Former Cpl. Walton checks off Kansas on 50-state ‘No Regrets’ tour

By TIM CARPENTER <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2021/07/20/kansas-officials-honor-102-year-old-world-war-ii-vet-raising-money-for-frontline-health-workers/">Kansas Reflector</a>

TOPEKA — Sidney Walton regretted 
missing an opportunity to personally meet some of the last surviving 
Civil War veterans at the 1939 World’s Fair in New York City.

Walton, 102, is in the final stage of a 50-state “No Regrets” tour to
 offer people a chance to visit with a veteran of World War II and to 
raise money for charity. The former U.S. Army corporal started the 
nationwide mission in 2018. Kansas was his 39th state on the U.S. road 
trip.

During a visit to the Kansas Capitol, Gov. Laura Kelly presented 
Walton a state flag as well as a coin decorated with an image of ruby 
red slippers worn by Dorothy in the film “Wizard of the Oz.” In 
response, Walton gave the governor a cap commemorating his whistle-stop 
visits of the state capitols.

Maj. Gen. David Weishaar, of the Kansas Air National guard, shared 
appreciation for Walton’s decision to join the U.S. Army eight months 
before Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. Walton became a medical 
technician in the 34th Infantry, 8th Division and was posted in India 
during the war. He remained in the Army for five years until the war’s 
end.

“Thank you very much for your continued service to the nation and 
remarkable service in World War II. May you continue that service to the
 nation throughout the rest of your life,” Weishaar said.

Walton, who was born in 1919 and lives in San Diego, said his World 
War II assignment took him far away from his preferred objective: “I 
joined the Army to fight Hitler.”

His current quest has assumed outlines of&nbsp; the campaign launched by 
Capt. Tom Moore, who was in the British Army during World War II and 
fought in Burma. Moore turned his 100th birthday into a project to raise
 contributions for charity, eventually generating $46 million for 
healthcare workers in England. He died in February.

Walton’s son, Paul, accompanies Walton on touring now dedicated to 
generating support for U.S. nurses engaged in responding to the COVID-19
 pandemic.

“Three and a half years ago,” said Paul Walton, “we set upon this 
magnificent tour called the ‘No Regrets’ tour. Because all my dad’s life
 I always heard that he regretted one thing. He had one regret.”

Turning to his dad, he asked: “You regret you did not meet Civil War 
veterans when you were young? If you could go back in time could you 
meet them?”

“Yes, right,” said Walton, who planned to spend the night in Wichita 
before heading to Oklahoma City to meet Friday with Oklahoma’s governor.

In February 2020, Walton was among four surviving World War II 
veterans who participated in the coin flip for Super Bowl LIV, a game 
won by the Kansas City Chiefs.

Paul Walton said his father was more frail than when they embarked on
 the 50-state journey, but each day of the tour was a blessing. The 
COVID-19 pandemic reduced opportunities to fly to state capitol cities, 
compelling them to travel in a vehicle elaborately decorated with 
signage noting their task.

“We are going to accomplish this mission,” he said. “Delaware, known as the first state, is going to be our last state.”

Tim Carpenter has reported on Kansas for 35 years. He covered the Capitol for 16 years at the Topeka Capital-Journal and previously worked for the Lawrence Journal-World and United Press International.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626811678863.png" alt="World War II veteran Sidney Walton, 102, met Tuesday with Gov. Laura Kelly at the Capitol during a 50-state tour to raise awareness and financial support for veterans and frontline nurses. Kelly presented him with a Kansas flag. (Tim Carpenter/Kansas Reflector)" />
 <figcaption>World War II veteran Sidney Walton, 102, met Tuesday with Gov. Laura Kelly at the Capitol during a 50-state tour to raise awareness and financial support for veterans and frontline nurses. Kelly presented him with a Kansas flag. (Tim Carpenter/Kansas Reflector)</figcaption>
 </figure><h2>Former Cpl. Walton checks off Kansas on 50-state ‘No Regrets’ tour</h2>By TIM CARPENTER <a href="https://kansasreflector.com/2021/07/20/kansas-officials-honor-102-year-old-world-war-ii-vet-raising-money-for-frontline-health-workers/">Kansas Reflector</a>TOPEKA — Sidney Walton regretted 
missing an opportunity to personally meet some of the last surviving 
Civil War veterans at the 1939 World’s Fair in New York City.Walton, 102, is in the final stage of a 50-state “No Regrets” tour to
 offer people a chance to visit with a veteran of World War II and to 
raise money for charity. The former U.S. Army corporal started the 
nationwide mission in 2018. Kansas was his 39th state on the U.S. road 
trip.During a visit to the Kansas Capitol, Gov. Laura Kelly presented 
Walton a state flag as well as a coin decorated with an image of ruby 
red slippers worn by Dorothy in the film “Wizard of the Oz.” In 
response, Walton gave the governor a cap commemorating his whistle-stop 
visits of the state capitols.Maj. Gen. David Weishaar, of the Kansas Air National guard, shared 
appreciation for Walton’s decision to join the U.S. Army eight months 
before Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. Walton became a medical 
technician in the 34th Infantry, 8th Division and was posted in India 
during the war. He remained in the Army for five years until the war’s 
end.“Thank you very much for your continued service to the nation and 
remarkable service in World War II. May you continue that service to the
 nation throughout the rest of your life,” Weishaar said.Walton, who was born in 1919 and lives in San Diego, said his World 
War II assignment took him far away from his preferred objective: “I 
joined the Army to fight Hitler.”His current quest has assumed outlines of&nbsp; the campaign launched by 
Capt. Tom Moore, who was in the British Army during World War II and 
fought in Burma. Moore turned his 100th birthday into a project to raise
 contributions for charity, eventually generating $46 million for 
healthcare workers in England. He died in February.Walton’s son, Paul, accompanies Walton on touring now dedicated to 
generating support for U.S. nurses engaged in responding to the COVID-19
 pandemic.“Three and a half years ago,” said Paul Walton, “we set upon this 
magnificent tour called the ‘No Regrets’ tour. Because all my dad’s life
 I always heard that he regretted one thing. He had one regret.”Turning to his dad, he asked: “You regret you did not meet Civil War 
veterans when you were young? If you could go back in time could you 
meet them?”“Yes, right,” said Walton, who planned to spend the night in Wichita 
before heading to Oklahoma City to meet Friday with Oklahoma’s governor.In February 2020, Walton was among four surviving World War II 
veterans who participated in the coin flip for Super Bowl LIV, a game 
won by the Kansas City Chiefs.Paul Walton said his father was more frail than when they embarked on
 the 50-state journey, but each day of the tour was a blessing. The 
COVID-19 pandemic reduced opportunities to fly to state capitol cities, 
compelling them to travel in a vehicle elaborately decorated with 
signage noting their task.“We are going to accomplish this mission,” he said. “Delaware, known as the first state, is going to be our last state.”Tim Carpenter has reported on Kansas for 35 years. He covered the Capitol for 16 years at the Topeka Capital-Journal and previously worked for the Lawrence Journal-World and United Press International.

Kan. officials honor 102-year-old WWII vet raising money for health workers

SHAWNEE COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities are investigating a weekend high-speed chase and attempting to locate 32-year-old Robert R. Boyles following a vehicle pursuit in the 500 block of SW Gage Boulevard early Sunday morning, according to Deputy Abigail Christian.

The driver,&nbsp; 32-year-old Robert R. Boyles of Colorado, fled the scene and has not been located. 

Just after 1a.m.&nbsp; Sunday, a deputy attempted to conduct a traffic stop on a spray painted black 2005 Dodge Ram pickup truck in the 500 block of SW Gage Boulevard for a stolen license plate. 

The driver later identified as Boyles refused to stop and a pursuit was initiated. The Topeka Police Department assisted and successfully deployed stop sticks at SW 15th Street and SW Gage Boulevard. 

In the 3700 block of SW Cambridge Avenue, the driver drove out of the lane of traffic and struck a deputy’s vehicle before continuing northbound on SW Gage Boulevard, according to Christian.

In the 2000 block of SW Atwood Avenue, two passengers fled from the vehicle and were taken into custody. Sarah L. Followell, 32, of Topeka was arrested, booked into the Shawnee County Department of Corrections and charged with possession of methamphetamine, possession of heroin, possession of marijuana, possession of drug paraphernalia, interference with law enforcement and a narcotics warrant out of Colorado. 

