Georgia Today: CDC tracking parasite; Shark bite off Georgia coast; Atlanta pushes for new hospital

Peter Biello: Welcome to the Georgia Today podcast. Here we bring you the latest reports from the GPB newsroom. On today's episode, the CDC tracks a foodborne parasite in Georgia and other states, a shark bites a teen off the Georgia coast, and Atlanta pushes for a new hospital in an underserved part of the city that works with existing hospitals. 

Valerie Motgomery Rice This effort is not about replacing or competing against those systems. It is about complementing them, strengthening regional capacity, and ensuring that underserved communities are no longer left behind. 

Peter Biello: Today is Tuesday, July 7th. I'm Peter Biello, and this is Georgia Today. 

Story 1:

Peter Biello: The U.S. Department of Justice cannot have the names of every person who worked during the 2020 election in Georgia's Fulton County. A federal judge ruled today that the government's request for that information was unreasonable because of the quote, "highly burdensome nature" of the disclosure. The Justice Department in April obtained a grand jury subpoena seeking the names and personal contact information of county employees and volunteer poll workers. President Donald Trump has long claimed without evidence that widespread voter fraud in Fulton County cost him victory in the state in 2020. Fulton County argued the request was meant to punish the president's perceived political opponents and would chill participation by election workers. 

Story 2:

Peter Biello: Lionel Messi scored his eighth goal of this year's World Cup to advance Argentina in the tournament. The defending champions defeated Egypt 3-2 in Atlanta this afternoon. Lionel Johnson Jr. watched the match in Decatur. Loyal to the U.S. team, which lost to Belgium last night, he now roots for Messi's Argentina. 

Lionel Johnson Jr.: He is the greatest and so I'm going for Argentina. I hope they take it all the way since the USA is out. Sadly, sadly I've moved on, but I've moved on and I'm in great hands. 

Peter Biello: Amany Kilany, originally from Cairo, says she never expected her country's team to make it this far. 

Amany Kilany: I'm not sad because I'm so proud of the Egyptian team. They have really played heroically, actually. 

Peter Biello: Atlanta will host the last of its eight World Cup matches next week. 

Story 3:

Peter Biello: The City of Atlanta is planning to build a new hospital serving South and West Side residents. GPB's Amanda Andrews reports Atlanta City Council is asking Fulton County to commit $200 million to the project. 

Amanda Andrews: The planned full service hospital is a partnership with Morehouse School of Medicine to expand medical resources in underserved parts of Atlanta. The new facility would include emergency care, maternal, and pediatric health services, as well as training programs for students. Wellstar Atlanta closed in 2022. MSM President Dr. Valerie Montgomery Rice says the new hospital will fill resulting gaps in Atlanta healthcare. 

Valerie Motgomery Rice: This effort is not about replacing or competing against those systems. It is about complementing them, strengthening regional capacity, and ensuring that underserved communities are no longer left behind. 

Amanda Andrews: The hospital will anchor a 40-acre, mixed-use campus near Morehouse School of Medicine. For GPB News, I'm Amanda Andrews. 

Story 4:

Peter Biello: Most people think of anxiety as worry or fear, but research from Emory University finds for many people it can show up as avoidance. GPB's Ellen Eldridge has more. 

Ellen Eldridge: Researchers are looking into why anxiety often leads people to avoid certain situations, places or decisions. Vanessa Brown is a researcher and assistant professor of psychology at Emory University. She says there has also not been a good theory on avoidance behavior and anxiety since the 1950s. 

Vanessa Brown I really wanted to try to use some of these newer computational approaches to understand why people are avoiding and hopefully develop a new theory as to why avoidance is happening so that we could then help people with it. 

Ellen Eldridge: Brown says avoidance can feel protective in the short-term, but may reinforce anxiety over time. For GPB News, I'm Ellen Eldridge. 

Story 5:

Peter Biello: A teenager was taken to a hospital after being bitten by a shark while fishing off Georgia's coast last week. The U.S. Coast Guard in Charleston says the teen was bitten near Ossabaw Island after a 5- to 6-foot shark was brought alongside the boat. The call went out around 4 o'clock Wednesday afternoon, according to Dispatch Audio. Responders were told the victim was a 13-year-old male who had been bitten by a shark on the upper thigh. 

911 Audio: This is going to be a reference to a 13-year-old male that was bit by a shark on the upper dock, close to us by a 10-minute EPA. 

Peter Biello: Authorities have not released the teen's condition. 

Story 6:

Peter Biello: Athens-Clarke County Mayor Kelly Girtz was recently recognized for his leadership, GPB's Alexia Ridley reports. 

Alexia Ridley: Mayor Kelly Girtz was inducted into the Georgia Municipal Government Hall of Fame during the GMA's 2026 annual convention in Savannah. Organizers say the induction recognizes city officials who have made significant contributions to their cities. We spoke with Mayor Girtz at the ceremony. He said the honor caught him by surprise. 

Kelly Girtz: It did. I thought I might need a — a different number in front of my age than the one that actually is there before I would be the recipient of something like this. 

Alexia Ridley: Three other Georgia leaders were also inducted into the Hall of Fame. For GPB News, I'm Alexia Ridley in Athens. 

Story 7:

Peter Biello: The Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is tracking a multi-state outbreak of a foodborne parasite that includes a handful of cases in Georgia. More than 140 cases of cyclosporiasis have been reported in 18 states, leading to 20 hospitalizations. The illness is caused by the parasite cyclospora, which spreads through contaminated food or water. Symptoms include stomach cramps, nausea, and fatigue. Federal investigators have not yet identified the source of the outbreak. 

Story 8: 

Peter Biello: Georgia environmental regulators say a company installing natural gas-based electrical generation for a Newton County data center likely has violated state air quality rules, GPB's Grant Blankenship reports. 

Grant Blankenship: Texas-based VoltaGrid says it offers electricity solutions for data centers so they don't have to wait on slow-moving utility companies. Companies Blackstone and Halliburton invested a billion dollars in the company this year. Last November, VoltaGrid requested a permit to install 33 natural gas engines to power a data center in Covington in Newton County. Together, they could power around 70,000 homes. So far, the permit has not been granted, but eight of those generators have been installed. In their letter to VoltaGrid, Georgia's Environmental Protection Division says that is likely a violation of state clean air rules, which could result in monetary penalties. VoltaGrid now has 15 days to respond. For GPB News, I'm Grant Blakenship. 

Story 9:

Peter Biello: A Florida-based real estate company has been ordered to pay $1 million to Georgia homeowners who paid the company an illegal fee. The company, MV Realty, gave homeowners money in exchange for a pledge to use its services when they sold their homes decades later. If they sold the homes without using the company, they paid a fee that would cost them 3% of their home's value. More than 400 Georgians paid the fee. Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr yesterday said MV Reality is now barred from doing business in the state. 

Outro: 

Peter Biello: And that is it for this edition of Georgia Today. If you want to learn more about these stories, visit gpb.org/news. And remember to subscribe to this podcast because we will be back in your feed tomorrow afternoon with all the latest news. And if you have feedback, we'd love to hear from you. Send us an email. The address is georgiatoday@gpb.org. I'm Peter Biello. Thanks again for listening. We will see you tomorrow. 

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For more on these stories and more, go to GPB.org/news