Utah Lawmakers Pass New Media Restrictions for House Floor

The Utah House of Representatives approved new rules on Tuesday that limit where members of the press can film and interview lawmakers, following similar action taken by the Utah Senate two weeks ago.

The rules extend pandemic-era restrictions on when journalists can report from the floors of state legislative chambers.

Journalists covering the Utah Legislature must now ask for permission to interview lawmakers on the floor of the House of Representatives and other restricted areas. TV reporters must ask committee chairs for permission to film speakers and crowds from behind the dais where lawmakers sit in committee hearings.

“I know that sometimes committee members get a little bit nervous from the cameras right behind them because they can see their screens,” Republican Rep. Timothy Hawkes said Monday in a committee hearing about the measure.

Media organizations and journalists covering the Statehouse opposed the rules changes in the Utah House and Senate, arguing that restricting media movements would make it more difficult to cover fast-paced action and make it easier for lawmakers to dodge the press. They said the move reduced transparency — a claim that lawmakers denied.

Utah Media Coalition lobbyist Renae Cowley Laub on Monday proposed an alternative, telling lawmakers that credentialed members of the media were working on establishing a formal press corps that could work with lawmakers to refine the rules in a mutually satisfactory way.

She proposed creating a commission with two members of the press and designees from the House, Senate and state legislative officials to govern press rules, similar to the method used in Utah courthouses.

“As you can tell by doing simple math, the committee would already be stacked in favor of the government. But it does offer the media and members of the press the opportunity to be a part of some of the decisions made regarding their practice and their profession,” she said.

Outside of Utah’s Republican-led Statehouse, similar restrictions have been passed in Iowa and Kansas.

The new limits come in an environment of increasing attacks on the media and parallel new restrictions placed on journalists covering protests and courtroom proceedings.

They also come as U.S. states and cities loosen coronavirus restrictions that have returned restaurants, sporting events and offices to pre-pandemic capacity.

Government supports restrictions before New Year's Eve

The Government has expressed this Tuesday its concern about the evolution of the pandemic in Spain, which reaches a record in accumulated incidence and hospital occupation is progressively rising, and has shown its support for the autonomous communities that have approved or plan restrictions for New Year’s Eve . The Interterritorial Council could debate tomorrow the reduction of the quarantines of close contacts and of the asymptomatic

The Minister of Territorial Policy and Government Spokesperson Isabel Rodríguez (d) and the Minister of Labor Yolanda Díaz upon their arrival at the press conference after the weekly meeting of the Council of Ministers held at the Palacio de la Moncloa in Madrid, this Tuesday . EFE / Juan Carlos Hidalgo

“The Government endorses and supports the autonomous communities,” said its spokesperson, Isabel Rodríguez, at the press conference after the Council of Ministers, when asked about the restrictions to contain the spread of the virus aimed at limiting capacity, business hours and the hotel industry before New Year’s Eve and New Year.

“We follow with great attention, with concern, the evolution of the indicators”, said the spokeswoman for the Government.

Galicia and Euskadi are considering restrictions for the moment and Cantabria has already approved them, where from today nightlife will not be able to open and the hotel industry will have a capacity of 75% of its capacity in 50 of the 102 municipalities at a high level (3) of risk by contagion of covid-19, including all those with more than 5,000 inhabitants.

In addition, the Government of Aragon plans to publish an order this Tuesday to bring forward from Wednesday the closure of catering establishments at midnight and nightlife establishments at 02:00 until January 15, with a limitation in both cases of ten diners per table and prohibition of consuming standing.

The Government spokeswoman recalled that only 5 days ago the Chief Executive, Pedro Sánchez, met with the regional presidents. “Co-governance, the distribution of powers, has worked in this country,” said the minister, who defends the need to “adapt each response” to the situation of each territory.

Because, as he has said, they are the ones who best know the reality of the pandemic and the healthcare situation in their territory.

He has pointed out that the current data shows that in those groups where the injection of the booster dose had begun, it is in those that are least affected by the coronavirus and therefore he has requested that “the commitment of the autonomous communities and the Government” must address to intensify vaccination, which, however, must be accompanied by caution.

Above all, “given the incidence”, he has asked to be more careful in these days of festivities and family and friendly gatherings.

In addition, he has assured that the Government is willing to continue dialoguing with the autonomies and in this sense has alluded to the fact that the talks will continue tomorrow in the Interterritorial Health Council, which brings together the Minister of Health and the regional councilors of the branch every week .

Andalusia and Madrid put the reduction of quarantines on the table

The Andalusian Minister of Health, Jesús Aguirre, has reported this Tuesday that reducing quarantines in close contacts without symptoms is being studied, an approach that has also been put on the table by the Madrid Deputy Minister of Health Care and Public Health, Antonio Zapatero, They warn that the sixth wave needs to be tackled with different measures.

In Spain now these quarantines are only mandatory for unvaccinated people who have been close contacts without symptoms.

Aguirre explained at a press conference after the Andalusian Governing Council that the omicron variant causes more infections, but with less clinical incidence, so experts are approaching this sixth wave “in a different way”.