The other passenger David W. Bentley, 42, of Topeka, was transported to a local hospital by American Medical Response for minor injuries and will be charged with interference with law enforcement.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626811630270.png" alt="Boyles photo Shawnee Co." />
 <figcaption>Boyles photo Shawnee Co.</figcaption>
 </figure>SHAWNEE COUNTY—Law enforcement authorities are investigating a weekend high-speed chase and attempting to locate 32-year-old Robert R. Boyles following a vehicle pursuit in the 500 block of SW Gage Boulevard early Sunday morning, according to Deputy Abigail Christian.The driver,&nbsp; 32-year-old Robert R. Boyles of Colorado, fled the scene and has not been located. Just after 1a.m.&nbsp; Sunday, a deputy attempted to conduct a traffic stop on a spray painted black 2005 Dodge Ram pickup truck in the 500 block of SW Gage Boulevard for a stolen license plate. The driver later identified as Boyles refused to stop and a pursuit was initiated. The Topeka Police Department assisted and successfully deployed stop sticks at SW 15th Street and SW Gage Boulevard. In the 3700 block of SW Cambridge Avenue, the driver drove out of the lane of traffic and struck a deputy’s vehicle before continuing northbound on SW Gage Boulevard, according to Christian.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626812024567.png" alt="Followell photo Shawnee Co." />
 <figcaption>Followell photo Shawnee Co.</figcaption>
 </figure>In the 2000 block of SW Atwood Avenue, two passengers fled from the vehicle and were taken into custody. Sarah L. Followell, 32, of Topeka was arrested, booked into the Shawnee County Department of Corrections and charged with possession of methamphetamine, possession of heroin, possession of marijuana, possession of drug paraphernalia, interference with law enforcement and a narcotics warrant out of Colorado. The other passenger David W. Bentley, 42, of Topeka, was transported to a local hospital by American Medical Response for minor injuries and will be charged with interference with law enforcement.

Sheriff: Man who fled Kansas high-speed chase still missing

KANSAS CITY (AP) — A full federal appeals court has decided to rehear a case over a sweeping Missouri abortion law that would ban the procedures at or around the eighth week of a pregnancy.

The U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals last week decided to take up the case on its own motion.

At issue is a 2019 state law that would ban abortions as early as eight weeks into a pregnancy and prohibit abortions based on a Down syndrome diagnosis.

A three-judge panel of the 8th Circuit Court&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-michael-brown-courts-abortion-health-924bc83f136b73f68cb5c6f0171de4ed">last month</a>&nbsp;upheld an injunction from U.S. District Judge Howard Sachs prohibiting Missouri from enforcing the provisions. But the full appeals court will now consider the case.

“We have long said the fight to protect abortion access in Missouri is far from over," Yamelsie Rodríguez, president and CEO of Reproductive Health Services of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region, said in a statement. “The Eighth Circuit’s sudden change to reconsider Missouri’s sweeping abortion ban — one the court said was unconstitutional — is just another troubling signal in a long line of threats to our reproductive freedom.”

A spokesman for the Missouri attorney general's office, which is defending the law, didn't immediately reply to a request for comment.

Sachs said when he ruled last year that he thought Planned Parenthood and the ACLU would likely succeed in their lawsuit challenging the law as unconstitutional. Similar laws have been struck down in North Dakota and Iowa.

Legislators who helped draft the Missouri law had said it was meant to withstand court challenges instead of spark them. It included a provision stating that if the eight-week ban was struck down, then a series of less-restrictive abortion limits would kick in at 14, 18 or 20 weeks. But courts have blocked enforcement of all of those limits thus far.

Missouri's Republican attorney general, Eric Schmitt, earlier this month asked the U.S. Supreme Court to take up the case. In a court filing, he said the U.S. Supreme Court should consider whether Missouri’s restrictions are “reasonable regulations on abortion” and should also use the case to decide whether to overturn its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, which established a nationwide right to abortion at any point before a fetus can survive outside the womb, which is roughly around the 24th week.

The Supreme Court&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-abortion-15-week-ban-5d066a9dc0030a4f8297711f341c9f5a">has agreed to consider</a>&nbsp;allowing the enforcement of a Mississippi law that would ban abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy, which could dramatically alter nearly 50 years of court precedent on abortion rights.

Missouri also is among several conservative states in recent years that have passed abortion restrictions in the hopes that the increasingly conservative Supreme Court will eventually overturn Roe v. Wade.

The next hearing on the Missouri abortion law has not yet been scheduled, according to online court records.

KANSAS CITY (AP) — A full federal appeals court has decided to rehear a case over a sweeping Missouri abortion law that would ban the procedures at or around the eighth week of a pregnancy.The U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals last week decided to take up the case on its own motion.At issue is a 2019 state law that would ban abortions as early as eight weeks into a pregnancy and prohibit abortions based on a Down syndrome diagnosis.A three-judge panel of the 8th Circuit Court&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-michael-brown-courts-abortion-health-924bc83f136b73f68cb5c6f0171de4ed">last month</a>&nbsp;upheld an injunction from U.S. District Judge Howard Sachs prohibiting Missouri from enforcing the provisions. But the full appeals court will now consider the case.“We have long said the fight to protect abortion access in Missouri is far from over," Yamelsie Rodríguez, president and CEO of Reproductive Health Services of Planned Parenthood of the St. Louis Region, said in a statement. “The Eighth Circuit’s sudden change to reconsider Missouri’s sweeping abortion ban — one the court said was unconstitutional — is just another troubling signal in a long line of threats to our reproductive freedom.”A spokesman for the Missouri attorney general's office, which is defending the law, didn't immediately reply to a request for comment.Sachs said when he ruled last year that he thought Planned Parenthood and the ACLU would likely succeed in their lawsuit challenging the law as unconstitutional. Similar laws have been struck down in North Dakota and Iowa.Legislators who helped draft the Missouri law had said it was meant to withstand court challenges instead of spark them. It included a provision stating that if the eight-week ban was struck down, then a series of less-restrictive abortion limits would kick in at 14, 18 or 20 weeks. But courts have blocked enforcement of all of those limits thus far.Missouri's Republican attorney general, Eric Schmitt, earlier this month asked the U.S. Supreme Court to take up the case. In a court filing, he said the U.S. Supreme Court should consider whether Missouri’s restrictions are “reasonable regulations on abortion” and should also use the case to decide whether to overturn its 1973 Roe v. Wade decision, which established a nationwide right to abortion at any point before a fetus can survive outside the womb, which is roughly around the 24th week.The Supreme Court&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-abortion-15-week-ban-5d066a9dc0030a4f8297711f341c9f5a">has agreed to consider</a>&nbsp;allowing the enforcement of a Mississippi law that would ban abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy, which could dramatically alter nearly 50 years of court precedent on abortion rights.Missouri also is among several conservative states in recent years that have passed abortion restrictions in the hopes that the increasingly conservative Supreme Court will eventually overturn Roe v. Wade.The next hearing on the Missouri abortion law has not yet been scheduled, according to online court records.

Full federal appeals court to consider Missouri abortion law

TOPEKA, Kansas - El Dorado Correctional Facility resident 33-year-old Keith Wade died Monday at the correctional facility, according to a media release from the State.

 The cause of death is pending an autopsy but is not believed to be COVID-19 related.

Per protocol, when a resident dies in the custody of KDOC, the death is under investigation by KDOC and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI).

Wade was serving an 84-month sentence for battery of a juvenile correctional facility officer. He had been imprisoned with KDOC since February 2017.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626811254979.png" alt="Wade" />
 <figcaption>Wade</figcaption>
 </figure>TOPEKA, Kansas - El Dorado Correctional Facility resident 33-year-old Keith Wade died Monday at the correctional facility, according to a media release from the State. The cause of death is pending an autopsy but is not believed to be COVID-19 related.Per protocol, when a resident dies in the custody of KDOC, the death is under investigation by KDOC and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation (KBI).Wade was serving an 84-month sentence for battery of a juvenile correctional facility officer. He had been imprisoned with KDOC since February 2017.

33-year-old inmate dies at Kansas prison

TOPEKA – The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) has issued an Emergency&nbsp;Order of Suspension to Totsy Turtles Daycare, owned by Amber Simmons at 129 S Railroad in the Cloud County community of Clyde. The day care license expired on Monday.&nbsp;

The last survey the state did at the facility was in 2019. The state didn't do a survey in 2020 due to COVID.

State law allows the Secretary of KDHE to issue such an order when, in the opinion of the Secretary, the order is necessary to protect children in the home from any potential threat to health or safety.

