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NYC mayoral candidates spar over Israel-Gaza positions

admin - Latest News - October 17, 2025
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During the New York City mayoral debate, candidates Zohran Mamdani, Andrew Cuomo and Curtis Sliwa sparred over Israel-Gaza positions. Silwa scolded Cuomo and Mamdani for not crediting Trump for the ceasefire plan while Mamdani said “of course” Hamas should lay down its arms and Cuomo said he “hopes the peace holds.”



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Savewith a NBCUniversal ProfileCreate your free profile or log in to save this articleOct. 16, 2025, 9:10 PM EDTBy Allan SmithAndrew Cuomo and Zohran Mamdani both opened Thursday’s New York City mayoral debate by saying a future headline about their first year in office would celebrate lowering costs for New Yorkers. The next 50 minutes of the debate — aired on NBC New York and Telemundo New York, in partnership with Politico — turned into an all-out brawl over issues including crime, the war in Gaza and President Donald Trump as the candidates tore into each other in deeply personal ways.During one back and forth focused on which candidate has the right experience for the job, Mamdani, a state assemblyman, blasted Cuomo, the former governor, for his handling of nursing homes during the Covid pandemic. Cuomo, who resigned from office amid allegations of sexual harassment, which he denies, had just said the mayorship was “no job for on the job training.”“What I don’t have in experience, I make up for in integrity,” Mamdani said. “And what you don’t have in integrity, you could never make up for in experience.”Democratic nominee Mamdani and Cuomo, running as an independent after losing the Democratic primary in June, were joined on stage by Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa, with the three clashing over how to handle the police department and mental health calls, the education system, taxes and the business climate in New York City.Mamdani, a self-described Democratic socialist, enters the stretch run of the election with a commanding lead, though Cuomo has closed some ground since Mayor Eric Adams dropped out of the contest.Trump has sought to influence the outcome of the race and has repeatedly threatened to withhold federal funding from New York should Mamdani wins the contest next month. And the president’s influence in New York was a central discussion of the debate.Each candidate was asked when they had last spoken with the president, with Cuomo saying he believed it was after the attempt on Trump’s life in 2024. Sliwa said it had been many years, while Mamdani said he never has never spoken to Trump.But Mamdani did express willingness to work with Trump to lower costs — before attacking Cuomo over reports that he had discussed the race with the president.“I don’t need the president’s assistance,” Mamdani said. “And what I’d tell the president is, if he ever wants to come for New Yorkers in the way that he has been, he’s going to have to get through me as the next mayor of the city.”Cuomo said he never had such a conversation with Trump and talked up past “bloody battles” with the president during Covid.“I’d like to avoid them,” Cuomo said.Mamdani also attacked Cuomo for not taking a strong enough line in defending state Attorney General Letitia James, who was recently indicted on federal charges after Trump had called for her prosecution.“I said political weaponization of the justice system is wrong,” Cuomo said. “Both sides do it. It’s wrong when Donald Trump does it. It’s wrong when they did it to [James] Comey. It’s wrong when Comey did it to Hillary” Clinton.Sliwa cut in and said New Yorkers will suffer if either Cuomo or Mamdani takes on Trump.“Look, you can be tough, but you can’t be tough if it’s going to cost people desperately needed federal funds,” Sliwa said. “Zohran Mamdani, the president has already said it’s going to take $7 billion out of the budget right from the start if you’re elected mayor. People are going to suffer in this city, people who need those federal funds. What I would do is sit and negotiate.”While Sliwa sought his openings in the debate, Mamdani and Cuomo were the main event, often ignoring his jibes — except to agree when the Republican was attacking the other candidate.Democratic dividesMeanwhile, Mamdani and Cuomo battled over who is a real Democrat, too. Mamdani said that voters who believe there is no difference between the Democratic and Republican parties should vote for Cuomo, while voters who want a mayor to stand up to Trump and his donors should back him.Cuomo then said Mamdani isn’t a Democrat, focusing on his membership in the Democratic Socialists of America and accused him of not voting for former Vice President Kamala Harris last fall. (Mamdani said voters should leave their presidential primary ballot blank if they disagree with then-President Joe Biden’s handling of the war in Gaza.)“If you want to look for me on the ballot, you’ll find me as the Democrat,” Mamdani said.The war in Gaza took up a significant portion of the debate. Mamdani has accused Israel of carrying out a “genocide” and, in a Fox News interview on Wednesday, declined to say whether Hamas should forfeit their weapons following the recent ceasefire agreement.“Of course I believe that they should lay down their arms, I’m proud to be one of the first elected officials in the state who called for a ceasefire and calling for a ceasefire means ceasing fire,” Mamdani said. “That means all parties have to cease fire and put down their weapons.”