WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court turned away a Missouri appeal that sought to ensure states can cut taxes even as they receive $195 billion in federal pandemic relief money.

The justices without comment left in place a federal appeals court decision that said Missouri lacked legal standing to press a lawsuit over the requirements imposed under the American Rescue Plan Act.

Missouri is among several Republican-led states that sued after President Joe Biden signed the $1.9 trillion measure into law in March 2021. The law includes a provision that says a state can’t use the money “to either directly or indirectly offset a reduction in the net tax revenue of such state.”

Missouri said that provision prohibits only the deliberate use of relief funds to pay for a tax cut. The state argued that the Treasury Department’s interpretation of the law would sweep more broadly, blocking any new state tax policy that reduces revenue without some sort of offset.

The St. Louis-based 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals faulted Missouri for not pointing to any particular state policy that might run afoul of the federal rule. The state was seeking “a quintessentially advisory opinion,” something federal courts don’t issue, Judge Jane Kelly wrote for the panel.

The rejection is a victory for the Biden administration, which is fighting legal battles around the country over the restriction. A different federal appeals court, the Cincinnati-based 6th Circuit, said in November the provision is too vague to be enforced.

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The five anonymous people were challenging a provision of Assembly Bill 173, which passed in 2021 and permits the sharing of data about firearm and ammunition purchases in California with “bona fide research institutions.”

The plaintiffs contend the law violates their rights under the Second and Fourteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution, which address gun ownership and equal protection under the law.

On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Larry Alan Burns in San Diego granted a request by Attorney General Rob Bonta to dismiss the suit.

Burns noted that AB 173 only permits sharing, under strict protocols, of information that the state already has about gun buyers and applicants for concealed-carry permits.

“The limited disclosure of private information for research purposes permitted by AB 173 doesn’t expose Plaintiffs to any novel risks or impose new burdens on them,” the ruling says.

Addressing the incident last year in which the state Justice Department publicly exposed personal information about applicants for concealed-carry permits, the ruling noted that none of it came from Stanford or UC Davis.

Speculation that such data could be hacked or deliberately disclosed has had no apparent “chilling effect” in the past on gun purchases, the ruling added.

So far, the two universities are the only institutions eligible to access the information, which includes gun owners’ names, addresses and ages. The database is to be used for studying and preventing gun violence, shooting accidents and suicide.

The plaintiffs have until Feb. 10 to file an amended complaint.

BEIJING — China’s population shrank for the first time in decades last year as its birthrate plunged, official figures showed Tuesday, adding to pressure on leaders to keep the economy growing despite an aging workforce and at a time of rising tension with the U.S.

Despite the official numbers, some experts believe China’s population has been in decline for a few years — a dramatic turn in a country that once sought to control such growth through a one-child policy.

Many wealthy countries are struggling with how to respond to aging populations, which can be a drag on economic growth as shrinking numbers of workers try to support growing numbers of elderly people.

But the demographic change will be especially difficult to manage in a middle-income country like China, which does not have the resources to care for an aging population in the same way that one like Japan does. Over time, that will likely slow its economy and perhaps even the world’s, and could potentially keep inflation higher in many developed economies.

“China has become older before it has become rich,” said Yi Fuxian, a demographer and expert on Chinese population trends at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

A slowing economy could also pose a political problem for the ruling Communist Party, if shrinking opportunities foment public discontent. Anger over strict COVID-19 lockdowns, which were a drag on the economy, spilled over late last year into protests that in some cases called for leader Xi Jinping to step down — a rare direct challenge to the party.

The National Bureau of Statistics reported Tuesday that the country had 850,000 fewer people at the end of 2022 than the previous year. The tally includes only the population of mainland China, excluding Hong Kong and Macao as well as foreign residents.

Over 1 million fewer babies were born than the previous year amid a slowing economy and widespread pandemic lockdowns, according to official figures. The bureau reported 9.56 million births in 2022; deaths ticked up to 10.41 million.

It wasn’t clear if the population figures were affected by a widespread COVID-19 outbreak following the easing of pandemic restrictions last month. China recently reported 60,000 COVID-related deaths since early December, but some experts believe the government is likely underreporting deaths.