Compliance history on this day care facility can be found by searching the Child Care and Early&nbsp;Education Portal for license No. 72983 at&nbsp;<a href="https://lnks.gd/l/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJidWxsZXRpbl9saW5rX2lkIjoxMDAsInVyaSI6ImJwMjpjbGljayIsImJ1bGxldGluX2lkIjoiMjAyMTA3MjAuNDM0NDk3MDEiLCJ1cmwiOiJodHRwOi8vd3d3LmtkaGVrcy5nb3YvYmNjbHIvY2FwcC5odG0_dXRtX21lZGl1bT1lbWFpbCZ1dG1fc291cmNlPWdvdmRlbGl2ZXJ5In0.CrLEl_0NoJewFhnMDAFjla5iREW3IPardHV4qQhzCEo/s/1305935158/br/109620219489-l" target="_blank">http://www.kdheks.gov/bcclr/capp.htm</a>.

TOPEKA – The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) has issued an Emergency&nbsp;Order of Suspension to Totsy Turtles Daycare, owned by Amber Simmons at 129 S Railroad in the Cloud County community of Clyde. The day care license expired on Monday.&nbsp;The last survey the state did at the facility was in 2019. The state didn't do a survey in 2020 due to COVID.State law allows the Secretary of KDHE to issue such an order when, in the opinion of the Secretary, the order is necessary to protect children in the home from any potential threat to health or safety.The order is subject to appeal.Compliance history on this day care facility can be found by searching the Child Care and Early&nbsp;Education Portal for license No. 72983 at&nbsp;<a href="https://lnks.gd/l/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJidWxsZXRpbl9saW5rX2lkIjoxMDAsInVyaSI6ImJwMjpjbGljayIsImJ1bGxldGluX2lkIjoiMjAyMTA3MjAuNDM0NDk3MDEiLCJ1cmwiOiJodHRwOi8vd3d3LmtkaGVrcy5nb3YvYmNjbHIvY2FwcC5odG0_dXRtX21lZGl1bT1lbWFpbCZ1dG1fc291cmNlPWdvdmRlbGl2ZXJ5In0.CrLEl_0NoJewFhnMDAFjla5iREW3IPardHV4qQhzCEo/s/1305935158/br/109620219489-l" target="_blank">http://www.kdheks.gov/bcclr/capp.htm</a>.

Kan. issues emergency suspension of group day care home 

By CELIA LLOPIS-JEPSEN <a href="https://www.kcur.org/news/2021-07-19/covid-is-putting-as-many-kansans-in-the-hospital-as-it-did-in-march">Kansas News Service</a>

For six straight months, COVID-19 hospitalizations dropped steadily.

Kansans let down their guard. They stopped wearing masks. Most didn’t bother to get the vaccine.

Then the <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/07/17/1017075240/delta-variant-is-spreading-fast-and-new-cases-are-rising-is-time-to-mask-up-agai" target="_blank">highly contagious</a> delta variant arrived.

It
 took root, and is fueling a surge of the coronavirus worse than 
anything in the past several months. That’s led to steep increases in 
hospitalizations and fresh outbreaks in long-term care.

And this is before schoolchildren and college students head back to classes in August.

“It is scary,” Fredonia,
 Kansas, family doctor Jennifer Bacani McKenney said. “Because we don’t 
have people wearing masks in the community. Pretty much here nobody’s 
wearing masks except for us in health care.”

The delta variant recently found its way into an assisted living 
center in rural Wilson County in southeast Kansas, where Bacani-McKenney
 is the local health officer. About two dozen people got sick.

Most
 of those people were vaccinated and got only mildly ill, 
Bacani-McKenney said. She declined to disclose whether any of the 
center’s residents died, but said her county has had three recent 
COVID-19 deaths.

Fewer than half of Kansans have gotten <a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data" target="_blank">fully</a><a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data" target="_blank"> </a><a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data" target="_blank">vaccinated</a> against COVID-19.

With so many still unprotected, the delta variant has no shortage of hosts to choose from.

It can also affect those who’ve gotten the shots, though vaccination significantly cuts the risks of hospitalization and death.

How did the delta variant get into the Wilson County assisted living center?

Confirming
 that is difficult. As far as health officials can tell, they believe a 
vaccinated staff member unwittingly carried in the germs from a side gig
 cleaning the home of an unvaccinated couple who got sick.

Topeka physician Erin Locke, health officer for Shawnee County, urged anyone with even mild symptoms to get a <a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/280/COVID-19-Testing" target="_blank">free COVID test</a> instead of assuming it’s just a cold.

“We
 have just over half of our county that are not protected” with 
vaccines, she said. “And going about and doing all the normal activities
 without taking any precautions is really, really risky right now.”

Shawnee County confirmed its first delta case in early June and it is now the dominant version of coronavirus there.

Last
 week the county pleaded for residents to get vaccinated after 
confirming 112 COVID cases in just four days, compared to 156 cases for 
the whole month of June.

The increase is fueled by unvaccinated 
adults and children. Locke said the county has seen very few cases of 
vaccinated people getting sick.

“We’ve calculated that rate at 
about one individual for every 1,000 fully vaccinated individuals,” she 
said. “So it's really quite low.”

Though children 11 and younger 
can’t get the shots yet, those 12 through 17 can. Yet Shawnee County 
estimates just 30% of that age group has done so.

Pediatrician
 Barbara Pahud researches infectious disease at Children's Mercy 
Hospital, where she leads the clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccine for 
children under 12.

If you have children in that age group, Pahud 
said, don’t expect shots this fall. The clinical study and federal 
review process may well take until early next year.

That doesn’t mean kids shouldn’t go back to classes in August, she said. But families and schools should take precautions.

“The
 problem is, people don’t want to wear masks,” she said. “We want to go 
back to school, but not with masks. You can’t do that in the middle of a
 pandemic.”

“Until we get everybody vaccinated, you're going to have to continue doing what we know works,” Pahud said. “Masks work.”

Several Kansas school districts have already <a href="https://www.kmuw.org/2021-07-08/even-with-delta-driving-a-covid-resurgence-most-kansas-schools-ditch-mask-rules" target="_blank">made masks optional</a>, including some of the state’s biggest in Sedgwick and Johnson counties.

Last
 week, the Johnson County health department urged school districts to 
make masks mandatory for anyone who is unvaccinated come August.

