Latest news with #Whipple
Yahoo
29-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Man sentenced in 2023 crash that killed ex-NBA player's daughter
GROTON, Conn. (WTNH) — A man was sentenced on Wednesday in the 2023 crash that killed former NBA player Tyson Wheeler's daughter. Scott Whipple, 26, of Mashantucket, was sentenced to 10 years, suspended after six years and five years' probation. Man arrested for Groton crash that killed dirt bike passenger In March, Whipple pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the second degree and reckless driving. This comes after a 24-year-old passenger, Tiara Wheeler, was killed in a dirt bike crash in August 2023. Police said around 9:26 p.m., they responded to a crash at the intersection of Long Hill Road and Meridian Street Extension. An investigation revealed that a 2010 Audi Q7 was traveling south on Long Hill Road and had a green left turn light at the intersection of Meridian Street Extension. As the Audi began to turn, several dirt bikes and ATVs were also traveling north on Long Hill Road and into the intersection. One of the dirt bikes with two riders on it, Whipple and Wheeler, entered the intersection and struck the right rear passenger section of the Audi, police said. Whipple also faced injuries in the crash, police said. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Los Angeles Times
24-05-2025
- Health
- Los Angeles Times
Whipple's Disease: Rare but Treatable Systemic Infection
Whipple's disease is a rare but serious systemic infection caused by the bacterium Tropheryma whipplei. It's found in the environment and even in asymptomatic carriers but targets middle-aged white men and can affect multiple organ systems—especially the small intestine. Because its early symptoms mimic more common conditions, diagnosis often requires a combination of clinical suspicion and specific laboratory testing. Tropheryma whipplei is a gram-positive bacterium first identified in 1907 and later linked to a chronic, relapsing multisystem illness. It's found in soil and sewage and can colonize healthy individuals without causing symptoms. But a small group—usually those with underlying immune system dysfunction—may develop full blown disease [1], [3]. Most patients with Whipple's disease are middle-aged Caucasian men, so what about genetic susceptibility and hormonal influence [4], [11]? Although the bacteria can live harmlessly in some, defects in cellular immunity likely allow it to multiply unchecked and cause multisystemic illness [10]. One of the weirdest things about Whipple's disease is how slowly and subtly it can unfold. Many patients first present with joint pain or arthropathy which may appear years before gastrointestinal symptoms. Unlike inflammatory arthritis, this joint pain often has no redness or swelling so it's hard to diagnose. Once gastrointestinal symptoms start, they usually include chronic diarrhea, abdominal pain and significant weight loss—hallmarks of malabsorption due to damage to the gastrointestinal tract, especially the small intestine [2], [6], [8]. Whipple's isn't limited to the gut. The disease can take many forms depending on which organs are involved. Some patients have cardiac symptoms like endocarditis, while others may have neurological symptoms. Some have symptoms of which are neurological symptoms. Some have isolated CNS symptoms—known as isolated Whipple's disease—without any gut symptoms at all. Children can also be affected, although this is less common. In pediatric cases, the disease often mimics acute infections with fever and lymphadenopathy [3]. Scientists are still figuring out how T. whipplei causes disease. What's clear is that it hijacks the host's immune system. The bacterium has been shown to replicate in host cells using interleukin 16 and induce cell death via apoptosis [3]. A subtle deficiency in the patient's T-cell mediated immunity may be the reason why only some carriers develop disease [4], [2]. This impaired immunity prevents the body from clearing the bacterium properly, allowing it to invade the small intestine's lining and spread through lymphatic and blood vessels to distant organs [9]. Diagnosing Whipple's disease can be tricky because of its many manifestations. The diagnostic gold standard is a small bowel biopsy—usually of the duodenum—with periodic acid–Schiff (PAS) staining which highlights the characteristic foamy macrophages filled with T. whipplei [2], [6]. For confirmation, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing targeting the 16S ribosomal RNA gene of T. whipplei is widely used. Immunohistochemistry and DNA sequencing can provide additional molecular confirmation especially in cases without classic gastrointestinal symptoms [12]. Whipple's disease is one of the few systemic infections where antibiotic treatment can potentially cure the