--:-- Shamita Basu: Good morning. It's Monday, December 11th. I'm Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today. On today's show, new moves by the U.S. involving the war in Gaza, why the lack of diversity in medical studies is a problem, and Miyazaki's new movie makes box office history.
--:-- Shamita Basu: First, to Gaza, where Israel's military campaign has expanded from Gaza City in the north down into the south, an area where many Gaza City residents had fled to find shelter from previous attacks. Aid organizations say the expanding battlefield is making it even more difficult to get aid to civilians.
--:-- Shamita Basu: As civilian deaths increase, top Biden administration officials have made more public statements, saying Israel should be more careful about civilian casualties as it expands the fight against Hamas. But at the same time, the U.S. is taking major steps in support of Israel and its military strategy.
--:-- Shamita Basu: There are two major recent developments. On Friday, the United States vetoed a proposal for an immediate ceasefire from the U.N. Security Council. As a permanent member of the Security Council, the U.S. has veto power, and it often uses it to block resolutions perceived as against Israel's interest, even measures with broad international support.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The U.S. was the only member that voted against this resolution, with officials saying they oppose a ceasefire because they believe it would benefit Hamas. The latest ceasefire vote came out of a major move by U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres. As we told you last week, he invoked the rarely used Article 99 to get this proposal to the Security Council.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Guterres says he won't give up on his ceasefire effort. Also, the Biden administration is taking the unusual step of allowing the sale of roughly 14 rounds of tank artillery to Israel without congressional approval. It's using an emergency authority in the Arms Export Control Act to push through $106.5 million of tank rounds to Israel quickly.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Critics say the move to go around Congress is at odds with the administration's statements that Israel needs to limit civilian deaths. We'll hear much more about aid to Israel this week. Congress is considering a package of new money for it and Ukraine, but it's been held up by Republicans who also want more border security funds as part of the deal.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Tomorrow, President Biden hosts Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. It's part of his push to get lawmakers to strike a deal.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now, let's take a quick look at some other stories in the news. In Tennessee, tens of thousands of people have been displaced or suffered through power outages after a series of powerful tornadoes and storms hit the state over the weekend.
--:-- Shamita Basu: At least six people are dead, including a young child. Emergency officials are helping arrange temporary shelter, and the region is preparing for a long rebuilding effort.
--:-- Shamita Basu: University of Pennsylvania President Liz McGill is out, stepping down amid criticism of her congressional testimony last week. At a hearing on anti-Semitism on college campuses, McGill and other university presidents were heavily criticized for failing to clearly say that calls for genocide of Jewish people were harassment.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Penn's board chair, Scott Bach, also resigned. And the Texas Supreme Court has temporarily halted a lower court order that would have allowed an abortion for a woman carrying a fetus with a condition dangerous to the fetus and the mother.
--:-- Shamita Basu: We talked about this case on Friday. The state Supreme Court didn't rule on the merits of the case or say when it might deliver a definitive ruling.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: Medical research has a long-running problem, ignoring people of color. White people account for 60% of the U.S. population, but they represent 75% of clinical trial participants. And there are major medical consequences to this.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: That has led to drugs being developed that haven't been proven safe and effective in all populations. That's because genetic traits that people inherit from their ancestors can influence their risk for some diseases. But because research into these traits has focused on mostly white people, there are significant knowledge gaps about such risks in other groups.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: Also, some devices that have been developed based mostly on white patients have also been shown to be less effective in people of color. Like pulse oximeters, which measure blood oxygen levels through your fingertip. Research has shown that darker skin pigmentation influences the accuracy.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: How problematic this was became apparent during the COVID-19 pandemic when there was a way for people to test whether or not their COVID symptoms were severe and whether or not they needed to be hospitalized.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: Over the last few years, there's been a big push to make more progress, to diversify medical research. One clinical geneticist told me the murder of George Floyd in 2020 pushed the medical industry into action.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: Today, researchers are working with doctors and patients to design better studies, hire more recruiters of color, open research sites in diverse communities, and pay better so that more low-income people can participate in studies.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: The Food and Drug Administration is prepping guidelines that would require pharmaceutical companies to explain plans to recruit diverse clinical trial participants.
--:-- Dominique Mossbergen: Researchers hope as medical data gets more diverse, safer and more effective treatment and prevention options will be available for people of color and everyone. As one researcher put it to me, good representation is good science. It really helps all of us.
--:-- Shamita Basu: The number one movie in America is The Boy and the Heron from the legendary creator of Animated Worlds, Hayao Miyazaki. It's the first original anime film to top the domestic box office.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Miyazaki's singular vision has won him passionate fans around the world. And nobody expected he would make this movie. People assumed the 82-year-old creator of classics like Spirited Away had finally retired after making his last feature film, The Wind Rises, a decade ago.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Whether you are one of those passionate fans, or even if you've never seen one of his films, you might enjoy reading two stories about Miyazaki from The Ringer.
--:-- Shamita Basu: One looks at how he earned fans from so many different communities over the years, from serious cinephiles to middle schoolers. And the other story explains how the Japanese filmmaker finally became popular in America.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It's one of those twisty Hollywood stories that involves a well-timed deal with Disney and the power of a mostly forgotten technology, VHS tapes. You can read those stories and more in the Apple News app.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And if you're already listening in the News app right now, we've got a narrated article coming up next from Time magazine, which interviewed Taylor Swift for the Person of the Year cover story.
--:-- Shamita Basu: She talks about the arc of her career, her relationship with Travis Kelsey, and why the Ares tour is, quote, harder than anything I'd ever done before by a long shot.
--:-- Shamita Basu: If you're listening in the Podcasts app, follow Apple News Plus Narrated to find that story.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And we'll be back with the news tomorrow. Thank you.
