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Category: Health

Flu season never came to the Southern Hemisphere this year

Flu season never came to the Southern Hemisphere this year

CNN reports: The run-up to flu season in the US has been fraught with fear. Health experts worry that fighting Covid-19 and influenza simultaneously could burden the health care system’s ability to treat both infections. Flu season in the Southern Hemisphere, though, came and went with so few cases that there was “virtually no influenza circulation,” according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. CDC experts believe that efforts like social distancing, mask-wearing and school closures might have critically…

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White House blocked CDC order to keep cruise ships docked

White House blocked CDC order to keep cruise ships docked

The New York Times reports: The White House has blocked a new order from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to keep cruise ships docked until mid-February, a step that would have displeased the politically powerful tourism industry in the crucial swing state of Florida. The current “no sail” policy, which was originally put in place in April and later extended, is set to expire on Wednesday. Dr. Robert R. Redfield, the director of the C.D.C., had recommended the…

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Why do some people weather a coronavirus infection unscathed?

Why do some people weather a coronavirus infection unscathed?

By Emily Laber-Warren One of the reasons Covid-19 has spread so swiftly around the globe is that for the first days after infection, people feel healthy. Instead of staying home in bed, they may be out and about, unknowingly passing the virus along. But in addition to these pre-symptomatic patients, the relentless silent spread of this pandemic is also facilitated by a more mysterious group of people: the so-called asymptomatics. According to various estimates, between 20 and 45 percent of the…

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Trump allies say the virus has almost run its course while experts most Americans remain at risk

Trump allies say the virus has almost run its course while experts most Americans remain at risk

The New York Times reports: In the last week, leading epidemiologists from respected institutions have, through different methods, reached the same conclusion: About 85 to 90 percent of the American population is still susceptible to SARS-CoV-2, the virus causing the current pandemic. The number is important because it means that “herd immunity” — the point at which a disease stops spreading because nearly everyone in a population has contracted it — is still very far off. The evidence came from…

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Covid-19: The most complicated vaccine campaign ever

Covid-19: The most complicated vaccine campaign ever

Sarah Zhang writes: On the day that a COVID-19 vaccine is approved, a vast logistics operation will need to awaken. Millions of doses must travel hundreds of miles from manufacturers to hospitals, doctor’s offices, and pharmacies, which in turn must store, track, and eventually get the vaccines to people all across the country. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, along with state and local health departments, coordinates this process. These agencies distributed flu vaccines during the 2009 H1N1 pandemic…

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New document reveals scope and structure of Operation Warp Speed and underscores vast military involvement

New document reveals scope and structure of Operation Warp Speed and underscores vast military involvement

STAT reports: When President Trump unveiled Operation Warp Speed in May, he declared that it was “unlike anything our country has seen since the Manhattan Project.” The initiative — to accelerate the development of Covid-19 vaccines and therapeutics — lacks the scale, and the degree of secrecy, of the effort to build the atomic bomb. But Operation Warp Speed is largely an abstraction in Washington, with little known about who works there other than its top leaders, or how it…

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Overheard: CDC Director Robert Redfield voices alarm over influence of Trump’s new coronavirus task force adviser

Overheard: CDC Director Robert Redfield voices alarm over influence of Trump’s new coronavirus task force adviser

NBC News reports: The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has grown increasingly concerned that President Donald Trump, pushed by a new member of his coronavirus task force, is sharing incorrect information about the pandemic with the public. Dr. Robert Redfield, who leads the CDC, suggested in a conversation with a colleague Friday that Dr. Scott Atlas is arming Trump with misleading data about a range of issues, including questioning the efficacy of masks, whether young people…

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Wisconsin is on the brink of a major coronavirus outbreak

Wisconsin is on the brink of a major coronavirus outbreak

Robinson Meyer writes: In New York, the decisive moment came in March. In Arizona and other Sun Belt states, it struck as the spring turned to summer. In every state that has so far seen a large spike of COVID-19 cases, there has been a moment when the early signs of an uptick are detectable—but a monstrous outbreak is not yet assured. Can a state realize what’s happening, and stop a surge in time? Wisconsin is about to find out….

