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Did My Cat Simply Hit On Me? An Journey in Pet Translation

Did My Cat Just Hit On Me? An Adventure in Pet Translation

My cat is a bona fide chatterbox. Momo will meow when she is hungry and when she is full, when she wants to be picked up and when she wants to be put down, when I leave the room or when I enter it, or sometimes for what appears to be no real reason at all

But because she is a cat, she is also uncooperative. So the moment I downloaded MeowTalk Cat Translator, a mobile app that promised to convert Momo’s meows into plain English, she clammed right up. For two days I tried, and failed, to solicit a sound.

On Day 3, out of desperation, I decided to pick her up while she was wolfing down her dinner, an interruption guaranteed to elicit a howl of protest. Right on cue, Momo wailed. The app processed the sound, then played an advertisement for Sara Lee, then rendered a translation: “I’m happy!”

I was dubious. But MeowTalk provided a more plausible translation about a week later, when I returned from a four-day trip. Upon seeing me, Momo meowed and then purred. “Nice to see you,” the app translated. Then: “Let me rest.” (The ads disappeared after I upgraded to a premium account.)

The urge to converse with animals is age-old, long predating the time when smartphones became our best friends. Scientists have taught sign language to great apes, chatted with gray parrots and even tried to teach English to bottlenose dolphins. Pets — with which we share our homes but not a common language — are particularly tempting targets. My TikTok feed brims with videos of Bunny, a sheepadoodle who has learned to press sound buttons that play prerecorded phrases like “outside,” “scritches” and “love you.”

MeowTalk is the product of a growing interest in enlisting additional intelligences — machine-learning algorithms — to decode animal communication. The idea is not as far fetched as it may seem. For example, machine-learning systems, which are able to extract patterns from large data sets, can distinguish between the squeaks that rodents make when they are happy and those that they emit when they are in distress.

Applying the same advances to our creature companions has obvious appeal.

“We’re trying to understand what cats are saying and give them a voice” Javier Sanchez, a founder of MeowTalk, said. “We want to use this to help people build better and stronger relationships with their cats,” he added.

To me, an animal lover in a three-species household — Momo the cranky cat begrudgingly shares space with Watson the overeager dog — the idea of ​​a pet translation app was tantalizing. But even MeowTalk’s creators acknowledge that there are still a few kinks to work out.

A meow contains multitudes. In the best of feline times — say, when a cat is being fed — meows tend to be short and high-pitched and have rising intonations, according to a recent study, which has not yet been published in a scientific journal. But in the worst of times (trapped in a cat carrier), cats generally make their distress known with long, low-pitched meows that have falling intonations.

“They tend to use different types of melody in their meows when they try to signal different things,” said Susanne Schötz, a phonetician at Lund University in Sweden who led the study as part of a research project called Meowsic.

And in a 2019 study, Stavros Ntalampiras, a computer scientist at the University of Milan, demonstrated that algorithms could automatically distinguish between the meows that cats made in three situations: when they were being brushed, while waiting for food or after being left alone in a strange environment.

MeowTalk, whose founders enlisted Dr. Ntalampiras appeared after the study, expands on this research, using algorithms to identify cat vocalizations made in a variety of contexts.

The app detects and analyzes cat utterances in real-time, assigning each one a broadly defined “intent,” such as happy, resting, hunting or “mating call.” It then displays a conversational, plain English “translation” of whatever intent it detects, such as Momo’s beleaguered “Let me rest.” (Oddly, none of these translations appear to include “I will chew off your leg if you do not feed me this instant.”)

MeowTalk uses the sounds it collects to refine its algorithms and improve its performance, the founders said, and pet owners can provide in-the-moment feedback if the app gets it wrong.

In 2021, MeowTalk researchers reported that the software could distinguish among nine intents with 90 percent accuracy overall. But the app was better at identifying some than others, not infrequently confusing “happy” and “pain,” according to the results.

And assessing the accuracy of a cat translation app is tricky, said Sergei Dreizin, a MeowTalk founder. “It’s assuming that you actually know what your cat wants,” he said.

I found that the app was, as advertised, especially good at detecting purring. (Then again, so am I.) But it’s much harder to determine what the calls mean in each category — if they carry a consistent meaning at all — without actually having a way of, you know, communicating with cats. (Cat-ch-22?)

After all, the precise purpose of purring, which cats do in a wide variety of situations, remains elusive. MeowTalk, however, interprets purrs as “resting.”

“But to be candid,” Mr. Sanchez said, “it can mean. …” He rephrased. “We don’t know what it means.”

