Ringling’s retired circus elephants to move to conservation center

The Asian elephants, which have been at the center of a long debate over performing animals, will get a 2,500-acre, state-of-the-art habitat.
BY OLIVER WHANG
PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER 23, 2020

THE RETIRED ELEPHANTS of Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus will be moving to a spacious new home at a Florida conservation center next year, concluding a journey that began in 2015 when the circus’s parent company, Feld Entertainment, first announced it would be phasing out its use of performing elephants.
White Oak Conservation’s purchase of 35 Asian elephants from Feld Entertainment, announced today, creates what will be the largest community of Asian elephants in the Western Hemisphere, according to the organization. Construction has begun on a 2,500-acre (four-square-mile) habitat that is slated for completion in 2021.

The new refuge will let the animals choose among different landscapes—including wetlands, grasslands, and woodlands—and will be speckled with 11 waterholes, each big enough for the elephants to wade in.
“It is a chance for us to let them return to just being elephants in a situation that is as close to the wild as we can make,” says Michelle Gadd, who leads global conservation efforts for Walter Conservation. (White Oak, owned by businessman and Los Angeles Dodgers owner Mark Walter and his wife Kimbra, is part of Walter Conservation, a division of the family’s philanthropic work dedicated to conserving wildlife.)
These elephants—a species whose lifespan in captivity averages about 45 years—range in age from a few years to more than 70 years. Having lived mostly in captivity, the elephants cannot be returned to the wild. But this move is a step in the right direction, says Ed Stewart, the president and co-founder of the Performing Animal Welfare Society (PAWS), a California-based nonprofit that takes in abandoned, abused, and retired performing animals. “It looks like it’s going to be very good captive welfare, some of the best captive welfare that you can have,” he says.

Dozens of COVID-19 vaccines are in development. Here are the ones to follow.

Here are the COVID-19 vaccine prospects that have made it to phase three trials and beyond.
BY AMY MCKEEVER
PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER 24, 2020

More than 150 coronavirus vaccines are in development across the world—and hopes are high to bring one to market in record time to ease the global crisis. Several efforts are underway to help make that possible, including the U.S. government’s Operation Warp Speed initiative, which has pledged $10 billion and aims to develop and deliver 300 million doses of a safe, effective coronavirus vaccine by January 2021. The World Health Organization is also coordinating global efforts to develop a vaccine, with an eye toward delivering two billion doses by the end of 2021.
It can typically take 10 to 15 years to bring a vaccine to market; the fastest-ever—the vaccine for mumps—required four years in the 1960s. Vaccines go through a three-stage clinical trial process before they are sent to regulatory agencies for approval—which can be a lengthy process itself.

Even after a vaccine is approved, it faces potential roadblocks when it comes to scaling up production and distribution, which also includes deciding which populations should get it first—and at what cost. Many vaccines also stay in what’s called phase four, a perpetual stage of regular study. (Here's how we'll know when a COVID-19 vaccine is ready.)

Given the urgent need, some vaccine developers are compressing the clinical process for SARS-CoV-2 by running trial phases simultaneously. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has stated that independent Data and Safety Monitoring Boards can end trials early if their interim results are overwhelmingly positive or negative. Meanwhile, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has promised to fast-track the approval process, though likely with tougher standards in place than is typical for the emergency use authorization process, and the Trump Administration is pushing states to establish vaccine distribution sites by November 1, 2020. Some observers worry these decisions are politically motivated, because the deadline falls just days before the U.S. presidential election. Still, CDC director Robert Redfield, vaccine developers, and the FDA have said it’s unlikely a vaccine will be widely available until the middle of 2021.

'It’s in the genes': New Orleans culture marches on despite the pandemic

In a city forged by challenges, musicians, chefs, and performers have found new ways to persevere.
BY CHELSEA BRASTED
PUBLISHED JUNE 26, 2020

SUNDAYS ARE FOR sewing. That much, at least, has not changed for Bo Dollis Jr.
During Memorial Day weekend, after New Orleans officials relaxed social distancing rules, the Big Chief of the Wild Magnolias Mardi Gras Indians got his tribe together for the first time since everything came unglued. About 15 people came, and they sat together on folding chairs, laughing, joking, and sewing. Each had an open toolbox stuffed with small plastic bags of beads at their feet and a stretched canvas across their laps. They shared advice and suggestions as easily as they passed around needles threaded with waxed dental floss, with which they attached beads and rhinestones to the canvas in the shape of bears, horses, and native people.

For Dollis, the sewing session marked a return to normalcy and an opportunity to continue sharing this New Orleans tradition he learned from his father. Since he was eight, the 39-year-old has masked as a Mardi Gras Indian, part of a tradition amongst Black New Orleanians that some say honors local natives who once housed escaped slaves. It culminates each spring when tribes across the city unveil their year’s work: A hand-beaded masterpiece of color and feathers—a new suit— that shines in the southern sunlight as the tribes sing, dance, and show off how pretty they are. (Is Alabama home to America’s oldest Mardi Gras celebration?)

Traditionally, Mardi Gras Indians have but a few days to wear their suits, including Mardi Gras Day and St. Joseph’s Day in March. The coronavirus, however, interrupted this tradition. New Orleans officials shut down public events and began enforcing social distancing just days before St. Joseph’s.
Instead of strutting the streets with his tribe, Dollis sat at home that night and cried. “That was a heartbreaker,” he said. His hair salon and barbershop closed, and Dollis huddled at home with his family hoping they wouldn’t be touched by the virus.

For many of New Orleans’ chefs, musicians, dancers, Mardi Gras Indians, singers, and street performers, the coronavirus has meant a loss of income, opportunity, and stability. For some, it’s brought sickness and grief. And for all, it has challenged how they identify and express themselves. But this city has been forged by challenge for hundreds of years. Over its history, one thing has proven true: New Orleans cannot be infected, flooded, burned, or mismanaged into submission.
“A disaster is a disaster. Hard times are hard times,” said Al Jackson, the founder of the Treme’s Petit Jazz Museum. “We know every year we should expect a hurricane, so we’re psychologically prepared to handle it. … Every year, we make a new suit. It’s in the music. It’s in the genes.”