amna: good evening. i'm amna nawaz. geoff bennett is away. on the “news hour” tonight, mediators workkiasefire talks wh toll in gaza crosses 40,000.

>> we are working beyond our capacity. i swear we are destroyed, life has been ruined. we have dug 50, 60, 70 graves daily. amna: fact checking the trump and harris camps' latest claims as the candidates rally voters on the campaign trail. and a new form of the mpox virus spreads, prompting health officials to declare another global health emergency. ♪ >> major funding for the "pbs news hour" has been provided by. >> a law partner rediscovers her grandmother's artistry and creates a trust to keep the craft alive. a raymondjames financial advisor gets to know you, your passions, and the way you enrich your community. life well planned.

>> carnegie corporation of new york, working to reduce political polarization through philanthropic support for education, democracy, and peace. more information at carnegie.org. and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. amna: welcome to the “news hour.” in gaza today, the war reached a

staggering milestone. the hamas-run gaza health ministry says 40,000 gazans have been killed since hamas attacked israel on october 7. it comes at yet another fraught moment for the region. negotiators met again in qatar to try and find a path toward a gaza ceasefire, which the u.s. believes is the best way to prevent the war in gaza from expanding to an even larger regional conflict. for more, nick schifrin is here and has been following both stories. how close are the sides to a deal? nick: a u.s. official tonight told me the talks were constructed and would continue tomorrow and the mediators were discussing the implementation of the deal rather than debating the framework. but i spoke to a regional official involved in the talks and the official said the two sides were entrenched and talks were difficult. the framework we are talking about overall remains the same. a six-week cease-fire. an initial release of more than 30 prisoners, the female, elderly, and infirmed.

israel would release an additional 700 palestinian teen -- detainees. and israel would allow, quote, a surge of humanitarian aid. over the last month, regional and israeli officials have told me israel have a few points being debated. one, the corridor between gaza and egypt, israel says and must now control that corridor. two, checkpoints that would screen gazans moving from southern to northern gaza to prevent hamas's fighters movement. three, all 30 hostages released must initially be alive. and which palestinian prisoners israel can refuse to release. now, the national security council spokesperson john kirby said before the talks began that the two sides had narrowed the gaps, but the regional official telling me tonight hamas says it has already made concessions and is not willing to make anymore. amna: you have been reporting on this from the start. why are these talks still

critical? nick: u.s. officials believe a cease-fire is key to preventing regional expansion. they believe if there is a cease-fire, iran might not respond with an attack on israel in response to two assassinations. if there is a cease-fire, that would reduce the cease-fire of any hezbollah/israel of war as well as israel's northern border. with the principal is to stop the war in gaza, which started after hamas's october 7 terror attack, the deadliest day in israeli history. israel blames hamas for hiding within civilian areas, and said today it had killed about 17,000 hamas fighters. even if that is true, that leaves more than 20,000 civilians dead and of course countless families crushed. in english, there is no word for the father who has lost his children.

surrounded today, mohammed abu al-qumsan surrounded himself with the doll that will never be held. the matching outfits that will never be worn by his twins, ayssel, and asser, born just three days before the family says they were killed in an israeli strike. >> when i married dr. jumana and had our two children, my joy was immense. unfortunately, i didn't even have three days to enjoy their presence. may god rest their soul. nick: there are no words for the father who has lost his children. when he learned of their deaths, he also learned his wife died with them. in a single moment, he had lost everything. her name written in pen, dr. jumana arafa, who just three days before had posted on facebook, new twins. a burden too difficult to bear. and yet, he bore the weight of her body, a pall bearer for his own wife.

and he prayed at his family's funeral. death stalks gaza. and the men who dig gaza's graves have run out of room. this is not a cemetery. it is a patch of sand that najy abu hateb said today, could one day be his own. >> since the war began, we haven't stopped for even a minute. we are working beyond our capacity. i swear, we are destroyed, life has been ruined. we have dug 50, 60, 70 graves daily, till the death toll reached 40,000. nick: it is the collapse of a community. this woman has just lost 20 members of her family. the family says the only survivor of an israeli strike was three-month-old reem, one of 90,000 wounded gazans and just the latest child identified by gazan doctors with an appalling label, wounded child, no surviving family.