The last time China is believed to have experienced a population decline was during the Great Leap Forward, a disastrous drive for collective farming and industrialization launched by then-leader Mao Zedong at the end of the 1950s that produced a massive famine that killed tens of millions of people.

China’s population has begun to decline nine to 10 years earlier than Chinese officials predicted and the United Nation projected, said Yi, the demographer. At 1.4 billion, the country has long been the world’s most populous nation, but is expected to soon be overtaken by India, if it has not already.

China has sought to bolster its population since officially ending its one-child policy in 2016. Since then, China has tried to encourage families to have second or even third children, with little success, reflecting attitudes in much of east Asia where birth rates have fallen precipitously. In China, the expense of raising children in cities is often cited as a cause.

Zhang Huimin bemoaned the “fierce competition” young people face these days — a fairly typical attitude toward starting a family among her age group.

“Home prices are high and jobs are not easy to find,” said the 23-year-old Beijing resident. “I enjoy living by myself. When I feel lonely, I can take pleasure in staying with my friends or keeping pets.”

Yi said that his own research shows China’s population has actually been declining since 2018, indicating the population crisis is “much more severe” than previously thought. The country now has one of the lowest fertility rates in the world, comparable only to Taiwan and South Korea, he said.

That means China’s “real demographic crisis is beyond imagination and that all of China’s past economic, social, defense and foreign policies were based on faulty demographic data,” Yi told The Associated Press.

The looming economic crisis will be worse than Japan’s, where years of low growth have been blamed in part on a shrinking population, Yi said.

The statistics bureau said the working-age population between 16 and 59 years old totaled 875.56 million, accounting for 62% of the national population, while those aged 65 and older totaled 209.78 million, accounting for 14.9% of the total.

It also reported China’s economic growth fell to its second-lowest level in at least four decades last year, although activity is reviving after the lifting of COVID-19 restrictions that kept millions of people at home.

Any slowdown has wider implications. China became a global manufacturing powerhouse in the early 2000s. With millions of its citizens flocking from the countryside to its cities, China’s seemingly endless supply of cheap labor lowered costs for consumers around the world for computers, smartphones, furniture, clothes and toys.

Its labor costs have already begun to rise — and changing demographics will likely accelerate that trend. As a result, inflation could creep higher in countries that import China’s products, though production may also move to lower-cost countries such as Vietnam, as it already has.

On top of the demographic challenges, China is increasingly in economic competition with the U.S., which has blocked the access of some Chinese companies to American technology, citing national security and fair competition concerns.

If handled correctly, a declining population does not necessarily translate to a weaker economy, said Stuart Gietel-Basten, professor of social science at Khalifa University in Abu Dhabi.”It’s a big psychological issue. Probably the biggest,” Gietel-Basten said.

According to the data from the statistics bureau, men outnumbered women by 722.06 million to 689.69 million, the bureau reported, a result of the one-child policy and a traditional preference for male offspring to carry on the family name.

The numbers also showed increasing urbanization in a country that traditionally had been largely rural. Over 2022, the permanent urban population increased by 6.46 million to reach 920.71 million, or 65.22%.

The United Nations estimated last year that the world’s population reached 8 billion on Nov. 15 and that India will replace China as the world’s most populous nation in 2023. India’s last census was scheduled for 2022 but was postponed amid the pandemic.

“The population of India is much younger and is growing. But there are many reasons why you wouldn’t necessarily automatically bet your entire fortune on India surpassing China economically in the very near future,” he said.

Among India’s many challenges is a level of female participation in the work force that is much lower than China’s, Gietel-Basten said.

“Whatever the population you have, it’s not what you’ve got but it’s what you do with it … to a degree,” he said.

Associated Press writers Huizhong Wu in Taipei, Taiwan, Kanis Leung in Hong Kong, and Chris Rugaber in Washington, and AP video journalist Emily Wang Fujiyama and video producer Olivia Zhang in Beijing contributed to this report.

It was the first time the two men had ever spoken. They’d chosen drastically different lives since that night in 1998, and when they met on that day in October 2021, Nelson had just left prison. Roberts, by then, was working with the Denver Police Department’s victim assistance unit.

