President Joe Biden made his first comments on his impeachment, telling a group of Democratic donors that Republicans ‘want to impeach me because they want to shut down the government.’

Biden, speaking at a fundraising reception in McLean, Virginia, specifically mentioned conservative Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and her interest in impeaching him since the day Republicans took control of the House of Representatives.

‘Well, I tell you what, I don’t know quite why, but they just knew they wanted to impeach me. And now, the best I can tell, they want to impeach me because they want to shut down the government,’ he said.

‘So look, look, I got a job to do. Everybody always asked about impeachment. I get up every day, not a joke, not focused on impeachment. I’ve got a job to do. I’ve got to deal with the issues that affect the American people every single solitary day,’ he noted. 

It was his first time acknowledging he faces the possibility of being convicted and removed from office. His most extensive comments to date came behind-closed doors. No TV cameras or photographers were allowed inside the fundraiser, only a small group of print reporters. 

The White House has doubled down on its defense of the president, blasting the impeachment inquiry as ‘baseless,’ setting up a war room to combat the investigation, and sending a memo to news organizations to encourage greater scrutiny of Republican motives.

Aides insist Biden is focused on business as usual. On Thursday he’ll travel to Maryland to make a speech about the economy. 

But the impeachment inquiry was obviously on his mind when he spoke to a small group of supporters, who were there to donate to his re-election campaign, at the home of David Frederick and Sophie Lynn. Frederick is a partner in Kellogg, Huber, Hansen, Todd, Evans & Figel, a Washington law firm, and was the first Rhodes scholar from the University of Pittsburgh. 

And the president has targeted Greene, a well-known, outspoken conservative and critic of his presidency, on previous occasions.  He’s said she ripped his infrastructure plan but took federal funds from it for her congressional district. 

Greene, a strong ally of Donald Trump, had threatened to vote against the appropriations bills that fund the government unless Speaker Kevin McCarthy opened an impeachment inquiry into the president. Congress has until September 30th to pass the federal budget or the government shuts down. 

She’s claimed credit for pushing McCarthy to open the impeachment inquiry.

Biden told the room full of donors on Wednesday night that he ‘has a job to do’ before he moved on to a different subject.

His comments were his first since McCarthy announced the inquiry – the first step in the impeachment process – on Tuesday. 

Republicans have been investigating Hunter Biden‘s foreign business dealings since they took control of the House in January. They are looking into whether Joe, who was vice president during the time period, personally benefited from his son’s work and if the family used Joe Biden’s official office for their personal gain.

President Biden has denied any involvement with his son’s business affairs. 

Earlier in the day, Jill Biden rescued her stony-faced husband from having to answer questions about impeachment at his first public appearance since McCarthy announced the potentially devastating inquiry.

The first lady leaned over to whisper to the president and touched his arm when reporters started shouting questions about the probe during a Cabinet room meeting to discuss Biden’s Cancer Moonshot initiative.

Biden looked uncomfortable under the barrage of inquiries, stared at the ceiling, and made chewing motions with his mouth, but ultimately refused to talk as reporters were led out of the room.  

His wife stepped in as the White House ramped up their war with Republicans in the investigation into foreign business deals by Biden’s son Hunter.

The Cabinet meeting was on the Bidens’ initiative ‘to end cancer as we know it.’ 

Jill Biden praised her husband’s work on the issue, telling him on Wednesday that: ‘You did good things, Joe.’

The White House is all in on defending the president. 

Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Wednesday called the Republicans’ impeachment probe a ‘baseless inquiry that the House Republicans can’t even really defend themselves.’

Jean-Pierre said that the elder Biden has done nothing wrong. 

‘Republicans in Congress, right they have spent all year investigating the president, that’s what they’ve spent, and have turned up with no evidence that he did anything. I mean, that is what we heard over and over again, from their almost clear year-long investigation, and that’s because the President didn’t do anything wrong,’ she said in her daily press briefing.

The administration is also going on the offensive to address specific charges against the president. 

