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Environmental diplomacy Fortunately, after a decade’s struggle with smog, Pakistani Punjab has understood the urgency of climate action The art of downplaying a dilemma or a disaster has been mastered by Pakistani politicians. They have done so in the past – and continue this trend with the ongoing smog disaster. The public, unfortunately, mirrors this insensitivity. During Covid-19 lockdowns, people turned the streets into sightseeing tours with their families. Now, when Punjab’s government closed schools to safeguard children and reduce emissions, parents were seen taking their children to parks. This mutual insensitivity is exacerbating an already dire crisis. For a crisis like this, we need to have clarity and a united front. For far too long, developed nations have denied billions across the globe, in South Asian countries like Pakistan in particular, the right to a future safeguarded by climate-conscious actions. We are pretty much aware of a dark reality: our world has known weather warfare before. In the past, it was deliberate – an act of war. But if, today, developed nations refuse to extend a hand to regions like ours, then – while unintended – the outcome will be no less destructive. Make no mistake: this is not just an environmental crisis; this is climate warfare. And it is more dangerous than Fifth Generation Warfare and more unpredictable than any nuclear conflict. This requires stronger collaborations in the shape of regional climate diplomacy, partnerships that cross borders, and a commitment that transcends politics. South Asian countries like India and Pakistan have strived on every possible stage: economic front, sports arenas, and technological innovations. Competition is essential; it is survival. But there is one stage where competition must cease and cooperation must prevail: climate action. In this fight for our shared future, we cannot afford divisions, pride, or reluctance. The partnership between India and Pakistan would be of key importance, if it happens. Similarly, time is of the essence. Fortunately, after a decade’s struggle with smog, Pakistani Punjab has understood the urgency of climate action through Chaudhry Rehmat Ali’s Now or Never, and we expect our neighbour to do the same as Nehru’s Now or Never. This climate diplomacy is far greater than opening onion trade between the two countries – because climate is the new peace dialogue of the millennium. Climate is no longer just a part of any economy – it is our economy. Climate is no longer just another branch of governance - it is a mode of governance now. Climate should be our unbreakable stance on sustainability. To realise this vision, Punjab has crafted an all-encompassing climate policy: the Climate Resilient Punjab Vision and Action Plan 2024. This powerful declaration is a blueprint for action, grounded in the urgency of the moment and infused with the spirit of resilience. Time-sensitive initiatives of supreme significance have already been taken up with full funding from the Government of Punjab. Key components of this framework are set in motion, and every target is backed by the resources to make it real. Punjab is investing in climate finally. This policy plan was developed in close coordination with international bodies, organisations, donor agencies, stakeholders, and civil society, and now the most populous province is in a condition to collaborate, to create and adopt joint strategic actions that go beyond borders. We have already suffered for environmental crimes we didn’t commit. Pakistan doesn’t contribute even one per cent to global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, yet, due to the actions of others, we are among the five most vulnerable nations to climate change. We, the citizens, call upon all our neighbours to come forward and work with us. You have a tremendous stake in this. I fully support exploring the universe and finding new planets to live on. But let’s not forget to fix the planet we already call home. The writer is a freelance journalist. He has also served as media adviser to the World Bank and Unicef-funded healthcare and tourism related projects in Punjab. He tweets/posts @EAAgop