At times I found MeowTalk’s grab-bag of conversational translations unsettling. In one moment, Momo sounded like a college acquaintance responding to a tossed-off text message: “Just chilling!” In another, she became a Victorian heroine: “My love, I’m here!” (This spurred my fiancé to begin addressing the cat as “my love,” which was also unsettling.) One afternoon I hoisted Momo off the floor and, when she mewed, glanced at my phone: “Hey baby, let’s go somewhere private! ”

“A lot of translations are kind of creatively presented to the user,” Dr. Ntalampiras said. “It’s not pure science at this stage.”

dr Schötz said that over the years she had seen several cat translation products, but that she had yet to find one that truly impressed her. “I’m looking forward to seeing something that really works, because that would be just brilliant,” she said.

In the meantime, Mr. Sanchez said he had also heard from users who had found an unexpected use for the app, which stores recordings of the meows it captures: listening to these recordings after their animal had died. It’s a “very magical experience,” he said.

Dogs could soon have their own day. Zoolingua, a start-up based in Arizona, is hoping to create an AI-powered dog translator that will analyze canine vocalizations and body language.

Dog owners have been overwhelmingly enthusiastic about the concept, said Con Slobodchikoff, the founder and chief executive of Zoolingua, who spent much of his academic career studying prairie dog communication. “Good communication between you and your dog means having a great relationship with your dog,” he said. “And a lot of people want a great relationship with their dog.”

(But not everyone, he added: “One small minority says, ‘I don’t think that I really want to know what my dog ​​is trying to communicate to me because maybe my dog ​​doesn’t like me.’”)

Still, even sophisticated algorithms may miss critical real-world context and cues, said Alexandra Horowitz, an expert on dog cognition at Barnard College. For instance, much of canine behavior is driven by scent. “How is that going to be translated, when we don’t know the extent of it ourselves?” dr Horowitz said in an email.

The desire to understand what animals are “saying,” however, does not seem likely to abate. The world can be a lonely place, especially so in the last few years. Finding new ways to connect with other creatures, other species, can be a much needed balm.

Personally, I would pay at least two figures for an app that could help me know whether my dog ​​truly needs to go outside or just wants to see if the neighbor has put bread out for the birds. (Maybe what I really need is a canine lie-detection app.) For now, I will simply have to use my own judgment and powers of observation.

After all, our pets are already communicating with us all the time, Dr. Horowitz noted. “It’s far more interesting to me to learn my own dog’s communications,” she said, “especially the idiosyncrasies that are formed between particular people and particular animals, than pretend that an app can — presto! — translate it all.”

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Entertainment

A Steamy French Thriller Is a ‘Sleeper Smash Hit’

A Steamy French Thriller Is a ‘Sleeper Smash Hit’

“It’s vicarious,” Mr. Goldstein said, trying to explain why a 50-year-old French film starring actors who were largely unknown in America has been such a hit. “It’s a vacation in the south of France that a lot of people can’t take. There’s also the incredible magnetism and chemistry of the two stars, who were real-life lovers.”

The film is classified as a psychological thriller, but to first-time viewers, very little happens until the very end. “Can you believe there’s another hour of this?” I overheard one older woman marvel to her friend near the halfway mark.

“A Bigger Splash,” the marvelous 2015 remake starring Ralph Fiennes and Tilda Swinton, which Americans may be more familiar with, maintains the broad strokes of the plot, but, as the title suggests, it is much splashier. In that version, the drowning is an accidental crime of passion, far from the cold, calculating murder of “La Piscine”; the dialogue is faster, the cuts sharper, the music louder.

Watching it now, having done a deep dive (ahem) into the original, made me acutely aware it was the very absence of action, the unapologetic decadence, that kept pulling me back to the theater. This is not a film interested in passing judgment on la belle vie.

Even as I became more sensitive to the subtleties of the film’s dialogue (“the first swim really takes it out of you,” says Marianne, when Penelope returns from the beach having lost her virginity to Jean-Paul), I remained more interested in simply watching beautiful people do very little. “Tomorrow I will take a long siesta,” Marianne declares, lying on a couch in her bathing suit after a day by the pool. Yes, please.

That a film so grounded in the gratuitous has resonated in 2021 is perhaps not entirely surprising. After a year in which New York City suffered enormous loss and its residents lived heavily circumscribed lives, it’s understandable we are looking to take our clothes off and have a good time, onscreen and off.

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Health

Washington state infections and hospitalizations hit document

Washington state infections and hospitalizations hit record

An infection control nurse accompanies a patient who was born on Jan.

Karen Ducey | Getty Images

Covid-19 transmissions and hospitalizations in Washington state are at all-time highs, according to the state’s Department of Health.

On July 8, Washington recorded a Covid infection prevalence of 1 in 588 residents. Just one month later, on August 6, that number almost quadrupled to a Covid infection prevalence of 1 in 156 residents, the department said on Thursday. The latest numbers exceeded those of the state’s third wave of Covid infections in the winter of 2020.

