Business
Loretta Ford, ‘Mother’ of the Nurse Practitioner Field, Dies at 104
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Loretta Ford, who co-founded the first academic program for nurse practitioners in 1965, then spent decades transforming the field of nursing into an area of serious clinical practice, education and research, died on Jan. 22 at her home in Wildwood, Fla. She was 104.
Her daughter, Valerie Monrad, confirmed the death.
Today there are more than 350,000 nurse practitioners in America; it is one of the fastest growing fields, and last year U.S. News and World Report ranked it the top job in the country, a reflection of salary potential, job satisfaction and career opportunities.
That success is in large part the result of a single person, Dr. Ford, who in 1965 co-founded the first graduate program for nurse practitioners, at the University of Colorado, and subsequently mapped the outlines of what the field entailed.
At the time, nurses were important figures in the medical field, providing not just administrative support but also vital services where and when doctors were unavailable. But the training and career framework for nurses was almost completely absent.
“In nurses’ training, the focus is too much on teaching and administration,” Dr. Ford said in a speech at Duke University in 1970. “We want to make the nurse into a clinician.”
She went further in 1972, when she was hired as the first dean of the school of nursing at the University of Rochester. There she implemented the “unification” model of nursing, in which education, practice and research are fully integrated.
“It gives the profession the ability to study itself with the research, and have nurse-practitioner researchers conducting that work while educating the future work force,” Stephen A. Ferrara, the president of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners, said in an interview.
Dr. Ford’s work in the 1970s often faced resistance from doctors, who scoffed at the idea of nurses wielding influence within the medical field and, perhaps, threatening their dominance of it.
“We actually got hate letters in the mail,” Eileen Sullivan-Marx, who studied under Dr. Ford at Rochester and is now the dean emerita of the school of nursing at New York University, said in an interview.
But Dr. Ford and others pushed on, establishing state-level licensing protocols, standardizing curriculums and adjusting insurance programs to allow nurse practitioners to have a substantive, and often independent, role within the health care system.
And she emphasized that nurse practitioners were not there to replace doctors but to complement them — to do the frontline work in hospitals, but also to be out in the community, focused on health and prevention at a grass-roots level.
“It was obvious to me,” she told Healthy Women magazine in 2022, “that we needed advanced skills and an expanded knowledge base to make the decisions. Because it happens in a hospital. Who do they think makes decisions at 3 a.m.?”
Loretta Cecelia Pfingstel was born on Dec. 28, 1920, in the Bronx and raised in Passaic, N.J. Her father, Joseph, was a lithographer, and her mother, Nellie (Williams) Pfingstel, oversaw the home.
As a child, Loretta hoped to become a teacher, but the onset of the Great Depression hit her family’s finances hard, and she was forced to find work at 16. She became a nurse, and in 1941 earned a diploma in nursing from Middlesex General Hospital in New Jersey.
Her fiancé was killed in combat in 1942, inspiring her to join the U.S. Army Air Forces, intending to be a flight nurse. But her poor eyesight disqualified her from flying, and by the end of the war she was based at a hospital in Denver.
She received a bachelor’s degree in nursing in 1949 from the University of Colorado, and a master’s in public health there in 1951.
Early in her career she specialized in pediatric public health, while also teaching in the nursing program at the University of Colorado; by 1955 she was an assistant professor, and in 1961 she earned a doctorate in education from the school.
She married William J. Ford in 1947. He died in 2014. Their daughter is her only survivor.
Dr. Ford’s work took her into rural parts of Colorado, where doctors were few, poor families were many and the need for basic preventive medical care was acute. She found herself playing many roles under the title “nurse” — she was part public health official, part counselor, part all-around clinician.
At the same time, the Kennedy and Johnson administrations were bringing a new sense of urgency to the issues of rural public health and supporting innovation across all medical fields.
Working alongside Henry Silver, a pediatrician at Colorado, Dr. Ford created a graduate program for nurses, though at first it was in the form of continuing education, without a degree. But the kernel of her vision was already there: that nurses should be sufficiently trained to make independent decisions, have their own practices and participate in health care as part of a team.
“Complete independence for any health practitioner today is a myth,” she said at Duke. “It could be downright poor practice.”
By the time she retired from Rochester, in 1986, there were thousands of licensed nurse practitioners, and many doctors had come to accept them as colleagues, not supporting players.
Dr. Ford continued to write and lecture, and in 2011 she was inducted into the U.S. Women’s Hall of Fame.
“I get a lot of credit for 140,000 nurses, and I don’t deserve it,” she said in her acceptance speech. “They’re the ones who fought the good fight. They took the heat, and they stood it, and they’ve done beautifully.”
