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Brief research report: impact of vaccination on antibody responses and mortality from severe COVID-19

Affiliations.

  • 1 Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, The Ohio State University, Wooster, OH, United States.
  • 2 Center for Food Animal Health, Department of Animal Sciences, Ohio Agriculture Research and Development Center (OARDC), College of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, The Ohio State University, Wooster, OH, United States.
  • 3 Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, United States.
  • 4 Division of Medical Oncology, Department of Internal Medicine, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, United States.
  • 5 The Pelotonia Institute of Immuno-Oncology, The Ohio State University James Comprehensive Cancer Center, Columbus, OH, United States.
  • PMID: 38390335
  • PMCID: PMC10883056
  • DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2024.1325243
  • Corrigendum: Brief research report: impact of vaccination on antibody responses and mortality from severe COVID-19. Adhikari B, Bednash JS, Horowitz JC, Rubinstein MP, Vlasova AN. Adhikari B, et al. Front Immunol. 2024 Feb 28;15:1384209. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2024.1384209. eCollection 2024. Front Immunol. 2024. PMID: 38482012 Free PMC article.

Introduction: While it is established that vaccination reduces risk of hospitalization, there is conflicting data on whether it improves outcome among hospitalized COVID-19 patients. This study evaluated clinical outcomes and antibody (Ab) responses to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection/vaccines in patients with acute respiratory failure (ARF) and various comorbidities.

Methods: In this single-center study, 152 adult patients were admitted to Ohio State University hospital with ARF (05/2020 - 11/2022) including 112 COVID-19-positive and 40 COVID-19-negative patients. Of the COVID-19 positive patients, 23 were vaccinated for SARS-CoV-2 (Vax), and 89 were not (NVax). Of the NVax COVID-19 patients, 46 were admitted before and 43 after SARS-CoV-2 vaccines were approved. SARS-CoV-2 Ab levels were measured/analyzed based on various demographic and clinical parameters of COVID-19 patients. Additionally, total IgG4 Ab concentrations were compared between the Vax and NVax patients.

Results: While mortality rates were 36% (n=25) and 27% (n=15) for non-COVID-19 NVax and Vax patients, respectively, in COVID-19 patients mortality rates were 37% (NVax, n=89) and 70% (Vax, n=23). Among COVID-19 patients, mortality rate was significantly higher among Vax vs. NVax patients (p=0.002). The Charlson's Comorbidity Index score (CCI) was also significantly higher among Vax vs. NVax COVID-19 patients. However, the mortality risk remained significantly higher (p=0.02) when we compared COVID-19 Vax vs. NVax patients with similar CCI score, suggesting that additional factors may increase risk of mortality. Higher levels of SARS-CoV-2 Abs were noted among survivors, suggestive of their protective role. We observed a trend for increased total IgG4 Ab, which promotes immune tolerance, in the Vax vs. NVax patients in week 3.

Conclusion: Although our cohort size is small, our results suggest that vaccination status of hospital-admitted COVID-19 patients may not be instructive in determining mortality risk. This may reflect that within the general population, those individuals at highest risk for COVID-19 mortality/immune failure are likely to be vaccinated. Importantly, the value of vaccination may be in preventing hospitalization as opposed to stratifying outcome among hospitalized patients, although our data do not address this possibility. Additional research to identify factors predictive of aberrant immunogenic responses to vaccination is warranted.

Keywords: COVID-19 vaccines; IgG4; SARS-CoV-2; antibodies; comorbidities; immune tolerance; mortality.

Copyright © 2024 Adhikari, Bednash, Horowitz, Rubinstein and Vlasova.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. The author(s) declared that they were an editorial board member of Frontiers, at the time of submission. This had no impact on the peer review process and the final decision.

