Month: May 2022

Enlarge / A negative stain electron micrograph of a monkeypox virus virion in human vesicular fluid. (credit: Getty | BSIP)

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention today provided an update on the monkeypox situation in the US, which is connected to a growing multinational outbreak. It also used the time to address open questions and calm some unfounded fears.

To date, there are five confirmed and probable cases in the US. The one confirmed case of monkeypox in the US was identified last week in a Massachusetts man who had recently traveled to Canada. The four probable cases include one in New York City, one in Florida, and two in Utah.

Those four cases are probable because they all tested positive for an orthopoxvirus, the family of viruses that includes monkeypox and smallpox. They are considered presumptive monkeypox cases and are being treated as such while the CDC carries out secondary testing to confirm monkeypox.

The fourth season of Stranger Things is almost here—at least the first seven episodes since the release is split in two. So Netflix released a spooky final trailer, chock full of 1980s horror tropes, on the heels of the revelation last month that the season's Big Bad will be a Dungeons and Dragons villain named Vecna.

We've previously reported that David Harbour is returning as Hopper, along with the rest of the main cast. Winona Ryder (Joyce Byers), Finn Wolfhard (Mike Wheeler), Natalia Dyer (Nancy Wheeler), Noah Schnapp (Will Byers), Charlie Heaton (Jonathan Byers), Gaten Matarazzo (Dustin Henderson), Joe Keery (Steve Harrington), Caleb McLaughlin (Lucas Sinclair), and Sadie Sink (Max Mayfield) all return.

We also know the fourth season is the first to mostly occur outside of Hawkins since Eleven and the Byerses have moved away, and Hopper is in a Russian prison. Maya Thurman Hawke returns as Robin, Brett Gelman is back as Murray Bauman, Cara Buono returns as the Wheeler matriarch, and we'll be seeing more of Priah Ferguson, who plays Lucas' sassy younger sister, Erica. Robert Englund of Nightmare on Elm Street fame is among the new cast members, a nice little nod to classic '80s horror. Englund plays Victor Creel, the former owner of the spooky Creel House featured in one of the teasers.