Celia
 Llopis-Jepsen reports on consumer health for the Kansas News Service. 
You can follow her on Twitter @celia_LJ or email her at celia@kcur.org.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626802783616.png" alt="Carlos Moreno / KCUR 89.3" />
 <figcaption>Carlos Moreno / KCUR 89.3</figcaption>
 </figure>By CELIA LLOPIS-JEPSEN <a href="https://www.kcur.org/news/2021-07-19/covid-is-putting-as-many-kansans-in-the-hospital-as-it-did-in-march">Kansas News Service</a>For six straight months, COVID-19 hospitalizations dropped steadily.Kansans let down their guard. They stopped wearing masks. Most didn’t bother to get the vaccine.Then the <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/07/17/1017075240/delta-variant-is-spreading-fast-and-new-cases-are-rising-is-time-to-mask-up-agai" target="_blank">highly contagious</a> delta variant arrived.It
 took root, and is fueling a surge of the coronavirus worse than 
anything in the past several months. That’s led to steep increases in 
hospitalizations and fresh outbreaks in long-term care.<ul>
 <li><a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/" target="_blank">Kansas reported</a> 3,000 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the past week. The state hasn’t seen an increase like that since February.</li>
 </ul><ul>
 <li>The daily count of COVID inpatients hit 275 last Wednesday — the highest since early March.</li>
 </ul><ul>
 <li>Nursing homes and other long-term care sites are battling nine outbreaks this week, four times as many as three months ago.</li>
 </ul>And this is before schoolchildren and college students head back to classes in August.“It is scary,” Fredonia,
 Kansas, family doctor Jennifer Bacani McKenney said. “Because we don’t 
have people wearing masks in the community. Pretty much here nobody’s 
wearing masks except for us in health care.”<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626802897897.png" alt="" />
 <figcaption></figcaption>
 </figure>The delta variant recently found its way into an assisted living 
center in rural Wilson County in southeast Kansas, where Bacani-McKenney
 is the local health officer. About two dozen people got sick.Most
 of those people were vaccinated and got only mildly ill, 
Bacani-McKenney said. She declined to disclose whether any of the 
center’s residents died, but said her county has had three recent 
COVID-19 deaths.<h2>Low vaccination rate</h2>Fewer than half of Kansans have gotten <a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data" target="_blank">fully</a><a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data" target="_blank"> </a><a href="https://www.kansasvaccine.gov/158/Data" target="_blank">vaccinated</a> against COVID-19.With so many still unprotected, the delta variant has no shortage of hosts to choose from.It can also affect those who’ve gotten the shots, though vaccination significantly cuts the risks of hospitalization and death.How did the delta variant get into the Wilson County assisted living center?Confirming
 that is difficult. As far as health officials can tell, they believe a 
vaccinated staff member unwittingly carried in the germs from a side gig
 cleaning the home of an unvaccinated couple who got sick.Topeka physician Erin Locke, health officer for Shawnee County, urged anyone with even mild symptoms to get a <a href="https://www.coronavirus.kdheks.gov/280/COVID-19-Testing" target="_blank">free COVID test</a> instead of assuming it’s just a cold.“We
 have just over half of our county that are not protected” with 
vaccines, she said. “And going about and doing all the normal activities
 without taking any precautions is really, really risky right now.”Shawnee County confirmed its first delta case in early June and it is now the dominant version of coronavirus there.Last
 week the county pleaded for residents to get vaccinated after 
confirming 112 COVID cases in just four days, compared to 156 cases for 
the whole month of June.The increase is fueled by unvaccinated 
adults and children. Locke said the county has seen very few cases of 
vaccinated people getting sick.“We’ve calculated that rate at 
about one individual for every 1,000 fully vaccinated individuals,” she 
said. “So it's really quite low.”Though children 11 and younger 
can’t get the shots yet, those 12 through 17 can. Yet Shawnee County 
estimates just 30% of that age group has done so.<h2>Masks and schools</h2>Pediatrician
 Barbara Pahud researches infectious disease at Children's Mercy 
Hospital, where she leads the clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccine for 
children under 12.If you have children in that age group, Pahud 
said, don’t expect shots this fall. The clinical study and federal 
review process may well take until early next year.That doesn’t mean kids shouldn’t go back to classes in August, she said. But families and schools should take precautions.“The
 problem is, people don’t want to wear masks,” she said. “We want to go 
back to school, but not with masks. You can’t do that in the middle of a
 pandemic.”“Until we get everybody vaccinated, you're going to have to continue doing what we know works,” Pahud said. “Masks work.”Several Kansas school districts have already <a href="https://www.kmuw.org/2021-07-08/even-with-delta-driving-a-covid-resurgence-most-kansas-schools-ditch-mask-rules" target="_blank">made masks optional</a>, including some of the state’s biggest in Sedgwick and Johnson counties.Last
 week, the Johnson County health department urged school districts to 
make masks mandatory for anyone who is unvaccinated come August.Celia
 Llopis-Jepsen reports on consumer health for the Kansas News Service. 
You can follow her on Twitter @celia_LJ or email her at celia@kcur.org.

COVID putting as many Kansans in the hospital as it did in March

JOHNSON COUNTY —Police investigating a fatal Monday accident in Johnson County have identified the victim as 31-year-old Elizabeth K. Busby of Kansas City, Missouri., according to Overland Park Police spokesman John Lacy.

Just before 2:30p.m. Monday, Overland Park Police reported a vehicle driven by Busby was northbound on U.S. 69 attempting to exit on eastbound Interstate 435.

The driver lost control of the vehicle, struck the median and was ejected. First responders pronounced Busby dead at the scene.

The crash remains under investigation, according to police.

JOHNSON COUNTY —One person died in an accident just before 2:30p.m. Monday in Johnson County.

Overland Park Police reported a vehicle driven by woman was northbound on U.S. 69 attempting to exit on eastbound Interstate 435.

The driver lost control of the vehicle, struck the median and was ejected. First responders pronounced the woman dead at the scene.

Police have identified the victim and were working to notify family before they released her name.

JOHNSON COUNTY —Police investigating a fatal Monday accident in Johnson County have identified the victim as 31-year-old Elizabeth K. Busby of Kansas City, Missouri., according to Overland Park Police spokesman John Lacy.Just before 2:30p.m. Monday, Overland Park Police reported a vehicle driven by Busby was northbound on U.S. 69 attempting to exit on eastbound Interstate 435.The driver lost control of the vehicle, struck the median and was ejected. First responders pronounced Busby dead at the scene.The crash remains under investigation, according to police.--------JOHNSON COUNTY —One person died in an accident just before 2:30p.m. Monday in Johnson County.Overland Park Police reported a vehicle driven by woman was northbound on U.S. 69 attempting to exit on eastbound Interstate 435.The driver lost control of the vehicle, struck the median and was ejected. First responders pronounced the woman dead at the scene.Police have identified the victim and were working to notify family before they released her name.

Police ID woman who died after ejected in Kan. crash

BARTON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities  investigating a man's death in Great Bend have located a Person of Interest identified as 36-year-old Elias Trejo, according to Great Bend Police.

Just after 6:31 p.m. Monday, the Barton County Sheriff’s Office deputies were dispatched to an area near SW 60th Avenue and SW 60th Road, according to a media relase.

A citizen had reported sighting Trejo. A deputy located the suspect, conducted a felony traffic stop and took him into custody without incident.

Trejo is being held on requested charges of murder in the 2nd degree&nbsp; on a $500,000 bond

BARTON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities&nbsp; investigating a man's death in Great Bend have located a&nbsp;Person of Interest identified as 36-year-old Elias Trejo, according to Great Bend Police.

Police have not reported an arrest or possible charges in the case.

"This was a great example of the Police Department, Barton County Sheriff's Office and the Kansas Highway Patrol working together behind the scenes to keep the community safe," the police department wrote on social media.

BARTON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities are investigating a man's death and asking for help to locate a suspect.

Just after 11:30 p.m., Sunday, the Great Bend Police and Fire Department ambulance personnel were dispatched to the Best Western, 2920 Tenth Street in Great Bend for report of a man&nbsp;on the ground, bleeding, and not moving, according to a media release.

 Upon arrival, officers found 39-year-old Micah Merryman-Scifres deceased. Through the investigation police identified 36-year-old Elias Trejo as a person of interest. 

Trejo was last seen in a dark colored, 4-door passenger car with unknown Texas license plates. Anyone with information about this crime is asked to call the Great Bend Police Department at 620-793-4120 or Crime Stoppers at 620-792-1300.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626714651434.png" alt="Trejo photo Great Bend Police" />
 <figcaption>Trejo photo Great Bend Police</figcaption>
 </figure>BARTON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities investigating a man's death in Great Bend have located a Person of Interest identified as 36-year-old Elias Trejo, according to Great Bend Police.Just after 6:31 p.m. Monday, the Barton County Sheriff’s Office deputies were dispatched to an area near SW 60th Avenue and SW 60th Road, according to a media relase.A citizen had reported sighting Trejo. A deputy located the suspect, conducted a felony traffic stop and took him into custody without incident.Trejo is being held on requested charges of murder in the 2nd degree&nbsp; on a $500,000 bond---------BARTON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities&nbsp; investigating a man's death in Great Bend have located a&nbsp;Person of Interest identified as 36-year-old Elias Trejo, according to Great Bend Police.Police have not reported an arrest or possible charges in the case."This was a great example of the Police Department, Barton County Sheriff's Office and the Kansas Highway Patrol working together behind the scenes to keep the community safe," the police department wrote on social media.--------BARTON COUNTY —Law enforcement authorities are investigating a man's death and asking for help to locate a suspect.Just after 11:30 p.m., Sunday, the Great Bend Police and Fire Department ambulance personnel were dispatched to the Best Western, 2920 Tenth Street in Great Bend for report of a man&nbsp;on the ground, bleeding, and not moving, according to a media release. Upon arrival, officers found 39-year-old Micah Merryman-Scifres deceased. Through the investigation police identified 36-year-old Elias Trejo as a person of interest. Trejo was last seen in a dark colored, 4-door passenger car with unknown Texas license plates. Anyone with information about this crime is asked to call the Great Bend Police Department at 620-793-4120 or Crime Stoppers at 620-792-1300.

Suspect in Great Bend homicide being held on $500K bond

KANSAS CITY (AP) — A Kansas City man has been sentenced to 22 years in prison for shooting a passenger on a bus in northeast Kansas City last year.

The Jackson County Prosecutor's office said Monday that 52-year-old Larry Harris Jr. has been sentenced for shooting a passenger on a bus at a bus stop on March 30, 2020. A jury convicted Harris of first-degree assault and armed criminal action in May.