Louisville will aim to end a three-game losing streak when it hosts UTEP on Wednesday, but beating the Miners may not be an easy feat. UTEP (6-2) comes to the Derby City winners of three straight, most recently beating Seattle 88-72 on Saturday. The Miners shot 56.1 percent (32 of 57) and used a 24-2 first-half run to essentially put the game away. Coach Joe Golding said that first-half performance may have been UTEP's best in his four years leading the school. "I thought offensively and defensively the first 20 minutes we were really locked in and ready to go. (The game) never got close," he said. "We kept it at 20-plus points for the majority of the game. Our ball movement was terrific." Ahamad Bynum led the Miners with 19 points on 7-of-9 shooting off the bench, while Otis Frazier III added 18 points and five assists. Frazier (13.6 points per game) and Bynum (12.1 ppg) are among four UTEP players averaging in double figures. Bynum leads the country shooting 63.3 percent from beyond the 3-point arc, though he has attempted just 30 threes, making 19. Louisville (5-4) also started hot in its last game but could not sustain its momentum in a 76-65 home loss to then-No. 9 Duke on Sunday. Coach Pat Kelsey's team, which had just seven players healthy, made 10 of its first 14 shots to build a 30-16 lead before the Cardinals' lack of depth caught up to them. Louisville shot just 9-of-37 (24.3 percent) after its hot start and was outscored 43-28 after halftime. Terrence Edwards Jr. paced the Cardinals with 21 points in his first game as a reserve this season. Edwards (11.9 ppg) is one of four Louisville scorers averaging double figures, led by Chucky Hepburn leads the team in scoring (14.3 ppg) and is second in the country with 3.2 steals per game. The Cardinals entered the season with expectations of rotating 10 or more players to utilize Kelsey's up-tempo attack. However, swingman Kasean Pryor (knee) and guard Koren Johnson (shoulder) will both miss the rest of the season, while forward Aboubacar Traore (arm) is out indefinitely. After Sunday's loss, Kelsey did not rule out adding players to the roster during the season. "Everything's on the table," he said. "I don't sleep, figuring out what buttons to push to get this team to be the best that they can be. We'll scour every inch of the Earth to figure out how we can improve our team. And whether that happens or not, I have no idea, but I'm willing to try anything." --Field Level Media

The only shop in one of the smallest villages in the country is closing its doors for the last time ever tomorrow, its owners have confirmed. Phillip Payne and his wife Lucy have run Mersham Stores and Post Office in Mersham, near Ashford, Kent , for more than eight years - but have been unable to renew their lease on the property, meaning the shop will cease to trade as of midday on Sunday. The shop owners said they are "devastated" to close the store which has become a "big part of the community" in the little village. The couple are now planning to move to Yorkshire and take over another village shop there. However, Mr Payne said both he and his wife are "incredibly sad" to leave Mersham. The 51-year-old told Kent Online : "It's not something we wanted to do, but we haven't been able to renew the lease. We have loved our time in the village and have had such a great relationship with our customers. "We're just truly grateful for everybody who has supported us over the years." Addressing the decision to move to Yorkshire, Mr Payne said: "We are opening a small village shop in the Yorkshire Dales and hope to replicate what we built here in Kent. I want to thank all of our amazing customers. We are really going to miss them. It's been a privilege to be a part of this community." Shoppers have also been left disappointed at the news, as one wrote: "Very sad to read this. Such a wonderful shop and very lovely people. All the best for the future." Another added: "Sadly the loss of village shops in traditional small villages has been the downfall of community life in such places. "The village shop is where people passed the time of day, people got to know any new neighbours and they were a lifeline for older people who couldn't access larger shops in towns or just wanted to get out and have a chat with someone. Now villages without shops are just somewhere to live; inhabitants go to work and come home, go elsewhere for their shopping and probably don't have much to do with other villagers; other than their immediate neighbours (if that)." It is believed the owner of the building is now looking for alternative tenants to take on the shop, after Ashford Borough Council (ABC) listed the store as an asset of community value (ACV) last month. An ACV is a building or other land whose "main use has recently been or is presently used to further the social wellbeing or social interests of the local community and could do so in the future." The move allows community groups to protect assets from being sold to private owners - and if the owner of the building wants to sell, they need to notify the local authority.Jimmy Carter: Many evolutions for a centenarian ‘citizen of the world’

