Tuesday Final Day to Register to Vote for November Elections

Tomorrow is the final day to register to vote in the upcoming midterm elections in November.

Anderson County has seen an uptick in voter registration for this year's election, and there's still time to sign In Anderson voter registrations are up by 2,800, a 51 percent increase from 2014. Meanwhile the state saw the voter rolls swell to more than 3 million early this year.

South Carolina residents were given an extra 10 days to register to vote this due to the impact of Hurricane Florence in some parts of the state.

You can vote at the Anderson County Office of Voter Resistration and Elections office at 301 N. Main St., Anderson. Or you can register at scvotes.org.

Eligible voters must:

• Be a United States citizen -be at least eighteen years old on or before the next electio
• Be a resident of South Carolina, this county and precinct
• Not be under a court order declaring you mentally incompetent
• Not be confined in any public prison resulting from a conviction of a crime
• Have never been convicted of a felony or offense against the election laws OR if previously convicted, have served the entire sentence, including probation or parole, or have received a pardon for the conviction. 

There is no length of residency requirement in South Carolina in order to register to vote.

Registered voters can check their registration information at scvotes.org When checking your voter registration information, you must provide your name, county and date of birth as it appears on your voter registration card in order to view your information.

Study: Post-Partum Depression More Likely in Winter

SUNDAY, Oct. 14, 2018 -- Women whose final stages of pregnancy occur during the short, dark days of winter may be at increased risk for postpartum depression, a new study suggests.

It has to do with reduced exposure to sunlight -- the same culprit that contributes to seasonal affective disorder, or SAD. That's a type of depression that usually starts in fall and winter and disappears in spring and summer. 

The study authors said their findings should prompt doctors to encourage pregnant women who are at high risk for postpartum depression to increase their exposure to daylight and boost their levels of vitamin D.

The study was led by Deepika Goyal, a professor of nursing at San Jose StateUniversity. She and her team reviewed data on nearly 300 first-time mothers who took part in randomized controlled sleep trials before and after pregnancy. 

The researchers looked at the amount of daylight during the women's last trimester of pregnancy and other risk factors for postpartum depression, such as medical history, age, socioeconomic status and sleep quality.

Overall, participants had a 30 percent risk for depression. Their odds were strongly influenced by the number of daylight hours during the last month of pregnancy and immediately after delivery.

Women who were in the late stages of pregnancy during winter had a 35 percent risk -- the highest scores -- for postpartum depression. And their symptoms were more severe, the study found.

Women whose third trimester coincided with longer hours of daylight had a 26 percent risk for depression, the study showed.

"Among first-time mothers, the length of day in the third trimester, specifically day lengths that are shortening compared to day lengths that are short, long or lengthening, were associated with concurrent depressive symptom severity," Goyal said.

The study was published recently in a special issue of the Journal of Behavioral Medicine focused on postpartum health.

Social Security Changes Announced for 2019

Motley Fool

We recently learned that Social Security beneficiaries are getting a 2.8% cost-of-living adjustment, or COLA, for 2019. However, that's just one of several Social Security changes that were just announced that are tied to rising prices.

For workers, Social Security's maximum taxable earnings are increasing, and more income will be required to earn a Social Security "credit." Beneficiaries who claimed Social Security early and still work will be happy to learn they'll be able to earn more without a benefit reduction in 2019, and for high earners, the maximum possible Social Security benefit is also on the rise.

With all of that in mind, here are the recently released details of these five 2019 Social Security changes.

Beneficiaries are getting a raise

As I mentioned, Social Security beneficiaries are getting a 2.8% COLA starting with their January 2019 benefit payment. The Social Security Administration, or SSA, estimates that the average benefit paid to all retired workers will increase from $1,422 to $1,461 as a result.

It's worth noting that Medicare hasn't yet released its Part B premium changes for 2019 as of this writing, and this will be an important factor in determining the effective COLA. In other words, if your Social Security benefit rises by $50 per month but your Medicare premiums increase by $40, your effective increase is just $10.

Social Security's maximum taxable earnings are rising

Each year, Social Security tax is assessed at a rate of 6.2% for employers and employees, but only on earnings up to a certain threshold. This is known as the Social Security maximum taxable earnings.

For 2019, the maximum taxable earnings will increase by $4,500 -- from $128,400 to $132,900. In other words, if you earn $150,000 in Social Security-covered employment in 2019, $132,900 of those earnings will be subject to Social Security tax, while the other $17,100 will not be.

This increases the maximum Social Security tax an employee could pay from $7,960.80 in 2018 to $8,239.80 in 2019.

