On Thursday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an update on its masking guidance. People who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 no longer need to wear masks or practice social distancing both outside and inside, with some exceptions based on state, local, federal, and tribal regulations. 

“We have all longed for this moment,” Dr. Rochelle P. Walensky, the director of the CDC, said at a White House news conference on Thursday. “If you are fully vaccinated, you can start doing the things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic.”

Hours after the announcement, First Lady Jill Biden made a quick appearance without her mask, as she, Senator Joe Manchin, and his wife Gayle disembarked Air Force Once. The following day, on Friday, the First Lady made a visit to the National Museum of African American History and Culture to celebrate the reopening of D.C. museums. When she was spotted without her mask and asked to comment on the new CDC guidelines she told reporters, “Isn’t it great? Don’t you feel great without it?”

The new guidelines didn’t stop Biden from continuing to wear her mask inside the museum, however, which caused some confusion and (of course) plenty of speculation. But there are a few good reasons for that. While the CDC guidelines state that masks are no longer required for people who are fully vaccinated, there are still exceptions, and businesses can determine their own guidelines. The National Museum of African American History and Culture still requires visitors aged two and older to wear a face mask during their visits even if they have received a vaccine. The First Lady was simply following the rules. 

Even though we can all breathe a little easier now as Americans continue to get vaccinated and take off our masks, we’re all still in a period of transition after engaging with the world in a highly restricted way for the last year. And while vaccination is underway across the country, only one-third of people in the U.S. are fully vaccinated as the pace of vaccination has slowed, according to The New York Times. 

With that in mind, there’s no right way to get back to living without a mask, and everyone is encouraged to do what makes them feel safest. Many epidemiologists say people should still wear masks in large outdoor crowds, like a concert or a protest, even if you’re fully vaccinated, unless “the vaccination rates increase to 80 or 90 percent over the next few months,” Vivian Towe, a program officer at the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute told The Times.

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all plan as the masks come off this summer and guidelines will likely vary by state, as they have throughout the pandemic. Some states have listed mask mandates, while others remain cautious. States led by Democrats said they were inclined to review the guidance before implementing it, for example. Meanwhile, half of the country — mostly Republican states — has already relaxed mask mandates.

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The international release of Emerald Fennell’s revenge thriller Promising Young Woman was postponed amid outrage that a male voice actor was hired to dub the voice of actress Laverne Cox in the Italian-language version of the film. According to The Guardian, the now-restricted film used a “distinctively masculine tone” when Cox’s character Gail talks to Carrie Mulligan’s Cassie in the film’s Italian trailer. Cox’s voice was dubbed by Roberto Pedicini, a cisgender man and Italian voice actor who has done dubbing work over the voices of actors like Jim Carrey and Woody Harrelson.  

Italian viewers immediately expressed outrage over the move, which Italian trans actor and voice actor Vittoria Schisano called “insulting” and “a straight-up act of violence” in an interview with The Guardian. “I’d feel bullied if I were [Cox],” she said. 

Universal Pictures International apologized for the choice but didn’t offer much of an explanation as to why they used a male actor to dub Cox’s voice in the first place. “We are deeply grateful to Laverne and the transgender community for opening our eyes to a bias that neither we nor many in our industry had recognized,” a spokesperson said in a statement to Variety. 

The statement added that the studio is redubbing Cox’s voice with a woman’s voice and is pushing back release dates until the issue is amended. “We are sorry for the pain caused but are thankful that we can address the situation on this film and prevent similar mistakes from happening again on future projects.”

Still, the studio’s decision to use a male voice actor to dub over a trans woman’s voice is a harmful, transphobic casting decision. It’s also not the first time that Universal used a male actor to dub for one of Cox’s characters, using a cis male voice actor for her role as Sophia Burset in Orange Is The New Black, as well as for her appearances on The Mindy Project. 