“And the reason that we call for that is not only for the end of the genocide, but also an unimpeded access of humanitarian aid,” Mamdani said. “I, like many New Yorkers, am hopeful that this ceasefire will hold.”Cuomo responded that Mamdani is refusing to “denounce Hamas” and separately said the state assemblyman was speaking in “code” with his answer — and that code signaling that Israel “does not have a right to exist as a Jewish state.” Mamdani responded that Cuomo was acting as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “legal defense team during the course of this genocide.”He added that conversations with Jewish New Yorkers had led him to discourage the use of the phrase “globalize the intifada,” a phrase he said he does not use.“And what I’m looking to do as the first Muslim mayor of this city is to ensure that we bring every New Yorker together, Jewish New Yorkers, Muslim New Yorkers, every single person that calls the city home, they understand they won’t just be protected, but they will belong,” he said.Cuomo attacked Mamdani for not explicitly denouncing the phrase.“He is a divisive personality across the board,” Cuomo said.Handling crime and costsOn crime, Mamdani said he had spoken to police officers to apologize for past anti-police postings, and he said that he is not running on those ideas, attacking Cuomo for not focusing on his actual plans. Cuomo said Mamdani “doesn’t like the police” and “that’s why he won’t hire more police.”“When everyone else says, we need more police,” Cuomo said. “He wants to use social workers on domestic violence calls, which are very dangerous, and he’s told you what he thinks. He thinks the police are racist, wicked, corrupt, and a threat to public safety.”Mamdani said that as a state assemblyman he learned “that to deliver justice means to also deliver safety, and that means leading a city where you recognize the bravery of the men and women who join the NYPD and put their lives on the line.”“It means representing the Muslims who were illegally surveilled in my district and the Black and brown New Yorkers who have been victims of police brutality,” Mamdani said.The second half of the debate featured more discussion on cost of living and affordability. Each candidate was asked what they paid in groceries and rent: $2,300 for Mamdani, $3,900 for Sliwa and $7,800 for Cuomo.Cuomo was deeply critical of Mamdani’s plans for affordable housing and free bus service while talking up his own experience as governor and secretary of Housing and Urban Development.“I just have to say it’s been an hour and 20 minutes of this debate, and we haven’t heard Governor Cuomo say the word affordability,” Mamdani said. “That’s why he lost the primary.” Mamdani criticized Cuomo for having the support of billionaire hedge fund executive Bill Ackman, to which Cuomo said “there are a lot of New Yorkers who support me, and there are a lot of Jewish New Yorkers who support me because they think you’re antisemitic.”“So it’s not about Trump or Republicans,” Cuomo said. “It’s about you.”The two candidates did have one point of agreement when asked to identify the best-ever mayor of New York City. Both shouted out former Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia.“We agree,” Mamdani said.Allan SmithAllan Smith is a political reporter for NBC News.
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November 7, 2025
Nov. 7, 2025, 5:55 PM ESTBy Berkeley Lovelace Jr.President Donald Trump hailed his deal to slash the price of blockbuster weight loss drugs as a game changer, promising to make Wegovy and Zepbound more affordable for millions of Americans. But major gaps in the plan could blunt its impact, drug policy experts say: Some of the drugs the administration has promised discounts on haven’t been approved yet by the Food and Drug Administration; the lower prices for people paying out of pocket only appear to apply to the lowest doses of the drugs; and the deal doesn’t expand Medicare coverage to people seeking treatment for weight loss alone.“It’s a situation where we have more questions than answers,” said Juliette Cubanski, deputy director of the Medicare policy program at KFF, a nonpartisan health policy research group. “Based on what we didn’t hear, that suggests to me that there’s a lot that the administration itself hasn’t even ironed out as of yet.”“It just feels,” she added, “a little bit too squishy right now.”U.S. President Donald Trump, joined by members of the pharmaceutical industry and administration officials, delivers remarks on lowering drug prices in the Oval Office at the White House on November 06, 2025 in Washington, DC. Andrew Harnik / Getty ImagesThe announcement marks one of the most ambitious efforts yet to tackle the high cost of weight loss drugs in the U.S. Wegovy and Zepbound carry list prices above $1,000 a month, a cost that both Republicans and Democrats have criticized as far too high, especially compared with what other countries pay. Administration officials say there’s still time to iron out details before the lower prices take effect. The lower prices that will be available through the administration’s self-pay platform, TrumpRx, aren’t expected to go live until the end of the year, and the Medicare and Medicaid changes won’t roll out until mid-2026.“I think the administration deserves credit for continuing to try to push the envelope on finding ways to lower prescription drug prices in the U.S.,” Cubanski said. She said KFF polling shows that health care costs, including prescription drugs, are a top concern for Americans.Art Caplan, the head of the division of medical ethics at NYU Grossman School of Medicine in New York City, said the deal, while ambitious, lacks crucial details.