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Business
Officials Are Fired at Traffic Safety Agency Investigating Musk’s Company
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The federal agency responsible for traffic safety, which has been investigating whether self-driving technology in Tesla vehicles played a role in the death of a pedestrian, will fire a “modest” number of employees, an agency spokesman said late Friday.
The agency did not say whether any of the fired employees were involved in investigations of Tesla, whose chief executive, Elon Musk, is leading the Department of Government Efficiency established by President Trump.
The efficiency department has been forcing layoffs at numerous government agencies as part of an effort to reshape the federal bureaucracy. Mr. Musk has retained control of Tesla while spending much of his time in Washington.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has three active investigations of Tesla, according to agency documents, including one examining whether the company’s autonomous driving software is prone to failure when visibility is poor.
The layoffs at the traffic safety agency, which has less than 1,000 employees, were reported earlier by The Washington Post. Even after the layoffs, the agency continues to employ more people than at the beginning of the Biden administration, the agency said in a statement.
“The last administration grew NHTSA by a whopping 30 percent,” the agency said in a statement.
“We have retained positions critical to the mission of saving lives, preventing injuries, and reducing economic costs due to road traffic crashes,” the agency said. “We will continue to enforce the law on all manufacturers of motor vehicles and equipment.”
Tesla did not respond to a request for comment.
One of the investigations into Tesla is based on four accidents involving technology that the carmaker calls supervised full self-driving, which can steer, brake and navigate Tesla cars in some situations. In one of the crashes, a Tesla struck and killed a pedestrian, according to agency documents. In another of the accidents, a person was injured.
Tesla’s self-driving technology relies on cameras to survey a car’s surroundings, in contrast with competitors like Waymo, a unit of the same company as Google, that also uses lasers and radar to recognize objects.
The traffic safety agency has been looking into whether Tesla’s technology failed when visibility was poor because of glare from the sun, fog or dust.
Mr. Musk has often argued that Tesla self-driving technology is safer than human drivers.
The technology is also crucial to Tesla’s future and share price. As Tesla sales have flagged, falling 1 percent last year even as the global market for electric vehicles rose 25 percent, Mr. Musk has shifted the company’s focus to autonomous driving technology and plans for a self-driving taxi.
The technology will help make Tesla the most valuable company in the world by far, Mr. Musk told investors last month.
Business
Beyond 'Emilia Pérez': Inside 7 of the nastiest Oscar campaigns in history
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By the time “Emilia Pérez” had garnered 13 Oscar nominations, including for best picture, Netflix’s Spanish-language musical about a transgender drug lord had already been mired in controversy. Critics skewered the film’s portrayal of trans issues and Mexican culture.
Then Karla Sofía Gascón’s old social media posts resurfaced in which the first out trans performer to receive a lead actress nod maligned Muslims, George Floyd and diversity and seemed to body-shame the singer Adele.
Gascón apologized, deactivated her X account and then went on the defensive, sometimes tearfully, in an interview with CNN en Español, on her Instagram account and in a letter to the Hollywood Reporter in which she denounced “this campaign of hate.”
After the social media storm erupted, during a talk on podcast “The Town,” Netflix chief content officer Bela Bajaria called the controversy “a bummer” that distracted from the film and its accolades. Gascón has largely been sidelined from the movie’s awards drive.
Yes, it’s Oscar season, where the road to the red carpet is often littered with unforced errors, smear campaigns, opposition research and sometimes dirty tricks in efforts to undermine if not outright torpedo the front-runners’ chances.
The Academy Awards are not just an evening of self-congratulation. In addition to prestige, an Oscar is a huge publicity generator that can translate into box office grosses, home video sales and streaming viewership.
While in years past such campaigns usually were fueled by awards consultants and frequently aimed at a single movie or actor, this season has seen controversies served upon multiple contenders.
It’s not just the professional consultants and studio marketers involved in these so-called whisper campaigns. Now small armies of amateur Internet sleuths and movie fans have joined the fray, turning gripes and teapot tempests into social media scandals.
“The big difference in the last 10 years is social media fanning the flames,” said Jason E. Squire, host of “The Movie Business Podcast” and professor emeritus at USC‘s School of Cinematic Arts. “The real question is whether it impacts Oscar voters.”
In addition to the travails of Gascón, best picture nominee “The Brutalist” has been slammed for admittedly using an AI speech tool to aid stars Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones’s Hungarian language skills. Fernanda Torres, the lead actress nominee for “I’m Still Here,” came under fire for appearing in blackface on a Brazilian television show in 2008. Torres apologized.
Then there’s “Anora,” another best picture nominee, which was lambasted for not hiring an intimacy coordinator on set. At a London screening, Sean Baker, the film’s director, said that he had offered one to the lead actors.