disease. But treatment must be prolonged and monitored closely because of the risk of relapse [5]. A common approach is to start with intravenous ceftriaxone for two weeks and then long term oral trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole for at least one year [7]. For patients who cannot tolerate this regimen, a combination of hydroxychloroquine and doxycycline has been used successfully [7]. Since the disease can affect the CNS, some experts recommend regimens that can cross the blood brain barrier. Relapses, especially of the brain, can occur years later so long term follow up is essential. Whipple's disease is a rare and fascinating illness that challenges clinicians with its many manifestations and slow progression. It often starts with vague joint pain or chronic digestive issues and can eventually affect almost every organ system—including the heart and brain. But with the right diagnostic tools and long term antibiotic treatment many patients can recover significantly. Research into the immunological mechanisms of susceptibility may one day lead to more targeted treatments or even prevention. For now awareness and early recognition are the best tools to fight this elusive disease. [1] Marth T. (2016). Whipple's disease. Acta clinica Belgica, 71(6), 373–378. [2] El-Abassi, R., Soliman, M. Y., Williams, F., & England, J. D. (2017). Whipple's disease. Journal of the neurological sciences, 377, 197–206. [3] Puéchal X. (2013). Whipple's disease. Annals of the rheumatic diseases, 72(6), 797–803. [4] Marth, T., & Raoult, D. (2003). Whipple's disease. Lancet (London, England), 361(9353), 239–246. [5] Schwartzman, S., & Schwartzman, M. (2013). Whipple's disease. Rheumatic diseases clinics of North America, 39(2), 313–321. [6] Ratnaike R. N. (2000). Whipple's disease. Postgraduate medical journal, 76(902), 760–766. [7] Biagi, F., Biagi, G. L., & Corazza, G. R. (2017). What is the best therapy for Whipple's disease? Our point of view. Scandinavian journal of gastroenterology, 52(4), 465–466. [8] Mönkemüller, K., Fry, L. C., Rickes, S., & Malfertheiner, P. (2006). Whipple's Disease. Current infectious disease reports, 8(2), 96–102. [9] Ramaiah, C., & Boynton, R. F. (1998). Whipple's disease. Gastroenterology clinics of North America, 27(3), 683–vii. [10] Marth, T., & Strober, W. (1996). Whipple's disease. Seminars in gastrointestinal disease, 7(1), 41–48. [11] Bai, J. C., Mazure, R. M., Vazquez, H., Niveloni, S. I., Smecuol, E., Pedreira, S., & Mauriño, E. (2004). Whipple's disease. Clinical gastroenterology and hepatology : the official clinical practice journal of the American Gastroenterological Association, 2(10), 849–860. [12] Fantry, G. T., & James, S. P. (1995). Whipple's disease. Digestive diseases (Basel, Switzerland), 13(2), 108–118.
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Central Texas ‘stuck' in middle-income affordability crisis: National Association of Realtors
AUSTIN (KXAN) — A report published May 15 by the National Association of Realtors (NAR) claims that Texas' major metros face a 'significant shortage of homes' available for middle-income families. The NAR said that in order to meet demand, the US must build two homes that list below $260,000 for each home above $680,000. Unless that happens, 'homeownership will remain blocked for millions of Americans who are otherwise financially ready to buy,' the NAR said. 'Middle-income buyers – those who are supposed to form the backbone of the homebuying market – are making progress, but they're still shut out of more than half of the homes for sale today,' the NAR wrote. Austin leads the nation in affordable multi-family construction, but has the 10th lowest homeownership rate. Austin's housing market: How quickly are homes selling, and for how much? Austin Habitat for Humanity's Chief Impact Officer Billy Whipple spoke with KXAN about the report. 'Even as homes are coming online, the asking prices are higher than a lot of our wage earners. If you look at the median incomes, they're not able to afford the product coming online,' Whipple said. 'We've experienced a lot of growth here in Austin, and with that has come a lot more homes, a lot more units. I think we've all seen the construction.' Whipple said that while Habitat is 'stepping in' to meet demand, support from the local and state governments is necessary to help builders. 'Delivering homes affordably, where more people across our entire economic spectrum can get into home ownership, does require support, subsidy and speed,' he said. 'The longer it takes to go through zoning, permitting, construction, the more uncertainty is entered into the equation. And that always equates to more cost to deliver.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
The EPA is designing a plan to clean Cedarburg's former Amcast site. Here's what to know.