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ASP Isotopes Inc. Investors: Please contact the Portnoy Law Firm to recover your losses. February 3, 2025 Deadline to file Lead Plaintiff Motion.Before being elected as the first transgender woman to the US Congress, 34-year-old Sarah McBride said she expected hostility. A harsh national spotlight has fallen swiftly upon her. "They may try to misgender me, they may try to say the wrong name, they will do what we can predictably assume they might do," she told the TransLash podcast last month ahead of her resounding election victory on November 5. "They are going to do that to get a rise out of me and my job will be to not give them the response they want," the Democrat from Delaware explained. Ahead of her arrival in the House of Representatives on January 3, McBride was targeted by a resolution this week from a right-wing Republican colleague that would ban transgender women from women's toilets in the Capitol. "Just because a Congressman wants to wear a mini skirt doesn’t mean he can come into a women’s bathroom," South Carolina firebrand Nancy Mace wrote on social media as she led a highly personal campaign against McBride. House Speaker Mike Johnson, after initially seeking to buy time to debate the issue, came out in support of a ban, saying that all single-sex facilities would be "reserved for individuals of that biological sex." McBride -- who wears knee-length dresses, not miniskirts -- issued a statement saying that she said would respect the rules "even if I disagree with them." "I'm not here to fight about bathrooms," said the politician and activist, who transitioned as a 21-year-old and told her parents on Christmas Day 2011. Donald Trump repeatedly raised transgender issues in the closing stages of his presidential campaign, with aides noting how questions around trans identity struck a nerve with swing voters. Two of the biggest issues -- at the heart of ongoing "culture wars" between conservatives and progressives -- are whether transgender women should be allowed in women's toilets and be admitted in women's sport. Mocking transgender athletes and "woke ideology," Trump promised to get "transgender insanity the hell out of our schools, and we will keep men out of women’s sports." McBride has long been an advocate for trans rights and she helped campaign for a law banning gender discrimination in her home state of Delaware, during which she was publicly called a "freak" and the "devil incarnate". "Listening to that was demeaning and dehumanizing for my child," her mother Sally told The Washington Post in a 2018 profile. "I still have a hard time coping with that." Undeterred, McBride rode the blows and was elected as the first US transgender state senator in 2020. She has been open about her mental health struggles growing up as a boy named Tim and the personal tragedy that has marked her life since, writing a memoir called "Tomorrow Will Be Different" in 2018. "I remember as a child praying in my bed at night that I would wake up the next day and be a girl," she told a TED talk in 2016. She first gathered major public attention with an open letter while a student leader at American University in Washington that announced her transition. She went on to encounter President Joe Biden and his family, also Delaware natives, when she became active in grassroots politics there. After interning at the White House under President Barack Obama, she secured an invitation to speak at the 2016 Democratic Party convention. The White House was also the scene of her first encounter with her late husband, Andrew Cray, a transgender man and LGTBQ+ activist. They married two years later shortly before Cray died from cancer. Knowing the attention she is destined for in the US Congress, she says her aim is to be an effective congresswoman focused on everyday voter priorities such as housing and inflation. But she knows she will be constantly pushed to be a spokeswoman -- and defender -- of the trans community. "I can't do right by the trans community if I'm not being the best member of Congress that I can be for Delaware," she told TransLash. "It's the only way that people will see that trans people can be good doctors, can be good lawyers, good educators, good members of Congress. I can't be there to put out a press release and tweet every time someone says something." adp/bgs

