America, we have a problem.

Newspapers, especially the smaller ones that often serve as the eyes and ears for their communities, are in danger of disappearing. That’s according to the newest State of Local News report by Northwestern University.

“We're not only in danger; we have been losing local outlets,” said Penny Muse Abernathy, a visiting professor at the Chicago-area school.

She says as those papers vanish, so too have their trained watchdogs who monitor local government.

“Not only have we lost newspapers, we have lost 60% of the newspaper journalists we had in 2005. So, 60% — that leaves 40,000 newspaper journalists that we had in 2005 that are not there now,” said Abernathy.

For communities across the United States, the problem has created news deserts.

“We have areas where people have an abundance of local news. Typically, that's around affluent areas and in metro areas. And then we have areas where people have to really, really look to find the local news and information and data that they need. And invariably those are the communities that need it the most,” said Abernathy. “They are low income, and they are traditionally underserved in marginalized communities, often with large ethnic populations that have not been served in the past well by mainstream media.”  

A map developed by Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism shows areas served by two or more papers in dark blue, one newspaper in light blue, and no newspaper in white.

“You lose a local newspaper, and you lose the person who shows up at the school board meeting, you lose the reporter who shows up at the zoning meeting or the county commissioner meeting,” said Abernathy.

Memphis, Tennessee, is 64% Black, 27% white. There, in the home of the blues, veteran journalist Wendi Thomas runs the online nonprofit news source MLK50: Justice Through Journalism.

“It can be hard to grow to the capacity you would want to be when you're relying on grants and foundations and the $10 check your mom can write every month,” said Thomas.  

Thomas started MLK50 six years ago; now she and her staff of six full-time journalists make sure the community has a voice.

“I saw a void in news coverage that wasn't being filled here in Memphis. And it was kind of one of those things where, like, 'OK, who better to do it than me?'” said Thomas.  

MLK 50 covers a range of topics. But its most important task is making sure those abandoned by profit-focused media are heard.

“We launched a newsroom focused on poverty, power and policy, which isn't something that traditional legacy newsrooms typically cover. But I knew we wanted to focus on marginalized people here in Memphis, the people who often aren't the subject of news coverage,” said Thomas.

During her 30-year-career, Thomas worked at mom-and-pop newspapers and at conglomerates.

“Rural communities have been hit hardest by the death of newspapers across the country,” said Thomas.

With advertising flowing to online and social media platforms, many small papers closed.

“That means that in a lot of these places, there is no one whose job it is to pay attention to how tax dollars are being spent, to what the county commission is doing, to what's happening at the jails. And in the absence of that sunlight from the media, all kinds of shady things happen in the dark,” said Thomas.

Online news organizations have popped up around the country that rely on private funding, such as foundation grants — outlets like the Texas Tribune and Block Club Chicago — but that model is tougher outside metro areas.

Abernathy says one solution might be using public dollars to help newspapers and local online media operate.

“Western democracies in Europe and in Asia have figured out how to do that very successfully. And in fact, if you look back, there has been a postal subsidy for most newspapers since the very beginning of this country,” said Abernathy.

This story was originally published by Tammy Estwick, Alex Livingston, Lindsay Tuchman, Tammy Estwick, Stephanie Sandoval on ScrippsNews.com.

AUSTIN, Tex. — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is suing Facebook owner, Meta.

Paxton alleges that Meta illegally collected users’ biometric data, including facial recognition technology, without their consent.

The lawsuit goes on to accuse Meta of sending the information to others for profit.

According to the suit, Facebook violated a Texas law that requires people to get permission before capturing a person’s biometric information.

The suit also alleges that Facebook failed to destroy the data in a reasonable amount of time, which violates state law.

The Attorney General’s Office says Facebook violated state law billions of times.

Meta is also accused of violating Texas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act because it reportedly misled users.

There is a $25,000 penalty for each unlawful capturing of a biometric identifier.

The lawsuit asks for an additional $10,000 civil penalty for each violation.

Paxton estimates that the penalties could add up to billions of dollars.

This lawsuit out of Texas is similar to another suit out of Illinois in 2021, where Facebook was accused of using its Tag Suggestions tool to store users’ biometric data without their consent.

The suit ended with a class action privacy settlement.

Facebook was ordered to pay $650 million.

Meta has not commented on the recent lawsuit in Texas.

When COVID-19 broke out in the United States, one of the first corners of life that was upended was grocery shopping: The aisles stood bare as the public stocked up, and then people turned to online shopping to stay safe in their homes.

But the transition online hasn't been seamless, according to a new study published Thursday.

Packaged foods are required by federal regulations to have nutritional facts and ingredients available for consumers to review when they are shopping in brick-and-mortar grocery stores. But information for some products in many online grocery retailers was not listed anywhere, the study published in Public Health Nutrition found.

"I think it's a misconception that people don't read the food labels," said study co-author Jennifer Pomeranz, an assistant professor of public health policy and management at New York University School of Global Public Health. "People who have been diagnosed with a disease or told that they are at risk for disease, the elderly, people with children ... people with allergies. ... People read food labels for different reasons, and it's incredibly important for safety purposes."