With this year’s Academy Awards just weeks away, we take a look at notable controversies of the past, some of which perhaps deserve their own statuettes for spite and nastiness: putting the tin in Tinseltown.
Gwyneth Paltrow and Joseph Fiennes in “Shakespeare in Love.”
(Miramax Films)
“Shakespeare in Love”
Oscar year: 1999
Backstory: Steven Spielberg’s World War II epic “Saving Private Ryan” was considered the favorite, but Miramax co-founder Harvey Weinstein, known for turning awards campaigns into a blood sport, had other plans.
Controversy: “Shakespeare in Love’s” best picture win is widely seen as the capstone to one of the most controversial award campaigns in Oscar history.
Mark Gill, then Miramax‘s L.A. president, told the Hollywood Reporter, “We used the playbook for ‘The English Patient’ — turbocharged, on steroids. It was just absolutely murderous the whole way through.”
Miramax staffers called voters to make sure they had received a VHS copy of “Shakespeare in Love.” Weinstein enlisted First Lady Hillary Clinton to host the film’s world premiere in New York, unleashed a blizzard of ads, hosted parties with the film’s stars and set up screenings and private dinners with Oscar voters.
Weinstein also was accused of badmouthing the Spielberg film, a DreamWorks release.
Terry Press, DreamWorks’ marketing chief at the time, later said that she received calls from reporters telling her that Miramax publicists were “trying to get us to write stories saying that the only thing amazing about ‘Ryan’ is the first 20 minutes, and then after that it’s just a regular genre movie.”
And the Oscar goes to: “Shakespeare in Love” won seven Academy Awards including best picture and lead actress (Gwyneth Paltrow). “Saving Private Ryan” won five, including director (Spielberg).
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Russell Crowe played mathematical genius John Nash in “A Beautiful Mind.”
(Universal Studios)
“A Beautiful Mind”
Oscar year: 2002
Backstory: The life of mathematician John Nash, a Nobel laureate who triumphed over schizophrenia, was chronicled in this acclaimed Ron Howard-directed biopic, earning eight Oscar nominations, including best picture.
Controversy: A narrative caught fire with critics who began charging that the more negative parts of Nash’s life were omitted from the film. Accusations that Nash was an antisemite, adulterer and homophobe began to appear in reviews, gossip sites and news articles, prompting him to appear on “60 Minutes” to refute the claims.
Angered by the reports, Sylvia Nasar, the author of the book on which the movie was based, wrote an op-ed for The Times, rebuking journalists and saying they had “distorted” material from her book and “invented ‘facts.’”
And the Oscar goes to: “A Beautiful Mind” won four Oscars including best picture, supporting actress (Jennifer Connelly) and director (Howard).
Whoopi Goldberg in “The Color Purple.”
(Michael Ochs Archives / Getty Images)
“The Color Purple”
Oscar year: 1986
Backstory: Spielberg’s adaptation of Alice Walker’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel earned 11 nominations, including best picture, director and adapted screenplay, and was Oprah Winfrey’s film debut, garnering her a supporting actress nomination.
Controversy: When the film was released in 1985, it immediately sparked a backlash, coming under fire for its depiction of rape and stereotypical representations of Black men, a portrayal that Spike Lee decried as “one-dimensional animals.” It also faced criticism for having been directed by a white man. During a special screening in Los Angeles, the Coalition Against Black Exploitation staged a protest.
And the Oscar goes to: “Out of Africa” took home the best picture trophy. “The Color Purple” was shut out, vying with 1977’s “The Turning Point,” which also earned 11 nods, for the most nominated film to take home zero awards.
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Jessica Chastain starred in “Zero Dark Thirty.”
(Jonathan Olley / Sony Pictures Releasing)
“Zero Dark Thirty”
Oscar year: 2013
Backstory: Kathryn Bigelow directed this thriller about the decades-long manhunt for 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden, and the U.S. military raid on his Pakistani compound where he was killed. The film received five Oscar nominations including best picture and original screenplay.
Controversy: When it was released, the film earned plenty of critical huzzahs, with The Times calling it “cinematic storytelling at its most effective.”
But it also drew opprobrium, with detractors taking aim at the movie’s depiction of torture and questioning its veracity. The film became a flash point for partisan bickering when critics of the Obama administration claimed that the film’s planned October release was timed to boost his reelection campaign — it was later moved to December.
There also were claims by some conservative activists that the CIA provided classified information to Bigelow and her team as they researched the film, charges that were denied by the filmmakers. A Senate inquiry into the matter was later dropped, Reuters reported.
And the Oscar goes to: “Zero Dark Thirty” took home the award for sound editing. Ben Affleck’s “Argo” won the top prize.
Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali in “Green Book.”