Numbers of Vax and NVax…

Numbers of Vax and NVax SARS-CoV-2 positive patients enrolled between May 2020 and…

Kaplan-Meier survival analysis of SARS-CoV-2…

Kaplan-Meier survival analysis of SARS-CoV-2 infected patients before (A) and after (B) adjustment…

SARS-CoV-2 S and N peptide-specific…

SARS-CoV-2 S and N peptide-specific IgG, IgA and IgM Ab titers in different…

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frontiers brief research report

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I N APRIL HILARY CASS , a British paediatrician, published her review of gender-identity services for children and young people, commissioned by NHS England. It cast doubt on the evidence base for youth gender medicine. This prompted the World Professional Association for Transgender Health ( WPATH ), the leading professional organisation for the doctors and practitioners who provide services to trans people, to release a blistering rejoinder. WPATH said that its own guidelines were sturdier, in part because they were “based on far more systematic reviews”.

Systematic reviews should evaluate the evidence for a given medical question in a careful, rigorous manner. Such efforts are particularly important at the moment, given the feverish state of the American debate on youth gender medicine, which is soon to culminate in a Supreme Court case challenging a ban in Tennessee. The case turns, in part, on questions of evidence and expert authority.

Court documents recently released as part of the discovery process in a case involving youth gender medicine in Alabama reveal that WPATH ’s claim was built on shaky foundations. The documents show that the organisation’s leaders interfered with the production of systematic reviews that it had commissioned from the Johns Hopkins University Evidence-Based Practice Centre ( EPC ) in 2018.

From early on in the contract negotiations, WPATH expressed a desire to control the results of the Hopkins team’s work. In December 2017, for example, Donna Kelly, an executive director at WPATH , told Karen Robinson, the EPC ’s director, that the WPATH board felt the EPC researchers “cannot publish their findings independently”. A couple of weeks later, Ms Kelly emphasised that, “the [ WPATH ] board wants it to be clear that the data cannot be used without WPATH approval”.

Ms Robinson saw this as an attempt to exert undue influence over what was supposed to be an independent process. John Ioannidis of Stanford University, who co-authored guidelines for systematic reviews, says that if sponsors interfere or are allowed to veto results, this can lead to either biased summaries or suppression of unfavourable evidence. Ms Robinson sought to avoid such an outcome. “In general, my understanding is that the university will not sign off on a contract that allows a sponsor to stop an academic publication,” she wrote to Ms Kelly.

Months later, with the issue still apparently unresolved, Ms Robinson adopted a sterner tone. She noted in an email in March 2018 that, “Hopkins as an academic institution, and I as a faculty member therein, will not sign something that limits academic freedom in this manner,” nor “language that goes against current standards in systematic reviews and in guideline development”.

Not to reason XY

Eventually WPATH relented, and in May 2018 Ms Robinson signed a contract granting WPATH power to review and offer feedback on her team’s work, but not to meddle in any substantive way. After wpath leaders saw two manuscripts submitted for review in July 2020, however, the parties’ disagreements flared up again. In August the WPATH executive committee wrote to Ms Robinson that WPATH had “many concerns” about these papers, and that it was implementing a new policy in which WPATH would have authority to influence the EPC team’s output—including the power to nip papers in the bud on the basis of their conclusions.

Ms Robinson protested that the new policy did not reflect the contract she had signed and violated basic principles of unfettered scientific inquiry she had emphasised repeatedly in her dealings with WPATH . The Hopkins team published only one paper after WPATH implemented its new policy: a 2021 meta-analysis on the effects of hormone therapy on transgender people. Among the recently released court documents is a WPATH checklist confirming that an individual from WPATH was involved “in the design, drafting of the article and final approval of [that] article”. (The article itself explicitly claims the opposite.) Now, more than six years after signing the agreement, the EPC team does not appear to have published anything else, despite having provided WPATH with the material for six systematic reviews, according to the documents.

