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Category: Health

For the past two years, Americans have accepted more harm to children in exchange for less harm to adults

For the past two years, Americans have accepted more harm to children in exchange for less harm to adults

David Leonhardt writes: Children fell far behind in school during the first year of the pandemic and have not caught up. Among third through eighth graders, math and reading levels were all lower than normal this fall, according to NWEA, a research group. The shortfalls were largest for Black and Hispanic students, as well as students in schools with high poverty rates. “We haven’t seen this kind of academic achievement crisis in living memory,” Michael Petrilli of the Thomas B….

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Omicron doesn’t infect the lungs very well, animal studies find

Omicron doesn’t infect the lungs very well, animal studies find

The New York Times reports: A spate of new studies on lab animals and human tissues are providing the first indication of why the Omicron variant causes milder disease than previous versions of the coronavirus. In studies on mice and hamsters, Omicron produced less damaging infections, often limited largely to the upper airway: the nose, throat and windpipe. The variant did much less harm to the lungs, where previous variants would often cause scarring and serious breathing difficulty. “It’s fair…

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Beyond case counts: What Omicron is teaching us

Beyond case counts: What Omicron is teaching us

STAT reports: The Omicron wave in the United States is upon us. If you were fortunate enough to tune out from Covid-19 news over the holidays, you’re coming back to startling reports about record high case counts and, in some places, increases in hospitalizations. The wave will crest, of course; the question is when. For now, experts say, the country still has a ways to go to get through the Omicron surge. Below, STAT outlines what Omicron is already teaching…

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Lessons my terminal cancer has taught me about the mind

Lessons my terminal cancer has taught me about the mind

David J. Linden writes: When a routine echocardiogram revealed a large mass next to my heart, the radiologist thought it might be a hiatal hernia—a portion of my stomach poking up through my diaphragm to press against the sac containing my heart. “Chug this can of Diet Dr. Pepper and then hop up on the table for another echocardiogram before the soda bubbles in your stomach all pop.” So I did. However, the resulting images showed that the mass did…

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Is fluvoxamine the Covid drug we’ve been waiting for?

Is fluvoxamine the Covid drug we’ve been waiting for?

The Wall Street Journal reports: The Food and Drug Administration last week authorized two oral antiviral medicines for the early treatment of Covid-19. But don’t get too excited. The U.S. will still have a meager treatment arsenal this winter. The U.S. has been relying on monoclonal-antibody treatments, but most don’t hold up against the Omicron variant. One, by GlaxoSmithKline and Vir Biotechnology, does better at neutralizing the variant, but supply is limited. Pfizer’s newly authorized antiviral pack Paxlovid will also…

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Massive new bird flu outbreak could turn into global emergency

Massive new bird flu outbreak could turn into global emergency

The Daily Beast reports: Israel’s National Security Council has assumed control of a massive bird flu outbreak in the Galilee, which scientists warn could become a “mass disaster” for humans. Over half a billion migrating birds pass through the area every year, heading for warm African winters or balmy European summers, making this a catastrophic location for a major bird flu outbreak—right at the nexus of global avian travel. The virus can be deadly if it infects people. The World…

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Omicron is pushing America into soft lockdown

Omicron is pushing America into soft lockdown

Sarah Zhang writes: “I do not see a scenario for any kind of shutdown,” New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio declared this week, as parts of New York were in fact shutting down all around him. Broadway canceled show after show. Restaurants closed their kitchens. De Blasio’s successor, Eric Adams, who will take office January 1, nixed his inauguration gala. There has been no March 2020–style universal shutdown, but New York is not back anymore, baby. For Brent Young,…

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In New York, the Omicron variant is getting weird

In New York, the Omicron variant is getting weird

Donald G. McNeil Jr. writes: In Gauteng, the urbanized Johannesburg-Pretoria region of South Africa where Omicron was first isolated, new cases are plummeting so fast that there are already only half as many as there were at the peak. It’s not a curve, it’s an icepick, and it lasted barely a month. That suggests that, as the former F.D.A. commissioner, Dr. Scott Gottlieb, said on Sunday, it’s “going to blow its way through the population, probably very quickly.” If that’s…

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Uncounted: Inaccurate death certificates across the country hide the true toll of COVID-19