“It’s just murky as to how this will take shape, how the programs will work,” Caplan said. “You can’t really tell from what’s going on.”Unapproved drugsSeveral forms of the drugs included in the deal haven’t yet received FDA approval. That includes oral versions of the weight loss drugs — which are still under development or FDA review — and Eli Lilly’s new multidose injection pens, which haven’t been approved but the drugmaker says are the versions included in the pricing agreement.Lawrence Gostin, director of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University, said that makes the administration’s promises premature, since those lower prices can’t take effect until the products are on the market. “It is reckless to negotiate pricing deals on products which the FDA have not yet approved as safe and effective,” Gostin said. “The administration is getting way out ahead of its own safety agency.”An oral version of Wegovy, from Novo Nordisk, is being reviewed by the FDA. A decision is expected in the coming weeks. A multidose version of Zepbound is under review by the FDA, Lilly said. The company hasn’t submitted its weight loss pill, orforglipron, to the agency yet. Lilly CEO David Ricks told NBC News’ Tom Llamas on “Top Story” that the FDA would review the pill quickly. “As part of the deal, they’ve agreed to give us an expedited approval,” Ricks said. Different doses, different pricesThe White House said that both the pills and the injection pens will be available for discounted prices for people who pay out of pocket. Starting doses of weight loss pills will cost $149 for a month’s supply, and the shots will cost an average of $350 for a month’s supply, the White House said. The price of the injections is expected to fall to about $250 within two years, it said.But people may end up paying more.When people start on a weight loss drug, they start with the lowest dose possible — the starting dose — to allow the body to get used to the drug. Over the course of several months, however, they increase the dose until they get to a dose that’s effective for weight loss. Wegovy comes in five doses and Zepbound comes in six, with the most weight loss seen at the highest doses. Administration officials said the starting doses of GLP-1 pills will cost $149 a month, but did not say what higher doses would be.For the injections, the exact White House language was vague: The shots will initially have a “weighted average” price of $350 a month. Lilly, however, said Zepbound will be available at the lowest dose for $299 a month, with additional doses priced up to $449. A spokesperson for Novo Nordisk didn’t say whether doses would have different prices, but said it plans to publish an update on costs “in the coming weeks.”That means patients paying through TrumpRx could end up paying far more than the administration’s advertised prices — especially if patients don’t stay on the lowest doses for long, Caplan said. Limited coverageAs part of the deal, Lilly and Novo Nordisk will charge Medicare and Medicaid $245 for a month’s supply of the shots, a move that will likely provide savings for the programs. Medicare enrollees will have their costs capped at $50 a month. Medicaid enrollees often don’t have copays.But not everyone on Medicare or Medicaid is eligible.Under the deal, Medicare will continue to cover the weight loss drugs for people who are overweight or obese and have another qualifying condition, such as heart or kidney disease. The agreement doesn’t expand coverage to people using the drugs for weight loss alone. Medicare, by law, is barred from covering weight loss drugs, Cubanski, of KFF, said.Eli Lilly CEO talks deal to cut medication prices with the Trump administration09:10The lack of expanded coverage is a significant omission, said Stacie Dusetzina, a health policy professor at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. Medicare is one of the largest payers in the country, and without broader coverage, millions of patients will remain priced out even as the administration touts lower costs.“You would have to change the law or go through several regulatory steps to be able to offer coverage outside of an already covered indication,” Dusetzina said. A White House spokesperson said the administration wanted to first lower prices for patients who would most benefit, such as those with risk factors associated with obesity. It’s possible the administration could eventually expand Medicare coverage through a pilot program. Ricks, the CEO of Lilly, said at a briefing Thursday that the government plans to launch one in spring 2026 that would be voluntary for Medicare plans. Still, there are issues Medicare plans would have to weigh, Dusetzina said. “The plans will have to think about how many more people might be interested in enrolling and using these drugs and how that would affect their costs,” she said. “So, again, it’s not totally clear to me how that will get operationalized and how soon Medicare beneficiaries would expect to see lower prices.”Ricks said the pilot would be “at no cost” to the plans.Dr. Shauna Levy, a specialist in obesity medicine and the medical director of the Tulane Weight Loss Center in New Orleans, said the deal is “a step in the right direction” but she worries if the administration is overstating the potential savings.“As an obesity community, I think we will remain skeptical of this deal until we see how it actually plays out,” Levy wrote in an email. Berkeley Lovelace Jr.Berkeley Lovelace Jr. is a health and medical reporter for NBC News. He covers the Food and Drug Administration, with a special focus on Covid vaccines, prescription drug pricing and health care. He previously covered the biotech and pharmaceutical industry with CNBC.