One Social Security credit will require more earnings

In order to qualify for Social Security benefits, you'll need to earn 40 Social Security "quarters of coverage," which are also known as Social Security credits.

For 2019, one credit translates to $1,360 in earnings, an increase of $40 from 2018. This may not sound like a lot of money (and it isn't, for most workers), but it's important to note that you can only earn four credits per year.

The earnings test limits are increasing

If you receive Social Security (or plan to) and you haven't reached full retirement age yet, you can now earn more money from a job without affecting your Social Security benefits. For 2019, the Social Security earnings test limits are increasing as follows:

DATA SOURCE: SSA.

If you'll reach full retirement age after 2019, $1 of your benefits will be withheld for every $2 in excess earnings. If you'll attain full retirement age during 2019, $1 of your benefits will be withheld for every $3 in excess earnings, and only earnings in the months before your birth month will be considered. As always, if you've already reached full retirement age, the earnings test doesn't apply to you at all.

The maximum Social Security benefit will be $73 higher

Finally, because Social Security benefits are limited by the maximum taxable earnings from each year (which rises over time), the maximum possible Social Security benefit is increasing for 2019, as well.

For 2019, the most someone claiming Social Security at full retirement age can get is $2,861 per month. Of course, this could become even higher if workers entitled to the maximum decide to wait longer to claim. If they claim in 2019, a beneficiary's full retirement age is still 66 years old (born in 1953), so if they were to wait until they turn 70 in 2023, their benefit would start at $3,776.52 plus any additional COLAs that are given between now and then.

Almost 800 Dietary Supplements Contained Unapproved Ingredients

NEW YORK (CNN) — Nearly 800 dietary supplements sold over the counter from 2007 through 2016 contained unapproved drug ingredients, a new analysis of US Food and Drug Administration data found. More than one unapproved pharmaceutical ingredient was found in 20% of those supplements, the study published Friday in JAMA Network Open showed.

The presence of prescription medicines, often at unknown concentrations, means these supplements are essentially "unapproved drugs" that could be harmful to users' health, according to the study authors.

"These products have the potential to cause severe adverse health effects owing to accidental misuse, overuse, or interaction with other medications, underlying health conditions, or other drugs within the same dietary supplement," wrote the authors, led by Madhur Kumar of the California Department of Public Health Food and Drug Branch.

More than 50% of adults use dietary supplements, a $35 billion industry, notes the study.

Kumar and his co-authors reviewed the FDA's Tainted Products Marketed as Dietary Supplements_CDER database for 2007 through 2016. The database is maintained on the agency's website as a resource for consumers and to increase transparency and public knowledge. The researchers performed the new analysis independent of the FDA.

The greatest number of products found to contain hidden ingredients were reported in 2009, when two large recalls together named 99 products. Otherwise, 443 of the total 776 products were reported from 2012 to 2016. In the overwhelming majority of cases (97%), the unapproved pharmaceutical ingredients were not declared on the labels of the supplements.

Most of the adulterated products, about 45%, were marketed for sexual enhancement, weight loss (about 41%) or muscle-building (12%). Drugs found in sexual enhancement products included sildenafil, tadalafil and vardenafil, all active ingredients in prescription medications intended for erectile dysfunction, which, when overused, can cause serious damage to the blood vessels.

More here

Anderson TD Club Names Week 7 Winners

The following are the winners chosen by the Anderson Touchdown Club for Week 7 – games played on Friday, Oct. 5.

Coach:                Russell Blackston, BHP

Offensive Player:   R J Ellis, BHP

Defensive Player:  Caleb Edwards, Westside

Co-Offensive Linemen:  Gabe Helms, Crescent, Jonathan Brown, T.L. Hanna

Defensive Lineman: Tanner Stuettgen, Pendleton

Denver Downs Corn Maze Ranked Second in U.S.

FOX21

USA Today ranked Denver Downs Farm, the second best corn maze in the nation in their 10 Best Readers' Choice travel award contest.

Out of 500 corn mazes ranked, Denver Downs caught the attention of the expert panel with their massive 10-acre tractor shaped landscape. 

“We are both thrilled and humbled to be selected among the hundreds of contenders for the top corn mazes in the country, We chose the theme this year to celebrate the 100th anniversary of John Deere tractors." said Catherine Garrison Davis, Co-Owner of Denver Downs.

This is not Denver Downs first attraction to take home an award. Their pumpkin patch was ranked the best one in South Carolina by both Reader's Digest, Good Housekeeping and Southern Living Magazine. 