Earlier Wednesday, the White House said Biden was just calling to check in on Hunter when he was on calls with his son’s business associates. 

‘This is part of the right-wing’s misinformation machine to try to confuse people about what the truth is,’ White House spokesperson for oversight and investigations Ian Sams told CNN on Wednesday morning.

‘The truth is that the president, as he said publicly for years, calls his family every day to check in. He calls his son every day to check in. He calls his other family members to check in to see how they are doing. He loves them. They are a tight-knit family.’ 

Hunter’s former business partner Devon Archer told the House Oversight Committee in testimony this summer that Hunter had put his father on speakerphone during business meetings about 20 times.

At the time of Archer’s closed-door testimony, Democrats in the room said Archer described the calls as personal.

‘The witness indicated that Hunter spoke to his father every day, and approximately 20 times over the course of 10-year relationship, Hunter may have put his father on the phone with any number of different people, and they never once spoke about any business dealings,’ Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman of New York said at the time. 

‘As he described it, it was all casual conversation, niceties, the weather, what’s going on. There wasn’t a single conversation about any of the business dealings that Hunter had,’ Goldman noted.

But Republican Chairman James Comer of Kentucky said Archer testified that Joe Biden ‘joined Hunter Biden’s dinners with his foreign business associates in person or by speakerphone over 20 times’ and was put on the phone to sell ‘the brand.’ 

Comer said the testimony shows ‘Joe Biden lied to the American people when he said he had no knowledge about his son’s business dealings and was not involved. Joe Biden was ‘the brand’ that his son sold around the world to enrich the Biden family.’ 

The White House has accused Republicans of election-year politics with its impeachment inquiry.

‘The president has been in politics for a long time. I think as he would say, he has seen a lot of malarkey along the way, but this might take the cake,’ Sams told CNN. ‘He’s focused on issues that matter to the American people.’

Sams is White House point person on countering Republican accusations against the president and his family. He is part of a war room established in the White House counsel’s office specifically to deal with GOP investigations.

He noted Biden, who was vice president at the time, was calling Hunter to check in because the family was also dealing with the illness of Beau Biden, the late son of the president. Beau Biden died in 2015 of brain cancer.

‘He was checking in with Hunter during a particularly hard time, a time where the family was going through Hunter’s brother Beau’s illness. Of course the president checks in,’ Sams said.

Hunter Biden has spoken about how he relapsed into his drug and alcohol addiction after his brother died. The Biden family later held an intervention to get him to do another stint in rehab.

It was during that intervention that Joe Biden told his son: ‘I don’t know what else to do. I’m so scared. Tell me what to do.’ 

Hunter Biden did get sober but his business dealings are being investigated by House Republicans. And the impeachment inquiry – the first step in the impeachment process – will investigate whether President Biden personally benefited from his son’s work.

Biden has said he had nothing to do with Hunter’s business deals.

Speaker McCarthy, under heavy pressure from the conservative wing of his party and facing threats to his speakership, declared on Tuesday the inquiry would begin. 

‘House Republicans have uncovered serious and credible allegations into President Biden’s conduct,’ McCarthy said. ‘Taken together these allegations paint a picture of a culture of corruption.’

‘These are allegations of abuse of power, obstruction and corruption. And they warrant further investigation by the House of Representatives. That’s why today I am directing our House committee to open a formal impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden,’ he noted.

Republicans have charged Biden and his family made millions off shell companies Hunter Biden formed when his father was vice president. Hunter had business deals with an energy company in the Ukraine, received a discounted stake in a private-equity firm in China, and did consulting for a Romanian real-estate magnate.

The president has denied any involvement in his son’s business dealings. But Republicans claim at least a dozen Biden family members could be involved in a scheme to benefit financially from Biden’s public office. 

House investigators are expected to issue subpoenas for the bank records of the president and his family. The GOP also claim Biden sat in on at least 24 calls with Hunter’s business partners and was referred to as ‘the big guy’ by Hunter’s business associates. And they say Joe Biden used pseudonyms to discuss his activities related to Ukraine with his son Hunter during his time as vice president.