tonight's macabre milestone, the reflection of reality. on average, every day for 314 days, more than 100 gazans have died. often, before they had the chance to live. for the "pbs news hour," i'm nick schifrin. amna: joining us now is dr. ahmad yousaf, an american pediatrician who recently returned from volunteering with the humanitarian group medglobal at gaza's al aqsa hospital. he's back home in arkansas. thank you for joining us. dr. yousaf: thank you for having me. amna: you heard the story as my colleague reported. the father who lost his twins just days after they were born. we are able here just to see a slice of these stories from on the ground in gaza. you were there. tell us what you think when you hear this story. were these kinds of stories unusual? dr. yousaf: the truth is this was as devastating as a story as

this is, this is the everyday story for the gazan people. almost every day i was there in gaza, every day there were bomb blasts that we heard in the distance sounding like rolling thunder and there were drones over our heads 24/7. often coinciding with the bomb blasts were mass casualty events that came to the hospital 35 or 40 minutes later. every story, devastating. children lost in a manner such as the one previously documented. people would come to us in pieces and family members often asked us to help in a situation but we could no way give them what they needed in terms of health care. amna: you are a pediatrician focused on children. what kind of impact has this war had on the children of gaza? dr. yousaf: it is a hard question to address because it carries two separate realities. one is the ongoing, what i would

call the bleeding that has not yet stopped because the bombs are still dropping. i get messages from my colleagues telling me about another mass casualty event, even apparently where it is supposed to be safe. the children keep coming in dead or dying. and the ones who survive often have a severe physical disability. that doesn't include the other side of this story we can only truly assess when this is over. which is the psychological trauma. there are moments seared into my brain of watching children in the that were treating patients screaming in pain the last moment of their lives with head trauma, open abdomens, torn limbs. there were burns and those comes of things just watching. the psychiatric impact of the trauma on young brains is going

to be a generational problem for the gazan people and will only be assessed when the bleeding stops. amna: as we speak we are marking another grim milestone, 40,000 reportedly dead according to gaza's health ministry. we should point out there has been a lot of doubt cast on the numbers we are getting from the gazan officials. from your experience on the ground how do you look at those numbers? dr. yousaf: listen, there was absolute consensus among international physicians on the ground that those numbers are understated. meaning, there was not a doctor i spoke with at any of the hospitals, many of the ngo's he came from international countries like the u.s., the u.k., france or other middle eastern countries, who did not believe the mortality count was significantly higher. the reason that is is because beyond the bomb blasts were recounted how many people died that day from the bomb blasts, we were not yet counting the patients who died from infections from their wounds many days later.

they should have never been there except see -- the water systems had been attacked in a similar manner strategically and systematically, making the patient population extremely prone to illness causing extreme morbidity. amna: what stays with you from your time there? dr. yousaf: i think the two things that will stick with me for a long time was that despite experiencing from the outside world and from the people attacking them, a level of inhumanity, that the gazan people found a way of finding meaning in events moments of inhumanity. men would run towards bomb blasts to save who they could despite risking their own lives. i saw physicians who had not slept in days who looked like their check -- their faces had changed forever. knowing their families may be at

risk of a bomb blast in the distance. they looked at me and thought how to feed me and take care of me and make sure i was ok. i have gotten message and message from them asking how i am doing. that comes to the latter part of the feeling i had -- amna: that is dr. ahmad yousaf. thank you for joining us tonight. appreciate your time. dr. yousaf: thank you so much for having me. ♪ amna: we start the day's other

headlines in russia, where ukrainian forces claim to be pushing deeper into the kursk region. today, president volodymyr zelenskyy said his country's troops have seized the town of sudzha, the administrative center for the kursk border area. even though it has just 5000 residents, it would mark the largest population center to fall under ukraine's control since last week's incursion. in a video call, the ukrainian army chief reported that the military now controls more than 80 communities, including sudzha, which president zelensky then announced in his nightly address. >> the commander-in-chief reported on the operation in the kursk region. we have a new advance. general syrskyi reported on the completion of the liberation of the town of sudzha from the russian military. a ukrainian military commandant's office is being established there. amna: zelensky's claim could not be independently verified, and russia has not responded. but defense officials said earlier in the day that russian forces had blocked ukraine's

attempts to take several other communities. a court in russia has sentenced russian-american citizen ksenia khavana to 12 years in prison on treason charges. rights groups say the case stems from a $52 donation khavana made to a charity that supports ukraine. she appeared in court in the city of yekaterinburg today, as the judge read her sentence. a u.s. state department official called it an escalation of the kremlin's domestic oppression. >> donating to a nonprofit organization, donating to an ngo, supporting the ukrainian cause and supporting the ukrainian people as they defend themselves against russian aggression, especially doing so on american soil, is not a crime. amna: khavana, who is also known by the last name karelina, reportedly became an american citizen after marrying her husband and moving to los angeles. she was arrested back in february while visiting family in russia.