When Refinery29 spoke with Cox about Promising Young Woman last year, she highlighted some of the film’s themes of accountability and taking back personal power. “I am insanely grateful that I got to be a part of this film and that this film exists,” she said. “And the questions [the film] brings up around accountability, how we deal with trauma and grief, and how we empower ourselves are at the center of this story and narrative. And now is the time to be having these conversations.”

Cox has not publicly commented on the Italian film’s dubbing, but the casting directors who created this whole violent mess might learn a thing or two about taking responsibility, being accountable to trans people, and centering trans voices in the future.

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After he secured a spot as an American Idol finalist on Sunday, 16-year-old Caleb Kennedy exited the show over a resurfaced social media post that appeared to show someone wearing a Ku Klux Klan hat. ABC confirmed that Kennedy would “no longer be moving forward in the competition,” and added that Sunday’s episode will now feature only four finalists with one elimination. 

Kennedy also announced his departure from the show and apologized in posts on his social media accounts. “I was younger and did not think about the actions, but that’s not an excuse,” he wrote. “I know this has hurt and disappointed a lot of people and made people lose respect for me. I’m so sorry! I pray that I can one day regain your trust in who I am and have your respect! Thank you for supporting me.” Kennedy also added that he would be taking a break from social media. 

The Snapchat video shows a younger Kennedy sitting against a wall. At first, it looks like he’s alone, but after a moment he turns his camera to show he is sitting next to a person wearing a white hood that looks like a KKK robe, with the caption “oh my.”

The three-second video went viral online after YouTube comedian Def Noodles shared it on Twitter on Tuesday night with the caption, “THIS SHOULD’VE STAYED IN YOUR DRAFTS.” As of Thursday morning, the video had been viewed more than 73,000 times. Some fans of the show were outraged over the post, while others thought the show took matters too far by eliminating the contestant over a video he made when he was 12 years old. 

Following the news that Kennedy would be leaving the show, American Idol removed all signs of the 16-year-old singer from its social media platforms, according to The Washington Post. Videos of Kennedy were taken off the show’s Instagram account, and there is no longer footage featuring him in their story highlights. The show’s official YouTube channel also removed all of Kennedy’s past performances. 

In a statement to Spartanburg Herald-Journal, Kennedy’s mother Anita Guy said it was an issue of how people perceived the video. “I hate this has happened and how Caleb is being portrayed by people online,” Guy said. “This video was taken after Caleb had watched the movie The Strangers: Prey at Night and they were imitating those characters. It had nothing to do with the Ku Klux Klan, but I know that’s how it looks. Caleb doesn’t have a racist bone in his body. He loves everyone and has friends of all races.”

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Ever since Twitter and Facebook banned former President Donald Trump from their platforms in January following his repeated lies about widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election, it’s been harder to keep up with what he’s doing. That’s not necessarily a bad thing — in fact, it’s absolutely blissful.

Trump typically used his social platforms to spread falsehoods and violent rhetoric about everything from the coronavirus pandemic to what was happening on the U.S.-Mexico border to anti-racist protest movements. Now that we’ve seen how effective it has been for tech companies to severely limit access to their platforms for the former president, it’s safe to say that de-platforming far-right politicians and activists — who spew their violent and hateful rhetoric to their eager followers online — not only works, but works really, really well. (Of course, what would be even more effective than social media de-platforming would be ensuring that far-right politicians can’t dictate policy matters from the White House or any other positions of power. Sadly, Congress failed to prevent Trump from running for public office a second time when the Senate acquitted him during his second impeachment trial in February, and Marjorie Taylor Greene, Madison Cawthorn, and Lauren Boebert are still in the House of Representatives.)

Still, Trump has less of an audience than he did five years ago when he ran his first presidential campaign, and far less of one than when he was serving as president, which is only good news. Even his daughter and former senior advisor Ivanka’s social media platforms have gone silent since January; though she wasn’t banned from any platform, perhaps she’s left them in solidarity with her father. And let’s not forget, the former president’s 2016 win was largely thanks to social media platforms like Facebook that helped generate millions of dollars for his campaign in online fundraising.

