Browsed by
Category: Health

Why are so many NYPD officers refusing to wear masks at protests?

Why are so many NYPD officers refusing to wear masks at protests?

The New York Times reports: Riot helmets, ballistic vests, shields, batons — fully decked-out police officers have become staples in New York City as the protests against racism and police brutality approach their third week. But increasingly, one piece of equipment has attracted attention with its absence: the face mask. On any given day, any corner, any group of officers, some or all of them are not wearing masks. Others wear them below their chin. With masks having become as…

Read More Read More

White House goes quiet on coronavirus as outbreak spikes again across the U.S.

White House goes quiet on coronavirus as outbreak spikes again across the U.S.

Politico reports: The coronavirus is still killing as many as 1,000 Americans per day — but the Trump administration isn’t saying much about it. It’s been more than a month since the White House halted its daily coronavirus task force briefings. Top officials like infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci have largely disappeared from national television — with Fauci making just four cable TV appearances in May after being a near fixture on Sunday shows across March and April — and…

Read More Read More

Widespread mask-wearing could prevent Covid-19 second waves, says study

Widespread mask-wearing could prevent Covid-19 second waves, says study

Reuters reports: Population-wide face mask use could push COVID-19 transmission down to controllable levels for national epidemics, and could prevent further waves of the pandemic disease when combined with lockdowns, according to a British study on Wednesday. The research, led by scientists at the Britain’s Cambridge and Greenwich Universities, suggests lockdowns alone will not stop the resurgence of the new SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, but that even homemade masks can dramatically reduce transmission rates if enough people wear them in public. “Our…

Read More Read More

Are viruses alive? Perhaps we’re asking the wrong question

Are viruses alive? Perhaps we’re asking the wrong question

Axel_Kock/Shutterstock Hugh Harris, University College Cork Viruses are an inescapable part of life, especially in a global viral pandemic. Yet ask a roomful of scientists if viruses are alive and you’ll get a very mixed response. The truth is, we don’t fully understand viruses, and we’re still trying to understand life. Some properties of living things are absent from viruses, such as cellular structure, metabolism (the chemical reactions that take place in cells) and homeostasis (keeping a stable internal environment)….

Read More Read More

Coronavirus and the climate crisis

Coronavirus and the climate crisis

Gaurab Basu and Samir Chaudhuri write: There are many ways in which the impacts of COVID-19 will make previously existing climate-related health threats in India worse. For instance, COVID-19 compounds the grave threat climate change poses to global food security. In India, 38 percent of children already show signs of chronic malnutrition. The World Food Programme has just reported that the pandemic will nearly double the number of people facing food insecurity worldwide, from 135 million to 265 million. Likewise,…

Read More Read More

The virus isn’t done with us

The virus isn’t done with us

Alexis C Madrigal and Robinson Meyer write: After months of deserted public spaces and empty roads, Americans have returned to the streets. But they have come not for a joyous reopening to celebrate the country’s victory over the coronavirus. Instead, tens of thousands of people have ventured out to protest the killing of George Floyd by police. Demonstrators have closely gathered all over the country, and in blocks-long crowds in large cities, singing and chanting and demanding justice. Police officers…

Read More Read More

Asymptomatic spread of coronavirus is ‘very rare,’ WHO says

Asymptomatic spread of coronavirus is ‘very rare,’ WHO says

CNBC reports: Coronavirus patients without symptoms aren’t driving the spread of the virus, World Health Organization officials said Monday, casting doubt on concerns by some researchers that the disease could be difficult to contain due to asymptomatic infections. Some people, particularly young and otherwise healthy individuals, who are infected by the coronavirus never develop symptoms or only develop mild symptoms. Others might not develop symptoms until days after they were actually infected. Preliminary evidence from the earliest outbreaks indicated that…

Read More Read More

Shutdowns prevented 60 million coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds

Shutdowns prevented 60 million coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds

The Washington Post reports: Shutdown orders prevented about 60 million novel coronavirus infections in the United States and 285 million in China, according to a research study published Monday that examined how stay-at-home orders and other restrictions limited the spread of the contagion. A separate study from epidemiologists at Imperial College London estimated the shutdowns saved about 3.1 million lives in 11 European countries, including 500,000 in the United Kingdom, and dropped infection rates by an average of 82 percent,…