federal law enforcement officials have charged five people in connection with the death of actor matthew perry. they include two doctors, and perry's own assistant. the “friends” star suffered an accidental ketamine overdose last year. at a news conference today in los angeles, officials said they'd uncovered a quote, broad underground criminal network that distributed ketamine to perry, and others. they said the defendants displayed utter disregard for perry's history of substance abuse. >> these defendants took advantage of mr. perry's addiction issues to enrich themselves. they knew what they were doing was wrong. they knew what they were doing was risking great danger to mr. perry, but they did it anyways. amna: at least two of the defendants, including perry's assistant, have already pleaded guilty to charges related to his death. bermuda is bracing for hurricane ernesto as it barrels across the atlantic ocean. early today it had maximum

sustained winds of 85 miles an hour as it moves north. ernesto is expected to become a category three hurricane before passing near or over bermuda on saturday with up to 12 inches of rain. ernesto already battered puerto rico as a tropical storm. today, more than 450,000 people were still without power amid sweltering heat. donald trump is asking the judge in his new york hush money case to delay his sentencing until after the november election. in a letter to justice juan merchan, trump's lawyers argue that the current date of september 18 could improperly influence voters. the judge is also set to rule on september 16, so two days earlier, on a request to overturn the verdict, following the supreme court's ruling on presidential immunity. in may, trump was convicted of 34 counts of falsifying business records related to payments to adult film actress stormy daniels. the u.s. economy is showing signs of resilience this summer.

the commerce department says that retail sales jumped by 1% in july from the month before. that's much more than expected, and the biggest increase in consumer spending in 1.5 years. a separate report showed that unemployment claims fell by 7000 last week, in a sign that the national jobs market remains stable. those reports come a day after a reassuring reading on inflation fueled expectations that the fed will cut interest rates when it meets next month. today's economic readings were also welcome news on wall street. the dow jones industrial average jumped more than 550 points, ending well above the 40,000 point level. the nasdaq added more than 400 points, or about 2.33%. and the s&p ended higher for a sixth straight session. and we have a passing of note. gena jenna rowlands, hailed as one of the finest actors of all time, has died. her career took off in the 1960's and 1970's, when she starred in a series of films directed by her husband, john

cassavetes. the pair often worked outside the hollywood studio system, and together helped bring independent american cinema to new heights, and to new audiences. >> i hope you kids never grow up. never. amna: rowlands gave vulnerable portrayals of working-class women, earning oscar nods for "a woman under the influence," and the crime-thriller, "gloria." decades later, she charmed a new generation of audiences, as a woman suffering from dementia in "the notebook." >> do you think our love could take us away together? >> i think our love can do anything we want it to. amna: that blockbuster was directed by rowlands' son, who revealed earlier this year that his mother had been diagnosed with alzheimer's disease in real life. gena jenna rowlands was 94 years old.

still to come on the “news hour,” the biden administration and drug companies make a deal to lower prices for some of medicare's costliest prescriptions. the backlash against tourists flooding popular european destinations. and 100 years after his birth, james baldwin's enduring influence on art and activism. >> this is the "pbs news hour" from weta studios in washington and in the west from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. amna: the presidential candidates are closing out another busy day on the campaign trail, with less than three months to go in the race for the white house. as events and advertising ramp up, so does the volume of misleading claims and outright lies. former president donald trump just wrapped a nearly 90 minute

press conference in which he repeated familiar grievances and several lies. >> virtually 100% of the net job creation the past year has gone to migrants. she wants to take away your health care. she wants to abolish coal, oil, and natural gas. amna: to parse out the truths and the falsehoods, we're joined by politifact editor-in-chief katie sanders. thanks for being with us. katie: thanks for having me. amna: the economy remains the number one issue for voters. mr. trump made several economic claims yesterday arguing when he left office, as he says, gasoline was at $1.87 a gallon, and poverty rates for african-americans had dropped 7%, that they dropped 8% for hispanics. mr. trump often speaks in hyperbole, but what is the truth and what is not true about what he is saying? katie: i will start with the gas prices. he is actually referring to a period where the economy was in a freefall during spring 2020.

