Vaccines In The South, LGBTQ Athletes, The View From Space: News You Need To Start Your Day

Good morning. The week is almost over, but the news keeps coming. Here’s what we’re watching today:

President Biden is traveling to North Carolina to encourage people to get the COVID-19 shot. It’s one of several Southern states with low vaccination rates.
If aliens are watching us, the view’s pretty good.
Athletes are offering praise and hoping for change after Carl Nassib became the NFL’s first openly gay active player this week.
A massive search-and-rescue operation continues just north of Miami Beach, after a 12-story residential building partially collapsed.
🎧 Also on Up First, our daily podcast, a new study says life expectancy in the U.S. decreased by about two years on average between 2018 and 2020. Declines are most pronounced among communities of color.

— The Morning Edition live blog team
(Emily Alfin Johnson, Rachel Treisman, Nell Clark, Casey Noenickx and William Jones)