It’s easy to use Amazon’s “thank my driver” feature to spread holiday cheer. Amazon is running a holiday promotion that lets customers show appreciation for their delivery drivers by clicking a button to send them $5 — on the retailer’s dime. If you’ve recently shopped on Amazon, you can either use the company’s Alexa virtual assistant and say, “Alexa, thank my driver” or type, “Thank my driver” in the search bar on Amazon.com or the Amazon app. You’ll get a brief message confirming that the driver who delivered your most recent order will receive a notice of your thanks. For the first 2 million driver thank-yous customers submit, drivers will receive $5 tips. Customers can actually thank a driver all year round, according to an FAQ about the program on Amazon’s website, so if you have a driver who regularly goes above and beyond, a thank-you is a nice way to show your appreciation that isn’t limited to the holiday season. The company first rolled out the Thank My Driver feature in 2022. Since then, customers have used it over 40 million times. Last year, when Amazon ran the $5 tip promotion for the holidays, the 2 million limit was reached in less than three days. After that threshold was reached, the retailer announced that 1,000 drivers receiving the most thank-yous each day would each get an additional $100 reward through the end of the year. In addition, Amazon also recognized 15 top-ranking drivers with $10,000 or $25,000 awards. Amazon declined to say how many shoppers have used the Thank My Driver feature since the program opened Wednesday. The holiday promotion is only available in the U.S. for drivers and for Amazon Flex independent delivery contractors. In addition to the promotion, there are several other ways to thank delivery drivers during the holiday season. Some customers leave drinks and snacks out on their porches for drivers. But keep in mind that shippers may have policies restricting what delivery drivers can accept. U.S. Postal Service workers, for example, can only take gifts under $20 — and you’re not allowed to give them cash. Includes VPN & password manager Up to $3 million identity theft coverage Comprehensive 3-bureau monitoring system Over 40 years of experience in the field More from Money: 6 Money Moves You Should Make Before the End of the Year Why the Odds of a ‘Santa Claus Rally’ in the Stock Market Are High This Year The FSA Deadline Is Coming. Here Are 12 Last-Minute Ways to Spend Your Dollars Pete Grieve is a New York-based reporter who covers personal finance news. At Money, Pete covers trending stories that affect Americans’ wallets on topics including car buying, insurance, housing, credit cards, retirement and taxes. He studied political science and photography at the University of Chicago, where he was editor-in-chief of The Chicago Maroon. Pete began his career as a professional journalist in 2019. Prior to joining Money, he was a health reporter for Spectrum News in Ohio, where he wrote digital stories and appeared on TV to provide coverage to a statewide audience. He has also written for the San Francisco Chronicle, the Chicago Sun-Times and CNN Politics. Pete received extensive journalism training through Report for America, a nonprofit organization that places reporters in newsrooms to cover underreported issues and communities, and he attended the annual Investigative Reporters and Editors conference in 2021.Pete has discussed his reporting in interviews with outlets including the Columbia Journalism Review and WBEZ (Chicago's NPR station). He’s been a panelist at the Chicago Headline Club’s FOIA Fest and he received the Institute on Political Journalism’s $2,500 Award for Excellence in Collegiate Reporting in 2017. An essay he wrote for Grey City magazine was published in a 2020 book, Remembering J. Z. Smith: A Career and its Consequence.

NoneIran condemns UK, US ‘hypocrisy’ in blaming others for regional instabilityJimmy Carter: Many evolutions for a centenarian ‘citizen of the world’The great National Hockey League contradiction of sports, celebration and politics is upon us. We have already begun the daily Alexander Ovechkin watch, the giant leap as he makes his way toward the career goal-scoring lead in hockey history. This all comes at a time when the league couldn’t — or wouldn’t — find a place for a Russian team in its major in-house tournament in February. It will be Ovechkin — yay — in the days and months to come, game by game, as he chases down Wayne Gretzky for a record none of us thought was possible. It will be Ovechkin — yay and Russia boo. All in the same convoluted sentence. All happening in a season in which Kirill Kaprizov of Minnesota and Nikita Kucherov of Tampa Bay are among the leading candidates for the Hart Trophy as the most valuable player in the NHL and the Rangers’ Igor Shesterkin signing a contract making him the highest paid goaltender in hockey history. Russian hockey is alive and well, individually. But it’s not alive in any team concept internationally. Ovechkin has been a long-time supporter of Russian president Vladimir Putin. So has the Stanley Cup-winning goaltender, Sergei Bobrovsky, who was just named Russian athlete of the year. We like their hockey but don’t