Good morning. The U.S. Coast Guard tried to intercept an oil tanker linked to Venezuela, but it sent distress signals and sailed toward the Atlantic Ocean, officials said. Read what happened. Also, President Trump’s donors have benefited from his return to office. And many Americans are struggling to afford the things they need. There’s more news below. But before we get to it, I’d like to make like my mother and caution you against the flu. It’s out there!
It’s the seasonThe flu came early this year. Britain, Australia and Japan have already seen spikes. The United States appears not far behind. New York City and its suburbs recently recorded some of the highest levels of flulike illness in the United States, my colleagues report. (A private school in Brooklyn closed for two days earlier this month after roughly a third of students became ill.) The numbers aren’t great in Louisiana or Colorado either. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s tracker shows spikes in Denver and in New Orleans and Lafayette, La. The dominant strain of the flu virus circulating this season is H3N2 subclade K, reports Dani Blum, who covers health. H3N2 is a common strain. But the new variant — that subclade — is a doozy. It may enable the virus to spread more widely. The flu shot may not stop you from getting subclade K, but it helps guard against becoming seriously sick. Here’s mom again: Get that jab. How bad is it this year?In Britain, where I’ve been for the last week, the flu season started so early and has accelerated so quickly that the tabloids here are calling it the “super flu.” (I’ve been working by open windows and dropping vitamin C tablets into my water — which does basically nothing, but makes me feel proactive.) It’s too soon to know if the same will happen in the United States, an expert told Dani. But there are a lot of infections, and we’re still weeks from when doctors generally see high-water marks for the illness. In 2024, New York City didn’t have 10,000 laboratory-reported cases of flu until late December. This year, the city crossed that threshold three weeks ago. “It’s earlier and faster this year, and the trajectory is much quicker than usual,” the chief of public health and epidemiology at Northwell Health said. Symptoms and treatmentVaccines remain the best way to protect yourself from the flu, perhaps during the holiday season especially. You’ll come into contact with more people than usual on the plane, at the train station or if you're singing carols in a hall. Who knows who’s carrying? Experts say the best time to get vaccinated is in early fall. Still: “I tell patients that it is generally never too late to get it,” an infectious disease specialist told my colleague Maggie Astor, a health reporter. “Some protection is better than none.” And there are additional ways to avoid risks. Dani knows them well: Frequently washing hands, wearing a mask in crowds and improving ventilation as much as possible — by opening windows, if it’s not too cold, or running air purifiers — can minimize the risk of catching the flu. So can disinfecting hard surfaces like phones, doorknobs and countertops, where the flu virus can linger for over a day. Based on the symptoms, it’s hard to distinguish the flu from other respiratory illnesses. But the flu often comes on quickly, the way a truck might hit you in a crosswalk. There are now at-home tests that detect both Covid and the flu. Those are helpful because you can treat the flu virus with an antiviral medication like Tamiflu. (Would that we had something similar for the common cold.) Stay safe, everyone. Now, let’s see what else is happening in the world.
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Political candidates generally fund-raise so they can run strong campaigns and, if all goes well, be elected. So why solicit donations once you’re already in office? For most second-term presidents, fund-raising tapers after inauguration. Not so for Trump, who has raised nearly $2 billion since being re-elected. (That likely eclipses the amount he raised to support his 2024 campaign.) The Times traced more than half a billion dollars’ worth of those donations back to 346 donors. We found that most of them had benefited from the Trump administration’s actions since he retook office. See who gave the money and how the Trump administration is using it.
This is the year millennials officially got old, Anna Silman writes. Shopping was once leisure time where buying was optional. As it moved online, it’s become a chore, Robin Givhan writes. Ezra Klein argues the Trump vibe shift is dead. The Times Sale starts now: Our best rate for readers of The Morning. Save now with our best offer on unlimited news and analysis as part of the complete Times experience: $1/week for your first year.
Lessons in love: We spoke to couples who have been married for 30 years or more about how they did it. The trouble in tourism: The American travel industry is stressed. Fewer international travelers came to the United States this year — 4.5 million fewer compared with 2024. (Last year, those visitors spent nearly $179 billion on travel in the United States, a number that is expected to be $6 billion lower in 2025.) “May was terrible. June was terrible. July was terrible. August was terrible, September and October and November,” a bike tour operation in Key West, Fla., told The Times. “That’s not going to pay the rent.” Viennese cafes: The old-school spots feel tired, some residents say. Check out the new bakeries taking over the Austrian capital. Your pick: The most-clicked story in The Morning yesterday was about Bowen Yang, who is leaving “Saturday Night Live.” Metropolitan Diary: Alone on the train in the dark. A teacher: Betty Reid Soskin, the nation’s oldest park ranger, educated the public about people of color who served the U.S. and would often wear her ranger uniform when off duty. She died at 104.
22— That is the number of states where Uber allows people convicted of violent felonies, child abuse, assault and other crimes to drive if the offenses are more than seven years old, a Times investigation found. Some passengers have accused the drivers of rape.
College sports: The Iowa State basketball player Audi Crooks recorded her third 40-point game this season. N.F.L.: Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver DK Metcalf appeared to grab a fan and swing upward at him in a sideline confrontation during a game against the Detroit Lions. N.B.A.: The Chicago Bulls and the Atlanta Hawks combined for more than 300 points in a high-scoring thriller. Somehow, the game ended on a missed shot.
Shakshuka is one of the great eggs-for-dinner affairs, particularly in this variation, which adds protein and heartiness in the form of white beans. (A sliced jalapeño brings heat.) It’s pantry cooking of the first order: Those canned beans and a jarred marinara sauce mean you can get the meal on the table in well under an hour, with toast, rice or couscous on the side. A word on the eggs you add at the end: Watch them closely. The recipe calls for seven to nine minutes to set the whites and the yolks, but your mileage may vary. On my stove, with my pan, they’re done at around six minutes. Garnish with chopped cilantro if that’s your bag, and enjoy.
To determine U.S. movie ratings, which range from G to NC-17, the Motion Picture Association examines onscreen violence, sex, nudity, drug use and crude language, keeping a tally of expletives. For films that want a PG-13 rating, the board keeps an eye on one expletive in particular, because in a PG-13 movie there can be only one. (For an R rating, there is no such restriction. “Uncut Gems” has 560.) Filmmakers often want that PG-13 rating. It means more young people can see the film, which means higher returns at the box office. Screenwriters compete for the funniest or most dramatic deployment of it. Actors want to be the one to say it; fans delight in tracking it. In test screenings, filmmakers note which time the word gets the biggest laugh and circle it on the script — that’s the one. Julia Jacobs, who covers the arts, looked at how moviemakers decide where and when the word is used. “It never fails to boost the amperage of a line,” the playwright |