But, it’s not all good news. Despite his limited reach, the former president is still voicing his terrible opinions — only now it’s in an echo chamber of his far-right supporters, as he continues to make appearances on Fox News, where he continues to perpetuate lies about the violent January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. Republicans who pushed the same conspiracy theories about widespread voter fraud that ultimately led to the Capitol riot have also not yet been held accountable.

Trump also addressed the Conservative Political Action Conference in Orlando earlier this month, where he spoke about uniting the Republican Party and passing new election laws. While he can’t spew his violent rhetoric on social media, the GOP is still listening and following Trump’s lead. Georgia became the first state to implement new voting rights restrictions this week, and Arizona, Florida, and Texas are working to pass similar restrictions. 

The former president’s platform may be more niche than ever, but he’s also still reaching the people he needs as Republicans attempt to consolidate power following their 2020 presidential election loss. The Republican Party will have to unite under the banner of so-called Trumpism in order to win the trust — and votes — of the former president’s far-right supporters.

As a result of Trump’s social media de-platforming, the former president is apparently in talks with app vendors as he considers creating his own social media network, sources familiar with the plans told Axios. “I do think that we’re going to see President Trump returning to social media in probably about two or three months here, with his own platform,” former Trump senior adviser Jason Miller told Fox News on Sunday. It’s safe to say we will not be signing up for whatever platform Trump ends up creating. We’re still too busy enjoying his absence from Twitter and Facebook.

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Georgia became the first state to impose new voting rights restrictions under the Biden administration Thursday. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signed into law the legislation that sets new voter ID requirements for absentee ballots, limits ballot drop boxes, and makes it illegal to give food and drinks — even water — to people waiting in line to vote.

Apparently motivated by fear over President Joe Biden’s victory in Georgia, as well as the Senate wins by Jon Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock, the law was passed by Republican lawmakers with the stated interest being that it would provide, said Kemp, “another step toward ensuring our elections are secure, accessible, and fair.” Kemp also cited alleged “alarming issues” with the 2020 presidential election as the reason to pass a sweeping crackdown on voting rights in the state, which will make voting even more difficult for Georgia’s large Black population. The fact that this legislation is being passed after Georgia turned blue in the presidential election for the first time in decades is no coincidence — the Democratic wins were thanks to community organizing efforts led by Black women, after all. 

The fact that these laws are specifically designed to suppress working-class and Black voters, who make up one-third of Georgia’s population and tend to overwhelmingly vote Democratic, is enraging. More rigid ID requirements on their own will always impact Black voters more harshly. According to a 2020 report on voter suppression from the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University Law School, 25% of Black voting-age citizens nationally did not have a current government-issued photo ID, compared to 8% of white voting-age citizens. 

“Rather than grappling with whether their ideology is causing them to fail, they are instead relying on what has worked in the past,” said voting rights activist Stacey Abrams. When she ran for governor in Georgia in 2018, Abrams centered voter suppression in her campaign. “Instead of winning new voters, you rig the system against their participation, and you steal the right to vote.” 

In an interview with The Guardian, Abrams added that legislation like this one is a response to “the big lie, to the disproven, discredited and, sadly, the blood-spilled lie of voter fraud” perpetuated by former President Donald Trump and the Republican Party in the 2020 election. “And they are responding to it by actually doing what the insurrectionists sought, doing what the liars asked for.” 

Faith leaders who sought a meeting with Kemp also called the law racist. Bishop Reginald T. Jackson, who oversees all African Methodist Episcopal churches in Georgia, said he told Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, “these bills were not only voter suppression, but they were in fact racist, and they are an attempt to turn back time to Jim Crow.”

Georgia isn’t the only state where Republicans are bowing to the demands of far-right conservatives who still falsely believe that Trump lost the presidential election due to widespread voter fraud. Republicans passed a similar law in Iowa and are working to pass similar restrictions in Arizona, Florida, and Texas. Such laws will continue to disenfranchise Black voters and voters of color.