care much for their politics or the war that continues in Ukraine. Ovechkin has had an incredible run since entering the NHL in 2005. His 868 goals are 266 more than anyone who has played during his time. Sidney Crosby is second in goals at 602, as of Saturday. Steven Stamkos and another Russian, Evgeni Malkin, are the only others within 300 goals of Ovie’s totals. In Gretzky’s career, he finished 186 goals ahead of Mike Gartner, 281 and 284 ahead of Mario Lemieux and Mark Messier. Ovechkin, in his time, is individually more of a dominant goal-scorer than Gretzky was in his time. And there’s a certain discomfort that goes along with it all in current times. I can cheer for Ovechkin the hockey player, while at the same time feel disdain for his politics and those of his leader and country. Sports and politics mix, whether we want them to or not. Rarely are they as separate as they should be or as they seem right now while Ovechkin works his way to a mark that may never be equalled. There is nothing wrong with Mitch Marner that a playoff series against Detroit or Buffalo or Pittsburgh wouldn’t solve. Marner has 13 goals this season, 10 of them against teams that won’t be in the playoffs. He has six playoff goals in his past 37 playoff games ... Marner, having a terrific season, still ranks below Mikko Rantanen and Kucherov in scoring among right wingers ... The Florida Panthers’ second line has Sam Bennett centring Matthew Tkachuk and Carter Verhaeghe. Not sure anyone would relish playing against them in a best-of-seven series in April ... If Auston Matthews doesn’t play for Team USA in the 4 Nations Face-Off, the Americans will still have Jack Hughes, Jack Eichel and Dylan Larkin at centre. But it becomes a tougher matchup, depending on what Canada does with Nathan MacKinnon, Connor McDavid and Crosby as either their first three centres, or two of the top three with one of Crosby or MacKinnon going to the wing ... Nearing the halfway point of the NHL season, Cale Makar leads all defencemen in scoring. But he’s also been on the ice for 37 even-strength goals-against. That’s significantly more than Victor Hedman and Gustav Forsling with 24, and Darnell Nurse, if you can believe this one, at just 15 ... A Canadian network would be wise to snap up fired Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde for panel work, at least for the short term. Lalonde was sharp on TV in the playoffs between periods a few years back ... Outdoor hockey games are wonderful spectacles for the city in which they take place. But as a must-see TV event, they’ve kind of lost their way. I can’t imagine there are a lot of people waiting for this Chicago-St. Louis outdoor event ... When I first met Scott Arniel, he was playing left wing on a line in Winnipeg with Dale Hawerchuk and Paul MacLean. All three of them became coaches, and Arniel is now a coach of the year candidate in the NHL with the Jets ... The last talk I had with Hawerchuk was when he was coaching Barrie of the OHL. He was telling me all about his underrated centre, Mark Scheifele. He said NHL scouts had him rated too low and he was going to be a good one. The great Hawerchuk, who passed away in 2020 at the age of 57, was right on Scheifele. I had this conversation with a Blue Jays front office man after they traded Teoscar Hernandez to Seattle following the 2022 season. “Would you pay Teoscar $20 million a year?” I was asked. I said I would not. He said neither would the Jays. Since then, Hernandez has won a World Series in Los Angeles and has recently signed to remain with the Dodgers for the next three years at an average of $22 million a season. And the Jays remain in need of a power bat for the outfield. Which means two things: 1) Don’t expect financial advice from me; 2) don’t trust whatever financial advice you might get from the Blue Jays front office, either ... A question to ask yourself, Mr. Edward Rogers. How is it the Blue Jays keep offering more money for free agents, but aren’t signing any? What does that say about the perception of the franchise around Major League Baseball and those operating it? ... This has not been the best of years for shareholders of Bell or Rogers Communications, the former majority owners of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment. Bell stock is down 36.5% on the year. Rogers stock is down 35%. Netflix stock, by the way, is up 85% on the year and 227% over the past two years ... This was Thursday in the NBA: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 45 points for Oklahoma City and teammate Lu Dort had 13 against Indiana. Meanwhile, Andrew Nembhard and Ben Mathurin combined for 41 for the Pacers. That’s 99 points scored by four Canadians in the same game. Not sure that’s ever happened