(Patti Perret / Universal Pictures)
“Green Book”
Oscar year: 2019
Backstory: The film chronicles the real-life friendship between a Black classical pianist, Donald Shirley, and Tony “Lip” Vallelonga, his Italian American driver, as they travel across the segregated South during Shirley’s concert tour in the 1960s. Directed by Peter Farrelly, it starred Mahershala Ali as Shirley and Viggo Mortensen as Vallelonga and earned five Oscar nominations including best picture.
Controversy: A swirl of charges surrounded the film, with many involving racial politics. Shirley’s family castigated the filmmakers for excluding them, saying the movie’s portrayal of Shirley as estranged from his family and the Black community was “hurtful.” They also called into question the depiction of his friendship with Vallelonga. Dr. Maurice Shirley, Donald’s brother, described the movie as a “symphony of lies.”
And the Oscar goes to: “Green Book” took best picture as well as statuettes for original screenplay and supporting actor (Ali).
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Joan Crawford as Blanche Hudson, left, and Bette Davis as Baby Jane Hudson in ‘Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?”
(Silver Screen Collection / Getty Images)
“Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?”
Oscar year: 1963
Backstory: The bitter rivalry between screen legends Bette Davis and Joan Crawford helped propel this film about an aging onetime child star who torments her sister, a paraplegic former actor.
Controversy: The actresses’ discord played out offscreen as Crawford actively campaigned against Davis, who earned a nomination for lead actress — her 10th and final nod.
Crawford, who was snubbed, ended up onstage and accepted on behalf of Anne Bancroft, who won for “The Miracle Worker,” beating Davis. Bancroft was appearing on Broadway and was unable to attend the ceremony.
And the Oscar goes to: “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane” won one Oscar, for costume design.
Orson Welles as Charles Foster Kane in “Citizen Kane.”
(Warner Bros.)
“Citizen Kane”
Oscar year: 1942
Backstory: Often cited as the greatest film ever made, “Citizen Kane” tells the story of Charles Foster Kane (played by Orson Welles, who co-wrote and directed), a wealthy newspaper publisher whose death becomes a global sensation. It earned nine Oscar nominations including best picture and director.
Controversy: The movie was considered a thinly veiled swipe at real-life newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst, who did not take kindly to the celluloid portrait. He attempted to blacklist it through negative press in his Hearst newspaper chain and, along with his defenders, pressured theaters not to show it.
And the Oscar goes to: “Citizen Kane” won a single Oscar, for original screenplay. “How Green Was My Valley” won best picture.
Business
Stock Market Sees Biggest Declines of Trump’s Presidency So Far
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Stocks slumped on Friday, with the S&P 500 wiping out almost all of its gains since President Trump took office last month, after a widely watched measure of how consumers feel about the economy showed mounting fears over stubborn inflation.
The S&P 500 fell 1.7 percent, adding to a modest dip on Thursday and notching the worst week of Mr. Trump’s second term, which began five weeks ago. The index is now just 0.3 percent higher since Inauguration Day. Other stock indexes also fell, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite dropping over 2 percent on Friday.
Fueling the decline was an unexpected drop in the University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment index, which slumped to its lowest level in more than a year in February. The index showed consumers more worried over the path ahead for the economy than economists had expected.
The survey showed consumers expecting that prices for goods and services would rise at an annual rate of 3.5 percent over the next five to 10 years, the most since 1995. Consumers are wary of spending on big-ticket items, and more than half of the survey respondents expect the unemployment rate to rise over the next year.
For investors, inflation expectations have taken on renewed importance as the Federal Reserve has signaled that it is unlikely to lower interest rates again unless inflation falls closer to its 2 percent target. The Fed’s preferred measure of inflation is currently just below 3 percent.
The Trump administration’s policy priorities, especially those targeting tariffs on U.S. trading partners and the deportation of immigrants, have raised concerns about reigniting inflation, leading to higher prices at the supermarket and higher interest rates on mortgages and other debt.
High interest rates tend to weigh on the stock market, while the prospect of faster inflation has raised fears about the ability for consumers to keep powering the domestic economy, as they have done since the coronavirus pandemic hit roughly five years ago. That could push the economy toward “stagflation,” the unpleasant double-whammy of slowing economic growth and rising prices.
This week, the S&P 500 inched up to a record high. But instead of being the catalyst for a further stock rally, the market’s heights have been a persistent cause of consternation among investors. Many are unsure if companies can produce the results to justify such lofty valuations and prevent their stock prices sliding.
Investors had already been jittery this week because of worrying signs from corporate bellwethers like Walmart, which said in its latest earnings report that it expected slower growth ahead amid the uncertainty around U.S. tariffs.
Some investors also noted Friday’s large expiration of derivatives contracts tied to the stock market may have exacerbated the sell-off.
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