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🌧️If you wished for a rainy St. Patrick’s Day, you’re in luck. Highs will be hitting 60, and lows should dip into the 30s tonight.

Are you getting more texts from unknown numbers telling you about packages you didn’t order, gift cards you didn’t ask for, unpaid tolls you didn’t rack up or job offers you didn’t apply for? Robokiller, a spam-blocking company, estimates that Americans got 19.2 billion spam texts in February and, according to the Anti-Phishing Working Group, SMS-based phishing attempts increased by 22% in the third quarter of 2024 ..

Behind the consumer frustration of constant spam texts lurks exploitation across the world: in February, 7,000 people who had been held captive and forced to work in scam centers in Myanmar were released. However, they remain detained in the Southeast Asian nation, living in crowded conditions with no access to medical care, according to the Associated Press. 

So what should you do if you get a scam text? First, never, ever click on a suspicious link; it could contain malware. Instead, delete the message and block the sender. The Federal Trade Commission recommends forwarding spam messages to them at 7726 (SPAM). You can also try to contact your wireless provider, but results may vary.

Four Things to Know

The family of a New Hampshire man with a green card says he was detained by immigration officers at Logan Airport after a flight home from Luxembourg, and was “violently interrogated,” stripped naked and denied access to medication. Fabian Schmidt, 34, told his mother that the agents had pressured him to give up his green card. “He hardly got anything to drink. And then he wasn’t feeling very well and he collapsed,” his mother said. “It was just said that his green card was flagged.”

High-end brothel case in court: Only two of the 12 men named so far as customers of a brothel ring appeared in court on Friday. Prosecutors had previously said that the customers, criminally charged with misdemeanors, included “elected officials, high tech and pharmaceutical executives, doctors, military officers, government contractors that possess security clearances, professors, attorneys, scientists, and accountants, among others.” But the people publicly named on Friday did not fit those profiles. 

Stay-at-home care: Hundreds of people were at the State House last week to call for support for personal care attendants: workers who assist older adults and people with disabilities with everyday tasks, allowing them to stay in their homes instead of moving into a nursing home. As living costs rise and the state’s population of older adults grows, so does the cost of the PCA program: it’s expected to go from $1.2 million in 2020 to an estimated $2 billion in 2027. Gov. Maura Healey’s administration is suggesting a cap on the program. State Senator Robyn Kennedy said that, in the long term, it’s still more cost-effective than other options. “Arbitrary caps will not save us money. It will hurt individuals and put costs on other parts of our system,” Kennedy said. “[The PCA program is] helping individuals stay with their family, stay with their community, stay at home.”

New supportive housing in Boston: The Lyndia, a new building named for Pine Street Inn President Lyndia Downie, opened on Washington Street in Jamaica Plain last week. The building includes140 units for people who were previously homeless, as well as 62 additional units for those earning between 60-80% of Boston’s median income. Officials expect the building to be at full occupancy by June. “Being homeless is like climbing Mount Everest. You know that you have to keep moving forward, but each step becomes more difficult,” said Michael Montanino, one of the building’s new residents. “For those who are experiencing homelessness, stay positive. Ask for help. Keep climbing.”

Bird flu, measles and more: where Massachusetts stands with public health right now

Where does Massachusetts stand on two disease outbreaks making national headlines? Measles cases have been reported in 15 states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. While most cases are in Texas, there have also been reported cases closer to home in Rhode Island, Vermont, and New York.

So far no cases have been reported in Massachusetts, according to the Commissioner of the Department of Public Health Dr. Robbie Goldstein. And vaccination rates here are fairly high, especially among vulnerable groups.

“We look as folks enter kindergarten, as kids go into the seventh grade, as folks come for college; I would say overall, our vaccination rates are incredibly high,” said Goldstein. “Specifically, if we look at that kindergarten group, which is where we really want to get the highest number, we’re [at] around 96% of children in the Commonwealth entering kindergarten are vaccinated for measles, mumps, and rubella.”

“That’s encouraging,” he continued, “but it’s still worth thinking ahead.”

“We have to continue to have these high levels of vaccination so that we can protect children, teachers, communities, parents — everyone from measles, which we know is now spreading around the country,”

As for bird flu: there are have been cases in both wild birds, such as geese and ducks, as well as in backyard chickens. “If you have an outdoor cat who likes chasing birds, it might be a good idea to keep them inside for now,” Goldstein noted. “That said, there’s not much risk to humans right now.”

“We’re up to 70 human cases here in the United States since 2022, which is a really small number,” said Goldstein. “If you think about the millions of birds that are infected and the hundreds of dairy cows that have been infected during this outbreak, I have a healthy skepticism right now of this virus. I think it’s important for us to remain vigilant, but it is important to remember the risk to humans is low.”

Hear more of what he said on GBH’s Morning Edition here.