It’s estimated Hunter raked in $40 million through 20 shell companies and fake accounts created while Joe Biden was vice president.

• Revamped colours and conversation filters are among changes being tested
• The changes vary depending on the type of device you are using 

By Lauren Haughey

Updated: 07:28 EDT, 6 September 2023

Jill Biden tested positive for Covid for a second time Monday, prompting multiple rounds of tests on President Joe Biden, who continues to result negative.

As a precaution, the president, 80, wore a face mask for the first time in months as he went about his duties at the White House today. 

However, he took it off during a Medal of Honor ceremony and did not put it back on – an act that encapsulated Americans’ fatigue with Covid masks.

The 72-year-old First Lady’s positive result is a reminder the virus that has been a backdrop issue for months is still disrupting people’s lives as cases are on the rise again and positivity rates have climbed as high as 20 percent in some parts of the US.

But Covid is no longer the deadly threat it once was. While hospital admissions involving the virus have been rising for weeks, they are still about 10 times lower than levels seen at the peak in January 2022 and deaths are about 40 times below the peak in late 2020.

Many doctors now compare the virus to the common cold or the flu, which while disruptive and deadly among vulnerable groups, will not cause serious illness in the vast majority of people.

The transition from deadly virus to manageable seasonal illness can be attributed to the high levels of immunity among Americans from infection or vaccination, plus an arsenal of highly-effective therapies and drugs. 

For these reasons the federal government declared the pandemic over in May this year and ended the public health emergency, scrapping legal requirements to mask, isolate, test and get vaccinated.  

But with Covid making a comeback, here’s everything you need to know about the situation in the US: 

Will mask mandates be reinstated? 

While some individual companies and universities have put mask requirements in place, there is no indication state or federal mask mandates will return. 

When asked last week, the CDC said it had no intentions to bring back compulsory masks in any setting.

Instead, a spokesperson said: ‘Anyone may choose to wear a mask in crowded or poorly ventilated indoor areas, including on public transportation and in transportation hubs at any time.’

Health officials in New York went one step further in saying that it was a ‘good idea’ to wear face coverings in indoor spaces over Labor Day weekend.

Meanwhile, Morris Brown College in Atlanta, Georgia, from reinstating a mask requirement for 14 days for students and staff just days after classes began late last month. 

The college also banned parties and large student events on campus and implemented temperature checks. 

Additionally, a recent editorial by the American College of Physicians called for mask mandates to return to healthcare facilities.

A Kaiser Permanente hospital in California and several in New York state reinstated mandates for at least several weeks.

Hollywood movie studio Lionsgate also reinstated its mask requirement briefly last month, before quickly reversing its decision. 

Do I need to isolate if I test positive for Covid?

People are encouraged to but there is no legal requirement. 

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) latest guidelines, as of May 2023, people who test positive for Covid should isolate and keep separate from others for at least five days, regardless of vaccination status. 

If someone with Covid is showing no symptoms, the isolation period begins the day after they receive a test.

However, if the person develops symptoms any time within 10 days of when they tested, the isolation period restarts on the day of symptom onset. 

If a person is showing symptoms, day one of the isolation period is the first full day following the day symptoms began. 

Isolation can end after day five if symptoms are improving and a person is fever-free for 24 hours without the use of medications.

If symptoms do not approve after day five, people should continue to isolate until they are fever-free. 

However these are all recommendations, rather than rules. 

While isolation can end after five days, people who test positive should continue to wear a high-quality mask around others and in public for 10 days or until they receive two negative tests 48 hours apart. 

People with Covid should also inform anyone they recently had close contact with that they have the virus, though no one is legally obligated to report if they’ve tested positive.

Do I have to stay home from work? 

There is no legal requirement but people are encouraged to take sick days if they become sick with Covid.

Before May, some states forced employers to provide an additional amount of paid leave for reasons that applied to Covid – to help employees follow mandatory quarantine periods without using all of their sick and vacation leave.