November 13, 2025
Nov. 13, 2025, 5:00 AM ESTBy Aria BendixOne of the most common viruses in the world could be the cause of lupus, an autoimmune disease with wide-ranging symptoms, according to a study published Wednesday.Until now, lupus was somewhat mysterious: No single root cause of the disease had been found, and there is no designated treatment for it. The research, published in the journal Science Translational Medicine, suggests that Epstein-Barr virus — which 95% of people acquire at some point in life — could cause lupus by driving the body to attack its own healthy cells.It adds to mounting evidence that Epstein-Barr is associated with multiple long-term health issues, including other autoimmune conditions. As this evidence stacks up, scientists have accelerated calls for a vaccine that targets the virus.“If we now better understand how this fastidious virus is responsible for autoimmune diseases, I think it’s time to figure out how to prevent it,” said Dr. Anca Askanase, clinical director of the Lupus Center at Columbia University, who wasn’t involved in the new research.In lupus patients, an autoimmune attack can result in extreme fatigue, joint pain and skin rashes. In rare cases, the disease may lead to fatal or life-threatening issues such as kidney damage, or weaken the immune system so the body can’t fight off infections.Scientists have long suspected a link between Epstein-Barr and lupus, but the exact connection had remained elusive. Dr. William Robinson, a co-author of the new study and chief of the division of immunology and rheumatology at Stanford University, said his new findings solve a major piece of that puzzle.“From our perspective, it’s the key, missing mechanistic link,” Robinson said. “We think it applies to all lupus cases,” he added. Hundreds of thousands of people in the U.S. are living with the disease.But Hoang Nguyen, assistant vice president of research at the Lupus Research Alliance, said it’s too soon to know if the mechanism is behind every case.“Although the evidence is intriguing and promising, more evidence is needed to demonstrate that the link to EBV applies to all lupus,” Nguyen said. The alliance is a private funder of lupus research and contributed grant funding to Robinson’s study.An infection withe Epstein-Barr virus does not necessarily cause symptoms, especially among children, though the virus is also the most common cause of mononucleosis (often referred to as mono).It’s primarily transmitted by saliva from kissing or sharing drinks, food, utensils or toothbrushes. After someone is infected, the virus lingers permanently in the body, where it usually remains inactive — though not always. The new study is not the first to tie Epstein-Barr to autoimmune issues. Past research has linked it to multiple sclerosis. Though not the sole trigger of MS, the virus may be part of a chain of events that leads to the disease. Robinson said a pathway similar to the one described in his new study could also lead to other autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn’s disease, but more research is needed to tease that out. Of course, the vast majority of people who contract Epstein-Barr do not go on to get lupus, MS or any other autoimmune disease. Robinson said it’s possible that only certain strains of Epstein-Barr trigger autoimmune reactions.To determine the causal link between Epstein-Barr and lupus, Robinson and his co-authors focused on B cells — white blood cells that help fight off infections. Even in healthy individuals, Epstein-Barr lies dormant in a tiny portion of B cells. But those virus-containing B cells are far more prevalent in lupus patients, who have a 25 times higher share of them, according to the new research.The study also highlights a type of protein called antinuclear antibodies, which bind to the nucleus of cells and are one of the hallmarks of lupus. The researchers found that Epstein-Barr infects and reprograms B cells to produce antinuclear antibodies that attack the body’s own tissue, thereby causing lupus.Robinson said the findings go hand-in-hand with some other theories about what causes lupus. For instance, scientists suspect that a person’s genetics or hormones can predispose them to the disease, as well. A study published last year in the journal Nature also found that people with lupus have too much of a particular T cell — another type of white blood cell — that’s associated with cell damage and too little of another T cell associated with repair. Robinson said the pathway described in his study could activate that T cell response.The new research points to a few potential options for lupus treatment, according to Robinson, who is the co-founder of two drug development companies exploring treatments for autoimmune diseases.Many of the current medications given to ease lupus symptoms, such as corticosteroids, broadly focus on reducing inflammation. Robinson said future therapeutics could specifically target B cells infected with Epstein-Barr.But an Epstein-Barr vaccine — several of which are in clinical trials — could someday stop infections in the first place.“Vaccination to protect people against ever being infected by EBV would be the ultimate, fundamental solution,” Robinson said.Aria BendixAria Bendix is the breaking health reporter for NBC News Digital.
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