What is being analyzed is whether, for example, it is necessary for a close contact without symptoms to quarantine for ten days, if all contacts have to undergo a PCR or a test, or if the traceability of the cases should be left alone in those not vaccinated or who have symptoms, he has detailed.

He explained that only this week 250,000 tests have been carried out, which represents a million in a month, a “very large volume of personnel” within the Andalusian Health Service (SAS), so “it must be assessed if it has been efficient” .

According to Aguirre, these issues have already been discussed with the Ministry of Health, since this wave must be approached differently and that is why they are trying to “articulate the means we have within reality”.

For his part, the Madrid deputy minister recalled that the American Center for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) has raised the possibility of reducing the isolation or quarantine of asymptomatic patients from ten to five days and monitoring with a mask five days after.

“The management of the pandemic now cannot be the same as it was a year ago or a few months ago due to the vaccination status of the population and the clinical and epidemiological characteristics of this variant. Changes are taking place in the international context” , pointed out the deputy minister, who has predicted that in the future there will be important changes in the management of the pandemic.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, the Interterritorial Health Council meets, where the regional councilors and the Ministry of Health will have the opportunity to discuss how to deal with a sixth wave that has raised the incidence of covid transmission well above a thousand cases per 100,000 inhabitants , a maximum not reached in Spain throughout the pandemic.

Asked about this matter at the press conference after the Council of Ministers, the Government spokesperson, Isabel Rodríguez, has avoided confirming whether the quarantines will be shortened and has referred to the technicians and to tomorrow’s meeting of the Interterritorial Health Council.
As he has assured, “any decision” that the institutions adopt regarding the pandemic is made according to the “rigor of the technical teams.”

Are COVID-19 Restrictions Stunting Children’s Immune Systems?

Some medical experts have expressed concern that COVID-19 preventative measures, like masking and remote schooling, are potentially weakening children’s immune systems by shielding them from the usual childhood illnesses.

“There’s a lot of reasons to believe that kids need to be exposed to things to keep their immunity complex, so that should they encounter something very dangerous, they have aspects of their immunity that might cross over and help protect them against those things,” says Sara Sawyer, a professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology at the University of Colorado Boulder.

At birth, vulnerable infants get antibodies from their mother’s breast milk, which helps protect them until they can build their own immunity. It’s no accident that babies start putting things in their mouths as soon as they gain enough dexterity to pick things up.

“They’re doing that because they’re sampling the environment and building their immunity. That’s an evolutionary trait,” Sawyer says. “They’re exposing their body to germs in a certain, level way to build their immunity. So, some people would argue that childhood illnesses, like colds and stomach bugs, build our immunity so that when more dangerous things come along, we’re prepared and we don’t get as sick from those more dangerous things.”

FILE — A new mother receives breastfeeding advice from a lactation consultant at St. Joseph Hospital in Denver, Colorado.

Even before the pandemic, epidemiological evidence suggested that children in more developed countries, where handwashing and the use of sanitizer are more prevalent, might have less-developed immune systems compared to kids in developing nations who are routinely exposed to more bacteria, viruses and allergens. This makes kids in more industrialized countries more vulnerable to developing autoimmune diseases, according to what’s known as the “hygiene hypothesis.”

“The hygiene hypothesis is actually quite controversial because it’s thought that our exposure to microbes isn’t the only factor,” says Cody Warren, a virologist and immunologist who is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Colorado Boulder. “A lot of this could also be dictated by genetics, diet, and the environment that we live in. That also shapes our immune system… it’s a real multifactorial thing that we can’t fully account for just by wearing masks. There are other things that go into that equation.”

In this April 8, 2020, photo, bicyclists wear pandemic masks while riding in Portland, Maine.

Warren, the father of three young children, says spending lots of time outdoors is one way to balance the negatives of isolation.

“Just exploring microbes in the environment also is benefiting [and] training our immune system,” Warren says. “Our immune systems get trained through the foods that we eat, which also have microorganisms on them. And so, despite the fact that we’ve kind of been hunkered down a little bit, I do feel that our immune systems will catch up.”

There are other things parents can do, he says, to boost their children’s immune systems during pandemic times.

“One of the most important things you can do is just to stay up to date on vaccines. That’s one of the best ways that we have to train our immune systems,” Warren says. “But also, equally important is making sure our children have a good diet and they regulate stress. It’s been well documented that both of those — having a good diet, a less stressful environment — can have a positive impact on our immune system.”

Pre-K students start the school day at Phyl’s Academy, March 24, 2021, in the Brooklyn borough of New York.

Once public health officials say masks are no longer necessary, Sawyer thinks pointing out the positives of putting our masks away could reassure hesitant parents who worry about their children getting sick.

“Maybe we should have a public conversation about the possible reasons to take that mask off, if they are in school, and get back to the normal repertoire of relatively safe childhood illnesses,” she says. “The plus side of childhood illnesses is that they can build up that hornet’s nest of immunity that could protect kids against new things that then come along.”