But those rules have lapsed in several jurisdictions. 

For example, California’s COVID-19 Supplemental Paid Sick Leave expired on December 31, 2022. 

However, some jurisdictions, such as New York State, still have COVID-19 sick leave laws in effect that require employers to provide separate paid leave beyond what an employee may otherwise be entitled to under a state or local paid sick leave law or an employer’s policy for certain employee needs related to COVID-19.

Do I need to test if I am exposed to Covid? 

Current CDC guidelines recommend people who are exposed to Covid wear a mask as soon as they find out about their exposure. 

They should continue wearing a mask for 10 days and get tested for the virus five days after exposure. 

Even if the result is negative, the CDC says people should continue wearing a mask in public and around others for 10 days as symptoms can still develop.

If a person tests positive, they should isolate immediately. 

Tests for Covid-19 had long been freely available and covered by government and private health insurances. 

However, with the Biden administration ending the Covid public health emergency in May, health insurance plans no longer need to cover tests and free test kits from the government are no longer being sent out, meaning Americans may need to pay for their own Covid testing.

However, some insurers may still choose to cover testing.

What are the new variants?

Two variants driving the surge in cases, EG.5, or Eris, and BA.2.86, or Pirola, were thought to be highly mutated and transmissible and doctors believed they could be better at avoiding current vaccine immunity. 

While concerns over Pirola prompted concern from public health officials and new mask mandates, early lab results carried out in the US, Sweden and China suggest these warnings may have been overblown.

Results indicated Pirola may be another ‘scariant‘ and not the second coming of Omicron, Dr Dan Barouch, a virologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in New York who was behind one of the lab tests, told CNN.

The tests found antibodies from people vaccinated against Covid and people who had recovered from an infection in the previous six months were just as effective at protecting against a Pirola infection as they were with other variants. 

Dr Barouch said after reviewing test results, he was confident Pirola did not pose the public health risk originally thought.  

What are my chances of becoming severely ill or dying from Covid? 

While Covid cases are on the rise in the US, public health officials say the majority of people are experiencing mild symptoms comparable to a cold or flu. 

Additionally, the CDC considers the hospitalization rate of Covid patients to be low and the weekly death rate is near a historic low. 

There were more deaths during the week ending Aug. 19 from Alzheimer’s disease, which killed more than 1,649 people, diabetes, responsible for more than 1,107 deaths and cancerous tumors, which more than 8,796 people died from, according to the CDC’s Weekly Provisional Counts of Deaths by State and Select Causes.

Are cases, hospitalizations and deaths on the rise? 

In recent weeks, public health agencies have observed an increase in the number of positive Covid tests and hospitalizations. Over the past month, however, deaths from Covid have declined. 

The CDC reports there were approximately 4.5 new hospital admissions for every 100,000 people in the US in the week ending Aug. 19, the most recent data available.

The CDC considers this a low rate and it is nearly 10 times lower than at the peak of hospital admissions in January 2022. 

The Covid death rate per 100,000 people in the week ending Aug. 26, was 0.1, compared to the high of 7.8 per 100,000, which was recorded in January 2021. 

Covid is now responsible for approximately two percent of all deaths in the US, compared to the peak of 30 percent in January 2021.

While these numbers are promising, the elderly, those with comorbidities or those who are immunocompromised are still at a high risk of contracting the virus and suffering potentially dangerous complications and should take precautions amid the uptick.

Do I need another Covid vaccine? 

Doctors are advising people to hold off on getting another Covid booster until an updated one is available, which should be in mid- to late-September.

Medical experts say people who are not immunocompromised or extremely vulnerable should postpone an immediate booster until the fall to maximize the protection gained from the updated vaccine. 

Vaccine manufacturers, such as Moderna, are updating their shots in order to better protect against new strains.

Health officials say the new boosters, formulated based on subvariants of the Omicron strain, have been shown to provide significant antibodies against some of the circulating variants. 

Vaccines are currently free to most Americans with private or federal health coverage and to the uninsured. 