In addition to the 10-acre tractor shaped corn maze, 35 barnyard activities, live music, and the Harvest of Horrors, Denver Downs will also have over 25 tons of pumpkins this autumn season. The Harvest of Horrors includes its own Dark Harvest corn maze, a terrifying haunted freak show, and an alien shootout at Area 51. 

Denver Downs is open Thursday and Friday evenings, Saturday and Sunday day and nights until November fourth. They will also open up October 29th, 30th, and 31st for special Halloween activities. 

High School Football Scores

T.L. Hanna 60, Wade Hampton 22

Woodmont 31, Westside 28

Wren 45, Palmetto 21

Pendleton 45, Crescent 7

Seneca 45, Powdersville 6

BHP 27, Pickens 10

Anderson Democrats to Meet Saturday

The Anderson County Democratic Party will meet Saturday at the Anderson County Library. The business meeting is set to begin at 9:30 a.m.

The October agenda includes organizing volunteers to drive people to the polls on election day, Phone banking needs, Changing meeting date from 1st Saturday to 2nd Saturday of each month, Treasurer training in Columbia on Oct. 20, the Constitutional Amendment and 3 referendum items on the ballot

The new mailing address for the organization is P.O. Box 13052, Anderson, SC 29624.

Clemson Research Could Reduce Cost of Self-Healing Materials

CLEMSON, South Carolina — The cost of making plastics, paints, coatings for cell phone screens and other materials that heal themselves like skin could be dramatically reduced thanks to a breakthrough that a Clemson University team detailed in the latest edition of the journal Science.

Marek Urban and his team wrote about how they were able to give self-healing qualities to polymers that are used in relatively inexpensive commodities, such as paints, plastics and coatings. The next step is to go from making small amounts in a lab to producing large quantities.

“It’s not available at the industrial scale, but it’s very close,” said Urban, who is the J.E. Sirrine Foundation Chair and Professor in the department of materials science and engineering at Clemson.

Researchers have been making small batches of self-healing polymers for the last two decades, but producing them on a commercial scale has so far been largely cost prohibitive.

Urban said he and his team took advantage of interactions between co-polymers that he likened to spaghetti strands with little brushes on the side.

The longer the spaghetti strands get, the more they become entangled, he said. The side groups interlock like two interlaced hands, making it harder to pull them apart, Urban said.

“At the same time, they like each other,” he said. “So, when you pull them out, they come back together. It becomes self-healable at that point.

“As simple as this may sound, these studies also revealed that ubiquitous and typically weak van der Waals interactions in plastics, when oriented, will result in self-healing. This discovery will impact the development of sustainable materials using weak bonding which becomes collectively very strong when oriented.”

What’s significant about his latest breakthrough is that if a company wanted to bring the technology to market, it would no longer have to build a new factory to produce self-healing polymers, Urban said.

Urban estimated that increasing the scale to make polymers or paints by the hundreds of gallons could be done in six to 12 months.”

The article is titled “‘Key-and-lock’ commodity self-healing copolymers’ and marks the second time since 2009 that Urban has detailed his work on self-healing polymers in Science. Co-authors on the more recent article are Dmitriy Davydovich, Ying Yang, Tugba Demir, Yunzhi Zhang and Leah Casabianca, all of Clemson University.

Obamacare Premiums to Drop in 2019

New York (CNN) -It will cost a little less to buy Obamacare coverage in 2019. 

The average premium for the benchmark silver plan will decline by 1.5%, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services said Thursday.  It's the first time average premiums have fallen since the Affordable Care Act exchanges opened in 2014 — but the decline comes after a 37% spike for this year's benchmark silver plan. 

Americans who buy those plans will save $6 a month over this year's rate, on average, but will still be paying $105 more a month than in 2017. 

Premiums vary across the 39 states that use the federal exchange. The biggest drop will be in Tennessee, where premiums will fall by more than 26%. The vast majority of Obamacare enrollees are not affected by annual premium changes because they receive federal subsidies to offset the cost.  

The number of insurers on the federal exchange will grow for the first time since 2015. There will be 23 more carriers for 2019 than there were during the open enrollment period in 2018. Plus, 29 insurers are expanding the service areas into more counties, the agency said.  

Four states will have only one insurer, down from 10 states in 2018, including South Carolina.Many insurers withdrew or limited their participation on the exchanges in recent years amid uncertainty emanating from Washington DC and large losses. 

The premium rate drop was expected by those who watch the industry closely. After years of raising rates — sometimes by double digits — insurers have found a sweet spot. Many are breaking even or have started making a profit in the individual market, despite changes to the Obamacare system since President Donald Trump took office. 