Moreover, as voting restrictions at the state level are underway, House Democrats are bringing the fight over voting rights to the federal level with legislation that seeks to expand voter protections. The omnibus voting, ethics, and campaign finance bill seeks to weaken restrictive state voter ID laws, mandate automatic voter registration, expand vote-by-mail and early voting, and restore voting rights to people formerly convicted of felonies, The New York Times reports. 

The bill was pushed through the House on Wednesday with a 220 to 210 vote mostly along party lines, in what is becoming a national fight over voting rights as Republicans push laws to further suppress Black voters following Trump’s lies about the election.

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New Zealand voted on Wednesday in favor of paid bereavement leave in the case of a miscarriage or stillbirth. The legislation would allow pregnant people and their partners to take paid time off work in the case of a miscarriage, which was already required of employers in the event of a miscarriage or stillbirth after 20 weeks or more. The new bill will extend these benefits to anyone who loses a pregnancy at any point in their pregnancy, rather than having to use sick leave.  

“I felt that it would give women the confidence to be able to request that leave if it was required, as opposed to just being stoic and getting on with life, when they knew that they needed time, physically or psychologically, to get over the grief,” Ginny Andersen, the Labour member of Parliament who drafted the bill, said. 

As New Zealand prepares to pass the measure into law in the coming weeks, this more inclusive legislation should be an example for how other countries, like the U.S., might handle paid leave for matters of reproductive and sexual health going forward.

According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, about 10% of pregnancies end in miscarriages. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention further notes that “1 pregnancy in 100 at 20 weeks of pregnancy and later is affected by stillbirth” in the United States. 

The issue is not only medical but psychological as 29% of women who experienced early pregnancy loss after one month exhibited signs of post-traumatic stress, anxiety, and depression, the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology found. People who experience miscarriage or stillbirth should not have to rely on paid sick time during their healing process. Instead, reproductive health issues deserve their own labor policy so that individuals can have space to grieve and recover physically and emotionally from the loss before worrying about their return to work.

“The two most common things I see women for after a miscarriage is trauma, grief or both,” Tessa Sugarbaker, a gynecologist who now works as a therapist with people who have experienced pregnancy loss, told The Washington Post. “I think the trauma can come from feeling helpless that nothing could be done, from doctors not being sensitive to the experience of the woman, and from society not recognizing it as a loss.”

Of course, the United States is not the most progressive country with matters of reproductive health or labor rights. Since the passage of Roe v. Wade in 1973, the landmark Supreme Court decision that protects the right to an abortion, there have been a number of cases where women were criminalized for having a miscarriage or stillbirth. Since Minnestota became the first state to pass a fetal homicide law in 1986, another 37 states had similar statutes on the books by 2018 as a result of the conservative Personhood Movement in response to Roe, according to ProPublica. 

Further, both Arkansas and Michigan have additional laws on the books that criminalize alleged actions that might lead to miscarriage or stillbirth. The New York Times reports that in Arkansas, for example, five women have been criminalized and incarcerated for stillbirth or miscarriage, one as recently as 2016.

When an individual experiences a pregnancy loss, it’s not enough for their workplace to offer condolences and flowers. Taking unpaid time off from work is not an option for many, and paid leave policies that don’t prioritize matters of reproductive health will always disproportionately harm low-wage workers and people of color. And it’s long past time for sweeping changes to both labor laws in the U.S. that protect the rights of pregnant people, and a more just vision of reproductive and sexual health.

“We hear from women, low-wage women in particular, who are often a complicated pregnancy away from losing their job,” Dina Bakst, co-founder of A Better Balance, told TODAY. Bakst added, “I think there’s a growing recognition in this country that people have health needs and they need job-protected time off.”