According to a CNBC analysis of data from Johns Hopkins University, Washington state reports a seven-day average of 38.5 daily new cases per 100,000 population, ranking 22nd among all states.

Four counties had 14-day new infection rates of 500 per 100,000 Washington residents and five counties had rates of 300 to 500 per 100,000 residents. Sixteen counties had rates from 200 to 300 and 12 counties had rates from 100 to 200. The delta variant accounts for 98% of the cases in the state.

Hospital admissions in the state also rose, with a seven-day moving average of 29 hospital admissions for Covid on June 16. The number remained relatively low through July 8, but tripled by August 6 to a seven-day moving average of 96 hospital admissions for Covid symptoms. The state found that hospital admissions for people between the ages of 20 and 30 have increased, a trend seen in hospitals across the country as most older Americans were vaccinated.

Admissions to state hospitals for the unvaccinated and over 65s are six times higher than for those who are fully vaccinated. In people aged 16 to 64, unvaccinated people are ten times more likely to be hospitalized than their vaccinated counterparts. “If the entire population were to experience the hospitalization rates currently observed in unvaccinated people, the hospital system would be completely overwhelmed,” the state health department said in a statement.

Death rates have been down since Jan.

Immunity to prior infection in the state is only 15.5%, which would leave 84.5% of Washington residents unprotected if they did not have access to Covid-19 vaccines. According to the Ministry of Health, by August 16, 71.5% of the population aged 12 and over had received at least one dose of a Covid vaccine.

In the nationwide population, immunity to previous infections and vaccinations is 54.7%, an increase of only 2.8% since July 6.

“It is imperative to realize that literally any of us or our loved ones could be in need of hospital treatment in the near future,” said Acting State Science Director Dr. Scott Lindquist. “To ensure that care is available when needed, our hospitals are currently counting on each of us to be masked and vaccinated.”

CNBC’s Nate Rattner contributed to this report.

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Entertainment

Chuck E. Weiss, Musician Who, in Love, Impressed a Hit Music, Dies at 76

Chuck E. Weiss, Musician Who, in Love, Inspired a Hit Song, Dies at 76

Chuck E. Weiss, blues musician, club owner and oversized character from Los Angeles, who was immortalized in Rickie Lee Jones’ breakout hit “Chuck E.’s in Love”, died on July 20 at Cedars Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles . He was 76.

His brother Byron said the cause was kidney failure.

Mr. Weiss was a voracious musicologist, encyclopedia of obscure jazz and early R&B artists, drummer, songwriter, and widely recognized villain who moved from his Denver home to his friend, singer-songwriter Tom., In the mid-1970s Los Angeles Landed Waiting.

At the Troubadour, the venerable folk club in West Hollywood where Mr. Weiss worked as a dishwasher for a while, they met another young singer-songwriter, a former runaway named Rickie Lee Jones. Mr. Waits and Ms. Jones became one item, and the three became inseparable as they wandered Hollywood, stealing lawn trinkets and joking people at music industry parties (like shaking hands with dip on their palms).

“Sometimes it seems like we’re real romantic dreamers stuck in the wrong time zone,” Ms. Jones told Rolling Stone in 1979, describing Mr. Weiss and Mr. Waits as their family at the time.

They stayed at the Tropicana Motel, a shabby 1940s bohemian on Santa Monica Boulevard. “It was a normal DMZ,” Mr. Weiss told LA Weekly in 1981, “except that they were all tan and good-looking.”

In the fall of 1977, Mr. Weiss called his pals in Los Angeles on a trip home to Denver, and when Mr. Waits hung up the phone, he announced to Ms. Jones, “Chuck E. is in love! ”

Two years later, Ms. Jones’ fanciful riff to that explanation had – “What’s her name? (Though the last line of the song suggests otherwise, it wasn’t Ms. Jones that Mr. Weiss fell in love with; it was a distant cousin of his.)

The song was a hit single, the opening track of Ms. Jones’ debut album “Rickie Lee Jones” and was nominated for a Grammy Award for Song of the Year in 1980. (“What a Fool Believes,” performed by the Doobie Brothers, took the honor.)

In a July 21 essay in the Los Angeles Times, Ms. Jones wrote that when she first met Mr. Waits and Mr. Weiss, she could not tell them apart. “They were two of the most charismatic characters Hollywood had seen in decades, and without them the entire street of Santa Monica Boulevard would have collapsed.”

In a telephone interview, she has since said of Mr. Weiss: “It was nonsense in him, he was our trickster. He was an exciting guy and a disaster for a while, as exciting people often are. “

Charles Edward Weiss was born in Denver on March 18, 1945. His father Leo was in the salvage business; his mother, Jeannette (Rollnick) Weiss, owned a hat shop, Hollywood Millinery. Chuck graduated from East High School and attended Mesa Junior College, now Colorado Mesa, in Grand Junction.

