Enlarge / Drops of the blood going onto an HIV quick test. (credit: Getty | BRITTA PEDERSEN)

Trendy, unproven "vampire facials" performed at an unlicensed spa in New Mexico left at least three women with HIV infections. This marks the first time that cosmetic procedures have been associated with an HIV outbreak, according to a detailed report of the outbreak investigation published today.

Ars reported on the cluster last year when state health officials announced they were still identifying cases linked to the spa despite it being shut down in September 2018. But today's investigation report offers more insight into the unprecedented outbreak, which linked five people with HIV infections to the spa and spurred investigators to contact and test nearly 200 other spa clients. The report appears in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

The investigation began when a woman between the ages of 40 and 50 turned up positive on a rapid HIV test taken while she was traveling abroad in the summer of 2018. She had a stage 1 acute infection. It was a result that was as dumbfounding as it was likely distressing. The woman had no clear risk factors for acquiring the infection: no injection drug use, no blood transfusions, and her current and only recent sexual partner tested negative. But, she did report getting a vampire facial in the spring of 2018 at a spa in Albuquerque called VIP Spa.

Enlarge / Ridges and basins in the Eridania Basin on Mars. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona)

Early in Earth's history, the heat left over from the collision that formed the Moon left its surface an ocean of magma. As it cooled, its crust was frequently shattered by massive impacts that dwarfed the one that did in the dinosaurs. Somewhere in between that and the onset of plate tectonics, it's thought that a distinct process caused parts of the crust to sink, while volcanism brought material to the surface that would later form the continental crust.

While we can model this period, we can't really search for evidence to back our models since any of this early crust has been eroded or transformed by the plate tectonics that eventually ensued. However, a team of researchers suggests that there might be a way to see what this process looked like, and it doesn't involve a time machine. Instead, it involves studying the surface of Mars.

Lots of volcanoes

On Mars, plate tectonics never got going. So, while some areas of the planet have been transformed in a way that keeps us from studying the earliest periods of Mars' history—looking at you, Olympus Mons—scientific consensus is that nearly half of the planet's surface is over 3.6 billion years old. This provides the opportunity to study processes that occurred in the first half-billion or so years after Mars formed.

Enlarge (credit: moodboard | moodboard / Getty Images Plus)

Dozens of California police agencies are still sharing automated license plate reader (ALPR) data with out-of-state authorities without a warrant, the Electronic Frontier Foundation has revealed. This is occurring despite guidance issued by State Attorney General Rob Bonta last year.

Clarifying a state law that limits state public agencies to sharing ALPR data only with other public agencies, Bonta's guidance pointed out that "importantly," the law's definition of "public agency" "does not include out-of-state or federal law enforcement agencies."

Bonta's guidance came after EFF uncovered more than 70 California law enforcement agencies sharing ALPR data with cops in other states, including anti-abortion states. After Bonta clarified the statute, approximately half of these agencies told EFF that they updated their practices to fall in line with Bonta's reading of the law. Some states could not verify that the practice had ended yet, though.