before ... Some things in life don’t make sense: The Raptors are a better three-point shooting team on the road than the 24-5 first-place Thunder is ... Simon Benoit is hardly a sexy name among NHL defencemen, but few are on the ice as much as he is while being scored upon so infrequently. My favourite sporting things of 2024, in no particular order: The Paris Olympics; Paris itself; Roland Garros Stadium; everything that is Summer McIntosh ; the American League Championship Series; the Patrick Mahomes comeback in the Super Bowl; the Stanley Cup final, never mind the result; Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani and Vladdy Guerrero Jr.; the unlikely Argos; Matthews’ almost 70-goal season; Andre De Grasse and his 100-metre teammates in the 4 x100 relay at the Olympics; Team USA vs. Serbia in men’s basketball, the greatest game I’ve ever seen; Steph Curry ... Terrible time to be a sports fan in Chicago. The Bears stink. The Blackhawks stink. The White Sox stink. The Bulls aren’t any good. Not much to care about in one of the great sporting towns in America ... It’s wonderful for the hammer thrower Ethan Katzberg to be named The Canadian Press male athlete of the year. But I don’t quite understand how you can compare a hammer thrower — a singular event in athletics with a very small competitive field — with an NBA star such as Gilgeous-Alexander, who plays 82 games, plus playoffs. Or McDavid or MacKinnon, who played more than 100 NHL games in the calendar year ... The challenge for Leafs coach Craig Berube in the second half of the NHL season: Finding the right defensive partner for Morgan Rielly. He hasn’t had the right partner since Ron Hainsey was a Leaf ... First baseman Pete Alonso, a good player, not a great one, seems to be pricing himself out of the free-agent market in baseball. Even the high-priced Mets seem to be willing to walk away from Alonso ... Brendan Shanahan takes a lot of heat for his time running the Leafs, but consider this: Steve Yzerman is six years in as GM in Detroit, nowhere near the playoffs; Buffalo hasn’t made the playoffs in a lifetime. Shanahan missed the playoffs once, hasn’t missed since drafting Matthews ... Don’t know where Darko Rajakovic rates as an all-time coach — probably near the bottom — but his tantrum in Memphis the other night is an all-time unforgettable Raptors moment ... So many tough questions this time of year. What presents to keep, which to return, which games to watch when you’re not screaming about junior hockey. Are you watching the Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl or the Snoop Dogg Arizona Bowl? ... And good luck to all those playing fantasy football championship games on Sunday. I started the wrong kicker two weeks ago. Cost me and my partner a title shot. There are four sound candidates for MVP in the NFL, although if you watch enough television these days, you would think there is only one: Josh Allen. It’s a quarterback’s job to produce wins and Patrick Mahomes and Kansas City have the most in the league. Two-time MVP Lamar Jackson has combined yardage of 4,807 passing and rushing in Baltimore, which blows everyone else away. The giant Allen is unstoppable, having run for 11 touchdowns and passed for 3,549 yards with the Bills. And Saquon Barkley is in contention for all-time numbers as a running back, leading the Philadelphia Eagles. In any given year, any one of the four could, or should, be MVP. This year it will come down to Allen or Jackson, and a sound case could be made right now for either quarterback ... It drives me a little batty when I see Tkachuk or Steelers wide receiver George Pickens dangling or chewing on their mouthguard, rather than keeping it where it should be. We try to convince kids about the necessity of mouthguard usage. This kind of example doesn’t help ... Wonder how many owners in sports are paying attention to what the Suns are doing in Phoenix, charging $2 at concession stands for water, soda, hotdogs, and popcorn? A small popcorn at Cineplex is $9 now. And you wonder why people don’t go to movies anymore ... It’s highly possible that Cody Bellinger will be batting next to Giancarlo Stanton in the Yankees batting order this coming season. Bellinger, by the way, is married to Stanton’s old girlfriend ... The NBA was excited to have five million people watching games on Christmas Day on television, especially those up against NFL games on Netflix for the first time. But follow me here for a second: The U.S. is 10 times the size of Canada. A five-million-person audience in the U.S. is about half a million Canadians. By my translation, the NBA audience in the U.S. at Christmas is basically equal to the average CFL audience in Canada throughout the season ... Happy birthday to Ray Bourque (64), Myles Garrett (29), Bill Lee (78), George Parros (45), Julio Rodriguez (24), Sean Payton (61) Theo Epstein (51), Adam Vinatieri (52) and B.J. Ryan (49) ... And hey, whatever became of Jonathan Toews? ssimmons@postmedia.com twitter.com/simmonssteve