His brother is his only immediate survivor.

In his early 20s, Mr. Weiss met Chuck Morris, now a music organizer, when Mr. Morris was a co-owner of Tulagi, a music club in Boulder, Colorado. When blues performers like Lightnin ‘Hopkins and John Lee Hooker came through, they often traveled alone, and it was up to Mr. Morris to find them a local band. He would ask Mr. Weiss to fill in as the drummer.

In 1973, Mr. Morris opened a nightclub called Ebbets Field in Denver (he was born in Brooklyn), which attracted artists such as Willie Nelson, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and Mr. Waits. Mr. Weiss also took part there.

At that time, as Mr Weiss recalled in 2014, he was trying to record his own music and had a habit of asking performers to play with him. That’s how he met Mr. Waits. “And I think what happened was that one night I saw Waits doing some finger pop things in Ebbets Fields,” he said, “and I went to see him after the show. I was wearing a pair of platform shoes and a chinchilla coat and slipped on the ice in the street outside because I was so high and asked if he wanted to take me on. He looked at me like I was out of space, man. “

Still, he said, they quickly became friends.

Mr. Waits, interviewed by the Philadelphia Inquirer in 1999, described Mr. Weiss as “a human, a liar, a monkey, and a pathological vaudevilian.”

Mr. Waits and Mr. Weiss ended up working together on a number of things, in one case they co-wrote the lyrics to “Spare Parts (A Nocturnal Emission),” a barroom lament on Mr. Waits’ album “Nighthawks at the Diner ”, published in 1975. Mr. Waits produced two albums for Mr. Weiss; the first, “Extremely Cool”, in 1999, was described in a review as “a silly, eclectic mix of loosely played blues and boogie-woogie”.

Although his songwriting was unique – “Anthem for Lost Souls” was told from the perspective of a neighbor’s cat – Mr. Weiss was best known for his live performances. Gravelly, scruffy and long-winded, he was a blues man with a Borcht-belt humor.

For much of the 1980s, Mr. Weiss played at a Los Angeles club called Central, accompanied by his band The Goddamn Liars. He later encouraged his friend Johnny Depp to buy the house with him and others. They turned it into the Viper Room, the celebrity-speckled nightclub from the ’90s.

He has been asked many times how he felt about his star turn in Ms. Jones’ hit. “Yeah, I was amazed,” he told The Associated Press in 2007. “Little did we know we’d both be known for the rest of our lives.”

But the rest of her life would no longer be intertwined.

“When ‘Chuck E.’s in Love’ disappeared from the sky and disappeared into the ‘I hate that song’ desert, which it still hasn’t really recovered from, he and I became estranged and everyone became different from everyone else Cut.” Ms. Jones wrote about Mr. Weiss in her article for the Los Angeles Times. “Wait left, the short Camelot on our street corner is over. I had made fictions out of us, made heroes out of very unheroic people. But I’m glad I did. “

Later on the phone, she said, “Two of the three of us became very successful musicians, but Chuck wasn’t, and he knew a lot of people.” She added, “We think being the most famous is a win, but I’m not sure. Chuck did everything right. “

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Why U.S. will not hit Fourth of July objectives

United States President Joe Biden speaks during an event in the South Court Auditorium of the White House on June 2, 2021 in Washington, DC.

Biden’s government says it will miss its July 4th vaccination target

All that free beer, donuts, and baseball tickets won’t be enough to keep up with the pace of vaccinations.

President Joe Biden’s goal of getting at least one shot in the arms of 70% of US adults before the July 4th holidays is missed.

According to a CNBC analysis of CDC data, by then about 67% of adults will be at least partially vaccinated at the current vaccination rate.

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The president said he hoped Independence Day would mark a turning point in the pandemic.

Yet vaccination efforts have come up against a wall in some states, despite the fact that the Delta variant of the disease is rapidly spreading across the country.

More from Personal Finance:
States hope free joints and other perks will generate interest
More and more universities are demanding Covid vaccines
More people plan to quit when return to work plans take hold

From Krispy Kreme to cold money, there is now no shortage of incentives to entice Americans into the Covid vaccine. But vaccination rates stay below 70% and are likely to stay there, according to Iwan Barrankay, professor of business and public policy at Wharton.

“These incentives are a great idea and they are very engaging, but there is simply no evidence that these incentives address the barriers,” Barankay said.

“We get into a population of people who are vehemently against it or who have a life situation that is too complicated,” he said. This group will not be swayed by vaccine sweeteners like cash gifts, sports tickets and free food, he added.

For some, socio-economic barriers remain, such as childcare or time off work to get vaccinated.

Barrankay has spent years researching what works to encourage patients to take their medication. Financial incentives are not compelling for patients with complicated lives, he said. Low income, inadequate housing, lack of transportation, and caring for others in the household are all factors that can get in the way.