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Since taking office earlier this year, Republican Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a QAnon conspiracy theorist, has been exposed for making a number of egregious racist and transphobic remarks. Greene’s old Facebook posts have showed her glorifying violence against Democratic politicians, supporting anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, and displaying disturbing thoughts about school shootings.

In one post, on which New York magazine reported earlier this year, Greene suggested that the 2018 California wildfires were started by space lasers controlled by the Rothschild banking firm, instead of something more probable like climate change. The claim is rooted in a long history of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about the Rothschild family, Vox reported. After NYMag writer Jonathan Chait described Greene’s theory about what he called “Jewish space lasers,” it didn’t take long for the term to start trending on Twitter. 

Now, Greene is now walking back these comments — but she’s not taking responsibility for them. Instead, she’s blaming the far-right’s favorite boogeyman, the “radical left.”

“This is a story that some leftist ‘journalist’ — really he’s an activist — wrote a hit piece on me and titled it ‘Jewish Space Lasers,'” Greene told Newsmax TV. “You know, the left-wing media, they just run the same lies over and over again and they call me an anti-Semite and say that I said something like Jewish space lasers, and I never did.”

Greene told Ami Magazine, which caters to the Orthodox Jewish community, that she didn’t know the Rothschilds were Jewish until recently — it might just as well have been non-Jewish people who started the wildfires with space lasers, according to the congresswoman. She added, “it really hurts to be called ‘anti-Semite’ or ‘racist.’ No one has ever called me that before in my life until the left-wing media decided to attack me.”

Despite her attempts to appear otherwise, Greene is no less of an extremist than she was when she took office. Just this week, Greene voted against the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act. To explain her vote, she made a transphobic argument on Twitter, writing that the bill would be a violation of “girls and women’s rights by destroying God’s creation, male and female.” Her office claimed to CNBC on Friday morning that Twitter suspended her account as a result.

Meanwhile, House Democrats are moving to expel her from Congress for advocating “violence against our peers, the speaker, and our government,” said California Democratic Rep. Jimmy Gomez, who introduced the resolution Friday. In February, the U.S. House voted to remove her from her committee assignments over the statements supporting conspiracy theories and advocating violence against other members of Congress. 

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Less than one day after a man shot and killed seven women in a violent rampage at three separate Asian massage parlors in Atlanta, the House of Representatives voted to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). Notably, 172 Republicans opposed the legislation because it adds firearm restrictions for people convicted of domestic violence, along with protections for transgender people and same-sex couples. The bill is a response to domestic violence, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking, and it previously expired in 2019. 

The House voted along party lines, with just 29 Republicans joining the 215 Democrats who voted in favor. The 244-172 vote will send the bill to the Senate where it might face even more difficulty being approved, with Democrats controlling 50 of the 60 necessary votes. 

Several provisions added to the bill have received bipartisan support, including state grants to expand sexual and domestic violence services and housing assistance for survivors. However, 172 Republicans took issue with additions that would make purchasing or owning a firearm more difficult for people convicted of a violent crime or subject to a court order, The New York Times reports. Republicans took further issue with the bill’s proposed expansion to protect gay, bisexual, and transgender people. Republicans who voted against the bill include Lauren Boebert (CO), Madison Cawthorn (NC), Liz Cheney (WY), Matt Gaetz (FL), Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA), Devin Nunes (CA), among others.

According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, nearly 20 people per minute are physically abused by a partner in the U.S. on average. Further, the organization states that 35% of all women killed by men are killed by an intimate partner with a firearm. But intimate partner violence is also a problem for gay, bisexual, and trans individuals who face high rates of domestic violence and additional barriers to receiving institutional support. Data from the No More Foundation reports that between 30 and 50% of transgender people experience intimate partner violence in their lifetime. 

Still, Republicans are invoking the boogieman of the so-called radical left in their opposition to passing the VAWA in its current form. 