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Fewer than 1 in 10 Americans show signs of past coronavirus infection, large national study finds

Fewer than 1 in 10 Americans show signs of past coronavirus infection, large national study finds

The Washington Post reports: Fewer than 1 in 10 Americans showed signs of past infection with the novel coronavirus as of late July, suggesting that most of the country may still be vulnerable to infection, according to one of the largest studies of its kind published Friday in the journal the Lancet. That proportion is an estimate based on the percentage of dialysis patients whose immune systems produced coronavirus antibodies. It does not indicate exactly how many Americans may be…

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Russia’s Covid-19 vaccine PR stunt could cast a long shadow

Russia’s Covid-19 vaccine PR stunt could cast a long shadow

By Olga Dobrovidova, Undark, September 24, 2020 In August, the Russian government unveiled, with pomp and flair, “the world’s first registered vaccine against Covid-19.” Although the vaccine — known officially as Gam-COVID-Vac but marketed as Sputnik V for a global audience — has yet to demonstrate its safety and efficacy in a phase III trial, an emergency use authorization was issued to make it available for limited use in the general public. This month, the horse finally caught up with…

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‘Close to 100% accuracy’: Helsinki airport uses sniffer dogs to detect Covid-19

‘Close to 100% accuracy’: Helsinki airport uses sniffer dogs to detect Covid-19

The Guardian reports: Four Covid-19 sniffer dogs have begun work at Helsinki airport in a state-funded pilot scheme that Finnish researchers hope will provide a cheap, fast and effective alternative method of testing people for the virus. A dog is capable of detecting the presence of the coronavirus within 10 seconds and the entire process takes less than a minute to complete, according to Anna Hielm-Björkman of the University of Helsinki, who is overseeing the trial. “It’s very promising,” said…

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Charting the coronavirus pandemic over the next 12 months — and beyond

Charting the coronavirus pandemic over the next 12 months — and beyond

Andrew Joseph writes: Think back through the pandemic. Think about the moments that stand out as beacons in the haze — signposts of how it would change all of our lives. Not all of these moments were clear at the time. China’s decision to shut down cities of millions of people in January was staggering, but to most Americans, this new coronavirus remained an ocean away, not something that would demand our own version of a lockdown. Other moments form…

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Covid-19 has killed more Americans than died in battle from five wars combined

Covid-19 has killed more Americans than died in battle from five wars combined

CNN reports: What happened today seemed impossible to many Americans six months ago. When Dr. Anthony Fauci predicted in March that Covid-19 could kill 200,000 people in the US, skeptics lambasted him and accused him of fearmongering. But Fauci was right. And the US reached that bleak milestone much earlier than some experts predicted. Since the first known US Covid-19 death on February 6, an average of more than 858 people have died from the disease every day. Many of…

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Pentagon has been diverting pandemic-related money to defense contractors

Pentagon has been diverting pandemic-related money to defense contractors

The Washington Post reports: A $1 billion fund Congress gave the Pentagon in March to build up the country’s supplies of medical equipment has instead been mostly funneled to defense contractors and used to make things such as jet engine parts, body armor and dress uniforms. The change illustrates how one taxpayer-backed effort to battle the novel coronavirus, which has killed about 200,000 Americans, was instead diverted toward patching up long-standing perceived gaps in military supplies. The Cares Act, which…

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CDC removed new guidance about airborne coronavirus transmission days after posting it

CDC removed new guidance about airborne coronavirus transmission days after posting it

BuzzFeed News reports: The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention removed its new guidance for stopping airborne coronavirus transmission on Monday, sparking more concerns that the Trump administration may be interfering with its health advice. The agency’s new “How COVID-19 Spreads” guidance, initially posted on Friday, acknowledged that the virus can spread by aerosol droplets released when infected people breathe, talk, and sing, spreading infectious particles beyond the 6-foot limit widely used as a guide for distancing. Many virus…

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In ‘power grab,’ Health Secretary Azar asserts authority over FDA

In ‘power grab,’ Health Secretary Azar asserts authority over FDA

The New York Times reports: In a stunning declaration of authority, Alex M. Azar II, the secretary of health and human services, this week barred the nation’s health agencies, including the Food and Drug Administration, from signing any new rules regarding the nation’s foods, medicines, medical devices and other products, including vaccines. Going forward, Mr. Azar wrote in a Sept. 15 memorandum obtained by The New York Times, such power “is reserved to the Secretary.” The bulletin was sent to…

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