Roberts found Nelson thanks to a random Facebook post. But Roberts wanted more than just to reconnect.

If they could build a relationship, he thought, telling their story could help young people who are at risk of being drawn into gun violence to make a better decision — for reconciliation over vengeance. Nelson, for his part, wanted to show them it’s possible to leave gangs and live a productive life.

There are only two places people in gangs wind up, he said: the grave or the penitentiary.

“I want them to see that change is possible,” he said. “Everybody is scared of change, but you have to do it if you want to go forward in the world.”

On Monday, the two men stood in front of a group of teenagers and, for the first time publicly, share their story. Their message comes as an increasing number of young people die in gun homicides every year. Fifteen teenagers were shot and killed in Denver in 2022 — nearly double the number of teens killed in 2019, when the mayor called youth gun violence an epidemic and convened city leaders to address the problem.

Roberts could have become a statistic like that. Or he could have sought out Nelson for revenge. Instead, he found his way to forgiveness.

“He’s like my brother now,” Roberts said.

Two lives collide in “chaos” of fighting at a party

Both men grew up in Denver in the 1990s, when a wave of gun violence bloodied the city’s streets. Roberts graduated from Overland High School in Aurora, and Nelson, three years younger, attended Denver’s East and South high schools. They didn’t know each other.

On Sept. 11, 1998, their lives intersected.

Nelson, 16 at the time, was invited to a party in Northeast Park Hill. He and his friends were looking for another teen they’d been having problems with — and he was on edge wondering if he’d see him there.

He brought a gun.

When someone at the party played a song about gang life, everyone started throwing their gang signs, Nelson said. Fights broke out and spilled outside.

“It was chaos — period,” Nelson said.

Roberts, then 19, arrived outside shortly before the violence erupted. He was dropping off a friend’s brother at the party. Immediately, he felt like they shouldn’t be there.

He got out of his car to say hi to a few people he recognized when he saw someone he knew, a basketball teammate at East High, about to get into a fight.

Roberts made his way through the crowd to break up the fighting.

As he weaved through the fights, someone hit him and he fell to the ground. He looked up and saw someone walking away. Assuming it was the person who hit him, he stood up, grabbed the man and took him to the ground.

The man Roberts tackled was Nelson, who thought he was about to get jumped.

Nelson fired two shots.

Roberts didn’t realize he’d been hit until he looked at his abdomen. He saw his shirt smoking. He felt the wound with his hand, stuck a finger inside.

“It felt like everything slowed down — time stopped — and then it was complete chaos again,” he recalled.

He asked a friend to help him over to some bushes. If he was going to die, he didn’t want to die in the street.

Instead, police and paramedics arrived and scooped him into an ambulance. He woke up the next morning in the hospital, his mom sitting by his bed. The bullet had pierced his colon.

Despite detectives’ insistence, Roberts couldn’t identify who shot him. He’d never seen Nelson before.

Roberts didn’t even recognize Nelson the next time they saw each other — in the downtown Denver courthouse, when Nelson was to be sentenced for shooting him. Before the hearing, they crossed paths in the bathroom.

“I remember thinking, ‘I wonder what he did?’ ” Roberts said.

It wasn’t until his case was called that Roberts realized the man in the bathroom was the same person who’d shot him. The judge sentenced Nelson to a boot camp program for teens and gave him a six-year suspended prison sentence.

But Nelson struggled to escape the gang life that surrounded him growing up. He spent most of the next two decades in and out of prison, with convictions that included burglary and attempting to escape. All told, 15 years locked up.

He said he realized during his most recent stint in prison that he was just spinning his wheels.

“I got tired of just living my life revolving around what other people think and other people believe,” he said. “I just woke up one day, and that was it. I gave everything up. I couldn’t do it anymore.”

Nelson was paroled and released from prison on Sept. 21, 2021.

“Tired of being angry,” Roberts forgives Nelson

Recovery from the shooting wasn’t easy for Roberts. For three months after Nelson shot him, he walked with a cane. He lost significant weight because the injury to his colon made it difficult for him to eat.