that is the last time gas was that low. by the time he was leaving office in january 2021, prices per gallon were up 28% higher than what he has said many times. as for the black poverty statistics, he does have a point that the administration achieved record lows to the extent any presidential administration can really influence the economy. but what he is leaving out is that for black americans the poverty rate continued to drop under president biden. the story is a little bit different for latino poverty. it did dip to its lowest point under trump and it has risen a little bit at the end of trump's tenure. but you are right, he is prone to exaggerate. amna: as for president biden and vice president harris, we saw them today appearing for an announcement about lower prescription drug prices. here is part of what vice president harris had to say. >> medicare was prohibited by

law from negotiating lower drug prices. and those costs that got passed on to our seniors. but not anymore. amna: what should we understand both about that statement and also how this announcement is being framed by the administration? katie: sure. it is true there was that prohibition in law and that prohibition is no more. i think the casual listener might not pick up on some of the details. to be fair, president biden did go into more details later in the speech. vice president harris's remarks were a bit shorter. if you were just popping in you would be like, oh great. any medicare drug is going to be capped as a result of the negotiation process and it is really starting smaller than that. there are 10 drugs that were negotiated. it will be another 10 to 15 one year, another 10 to 15 the next. it is a slow implementation but

it is historic. for the casual listener this is happening in a few years down the road. amna: there are another couple headlines folks will have seen. tim walz and j.d. vance, a few statements routed to governor walz's military service want to tackle. this one first. after there was a harris campaign effort to share a clip of governor walz from 2018 in which he was discussing gun-control. >> we can make sure we don't have reciprocal kerry-- carry and we can make sure those weapons of war i carried in war are the only weapons -- the only place those weapons are carried. amna: there are questions as to whether he served in war, in a combat zone. what are the facts we need to understand about that? katie: the facts needed to understand this claim is that walz at a lengthy military career, he was deployed

overseas, but it was in a support role, not in a combat zone in a rack or afghanistan. so vance has a point. the harris/walz campaign has said he misspoke, so there is not much contention there. amna: there is another related allegation from senator vance saying governor walz deliberately retired when he did to avoid being deployed with his unit to iraq. what have you found out about that? katie: the precision of the known timeline based on official documents is important here. we rated vance's claim mostly false. he made it sound as if walz got information about the deployment and then decided to retire. the burden is on vance to prove that is what happened. as we have been reviewing documents from the time from the minnesota national guard and

walz's candidacy, that timeline doesn't square up. he submitted to deceit taker work -- paperwork in february 2005, after a 24 year career. by that time he had already submitted retirement paperwork. that takes months. then in march 2005, his battalion was notified of the possibility of being deployed within the next two years. it was not a definite you are going but it was this is possible. in may 2005, walz retirement from the minnesota national guard went through. then in july, his battalion received the official word of deployment that happened the next year. so there is an element of truth here, and i think it is seen by people who served with walz that he was wrestling between the decision to retire or to stay in case of a deployment. so he did know it was a possibility. but vance is too fast and loose with the timelines, so it is

mostly false. amna: the race has changed a lot since the last time you and i spoke. it went from a biden and trump raced to now a harris and trump raise. how has that changed the landscape for you and your team especially with the condensed timeline and the challenge of real time fact checking? katie: that is the secret of fact checking in real time. it is fact checking we have learned from doing reporting on various claims by the candidates. i can take days to ascertain. when the race upended and we had relatively three newcomers, we have a whole new race of new claims, new biographical assertions. new records to examine. it is no rematch we were talking about back in milwaukee where we were deeply familiar with the presidential candidates. we are really on superspeed

trying to learn a lot as quickly as possible antidemocratic convention is fast approaching. amna: that is katie sanders joining us tonight. good to speak with you. katie: thank you so much. amna: and of course politifact will be fact-checking next week's democratic national convention. you can find that and other updates from politifact on our website, pbs.org/newshour. as we just heard, medicare has reached agreements with major pharmaceutical companies to cut the cost the government pays for 10 prescription drugs used by millions of americans. this marks the first time the government has been able to negotiate directly with drug makers, a result of provisions in the inflation reduction act, passed two years ago. today in maryland, president biden called it a success more than half a century in the making. >> first time i sponsored a bill, medicare negotiate the price of drugs was in 1973 as a

freshman senator. i thank god that in the last three months i'm president, united states, i was able to finally get done what i tried to get done when i was a young senator at 30 years old. amna: the drugs selected were some of the costliest and most frequently dispensed in the program, including blood thinners eliquis and xarelto, medication used to treat heart failure and diabetes drugs. to discuss the impact and the implications of the historic negotiations, we're joined now by neera tanden, domestic policy advisor to president biden. neera, welcome back to the program. thanks for joining us. as the president said, it is a long time coming on these kind of agreements. so when will americans actually start to feel the impact? how soon should they expect to pay less for these medications? neera: per the statute, this will be implemented january 1, 2026. so, people will experience those

