Jason Schwartz is a lifelong baseball fan and card collector who had to be socially distant from the game he loves during the 2020 pandemic. He turned his free time into a professional workshop to keep his passion for collecting alive by bringing a new generation of fans to baseball card creation. His studio is also advocating for a Negro League legend’s name be added to one pro baseball’s most cherished awards. Schwartz is founder of Chicago-based Heavy J Studios, and is helping resurrect the interest in baseball trading cards, which have been declining in popularity in recent years. The…
Author: zenger.news
HARARE, Zimbabwe — Primary and secondary school students in Zimbabwe will benefit from a donation of 30,000 children storybooks from Merck Foundation in partnership with Zimbabwe’s first lady Auxillia Mnangagwa. The storybooks titled “Tudu’s Story”, “Educating Rujeko Story”, and “Make the Right Choice Story” were handed over to the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education on June 21 by Mnangagwa and Senator Rasha Kelej, chief executive of Merck Foundation. “These storybooks convey important lessons of life, like supporting girls’ education; emphasize on the right family values of love and respect, to break infertility stigma; and raise awareness about coronavirus and…
VIENNA, Austria — Covid-19 patients suffer from cognitive and behavioral problems two months after being discharged from hospital, a new study presented at the 7th Congress of the European Academy of Neurology (EAN) has found. Issues with memory, spatial awareness, and information processing problems were identified as possible overhangs from the virus in post-Covid-19 patients who were followed up within eight weeks. The research also found that one in 5 patients reported post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), with 16 percent presenting depressive symptoms. The study, conducted in Italy, involved testing neurocognitive abilities and taking MRI brain scans of patients two months after…
SEOUL, South Korea — Researchers from Yonsei University in South Korea have found that certain commensal bacteria that reside in the human intestine produce compounds that inhibit SARS-CoV-2. The research was presented at the World Microbe Forum, an online meeting of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), the Federation of European Microbiological Societies (FEMS), and several other societies that are taking place online from June 20 to June 24. Previous clinical findings have shown that some patients with moderate to severe Covid-19 have gastrointestinal symptoms, while others showed signs of infection solely in the lungs. “We wondered whether gut resident bacteria…
WASHINGTON — U.S. social media giant Facebook said it would update its community standards to consider satire when assessing hate speech violations. “We’ll add information to the community standards that makes it clear where we consider satire as part of our assessment of context-specific decisions,” Facebook said in a blog post. “This change will allow teams to consider satire when assessing potential Hate Speech violations.” Facebook’s decision came after a recommendation by its Oversight Board which determined that the firm was wrong to remove a user’s meme regarding the Turkish government. Facebook earlier removed the post, citing its ‘Cruel and Insensitive…
TOKYO — The organizing committee for Tokyo Olympics has set the spectator limit for the Games to a maximum of 10,000 people, or 50 percent of the venue capacity. By July 16, 2021, a week before the Olympic Games, the decision on the Paralympic Games will be made. Residents of Japan will be allowed to attend the Summer Games this year. “During a meeting held between the five parties, the International Olympic Committee, International Paralympic Committee, Tokyo 2020, Tokyo Metropolitan Government, and the Japan government agreed for the spectator limit to be set at ‘50 percent of venue capacity, up to a maximum of…
ISLAMABAD — Pakistani traders have started to protest in Islamabad as the Pakistan-China trade border is closed for the past 20 months due to the Covid-19 pandemic, resulting in a considerable loss. Traders protested about the massive damage the closure has caused to their businesses, gave a week’s deadline to open the border, and warned of sit-ins in Islamabad and Gilgit-Baltistan. Addressing a press conference in Islamabad, a group of traders from Gilgit-Baltistan headed by Exporters Association Chairman, Javed Hussain, has appealed to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan, Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa, the foreign minister, commerce minister, and the Chinese…
CANBERRA, Australia — A snowboarder dressed as Star Wars character Chewbacca when he bashed a Thredbo manager on the famous ski fields has been jailed for at least one year and four months. Keith Melvyn Wass struck Kosciusko’s Thredbo resort manager Jordan Rogers in August 2017 with his snowboard after being told “we have had complaints kids are getting scared,” the New South Wales District Court was told on June 18. The 54-year-old was sentenced to a maximum term of two years and four months by Judge Garry Neilson, who described the attack as “vicious and brutal” and certainly not justified by the earlier verbal…
After almost two decades of fighting for the right to control their marketing and revenue-generating potential as undergraduate student-athletes, the ball is about to favorably bounce into the players’ court. The NCAA’s landmark name, image and likeness (NIL) rules take effect July 1, marking the first time college players will be able to get paid for their personal-brand attributes without penalty. However, the rule has a staggered launch, and it’s up to the individual states to implement it as the NCAA works to fine tune it. Many experts say there is still concerns about relying on institutions to debut plans…
NEW YORK — More than 3,000 people attended the seventh edition of the day-long yoga festival, titled ‘Solstice in Times Square 2021‘, where yogis filled the iconic Times Square with their yoga mats to mark the beginning of summer. Randhir Jaiswal, Consulate General of India, New York, partnered with the Times Square Alliance to host the Yoga celebrations. “As we celebrate yoga at the iconic Times Square — at the crossroads of the world, let us remind ourselves of the truly global embrace of yoga,” said Jaiswal. “Yoga was born in India but is part of global heritage today. Yoga is…