Reinsurance programs that protect insurers from high-cost enrollees have also helped to keep premiums lower. In Maryland, rates are now expected to drop by 30%, after the state received a waiver for a reinsurance program.  

The federal government has approved reinsurance waivers for seven states, resulting in lower premiums, CMS Administrator Seema Verma said on a call with reporters.

Some uncertainty still looms. Next year will be the first time that Americans will not have to pay the penalty for being uninsured. Congress eliminated the individual mandate penalty as part of last year's tax overhaul. 

Also, it will be easier for people to sign up for alternatives to Obamacare, including short-term health plans and association health plans, which are usually cheaper but offer skimpier benefits. 

Yet premiums are going down at least in part because insurers overshot in 2018 and raised them too high amid uncertainty over how the changes made by the Trump administration would affect the program. 

"Premiums would be even lower if not for repeal of the individual mandate penalty and expansion of short-term plans," said Larry Levitt, senior vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation, on twitter Thursday.

Library to Host Annual Starburst Storytellers Festival

The Friends of the Anderson County Library will present the 14th Annual Starburst Storytellers Festival Sunday-Thursday, with performances each day at the main library and at schools across the county.

The schedule is:

Sunday at 3 p.m.: Grandma's Apron Strings with John Thomas Fowler

Monday at 7 p.m.: My Life's a Long Story - How About Yours? with Donna Marie Todd

Tuesday at 7 p.m.: Comeyah Tales with Natalie Daise (Host of "Gullah, Gullan Island)

Wednesday at 7 p.m.: South Carolina Ghost Lore with Tally Johnson

Thursday at 7 p.m.: Gems: The World's Wisdom Stories with Doug Berky

For more information, visit our website at http://www.andersonlibrary.org/events/storytellers/

BHP Manufacturing Classroom Aims to Provide High-Tech Workers

Observer Reports

Belton-Honea Path High School launched an initiative this year to bring needed manufacturing skills to students. 

The "Introduction to Manufacturing" classroom serves more than 100 students with state-of-the-art manufacturing equipment, and aims to provide hands on experience to students looking to participate in the growing high-tech manufacturing work force.

“Touring this class I was very impressed with all the equipment all the way down to how organized each toolbox was laid out," said Kevin Craft, President/Owner - IMS Belton. "This teaches the students to pay attention to details. As a General & Mechanical Contractor in Anderson School District Two, we need a class like this to prepare our students with the skills I need them to have to begin working for me upon high school graduation.”

“This new manufacturing program will have a significant impact for students looking for a career path opportunity," said Greg Tysl, vice-president of manufacturing at Med-line Industries, Inc. "High-tech manufacturing job opportunities are increasing in Anderson County, and students fortunate enough to be in the BHP manufacturing program will have skill sets that will be advantageous for these high paying jobs.” 

Officials at BHP said the goal is to graduate high school with the skills to be prepared for Anderson County manufacturing job market.

The last decade has witnessed a surge in manufacturing companies moving to or expanding in Anderson County, investing more than $3.3 billion since 2008. Public schools moved to meet the need for highly trained employees at the Anderson County School Districts 1 & 2 Career Center and soon at the new Anderson Institute of Techonology which will serve school districts 3,4, & 5, which will open for the 2019 school year.

Mill Town Players, Foothills Playhouse End Partnership

From Report by Paul Hyde

Easley's Foothills Playhouse and the Pelzer-Based Mill Town Players are severing ties, only three months after announcing a pact and plans for an eventual merger of some sort.

In July, Will Ragland, founder of the Mill Town Players, was appointed executive artistic director of Foothills Playhouse, in hopes that Ragland would help to revive the fortunes of Foothills, which had struggled in recent seasons. The first fruit that collaboration was the musical “Godspell,” which continues through Oct. 21.

But the two theaters have now decided to go their own ways. It appears that the season of shows, which Ragland designed based on community input, will not change at this time.

"I'm very proud of the hard work of all those who are a part of “Godspell,” and I encourage the community to enjoy the show over these next two weekends and to support Foothills Playhouse as they move forward," said Ragland in a released statement.

The two theaters released a joint statement:

“The Boards of Directors of Mill Town Players and Foothills Playhouse previously entered into a plan of partnership and eventual merger. However, both organizations have mutually agreed to discontinue that plan at this time. Mill Town Players and Foothills Playhouse wish each other the best in their upcoming productions and shared mission of quality, affordable theater for the community.”