In some cases, there is no incentive that you can offer people.

Ivan Barankay

Wharton professor

For others, there are also behavioral barriers, including skepticism about the vaccine, that can be even more difficult to overcome.

“In some cases, there is no incentive you can give people,” Barankay said.

Some Americans, especially those in black, Hispanic, and rural communities, are more reluctant to get Covid vaccinations.

“People are influenced by others around them,” said Barrankay. “If you can change someone’s behavior in a community, it has a multiplier effect, but it is much more difficult work.”

Still, as vaccination rates plateau, public and private groups continue to increase the stakes – from million dollar payouts and even marijuana or a lap around a NASCAR track – to encourage more vaccinations.

In May, Maryland hosted the first of its $ 40,000 lottery draws for people who were vaccinated. Forty consecutive days of the drawing for a prize of $ 40,000 will end on July 4th with a final drawing for a payout of $ 400,000.

Ohio also hosts a series of cash prize draws with its own “Vax-a-Million” contest.

In the private sector, Krispy Kreme was one of the first in March to introduce a nationwide Covid vaccine incentive, offering a free glazed donut to every adult with a vaccination card. The company said it has already given away more than 1.5 million donuts. (The offer is still valid for the rest of the year.)

And Anheuser-Busch recently said it would buy “a round of beer” to anyone over the age of 21 once Biden’s 70% target is reached on July 4th.

A handful of states have reported that vaccination incentive programs have increased local vaccination rates in some populations following recent declines.

For its part, Ohio said its vaccination rates doubled in some counties after the state vaccine lottery was announced.

Recent data shows that the Gambit could be effective with certain groups and have few overall drawbacks, according to a Morning Consult report.

The survey of 2,200 adults, including nearly 1,600 unvaccinated people, found that men are more likely than women to say that these offers would get them to sign up for a vaccination.

Democrats, more than Republicans, also said they were more likely to get vaccinated if they could get free goods or services, and when broken down by generations, millennials were the most likely to say that certain freebies would encourage them to get vaccinated.

A separate survey by Blackhawk Network found that money is the most popular motivator over a sweepstakes, paid time off, free food or drink, or other commodity.

About 66% of unvaccinated adults said they would accept a monetary incentive, and 44% said they would even get vaccinated for $ 100 or less. Blackhawk Network surveyed more than 3,000 adults in June.

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Simply because the field workplace hit its stride, the delta variant appeared

Just as the box office hit its stride, the delta variant appeared

A slow and steady increase in box office receipts could be threatened by a new variant of the coronavirus.

The domestic box office has gained momentum since March, bringing in up to $ 98.7 million in ticket sales last weekend, a record during the pandemic era.

Around 80% of the cinemas are open to the public this weekend, and mask restrictions on those who have received the coronavirus vaccination have been relaxed. With cinemas opening wider and Covid cases falling, studios have been confident of releasing big blockbuster pictures.

Last weekend, Universal’s “F9” hit the highest opening weekend of any movie released during the pandemic for a grand total of $ 70 million and helped increase total weekend loot to $ 98.7 million, another record for the industry .

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More than half of the US population has received at least one dose of the vaccine, which has resulted in a sharp decrease in the number of deaths from Covid, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The number of new cases had fallen significantly in the last few weeks and is still well below its peak. However, public health officials are watching the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant in communities with low vaccination rates, which has led to a surge in cases recently.

It is feared that an increase in the cases of Delta variants could lead to a resurgence of health and safety restrictions not only domestically but also internationally and discourage worldwide moviegoers from going to the movies.

Cities like Los Angeles have already chosen to reverse mask guidelines and strongly recommend that both unvaccinated and vaccinated individuals wear masks in public places such as restaurants, shops, and movie theaters. Cinema chains have told CNBC that cinema locations will continue to comply with all local regulations.

“Each state is loosening mask strategies so many companies could be affected if it flares up,” said Eric Handler, media and entertainment analyst at MKM Partners. “I hope the vaccines can help fight it off enough that it’s not a big problem.”

CDC director Rochelle Walensky said Wednesday that the US has a high vaccination rate and its highly potent vaccines have allowed them to relax mask restrictions and social distancing measures. In comparison, much of the world is still unvaccinated and there is currently evidence that vaccines developed outside of the United States have been less effective.

“The global outlook also remains important as studios and exhibitors closely monitor key international markets and the evolution of their various vaccine distributions in the second half of the year,” said Shawn Robbins, chief analyst at Boxoffice.com.

In some countries where the Delta variant is on the rise, new lockdown measures have been imposed.

The Delta variant currently accounts for about 25% of the new cases sequenced in the US, and officials believe it will become the dominant strain in the country. In some counties, the delta variant rates are up to 50% according to the CDC.