At the time of the shooting, witnesses told police that Harris fired a shot into the bus from the sidewalk as the bus pulled up to the stop. The shot struck a passenger in the back, and the passenger suffered life-threatening injuries, according to court documents.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/2/1613042962761.png" alt="Harris photo Jackson Co." />
 <figcaption>Harris photo Jackson Co.</figcaption>
 </figure>KANSAS CITY (AP) — A Kansas City man has been sentenced to 22 years in prison for shooting a passenger on a bus in northeast Kansas City last year.The Jackson County Prosecutor's office said Monday that 52-year-old Larry Harris Jr. has been sentenced for shooting a passenger on a bus at a bus stop on March 30, 2020. A jury convicted Harris of first-degree assault and armed criminal action in May.At the time of the shooting, witnesses told police that Harris fired a shot into the bus from the sidewalk as the bus pulled up to the stop. The shot struck a passenger in the back, and the passenger suffered life-threatening injuries, according to court documents.

Man sentenced for shooting Kansas City bus passenger

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The health department in Kansas’ most populous county urged its public schools Monday to require students and staff who aren’t vaccinated against COVID-19 to wear masks indoors when classes resume for the fall.

The Johnson County Department of Health and Environment’s guidance came with confirmed cases of the faster-spreading delta variant continuing to rise across Kansas and fueling larger numbers of new COVID-19 cases overall.

“We want a return to normalcy, but we need to be cautious and get vaccinated if eligible.” said Dr. Sanmi Areola, the department’s director.

Lance Williamson, a registered nurse and infection prevention consultant for the University of Kansas Health System, said wearing masks is a “basic precaution” against COVID-19.

“Especially when you’re unsure of the unvaccinated people versus vaccinated people in an area, it’s just easier to have everyone wear a mask,” he said during a daily health system webcast.

The state reported Monday that confirmed delta variant cases increased by 20% since Friday, up 158 to 950. Confirming variant cases requires genetic testing of patients’ nasal swabs or saliva samples.

State data also showed that Kansas averaged 440 new COVID-19 cases overall for the seven days ending Monday, the highest such average since Feb. 26.

By JOHN HANNATOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — The health department in Kansas’ most populous county urged its public schools Monday to require students and staff who aren’t vaccinated against COVID-19 to wear masks indoors when classes resume for the fall.The Johnson County Department of Health and Environment’s guidance came with confirmed cases of the faster-spreading delta variant continuing to rise across Kansas and fueling larger numbers of new COVID-19 cases overall.“We want a return to normalcy, but we need to be cautious and get vaccinated if eligible.” said Dr. Sanmi Areola, the department’s director.Lance Williamson, a registered nurse and infection prevention consultant for the University of Kansas Health System, said wearing masks is a “basic precaution” against COVID-19.“Especially when you’re unsure of the unvaccinated people versus vaccinated people in an area, it’s just easier to have everyone wear a mask,” he said during a daily health system webcast.The state reported Monday that confirmed delta variant cases increased by 20% since Friday, up 158 to 950. Confirming variant cases requires genetic testing of patients’ nasal swabs or saliva samples.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626715232828.png" alt="Monday July 19, 2021 KDHE image" />
 <figcaption>Monday July 19, 2021 KDHE image</figcaption>
 </figure>State data also showed that Kansas averaged 440 new COVID-19 cases overall for the seven days ending Monday, the highest such average since Feb. 26.___

Health Dept.: Kan. schools should mandate masks for unvaccinated

VAN HORN, Texas (AP) — Jeff Bezos blasted into space Tuesday on his rocket company’s first flight with people on board, becoming the second billionaire in just over a week to ride his own spacecraft.

The Amazon founder was accompanied by a hand-picked group: his brother, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and an 82-year-old aviation pioneer from Texas — the youngest and oldest to ever fly in space.

Named after America’s first astronaut, Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket soared from remote West Texas on the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, a date chosen by Bezos for its historical significance. He held fast to it, even as Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson pushed up his own flight from New Mexico in the race for space tourist dollars and beat him to space by nine days.

Unlike Branson’s piloted rocket plane, Bezos’ capsule was completely automated and required no official staff on board for the anticipated 10-minute, up-and-down flight.

Blue Origin was shooting for an altitude of roughly 66 miles (106 kilometers), more than 10 miles (16 kilometers) higher than Branson’s July 11 ride. The 60-foot (18-meter) booster accelerated to Mach 3 or three times the speed of sound to get the capsule high enough, before separating and aiming for a vertical landing.

The passengers were expected to get three to four minutes of weightlessness to float around the spacious white capsule. Then the window-filled capsule was going to head to a parachute touchdown on the desert floor, with Bezos and his guests briefly experiencing nearly six times the force of gravity, or 6 G’s, on the way back.

Sharing Bezos’ dream-come-true adventure was Wally Funk, from the Dallas area, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same tests as NASA’s all-male astronaut corps in the early 1960s but never made it into space.

Joining them on the ultimate joyride was the company’s first paying customer, Oliver Daemen, a last-minute fill-in for the mystery winner of a $28 million auction who opted for a later flight. The Dutch teen’s father took part in the auction, and agreed on a lower undisclosed price last week when Blue Origin offered his son the vacated seat.

Blue Origin — founded by Bezos in 2000 in Kent, Washington, near Amazon’s Seattle headquarters — has yet to open ticket sales to the public or reveal the price. For now, it’s booking auction bidders. Two more passenger flights are planned by year’s end, said Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith.

The recycled rocket and capsule that carried up Tuesday’s passengers were used on the last two space demos, according to company officials.

Virgin Galactic already has more than 600 reservations at $250,000 apiece. Founded by Branson in 2004, the company has sent crew into space four times and plans two more test flights from New Mexico before launching customers next year.

Blue Origin’s approach was slower and more deliberate. After 15 successful unoccupied test flights to space since 2015, Bezos finally declared it was time to put people on board. The Federal Aviation Administration agreed last week, approving the commercial space license.

Bezos, 57, who also owns The Washington Post, claimed the first seat. The next went to his 50-year-old brother, Mark Bezos, an investor and volunteer firefighter, then Funk and Daemen. They spent two days together in training.

University of Chicago space historian Jordan Bimm said the passenger makeup is truly remarkable. Imagine if the head of NASA decided he wanted to launch in 1961 instead of Alan Shepard on the first U.S. spaceflight, he said in an email.

“That would have been unthinkable!” Bimm said. “”It shows just how much the idea of who and what space is for has changed in the last 60 years.”

Bezos stepped down earlier this month as Amazon’s CEO and just last week donated $200 million to renovate the National Air and Space Museum. Most of the $28 million from the auction has been distributed to space advocacy and education groups, with the rest benefiting Blue Origin’s Club for the Future, its own education effort.

Fewer than 600 people have reached the edge of space or beyond. Until Tuesday, the youngest was 25-year-old Soviet cosmonaut Gherman Titov and the oldest at 77 was Mercury-turned-shuttle astronaut John Glenn.

Both Bezos and Branson want to drastically increase those overall numbers, as does SpaceX’s Elon Musk, who’s skipping brief space hops and sending his private clients straight to orbit for tens of millions apiece, with the first flight coming up in September.

Despite appearances, Bezos and Branson insist they weren’t trying to outdo each other by strapping in themselves. Bezos noted this week that only one person can lay claim to being first in space: Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, who rocketed into orbit on April 12, 1961.

“This isn’t a competition, this is about building a road to space so that future generations can do incredible things in space,” he said on NBC’s ”Today.”

Blue Origin is working on a massive rocket, New Glenn, to put payloads and people into orbit from Cape Canaveral, Florida. The company also wants to put astronauts back on the moon with its proposed lunar lander Blue Moon; it’s challenging NASA’s sole contract award to SpaceX.

VAN HORN, Texas (AP) — Jeff Bezos is about to soar on his space travel company’s first flight with people on board.

Just after 8a.m. CDT, Tuesday, the founder of Blue Origin as well as Amazon will become the second billionaire to ride his own rocket. He’ll launch from West Texas with his brother, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and an 82-year-old female aviation pioneer from Texas — the youngest and oldest to ever hurtle off the planet.

Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket is set to blast off with its eclectic group of passengers on the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.

Bezos is aiming for an altitude of roughly 66 miles more than 10 miles higher than Richard Branson’s ride on July 11.

The capsule is fully automated, so there’s no need for trained staff on the quick up-and-down flight, expected to last just 10 minutes. Branson’s Virgin Galactic rocket plane needs two pilots to operate.