No one at WPATH or Johns Hopkins has responded to multiple inquiries, so there are still gaps in this timeline. But an email in October 2020 from WPATH figures, including its incoming president at the time, Walter Bouman, to the working group on guidelines, made clear what sort of science WPATH did (and did not) want published. Research must be “thoroughly scrutinised and reviewed to ensure that publication does not negatively affect the provision of transgender health care in the broadest sense,” it stated. Mr Bouman and one other coauthor of that email have been named to a World Health Organisation advisory board tasked with developing best practices for transgender medicine.

Another document recently unsealed shows that Rachel Levine, a trans woman who is assistant secretary for health, succeeded in pressing wpath to remove minimum ages for the treatment of children from its 2022 standards of care. Dr Levine’s office has not commented. Questions remain unanswered, but none of this helps WPATH ’s claim to be an organisation that bases its recommendations on science. ■

Stay on top of American politics with  The US in brief , our daily newsletter with fast analysis of the most important electoral stories, and  Checks and Balance , a weekly note from our Lexington columnist that examines the state of American democracy and the issues that matter to voters.

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This article appeared in the United States section of the print edition under the headline “Marking their own homework”

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Is land fragmentation undermining collective action in rural areas an empirical study based on irrigation systems in china’s frontier areas.

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1. Introduction

2. literature review, 2.1. the causes of land fragmentation, 2.2. research on collective action, 2.3. the impacts of land fragmentation on collective action: a social science perspective, 2.4. the impacts of land fragmentation on social–ecological systems: a natural science perspective, 2.5. summary of the literature, 3. theoretical analysis and research hypotheses, 3.1. connections between humans and nature, 3.2. the impact of land fragmentation on collective action in the context of connection between humans and nature, 4. materials and methods, 4.1. research area, 4.2. research data, 4.3. variable selection, 4.3.1. dependent variable, 4.3.2. core independent variables, 4.3.3. control variables, 4.4. research methodology, 4.4.1. ordered probability regression model, 4.4.2. instrumental variables test, 5. estimated results, 5.1. benchmark regression, 5.2. robustness analysis, 6. discussion, 6.1. the impact of an lf threshold of 513.3 m 2 on collective action and its policy implications, 6.2. possible mechanisms through which land fragmentation affects collective action, 6.3. promoting an extended understanding of the relationship between land fragmentation and collective action: a dynamic perspective discussion, 7. conclusions, implications, and limitations, 7.1. conclusions, 7.2. implications, 7.3. limitations, author contributions, data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

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Click here to enlarge figure