prices, seniors will experience these prices through 2026. the law as specifies that these are just the first 10 drugs. however, next year they'll negotiate 15, 15 the year after that, and then 20 from here on forward. so this is really the beginning of lowering drug prices for seniors. amna: some of the savings that have been hailed by the president and vice president today, we should point out they are compared to the list prices of the drugs, and we know those list prices can be higher than the privately negotiated prices that medicare plans actually end up paying for a lot of these medications. so some experts say the percentage is being held up by the administration here in terms of what's being saved are a little misleading because of that. what do you say to that? neera: in every instance, in all of these 10 drugs, the price negotiated by medicare is lower than the price that people pay for the drugs -- seniors pay for these drugs. so this is going to be savings for seniors. in addition, we know that there

will be $1.5 billion for in savings for the millions of people in medicare. so this is definitely delivering savings to seniors. and again, it's just the beginning. amna: in terms of what the average senior would actually save, though, it's also true to say that, you know, there's other factors like rebates and copays and drug middlemen. that also factor into what individuals end up paying for each of the medications. so is it possible to say what the average american would actually save as a result of this change? neera: well, there are a lot of different insurance plans. so it's a little hard to say exactly how much each person pays, but we know that they will have significant savings. and we also know that other elements of the prescription -- of the inflation reduction act, other elements of the inflation reduction act will deliver savings as well. january 1, 2025. in just a few months, we'll have the $2000 cap on all drugs for seniors. so, for people taking enbrel or

other drugs that are very expensive, they will also benefit from the $2000 cap. this is a significant savings, though, to individuals. and more importantly and as importantly, i should say, it's a significant savings to the taxpayer. there will be $6 billion in savings to the medicare program. this is a significant portion of the $160 billion in savings we'll have from the drug reforms and the inflation reduction act over the next 10 years. amna: as i'm sure you've seen, the drug companies have long argued that lowering prices, among other things, stifles innovation. we've also seen some of the pharmaceutical companies and their umbrella organizations already challenging this in the courts. are you worried about the potential downsides of this, that it could stifle innovation or the litigation could have an impact here? neera: well, first of all, the congressional budget office did an assessment of the inflation reduction act and found that one out of thousands of drugs would be limited over the next 10 years. they really found this argument

that there would be a lack of innovation to not stand up. and so, we think it's important, we think that it's important that we have innovation, of course. we know the companies are extremely profitable. i would also say when it comes to the litigation, even judges who've been nominated by republican presidents have found that this is well within the power of congress. amna: you may have heard there's an election looming, and we've heard from republicans alleging that this is a political ploy to woo senior voters in particular, even the head of the pharmaceutical industry lobbying group, the president of the pharmaceutical research and manufacturers group, said this is to score political points. he says patients will be disappointed when they don't see the impact the administration is hyping. the timeline raises the question, why now? is this a political ploy? neera: this timeline was determined by the statute. the statute said that we had to negotiate the drug prices. they had to be public by september 1.

we are meeting that statute deadline. the statute required that they go into effect in january of 2026. they would have been ready to do it earlier, but that's what it specifies. and the fact is, i just think this is, you know, we really just dismiss this argument that this is about politics. it's about politics if you believe politics should be about solving people's problems, then it is political. it is not political in any other way. and i think one of the reasons why we're hearing from the opponents of this, that it's political or there's some other nefarious thing going on, is because republicans had a chance to vote for this. they had a chance to vote for the inflation reduction act. they had a chance to vote for prescription drug reform. they had a chance to lower drugs for seniors. and they said no. amna: that is domestic policy advisor to president biden, neera tanden joining us tonight. neera, thank you. good to speak with you. neera: thanks so much for having me. ♪

amna: summer vacation time is quickly fading, but this season is expected to break records worldwide, with billions of people breaking out their suitcases, sandals, and swimsuits. and while tourism is a huge money maker, a growing number of destinations are finding their visitors, well, rather annoying, and asking many to stay away. special correspondent malcolm brabant has been looking at european hot spots that are trying to deter the holiday hordes, and he starts his report from the cotswolds in southwestern england. malcolm: straddling the river windrush, bourton on the water is known as the little venice of the cotswolds, a region of southern england notable for its mellow, honeyed stone architecture. [church bells] this is england at its finest,

it's picture perfect, almost fairy tale beautiful and wonderfully tranquil. but you have to get up early to find it like this, especially when the sun deigns to appear. >> when you think a population of about 4300, and we get round about 1.25 million tourists a year, you know, you can see how people get stressed out by it. malcolm: jon wareing is both a district councillor and an occasionally frazzled resident. >> i've had a number of people who've actually said that considering moving from bourton, because they just can't take the overtourism anymore. malcolm: one of bourton's attractions is a replica of the village, a suitable metaphor for tourism's footprint here and around the world. >> when you come to live in a place like baltimore water, you would be a fool to do so if you couldn't handle knowing that there was a peak tourist season, and you were going to see a lot of people. malcolm: an employee here for nearly 30 years, bryony holden is unapologetic about the commercial benefits of tourism. >> it doesn't really affect us.