Read More Read More

Hospitals got bailouts and furloughed thousands while paying CEOs millions

Hospitals got bailouts and furloughed thousands while paying CEOs millions

The New York Times reports: HCA Healthcare is one of the world’s wealthiest hospital chains. It earned more than $7 billion in profits over the past two years. It is worth $36 billion. It paid its chief executive $26 million in 2019. But as the coronavirus swept the country, employees at HCA repeatedly complained that the company was not providing adequate protective gear to nurses, medical technicians and cleaning staff. Last month, HCA executives warned that they would lay off…

Read More Read More

Police tactics during protests threaten public health across America

Police tactics during protests threaten public health across America

Politico reports: Mass arrests of protesters across the country — many held for hours in vans, cells and other enclosed spaces — are heightening the risk of coronavirus spread, according to public health experts and lawsuits filed by civil rights groups. As tens of thousands of people take to the streets to protest police brutality after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the arrest and detention of thousands further jeopardizes the health of demonstrators — and that of police…

Read More Read More

Sweden had no lockdown. Did it work?

Sweden had no lockdown. Did it work?

  Sweden has become a model for staying open during the pandemic for lockdown opponents in the U.S. Yet comparing Sweden and the U.S. without context is misleading. Unlike the Scandinavian country, the U.S. was not equipped with a robust social welfare system. But most importantly, has Sweden even successfully contained COVID-19? And will Sweden reach herd immunity?

Jim Cramer: The pandemic led to ‘one of the greatest wealth transfers in history’

Jim Cramer: The pandemic led to ‘one of the greatest wealth transfers in history’

CNBC reports: The coronavirus pandemic and corresponding lockdown made way for “one of the greatest wealth transfers in history,” CNBC’s Jim Cramer said Thursday. The stock market is rising as big business rebounds from state-ordered stoppage of nonessential activity, while small businesses drop like flies, the “Mad Money” host said. “The bigger the business, the more it moves the major averages, and that matters because this is the first recession where big business … is coming through virtually unscathed, if…

Read More Read More

Tear gas being used to suppress protests could intensify coronavirus pandemic

Tear gas being used to suppress protests could intensify coronavirus pandemic

The New York Times reports: The billowing clouds of tear gas that the authorities are sending through protest crowds across the United States may increase the risk that the coronavirus could spread through the gatherings. Along with the immediate pain that can cause watering eyes and burning throats, tear gas may cause damage to people’s lungs and make them more susceptible to getting a respiratory illness, according to studies on the risks of exposure. The gas can also incite coughing,…

Read More Read More

Keep wearing masks and social distancing — it works, new study says

Keep wearing masks and social distancing — it works, new study says

The Canadian Press reports: Masks and social distancing can help control the coronavirus but hand washing and other measures are still needed, a new study from Hamilton’s McMaster University says. Researchers concluded single-layer cloth masks are less effective than surgical masks, while tight-fitting N95 masks provide the best protection. A distance of 1 metre (more than 3 feet) between people lowers the danger of catching the virus, while 2 metres (about 6 1/2 feet) is even better. Eye protection such…

Read More Read More

Epidemiologist behind Sweden’s controversial virus strategy admits mistakes

Epidemiologist behind Sweden’s controversial virus strategy admits mistakes

Bloomberg reports: Sweden’s top epidemiologist has admitted his strategy to fight Covid-19 resulted in too many deaths, after persuading his country to avoid a strict lockdown. “If we were to encounter the same illness with the same knowledge that we have today, I think our response would land somewhere in between what Sweden did and what the rest of the world has done,” Anders Tegnell said in an interview with Swedish Radio. Tegnell is the brains behind Sweden’s controversial approach…

Read More Read More

Sweden’s coronavirus experiment has well and truly failed

Sweden’s coronavirus experiment has well and truly failed

Wired reports: There was a familiar refrain from political commentators on certain corners of the internet in the early days of the pandemic – a three-word slogan in the vein of ‘Get Brexit Done’ that popped up wherever people felt the government’s lockdown plans impinged on their rights: what about Sweden? The Nordic country was used as an example of why closing down society in the way that most other European countries have done was unnecessary. Even now, restaurants and…

Read More Read More