Evening Briefing: F.D.A. authorizes updated Covid booster

August 31, 2022

By Matthew Cullen

Good evening. Here's the latest at the end of Wednesday.

Vaccinations remain the cornerstone of the government's coronavirus strategy.Matt Rourke/Associated Press

1. The F.D.A. authorizes vaccines targeting Omicron.

The agency's move marks the first approved redesign of coronavirus vaccines since they were rolled out in late 2020, setting the stage for millions of Americans to receive new booster doses as soon as next week.

Two different vaccines aimed at the dominant BA.5 variant were cleared: one made by Pfizer for people as young as 12, and the other by Moderna, for those 18 and older. Only people who have received at least two shots and had at least two months since their last dose will be eligible for the updated booster.

If you're confused about what to do, we asked experts to answer some of the most common questions.

A photo of documents seized from Donald Trump's Florida home from the government's filing.Jose Romero/U.S. Department Of Justice via AFP

2. The Justice Department said classified documents at Mar-a-Lago were most likely moved and hidden when the government sought them.

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The D.O.J. said in a new filing that the F.B.I. searched Donald Trump's Florida residence only after finding evidence that highly classified documents were "likely concealed" and that the former president's representatives had falsely claimed all sensitive material had been returned.

The Justice Department also disclosed that the F.B.I.'s search yielded three classified documents in desks inside Mr. Trump's office and more than 100 documents with classification markings in the residence — twice what his lawyers had voluntarily turned over.

The suggestions of deception put two of Trump's lawyers, M. Evan Corcoran and Christina Bobb, in the spotlight as potential witnesses or targets of the government's investigation.

Separately, John Eastman, the lawyer who developed strategies to block certification of the 2020 election, is a likely target of Georgia's grand jury investigation.

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Conscripts serving their required year of military service are not fighting in Ukraine, according to the Kremlin.Alexey Malgavko/Reuters

3. The loudest cheerleaders of the war in Ukraine are pushing for a draft in Russia. But Putin has so far declined, intent on maintaining a sense of normalcy.

Six months into the biggest land war in Europe since World War II, Russia continues to fight with a military that is essentially at peacetime strength. The debate over a draft has grown more urgent as Ukraine has gained momentum on the southern front, and the killing of an ultranationalist commentator in a car bombing outside Moscow has magnified the voices of radical hawks.

In Ukraine, experts from the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog agency left the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv in a convoy of armored S.U.V. vehicles and traveled toward the imperiled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. They are expected to arrive tomorrow.

Related: European foreign ministers agreed to make it more difficult for Russians to get visas to travel to the E.U. but stopped short of banning Russian tourists.

A funeral for two Lakota elders who both died from Covid in 2020.Victor J. Blue for The New York Times

4. U.S. life expectancy fell sharply over the past two years.

In a stark reminder of the toll of the coronavirus pandemic, U.S. life expectancy fell by nearly three years between 2019 and 2021 — from an average of 79 to about 76 — the sharpest two-year decline in nearly a century. A rise in accidental deaths and drug overdoses contributed to the reduction, as did deaths from heart disease, chronic liver disease and cirrhosis.

The drop has been particularly steep in the Native American and Alaska Native communities, whose average life expectancy fell by more than six years and a half years on average to 65 — on par with the figure for all Americans in 1944.

Related: Seven monkeypox patients shared their stories of devastating symptoms, their frustration over finding care and their efforts to help each other after doctors and officials failed.

Russian President Vladimir Putin with Mikhail Gorbachev, the former Soviet leader, in Germany in 2004.Christian Charisius/Reuters

5. Mikhail Gorbachev is lionized by the West, but reviled by many Russians.

Soon after his death, it became clear that he would not be venerated by the Kremlin the same way some former leaders had been. Putin offered a brief conciliatory message, but he did not address his efforts to reverse Gorbachev's legacy of openness.

Many Russians share a similar view, castigating Gorbachev for bringing about the end of the once-powerful Soviet empire.

In the West, leaders remembered him as an honest reformer and "a man of peace," as President Emmanuel Macron of France said. Once seen as the opposition by American leaders, Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush both came to view Gorbachev as a valuable collaborator and an agent of change.

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Dr. Martin Luther King waves to supporters during the March on Washington in August 1963. AFP via Getty Images

6. The first A.P. African American studies class is coming this fall.

About 60 high schools around the country will offer a pilot program of a multidisciplinary course on African American history, politics, literature, arts and geography. Students will be able to take an end-of-year exam but will not receive scores or college credit in the pilot, according to the College Board,

The course comes at a precarious time for the teaching of history, particularly Black history. Across the country this year, 36 states have introduced 137 bills mostly driven by Republican legislators that seek to restrict teaching, mainly on race but also on gender and history.

But if all goes well, the full A.P. course will be available to all high schools that want it in the 2024-25 school year.

At 5 feet 8 inches, Fatima's height is an asset as a goalkeeper.Gabriela Bhaskar/The New York Times

7. Her soccer trophies were her most prized possessions. When the Taliban came, they could've gotten her killed.

Fatima, whose friends and family call her Fati, was the goalkeeper for the Afghanistan women's national soccer team. Playing the sport is where she found the most freedom. But in mid-August of last year, when she was just 19, the Taliban conquered Kabul and their fundamentalist views defined her soccer career as traitorous.

She buried her jerseys and trophies and made a dangerous escape to Australia, where she has started a new chapter of her life — and has continued her soccer career — along with other Afghan refugees.

In other sports news, Serena Williams will play in a second-round match against Anett Kontaveit, the No. 2 seed, tonight at 7 p.m.

Testing substitute ingredients has become a greater focus across the food industry.Lanna Apisukh for The New York Times

8. To combat the supply crunch, Totino's came up with 25 recipes for their pizza rolls.

Totino's pizza rolls went missing from shelves last winter. General Mills decided it needed to come up with a solution partly because of supply chain delays and rising costs.

The answer: It identified 25 different ways to make them. Each is a slightly different variation on about 21 ingredients — swapping in cornstarches, for example, for tapioca starch that had become hard to find. Soon after, pizza rolls filled freezer sections again.

Related: Open only on Tuesdays, the restaurant One White Street's seasonal farm stand in TriBeCa has become a reliable place to spot famous faces.

9. NASA is preparing to deal with Mars rocks as if they contain ebola.

On Mars right now, a rover is scooping up material that will eventually be collected by other spacecraft and returned to Earth. But once the rocks arrive, we aren't sure what to expect.

Could they — as Carl Sagan and other astronomers have warned — be harmful to humans? NASA, taking no chances, is planning to build a special lab to receive the Mars rocks. The rocks could land on Earth by the mid 2030s, and it could take about as much time to prepare the lab.

Related: NASA plans to retry the launch of its new Artemis rocket on Saturday, hoping to work around an engine problem that canceled Monday's attempt.

The Wave Hill flower garden in New York City.Ngoc Minh Ngo

10. And finally, September could be the new May in your garden.

On the cusp of fall, gardens may soon be losing some color and vibrancy. But if you stay consistent, you can keep your garden going strong at least until the frost arrives, the popular lecturer Jenny Rose Carey says.

Carey offers some advice: First, maintain your flowering plants to help coax their maximum output. Take a look at local landscapes, such as parks and public gardens, for clues on what works out in nature. Finally, dahlias, chrysanthemums and autumn crocus make a grand finale.

Have a thriving night.

Bryan Denton compiled photos for this briefing.

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