currently transmitting it,” said Abbott, accompanied by Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and Texas House Speaker Dennis Bonnen. “We are doing this now, today, so that we can get back to business as usual more quickly.”
At the news conference, Abbott clarified that his order is not a shelter-in-place order. “All critical infrastructure” remains open and Texans may freely go to places such as grocery stores and banks. Businesses are also allowed to keep their workplaces open but should use only “essential employees” and allow remote work where possible.
At a town hall that followed the news conference, Abbot warned that restaurants caught in violation of the order could have their licenses to operate revoked, stating that “literally their life as an ongoing business is on the line.”
On the departure from Texas’ traditional model of leaving it to cities and counties to choose how to address situations based on their particular local circumstances, Abbot said, “The traditional model that we have employed in the state of Texas for such a long time so effectively does not apply to an invisible disease that knows no geographic and no jurisdictional boundaries and threatens the lives of our fellow Americans across the entire country.”
Abbot followed that approach for weeks even while other states imposed strict top-down government controls to contain the COVI-19 spread.
“They know their communities better than anybody else does,” he previously said.
But that model brought criticism from voices who urged the government to provide a uniform response policy for the entire state.
“Instead of following the lead of other states and the guidelines recommended by the CDC, Governor Abbott continuously passed this health crisis off to local and county officials,” complained Manny Garcia, executive director of the Texas Democratic Party, said in a statement.
Abbot maintained that his executive order brings Texas in line with direction from Washington.
“I find it necessary that we as a state, in unison, are doing exactly what has been prescribed by the federal government,” he said.
When asked if the policy applies to spring breakers on the beach at Port Aransas, the governor replied, “So any place where anybody would gather, by this executive order they are prohibited from having more than 10 people gather at any one time and location.”
He asserted that the state has ample power to enforce the order but will refrain from a full-on quarantine if Texans will abide by the mandated behavior of their own accord. If not, he warned, the government may enact tougher enforcement measures:
The state now has the quarantine authority but we are not going to exercise that authority right now because we are going to depend on the responsibility that all Texans will show. If Texans are irresponsible in their behavior, though, there are more tools that we can use and we can be more aggressive, only if we need to be.
Abbott also announced that State Health Commissioner John Hellerstedt declared a public health disaster earlier on Thursday. The last time such a declaration was made was in 1901, when a quarantine was issued to contain small pox.
The disaster designation allows for greater government controls, but does not entitle the state to additional resources and test kits from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Abbott said that Texas has billions of dollars in its rainy-day fund that it can “tap into at the appropriate time, but the appropriate time will be when we know the full extent of the challenge that we're dealing with.”
Texas currently has over 140 cases and five deaths related to coronavirus, putting it far behind hard-hit states such as Washington, which has reported 904 cases and 55 deaths. New York has had nearly 1,400 cases with 10 deaths, while California, the largest state in the union in terms of population, counts over 550 cases with seven deaths.

FIRST PERSON TO TEST CORONAVIRUS VACCINE SPEAKS OUT

FIRST PERSON TO TEST CORONAVIRUS VACCINE SPEAKS OUT
 Today, the United States has test its very first coronavirus vaccine. It went to a volunteer […], 43-year-old Jennifer Haller, who is from Seattle… that’s one of the hardest hit areas for this virus in the nation… Washington state with over 840 cases. It’s a fast moving story and she joins us… Jennifer, thank you for what you’re doing. Obviously, this fits into a lot of the different ways people are participating and trying to help around the nation.

MALE PENNSYLVANIA HEALTH DEPARTMENT HEAD, WHO IDENTIFIES AS "RACHEL", ADDRESSING PUBLIC IN DRESS AMID CORONAVIRUS CRISIS


Allegheny County has had a number of calls from parents asking about play dates, sleep overs and other activities that their children can participate in with their friends while they're out of school.