we work in the village, we welcome the people, and then we go home, close our from doors, and nobody else is there. malcolm: although few in number, many villagers share a kinship with bigger destinations whose quality of life has been diminished by tourism. >> i think the challenge is how we get the right balance of numbers of visitors so that the experience for them and for local people is not a negative one. malcolm: on santorini, the jewel of greek islands, residents were angered at being urged to stay indoors on a day it was swamped by 17,000 cruise line passengers. the greek government is considering limiting the number of ships that can dock at once and overwhelm people like hotelier georgios damigos. >> when you increase the number of visitors 20 times, i know for a fact that our standards of living has gone down. malcolm: as tourists crowded into narrow village lanes to capture the sunset over an

extinct volcano, portuguese visitor rita cristovao made this appeal. >> maybe there should be some rules about the maximum visitors per day that santorini should have so every visitor can have a more pleasant experience. malcolm: in early july in barcelona, some demonstrators delivered their message to visitors with water pistols. >> i condemn this expression that goes against our country's values and sentiments. malcolm: spain's tourism minister and barcelona's former mayor jordi hereu. >> i want to reaffirm the values of hospitality of spain and the spanish tourism model and one of its characteristics, which is security. malcolm: but barcelona is turning up the temperature. cruise passengers who visit the city for less than 12 hours will have to pay an increased tourist tax, if the mayor gets his way. he says day trippers aggravate the sense of occupation and saturation without providing any benefit. that sentiment is shared from

the canary islands to amsterdam, capital of the netherlands. last year, exasperated by weekly drink and drug fueled bad behavior in the red-light district, the city launched a campaign aimed squarely at the usual suspects. young british men. >> i think we can say this hasn't had much of an impact. malcolm: based in valencia, spain, forward keys is a travel analytics company that monitors who's travelling where and when. olivier ponti is its director of intelligence and marketing. >> looking at the year to date data, we can see a 17% increase in english arrivals airports in amsterdam. malcolm: so what does amsterdam need to do to try to keep the brits away? >> so i think the strategy should be to try and identify those travelers from the u.k. and other places that could be interested in a destination like

amsterdam outside of the high season. malcolm: amsterdam has pivoted. >> it makes you see how you can be just you while giving room to others. malcolm: it's also an appeal for more respectful behavior. >> as a tourist, if you can travel outside of the peak holiday season, that's going to be more enjoyable for you and take the pressure off local residents. malcolm: justin francis runs an ethical travel agency which advocates that better treatment of local people and places result in better vacations. >> spend as many of your dollars in the local communities you can, which shouldn't be a hardship. but look for hotels, local bars, local restaurants, local markets. because this is the trade off. you come, you enjoy, but if your money is ending in local hands, it feels a fairer deal for them. malcolm: the city of venice can't wait for attitudes to change.

this summer it's levied an entrance fee costing five euros, or $5.45. but travel analyst olivier ponti says the tax has failed to deter visitors. >> people want to visit venice. they want to see it at least once in their life. is a five euro tax really expect to deter people from fulfiing their dream of visiting venice? i don't think so. malcolm: back in bourton on the water, thomas wong from des moines, iowa was glad he beat the rush. >> when there are too many tourists, you find it, like, not as authentic compared to more remote regions, and it's not as like realistic. so i like when there's not as many people so you can live by yourself with your family. malcolm: but day trippers who bring their own picnics and don't contribute to the local economy provide ammunition for those who favor a venice-style tourist tax. >> as you can see, as the numbers start to increase, when it's absolutely full, there's a lot of wear and tear. residents in the past felt pretty negative about having to be the ones that bear the cost

of doing that when they're not the ones enjoying their own amenity. malcolm: when we visited, there was a better class of traffic jam. but on peak summer days, lines of cars and coaches, or busses, as americans call them, can delay emergency vehicles by over an hour. >> the problem is there's no longer any provision for coach parking in the village. it causes congestion and it causes a little bit of irritation on some parts, even though we really welcome the coaches. the real difficulty is there are far too many cars coming. if more people took a coach and booked, the problem would probably be solved if there was sufficient provision for the coach parking. malcolm: tourism is becoming more of a battlefield with every passing day. for the "pbs news hour" i'm malcolm brabant in bourton on the water. ♪