Cedarburg residents might soon see some crews and hefty equipment sampling the former Amcast Industrial Corp. properties again in their city. Preliminary plans are coming together for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to clean up the former automotive aluminum die-casting facility, making way for hopes of residential redevelopment by the site's owner. The facility, which operated for 65 years, has contaminated the nearby area with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other hazardous chemicals in the two decades since it closed in 2005. Amcast went bankrupt, and the EPA placed the former site on its national priority list for cleanup using Superfund money in 2009. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), which is working with the EPA to design a cleanup plan, is preparing to collect and test samples at and around the site, USACE Project Manager Rich Whipple said at an open house event held May 5 at city hall to inform the public about the status of the cleanup. This will help identify the exact spots where cleanup is needed and the methods it would use to do so, he said. The Army Corps is currently surveying the site and will start taking samples in mid-July, which will likely take two months tops, Whipple said. The presence of PCBs was identified by the EPA during its initial investigation of the site between 2009 and 2015. The substance is a carcinogenic chemical previously used in many industrial and consumer products because of its fire-resistant and insulating properties until it was banned in manufacturing in 1979. Full cleanup is still at least a few years away, and its fate depends on federal funding and the EPA's ability to prioritize the project. There are around 1,300 Superfund sites across the nation, "and we're competing against them," Whipple said. The current cleanup planning process, known as remedial design, is expected to be completed in 2026. Actual cleanup would start once additional funding has been obtained for that stage of remediation, since each stage of cleanup is funded separately, Phil Gurley, U.S. EPA Community Involvement Coordinator. Since the Amcast site has no responsible party that the EPA can hold liable for the cleanup, the costs associated with each stage of the process must come out of the EPA's Superfund Trust Fund, which must be approved by the federal government, Gurley said. The EPA's headquarters office weighs all the proposed cleanup plans for contaminated sites across the country and chooses which sites will be prioritized that year. The agency will also choose whether to continue contracting with the Army Corps for cleanup. The fate of the project also hinges on how much money Congress and the president appropriate towards the Superfund program as part of the federal budget, which will affect the number of cleanups the EPA can fund. According to reporting from Bloomberg Law, President Donald Trump has been supportive of the Superfund program and using federal funding to cleanup blighted sites, though attorneys warn his cuts to the EPA may hamper progress. If the site isn't chosen for cleanup funding though, the EPA still has a responsibility to clean up the site, meaning it would continue to apply for that funding in future cycles, Gurley said. It's not just the 8.5-acre factory site at N37 W5684 Hamilton Road that needs to be sampled for remediation. Hazardous chemicals were also dumped in the surrounding area, including the quarry pond in Zeunert Park, Wilshire Pond and some nearby residential properties. The variety of stakeholders involved with the contaminated areas, including homeowners and public park users, is, in part, why Whipple is hopeful the site will be selected for clean-up funds soon. Eventually, the EPA will also seek testing on nearby storm sewers and groundwater wells, which are less of a priority, since they're not used for drinking water, Gurley said. Amcast's plant released PCBs into nearby Cedar Creek via storm sewers, according to the EPA's website. The former factory also released harmful chemicals into the nearby Cedar Creek via storm sewers, according to the EPA's website, as did the former Mercury Marine Plant 2 factory, another site the EPA helped clean up in 2013 The site's owner Daniel Burns has plans to redevelop the site for residential use but must wait until remediation is finished. In 2017, Cedarburg officials agreed to spend around $3 million in tax incremental financing for preliminary cleaning of the site ahead of remediation, which has already been completed. In the meantime, Burns is locked in a legal dispute with the city about the site's current use. On Aug. 2, 2024 the City of Cedarburg send a cease use and vacate property order to Burns for storing items in the former Amcast facility structure, as first reported by the Cedarburg News Graphic. In July, city officials found a vehicle, motorcycles, construction equipment and other small, miscellaneous items stored in the building while conducting a walk-through to evaluate the safety and security of the facility, according to court records. City Administrator Mikko Hilvo told the Cedarburg News Graphic that the city had been asking Burns since November 2023 to not store items in the building, since it has not been up to fire and occupancy code for years. Burns, through his entity Oliver Fiontar, LLC, appealed the order and took legal action against the city in the Circuit Courts, per the Cedarburg News Graphic. Particularly, he filed a notice of breach of development against the city, claiming it didn't pay him for razing and removing buildings on the property on Oct. 25, 2024, according to court records. On Nov. 11, 2024, the city took its own legal action, filing a petition in Ozaukee County Circuit Court to have Burns remove the items on the property and raze the remaining structures. A court trial scheduled for May 2 was postponed, giving both parties more time to discuss issues at the property and potentially come to a resolution, Burns' attorney Jacques Condon told the Journal Sentinel. City Administrator Mikko Hilvo and City Attorney Johnathan Woodward could not be reached for comment on May 8 or 9. Contact Claudia Levens at clevens@ Follow her on X at @levensc13. This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Here's the status on the EPA plans to clean Cedarburg's Amcast site