The US government is concerned about parts of the US where vaccination rates are low. Domestically, about 1,000 counties in the United States have a vaccination coverage rate of less than 30%, Walensky said Thursday. These counties are mainly in the Southeast and Midwest and are the most prone to getting Covid infection, she said. The authority already sees increasing disease rates in these districts due to the further spread of the more transmissible delta variant.

“The movie industry, like many others, has been considering variant scenarios similar to the current one under the reopening plans and nothing is taken for granted,” said Robbins. “At this point, however, there is no evidence of an immediate impact on domestic cinemas as long as the vaccinated individuals remain protected, as health officials have widely reported.”

– CNBC’s Rich Mendez contributed to this report.

Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC. NBCUniversal is the distributor of “F9”.

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A Coronavirus Epidemic Hit 20,000 Years In the past, New Research Finds

A Coronavirus Epidemic Hit 20,000 Years Ago, New Study Finds

Researchers have found evidence that a coronavirus epidemic swept East Asia about 20,000 years ago and was devastating enough to leave an evolutionary imprint on the DNA of people living today.

The new study suggests that the region was plagued by an ancient coronavirus for many years, researchers say. The finding could have devastating effects on the Covid-19 pandemic if it is not brought under control soon with vaccinations.

“It should worry us,” said David Enard, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona who led the study, which was published Thursday in the journal Current Biology. “What is happening now could last for generations.”

So far, researchers have not been able to look very far back into the history of this family of pathogens. Over the past 20 years, three coronaviruses have adapted to infect people and cause serious respiratory illnesses: Covid-19, SARS, and MERS. Studies on each of these coronaviruses suggest that they jumped into our species from bats or other mammals.

Four other coronaviruses can also infect people, but usually only cause mild colds. Scientists didn’t directly observe how these coronaviruses became human pathogens, so they relied on indirect clues to gauge when the jumps happened. Coronaviruses acquire new mutations at roughly regular rates, and so by comparing their genetic variation it can be determined when they deviated from a common ancestor.

The youngest of these mild coronaviruses, called HCoV-HKU1, crossed species boundary in the 1950s. The oldest, called HCoV-NL63, can be up to 820 years old.

But before that, the coronavirus trail got cold – until Dr. Enard and his colleagues applied a new method to the search. Instead of looking at the coronavirus genes, the researchers looked at the effects on the DNA of their human hosts.

Viruses cause enormous changes in the human genome over generations. A mutation that protects against a viral infection can make the difference between life and death and is passed on to the offspring. For example, a life-saving mutation could allow humans to hack up the proteins of a virus.

But viruses can also develop. Your proteins can change shape to overcome a host’s defenses. And these changes could spur the host to develop even more counter-offensives, which leads to more mutations.

If a random new mutation creates resistance to a virus, it can quickly become more common from one generation to the next. And other versions of this gene are becoming rarer. So if, in large groups of people, one version of a gene dominates all the others, scientists know that it is most likely a sign of rapid evolution in the past.

In recent years, Dr. Enard and his colleagues searched the human genome for these genetic variation patterns to reconstruct the history of a number of viruses. When the pandemic broke out, he wondered if ancient coronaviruses had left their own mark.

He and his colleagues compared the DNA of thousands of people from 26 different populations around the world, looking at a combination of genes known to be critical for coronaviruses but not other types of pathogens. In East Asian populations, the scientists found that 42 of these genes had a dominant version. That was a strong signal that people in East Asia had adapted to an ancient coronavirus.

But whatever happened in East Asia seemed to be confined to that region. “When we compared them to populations around the world, we couldn’t find the signal,” said Yassine Souilmi, postdoctoral fellow at the University of Adelaide in Australia and co-author of the new study.

The scientists then tried to estimate how long East Asians had already adapted to a coronavirus. They took advantage of the fact that once a dominant version of a gene begins to be passed down through the generations, it can acquire harmless random mutations. The more time passes, the more of these mutations accumulate.

Dr. Enard and his colleagues found that all 42 genes had about the same number of mutations. That meant they had all evolved rapidly at about the same time. “This is a signal that we should definitely not expect by chance,” said Dr. Enard.

They estimated that all of these genes developed their antiviral mutations sometime between 20,000 and 25,000 years ago, most likely over the course of a few centuries. This is a surprising finding, since the East Asians did not live in dense communities at the time, but rather formed small groups of hunters and gatherers.

Aida Andres, an evolutionary geneticist at University College London who was not involved in the new study, said she found the work compelling. “I’m pretty sure there is something,” she said.

Still, she didn’t think it was possible to give an accurate estimate of how long ago the ancient epidemic was. “Timing is a complicated thing,” she said. “Whether that happened a few thousand years before or after – I personally think that we can’t be so sure about it.”