amna: health officials are on high alert because of the rapid spread of mpox in several african nations. the world health organization has declared the outbreak a global health emergency and experts warn the virus could spread further internationally. in fact, today, sweden reported the first case outside africa in an individual who had recently returned to sweden from africa. ali rogin has the details. ali: the africa centers for disease control reports that mpox, originally known as monkeypox, has been detected in 13 african nations, including kenya, rwanda, and uganda. more than 96% of all cases and deaths have occurred in one country, the democratic republic of congo. so far there have been more than 14,000 cases registered and 524 deaths in the continent this year alone, surpassing last year's numbers. experts are asking for more funding, vaccines, and a concerted effort to slow the transmission of this virus, which can be spread through

infected individuals, sex, and contaminated meat. for more, i'm joined by anne rimoin, an epidemiologist at the university of california at los angeles who has studied mpox in the democratic republic of congo for two decades. thank you so much for being here with us. what populations are the most vulnerable to mpox? anne: thanks for having me here. what we're seeing is we're seeing two different populations at great risk. we're seeing people in remote rural areas in drc who are traditionally hunting wild animals for food source, and then we're seeing spillover from an animal to a human, so human to human transmission within households. the other thing that we're seeing in more urban areas is sexual transmission, primarily happening in sexual and gender minorities and also in sex workers as well.

ali: and why are we seeing such a rise in reported cases and deaths this year as compared to last year? anne: well, there are a number of reasons that this could be happening and nobody knows for sure because we just haven't had terrific disease surveillance on the ground given all of the logistical barriers that that are in place given the vastness of a place like drc and the limited resources available. so, you know, we don't have excellent surveillance on the ground. we don't have enough diagnostics, so many of these cases are reported, they don't go with big case investigations. that give us the data that we need to really know what's happening on the ground. we don't have the tests available to be able to determine this is monkeypox or is this something else? so right now, situational awareness on the ground is less than optimal, and that's why it's not possible to say with certainty anything about what's happening on the ground. ali: and that underscores again

how little we know about the specifics of how this disease, how this virus is spreading, but i do wonder, does the declaration of a global emergency have any impact on that, and what other effects might come from this declaration? anne: well, seeing these global declarations first from africa cdc calling this a global health emergency of regional concern, and then from w.h.o., the public health emergency of international concern, should be very important in terms of unlocking funds and resources to be able to really better understand the mechanisms of spread, provide information through better surveillance, better testing. and then also being able to get vaccines on the ground to be able to better control the outbreaks that are occurring. ali: and tell us about the scarcity of vaccines. i know that's a big issue. anne: africa cdc suggested that

there is a need for approximately 10 million doses of vaccine to be able to control the outbreak on the ground. and right now there is actually very limited supply of vaccine available. the drc is working closely with their partners on the ground to be able to identify groups that are at greatest risk, where they can deploy the vaccine most effectively first to be able to control the outbreak on the ground. but by and large, we should be getting maximum number of doses of vaccine available to places like the democratic republic of congo, where this virus has originated, so that we can control it at its source. that's going to be critically important. and these countries where that are most affected by this virus are countries that have the least amount of resources available traditionally and currently, so hopefully these declarations will make a very big difference in terms of being able to get resources to the places that are needed.

ali: that's ucla epidemiologist anne rimoin. thank you so much for joining us. anne: my pleasure. ♪ amna: this month, the legendary writer and activist james baldwin would have turned 100 years old. baldwin is best known for his novels and essays, and as a moral voice addressing race, sexuality, and the very fabric of american democracy. nearly 40 years after his death, his words are more relevant than ever. jeffrey brown looks at his enduring legacy for our series, "art in action," exploring the intersection of art and democracy, and our ongoing "canvas" coverage. >> the inequality suffered by the american negro population of the united states has hindered the american dream. jeffrey: james baldwin, novelist, essayist, civil rights activist, public intellectual, here debating william f. buckley jr. at the university of cambridge in 1965.