But by January 1999, he was returning to normal.

He stayed in Denver, working in human services roles in Denver Public Schools and for nonprofits. He got married and became a father. And in 2019, he joined the Denver Police Department’s Victim Assistance Unit.

As victim assistance coordinator, Roberts’ job is to build relationships with residents in the East Colfax neighborhood — one of Denver’s neighborhoods most impacted by gun violence.

Occasionally, Roberts thought about Nelson. Once, he saw him in passing at Denver’s Juneteenth celebration. But he didn’t approach.

“I always wondered what his upbringing was, where he came from,” Roberts said. “I wanted to know what he was going through in prison.”

Roberts forgave Nelson years ago, he said.

“I was tired of being angry,” Roberts said. “I had nightmares and PTSD,” or post-traumatic stress disorder. “I was tired of wondering what would happen if we did run into each other.”

Shortly after Nelson was released from prison, Roberts saw Nelson’s name tagged in a Facebook post. He reached out to their mutual connection and asked for Nelson’s phone number.

He thought that if they worked together to tell their story, they could help young people see the possibilities of forgiveness, redemption and change.

When he called, Nelson was eager to help.

“I was like, ‘Whatever you want to do, I’m on board,’ ” Nelson said.

They met for brunch with their wives. Then they kept meeting. They became friends.

Roberts, now 43, introduced Nelson to his family and told them Nelson was the person who shot him. Roberts’ daughter later came up to Nelson and told him she was proud they had become friends.

Everyone had tears in their eyes, said Nelson, 41.

“These stories of forgiveness are so profound,” Ali said. “It lets you know that change is possible. You don’t have to be stuck in a mire of hate.”

At a retreat he hosted last year, Ali asked the 20 teens gathered there how many of them had been affected by suicide or gun violence.

“Every hand went up,” he said. “Even the 13-year-olds.”

Both Nelson and Roberts exemplify uncommon strength, Ali said: Nelson turned his life around after years of street life. Roberts proved that choosing forgiveness instead of revenge can yield unexpected gifts.

On Monday, Ali is hosting another day of mental health and wellness workshops for young people, a program aimed at preventing suicide and gun violence.

Nelson and Roberts plan to be there. They’ll tell their story to the participants — the first time they’ve done so in such a setting.

“Never underestimate the power of forgiveness,” Ali said. “That’s what we want them to walk away with understanding.”

Yes, the chickens have come home to roost nationwide — if they could roost in a factory farm system that denies them even basic instincts — and consumers are feeling the pinch. Here’s why.

A highly infectious and deadly strain of avian influenza virus has infected tens of millions of birds across Europe, Asia, Africa and North America. Outbreaks of avian influenza, also known as bird flu, can lead to significant mortality in infected flocks. It also makes every single bird on a property subject to “depopulation,” which is just a clinical way of describing the mass killing and discarding of the remaining animals.

In the United States alone, the bird flu virus has triggered the deaths of more than 50 million domestic chickens since last February. And sadly, the factory farm system, which values profits and volume over everything else — including the welfare of the individual animals trapped in it — is creating ideal conditions for large-scale outbreaks.

It’s common for large egg-producing operations in the U.S. to house hundreds of thousands or even millions of hens. These operations are highly automated and use battery cages or similar types of housing systems to keep the hens confined. These cages are typically small, crowded and may contain up to 10 hens, with each hen having an amount of space equivalent to less than a sheet of letter-sized paper. The hens are unable to express many of their natural behaviors, such as spreading their wings, nesting and perching, and they are subjected to various forms of physical and psychological stress.

Thankfully, California voters approved Proposition 12, which sets minimum standards for the confinement of hens and other farm animals, but with almost 80% of U.S. eggs still produced in the “conventional” way, the demand for cage-free eggs far outstrips what farms can supply.

Whether it’s part of an intention to make more animal-friendly choices or simply to save some money, consider reducing your use of eggs this January and beyond. The Just Egg product mentioned as a punchline in the Chronicle article actually happens to be an excellent alternative, and makes a delicious scramble or omelet. But if commercially available, ready-made substitutions aren’t your thing, there are many alternatives to eggs that can be used in cooking and baking. Some popular options include:

• Banana. Mashed banana can be used as a binding agent in recipes, such as cookies and quick breads.