“It seems to me that many on the left decided that they could use this critical legislation that’s intended to protect women and girls from violence as a vehicle to promote their far-left political agenda,” said Republican Ohio Rep. Steve Chabot. Republican Arizona Rep. Debbie Lesko echoed the same, claiming that “The most egregious provisions of this bill push leftist gender ideology at the expense of important protections for women’s privacy and safety.”

Jason Ouimet, the executive director of the NRA’s lobbying arm told NPR, “Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi and anti-gun lawmakers chose to insert gun control provisions into this bill in 2019 to pit pro-gun lawmakers against it so that they can falsely and maliciously claim these lawmakers don’t care about women.” 

While conservatives and far-rightists in Congress claim that additional gun control provisions in a bill to protect people from intimate partner violence is some kind of Democrat-led conspiracy, advocates of the bill simply want to keep people — namely, women — alive. 

“This reauthorization would significantly increase funding for rape prevention programs,” said Allison Randall, vice president for policy for the National Network to End Domestic Violence. “The longer it takes means more survivors won’t benefit.”

Jennifer Becker, deputy legal director of Legal Momentum, a legal advocacy group for women, told NPR the additional firearm provisions and protections for trans people are necessary. “Everything that we advocate for in VAWA is based on the reality of what we know victims are being subjected to, and what we know survivors need to seek safety, accountability, healing,” said Becker. “These provisions are central to ensuring that people stay alive,” she said.

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While Atlanta law enforcement is still not calling the murder of eight people at Asian massage parlors a hate crime, resurfaced social media posts from a member of the Sheriff’s office have now come under fire. After 21-year-old Robert Aaron Long admitted to killing eight people, including six Asian women, during a deadly shooting rampage on Tuesday, a Cherokee County, Georgia, Sheriff’s Office spokesperson said Long was simply having a “really bad day.” 

“Yesterday was a really bad day for him and this is what he did,” said Jay Baker during a press conference with the Atlanta Police Department on Wednesday. But Baker has his own history of sinophobia, and shared posts on Facebook that echo former President Donald Trump’s racist rhetoric in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Daily Beast reports. 

The Facebook posts, which were live on Twitter, show Baker promoting shirts that read, “COVID-19 imported virus from CHY-NA.” In a March 30 post, Baker wrote, “Place your order while they last,” adding a smiley-face emoji. “Love me shirt,” Baker wrote in a later post from April 2020. “Get yours while they last.” 

Sheriff Frank Reynolds, who is Facebook friends with Baker, told the Daily Beast he was unaware of Baker’s posts. “I am not aware of that. I will have to contact him, but thank you for bringing that to my attention,” Reynolds said. The Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Refinery29. 

Hey Captain Jay Baker with Cherokee Country Sheriff's Office… this you? pic.twitter.com/1pTlwSlYZQ

— Rich Phelps (@RichPhelps) March 17, 2021

During Wednesday’s news conference, Baker attributed Long’s actions to his apparent “sexual addiction” and said the 21-year-old targeted the spas to “take out that temptation.” Despite not calling the attacks a hate crime, police say the investigation is ongoing and the murders could still be categorized as such.

Long specifically targeted working class Asian women, who are “constantly subjected to sexual assault and violence,” said writer Mimi Zhu in an Instagram post. “Spas, churches, temples, and mosques are sacred spaces for the spirit to find peace,” wrote Zhu. “White supremacists have tactfully and historically targeted these spaces because they target the unarmed, and the unexpecting. The Asian women who were targeted and murdered were in spaces of restfulness and relaxation.” 

Tuesday’s shootings happened after a rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans over the last year. A report published just one day before the shootings by the group Stop AAPI Hate noted 3,795 incidents of verbal harassment, physical assault, workplace discrimination, and other forms of violence against Asian Americans during the pandemic. 

“For all feeling impacted by this continuing chain of violence against Asians, I hope you’ll take some time to think abt why these (racialized, gendered) massage parlors were targeted & how much those who work in those spaces are deserving & worthy of respect, dignity, protection,” activist Hyejin Shim wrote on Twitter, pointing to the sexualized violence and exploitation that Asian women face in the workplace. Shim added, “sending more police into already criminalized sites like massage parlors will absolutely NOT protect Asian sex workers.” 

