US flu season is underway, as cases surge in some areas and vaccinations lag

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. flu season is underway. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday released its latest flu-monitoring data, and noted sharp increases in several measures. Thirteen states last week were reporting high or very high levels of flu-like illness last week, about double from the week before. No flu strain seems to be dominant, and it’s too early in the season to know how good a match the flu vaccine will be. Flu experts suggest everyone get vaccinated, especially as people prepare to attend holiday gatherings where respiratory viruses can spread widely.

WH starts scrapping pending regulations, including student debt cancellation

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden’s administration has started to withdraw pending regulations that won’t be finalized by the time he leaves office. If the rules were left unfinished, President-elect Donald Trump would have an opportunity to rewrite them and advance his own goals more quickly. The withdrawals begin Friday with two regulations intended to cancel student loan debt for more than 38 million Americans and another regulation that would provide some protections for transgender student athletes. Even as the Biden administration moves to pull back the rules, it pushed ahead with cancellation through other avenues on Friday. The Education Department said it was clearing loans for another 55,000 borrowers who reached eligibility through a prior program known as Public Service Loan Forgiveness.

Indiana man sentenced to 130 years in prison for 2017 killings of 2 teenage girls

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — An Indiana man convicted in the 2017 killings of two teenage girls who vanished during a winter hike has been sentenced to the maximum of 130 years in prison. A special judge sentenced Richard Allen on Friday in the girls’ hometown of Delphi, Indiana. Allen had faced between 45 years and 130 years in prison. The 52-year-old was convicted in November in the killings of 13-year-old Abigail Williams and 14-year-old Liberty German, known as Abby and Libby. He was found guilty of two counts of murder and two counts of murder while committing or attempting to commit kidnapping. Allen was arrested more than five years after the slayings.

Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge shows price pressures eased last month

WASHINGTON (AP) — An inflation gauge that is closely watched by the Federal Reserve barely rose last month in a sign that price pressures cooled after two months of sharp gains. Prices rose just 0.1% from October to November. Excluding the volatile food and energy categories, prices also ticked up just 0.1%, after two months of outsize 0.3% gains. The milder inflation figures arrived two days after Federal Reserve officials, led by Chair Jerome Powell, rocked financial markets by revealing that they now expect to cut their key interest rate just two times in 2025, down from four in their previous estimate.