Bezos’ dream-come-true trip follows 15 successful test flights to space by New Shepard rockets since 2015, all of them unoccupied. If successful, Blue Origin plans two more passenger flights by year’s end.

The company has yet to open ticket sales to the public and is filling upcoming flights with those who took part in last month’s $28 million charity auction for the fourth capsule seat. The mystery winner bowed out of Tuesday’s launch because of a scheduling conflict. That opened up the slot for Oliver Daemen, a college-bound student from the Netherlands whose father was among the unsuccessful bidders.

Also flying: Bezos’ younger brother, Mark, and Wally Funk, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same testing back in the early 1960s as NASA’s Mercury astronauts, but failed to make the cut because they were women.

Not everyone in the remote, desert town of Van Horn was excited about the drama unfolding 25 miles (40 kilometers) to the north.

“It’s a luxury that’s going to be set aside for the wealthy,” said pizza shop owner Jesus Ramirez. He planned to watch the morning launch from his restaurant’s patio with a cup of coffee.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626787474270.png" alt="&nbsp;Blue Origin capsule floated safely back to earth-courtesy image" />
 <figcaption>&nbsp;Blue Origin capsule floated safely back to earth-courtesy image</figcaption>
 </figure>VAN HORN, Texas (AP) — Jeff Bezos blasted into space Tuesday on his rocket company’s first flight with people on board, becoming the second billionaire in just over a week to ride his own spacecraft.<div><iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/tMHhXzpwupU" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe></div>The Amazon founder was accompanied by a hand-picked group: his brother, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and an 82-year-old aviation pioneer from Texas — the youngest and oldest to ever fly in space.Named after America’s first astronaut, Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket soared from remote West Texas on the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, a date chosen by Bezos for its historical significance. He held fast to it, even as Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson pushed up his own flight from New Mexico in the race for space tourist dollars and beat him to space by nine days.Unlike Branson’s piloted rocket plane, Bezos’ capsule was completely automated and required no official staff on board for the anticipated 10-minute, up-and-down flight.Blue Origin was shooting for an altitude of roughly 66 miles (106 kilometers), more than 10 miles (16 kilometers) higher than Branson’s July 11 ride. The 60-foot (18-meter) booster accelerated to Mach 3 or three times the speed of sound to get the capsule high enough, before separating and aiming for a vertical landing.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626782551885.png" alt="Also flying Tuesday Bezos’ younger brother, Mark; Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and Wally Funk, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same testing back in the early 1960s as NASA’s Mercury astronauts, but failed to make the cut because they were women-photo courtesy Blue Origin" />
 <figcaption>Also flying Tuesday Bezos’ younger brother, Mark; Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and Wally Funk, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same testing back in the early 1960s as NASA’s Mercury astronauts, but failed to make the cut because they were women-photo courtesy Blue Origin</figcaption>
 </figure>The passengers were expected to get three to four minutes of weightlessness to float around the spacious white capsule. Then the window-filled capsule was going to head to a parachute touchdown on the desert floor, with Bezos and his guests briefly experiencing nearly six times the force of gravity, or 6 G’s, on the way back.Sharing Bezos’ dream-come-true adventure was Wally Funk, from the Dallas area, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same tests as NASA’s all-male astronaut corps in the early 1960s but never made it into space.Joining them on the ultimate joyride was the company’s first paying customer, Oliver Daemen, a last-minute fill-in for the mystery winner of a $28 million auction who opted for a later flight. The Dutch teen’s father took part in the auction, and agreed on a lower undisclosed price last week when Blue Origin offered his son the vacated seat.Blue Origin — founded by Bezos in 2000 in Kent, Washington, near Amazon’s Seattle headquarters — has yet to open ticket sales to the public or reveal the price. For now, it’s booking auction bidders. Two more passenger flights are planned by year’s end, said Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith.The recycled rocket and capsule that carried up Tuesday’s passengers were used on the last two space demos, according to company officials.Virgin Galactic already has more than 600 reservations at $250,000 apiece. Founded by Branson in 2004, the company has sent crew into space four times and plans two more test flights from New Mexico before launching customers next year.Blue Origin’s approach was slower and more deliberate. After 15 successful unoccupied test flights to space since 2015, Bezos finally declared it was time to put people on board. The Federal Aviation Administration agreed last week, approving the commercial space license.Bezos, 57, who also owns The Washington Post, claimed the first seat. The next went to his 50-year-old brother, Mark Bezos, an investor and volunteer firefighter, then Funk and Daemen. They spent two days together in training.University of Chicago space historian Jordan Bimm said the passenger makeup is truly remarkable. Imagine if the head of NASA decided he wanted to launch in 1961 instead of Alan Shepard on the first U.S. spaceflight, he said in an email.“That would have been unthinkable!” Bimm said. “”It shows just how much the idea of who and what space is for has changed in the last 60 years.”Bezos stepped down earlier this month as Amazon’s CEO and just last week donated $200 million to renovate the National Air and Space Museum. Most of the $28 million from the auction has been distributed to space advocacy and education groups, with the rest benefiting Blue Origin’s Club for the Future, its own education effort.Fewer than 600 people have reached the edge of space or beyond. Until Tuesday, the youngest was 25-year-old Soviet cosmonaut Gherman Titov and the oldest at 77 was Mercury-turned-shuttle astronaut John Glenn.Both Bezos and Branson want to drastically increase those overall numbers, as does SpaceX’s Elon Musk, who’s skipping brief space hops and sending his private clients straight to orbit for tens of millions apiece, with the first flight coming up in September.Despite appearances, Bezos and Branson insist they weren’t trying to outdo each other by strapping in themselves. Bezos noted this week that only one person can lay claim to being first in space: Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, who rocketed into orbit on April 12, 1961.“This isn’t a competition, this is about building a road to space so that future generations can do incredible things in space,” he said on NBC’s ”Today.”Blue Origin is working on a massive rocket, New Glenn, to put payloads and people into orbit from Cape Canaveral, Florida. The company also wants to put astronauts back on the moon with its proposed lunar lander Blue Moon; it’s challenging NASA’s sole contract award to SpaceX.------------VAN HORN, Texas (AP) — Jeff Bezos is about to soar on his space travel company’s first flight with people on board.<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626782551885.png" alt="Also flying Tuesday is Bezos’ younger brother, Mark; Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and Wally Funk, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same testing back in the early 1960s as NASA’s Mercury astronauts, but failed to make the cut because they were women-photo courtesy Blue Origin" />
 <figcaption>Also flying Tuesday is Bezos’ younger brother, Mark; Oliver Daemen, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and Wally Funk, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same testing back in the early 1960s as NASA’s Mercury astronauts, but failed to make the cut because they were women-photo courtesy Blue Origin</figcaption>
 </figure>Just after 8a.m. CDT, Tuesday, the founder of Blue Origin as well as Amazon will become the second billionaire to ride his own rocket. He’ll launch from West Texas with his brother, an 18-year-old from the Netherlands and an 82-year-old female aviation pioneer from Texas — the youngest and oldest to ever hurtle off the planet.Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket is set to blast off with its eclectic group of passengers on the 52nd anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.Bezos is aiming for an altitude of roughly 66 miles more than 10 miles higher than Richard Branson’s ride on July 11.The capsule is fully automated, so there’s no need for trained staff on the quick up-and-down flight, expected to last just 10 minutes. Branson’s Virgin Galactic rocket plane needs two pilots to operate.Bezos’ dream-come-true trip follows 15 successful test flights to space by New Shepard rockets since 2015, all of them unoccupied. If successful, Blue Origin plans two more passenger flights by year’s end.The company has yet to open ticket sales to the public and is filling upcoming flights with those who took part in last month’s $28 million charity auction for the fourth capsule seat. The mystery winner bowed out of Tuesday’s launch because of a scheduling conflict. That opened up the slot for Oliver Daemen, a college-bound student from the Netherlands whose father was among the unsuccessful bidders.Also flying: Bezos’ younger brother, Mark, and Wally Funk, one of 13 female pilots who went through the same testing back in the early 1960s as NASA’s Mercury astronauts, but failed to make the cut because they were women.Not everyone in the remote, desert town of Van Horn was excited about the drama unfolding 25 miles (40 kilometers) to the north.“It’s a luxury that’s going to be set aside for the wealthy,” said pizza shop owner Jesus Ramirez. He planned to watch the morning launch from his restaurant’s patio with a cup of coffee.___

🎥  World's richest man reaches space on 1st passenger flight

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden tempered his assessment that social media giants are “killing people” by hosting misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccines on their platforms, saying Monday that he hoped they would not take it “personally” and instead would act to save lives.