• Applesauce. Like banana, applesauce can be used as a binding agent and can add moisture to baked goods.

• Flax or chia seeds. Ground flax or chia seeds mixed with water can be used as an egg replacer in recipes.

• Silken tofu. Tofu can be used as a substitute for eggs in recipes like quiches and omelets.

• Aquafaba. The liquid from a can of chickpeas can be whipped and used as an egg replacer in recipes like meringues and mousses.

Keep in mind that egg substitutes may affect the texture and taste of the finished product, so it may be necessary to adjust the recipe or expect a slightly different result.

January is a great month to try new things, so why not make this small change that can help animals every day of the year?

Carina DeVera is the digital marketing manager for Marin Humane, which contributes Tails of Marin articles and welcomes animal-related questions and stories about the people and animals in our community. Go to marinhumane.org, find us on social media @marinhumane, or email lbloch@marinhumane.org.

At present, Good Sam hospital accommodates 273 beds on the grounds of the healthcare organization’s campus at 2425 Samaritan Drive in southwest San Jose.

Once complete, the new campus would contain 419 beds, according to plans on file with San Jose city officials.

“HCA seeks a new planned development zoning to replace the existing zoning to address seismic retrofit requirements as required by Senate Bill 1953, to modernize hospital facilities and to improve access to comprehensive healthcare for the growing population,” Elizabeth Cobb, a senior project manager with Kimberly-Horn, a planning consultant for HCA for the hospital expansion.

The total building area at the future Good Samaritan medical complex would be slightly under 1.37 million square feet, compared with the current campus which totals 450,700 square feet, the city plans show.

That’s slightly more than three times the size of the existing campus, according to the plans filed by Good Samaritan Hospital, whose owner is Tennessee-based HCA Healthcare.

The project also envisions an interim size for the campus. In the interim phase, the Good Sam complex would total 378 beds and consist of 710,700 square feet.

The existing Good Sam complex provides 1,031 parking stalls. The proposal would eventually create a complex with 2,422 stalls.

Good Sam and HCA Healthcare want city officials to completely rezone the entire 21-acre site that accommodates the existing hospital as well as the future expansion buildings and parking facilities.

In its final phase, the project would add a medical office building totaling 200,000 square feet.

The expansion project is being undertaken largely to comply with the requirements of SB 1953 which obliges all hospital buildings to meet certain seismic safety requirements by a deadline.

Among other key changes that would arise from this proposal, once the expansion is complete:

• The existing main building would no longer provide general acute care services by Jan. 1, 2030.
• The women’s and children’s center may continue to provide general acute care services after Jan. 1, 2030.
• An existing daycare center totaling 7,000 square feet would no longer exist on site after the expansion is complete.

“Reconfiguration of Good Samaritan Hospital needs to consider and evaluate expansion options of the diagnostic and treatment functions, new medical offices and backfilling the existing main hospital building with ancillary support services so as to provide for a comprehensive healthcare campus,” HCA and Good Sam stated in the planning documents.

The hospital rooms in the new main medical center are likely to be considerably larger than the existing rooms.

“Currently, Good Samaritan Hospital does not have any private patient rooms,” Good Sam and HCA stated in the planning documents. “Today, private patient rooms are the norm and are now recommended” in the Facility Guidelines Institute recommendations for the design and construction of healthcare facilities.

In addition to private and bigger rooms at hospitals, operating rooms, as well as diagnostic and treatment departments, have become larger, the planning documents stated.

The project’s initial phase would be the expansion of the diagnostic and treatment functions, and to shift some support services to the existing main hospital building, the planning documents state.

Construction of the first phase of the expansion should be complete by 2029, according to the proposal.

“The proposed improvements are necessary to allow HCA to continue providing high-quality care to the community,” Cobb wrote in the project overview.

Walgreens only had limits in place on medicines purchased online. It did not have limits on medication purchased in stores.

“So currently, we have no purchase limits either in-store or online,” Krey said.

