WORLD Radio News - WORLD Radio News: 12-18-25 (3/3)

Episode Date: December 18, 2025

The latest headlines in three minutes from WORLD updated three times throughout the day.Sign-up for the daily Sift email at thesift.org.Support sound journalism, grounded in facts and Biblical truth at wng.org/donate.

With World Radio News, I'm Kent Covington. The Trump administration is moving to protect children from so-called transgender medical procedures. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. signed a declaration stating the procedures meant to change a child's sex are unsafe and unproven. This is not medicine. It is malpractice. We're done with junk science, driven by ideological pursuits. Under the plan, hospitals that perform. these procedures on minors could lose Medicare and Medicaid funding. Administration officials argue the move is necessary to protect kids from rushed and experimental medical procedures amid a growing body of evidence about their harm.

Chloe Cole underwent transgender procedures and later took steps to reverse them. She says doctors failed her as a child. They affirmed my childish misgivings about my developing body. My belief that I wasn't just a tomboy. The FDA has also warning companies against marketing chest binding devices to children the proposed rules are not yet final and would still go through public review. The Trump administration has announced a massive package of arms sales to Taiwan, valued at more than $10 billion, drawing an angry response from China.

The eight arms sales agreements cover missiles, rocket systems, howitzers, and drones. If approved by Congress, it would be the largest ever U.S. weapons package to Taiwan. Some unexpected good news today on inflation, World's Mary Muncie has details. The Labor Department says consumer prices were up 2.7% as compared to one year earlier. That was down from 3% in September. And that beat expectations. Many economists said that number would likely stay around 3%.

Some analysts caution that the data may be less reliable because it was delayed by the federal shutdown, which disrupted the normal collection of data. Even so, the report gives policymakers their first fresh look at inflation in weeks. Energy prices rose last month, while core inflation, which strips out food and fuel, fell to its lowest level in nearly four years. For World, I'm Mary Muncie. A French doctor will spend decades in prison on a life sentence after fatally poisoning 12 patients. Anesthetist Frederique Pesier was convicted of poisoning 30 patients total,

while working at two French clinics, with victims ranging in age from four years old to 89. Prosecutors say Pichier added pharmaceuticals to victim IV bags, triggering cardiac arrest or hemorrhaging. The doctor targeted patients being treated by colleagues he feuded with, allowing Pichier to play hero when called in to save patients. He has denied all wrongdoing. For World Radio, I'm Kent Covington. For more sound journalism grounded in facts and biblical truth, visit world radio. Thank you.