U.S Government 2021

  The COVID-19 pandemic has forced federal, state and local governments around the world to take urgent action to protect public health.  That includes implementing orders requiring people to stay home as a way to help combat the spread of this deadly virus.  However, in the United States, these orders do not override all of your constitutional rights. What are the stay-at-home, quarantine, and safe work orders?  In many cities and counties across the country, such as here in Texas, various stay-at-home orders have been implemented to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.  In Texas, dozens of counties have already implemented such orders.  The governor, the Texas Supreme Court, and various government agencies have also issued rules and guidelines to respond to this public health emergency. Are stay-at-home orders constitutional?  Probably yes.  There is no question that national, state and local governments can - and should - respond to emergencies an...

 An ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) in March 2020. The novel virus was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019;  a lockdown in Wuhan and other cities in Hubei province failed to contain the outbreak, and it spread to other parts of mainland China and around the world.  The WHO declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 30 January 2020, and later a pandemic on 11 March 2020. Since 2021, variants of the virus have resulted in further waves in several countries, with the Delta, Alpha and Beta variants being the most virulent.  As of 21 July 2021, more than 191 million cases have been confirmed, with more than 4.12 million confirmed deaths attributed to COVID-19, making it one of the deadliest pandemics in history. Current clinical management of COVID-19 includes infection prevent...

 The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted politics, both international and domestic, by affecting the governing & political systems of multiple countries, causing suspensions of legislative activities, isolation or deaths of multiple politicians and reschedulings of elections due to fears of spreading the virus.  The pandemic has triggered broader debates about political issues such as the relative advantages of democracy and autocracy, how states respond to crises, politicization of beliefs about the virus, and the adequacy of existing frameworks of international cooperation. Additionally, the pandemic has, in some cases, posed several challenges to democracy, leading to it being fatally undermined and damaged. Early in February, there was widespread and robust concern around the globe that an excessive reaction to the COVID-19 threat, whose impact was unclear, would lead to a severe slowdown of the global economy.  President Trump presumably shared this concern to the poi...