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. (AP) — Brandon Nunez threw just two passes, each for a score, and New Mexico State beat Middle Tennessee 36-21 on Saturday to end a three-game losing streak. Nunez tossed a 12-yard touchdown pass to Seth McGowan to give the Aggies a 20-7 lead midway through the third quarter. After Middle Tennessee pulled to 26-21 early in the fourth, Nunez tossed a 4-yard TD pass to Cooper Sheehan that made it 33-21 with 7:43 left.Jimmy Carter: Many evolutions for a centenarian ‘citizen of the world’

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The team that President-elect Donald Trump has selected to lead federal health agencies in his second administration includes a retired congressman, a surgeon and a former talk-show host. All could play pivotal roles in fulfilling a political agenda that could change how the government goes about safeguarding Americans' health — from health care and medicines to food safety and science research. In line to lead the Department of Health and Human Services secretary is environmental lawyer and anti-vaccine organizer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Trump's choices don't have experience running large bureaucratic agencies, but they know how to talk about health on TV . Centers for Medicare and Medicaid pick Dr. Mehmet Oz hosted a talk show for 13 years and is a well-known wellness and lifestyle influencer. The pick for the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Marty Makary, and for surgeon general, Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, are frequent Fox News contributors. Many on the list were critical of COVID-19 measures like masking and booster vaccinations for young people. Some of them have ties to Florida like many of Trump's other Cabinet nominees: Dave Weldon , the pick for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, represented the state in Congress for 14 years and is affiliated with a medical group on the state's Atlantic coast. Nesheiwat's brother-in-law is Rep. Mike Waltz , R-Fla., tapped by Trump as national security adviser. Here's a look at the nominees' potential role in carrying out what Kennedy says is the task to “reorganize” agencies, which have an overall $1.7 billion budget, employ 80,000 scientists, researchers, doctors and other officials, and effect Americans' daily lives: The Atlanta-based CDC, with a $9.2 billion core budget, is charged with protecting Americans from disease outbreaks and other public health threats. Kennedy has long attacked vaccines and criticized the CDC, repeatedly alleging corruption at the agency. He said on a 2023 podcast that there is "no vaccine that is safe and effective,” and urged people to resist the CDC's guidelines on if and when kids should get vaccinated . Decades ago, Kennedy found common ground with Weldon , 71, who served in the Army and worked as an internal medicine doctor before he represented a central Florida congressional district from 1995 to 2009. Starting in the early 2000s, Weldon had a prominent part in a debate about whether there was a relationship between a vaccine preservative called thimerosal and autism. He was a founding member of the Congressional Autism Caucus and tried to ban thimerosal from all vaccines. Kennedy, then a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, believed there was a tie between thimerosal and autism and also charged that the government hid documents showing the danger. Since 2001, all vaccines manufactured for the U.S. market and routinely recommended for children 6 years or younger have contained no thimerosal or only trace amounts, with the exception of inactivated influenza vaccine. Meanwhile, study after study after study found no evidence that thimerosal caused autism. Weldon's congressional voting record suggests he may go along with Republican efforts to downsize the CDC, including to eliminate the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, which works on topics like drownings, drug overdoses and shooting deaths. Weldon also voted to ban federal funding for needle-exchange programs as an approach to reduce overdoses, and the National Rifle Association gave him an “A” rating for his pro-gun rights voting record. Kennedy is extremely critical of the FDA, which has 18,000 employees and is responsible for the safety and effectiveness of prescription drugs, vaccines and other medical products, as well as overseeing cosmetics, electronic cigarettes