The change comes after high demand for children’s pain and fever medications led some stores, including CVS and Rite Aid, to limit purchases. A brutal respiratory virus season fueled the sales of kids’ medications to treat pain and fever to 65% higher than what was typical the year before.

CVS on Monday told CNN there is currently a two product limit on all children’s pain relief products at its stores and online. A spokesperson for the chain said the limits were in place “to ensure equitable access for all our customers,” and said CVS was working with its suppliers to ensure continued access to the items.

Last month, the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, which represents makers of over-the-counter medicines, said manufacturers were running 24/7 to supply more medications to stores, but there was no timeline for when supply could catch up to demand.

Since then, flu and RSV activity have peaked in the US, according to data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. COVID-19 cases are still on the rise.

Still, flu and other respiratory virus activity remains “high” or “very high” in about half of states, according to CDC data updated Friday, and the US continues to contend with multiple respiratory viruses that are circulating at high levels.

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WASHINGTON — Jill Biden’ s advocacy for curing cancer didn’t start with her son’s death in 2015 from brain cancer. It began decades earlier, long before she came into the national spotlight, and could now be further energized by her own brush with a common form of skin cancer.

The first lady often says the worst three words anyone will ever hear are, “You have cancer.” She heard a version of that phrase for herself this past week.

A lesion that doctors had found above her right eye during a routine screening late last year was removed Wednesday and confirmed to be basal cell carcinoma — a highly treatable form of skin cancer. While Biden was being prepped to remove the lesion, doctors found and removed another one from the left side of her chest, also confirmed to be basal cell carcinoma. A third lesion from her left eyelid was being examined.

While it’s too early to know when and how Biden might address her situation publicly, her experience could inject new purpose into what has become part of her life’s work highlighting research into curing cancer and urging people to get regular screenings.

Personal experiences can add potency to a public figure’s advocacy.

“Nothing like ‘I’ve been there, done that’ and being personally involved,” said Myra Gutin, a first lady scholar at Rider University.

Biden’s spokesperson, Vanessa Valdivia, said “the first lady’s fight against cancer has always been personal. She knows that cancer touches us all.”

Biden’s advocacy dates to 1993, when four girlfriends were diagnosed with breast cancer, including her pal Winnie, who succumbed to the disease. She said last year in a speech that “Winnie inspired me to take up the cause of prevention and education.”

That experience led her to create the Biden Breast Health Initiative, one of the first breast health programs in the United States, to teach 16-to 18-year-old girls about caring for their breasts. Biden was among staffers who went into Delaware’s high schools to conduct lectures and demonstrations.

Her mother, Bonny Jean Jacobs, and father, Donald Jacobs, died of cancer, in 2008 and 1999, respectively. A few years ago, one of her four sisters needed an auto-stem cell transplant to treat her cancer.

In May 2015, Beau Biden, President Joe Biden’s son with his late first wife, died of a rare and aggressive brain cancer, leaving behind a wife and two young kids. Joe Biden was vice president at the time and the blow from Beau’s loss led him to decide against running for president in 2016. Jill Biden, who had helped raise Beau from a young age after she married his dad, was convinced he would survive the disease and later described feeling “blinded by the darkness” when he died.

After their son’s death, the Bidens helped push for a national commitment to “end cancer as we know it.” Then-President Barack Obama — Biden’s boss — put the vice president in charge of what the White House named the Cancer Moonshot.

The Bidens resurrected the initiative after Joe Biden became president and added a new goal of cutting cancer death rates by at least 50% over the next 25 years, and improving the experience of living with and surviving cancer for patients and their families.

“We’re ensuring that all of our government is ready to get to work,” Jill Biden said at the relaunch announcement at the White House last February. “We’re going to break down the walls that hold research back. We’re going to bring the best of our nation together — patients, survivors, caregivers, researchers, doctors, and advocates — all of you — so that we can get this done.”

In the years between Biden serving as vice president and running for president, the Bidens headed up the Biden Cancer Initiative, a charity.