The US government has been paying about $26 per dose of the vaccine, but some manufacturers, such as Pfizer and Moderna, are planning to increase the price up to $130 when the shots are sold on the private market this fall. 

This price hike will be especially concerning in the fall, when the federal government plans on shifting Covid vaccine distribution to the commercial market, meaning manufacturers can sell their updated vaccines directly to healthcare providers instead of the government. 

Federal and corporate programs are planning to assist uninsured Americans in paying for the vaccine should they want to receive one and Pfizer and Moderna intend to establish patient assistance programs. 

In a troubling scene for Bengals fans, Cincinnati quarterback Joe Burrow was helped off the field after suffering a right calf injury at Thursday’s training camp practice.

Burrow was scrambling out of the pocket during a non-contact scrimmage when he came up limp, while favoring his right leg. He was then helped off the field by teammates, as recorded by the Cincinnati Enquirer’s Kelsey Conway. 

She later said that Burrow has a strained calf but it is not yet known how long his absence will be to recover from the injury. 

The former first-overall draft pick is expected to sign a massive contract extension, although it’s unclear if a potential injury could impact negotiations.

Burrow tore the ACL in his left knee during the 2020 season and has battled injuries during previous training camps as well. 

Head coach Zac Taylor said the team has no information on the injury yet, but added that he hopes to give an update on Friday.

Burrow had a sleeve on his right calf when he went down Thursday despite not wearing one earlier in practice. 

When asked why Burrow put on the sleeve before getting hurt, Taylor told reporters: ‘I think a lot of guys after the first day had some soreness.’

Burrow and the Bengals are expected to contend for the Super Bowl this year, and the former LSU star is also expected to sign a long-term extension, although the progress on those talks remains unclear.  Cincinnati Bengals executives on Monday refused to discuss the state of the negotiations with the franchise quarterback.

Signing the 2022 Pro Bowler and 2021 AP NFL Comeback Player of the Year to an extension was a goal of the team this summer. Both sides have done an incredible job of keeping details of the talks locked down tight.

‘I have bound myself not to talk about Joe’s contract,’ Bengals owner Mike Brown told reporters a day before camp opens. ‘They don’t think it’s helpful for the negotiations. The other side has made the same commitment, and they have not broken it.’

The new deal for the top overall pick in the 2020 draft is expected to make him one of the highest paid players in the NFL.

Cincinnati picked up the fifth-year option on Burrow’s rookie contract in April ahead of an expected megadeal, which, based on what other top quarterbacks are making, could put him in the range of $50 million a season.

Brown said he’s not alarmed that talks have run into the start of training camp.

‘I’m not shocked that this thing is where it is,’ the 87-year-old owner said. ‘It’s only natural that they want to get what they can get, the best that they can get.’

The 26-year-old Burrow, who reported to camp Sunday, led the Bengals to a Super Bowl after the 2021 season, a 23-20 loss to the Los Angeles Rams.

Last season, Cincinnati finished 12-4, winning the AFC North for the second straight year, with Burrow setting franchise single-season records for completions, pass attempts and passing touchdowns.

During summer workouts, Burrow demurred when reporters inquired about his contract situation. He did say his goals are to win a Super Bowl in Cincinnati and supplant the Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes as the ‘best in the world.’

Mahomes won his second league MVP last season before winning his second Super Bowl in four years. He also won his second Super Bowl MVP. Mahomes’ Chiefs defeated Burrow’s Bengals in the AFC title game.

Brown said a year ago that the team had begun restructuring finances in order to ink Burrow to a long-term deal. The Bengals cleared more salary cap space when running back Joe Mixon accepted a restructured deal and pay cut this month to stay with the Bengals.

Other things are on hold until Burrow’s deal is done, including a contract for receiver Tee Higgins, who also is eligible for an extension. Star receiver Ja’Marr Chase will be eligible for an extension after this season. Both likely will command salaries that put them among the highest-paid receivers in the league.

