need2know-afternoon-edition-022723

Let's get right into today's need to know headlines as California reels from the weekend's historic weather conditions. The National weather service is warning people out west get ready for even more winter storms through Wednesday. This storm system is moving east is expected to stretch as far as boston. In the next few days. Severe weather including strong winds and lightning caused widespread damage to several towns and cities in Oklahoma. The state had at least seven tornadoes. On sunday night, officials say three there were 12 confirmed whether related injuries in the city of norman. More than 10,000 Oklahoma homes and businesses don't have power right now. That's according to power outage dot org dot us. Some people in michigan are now in their fifth consecutive day without power. After last week's winter storm, we'll have another weather update shortly. Another U. S. Agency is joining a growing number of groups and people who say covid 19 started in a chinese lab. The U. S. Department of Energy says it's more likely this was unintentionally leaked by a lab in Wuhan china. The Wall Street Journal broke this story after reviewing a classified intelligence report that was recently updated for more than a year. Now there have been debates about whether Covid was produced in a lab or if it is a naturally occurring virus and first infected people at a chinese animal market. For his part, the former U. S. Ambassador to china says there is at least one certainty about the covid 19 pandemic whether it came from a lab or came from animals is that the chinese were very very slow in alerting the world to it. Uh it only came out from bits and pieces from scientists and doctors within china and by then it was too late. Intelligence agencies say this latest assessment was made with quote low confidence. And today, National Security Council spokesman john Kirby said during the White House briefing that quote, there is not a consensus right now in the U. S. Government about exactly how Covid started. At least 60 people, including 12 Children were killed in a migrant shipwreck off the coast of Italy this weekend. Their wooden boat was headed to europe when it crashed into rocks early sunday morning, according to an Italian Coast Guard, there were about 100 and 20 people from multiple countries on board this vessel. The boat departed from the Turkish city last week, more than 80 people were rescued, 20 were hospitalized, but many, they're just still unaccounted for. Police arrested one person on migrant trafficking charges, authorities say stormy weather contributed to the dangerous conditions in which this boat was traveling. The Environmental Protection Agency has given Cruz the green light to resume shipping contaminated waste out of that site near the toxic train wreck in East Palestine Ohio. This announcement comes just a day after the federal agency ordered North Fork Southern, which is a company that owns the train to pause shipments from the february 3rd derailment site. Now some of this contaminated liquid and soil is going to two newly approved locations in Ohio. The administration confirms hazardous waste materials were already sent to michigan and texas and they are right now being processed. Ohio Governor mike dewine was on twitter giving updates on east Palestine and he says quote new water monitoring wells will be installed this week at the side of the derailment. These wells will give and help us determine if the groundwater directly below the site is also contaminated. End quote concerns continue to grow about how toxic chemicals from the side are being released and handled if you add zero calorie sweetener to your coffee. This story directly impacts you. A new study published in the journal Nature Medicine shows a sugar replacement called aerate throttle has been linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular events including stroke, heart attack and even death. A rich throttle is used to add bulk or sweetened stevia, Monk fruit and keto reduced sugar products. According to the study. People with existing risk factors for heart disease were twice as likely to suffer a heart attack or stroke if they had the highest levels of this particular compound in their blood system and an imprint of penguin. Random House has decided not to publish Dilbert creator scott Adams upcoming book and the book titled reframe your brain was previously expected to be published. This coming september by division called portfolio. The company is doing this at Adams made racially insensitive remarks on his online video program last week. The distributor of the Dilbert comic strip, like the newspapers that carried it, have all dropped the project completely. The Washington post and the Los Angeles Times are just some of the papers who are cutting them. And a scheduled launch to the international space station was postponed earlier today. This was supposed to be a joint SpaceX Nasa mission. It was halted about two minutes before takeoff because an issue that was related to fuel ignition system on a blog post today, Nasa administrator Bill Nelson wrote quote human spaceflight is an inherently risky endeavor and as always we will fly when we are ready. The crew included two NASA Astronauts, a Russian cosmonaut and the second ever astronaut from the United Arab Emirates to fly into space. The team when they finally get to space, are expected to spend up to six months at the international space station.