VariableDescriptionMeanStd. Dev.Min.Max.
ICADoes the household regularly participate in irrigation facility repair activities? (ICA) (1 = Never participate to 5 = Frequently participate)4.2860.87915
LFReciprocal of the area of land managed by households1.0890.6510.1432.915
LF2Reciprocal of the area of land managed by households (square)1.6101.8900.0208.500
PESTICIDEDid your family reduce pesticide application in actual cultivation? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)1.5190.50012
FERTILIZERDid your family reduce fertilizer application in actual cultivation? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.4360.49601
FAITHDo your family members hold religious beliefs? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.0390.19301
INCOMEWhat was the family income in 2022? (Yuan)90,594.160218,947.80003,750,000
POPULATIONHow many people are there in your family?5.1492.308135
COASTALIs the village located in a coastal area? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.0330.17901
MOUNTAINIs the village located in a mountainous area? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.4710.49901
DEGENERATHas there been any degradation in the quality of family farmland in recent years? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.3680.48301
Soil HealthHow is the fertility level of the family land? (1 = Very barren; 5 = Very fertile)3.4280.86815
DISTANCEHow far is the family residence from the town center? (km)7.5406.5630.0150
ENDOWMENTDoes the family purchase elderly insurance? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.7790.41501
LAWHave you heard or are you familiar with the “Environmental Protection Law”? (1 = Never heard of it; 5 = Very familiar)2.8081.14515
FACILITIESHas there been any improvement in the village’s farmland infrastructure conditions in recent years? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.7620.42601
COOPERATIVEDid your family join a rural cooperative in 2022? (0 = No; 1 = Yes)0.1450.35301
RELATIONHow familiar are you and your family with other villagers in the village? (1 = Not familiar at all; 5 = Very familiar)4.4890.72915
SELLWhat percentage of the grains planted by the family is used for external sales? (%)25.85237.6960100
TECHNOLOGYDo you seek agricultural technology assistance through the Internet? (1 = Strongly disagree; 5 = Strongly agree)1.9981.21215
DISASTER1In recent years, natural disasters have caused substantial damage to properties such as houses and gardens (1 = strongly disagree; 5 = strongly agree)2.3541.31815
DISASTER2In recent years, have natural disasters caused substantial harm to household agricultural production? (1 = strongly disagree; 5 = strongly agree)2.8741.43715
REGULATIONSHow well do other villagers adhere to village rules and agreements? (1 = Never adhere; 5 = always adhere)4.0590.77415
EQUITYDo you believe that decision-making on various village affairs is genuinely fair, just, and transparent? (1 = strongly disagree; 5 = strongly agree)4.0641.13515
VariableModel 1 (Oprobit)Model 2 (2SLS)Model 3 (IV-Probit)
ICAICAICA
LF0.679 **2.474 **0.599
(2.39)(2.14)(1.49)
LF2−0.261 ***−0.887 **−0.263 ***
(−2.70)(−2.17)(−2.72)
PESTICIDE−0.0391−0.0493−0.0294
(−0.36)(−0.63)(−0.26)
FERTILIZER0.02620.02840.0148
(0.24)(0.36)(0.12)
FAITH−0.174−0.189−0.164
(−0.79)(−1.15)(−0.73)
INCOME−0.022−0.013−0.022
(−1.27)(−0.98)(−1.26)
POPULATION−0.005550.00462−0.00729
(−0.29)(0.33)(−0.37)
COASTAL0.01830.1230.0312
(0.08)(0.70)(0.13)
MOUNTAIN0.170 *0.170 **0.148
(1.82)(2.25)(1.22)
DEGENERAT0.03920.03860.0490
(0.42)(0.57)(0.49)
FERTILITY0.176 ***0.0988 **0.177 ***
(3.22)(2.56)(3.24)
DISTANCE0.001190.002400.00243
(0.17)(0.48)(0.30)
ENDOWMENT0.09370.06010.0944
(0.91)(0.79)(0.92)
LAW0.106 ***0.0715 **0.106 ***
(2.64)(2.44)(2.65)
FACILITIES0.03220.05540.0309
(0.32)(0.73)(0.30)
COOPERATIVE−0.0415−0.0234−0.0434
(−0.34)(−0.27)(−0.35)
RELATION0.356 ***0.272 ***0.353 ***
(6.16)(6.09)(6.00)
SELL−0.00103−0.00150−0.000794
(−0.86)(−1.60)(−0.54)
TECHNOLOGY0.04810.03280.0480
(1.30)(1.26)(1.29)
DISASTER1−0.126 ***−0.0788 ***−0.127 ***
(−3.13)(−2.77)(−3.15)
DISASTER20.0803 **0.04310.0808 **
(2.11)(1.60)(2.13)
REGULATIONS0.314 ***0.171 ***0.310 ***
(5.41)(3.93)(5.11)
EQUITY0.03070.01220.0331
(0.77)(0.44)(0.82)
Regional variablesControlledControlledControlled
Observed value798798798
Wald chi-squared183.7311.613183.73
p > chi-squared0.0000.0000.000
Pseudo-R-squared0.1030.0710.103
VariablesModel 4Model 5Model 6Model 7
DCASCATCAPCA
LF0.688 **−0.539 **−0.4071.034 ***
(2.49)(−2.08)(−1.38)(3.14)
LF2−0.252 ***0.182 **0.228 **−0.358 ***
(−2.69)(2.04)(2.23)(−3.19)
Connection between
humans and nature
ControlledControlledControlledControlled
Controlled variablesControlledControlledControlledControlled
Regional variablesControlledControlledControlledControlled
Observations798798798798
Wald chi-squared181.61120.87102.83124.74
Chi-squared0.0000.0000.0000.000
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Su Y, Xuan Y, Zang L, Zhang X. Is Land Fragmentation Undermining Collective Action in Rural Areas? An Empirical Study Based on Irrigation Systems in China’s Frontier Areas. Land . 2024; 13(7):1041. https://doi.org/10.3390/land13071041