The study looked at 10 major national packaged products across nine online retailers at the start of 2021 and found that nutritional facts and ingredient lists were not included at all for almost 11% of products across retailers. In products that contained them, 63% did not disclose the presence of common food allergens, according to the study.

The United States Food and Drug Administration specifies what information needs to be available to consumers. That includes serving sizes, calories, added sugars, allergens, ingredients, and daily values of sodium, sugar, carbohydrates, fats and protein.

"I would argue that not disclosing the nutrition facts panel and the ingredients list, including allergens, is an unfair or deceptive act," Pomeranz said.

There is a limitation to the study in that the sample size is small, said Wendy White, industry manager for food and beverage at Georgia Institute of Technology, who was not affiliated with the study. White added that the small sample could limit the ability of the research to give an accurate look at the state of online nutritional information.

Keeping up with COVID-19

In a world where people are growing more conscientious about what is in their food, Pomeranz speculates that leaving out nutritional information is a strategy to sell packaged foods.

But White thinks the issue is more logistical than strategic.

"The pandemic changed everything for everyone," White said. "It really expedited the growth of (online) sales in a way no one could have anticipated, and so all of a sudden this became a forefront issue."

She added, "This is an excuse like any other, but I really do think with the pandemic a lot of retailers were caught unaware, and they really had to put together their online e-commerce platforms very, very quickly."

For a company looking to get a lot of products to many people quickly, it's a lot easier to put a picture of the packaging online than it is to make sure all the information is easily accessible, White explained.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is responsible for regulating labeling practices, and though White said the agency has taken steps to address the online information gap, it may take time.

"I think, the FDA, they are definitely taking steps to correct this gap that we currently have in some types of online food sales, but unfortunately the speed at which the FDA can create and then enforce regulations is notably slow," she said.

In the past, the FDA has recommended that online nutritional information be similar to its in-store counterpart, but "we acknowledge that most of our labeling requirements pre-date online sales practices," said FDA spokesperson Courtney Rhodes. The agency has been learning more about online labeling to inform recommendations and discussed the issue at an E-Commerce Summit in October.

"The FDA anticipates engaging further with stakeholders on the issue to inform next steps," Rhodes said.

People need to know

Whether for an allergy, diabetes, hypertension or even just being mindful of health, White said many people are cautious about what they eat.

"Understanding what is in a product, especially a formulated product, is vital to a lot of consumers out there," White said.

The U.S. has rules and regulations about how companies disclose nutritional information, which shows both what ingredients are in the food and how much of potentially harmful elements like sodium and sugar are in a serving.

"The American consumer has become very used to being able to access this information very easily. They're used to going to the supermarket, picking up that can, looking at the label and understanding exactly what is in that product," White said.

While policy on a national level might be slow going, the public can promote transparency from online grocery retailers with where they choose to spend their money, Pomeranz said.

"Online retailers have the ability to track our purchases and what we search for online, so it's important for people to know that they're not shopping on a blank slate," she said. "With that knowledge, it's worth looking around for retailers who do provide the information."

Pomeranz added, "It's becoming even more of a hot topic for younger consumers, and so obviously they may have a lot of spending power. So, it would be worth it for retailers to compete on that transparency aspect."

As COVID-19 misinformation continues to spread, experts say many people who are sharing it don’t realize the harm they could be doing to others.

It’s not always easy to differentiate between what’s true and what’s not, especially on social media.

It’s exactly what Sally Baalbaki-Yassine teaches her students: to pause before believing everything you see online, because there are algorithms in place specifically directing that information at you.

“My biggest thing is teaching them to always be skeptical of what they see on social media. You just can’t trust everything. To be able to go past this overconfidence bias that we all have," Baalbaki-Yassine said. “We’ve given them permission to do that, right? Where we have agreed to all of these things that we don’t necessarily read that say they can track everything we do on the social media platform and they are using algorithms from like Siri, for example, listening to what we say.”

Unlike disinformation, misinformation isn’t intended to mislead others, but it still can.

“So, if you’re already getting controversial information on other forms, that’s an easy way for a social media platform to be like, 'OK, this person is already absorbing this kind of information, let's give them more of this information,'" Baalbaki-Yassine said.

Anything that you see on social media has been purposely generated to get in front of your eyes.

“What you’re researching, even on Facebook, and who you’re following on Facebook will affect what kind of information you see in your news feed and then if you like certain things that your friends put on Facebook, then you’ll start getting that kind of information to show up as well," Baalbaki-Yassine said.

Experts say when you’re hungry for certainty and clarity, you can become more vulnerable to misinformation.

Jennifer Reich is a professor of sociology and explains it’s only natural for humans to want to feel the information they are getting is a guaranteed safety net. But that’s not the case with science, because there are always new discoveries.

