When the first phase of the opioid epidemic was cresting in 2010, driven largely by prescription pain medications, white Americans were dying of fatal drug overdoses at rates twice that of Black Americans.

In the decade that followed, drug deaths surged again. But this time Black communities faced the brunt of the carnage.

"Overdose rates have been growing fastest among Black communities," says Joseph Friedman, an addiction researcher at UCLA. "For the first time we see them overtaking the overdose rate among white individuals."

https://www.npr.org/2022/03/02/1083838947/black-americans-dying-drug-overdoses?ft=nprml&f=1083838947

The video game giant Electronic Arts announced Wednesday that it's removing Russian teams from some of its sports games amid the country's ongoing invasion of Ukraine.

"We stand with the people of Ukraine and join the voices around the world calling for peace," one of the statements reads.

EA is removing the Russian national team and all Russian clubs from FIFA 22, FIFA mobile and FIFA online.

The statement from EA SPORTS FIFA noted that it was also "actively evaluating changes to other areas of our games," but didn't clarify what it meant.

EA will also cut the Russian and Belarusian national and club teams from NHL 22 in the coming weeks.

Also on Wednesday, Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine's vice prime minister and minister of digital transformation, urged companies in the gaming industry, including tech giants Sony and Microsoft, to temporarily block all Russian and Belarusian accounts.

He also implored gaming companies to stop Russian and Belarusian teams from participating in esports competitions and cancel any international events in either country.

https://www.npr.org/2022/03/02/1084046601/ea-russian-teams-fifa-nhl?ft=nprml&f=1084046601

Harris County voters were among the losers in this year’s Texas primaries.

Our voting rights have been made subject to the micromanagement of state leaders. And while local leaders have been stalwart in defense of those rights, they fumbled the ball on Tuesday in terms of actual election administration.

By the later side of the evening, many results in the state, and the region, were clear enough. Gov. Greg Abbott, for one, cruised through his primary, mustering fully two-thirds of the vote against seven GOP challengers. The performance raises the question of why the governor seemed nervous about this primary, and whether he really needed to throw so much red meat along the way.

But in Harris County, we were waiting. Still. Again.

“This is actually very typical for Harris County,” said Isabel Longoria, Harris County’s elections administrator, at a press conference Tuesday night, just before 10 pm. “It’s a big county.”

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/columnists/grieder/article/We-are-once-again-waiting-on-election-results-16971553.php