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What is Project 2025? What to know about the conservative blueprint for a second Trump administration

By Melissa Quinn , Jacob Rosen

Updated on: July 11, 2024 / 9:40 AM EDT / CBS News

Washington — Voters in recent weeks have begun to hear the name "Project 2025" invoked more and more by President Biden and Democrats, as they seek to sound the alarm about what could be in store if former President Donald Trump wins a second term in the White House.

Overseen by the conservative Heritage Foundation, the multi-pronged initiative includes a detailed blueprint for the next Republican president to usher in a sweeping overhaul of the executive branch.

Trump and his campaign have worked to distance themselves from Project 2025, with the former president going so far as to call some of the proposals "abysmal." But Democrats have continued to tie the transition project to Trump, especially as they find themselves mired in their own controversy over whether Mr. Biden should withdraw from the 2024 presidential contest following his startling debate performance last month.

Here is what to know about Project 2025:

What is Project 2025?

Project 2025 is a proposed presidential transition project that is composed of four pillars: a policy guide for the next presidential administration; a LinkedIn-style database of personnel who could serve in the next administration; training for that pool of candidates dubbed the "Presidential Administration Academy;" and a playbook of actions to be taken within the first 180 days in office.

It is led by two former Trump administration officials: Paul Dans, who was chief of staff at the Office of Personnel Management and serves as director of the project, and Spencer Chretien, former special assistant to Trump and now the project's associate director.

Project 2025 is spearheaded by the Heritage Foundation, but includes an advisory board consisting of more than 100 conservative groups.

Much of the focus on — and criticism of — Project 2025 involves its first pillar, the nearly 900-page policy book that lays out an overhaul of the federal government. Called "Mandate for Leadership 2025: The Conservative Promise," the book builds on a "Mandate for Leadership" first published in January 1981, which sought to serve as a roadmap for Ronald Reagan's incoming administration.

The recommendations outlined in the sprawling plan reach every corner of the executive branch, from the Executive Office of the President to the Department of Homeland Security to the little-known Export-Import Bank. 

President Donald Trump speaks during a meeting with advisers in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D,C., on June 25, 2019.

The Heritage Foundation also created a "Mandate for Leadership" in 2015 ahead of Trump's first term. Two years into his presidency, it touted that Trump had instituted 64% of its policy recommendations, ranging from leaving the Paris Climate Accords, increasing military spending, and increasing off-shore drilling and developing federal lands. In July 2020, the Heritage Foundation gave its updated version of the book to then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. 

The authors of many chapters are familiar names from the Trump administration, such as Russ Vought, who led the Office of Management and Budget; former acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller; and Roger Severino, who was director of the Office of Civil Rights at the Department of Health and Human Services.

Vought is the policy director for the 2024 Republican National Committee's platform committee, which released its proposed platform on Monday. 

John McEntee, former director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office under Trump, is a senior advisor to the Heritage Foundation, and said that the group will "integrate a lot of our work" with the Trump campaign when the official transition efforts are announced in the next few months.

Candidates interested in applying for the Heritage Foundation's "Presidential Personnel Database" are vetted on a number of political stances, such as whether they agree or disagree with statements like "life has a right to legal protection from conception to natural death," and "the President should be able to advance his/her agenda through the bureaucracy without hindrance from unelected federal officials."

The contributions from ex-Trump administration officials have led its critics to tie Project 2025 to his reelection campaign, though the former president has attempted to distance himself from the initiative.

What are the Project 2025 plans?