Scientists looking for drugs to fight the new coronavirus may want to study the 42 genes that evolved in response to the old epidemic, said Dr. Souilmi. “It actually points us out to molecular buttons to adjust the immune response to the virus,” he said.

Dr. Anders agreed, saying that the genes identified in the new study should receive special attention as drug targets. “You know they are important,” she said. “That’s the beauty of evolution.”

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Health

Biden administration says it will not hit Fourth of July objectives

Biden administration says it won't hit Fourth of July goals

The Biden administration said Tuesday that it is unlikely to meet President Joe Biden’s goal of getting 70% of American adults to receive one or more vaccinations by July 4th.

White House Covid Tsar Jeff Zients said the government has reached its 70 percent target for people 30 and older and is well on its way to achieving it by July 4th for those 27 and older.

“We believe it will take a few more weeks to reach 70% of adults with at least one vaccination, including those aged 18-26,” he said.

Still, Zients insisted that the White House “exceeded our highest expectations” in its vaccination program and achieved a vision for Biden in March of gathering friends and family safely to celebrate the holiday.

Biden set two goals in early May: to have 70% of adults in the United States given at least one vaccination, and to fully vaccinate 160 million American adults by Independence Day.

About 65% of American adults will have had one or more injections by Monday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A CNBC analysis of the CDC data shows that with the current vaccination schedule, about 67% of adults are at least partially vaccinated by the fourth.

According to CDC data, around 144 million people aged 18 and over are fully vaccinated, on the way to reaching around 151 million if the current pace of daily vaccinations reported remains constant.

United States President Joe Biden speaks during an event in the South Court Auditorium of the White House on June 2, 2021 in Washington, DC.

Alex Wong | Getty Images

When Biden first announced his two goals on May 4th, the US was well on its way to scoring both. However, according to CDC data, the vaccination rate has fallen in the weeks since the seven-day average from 2.2 million vaccinations per day in all age groups to 1.1 million on June 21.

The government has easily met its previous vaccination goals in the first 100 days of the president’s tenure. Biden initially targeted 100 million vaccinations in 100 days, which was criticized as being too easy, and achieved it on day 58. The White House raised the target to 200 million vaccinations, which it surpassed on the 92nd day of the presidency.

Amid the vaccination campaign, nationwide case numbers have dropped to levels not seen since the early days of the pandemic, although the risk of disease remains for the unvaccinated.

Zients said many younger Americans are less eager to get a vaccination and stressed the importance of vaccinations for this age group due to the spread of the Delta variant.

Biden warned on Friday that the highly contagious variant, first identified in India, appears to be “particularly dangerous” for young people.

“The data is clear: if you are not vaccinated, there is a risk that you will become seriously ill, or die, or spread,” Biden said during a White House press conference.

Sixteen states and the District of Columbia have already reached Biden’s goal, led by Vermont, Hawaii and Massachusetts, where more than 80% of adults are at least partially vaccinated.

Other states are lagging behind, 17 of which are below the 60% mark. These include Mississippi, Louisiana, Wyoming, and Alabama, each of which less than 50% of its adult residents hit one or more shots.

“Our work doesn’t stop on July 4th or at 70%,” said Zients, calling Biden’s goals a “goal worth striving for in order to make progress in a short period of time.”

“We want every American in every community to be protected and free from fear of the virus,” Zients said.

– CNBC’s Berkeley Lovelace Jr. contributed to this report.

Categories
World News

Planet set to hit crucial temperature restrict quickly

Planet set to hit critical temperature limit soon

A family walks across dry cracked earth that used to be the bottom of Lake Mendocino on April 22, 2021 in Ukiah, California.

Justin Sullivan | Getty Images

The likelihood of the planet reaching a key temperature limit within the next five years has doubled, according to a study by climate scientists, with the world on track to witness the hottest year on record in that same time frame.

“There is about a 40% chance of the annual average global temperature temporarily reaching 1.5° Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above the pre-industrial level in at least one of the next five years — and these odds are increasing with time,” the World Meteorological Organization said on Thursday. The WMO, a specialized agency of the United Nations, said this had doubled from 20% in the last decade.

That 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial level is the lower target of the landmark 2015 Paris Agreement. The climate accord is widely recognized as critically important to avoid an irreversible climate crisis.

In 2020 — one of the three hottest years on record — the global average temperature was 1.2 °C above the pre-industrial baseline, the WMO reported in April. The Paris Agreement aims to keep the rise in global temperature significantly below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels this century.

“There is a 90% likelihood of at least one year between 2021-2025 becoming the warmest on record,” the WMO said in its press release.

Between now and 2025, high latitude regions like Europe, the northern U.S. and Canada, and Russia, as well as the Sahel in Africa, are likely to become wetter and the Atlantic is expected to see more tropical cyclones compared to the recent past, which the WMO defines as the 1981-2010 average. 