MALE PENNSYLVANIA HEALTH DEPARTMENT HEAD, WHO IDENTIFIES AS "RACHEL", ADDRESSING PUBLIC IN DRESS 
AMID CORONAVIRUS CRISIS
BY HEATHER CLARK
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research 
purposes:
HARRISBURG, Pa. — A man born as Richard who now identifies as Rachel, and who has officially led Pennsylvania’s Department of Health as secretary since 2018, is being broadcast on television screens across the commonwealth on a daily basis as he provides regular briefings on the status of COVID-19 in the Keystone state, exhorting residents on taking care of their physical and mental health.
“Your job right now is to stay calm, stay safe and please stay at home,” Levine said in a press conference on Monday, wearing a scarf, black dress with Mary Jane shoes, and nail polish.
“As our commonwealth moves forward through this, it is important to note that there are also mental health resources available,” he added. “If you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health crisis, contact the Crisis Text Line …”
Levine is a pediatrician who founded the Division of Adolescent Medicine and Eating Disorders at Penn State Children’s Hospital on the campus of the Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. A graduate of Harvard and Tulane University, he obtained fellowships in pediatrics and adolescent medicine at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York before making the move to Pennsylvania to work at the Penn State College of Medicine.
“Levine … has long focused on the connection between mental and physical health,” NBC News reports.
“I have always been interested in patients with eating disorders because it really is this medical-behavioral health intersection,” he also told Lancaster Online, outlining that when he worked at Penn State he “would see patients and try to help teens and young adults and their families.”
In 2015, Levine became the physician general and was named acting secretary of health in July 2017. He was confirmed as secretary by the Pennsylvania Senate the following year without a single objection from Republicans or Democrats.
“One of the things I’m most proud of is that I was unanimously confirmed by the Senate,” Levine told NBC, stating that he met with most of the lawmakers personally. “[They] judged me strictly on my professional qualifications.”
Writing on the opioid crisis, medical marijuana, adolescent medicine, eating disorders and “LGBT medicine,” Levine is also a professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at the Penn State College of Medicine. He was named the grand marshal of the Philadelphia Pride Parade in 2015 and is on the board of the homosexual and transgender advocacy group Equality Pennsylvania.
BACKGROUND
According to the Washington Post, Levine, now 61, began seeing a therapist nearly 20 years ago after struggling with transgender feelings from his youth. He played football and hockey in an all-male private school and went on to marry and have children.
“Boy, did I have a midlife crisis,” he said of his 40s during a speech in which he emphasized support for youth who struggle with gender identity.
In 2007, at the age of 48, Levine decided to grow his hair long. In 2011, he officially began identifying as a woman and changed his name to Rachel.
In 2016, while serving as physician general for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Levine told CBS 21 that it is possible that gender incongruity begins in the womb — although acknowledging that data was inconclusive.
“Because of hormonal effects in utero, the brain has a gender identity which is different from the sex the child was born as,” he said. “If you look at the brain scans of a transgender woman, such as myself, then those scans, even before medical treatment, before hormones, [they] tend to look female.”
“It hasn’t been 100 percent proven,” Levine added, “and science continuously is advancing, and we need to learn more, but that is the current theory of why individuals might be transgender.”
HOPE
As previously reported, Christians believe that transgenderism isn’t just a medical or mental condition but primarily a spiritual issue — one that stems from the same predicament all men everywhere face without Christ.
In Matthew 19:4, Jesus noted that “He which made them at the beginning made them male and female.”
The Bible teaches that all are born with the Adamic sin nature, having various inherent feelings and inclinations that are contrary to the law of God, and being utterly incapable of changing by themselves.
It is why Jesus came: to “save His people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21).
Scripture outlines that Jesus came to be the propitiation for men’s sins (1 John 2:21 John 4:10), a doctrine in Christianity known as substitutionary atonement, and to save men from the wrath of God for their violations against His law (Romans 4:25Romans 5:9Romans 5:16), a doctrine known as justification.
The Bible also teaches about regeneration, as in addition to sparing guilty men from eternal punishment, Christ sent his Holy Spirit to make those who would repent and believe the gospel new creatures in the here and now, with new desires and an ability to do what is pleasing in the sight of God by His indwelling and empowerment (Ezekiel 11:192 Corinthians 5:17Titus 3:5).
1 Corinthians 15:45 states, “The first man, Adam, became a living soul. The last Adam (Jesus) became a life-giving spirit.”