and most foods. Makary, Trump’s pick to run the FDA, is closely aligned with Kennedy on several topics . The professor at Johns Hopkins University who is a trained surgeon and cancer specialist has decried the overprescribing of drugs, the use of pesticides on foods and the undue influence of pharmaceutical and insurance companies over doctors and government regulators. Kennedy has suggested he'll clear our “entire” FDA departments and also recently threatened to fire FDA employees for “aggressive suppression” of a host of unsubstantiated products and therapies, including stem cells, raw milk , psychedelics and discredited COVID-era treatments like ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine. Makary's contrarian views during the COVID-19 pandemic included questioning the need for masking and giving young kids COVID-19 vaccine boosters. But anything Makary and Kennedy might want to do when it comes to unwinding FDA regulations or revoking long-standing vaccine and drug approvals would be challenging. The agency has lengthy requirements for removing medicines from the market, which are based on federal laws passed by Congress. The agency provides health care coverage for more than 160 million people through Medicaid, Medicare and the Affordable Care Act, and also sets Medicare payment rates for hospitals, doctors and other providers. With a $1.1 trillion budget and more than 6,000 employees, Oz has a massive agency to run if confirmed — and an agency that Kennedy hasn't talked about much when it comes to his plans. While Trump tried to scrap the Affordable Care Act in his first term, Kennedy has not taken aim at it yet. But he has been critical of Medicaid and Medicare for covering expensive weight-loss drugs — though they're not widely covered by either . Trump said during his campaign that he would protect Medicare, which provides insurance for older Americans. Oz has endorsed expanding Medicare Advantage — a privately run version of Medicare that is popular but also a source of widespread fraud — in an AARP questionnaire during his failed 2022 bid for a U.S. Senate seat in Pennsylvania and in a 2020 Forbes op-ed with a former Kaiser Permanente CEO. Oz also said in a Washington Examiner op-ed with three co-writers that aging healthier and living longer could help fix the U.S. budget deficit because people would work longer and add more to the gross domestic product. Neither Trump nor Kennedy have said much about Medicaid, the insurance program for low-income Americans. Trump's first administration reshaped the program by allowing states to introduce work requirements for recipients. Kennedy doesn't appear to have said much publicly about what he'd like to see from surgeon general position, which is the nation's top doctor and oversees 6,000 U.S. Public Health Service Corps members. The surgeon general has little administrative power, but can be an influential government spokesperson on what counts as a public health danger and what to do about it — suggesting things like warning labels for products and issuing advisories. The current surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, declared gun violence as a public health crisis in June. Trump's pick, Nesheiwat, is employed as a New York City medical director with CityMD, a group of urgent care facilities in the New York and New Jersey area, and has been at City MD for 12 years. She also has appeared on Fox News and other TV shows, authored a book on the “transformative power of prayer” in her medical career and endorses a brand of vitamin supplements. She encouraged COVID-19 vaccines during the pandemic, calling them “a gift from God” in a February 2021 Fox News op-ed, as well as anti-viral pills like Paxlovid. In a 2019 Q&A with the Women in Medicine Legacy Foundation , Nesheiwat said she is a “firm believer in preventive medicine” and “can give a dissertation on hand-washing alone.” As of Saturday, Trump had not yet named his choice to lead the National Institutes of Health, which funds medical research through grants to researchers across the nation and conducts its own research. It has a $48 billion budget. Kennedy has said he'd pause drug development and infectious disease research to shift the focus to chronic diseases. He'd like to keep NIH funding from researchers with conflicts of interest, and criticized the agency in 2017 for what he said was not doing enough research into the role of vaccines in autism — an idea that has long been debunked . Associated Press writers Amanda Seitz and Matt Perrone and AP editor Erica Hunzinger contributed to this report. The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Get local news delivered to your inbox!

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