“These are more than just statistics,” WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said in a statement. 

“Increasing temperatures mean more melting ice, higher sea levels, more heatwaves and other extreme weather, and greater impacts on food security, health, the environment and sustainable development,” he said.

Still, the WMO says that it is “very unlikely,” with just a 10% probability, that the five-year mean annual temperature of the planet will be 1.5°C warmer than pre-industrial levels for the entire 2021-2025 period. The 90% likelihood refers to that temperature rise in any one of the next five years.  

Speaking about the report, senior Met Office scientist Leon Hermanson told BBC News on Thursday: “We’re approaching 1.5 C – we’re not there yet but we’re getting close. Time is running out for the strong action which we need now.”

Worse extreme disaster events

Governments around the world have launched ambitious targets to cut carbon emissions and major energy companies are now beginning to feel the impact of the climate movement as some heavyweight investors pressure firms to decrease their fossil fuel use.

But substantially lowering emissions will be an extremely challenging endeavor, scientists warn. The WMO notes that the Paris Accords’ “nationally determined contributions,” or states’ commitments to emissions reductions, “currently fall far short of what is needed to achieve this target.”

And energy demand is expected to rise dramatically in the coming years as the world’s population continues to grow, with most of that need still set to be met by fossil fuels, according to the Energy Information Administration.

The COP26 Summit scheduled for November of this year in Glasgow, Scotland is being described by many in the scientific and policymaking community as a crucial “make or break” moment for governments to stem what many warn will be a climate disaster as sea levels and global temperatures rise. 

In the U.S. alone, intensifying rainfall fueled by climate change has caused nearly $75 billion in flood damage in the past thirty years, Stanford University researchers found in a study published in January. Those researchers warned that passing warming levels outlined in the global Paris Climate Accord will worsen extreme disaster events.

And developing nations are most exposed to climate risk — especially those in coastal areas and those highly dependent on predictable weather patterns for agricultural production.

Morgan Stanley in 2019 reported that climate-related disasters have cost the world $650 billion over the last three years, with North America shouldering most of the burden.

Categories
Business

Man Fieri is on a mission to assist save eating places hit by pandemic

Guy Fieri is on a mission to help save restaurants hit by pandemic

Food Network star and restaurateur Guy Fieri has more on his mind these days than navigating his own restaurant business out of the Covid pandemic.

He’s trying to help revitalize the industry itself.

Next month, he’ll give out $300,000 in grants to aspiring restaurant entrepreneurs and existing owners.

“I’ve been very blessed,” said Fieri, who recently signed a three-year deal with the Food Network that Forbes said is worth $80 million.

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“That’s why I try to turn my time and attention to helping others and raising that money and raising some awareness,” he added.

About 90,000 eating and drinking establishments are still closed, either completely or long term, according to the National Restaurant Association’s Covid-19 Operator Survey for April.

Those that are open are dealing with higher costs and lower profits.

The grants, to be made in partnership with the National Restaurant Association Education Foundation and the California Restaurant Association, will take place during Fieri’s event, Guy’s Restaurant Reboot, on June 12 at 7 p.m. ET. It will be livestreamed on his Facebook page and GuysRestaurantReboot.com, as well as simulcast across other social media platforms.

NBC | NBCUniversal | Getty Images

The recipients, who will get $25,000 each, will be chosen by the two food groups, Fieri said. The grants are largely funded by the event’s sponsors, including LendingTree. In fact, there will be no fundraising during the event. Instead, celebrities and culinary icons will join in with food creations and conversation.

“It’s not a telethon,” Fieri said. “It’s a celebration, an inspiration.

“We want to remind everybody: Go eat out more often,” he added. “Go get more delivery. Buy more gift certificates.”

This isn’t Fieri’s first foray into philanthropy. He’s been honored by Make-A-Wish for his work with the charity and he fed firefighters battling California wildfires last year, among other activities.

Also last year, he raised $21.5 million to help restaurant workers through the National Restaurant Association’s Employee Relief Fund. The result: $500 grants to more than 43,000 workers.

Now, as restaurants reopen and try to move forward, workers are hard to find. In fact, 84% of operators say their staffing level is lower than it was in the absence of Covid-19, the National Restaurant Association’s April survey found.

Owners have blamed unemployment benefits, lack of child care for working parents and people leaving the business during the pandemic.

“I hope folks are recognizing that the industry needs you,” Fieri said. “The industry has been great to you.”

Even Fieri is feeling the pain. He recently tried to get a friend into Guy Fieri’s Vegas Kitchen and Bar for lunch on a weekday — only to find out the location wasn’t open for those hours yet.

“It’s a variety of topics, staffing being one of them,” he said.

“But we’re making it, you know, we’re coming back.”

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