By Tinashe Chingarande, Special to the AFRO The first presumptive case of monkeypox was reported at the University of Maryland on Aug. 17, according to a campus-wide email sent to students, faculty and staff. The email assured the university community that precautions were being taken to prevent the spread of the disease on campus. “The […]
Category: Coronavirus
Posted inHealth
WHO wants name change for ‘Monkeypox’ virus, calling it ‘discriminatory and stigmatizing’
By Black Press USA NNPA NEWSWIRE – The World Health Organization (WHO) has announced plans to find a new name for the viral disease informally known as ‘monkeypox,’ which the world body says is “discriminatory and stigmatizing.” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, in a briefing on the matter, said the virus is no longer behaving […]
Posted inWord In Black
A back-to-school letter to my daughter
By Rashaad Thomas, Word In Black News about school shootings, achievement gaps, the digital divide, COVID-19, and monkeypox inundate us daily. Watching my 7-year-old daughter walk onto her school campus for her first day of second grade makes not worrying about all that extremely difficult. My wife and I struggled with the decision to send […]
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Baltimore schools prep for a school year with COVID-19, safety and teacher shortage concerns
By Kara Thompson, Special to the AFRO As August draws to a close, back-to-school preparations are kicking into high gear. Teachers and school systems across the country are making arrangements to welcome students back to the classroom, including Baltimore County and Baltimore City. At the start of the last school year, school systems in the […]
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Prince George’s County Schools resume mask mandate as students return
By Deborah Bailey, AFRO D.C. Editor Officials in Prince George’s County have announced that students will start the 2022-2023 school year with masks on. The PGCPS website recently notified parents that masking is now required of Prince George’s County Public Schools (PGCPS) students and employees. “In light of the highly contagious COVID-19 BA.5 variant, Prince […]
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COVID-19 safety protocols priority for students heading back to D.C. schools
By Samuel Williams Jr., Special to the AFRO D.C. Public Schools (DCPS) officials are taking no chances with potential COVID-19 outbreaks as they prepare to open. DCPS used the summer ahead of the 2022-2023 school year to release important up-to-date COVID information for families through its new website, dcpsstrong.com. Families currently have access to the […]
Posted inHealth
Biden Administration Declares Public Health Emergency Over Monkeypox Outbreak
NNPA NEWSWIRE — “We are prepared to take our response to the next level in addressing this virus, and we urge every American to take monkeypox seriously and to take responsibility to help us tackle this virus,” said Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra. By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent, @StacyBrownMedia […]
Posted inCoronavirus
Pandemic blues: how the Black community weathered a global pandemic – again
Compiled by AFRO Staff In March of 2020 the activities of day-to-day life came to a grinding halt as the coronavirus pandemic began. No country has been left untouched by COVID-19, the condition caused by the virus. Communities across the globe have struggled to combat an enemy you can’t see- a coronavirus moving at uncontrollable […]
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Boost now or wait? Many wonder how best to ride out COVID’s next wave
By Sam Whitehead and Arthur Allen, Kaiser Permanente for Word in Black Gwyneth Paige didn’t want to get vaccinated against COVID-19 at first. With her health issues — hypertension, fibromyalgia, asthma — she wanted to see how other people fared after the shots. Then her mother got colon cancer. “At that point, I didn’t care […]
Posted inHealth
Some schools hit hard by virus make few changes for new year
By Sharon Lurye and Collin Binkley, The Associated Press As a new school year approaches, COVID-19 infections are again on the rise, fueled by highly transmissible variants, filling families with dread. They fear the return of a pandemic scourge: outbreaks that sideline large numbers of teachers, close school buildings and force students back into remote […]
Posted inWord In Black
#WordinBlack: What happens to Black kids when record numbers of teachers quit?
By Maya Pottiger, Word in Black The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted every aspect of our lives, but there’s one that has taken an incredibly dramatic hit: schooling. First, there was the shift to virtual learning, which had its own ups and downs. Then came the debates over how soon students should return to in-person learning, […]
Posted inCoronavirus
#WordinBlack: Fact check FALSE: If you’re young you can’t get COVID-19, and if you do – it’s not ‘that bad
By Heather M. Butts, JD, MPH, MA, Word in Black In the early days of the pandemic, the prevailing notion regarding COVID-19 was that it was a disease that only affected older people. The term “Boomer Remover” became prevalent on the internet, referring to COVID-19 as a disease that kills older individuals. According to Johns […]