By Caleb Hellerman

(CNN) — Lung cancer kills more Americans than any other form of cancer: more than prostate cancer and colon cancer combined, and nearly three times as many as breast cancer. But while pink ribbons are a familiar sight and 4 in 5 women get their recommended mammograms, screening for lung cancer is far less common. It’s often viewed as a disease primarily of heavy smokers, when the reality is far more nuanced.

Technology offers new opportunities to catch lung cancer early, when it can be treated most easily. But official screening guidelines, which play a major role in determining whether insurance will cover the cost of screening, often fail to pinpoint who is at risk. What’s more, only 20% of people who are eligible for screening actually get checked. Some of this failure can be traced to persistent myths about lung cancer.

Myth: Lung cancer is only a disease of smokers

Juliet DuBois learned that she had cancer after she had a hip replacement two years ago, at age 46. In the weeks after the operation, a blood test showed warning signs of a possible blood clot. DuBois went to the ER, where a CT scan revealed a 1-centimeter mass in her lung.

DuBois isn’t sure whether to consider herself lucky or unlucky. “If I hadn’t gotten a hip replacement and then been extra careful, I would never have known about it,” she said.

Before the hip operation, the former dancer noticed aches and pains but no other symptoms aside from lingering fatigue and sleeping more than usual.

After four rounds of chemo, she now says she’s feeling “pretty good” and has no evidence of disease. This winter, she started an online MBA program, chasing a dream she put off for years. “It can’t be as scary as cancer,” DuBois said.

Both of DuBois’ parents were heavy smokers, which turned her off cigarettes and kept her from ever picking up the habit. Lung cancer screening was never on her radar: “I just wonder, if someone had recommended it, if I’d have done the thing.”

In fact, as many as a quarter of all lung cancer appears in “never-smokers,” defined as smoking fewer than 100 cigarettes in a lifetime. Lung cancer in nonsmokers is more common among women than men, and it’s especially common in women with East Asian or South Asian ancestry. One study found that 83% of female lung cancer patients in south Asia were never-smokers.

Myth: Only heavy smokers need worry

Albertha “Bertie” Gethers started smoking in junior high, hanging out with friends in Mattapan, Massachusetts. It was the 1960s, and for 12-year-old Bertie, Virginia Slims were the brand. “We thought it was cute,” she recalled.

Gethers never smoked more than a few cigarettes a day, even as she kept up the habit for another 56 years. Because it didn’t add up to a “20-pack-year” smoking history – the equivalent of a pack a day for 20 years – she didn’t meet official criteria for screening. That meant Medicare wouldn’t pay for it, and no doctor suggested that she seek out screening on her own.

But in 2024, a friend tipped Gethers to a research program in Boston that offered free CT scans to Black women between the ages of 50 and 80. Accompanied by an aunt, Gethers went for a scan, which to her surprise turned up three cancerous lesions on her lungs. Dr. Chi-Fu Jeffrey Yang, a thoracic surgeon at Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute, removed the growths, and Gethers made a good recovery.

The program Gethers stumbled across was the “INSPIRE” study, launched by Yang along with medical students Alex Potter and Deepti Srinivasan. A primary aim is to explore the feasibility of lung cancer screening for Black patients with any smoking history, even if they fall outside the 20-pack-year guideline.

Black patients are at particular risk; they are less likely to be screened for lung cancer despite having a higher chance o

By Hadas Gold, CNN

(CNN) — OpenAI is expanding access to its most advanced AI models to help businesses and governments shore up their cyber defenses, a sharp contrast to rival Anthropic, which says controlling access to its models is the best way to boost global cybersecurity.

The difference in the two companies’ approaches to cybersecurity mirrors much of the wider debate in the world of AI, where the technology has been advancing much more quickly than legal, regulatory and social guardrails.

That’s left some companies to advance a philosophy of innovating as quickly as possible, while others have moved more cautiously, mindful of potential social harms.

Until recently, OpenAI’s Trusted Access for Cyber program was limited to a select group of partners. But now the ChatGPT maker exclusively tells CNN it’s opening access to all vetted levels of government, from federal agencies down to state and local offices, giving those who are verified and approved access to special versions of OpenAI’s models with fewer guardrails.

“We don’t, as a company, believe that we should be the sole determinants of who gets access to our tools and what is the highest priority,” Sasha Baker, OpenAI’s head of national security policy, told CNN in an interview.

OpenAI is seemingly taking a very different approach to the one its rival Anthropic has taken with Mythos, a model that sent shock waves through cybersecurity circles for its ability to identify and exploit software vulnerabilities.

Citing the potential for harm, Anthropic has been rolling out the model through Project Glasswing, a tightly controlled consortium, and has said it’s working closely with federal, state, and local representatives.