Some of the policies in the Project 2025 agenda have been discussed by Republicans for years or pushed by Trump himself: less federal intervention in education and more support for school choice; work requirements for able-bodied, childless adults on food stamps; and a secure border with increased enforcement of immigration laws, mass deportations and construction of a border wall. 

But others have come under scrutiny in part because of the current political landscape. 

Abortion and social issues

In recommendations for the Department of Health and Human Services, the agenda calls for the Food and Drug Administration to reverse its 24-year-old approval of the widely used abortion pill mifepristone. Other proposed actions targeting medication abortion include reinstating more stringent rules for mifepristone's use, which would permit it to be taken up to seven weeks into a pregnancy, instead of the current 10 weeks, and requiring it to be dispensed in-person instead of through the mail.

The Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative legal group that is on the Project 2025 advisory board, was involved in a legal challenge to mifepristone's 2000 approval and more recent actions from the FDA that made it easier to obtain. But the Supreme Court rejected the case brought by a group of anti-abortion rights doctors and medical associations on procedural grounds.

The policy book also recommends the Justice Department enforce the Comstock Act against providers and distributors of abortion pills. That 1873 law prohibits drugs, medicines or instruments used in abortions from being sent through the mail.

US-NEWS-SCOTUS-ABORTION-PILL-NEWSOM-TB

Now that the Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade , the volume states that the Justice Department "in the next conservative administration should therefore announce its intent to enforce federal law against providers and distributors of such pills."

The guide recommends the next secretary of Health and Human Services get rid of the Reproductive Healthcare Access Task Force established by the Biden administration before Roe's reversal and create a "pro-life task force to ensure that all of the department's divisions seek to use their authority to promote the life and health of women and their unborn children."

In a section titled "The Family Agenda," the proposal recommends the Health and Human Services chief "proudly state that men and women are biological realities," and that "married men and women are the ideal, natural family structure because all children have a right to be raised by the men and women who conceived them."

Further, a program within the Health and Human Services Department should "maintain a biblically based, social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family."

During his first four years in office, Trump banned transgender people from serving in the military. Mr. Biden reversed that policy , but the Project 2025 policy book calls for the ban to be reinstated.

Targeting federal agencies, employees and policies

The agenda takes aim at longstanding federal agencies, like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA. The agency is a component of the Commerce Department and the policy guide calls for it to be downsized. 

NOAA's six offices, including the National Weather Service and National Marine Fisheries Service, "form a colossal operation that has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity," the guide states. 

The Department of Homeland Security, established in 2002, should be dismantled and its agencies either combined with others, or moved under the purview of other departments altogether, the policy book states. For example, immigration-related entities from the Departments of Homeland Security, Justice and Health and Human Services should form a standalone, Cabinet-level border and immigration agency staffed by more than 100,000 employees, according to the agenda.

The Department of Homeland Security logo is seen on a law enforcement vehicle in Washington on March 7, 2017.

If the policy recommendations are implemented, another federal agency that could come under the knife by the next administration, with action from Congress, is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The agenda seeks to bring a push by conservatives to target diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, initiatives in higher education to the executive branch by wiping away a slew of DEI-related positions, policies and programs and calling for the elimination of funding for partners that promote DEI practices.

It states that U.S. Agency for International Development staff and grantees that "engage in ideological agitation on behalf of the DEI agenda" should be terminated. At the Treasury Department, the guide says the next administration should "treat the participation in any critical race theory or DEI initiative without objecting on constitutional or moral grounds, as per se grounds for termination of employment."

The Project 2025 policy book also takes aim at more innocuous functions of government. It calls for the next presidential administration to eliminate or reform the dietary guidelines that have been published by the Department of Agriculture for more than 40 years, which the authors claim have been "infiltrated" by issues like climate change and sustainability.

Immigration

Trump made immigration a cornerstone of his last two presidential runs and has continued to hammer the issue during his 2024 campaign. Project 2025's agenda not only recommends finishing the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, but urges the next administration to "take a creative and aggressive approach" to responding to drug cartels at the border. This approach includes using active-duty military personnel and the National Guard to help with arrest operations along the southern border.