Jill Biden, 71, has been using her first lady platform to highlight research into a cancer cure, along with other issues she has long championed, including education and military families.Her first trip outside of Washington after the January 2021 inauguration was to Virginia Commonwealth University’s Massey Cancer Center in Richmond to call for an end to disparities in health care that she said have hurt communities of color.

She has toured cancer centers, including those for children, in New York City, South Carolina, Tennessee, Costa Rica, San Francisco and Florida, among others. She joined the Philadelphia Eagles and Phillies — two of her favorite professional sports teams — for events, including during the World Series, to highlight efforts to fight cancer through early detection and to honor patients.

For Breast Cancer Awareness Month last October, Jill Biden hosted a White House event with the American Cancer Society and singer Mary J. Blige, who became an advocate for cancer screening after losing aunts and other relatives to various forms of cancer.

The first lady also partnered with the Lifetime cable channel to encourage women to get mammograms. A Democrat, she gave an interview last year to Newsmax, the conservative cable news channel, to discuss the federal investment in accelerating the cancer fight.

She regularly encourages audiences to schedule cancer screening appointments they skipped during the pandemic out of fear of visiting doctor’s offices.

Asked on Friday how the first lady was doing, the president flashed a thumbs-up to reporters.

The Skin Cancer Foundation says the delicate skin around the eyes is especially vulnerable to damage from the sun’s ultraviolet rays, which makes basal cell carcinoma on and around the eyelids particularly common.

After the first storms, all of the EBRPD’s parks were closed for public protection. Then the regional parks along the San Francisco Bay shoreline and Sacrameno-San Joaquin River Delta were reopened.

As of Jan. 12, five regional parks were closed until further notice: Anthony Chabot, Del Valle, Sunol, Ohlone Wilderness and the Tilden Nature Area. Although the rest of the regional parks were reopened, some were accessible only for pedestrian and bicycle traffic. Paved interpark trails including the Contra Costa Canal, Iron Horse and Lafayette-Moraga trails are also open.

The situation is evolving as the weather changes. Up-to-date information on the parks’ status is posted at the top of the home page on the EBRPD’s website, ebparks.org. Or you can call the visitor centers at the phone numbers listed with program descriptions.

Even if a park is open, some entrances, trails and roads may be closed due to flooding or other storm damage. Please cooperate with any signage warning of hazards and any instructions from district staff.

Also, when you’re visiting parks, be mindful of conditions and exercise caution. The ground is highly saturated. Weather permitting, below are some of the activities planned in the regional parks in coming days.

Fremont: If high water intrigues you, join a “King Tides Walk” from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday with naturalist Erin Blackwood at Coyote Hills.

This is a mostly flat, paved walk along the San Francisco Bay shoreline for ages 10 and older, with parent participation. Find out how high tides affect plants, animals and humans. Wear good walking shoes and bring water.

Or you can join in a “Storywalk Along the Marsh” at Coyote Hills from 3 to 3:30 p.m. the same day. A naturalist will lead an exploration of the park’s marshland with stories, songs and movement. The program is for all ages; parent participation is required, but registration is not necessary.

Coyote Hills is at the end of Patterson Ranch Road off Paseo Padre Parkway. Meet at the visitor center for either program. Both programs are free. If the entrance road is open to vehicles, there’s a parking fee of $5 per car. Otherwise you have to bike or walk in. Parking for a fee is available at the nearby Dumbarton Quarry Campground. For information, call 510-544-3220.

Martinez: Speaking of King Tides, there’s another tidal walk from noon to 2 p.m. Jan. 22 at Radke Martinez Regional Shoreline with naturalist Jessica Kauzer. The walk is on flat, unpaved trails. Dress for the weather, wear boots and expect to get a bit wet. Bring water and snacks.

The program is free, and registration isn’t required. Meet Jessica in the parking lot off North Court Street in Martinez. For information, call Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve at 510-544-2750.

Newt sightings: With the rainy weather, newts are on the march. Newts are a variety of salamander that lies dormant in woods and fields during the dry season, then migrates to ponds and streams during the rainy season to mate.

Newts are about 4 to 6 inches long and brown with gold-colored bellies. You may see these cute creatures crawling across roads and trails on their way to water.