Anthropic says that a slower, more cautious approach is needed to slow the arms race ignited by AI in the hands of hackers.

OpenAI had already made its most capable models available to certain companies and vetted independent security researchers. Now Baker says the company wants to throw the doors wide open.

“We have to democratize our ability to uplift everyone who needs cyber defense and not just reserve it for the Fortune 50 or the biggest fanciest companies that can afford to pay for it,” Baker said.

She described the latest generation of AI models as a “wake-up call” for the cybersecurity community and a chance to fix vulnerabilities before these powerful tools fall into the wrong hands.

“Nobody needs to be panicking,” she said. “But it is a moment where we have to move and do that in coordination and do that with some sense of efficiency and urgency.”

OpenAI recently held a hands-on workshop in Washington with representatives from across the federal government, including the Pentagon, the White House, the Department of Homeland Security and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, to test OpenAI’s latest model and its cybersecurity capabilities, Baker said. The company plans to return to DC in the coming weeks to gather feedback on both its tools and its policy proposals.

“We’re going to take some guidance from the White House about where they want to drive this and how they want to see the AI companies show up,” Baker said.

Representatives from OpenAI, other tech companies including An

By Laura Paddison, CNN

(CNN) — The moringa tree, known as the “miracle tree”, is one of the most nutrient-dense plants on the planet and is prized for its healing qualities. It also has another huge benefit, according to new research: it’s excellent at removing microplastics from water.

A team of scientists from Brazil and the United Kingdom found extracts of seeds from these fast-growing trees are just as effective at removing microplastics from drinking water as commonly-used chemicals, according to their findings published in April.

Moringa trees have been used to purify water for millennia, with evidence of their use by ancient Greeks, Romans and Egyptians, said Adriano Gonçalves dos Reis, a study author and a professor at the Institute of Science and Technology of São Paulo State University.

He and his colleagues have been studying the tree’s seeds for a decade, specifically the role they can play as a “coagulant”, a substance which causes tiny particles in water to stick together so they can be filtered out. Given growing concerns over microplastics in drinking water, they decided to look at the moringa’s potential for removing them.

Microplastics are tiny fragments, that can be as small as 1/25,000th of an inch (1 micrometer) and are a pernicious part of the plastic pollution crisis.

They have been found everywhere, from deep oceans to towering mountains. They contaminate our food and water — a 2024 study found microplastics in 83% of tap water tested around the world — and have made their way into our bodies, including our brains, reproductive organs and cardiovascular systems. Scientists are still trying to unravel their impacts on human health, but animal research has linked them to reproductive problems and hormone disruption.

For their study, the researchers focused specifically on PVC microplastics, as these are among the most hazardous and are prevalent in drinking water, Gonçalves dos Reis said.

They tested microplastics with a mean size of 18.8 micrometers — about a quarter of the thickness of the average human hair — and found the seed extracts were 98.5% effective at removing them from tap water when used in filtration systems.

This efficiency is roughly comparable to a commonly-used chemical coagulant aluminum sulfate, known as alum. Moringa seeds performed even better than alum in more alkaline water, the scientists found.

A big advantage of using the seeds compared to alum is that they are renewable, biodegradable, don’t create large amounts of sludge and have fewer toxicity concerns, said Gonçalves dos Reis. Aluminum can be toxic at high levels and has been linked to neurodegenerative diseases.

Matthew Campen, distinguished professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, who was not involved in the research, said using a natu

Por Jeremy Herb, Jamie Gangel, Whitney Wild, Josh Campbell y Betsy Klein, CNN

El presidente Donald Trump, el secretario de Justicia interino y otros altos funcionarios de la administración afirman públicamente que el Servicio Secreto respondió según lo previsto cuando un hombre armado intentó irrumpir en la cena de la Asociación de Corresponsales de la Casa Blanca.

Pero entre bastidores, el incidente del sábado por la noche en el Washington Hilton, en el que el atacante intentó atravesar corriendo un control de seguridad antes de caer y ser reducido por las fuerzas del orden, ha reavivado las dudas sobre los problemas que arrastra desde hace tiempo el Servicio Secreto, como la escasez de personal, la presión sobre los agentes y el agotamiento.

Funcionarios actuales y antiguos del Servicio Secreto han declarado a CNN que los problemas de personal han afectado a la agencia durante años, a pesar de las promesas de solución.

“Tenemos recursos limitados y los utilizamos lo mejor que podemos”, declaró a CNN un exalto funcionario. “La realidad es que estamos sobrecargados y la agencia está constantemente intentando ponerse al día”.

Expertos en seguridad y legisladores expresaron a CNN su preocupación por las vulnerabilidades que el incidente puso de manifiesto.