While companies like Facebook defend their practices and say they’re helping people around the world access verified information about the shots, the White House says they haven’t done enough to stop misinformation that has helped slow the pace of new vaccinations in the U.S. to a trickle. It comes as the U.S. sees a rise in virus cases and deaths among those who haven’t gotten a shot, in what officials call an emerging “pandemic of the unvaccinated.”

Speaking at the White House, Biden insisted he meant “precisely what I said”&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-business-health-media-social-media-73ca875f1d1c04bc69108607d8499e3c">when he said Friday of the tech giants that “they’re killing people.”</a>&nbsp;But he said the point of his rhetoric was to ramp up pressure on the companies to take action.

“My hope is that Facebook, instead of taking it personally that somehow I’m saying ‘Facebook is killing people,’ that they would do something about the misinformation,” Biden said.

Biden’s comments come as the White House has struggled to counteract resistance to getting a shot, particularly among younger and more Republican demographics. Fewer than 400,000 Americans are getting their first vaccine dose each day — down from a high of more than 2 million per day in April. More than 90 million eligible people have not received a dose.

The administration has increasingly seized on false or misleading information about the safety and efficacy of the vaccines as a driver of that hesitance. It has referenced a study by the Center for Countering Digital Hate, a nonprofit that studies extremism, that linked a dozen accounts to spreading the majority of vaccine disinformation on Facebook.

“Facebook isn’t killing people. These 12 people are out there giving misinformation, anyone listening to it is getting hurt by it, it’s killing people,” Biden said. “It’s bad information.”

“I’m not trying to hold people accountable. I’m trying to make people look at themselves, look in the mirror,” Biden said, adding, “Think about that misinformation going to your son, your daughter, your relative.”

In the view of the administration, chastising the social media companies — who have come under mounting scrutiny in Washington over not just disinformation, but also antitrust and privacy practices — is a proxy for criticizing the originators of disinformation themselves. To avoid amplifying falsehoods, the White House has generally sought to avoid engaging directly with those spreading misinformation.

Last week, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy declared misinformation about the vaccines a deadly threat to public health.

“Misinformation poses an imminent and insidious threat to our nation’s health,” Murthy said during remarks Thursday at the White House. “We must confront misinformation as a nation. Lives are depending on it.”

Murthy said technology companies and social media platforms must make meaningful changes to their products and software to reduce the spread of false information while increasing access to authoritative, fact-based sources.

Too often, he said, the platforms are built in ways that encourage the spread of misinformation.

“We are asking them to step up,” Murthy said. “We can’t wait longer for them to take aggressive action.”

Facebook on Friday responded to Biden’s attack, with spokesperson Kevin McAlister saying, “The facts show that Facebook is helping save lives. Period.”

The company also released a blog post saying its internal research showed it was not responsible for Biden’s missed vaccination goal. “The data shows that 85% of Facebook users in the US have been or want to be vaccinated against COVID-19. President Biden’s goal was for 70% of Americans to be vaccinated by July 4. Facebook is not the reason this goal was missed.”

Brendan Nyhan, a professor of government at Dartmouth College who focuses on politics and health care, said Facebook “should absolutely be held accountable for allowing vaccine misinformation to spread.”

“With that said, we should be careful about assuming that the circulation of misinformation online is a cause of hesitancy rather than a consequence,” he added.

“It’s very difficult to show the relationship between misinformation on social media and vaccine hesitancy directly. We don’t have good measures of what people see on social media or any ability to link it to their vaccination behavior. And even if we see correlations in the data, these could be spurious rather than causal — people who aren’t going to get vaccinated are presumably more likely to be exposed to negative and false information about the vaccine.”

That said, Nyhan added that there is some evidence that exposure to misinformation can reduce a person’s intention to vaccinate immediately after viewing the misinformation.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki insisted Monday: “We’re not in a war or battle against Facebook — we’re in a battle with the virus.” But she ramped up pressure on the companies to share information on how many Americans are exposed to misinformation on their platforms and how their secretive and powerful algorithms promote false content to users.

“Do you have access to information from these platforms as to who is receiving misinformation?” she asked. “I don’t think that information has been released. Do you know how the algorithms are working at any of these platforms? I don’t think that information has been released.”

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626736817021.png" alt="President Biden turns to answer a question during Monday's news conference and said,“My hope is that Facebook, instead of taking it personally that somehow I’m saying ‘Facebook is killing people,’ that they would do something about the misinformation."-photo courtesy White House" />
 <figcaption>President Biden turns to answer a question during Monday's news conference and said,“My hope is that Facebook, instead of taking it personally that somehow I’m saying ‘Facebook is killing people,’ that they would do something about the misinformation."-photo courtesy White House</figcaption>
 </figure>WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden tempered his assessment that social media giants are “killing people” by hosting misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccines on their platforms, saying Monday that he hoped they would not take it “personally” and instead would act to save lives.While companies like Facebook defend their practices and say they’re helping people around the world access verified information about the shots, the White House says they haven’t done enough to stop misinformation that has helped slow the pace of new vaccinations in the U.S. to a trickle. It comes as the U.S. sees a rise in virus cases and deaths among those who haven’t gotten a shot, in what officials call an emerging “pandemic of the unvaccinated.”Speaking at the White House, Biden insisted he meant “precisely what I said”&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-business-health-media-social-media-73ca875f1d1c04bc69108607d8499e3c">when he said Friday of the tech giants that “they’re killing people.”</a>&nbsp;But he said the point of his rhetoric was to ramp up pressure on the companies to take action.“My hope is that Facebook, instead of taking it personally that somehow I’m saying ‘Facebook is killing people,’ that they would do something about the misinformation,” Biden said.Biden’s comments come as the White House has struggled to counteract resistance to getting a shot, particularly among younger and more Republican demographics. Fewer than 400,000 Americans are getting their first vaccine dose each day — down from a high of more than 2 million per day in April. More than 90 million eligible people have not received a dose.The administration has increasingly seized on false or misleading information about the safety and efficacy of the vaccines as a driver of that hesitance. It has referenced a study by the Center for Countering Digital Hate, a nonprofit that studies extremism, that linked a dozen accounts to spreading the majority of vaccine disinformation on Facebook.“Facebook isn’t killing people. These 12 people are out there giving misinformation, anyone listening to it is getting hurt by it, it’s killing people,” Biden said. “It’s bad information.”“I’m not trying to hold people accountable. I’m trying to make people look at themselves, look in the mirror,” Biden said, adding, “Think about that misinformation going to your son, your daughter, your relative.”In the view of the administration, chastising the social media companies — who have come under mounting scrutiny in Washington over not just disinformation, but also antitrust and privacy practices — is a proxy for criticizing the originators of disinformation themselves. To avoid amplifying falsehoods, the White House has generally sought to avoid engaging directly with those spreading misinformation.Last week, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy declared misinformation about the vaccines a deadly threat to public health.“Misinformation poses an imminent and insidious threat to our nation’s health,” Murthy said during remarks Thursday at the White House. “We must confront misinformation as a nation. Lives are depending on it.”Murthy said technology companies and social media platforms must make meaningful changes to their products and software to reduce the spread of false information while increasing access to authoritative, fact-based sources.Too often, he said, the platforms are built in ways that encourage the spread of misinformation.“We are asking them to step up,” Murthy said. “We can’t wait longer for them to take aggressive action.”Facebook on Friday responded to Biden’s attack, with spokesperson Kevin McAlister saying, “The facts show that Facebook is helping save lives. Period.”The company also released a blog post saying its internal research showed it was not responsible for Biden’s missed vaccination goal. “The data shows that 85% of Facebook users in the US have been or want to be vaccinated against COVID-19. President Biden’s goal was for 70% of Americans to be vaccinated by July 4. Facebook is not the reason this goal was missed.”Brendan Nyhan, a professor of government at Dartmouth College who focuses on politics and health care, said Facebook “should absolutely be held accountable for allowing vaccine misinformation to spread.”“With that said, we should be careful about assuming that the circulation of misinformation online is a cause of hesitancy rather than a consequence,” he added.“It’s very difficult to show the relationship between misinformation on social media and vaccine hesitancy directly. We don’t have good measures of what people see on social media or any ability to link it to their vaccination behavior. And even if we see correlations in the data, these could be spurious rather than causal — people who aren’t going to get vaccinated are presumably more likely to be exposed to negative and false information about the vaccine.”That said, Nyhan added that there is some evidence that exposure to misinformation can reduce a person’s intention to vaccinate immediately after viewing the misinformation.White House press secretary Jen Psaki insisted Monday: “We’re not in a war or battle against Facebook — we’re in a battle with the virus.” But she ramped up pressure on the companies to share information on how many Americans are exposed to misinformation on their platforms and how their secretive and powerful algorithms promote false content to users.“Do you have access to information from these platforms as to who is receiving misinformation?” she asked. “I don’t think that information has been released. Do you know how the algorithms are working at any of these platforms? I don’t think that information has been released.”