“It’s important noting that when people lack official information that’s clear and trustworthy, they go to informal information. And it’s not exceptional. Most of us listen to our friends, our family, people we think reflect our values and lifestyle, the people we trust," Reich said. “And so that level of uncertainty that surrounds us feels scary and it feels like it’s not trustworthy, and the challenge is that just because we don’t know everything, it doesn’t mean we don’t know anything. You know, science is constantly refining and learning and we’ve seen this with vaccines in the past.”

Researchers with the World Health Organization say there were at least 800 global deaths due to misinformation related to COVID-19 within the first three months of 2020.

“So, there’s a constant process of learning and refining, but living through that process can be really anxiety-provoking and those are the opportunities where official information can feel uncertain and people look for other kinds of information," Reich said. “One of the traits with misinformation is it’s often stated with great certainty and that’s kind of a flag when there is no room to say from what we know now, as we’re learning, right? The kind of things we would expect a scientific process to unfold.”

Reich says that’s why so much misinformation has come out surrounding COVID-19 and the vaccine. As things are discovered, original information can be changed and more people become skeptical.

“And it’s not that it’s all true or untrue, but often it’s competing information. So, there might be something that was shown to be true, and then it’s evolved in a way that doesn’t work scientifically and we’ve learned new things, but that becomes hard to challenge, hard to kill in a lot of ways and it’s still shared," Reich said.

Baalbaki-Yassine and Reich say self-educating is one of the best favors you can do for yourself, but sharing, on the other hand, has larger implications than you may realize.

“So, educating them and helping them understand, giving them digital literacy of it’s not the end all be all, and you should be always skeptical, do your research and don’t share it," Baalbaki-Yassine said.

HAMILTON, Ohio — Police are investigating after two people were found dead by gunshot wounds in a home early this morning in Hamilton, and information “points to murder-suicide as a possible explanation,” police said.

The two victims were found dead about 6:20 a.m. in the 1300 block of Hamel Drive, police said. The victims are believed to have suffered gunshot wounds, according to police.

Both victims were 90, according to a police report.

The investigation is ongoing and open, pending a coroner’s determination of the cause of death. But there is “no need for anyone to be alarmed in the neighborhood. The public is not in danger,” said Hamilton police officer Kristy Collins.

“The investigation is early and ongoing although investigators have discovered information that points to murder-suicide as a possible explanation,” Hamilton police said in a news release.

As COVID-19 vaccinations are underway across the country, medical experts are working to change public perception and doubt surrounding the fastest development of a vaccine in history.

"I think people focused on maybe there's a problem instead of maybe there's a benefit," said Dr. David Sanchez, Associate Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences at Western University of Health Sciences in Southern California.

Dr. Sanchez's interest in the vaccine is, perhaps, much more significant than his profession.

"I think it's just, as a person, I want to get through this pandemic and get over, and I see vaccines as the easiest way out," Dr. Sanchez said.

He also wanted to help with the COVID vaccine in some way.

"Just by chance on Facebook, one time I saw an ad if we wanted to volunteer to be in a trial to study one of the COVID vaccines I didn't know which at the time, I signed up- this was in September," he said.

Dr. Sanchez got the second shot in October and got a slight fever, which made him realize that he received the actual vaccine rather than a placebo. He's since had no other side effects apart from some injection site pain, familiar with many shots.

"I think what the investigators were trying to do was get a diverse group of participants in the trial," Dr. Sanchez said. "And for myself, I think they saw I was Latino. It would be good to have me be part of the clinical trial because it helped the group of people that were in it."

President of Western University Dr. Daniel Wilson said enough people must understand its value.

"I think the critical point is to get enough people who understand the value of it- both individually and at the population level to get us up to herd immunity," Dr. Wilson said. "That's the critical pivot point in any infectious pandemic."

Recently, he's been working to help change the narrative and perception around the vaccine, which he likes to remind people is a vast scientific and historic feat.

"This rollout of a vaccine is equally unique in terms of trying to massively get millions and tens of millions and ultimately hundreds of millions of people vaccinated," Dr. Wilson said. "With an effective vaccine that did not exist for a disease that did not exist a year ago."

Dr. Wilson says now, the only thing that will help is education.

"Encouragement, not trying to chastise- berate or shame people into the vaccine those who are reluctant," Dr. Wilson said. "I believe just don't have enough information."

Because it was developed and rolled out so quickly, people are wary. Like with anything new, change is different. Change is hard.

"With new things, with something different, people have a little bit of worry," Dr. Sanchez said. "What's going to happen is it going to happen to me, especially now with so much information online so many social media interactions people make up stories that aren't based in something they're worried about stuff instead."

Sanchez also says the state of science is faster than it was decades ago. This vaccine came out quickly because we could develop it quickly.

At this point, Dr. Sanchez says, our best shot at getting back to "normal" is this shot.

"That's the reason I participated in the trial- I didn't know if it was going to be safe, I wanted to be closer to that normalcy that we're looking at, and the vaccine is the best way out," Dr. Sanchez said.