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Overnight Briefing & General Reality Check - Nov 18, 2021
November 18, 2021
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Sad news: US drug overdose deaths have topped 100,000 in just one year. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced yesterday (Wednesday) that there was a 28.5 percent increase from May of 2020 to April of 2021, and blamed the increased drug use on the COVID pandemic and its affect on people with substance abuse problems and the increased use of fentanyl. The CDC says dealers often mix fentanyl with methamphetamine, further increasing drug overdose casualties. Overdoses have broken into the top-10 reasons for death in the US as well, beating out car crashes, guns, flu and pneumonia.
Do it yourself dep't: Good news for people who want to fix their own Apple iPhones. Bloomberg News reports Apple will start making parts and tools available for people to fix their own devices under their Self Service Repair program. Then, later on, the company said it will let buyers of the new Mac M1 computers fix them as well.
Good news for LEVAR BURTON --although he didn't get the "Jeopardy!" hosting gig, it turns out he'll be doing a new game show based on the "Trivial Pursuit" game. The new show is being put together by Hasbro --who did the original board game-- and entertainment company Entertainment One Ltd (called "eOne").
Harry Potter update: As we mentioned yesterday, the upcoming four-part Harry Potter reunion special on HBO Max called "Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts," will feature lots of actors from the various films, but author J.K. ROWLING will not be in it. The reason given is that the special is being done about the various films in the franchise, as opposed to the books.
Thanksgiving is next week, and already the experts are predicting more than 53 million Americans are expected to travel during the long weekend, with the majority driving and just 4.2 million Americans expected to fly to see family and friends.
Question for listeners --what's the weirdest service animal you've ever seen? Sure, mostly they are dogs, but up in Canajoharie, NY, NEWS10 reports one person --WYVERNE FLATT-- has a pot-bellied pig named Ellie helping him!. The problem --the village of Canajoharie believes the 100-pound pig doesn’t belong in their community, and they want to define what a service animal is --and is not. Flatt has been to court 13 times in the last two years and up until now he's kept her, but now the village has given him a deadline of December 14th to move Ellie out of the village.
Switzerland is letting same-sex couples get married beginning on July First of next year. The Swiss Federal Council made the declaration based on a referendum earlier this year. Up until now, Switzerland has been one of the few countries in Western Europe where gay and lesbian couples do not already have the right to wed.
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