Biden on social media 'killing people' with vaccine misinformation

KANSAS CITY (AP) — A third child has died following a house fire in Kansas City last week that killed two other children, police said Monday.

The Kansas City Police Department identified the victims as 10-year-old Chace Freeman, 4-year-old Achilles Hardy and 3-year-old Maxwell Hardy.

Chace and Maxwell&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/fires-police-michael-brown-kansas-city-306ba011ad806aa24974614fb3e54881">died last week</a>, while Achilles died Monday of his injuries, police said in a news release.

Two other people were also injured in Wednesday's fire at the house.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Two people killed in a house fire in northwest Kansas City were children under the age of 11, police confirmed Thursday in a news release.

Two others injured in the Wednesday fire remained in critical condition and a third injured person suffered injuries not believed to be life-threatening, police said.

Officials had not released the identities of the five victims of the fire by Thursday afternoon. In the aftermath of the fire Wednesday, fire officials said three children and one adult had been taken to local hospitals.

Officials have not given the cause of the fire, saying it’s under investigation.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Two people were killed and three others injured after a house fire Wednesday in northwest Kansas City, Missouri, police said.

Police spokeswoman Donna Drake confirmed the two deaths and said two of the other victims suffered critical injuries.

The victims' names and ages were not immediately available.

Earlier in the day, fire officials said three children and one adult had been taken to local hospitals.

<figure>
 <img src="https://media.eaglewebservices.com/public/2021/7/1626295203087.png" alt="The July 14 fatal fire photo courtesy KCTV" />
 <figcaption>The July 14 fatal fire photo courtesy KCTV</figcaption>
 </figure>KANSAS CITY (AP) — A third child has died following a house fire in Kansas City last week that killed two other children, police said Monday.The Kansas City Police Department identified the victims as 10-year-old Chace Freeman, 4-year-old Achilles Hardy and 3-year-old Maxwell Hardy.Chace and Maxwell&nbsp;<a href="https://apnews.com/article/fires-police-michael-brown-kansas-city-306ba011ad806aa24974614fb3e54881">died last week</a>, while Achilles died Monday of his injuries, police said in a news release.Two other people were also injured in Wednesday's fire at the house.------------KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Two people killed in a house fire in northwest Kansas City were children under the age of 11, police confirmed Thursday in a news release.Two others injured in the Wednesday fire remained in critical condition and a third injured person suffered injuries not believed to be life-threatening, police said.Officials had not released the identities of the five victims of the fire by Thursday afternoon. In the aftermath of the fire Wednesday, fire officials said three children and one adult had been taken to local hospitals.Officials have not given the cause of the fire, saying it’s under investigation.--------KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Two people were killed and three others injured after a house fire Wednesday in northwest Kansas City, Missouri, police said.Police spokeswoman Donna Drake confirmed the two deaths and said two of the other victims suffered critical injuries.The victims' names and ages were not immediately available.Earlier in the day, fire officials said three children and one adult had been taken to local hospitals.

3rd child dies after Kansas City house fire that killed 2 others

KANSAS CITY— A Houston, Texas, man pleaded guilty in federal court to defrauding two Kansas City-area brothers who have also been convicted in the investment fraud scheme.

Duc Nguyen, also known as “Doug,” 57, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Roseann Ketchmark to one count of wire fraud.

By pleading guilty July 15, Nguyen admitted that he engaged in a fraud scheme from April 2018 to August 2019 in which he proposed an opportunity for high net worth individuals to invest in the purchase, refurbishing, and sale of used oil equipment. He told Phillip Hudnall of Lenexa, Kansas, and his brother, Brian Hudnall, of Kansas City that profit from these transactions would be three to five times the amount of the investment. Brian and Phillip Hudnall raised money from investors based upon these representations from Nguyen.

For example, Brian Hudnall wire transferred $415,000 to Nguyen between May 3 and Sept. 19, 2018, for the purchase, refurbishment, and shipping of the oil equipment. Brian Hudnall wire transferred an additional $80,000 to Nguyen on Feb. 26, 2019. Phillip Hudnall transferred $1,075,000 to Nguyen between April 15 and June 17, 2019, for the purchase, refurbishment, and shipping of the oil equipment.

Nguyen admitted that he did not use any of the monies for the purchase, refurbishment, and shipment of used oil equipment, but instead spent the money on personal expenses.

Phillip and Brian Hudnall pleaded guilty in June 2020, in separate but related cases, to their roles in the investment fraud scheme and await sentencing.

Phillip Hudnall told investors that his company, BirdDog Business Group, LLC, had completed two successful transactions – a $244,000 loan and a $490,000 loan, both of which had been repaid with an interest rate of 30 percent. In fact, no prior completed transactions occurred and no monies were received from the sale of any oil equipment including any principal or interest. To support the false claim, Phillip Hudnall requested that Brian Hudnall create documents as proof of the prior successfully completed transactions. Brian Hudnall wrote two checks on the bank account of his business, DonDon LLC, which was closed. Brian Hudnall also created a fraudulent memorandum to support the false claim.

Phillip Hudnall told investors their funds would be used to purchase specific pieces of oil equipment for refurbishment and resale. Persons invested approximately $3.6 million for the purpose of purchasing specific pieces of oil equipment. Phillip Hudnall and another person also obtained a loan from a bank in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for approximately $1.3 million to finance the oil equipment scheme. Most of the money raised from investors, however, was spent on personal expenses.

KANSAS CITY— A Houston, Texas, man pleaded guilty in federal court to defrauding two Kansas City-area brothers who have also been convicted in the investment fraud scheme.Duc Nguyen, also known as “Doug,” 57, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge Roseann Ketchmark to one count of wire fraud.By pleading guilty July 15, Nguyen admitted that he engaged in a fraud scheme from April 2018 to August 2019 in which he proposed an opportunity for high net worth individuals to invest in the purchase, refurbishing, and sale of used oil equipment. He told Phillip Hudnall of Lenexa, Kansas, and his brother, Brian Hudnall, of Kansas City that profit from these transactions would be three to five times the amount of the investment. Brian and Phillip Hudnall raised money from investors based upon these representations from Nguyen.For example, Brian Hudnall wire transferred $415,000 to Nguyen between May 3 and Sept. 19, 2018, for the purchase, refurbishment, and shipping of the oil equipment. Brian Hudnall wire transferred an additional $80,000 to Nguyen on Feb. 26, 2019. Phillip Hudnall transferred $1,075,000 to Nguyen between April 15 and June 17, 2019, for the purchase, refurbishment, and shipping of the oil equipment.Nguyen admitted that he did not use any of the monies for the purchase, refurbishment, and shipment of used oil equipment, but instead spent the money on personal expenses.Phillip and Brian Hudnall pleaded guilty in June 2020, in separate but related cases, to their roles in the investment fraud scheme and await sentencing.Phillip Hudnall told investors that his company, BirdDog Business Group, LLC, had completed two successful transactions – a $244,000 loan and a $490,000 loan, both of which had been repaid with an interest rate of 30 percent. In fact, no prior completed transactions occurred and no monies were received from the sale of any oil equipment including any principal or interest. To support the false claim, Phillip Hudnall requested that Brian Hudnall create documents as proof of the prior successfully completed transactions. Brian Hudnall wrote two checks on the bank account of his business, DonDon LLC, which was closed. Brian Hudnall also created a fraudulent memorandum to support the false claim.Phillip Hudnall told investors their funds would be used to purchase specific pieces of oil equipment for refurbishment and resale. Persons invested approximately $3.6 million for the purpose of purchasing specific pieces of oil equipment. Phillip Hudnall and another person also obtained a loan from a bank in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for approximately $1.3 million to finance the oil equipment scheme. Most of the money raised from investors, however, was spent on personal expenses.Under federal statutes, Nguyen is subject to a sentence of up to 20 years in federal prison without parole. The maximum statutory sentence is prescribed by Congress and is provided here for informational purposes, as the sentencing of the defendant will be determined by the court based on the advisory sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors. A sentencing hearing will be scheduled after the completion of a presentence investigation by the United States Probation Office.