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Your daily news digest from KUOW | Thursday, Feb. 21

caption: Lillian Rockett, 4, laughs as she is pushed on a circular swing on Sunday, October 1, 2017, at We Rock the Spectrum Kid's Gym in Bellevue.
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Lillian Rockett, 4, laughs as she is pushed on a circular swing on Sunday, October 1, 2017, at We Rock the Spectrum Kid's Gym in Bellevue.
KUOW Photo/Megan Farmer

Food safety emojis // Smoking age // Rape kits // City Light scam // Daylight savings // UW data breach

Is "good" good enough?

A listener asked KUOW: “Recently my favorite Korean BBQ joint received a merely 'Good' rating — should I be worried?”

We peeled back the mask on those food safety emojis to find the truth.

New smoking age?

The smoking and vaping age in Washington state is one step closer to being raised to 21. Lawmakers in the state House approved a bill Wednesday and it now heads to the Senate for consideration.

Similar bills have failed in Olympia for three straight years.

Rape kit backlog

Lawmakers are considering a proposal that would eventually eliminate the backlog of untested rape evidence in Washington state.

A new bill seeks to modernize the state crime lab and increase the pace of DNA testing. It currently takes over a year on average. The new proposal would eventually cut testing time down to a month and a half.

Read the full story.

caption: A scientist models how rape evidence is tested at the Washington State Patrol crime lab, stock photo from Washington State Patrol
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It was a time in which I couldn’t heal because I was constantly thinking about what am I going to say in court. What am I going to do when this evidence comes back? It is a time of limbo that is absolutely hellish. It is obscene that we are putting survivors through this. Leah Griffin, testifying before the Washington Legislature
Courtesy of Washington State Patrol

Scam alert!

Scammers posing as Seattle City Light have been calling customers and demanding payment immediately … or they’ll shut off your power.

If that happens, hang up, says the utility company.

Read the full story.

Daylight savings saves

A legislative proposal would end the twice-yearly time changes. Its sponsors, which include Democrats and Republicans, say changing the clocks has negative health impacts, including more traffic collisions and heart attacks in the days following the time switch.

Lawmakers have yet to vote on the bill. Similar bills are being considered in Oregon, Idaho, and California's legislatures.

caption: A pedestrian crosses Ballard Avenue Northwest as snow falls on Monday, February 11, 2019, in Seattle.
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Darkness kills and darkness is far more deadly in the early evening hours than it is in the early morning hours. Crime is reduced when sunlight is out in the evening hours. There be a 20 percent reduction in especially juvenile crime, vandalism, in the early evening hours because they do not like to work when the sun is out. University of Washington Law professor Steve Calandrillo
KUOW Photo/Megan Farmer

Data breach

UW Medicine says nearly one million patients are affected by a data breach and is distributing letters to those affected.

Last December, internal files were available for anyone to see on the internet.

The files contained patients’ names and medical record numbers, but not any medical records, patient financial information, or Social Security numbers.

UW medicine says there's no evidence that the information was misused in any way.


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