Both the Secretary of Defence and the Pentagon were left utterly blindsided by President Donald Trump’s ban of transgender military personnel. Reversing an Obama-era bill to allow transgender Americans to serve in all aspects of the military, the Trump decision was either aimed at distracting everyone from the dumpster fire called the Senate, or a genuine attempt to unravel another strand of Obama-era policy.

Facebook took a break from its social media war with Elon Musk to announce a major surge in profit. Surpassing two billion users, the social media juggernaut announced a 71% increase in profit this year, making a whopping net profit of $3.9-billion. This was largely due to new paid-ads integrated into Facebook’s systems. The majority of said revenue, Facebook noted, came from users on mobile phones.

A resurgent spate of Venezuelan protests has left two people dead, including a 16-year-old boy. Officials have not revealed the boy’s identity, but his death brought the number of anti-Maduro protesters killed to a shocking 105. With no end in sight to the unrest, more dead are an unfortunate probability.

Researchers have announced a new finding that the “finish your course” approach to antibiotics is not evidence-based. Claiming it also fueled drug resistance among patients, the British disease experts argued on Wednesday that doctors are far too quick to over-prescribe. Instead, the group advocated for a new set of tailor-made antibiotics prescription guidelines to avoid the looming drug resistance crisis.

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