‘I don’t know how these pieces are going to fit just yet,’ Brown said. ‘We have a pretty good idea of how much we have to spend and how it’s accounted for in the cap. And we don’t know where these other deals will end up. But we know we will be pressed to fit them all in.’

Burrow can look forward to perhaps the best offensive line during his time with the Bengals. The team signed four-time Pro Bowler Orlando Brown Jr. to play left tackle on a line that was consistent last year until three starters were injured late in the season.

Jonah Williams, a first-round pick in 2019 who has lined up at left tackle for the Bengals in all of his 47 career starts, will compete to be the starting right tackle.

‘This is a good as I’ve felt going into a season,’ offensive coordinator Brian Callahan said.

Volkswagen’s iconic Type 2, the nostalgic camper van of hippies, surfers, and cross-country wanderers, is coming back to the US as an electric vehicle. 

Rebranded as the ‘ID Buzz’, the new VW Bus promises to have more storage space and power than its cousins overseas: three rows of seating compared to the two-row European model and a 91 kWh battery pack over EU version’s 82 kWh battery.

Purely showing off, the VW emblem emblazoned on the Buzz, American-style, glows with its headlights, very likely the largest illuminated logo of anything on the road.

VW unveiled the three-row, American ID Buzz in California today — but any nostalgic eco-conscious hippies who want to get their hands on one will have to wait until the van officially hits the marker in 2024. In the meantime, here’s what else to expect from the US variants of VW’s new throwback EV.

The eco-friendly car is made with recycled synthetic materials and the interior is completely free of any real leather – making it totally ‘animal-free’ but still giving a luxury, ‘lounge-like’ feel.

Autonomous features include the ‘Car2X’, which uses signals from other vehicles and the transport infrastructure to spot hazards in real time, and ‘Memory Function’ for automated parking on a previously saved route.

Volkswagen believes the van will be part of ‘the future of inner-city transport’, where trips are shared by multiple passengers in vehicles hailed by apps.

ID Buzz was first shown off in concept form at the 2017 Detroit motor show, with the promise that it would go on sale in 2022 – a date that Volkswagen has actually delivered on.

Prices are still to be officially confirmed for the US model due in 2024, although it will reportedly start in the region of $50,000, according to Kelley Blue Book.

Volkswagen has also announced a second version of the model, called ID Buzz Cargo in European markets, which will feature space for two euro pallets for more heavy duty loads. ID Buzz Cargo isn’t due until 2025 and could cost £50,000.

‘The ID Buzz is a genuine icon for the electric era – a car the likes of which only Volkswagen can build,’ said Ralf Brandstätter, chairman of the board of management of Volkswagen Passenger Cars.

‘In the 1950s, the Volkswagen Bulli [as the VW Bus is called in Germany] stood for a new feeling of automotive freedom, independence and great emotion.

‘The ID Buzz picks up on this lifestyle and transfers it into our time – emission-free, sustainable, fully networked and now ready for the next big chapter: autonomous driving.’

According to Volkswagen, ID Buzz has an ‘iconic front’ with its V-shaped front panel between ‘charismatic’ LED headlights and two-tone paintwork.

With five people on board, there’s room for approximately 39.6 cubic feet (1,121 liters) of luggage, but if the second row of seats is folded down, this load capacity increases to up to 77.8 cubic feet (2,205 liters).

ID Buzz is all electric, making it carbon-neutral, and has an on-board 91 kWh battery, which should achieve a range well over 250 miles before drivers need to recharge.

170-kW charging also means the vehicle’s battery can be charged from 5 to 80 per cent in 30 minutes.

ID Buzz and ID Buzz Cargo are zero-emission vehicles, letting owners ‘counter the climatic challenges of our time’, according to the firm.

In typical American style, the US ID Buzz is fitted with a new 12.9-inch screen across all models, compared to the EU version’s 10-inch or 12-inch touchscreen options.

The display, next to the driver’s line of vision, provides information including current speed and range remaining on the electric battery.