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Now that it’s been a whole year since the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic, it might seem extra hard to remember anything from the before times. Remember bars? Remember hugs? Remember…Theranos? Well, the law hasn’t forgotten about Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos, who is still awaiting trial in her fraud case.

Holmes lucked out when the pandemic started last year because she was able to evade her initial trial date, which was pushed back from October 2020 to July 13, 2021, and with it the continued public scrutiny for being one of the most fascinating scammers of our generation. Now, she may be in luck yet again.

In a court filing on March 2, Holmes’ lawyers requested a six-week delay for her trial because, as it turns out, she is pregnant with a July due date. The status report was filed by Holmes’ attorneys and federal prosecutors in the San Jose U.S. District Court. Because of her pregnancy, the defense and prosecution have both agreed to request a delay to the start of the trial, with jury selection scheduled to begin in August. 

But let it be known that this is not the first attempt to delay the trial. In a request from December 2020, Holmes’ team noted that the pandemic presented a “great inconvenience to victims who would like their day in court, as well as Defendant who wishes a speedy opportunity to defend against the charges.” The trial was then delayed for the second time.

Holmes is facing a dozen felony charges after she was accused of lying to investors and patients about Theranos’ technology, which was allegedly worth $9 billion in 2015. The company claimed it could use just a few drops of blood from a finger prick to test for a full range of health conditions. However, a Wall Street Journal investigation found that the company was not using its technology on all the tests it was offering, and employees said they didn’t trust the machine’s accuracy. Theranos instead used commercial analyzers from outside companies to run the tests.

The company also partnered with Walgreens and Safeway, who adopted tests from Theranos before Holmes and her partner, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, were exposed for fraud in 2015. The two were both charged in March 2018 and indicted on nine counts of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, each facing a maximum sentence of 20 years if found guilty. Both Holmes and Balwani have denied the allegations.

Holmes can only delay her trial so many times before she inevitably sees her day in court — but there’s no telling what she might come up with next.

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After so many of us living in isolation for the better part of last year, things could be looking up. President Joe Biden announced on Thursday night plans to speed up the vaccination process, opening up vaccines to all U.S. adults by May 1 with the hopes that people can start gathering in small groups again by the Fourth of July. And suddenly it’s starting to look like we might have some semblance of a more normal summer, including the reintroduction of casual hookups.

“While it was different for everyone, we all lost something,” Biden said from the White House East Room on Thursday, adding that the last year has been one of “collective suffering, a collective sacrifice.” The president said that as vaccine supplies continue to increase in the coming months, he will direct states to make them available to all adults by May 1 while also launching a website to help people find doses of the vaccine.

The process thus far has varied state by state, with many hurdles in the way of easily getting vaccinated as many people are “searching day and night for an appointment,” said Biden. But “finding light in the darkness is a very American thing to do. In fact, it may be the most American thing we do,” he said. Because a year into the pandemic, people across the country are exhausted by collective grief and loss and need something to look forward to.  

With some newfound hope for vaccinations speeding up nationwide, the question now remains: Will this be the summer of casual sex? 

Many people certainly seem to think so, as lots of tweets have been churned out with excitement for a horny, post-vaccination 2021 summer. Since the start of pandemic lockdowns last year, sex has been on a lot of people’s minds, with many of us longing for sexual intimacy, especially those weathering the pandemic alone. It’s to be expected, of course, since the federal government in 2020 advised people who don’t live together to stay apart for the foreseeable future to slow the spread of the deadly virus. 

Throughout the pandemic, people have been navigating sexual and physical intimacy in different ways. Some people stopped having sex altogether, while others increased communication about boundaries and COVID risk factors before meeting up with someone new.