A memo from Immigration and Customs Enforcement that prohibits enforcement actions from taking place at "sensitive" places like schools, playgrounds and churches should be rolled back, the policy guide states. 

When the Homeland Security secretary determines there is an "actual or anticipated mass migration of aliens" that presents "urgent circumstances" warranting a federal response, the agenda says the secretary can make rules and regulations, including through their expulsion, for as long as necessary. These rules, the guide states, aren't subject to the Administration Procedure Act, which governs the agency rule-making process.

What do Trump and his advisers say about Project 2025?

In a post to his social media platform on July 5, Trump wrote , "I know nothing about Project 2025. I have no idea who is behind it. I disagree with some of the things they're saying and some of the things they're saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal. Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them."

Trump's pushback to the initiative came after Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts said in a podcast interview that the nation is "in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be."

The former president continued to disavow the initiative this week, writing in another social media post  that he knows nothing about Project 2025.

"I have not seen it, have no idea who is in charge of it, and, unlike our very well received Republican Platform, had nothing to do with it," Trump wrote. "The Radical Left Democrats are having a field day, however, trying to hook me into whatever policies are stated or said. It is pure disinformation on their part. By now, after all of these years, everyone knows where I stand on EVERYTHING!"

While the former president said he doesn't know who is in charge of the initiative, the project's director, Dans, and associate director, Chretien, were high-ranking officials in his administration. Additionally, Ben Carson, former secretary of Housing and Urban Development under Trump; John Ratcliffe, former director of National Intelligence in the Trump administration; and Peter Navarro, who served as a top trade adviser to Trump in the White House, are listed as either authors or contributors to the policy agenda.

Still, even before Roberts' comments during "The War Room" podcast — typically hosted by conservative commentator Steve Bannon, who reported to federal prison to begin serving a four-month sentence last week — Trump's top campaign advisers have stressed that Project 2025 has no official ties to his reelection bid.

Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, senior advisers to the Trump campaign, said in a November statement that 2024 policy announcements will be made by Trump or his campaign team.

"Any personnel lists, policy agendas, or government plans published anywhere are merely suggestions," they said.

While the efforts by outside organizations are "appreciated," Wiles and LaCivita said, "none of these groups or individuals speak for President Trump or his campaign."

In response to Trump's post last week, Project 2025 reiterated that it was separate from the Trump campaign.

"As we've been saying for more than two years now, Project 2025 does not speak for any candidate or campaign. We are a coalition of more than 110 conservative groups advocating policy & personnel recommendations for the next conservative president. But it is ultimately up to that president, who we believe will be President Trump, to decide which recommendations to implement," a statement on the project's X account said.

The initiative has also pushed back on Democrats' claims about its policy proposals and accused them of lying about what the agenda contains.

What do Democrats say?

Despite their attempts to keep some distance from Project 2025, Democrats continue to connect Trump with the transition effort. The Biden-Harris campaign frequently posts about the project on X, tying it to a second Trump term.

Mr. Biden himself accused his Republican opponent of lying about his connections to the Project 2025 agenda, saying in a statement that the agenda was written for Trump and "should scare every single American." He claimed on his campaign social media account  Wednesday that Project 2025 "will destroy America."

Congressional Democrats have also begun pivoting to Project 2025 when asked in interviews about Mr. Biden's fitness for a second term following his lackluster showing at the June 27 debate, the first in which he went head-to-head with Trump.

"Trump is all about Project 2025," Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman told CNN on Monday. "I mean, that's what we really should be voting on right now. It's like, do we want the kind of president that is all about Project '25?"

Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, one of Mr. Biden's closest allies on Capitol Hill, told reporters Monday that the agenda for the next Republican president was the sole topic he would talk about.

"Project 2025, that's my only concern," he said. "I don't want you or my granddaughter to live under that government."