Uncounted: Inaccurate death certificates across the country hide the true toll of COVID-19

Missouri Independent reports: In Cape Girardeau County, the coroner hasn’t pronounced a single person dead of COVID-19 in 2021. Wavis Jordan, a Republican who was elected last year to serve as coroner of the 80,000-person county, says his office “doesn’t do COVID deaths.” He does not investigate deaths himself, and requires families to provide proof of a positive COVID-19 test before including it on a death certificate. Meanwhile, deaths at home attributed to conditions with symptoms that look a lot…

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How zinc helps you fight off infections

How zinc helps you fight off infections

Diana Kwon writes: Walk down the cold-remedy aisle of almost any pharmacy and you’ll see a shelf full of zinc supplements. Clearly, people must be worried that they’re not getting enough zinc, a nutrient often touted for its ability to quash the common cold and other respiratory illnesses. But do many of us really need more zinc? And if so, what good does it do? As researchers learn more about how our bodies use zinc, they’re finding that the element…

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Trump finally decides to push back against Covid vaccine lies

Trump finally decides to push back against Covid vaccine lies

Eric Lutz writes: In a rare dalliance with the truth, Donald Trump championed COVID-19 vaccines in an interview published Wednesday, pushing back on an attempt by the Daily Wire’s Candace Owens to undermine the shots, calling them “very, very good.” The former president’s defense of the inoculations was, of course, as self-serving as anything he’s ever done, and by no means makes him some heroic defender of public health. But it is a welcome—albeit belated—gesture that one hopes will help…

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Omicron sweeps across nation, now 73% of U.S. Covid cases

Omicron sweeps across nation, now 73% of U.S. Covid cases

The Associated Press reports: Omicron has raced ahead of other variants and is now the dominant version of the coronavirus in the U.S., accounting for 73% of new infections last week, federal health officials said Monday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention numbers showed nearly a six-fold increase in omicron’s share of infections in only one week. In much of the country, it’s even higher. Omicron is responsible for an estimated 90% or more of new infections in the…

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Trump implores supporters to take credit for the vaccines — even if they don’t want to take the vaccines

Trump implores supporters to take credit for the vaccines — even if they don’t want to take the vaccines

CNN reports: According to video tweeted by O’Reilly’s “No Spin News,” the former Fox News host says, “Both the President and I are vaxxed” and then asks Trump, “Did you get the booster?” “Yes,” Trump says to a smattering of boos in the audience. “Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t,” Trump says in the video, seemingly trying to quiet the boos. “That’s all right, it’s a very tiny group over there.” CNN has reached out to a Trump spokesperson for more…

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Most of the world’s vaccines likely won’t prevent infection from Omicron

Most of the world’s vaccines likely won’t prevent infection from Omicron

The New York Times reports: A growing body of preliminary research suggests the Covid vaccines used in most of the world offer almost no defense against becoming infected by the highly contagious Omicron variant. All vaccines still seem to provide a significant degree of protection against serious illness from Omicron, which is the most crucial goal. But only the Pfizer and Moderna shots, when reinforced by a booster, appear to have initial success at stopping infections, and these vaccines are…

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Don’t panic about Omicron. But don’t be indifferent, either

Don’t panic about Omicron. But don’t be indifferent, either

Ashish K. Jha writes: The Omicron wave is upon us, and the national conversation is vacillating between panic and indifference. Those who are near panic point to rapidly rising case counts and lockdowns in several European nations. Those who are indifferent lean into reports of Omicron being a milder coronavirus variant; after nearly two years of COVID, that can feel like reason enough to put the pandemic in the rear-view mirror and get on with their life. Both perspectives are…

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In South Africa, Gauteng’s Omicron wave is already peaking. Why?

In South Africa, Gauteng’s Omicron wave is already peaking. Why?

David Wallace-Wells writes: In Gauteng, South Africa’s Omicron epicenter, the wave seems to be cresting. In other parts of the country, too, the terrifyingly fast rise of the new variant appears already to be slowing and even receding. This is very encouraging, since it suggests that Omicron waves elsewhere in the world may also be, if disorientingly fast, also mercifully short. But it is also a bit confusing, given that the wave has peaked well before anything like it had…

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