“What this means for the future is that we’re going to see a wide range of reactions as we come out of lockdown,” Justin Lehmiller, a research fellow at the Kinsey Institute at Indiana University, told Vox last year. He later added, “Long-term abstinence, especially when it’s not by personal choice, is something that most people find very difficult to stick to.”

Some U.S. leaders recognized how hard things have become for a lot of single young people. Just last week, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders went viral on Twitter after addressing the Senate floor about the trauma and mental health risks of a year spent mostly at home and in isolation due the pandemic. “You’ve got young people who want to go to school, who want to socialize, want to date, want to do things that young people do,” the senator said. “And they can’t do it and have been unable to do that for the last year, and that has resulted in a very sharp increase in mental illness in this country.” Bernie’s call to help young people get back to having sex and dating did not go unappreciated.

While many people can look forward to the prospect of having more sex in the near future, we should also still be taking necessary precautions to keep ourselves and each other safe. New COVID cases have continued dropping across the country, but experts worry that this could also lead to more surges as people start relaxing safety measures. Meanwhile, Republican governors like Texas’ Greg Abbott are starting to lift statewide restrictions to get “back to normal” before mass vaccination efforts have been fully rolled out. And even as more and more people continue to get vaccinated, people should continue wearing masks and social distancing in public, and discussing COVID risks before meeting up with strangers.

Now that the federal government seems to have a plan to roll out more vaccinations, people are ready to get to it. For the first time in an entire year, there is some hope that we can gather with our families, hug our friends, kiss and cuddle our partners — and make up for lost time hooking up with strangers.

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Former First Lady Michelle Obama has a message for all Americans: we need to protect each other, and she’s taking the lead. She shared this sentiment alongside a photo of herself receiving her COVID-19 vaccination on Thursday. “When you can get the COVID-19 vaccine, I hope you do,” Obama wrote on Twitter and Instagram. “It’s our best shot at beating this virus, looking out for one another, and getting back to some of the things we miss. Getting vaccinated will save lives—and that life could be yours.”

The photo of the former first lady was included in a new vaccination ad campaign, which included all living former presidents and former first ladies — with the exception of the Trump family — urging Americans to get vaccinated when they can. The ad is an effort to combat vaccine skepticism as we come up on the one-year anniversary of the novel coronavirus pandemic. In the last year, more than half a million Americans have died as a result of the federal government’s mishandling of the pandemic. 

Apart from her charismatic message, the image of Obama — in her casual headband, white t-shirt, and hoop earrings — was worthy of recognition. “Michelle must be protected at all costs,” one person commented. Others commented on the former first lady’s continued leadership on public health issues, despite leaving the White House more than four years ago. “Thank you @MichelleObama, for continuing to show leadership,” one person wrote. “I thank you for continuing to be a role model. Seeing you get the vaccine publicly will change many minds regarding its safety,” wrote another.

Thank you @MichelleObama, for continuing to show leadership. #COVID19 https://t.co/eL93MvkWA2

— David Weissman (@davidmweissman) March 11, 2021

yes MA’AM. 😎 https://t.co/qvuFFpGimB

— Dennis Herring (@dcherring) March 11, 2021

Wonder Woman 😎🙌 https://t.co/OVmWTjW4zI

— Marko Petrovic (@Marceau96) March 11, 2021

While former U.S. leaders hope to show unity in their efforts to encourage people nationwide to get the vaccine, it is imperative to remember the ways in which the virus has disproportionately impacted marginalized communities, and vaccination efforts have been simultaneously inequitable. Over the last year, Black and brown communities have seen higher rates of COVID infection and less access to testing services, with vaccination sites often inaccessible, as well. 

Michelle Obama has been among those leading voices trying to change that, and her efforts — and candor — are certainly impactful. The more people who sign up to get vaccinated, the more likely we all are to keep ourselves and each other safe, while also working toward herd immunity. That’s her real message here: getting vaccinated really is our best shot at caring for each other.

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