This 25 May 2020 video says about itself:
Trump White House advisor Kevin Hassett Calls Workers “Human Capital Stock”
Earlier today, Donald Trump White House advisor Kevin Hassett called workers “Human Capital Stock”, as he talked about the plan to reopen America in the midst of this global crisis. This shows how Donald Trump and the Republican Party (as well as some corporate Democrats) think of working-class people: Not as human beings with hopes and dreams, but as livestock to be deployed to help billionaires make even more money.
They are saying that workers only have value insofar as they can put their lives at risk.
DOJ DROPS PROBES OF SENATE VIRUS TRADERS The Justice Department is dropping investigations into three senators who made large stock trades after attending closed-door briefings about the coronavirus threat. Officials informed attorneys for Sens. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.), James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) that they would not pursue the investigations into transactions that potentially saved lawmakers from substantial financial losses. The probe into North Carolina GOP Sen. Richard Burr’s transactions appears to be continuing. [HuffPost]
Some coronavirus patients are developing dangerous blood clots.
INSIDE A FEDERAL PRISON WITH A DEADLY OUTBREAK Nine inmates incarcerated at Butner, North Carolina, have died since the pandemic began. The latest was Eric Spiwak, a 73-year-old man … Like most other Butner inmates who died, Spiwak was not brought to the hospital until after he had experienced respiratory failure. “The situation inside Butner is dire,” a new class-action lawsuit filed on inmates’ behalf states. [HuffPost]
WHO SUSPENDS TRIAL OF DRUG TOUTED BY TRUMP OVER SAFETY FEARS The World Health Organization is suspending its international trial of hydroxychloroquine, the anti-malarial drug repeatedly touted by Trump as a coronavirus treatment, because of concerns that it’s not safe to use on people with COVID-19. “The Executive Group has implemented a temporary pause of the hydroxychloroquine arm within the Solidarity Trial while the safety data is reviewed,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a news briefing. Three other drugs in the trial involving 17 countries will continue to be tested. [HuffPost]
The FDA has canceled emergency use of hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19. The malaria drug is unlikely to work as an antiviral and its risks don’t outweigh benefits in use against the coronavirus, the agency rules. By Tina Hesman Saey, June 15, 2020.
TRUMP TAUNTS REPORTER FOR WEARING MASK Trump told a reporter to take off his mask during a White House news conference. Trump said he had a hard time hearing Reuters White House correspondent Jeff Mason. Mason said he would just speak louder instead ― and Trump retorted: “Oh, OK, because you want to be politically correct.” “No, sir, I just want to wear the mask,” Mason replied. Mason later tweeted a link to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s recommendations for face coverings to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Trump’s own task force has recommended face coverings while in public. [HuffPost]
Many Americans would like to keep working from home.
Dear Kitty. Some blog 
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At this moment of national crisis, Our Revolution is doing the necessary work to demand health care for all and economic justice for our most vulnerable neighbors.
The corporate establishment is united against us — which is why House Democratic leadership opposes Medicare for All and instead is pushing to expand expensive COBRA coverage.
While establishment Democratic groups remain silent, Our Revolution is fighting to build enough grassroots pressure to force Joe Biden and Democratic leadership to embrace the idea that nobody should die because they can’t afford health coverage.
If you believe that all Americans deserve significantly more health and economic relief, donate to help fund Our Revolution’s incredibly important organizing work before our end-of-month deadline on Sunday at midnight!
When the Party establishment tries to undermine progressive challengers who support Medicare for All — like Marie Newman — Our Revolution doesn’t hesitate to fight against the DCCC and its undemocratic blacklist.
Not only are we taking on the DCCC directly; we’re also empowering our local chapters to do the deep grassroots organizing essential to elect more “Medicare for All” champions to serve in Congress — including Mike Siegel (TX-10), Samelys Lopez (NY-15), and Georgette Gomez (CA-53).
And with over 600 active groups and a willingness to speak hard truths, we’re already mobilizing DNC delegates to ensure that we have the support to win a progressive Democratic Party platform at the convention.
It’s going to take all of us coming together to stand up for the tens of millions of Americans who have lost their jobs and their health care — and it’s not a fight we can afford to lose.
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Nine weeks after Governor Andrew Cuomo closed all but essential businesses and services, many of the state’s essential workers are now finding themselves struggling with their employers and insurance companies for injury benefits related to Covid-19, and for those who die, their survivors are left to pick up the mantle.
Infected front-line staff, from health-care workers to grocery store clerks, are being asked to prove they contracted the virus on the job in order to receive workers’ compensation and death benefits, union leaders and elected officials say.
In some cases, insurance companies are asking nurses to identify which patient may have exposed them to the virus or when they had a breach of personal protective equipment, the officials said.
‘There was an assumption that the employers were doing the right thing, that they were considering this a workplace illness because it was pretty obvious that all essential workers, to have to be out there while we were all sheltered in place, of course were exposed,’ Pat Kane, executive director of the New York State Nurses Association, said in an interview.
‘Certainly in the nurses’ case, there is a sign on the door that says “This patient has Covid,” and you know you are going to be doing procedures that put you at risk. That’s your job.’
According to labour and elected officials, under the state’s workers’ compensation law, the burden falls on the employee to show they contracted the virus at work and not elsewhere, leaving first responders to pinpoint the specific circumstances in which they might have been exposed – a monumental task in a pandemic, they say, and harder still for survivors of the deceased.
Labour unions, including NYSNA (New York State Nurses Association) and the New York State AFL-CIO, have called unsuccessfully on the New York State Workers’ Compensation Board to acknowledge Covid-19 as an ‘occupational disease’ for front-line workers, which they say would create the presumption that they contracted it as part of the hazards of the workplace.
The unions are now eying a bill in the State Legislature that would add the virus directly to the law, removing a significant administrative hurdle to workers receiving benefits.
The provision would mean employees in workplaces with a documented outbreak would be eligible to receive salary, healthcare, and survivors’ benefits for Covid-related illness unless it could be proven that they contracted the virus in the community.
Dental Assistants from Union Community Health Center (UCHC) in the Bronx, which is affiliated with nearby St. Barnabas Hospital (SBH) rallied today to celebrate their reinstatement and press St. Barnabas for #CrisisPay.
The UCHC dental assistants were sent to St. Barnabas when their clinic closed in the surge of the COVID-19 crisis. Instead of being assigned work for which they were appropriately trained, they were given tasks far beyond their scope of work, including working with psychiatric patients and moving dead bodies. When they complained, St. Barnabas management sent them home.
After three weeks of pressure from Union representatives and delegates, SBH reinstated the workers with full back pay.
https://wrp.org.uk/features/up-to-80-of-us-based-medical-doctors-have-financial-ties-to-big-business-groups-says-major-bmj-study/
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