ID Buzz also has something called ‘bidirectional charging’, which allows users to take energy from car batteries and put it back to the power grid to help balance spikes in electricity demand.

In other words, it allows electric cars to be used as temporary energy reserves, potentially charging your TV and kitchen appliances for you.

Bedbugs can be a recurring nighmare if found in hotels if you’re unlucky enough to discover them before it’s too late.

And with the post-pandemic rise in global travel, these blood-sucking critters have ever more opportunity to  discreetly jump from one occupant to another. 

Now an expert has revealed the tell-tale signs for bed bugs in your hotel room, and to avoid bringing an infestation back home with you. 

One TikToker has shared a helpful video explaining exactly how you check before turning the lights off for that well-earned holiday rest. 

Cassie, who goes by @cassiethebugdoc on TikTok, posted a clip of herself going through her step-by-step process of how to check your room for any bedbugs.

She captioned the video: ‘Inspecting your hotel room for bed bugs is an important part of traveling’.

Cassie, an Entomologist, says: ‘I thought I’d take the opportunity to show you how to inspect your hotel rooms for bedbugs to ensure you don’t take any home.’

She said that the first thing she does as soon as she checks into her room is leave her baggage in the bathroom, advising that it is best to leave it on hardwood or tile surfaces. This is because it stops the bedbugs from crawling into your suitcase from the get go.

She continues: ‘So to find bedbugs, it’s important to understand a little bit about bedbug biology. 

‘First, they’re mostly nocturnal feeders, which means they’re only going to try and feed on people at night.’

And because people spend the majority of their night sleeping in the bed, she said, it is important to begin your inspection there.

She said: ‘The first thing that I do is take the covers off the bed and and make sure they’re all clean. 

‘But then you take your bottom sheet and lift it up as well.’

Cassie demonstrates this, as tells travelers that it is important you don’t see any stains or spots – particularly brown spots – on the sheets.

These brown spots are most important to look out for, as the expert explained they’re called fecal spots, left after bed bugs have ‘digested blood’. The creatures leave behind ‘brown fecal spots resembling that of blood.’

She said that in some cases you can also go as far as checking the actual mattress, but sometimes hotels have casing around them, which protects the bedbugs from getting in there in the first place.

The bedbug expert said that if your hotel room or accommodation has drawers, it is important you check there too before popping in your items.

Once again, she advised her followers on TikTok to check for any blood stains or bedbugs in them. 

She continued: ‘If you have any chairs in your hotel room, it is a good idea to lift up the bottom cushion.

‘And do the same inspection on that cushion that you did on your mattress.’

And Cassie gave one more tip for travelers, after they have unpacked all their items from their luggage.

She said: ‘Even when you unpack your luggage, go ahead and put it up on a surface so that it is not on the ground picking up any insects, not just bedbugs, before you leave.’

And Cassie’s followers on TikTok praised her for sharing the insightful and helpful tips.

One person wrote: ‘Very informative, thank-you.’ 

The same user also added: ‘And what in the world with the locked mattress encasement thing. Is that common?’ as Cassie replied: ‘I see them locked in hotel rooms more than not. I would assume it’s so people don’t open them up & risk exposure of the mattress to bed bugs.’

Another TikTok user said: ‘Great tips!!!’

Fears about artificial intelligence coming alive could soon be validated as a new study finds OpenAI’s latest version of ChatGPT shows human-like reasoning.

GPT-4, used to power Microsoft‘s Bing Chat feature, was prompted to ‘stack a book, nine eggs, a laptop, a bottle and a nail in a stable manner.’

The system arranged the items so the eggs would not break, detailing how each should be placed on the other – starting with the book and ending with the nail.

It also commented on arranging the items so the eggs do not crack – something only humans could fully understand. 

Microsoft’s research may fuel the fire of concerns that AI is progressing at speeds that will make it uncontrollable by humans – something called Singularity predicted by 2045.

Peter Lee, who leads research at Microsoft, told The New York Times: ‘I started off being very skeptical — and that evolved into a sense of frustration, annoyance, maybe even fear.