Yahoo
20-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Go-to author on White House reverses take on Biden and slams former president
'Biden was mentally sharp, even if he appeared physically frail,' Chris Whipple wrote in The Fight of His Life, his 2023 book on the 46th president, who was then warming up his re-election bid at the age of 80. In that book, Whipple quoted Bruce Reed, a senior aide, describing a long-distance flight. When others appeared exhausted, Biden was raring to go, Reed said. Biden showed 'unbelievable stamina'. Speaking to the Guardian in January 2023, Whipple said Biden's 'inner circle' was 'bullish about Biden's mental acuity and his ability to govern. I never heard any of them express any concern and maybe you would expect that from the inner circle. Many of them will tell you that he has extraordinary endurance, energy.' Put it this way: much has happened since. Obviously, there was that whole 2024 election thing. You know – the one when Biden dropped out after a disastrous debate exposed his decline for all to see. There was also the day in February, before the campaign kicked off, when the special counsel Robert Hur declined to charge Biden with mishandling classified documents, because he found him too addled and sympathetic a prospective defendant. Hur wrote: 'He did not remember when he was vice-president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended ('If it was 2013 – when did I stop being vice-president?') and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term began ('In 2009, am I still vice-president?') … He did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died.' Whipple, a former CBS producer, has emerged as a go-to author on the White House and those who work there. In The Gatekeepers, he examined the lives of chiefs of staff. Then came The Fight of His Life. With hindsight, Whipple seems to have missed key evidence of Biden's decline. But Whipple is back with a vengeance. Uncharted, his third book, hits Biden and his aides like a bludgeon. Kamala Harris, who became the Democratic nominee after Biden withdrew, fares little better: Whipple depicts a candidate who never should have been there, a sentiment repeatedly expressed by senior Democrats. Whipple had access. People talked. Ron Klain, Biden's first chief of staff, is a key source – and demonstrates startling cognitive dissonance about Biden's mental and physical decline. Klain says Biden should have stayed in the race – but also gives an absolutely withering account of debate prep at Camp David. At his first meeting with Biden in Aspen Lodge, the president's cabin, Klain describes Biden as 'startled'. Whipple writes: 'He'd never seen him so exhausted and out of it. Biden was unaware of what was happening in his own campaign. Halfway through the session, the president excused himself and went off to sit by the pool.' He fell asleep. ''We sat around the table,'' says Klain in the book. ''And I was struck by how out of touch with American politics he was. He was just very, very focused on his interactions with Nato leaders.'' Klain, Whipple writes, 'wondered half-seriously if Biden thought he was president of Nato instead of the US'. Come the debate against Trump, Biden gave perhaps the worst performance of all time. He shuffled, he stared, he made verbal stumbles and gaffes. He handed Trump the win. Klain also tags Biden for skipping a post-debate meeting with progressives in favor of a family photoshoot with Annie Leibovitz. ''You need to cancel that,'' Klain says he told Biden. ''You need to stay in Washington. You need to have an aggressive plan to fight and to rally the troops.'' Biden rebuffed him and instead held a Zoom call with the progressives. It went badly. ''All you guys want to talk about is Gaza … What would you have me do?'' Biden said. ''I was a progressive before some of you guys were even in Congress.'' How do you remind people you're old without saying you're old? Whipple also pays attention to Trump. Susie Wiles, now Trump's chief of staff, and Karl Rove, a veteran of the George W Bush White House, speak on the record. So does Paul Manafort, a campaign manager in 2016, later jailed and pardoned. 'Democrats wanted to know why Harris had lost to Trump and his MAGA movement,' Whipple writes. 'Susie Wiles wanted to know why Harris and her team had run such a flawed campaign.' Wiles did not view a Trump victory as inevitable. Whipple asks Wiles: ''Did that mean Harris couldn't have won?'' Trump's campaign chair didn't mince words. ''We'll never know,'' she replies, ''because it didn't seem like she even tried.' ''Voters want authenticity … and they didn't get that from her.'' Leon Panetta, chief of staff to Bill Clinton, echoed Wiles. ''I thought they were thinking they could tiptoe into the presidency without getting anybody pissed off at them,'' he tells Whipple. ''Baloney. You've got to make the American people understand that you're tough enough to be president of the United States.'' Rove does take a jab at Trump and Chris LaCivita, the ex-Marine who became a senior adviser. Rove introduced LaCivita to Trump, via the late megadonor Sheldon Adelson, but didn't think LaCivita would take the gig. ''I'm surprised because I know what he thinks of Trump,'' Rove tells Whipple. ''He thinks Trump's an idiot.'' LaCivita condemned January 6, after which he 'liked' a tweet that urged Trump's cabinet to invoke the 25th amendment and remove him from power. LaCivita deleted the post – but did not join the second Trump administration. Back in 2023, in The Fight of His Life, Whipple wrote: 'Presidents do not give up power lightly.' Andy Card, chief of staff to George W Bush, weighed in: ''If anybody tells you they're leaving the White House voluntarily, they're probably lying. This applies to presidents, of any age, who are driven by vast reserves of ego and ambition.'' Biden did go – but not voluntarily. In Uncharted, in merciless detail, Whipple shows he should have gone much sooner. Uncharted is published in the US by HarperCollins