If the parks are open, the best places to see them include South Park Drive at Tilden Regional Park in Berkeley (closed to vehicle traffic during the winter to protect the newts) and the Maricich lagoons at Briones Regional Park, south of Martinez.

If you see newts, please do not pick them up or otherwise disturb them. For one thing, their skin has a poison to protect them from predators. It’s also illegal to collect and remove any plants or animals from regional parks.

Online: These are just a few of the programs scheduled in the regional parks. For the full list, go to ebparks.org/things-to-do and, again, be sure to check for weather-related closures and cancellations.

Ned MacKay writes about East Bay Regional Park District sites and activities. Email him at nedmackay@comcast.net.

Until Saturday, China had reported a total of just 5,241 COVID deaths since the pandemic began in the city of Wuhan in late 2019. That measure was narrowly defined as deaths from pneumonia or respiratory failure caused by COVID. The new figure released Saturday included those who had COVID-19 but died from other underlying illnesses.

China has faced mounting criticism from other countries and from the World Health Organization for not providing reliable data about the extent of its COVID outbreak and about the number of deaths across the country despite widespread scenes of overflowing hospitals, morgues and funeral homes in recent weeks.

Before the announcement, China said that only 37 people had died of COVID since Dec. 7, the day it ended its “zero-COVID” policy.

The lack of transparency prompted several countries, including Japan and South Korea, to impose travel curbs on Chinese visitors after China reopened its borders last Sunday. Experts also warned that playing down the severity of the outbreak could lead people within the country to take fewer precautions.

China recorded 59,938 COVID-related deaths from Dec. 8 to Jan. 12, Jiao Yahui, an official with China’s National Health Commission, said at a news conference in Beijing. That figure included 5,503 people who died of respiratory failure directly caused by COVID. An additional 54,435 fatalities were linked to other underlying illnesses, Jiao said.

Jiao said China was unable to release the data on COVID-related deaths sooner because it required a comprehensive examination of hospital reporting.

“We organized experts to conduct a systematic analysis on the death cases, so it took a long time,” Jiao said.

It was unclear whether the new figures mean that China has changed the way it discloses COVID deaths to include people with underlying diseases whose conditions were worsened by the virus. Officials have maintained that China’s official toll counts only those who died from pneumonia or respiratory failure caused by COVID. Other countries, such as the United States and Britain, count COVID deaths more broadly.

Experts said it was too soon to determine whether China had changed tack, but they welcomed the move to provide more data.

“We cannot make a judgment now, but it is obviously more reliable than the previous data saying there were only several deaths,” said Jin Dongyan, a virologist at the University of Hong Kong. “I hope the government will be more transparent now.”

China has narrowly counted deaths from infectious diseases for a long time, including SARS in 2003 and seasonal flu. But during the Shanghai lockdown in spring 2022, authorities made an exception and used a looser definition to justify the lengthy confinement of residents. Of the 588 COVID deaths the Shanghai city government reported at that time, one was ascribed to a heart attack, and the rest to “underlying conditions” or “tumors.” Despite this inconsistency, the National Health Commission has never expunged those deaths from the national toll on COVID deaths.

Ben Cowling, an epidemiologist at the University of Hong Kong, said the actual death toll in China, like that in every country, was almost certainly higher. He said that China could have provided more reliable data on death and infection rates if it had tested hospital patients more vigorously.

“The one thing which is a bit surprising is that China has so much testing capacity but hasn’t been using it to confirm COVID in hospitalized patients,” Cowling said.

The National Health Commission’s data confirmed long-standing fears that China’s older population would be hit hard by an outbreak because so many did not receive enough vaccine doses. Of the nearly 60,000 fatalities, 56.5% involved someone at least 80 years old. COVID deaths are a particularly sensitive political issue in China, because Xi Jinping, the country’s top leader, had championed a strategy of harsh lockdowns, quarantines and mass testing to try to contain the virus. Xi boasted that the model could be adopted by other countries after it proved successful in suppressing transmission early in the pandemic.

Officials have said in recent days that infections have peaked in major cities, although concern is growing about how the current coronavirus wave will affect the nation’s countryside, which has a far weaker health care system compared with China’s cities.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.