In a statement reiterating her support for Mr. Biden, Rep. Frederica Wilson of Florida called Project 2025 "MAGA Republicans' draconian 920-page plan to end U.S. democracy, give handouts to the wealthy and strip Americans of their freedoms."

What are Republicans saying about Project 2025?

Two GOP senators under consideration to serve as Trump's running mate sought to put space between the White House hopeful and Project 2025, casting it as merely the product of a think tank that puts forth ideas.

"It's the work of a think tank, of a center-right think tank, and that's what think tanks do," Florida Sen. Marco Rubio told CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday.

He said Trump's message to voters focuses on "restoring common sense, working-class values, and making our decisions on the basis of that."

Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance raised a similar sentiment in an interview with NBC's "Meet the Press," saying organizations will have good ideas and bad ideas.

"It's a 900-page document," he said Sunday. "I guarantee there are things that Trump likes and dislikes about that 900-page document. But he is the person who will determine the agenda of the next administration."

Jaala Brown contributed to this report.

Melissa Quinn is a politics reporter for CBSNews.com. She has written for outlets including the Washington Examiner, Daily Signal and Alexandria Times. Melissa covers U.S. politics, with a focus on the Supreme Court and federal courts.

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BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article

Single cell rna sequencing of aging neural progenitors reveals loss of excitatory neuron potential and a population with transcriptional immune response.

Jonas Fritze

  • 1 Lund Stem Cell Center, Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Skane County, Sweden
  • 2 Department of Experimental Medical Science, Stem Cells, Aging and Neurodegeneration group, Lund University, Faculty of Medicine, Lund, Sweden
  • 3 Division of Molecular Hematology, Computational Genomics group, Lund University, Faculty of Medicine, Lund, Sweden
  • 4 Division of Molecular Hematology, Lund Stem Cell Center, Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, Lund, Sweden

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In the adult murine brain, neural stem cells (NSCs) reside in two main niches, the dentate gyrus (DG), and the subventricular zone (SVZ). In the DG, NSCs give rise to intermediate progenitors (IPs) that differentiate into excitatory neurons, while progenitors in the SVZ migrate to the olfactory bulb (OB) where they mainly differentiate into inhibitory interneurons.Neurogenesis, the production of new neurons, persists throughout life but decrease dramatically during aging, concomitantly with increased inflammation. Many cell types, including microglia, undergo dramatic transcriptional changes but few such changes have been detected in neural progenitors. Furthermore, transcriptional profiles in progenitors from different neurogenic regions have not been compared at single cell level, and little is known about how they are affected by agerelated inflammation.We have generated a single cell RNA sequencing dataset enriched for IPs, which revealed that most aged neural progenitors only acquire minor transcriptional changes. However, progenitors set to become excitatory neurons decrease faster than others. In addition, a population in the aged SVZ, not detected in the OB, acquired major transcriptional activation related to immune responses. This suggests that differences in age related neurogenic decline between regions is not due to tissue differences but rather cell type specific intrinsic transcriptional programs, and that subset of neuroblasts in the SVZ react strongly to age related inflammatory cues.

Keywords: Neurogenesis, Aging, Intermediate progenitors, neuroblasts, immune response, Dentate Gyrus, Subventricular zone, excitatory

Received: 14 Mar 2024; Accepted: 08 Jul 2024.

Copyright: © 2024 Fritze, Lang, Sommarin, Soneji and Ahlenius. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Jonas Fritze, Lund Stem Cell Center, Faculty of Medicine, Lund University, Lund, 221 84, Skane County, Sweden

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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    In the adult murine brain, neural stem cells (NSCs) reside in two main niches, the dentate gyrus (DG), and the subventricular zone (SVZ). In the DG, NSCs give rise to intermediate progenitors (IPs) that differentiate into excitatory neurons, while progenitors in the SVZ migrate to the olfactory bulb (OB) where they mainly differentiate into inhibitory interneurons.Neurogenesis, the production ...