>> he's engaged in this ongoing work of self-creation, in this sustained reflection on the power of the american idea. he's bringing the full weight of his intellect to bear on this project. jeffrey: eddie glaude jr. is a professor of african-american studies at princeton university and author of the 2020 book, "begin again: james baldwin's america and its urgent lessons for our own." >> i think if you read baldwin closely, there is this underlying idea that we have yet to discover who we are. right? because the ghost of the past in so many ways, not only blind us, but they have us by the throat. jeffrey: james arthur baldwin was born in harlem in 1924 and raised there by his mother and stepfather, a baptist preacher. the oldest of nine children, he excelled in school and served as

a junior minister. a man on the margins, black and queer, he spent years of his life abroad, much of it in france, beginning at age 24. he wrote novels including "go tell it on the mountain," an autobiographical book about growing up in harlem, and "giovanni's room," about a tormented love affair between two men living in paris. and powerful essays exploring race and american identity, including "notes of a native son" and "the fire next time." >> he's one of the greatest essayists we've ever produced, the world has ever produced i think, and his subject is us. but his vantage point is not that of a victim. his vantage point is from those who've had to bear the burden of america's refusal to look itself squarely in the face. jeffrey: he was also a playwright and poet, an activist who marched and spoke out for civil rights, including on

television, here on "the dick cavett show" in 1969. >> and the word negro in this country really is designed, finally, to disguise the fact that one is talking about another man, a man like you who wants what you want. and insofar as the american public wants to think there has been progress, they overlook one very simple thing. i don't want to be given anything by you. i just want you to leave me alone so i can do it myself. jeffrey: baldwin died in 1987, but he's remained a powerful cultural presence, one that's only grown in the past decade. >> there are days, and this is one of them, when you wonder what your role is in this country and what your future is in it. jeffrey: in the 2016 documentary "i am not your negro," director raoul peck drew from baldwin's own words.

as he told me then -- >> he was already a classic, and he wrote those things 40, 50 years ago. and watching the film, you think that he would have, he wrote that in the morning, the morning before watching the film, because those words are so accurate. they are so prescient and so impactful that you can't do it better. jeffrey: in 2018, baldwin's 1974 novel "if beale street could talk" was adapted by oscar-winning director barry jenkins. >> whether i had won eight oscars or no oscars, it's james damn baldwin, you know? it's james baldwin. that's pressure enough, in and of itself, because i wanted to honor his legacy in the way that i thought it should be honored. jeffrey: and now, a celebration of the centennial of his birth, including an exhibition at the national portrait gallery called "this morning, this evening, so soon: james baldwin and the voices of queer resistance," which takes its name from a short story he published in

1960. another at the schomburg center for research in black culture, titled "jimmy: god's black revolutionary mouth," presenting a selection of baldwin's archive of personal papers. there's a new album by singer-songwriter and bassist, meshell ndegeocello, called "no more water: the gospel of james baldwin." ♪ and reissues of seminal works with new introductions and artwork. >> what is the best lesson you have learned being in the spiritual community that you are in with james baldwin? jeffrey: along with a podcast, "the baldwin 100," in which host cree myles talks with contemporary writers and thinkers. what is his relevance today, especially when you think about younger people, younger readers, younger citizens? >> despite the time that has passed, his amount of truth is still relatively radical.

when i think about his novels and "giovanni's room," and we're thinking about the ways that he grappled with, like, sexuality. those are things we're still coming to terms with. jeffrey: acclaimed irish novelist colm toibin contributed the new book, "on james baldwin." >> i'm interested in him as i suppose someone who really found ways of dealing with individuality versus community, with being an artist in a difficult time. but more than anything, more than anything, he wrote well. toibin saw connections to his own upbringing. and told us how baldwin has influenced him as writer and man. >> it's a question of engaging with this great intelligence and with the sensuous intelligence, with someone sort of thinking brilliantly and glittering sort of way. but it is also, of course, developing strategies which he did in relation to his family, in relation to harlem, in relation to black america, in

relation to exile, in relation to attempting to being an artist in a time of flux, and also in a way of being a gay artist, a homosexual artist coming out of a world which is very conservative and very religious, and attempting also to build strategies around that, that give you energy rather than ones that take you down. jeffrey: one deeply resonant thread through all the commemorations, baldwin's focus on the fragility of democracy itself. >> baldwin's exposing the lie that is the source of the suffering, that defines this fragile project, it seems to me. he's committed to democracy, he's committed to america. after all, we are deeply american. but by virtue of that commitment, he has to relentlessly critique it. >> it comes as a great shock to discover the country, which is your birthplace and to which you owe your life and your identity, has not, in its whole system of reality, evolved any place for you. jeffrey: a commitment, as glaude puts it, to the complex experiment called america.

for the "pbs news hour" i'm jeffrey brown. amna: and that's the "news hour" for tonight. i'm amna nawaz. on behalf of the entire "news hour" team, thank you for joining us. >> major funding for the "pbs news hour" has been provided by. the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions, and friends of the "news hour," including leonard and norma klorfine, and the judy and peter blum kovler foundation. the ford foundation, working with visionaries on the front lines of social change worldwide. and with the ongoing support of these institutions. and friends of the "news hour."

this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy.]

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