Entre ellas, mencionaron los problemas de seguridad del propio hotel, así como la conveniencia de un perímetro de seguridad más amplio o la presencia de agentes adicionales en un evento donde se encontraban reunidos el presidente, el vicepresidente y la mayor parte del gabinete.

“Tras haber asistido a muchos eventos, y ciertamente a eventos con el presidente y el gabinete, la seguridad fue lamentablemente insuficiente cuando se trata de tanta gente entrando en una sala de ese tamaño”, comentó el representante Mike Lawler, republicano de Nueva York, a Manu Raju de CNN el domingo.

“El Servicio Secreto cumplió con su deber al interceptar al atacante, y lograron detenerlo. Pero no debería haber sido necesario llegar a eso”, añadió Lawler. “Para empezar, no debería haber estado en esa zona”.

Tras el intento de asesinato de Trump en 2024 en Butler, Pensilvania, y las investigaciones posteriores que expusieron importantes fallos del Servicio Secreto, surgió un impulso para contratar y capacitar a más agentes, según Jonathan Wackrow, exempleado del Servicio Secreto y analista de CNN que ha colaborado en los preparativos de la cena anual.

Pero en cambio, la administración Trump se centró en capacitar a nuevos agentes para el Servicio de Inmigración y Control de Aduanas (ICE) para su campaña de deportaciones, lo que creó un atasco en el Centro Federal de Capacitación para el Cumplimiento de la Ley, señaló Wackrow.

“El momento oportuno para hacerlo fue al comienzo de esta administración, cuando contábamos con el impulso generado por Butler y las recomendaciones bipartidistas”, agregó Wackrow. “Teníamos cierto apoyo presupuestario para impulsar una campaña de contratación y que esas personas avanzaran en el proceso. Pero entonces la atención se centró en ICE”.

Desde el tiroteo del sábado, altos funcionarios encargados de hacer cumplir la ley durante la administración Trump, incluyendo al secretario de Justicia interino Todd Blanche y al director del Servicio Secreto Sean Curran, han desestimado las preocupaciones sobre posibles fallas de seguridad.

“Fue un éxito rotundo en materia de seguridad”, declaró Blanche a Dana Bash de CNN el domingo. “Según lo que sabemos por las grabaciones de las cámaras de vigilancia y los testimonios de los testigos presentes, este

By Alexandra Banner, CNN

Gas prices have climbed to an average of $4.23 per gallon — the highest level since August 2022 — according to AAA. With oil futures rising and supply routes under strain, any near-term relief at the pump appears unlikely.

Here’s what else you need to know to get up to speed and on with your day.

1⃣ Free speech

The FCC is taking the remarkable step of challenging ABC’s station licenses as President Donald Trump again called on the network to take action against late-night host Jimmy Kimmel over a joke. Separately, the administration secured an indictment against former FBI Director James Comey over conduct that appears likely to be protected speech. Analysts say the moves could be seen as renewed attempts to punish foes after previous efforts failed. Read more.

2⃣ King Charles

Britain’s King Charles III and Queen Camilla will travel to New York City today to visit the 9/11 memorial and meet with families of victims. The visit follows the king’s historic address to Congress on Tuesday, marking only the second time a British monarch has spoken before the chamber. He also highlighted some issues that President Trump has sparred with Britain over in recent months, though much of his speech focused on the kinship between the US and the UK. Read more.

WATCH: Moments from King Charles’ speech to Congress that drew laughter

3⃣ Tornado devastation

Several people were injured after a tornado tore through Mineral Wells, Texas, on Tuesday night, flattening parts of the town as a dayslong severe storm outbreak continues to sweep across the Midwest and South. The storm struck the community about 80 miles west of Dallas, damaging multiple homes and a broad stretch of the town’s industrial area. Officials said a full assessment of the damage is expected later today. Read more.

4⃣ Elon Musk

Elon Musk testified Tuesday in a case that could shape the future of artificial intelligence. Musk is accusing ChatGPT’s parent company, OpenAI, and its leaders — CEO Sam Altman and president Greg Brockman — of misleading him and abandoning the company’s original nonprofit mission. Musk said his lawsuit reaches beyond a single company, arguing it touches on the broader direction of a technology he warned “could also kill us all.” Read more.

WATCH: Musk testifies: “We don’t want to have a ‘Terminator’ outcome.”

5⃣ Passports

The US will soon begin issuing passports featuring an image of President Trump inside. It appears to be the most prominent use yet of Trump’s likeness in items tied to the 250th anniversary of America’s independence, some analysts say. Unlike a commemorative coin or national park pass bearing the president’s image — some of which are already in circulation — a US passport is an internationally recognized form of identification that is typically valid for 10 y