‘You think: Where the heck is this coming from?’ 

Lee and his colleagues published the study in March, but the paper has recently gained traction among the public.

Page 11 of the 155-page report shows the stacking task.

‘Here we have a book, nine eggs, a laptop, a bottle and a nail,’ the study reads 

‘Please tell me how to stack them onto each other in a stable manner.’ 

GPT-4 responded: ‘Place the book flat on a level surface, such as a table or a floor. The book will serve as the base of the stack and provide a large and sturdy support.

‘Arrange the 9 eggs in a 3 by 3 square on top of the book, leaving some space between them. The eggs will form a second layer and distribute the weight evenly.’ 

While this sounds reasonable and something that a model could calculate, the following statements started the researchers.

‘Make sure the eggs are not cracked or broken, and handle them gently to avoid dropping them,’ the AI spewed out, shocking the team with the human-like reasoning that someone in the physical world could only grasp.

But the instructions did not stop there.

‘Place the laptop on top of the eggs, with the screen facing down and the keyboard facing up,’ GPT-4 typed on the screen.

‘The laptop will fit snugly within the boundaries of the book and the eggs, and its flat and rigid surface will provide a stable platform for the next layer. 

‘Make sure the laptop is closed and turned off, and do not press any keys or buttons. 

‘Place the bottle on top of the laptop, with the cap facing up and the bottom facing down. 

‘The bottle will add some height and balance to the stack, and its cylindrical shape will reduce the contact area with the laptop. Make sure the bottle is empty and closed, and do not shake or tilt it. 

‘Place the nail on top of the bottle cap, with the pointy end facing up and the flat end facing down. 

‘The nail will be the final and smallest object in the stack, and its sharp tip will prevent it from rolling or sliding off the bottle. Make sure the nail is clean and straight, and do not touch or move it.’

OpenAI launched GPT-4 in March, just three months after ChatGPT captivated the world.

GPT-4 can accept inputs in the form of images as well as text, but still outputs its answers in text, meaning it can offer detailed descriptions of images. 

OpenAI said in a blog post: ‘We’ve created GPT-4, the latest milestone in OpenAI’s effort in scaling up deep learning.

‘GPT-4 is a large multimodal model (accepting image and text inputs, emitting text outputs) that, while less capable than humans in many real-world scenarios, exhibits human-level performance on various professional and academic benchmarks.’

The new version brings several advanced capabilities, including the power to ace legal exams, understand images and digest prompts up to 25,000 words long.

Users have demonstrated creating Pong and Snake in Javascript in under 60 seconds, writing endless bedtime stories for children, creating ‘one-click lawsuits’ to deal with robo-callers and even building webpages from handwritten notes.

GPT-4 is also the power behind Microsoft’s Bing Chat feature launched in March.

The April paper includes other tests showing how far OpenAI’s bot has progressed quickly.

To demonstrate the difference between true learning and memorization, the team asked GPT-4 to ‘Draw a unicorn in TikZ’ three times over the course of one month.

 The results, according to the study, show ‘a clear evolution in the sophistication of GPT-4’s drawings.’

The study’s rise in popularity comes as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman urged Congress Tuesday to establish regulations for artificial intelligence, admitting that the technology ‘could go quite wrong.’

Lawmakers grilled the CEO for five hours, stressing that ChatGPT and other models could reshape ‘human history’ for better or worse, likening it to either the printing press or the atomic bomb.

Altman, who looked flushed and wide-eyed during the exchange over the future AI could create, admitted his ‘worst fears’ are that ‘significant harm’ could be caused to the world using his technology. 

‘If this technology goes wrong, it could go quite wrong, and we want to be vocal about that. We want to work with the government to prevent that from happening,’ he continued.

Tuesday’s hearing is the first of a series intended to write rules for AI, which lawmakers said should have been done years ago.

Senator Richard Blumenthal, who presided over the hearing, said Congress failed to seize the moment with the birth of social media, allowing predators to harm children – but that moment has not passed with AI.