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Category: Health

WHO Special Envoy on Covid-19 makes an impassioned plea for global leadership

WHO Special Envoy on Covid-19 makes an impassioned plea for global leadership

  Dr David Nabarro: We just have a complete fracture in global leadership right now. To the point where a UN Security Council resolution on Covid was not approved because the World Health Organisation was mentioned in the resolution. The people of the world actually should be going completely crazy with anger. There should be a petition of 500 million people to the world leaders saying, “What on earth are you doing? What on earth are you playing at?” We…

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Growing friction between White House and CDC hobbles pandemic response

Growing friction between White House and CDC hobbles pandemic response

The Washington Post reports: The meager guidelines for safely reopening the country released this week are the latest sign of the Trump administration’s efforts to sideline the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the increasing tension between the White House and the world-renowned public health agency. With Americans waiting for expert advice on how to resume a semblance of normal life during the pandemic, the CDC released just six short “decision trees” Thursday while the rest of its lengthy…

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The coronavirus is mutating, but that’s not necessarily good or bad

The coronavirus is mutating, but that’s not necessarily good or bad

Jeremy Draghi and C. Brandon Ogbunu write: In early March, the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ National Science Review published a peer-reviewed study titled “On the Origin and Continuing Evolution of SARS-CoV-2.” The authors argued that the various strains of SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes Covid-19, could be grouped into two clusters: An “L” type, which was predominant during the early weeks of the outbreak in Wuhan, and an “S” type, which could be distinguished from the L type by only…

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Vitamin D determines severity in Covid-19

Vitamin D determines severity in Covid-19

Trinity College Dublin: Researchers from Trinity College Dublin are calling on the government in Ireland to change recommendations for vitamin D supplements. A new publication from Dr. Eamon Laird and Professor Rose Anne Kenny, School of Medicine, and the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA), in collaboration with Professor Jon Rhodes at University of Liverpool, highlights the association between vitamin D levels and mortality from COVID-19. The authors of the article, just published in the Irish Medical Journal, analyzed all…

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Sweden’s Covid-19 outbreak has been far deadlier than those of its neighbors

Sweden’s Covid-19 outbreak has been far deadlier than those of its neighbors

The New York Times reports: By late March, nearly every country in Europe had closed schools and businesses, restricted travel and ordered citizens to stay home. But one country stood out for its decision to stay open: Sweden. The country’s moderated response to the coronavirus outbreak has drawn praise from some American politicians, who see Sweden as a possible model for the United States as it begins to reopen. “We need to observe with an open mind what went on…

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Insecure men view face covering as threat to their masculinity

Insecure men view face covering as threat to their masculinity

MarketWatch reports: As the coronavirus death toll ticks up and some states ease their restrictions, a new study suggests that men might be more likely to leave their face coverings at home. Men in the U.S. report less intention than women to wear face coverings, especially in counties that don’t mandate wearing them, according to a paper authored by researchers from Middlesex University London in the U.K. and the Mathematical Science Research Institute in Berkeley, Calif. This, the authors say,…

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Young, healthy people like me are getting very, very sick from Covid-19

Young, healthy people like me are getting very, very sick from Covid-19

Mara Gay writes: The day before I got sick, I ran three miles, walked 10 more, then raced up the stairs to my fifth-floor apartment as always, slinging laundry with me as I went. The next day, April 17, I became one of the thousands of New Yorkers to fall ill with Covid-19. I haven’t felt the same since. If you live in New York City, you know what this virus can do. In just under two months, an estimated…

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‘We’re the Wild West,’ Gov. Tony Evers says after Wisconsin Supreme Court blocks stay-at-home order

‘We’re the Wild West,’ Gov. Tony Evers says after Wisconsin Supreme Court blocks stay-at-home order

The Washington Post reports: On Wednesday night in the heart of downtown Platteville, Wis., just hours after the Wisconsin Supreme Court threw out the state’s stay-at-home order, Nick’s on 2nd was packed wall to wall, standing room only. It was sometime after 10 p.m. when “Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress” by the Hollies came over the sound system and a bartender took out his camera. In a Twitter broadcast, he surveyed the room of maskless patrons crammed together,…

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Michigan cancels legislative session to avoid armed protesters

Michigan cancels legislative session to avoid armed protesters

Bloomberg reports: Michigan closed down its capitol in Lansing on Thursday and canceled its legislative session rather than face the possibility of an armed protest and death threats against Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer. The gathering, meant to advocate opening the state for business despite the coronavirus pandemic, followed one April 30 that resulted in pictures of protesters clad in military-style gear and carrying long guns crowding the statehouse. They confronted police and taunted lawmakers. The shutdown was done with little…

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EPA opts against limits on toxic water contaminant tied to fetal damage

EPA opts against limits on toxic water contaminant tied to fetal damage

The New York Times reports: The Trump administration will not impose any limits on perchlorate, a toxic chemical compound that contaminates water and has been linked to fetal and infant brain damage, according to two Environmental Protection Agency staff members familiar with the decision. The decision by Andrew Wheeler, the administrator of the E.P.A., appears to defy a court order that required the agency to establish a safe drinking-water standard for the chemical by the end of June. The policy,…

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The value of leaders who can lead

The value of leaders who can lead

The Atlantic reports: In March, when the severity of the coronavirus pandemic was becoming clear but many of the world’s leading nations had yet to formulate a response to it, one country was springing into action. Within 10 days of identifying its first case, it went into lockdown: Its borders were sealed, schools and restaurants were closed, and face masks were made mandatory in public places, with some of the country’s most visible public figures, including its president and prime…

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CDC is ‘almost certainly underestimating’ Covid-19 death toll but Trump wants numbers even lower

CDC is ‘almost certainly underestimating’ Covid-19 death toll but Trump wants numbers even lower

The Daily Beast reports: President Donald Trump and members of his coronavirus task force are pushing officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to change how the agency works with states to count coronavirus-related deaths. And they’re pushing for revisions that could lead to far fewer deaths being counted than originally reported, according to five administration officials working on the government’s response to the pandemic. Though he has previously publicly attested to the accuracy of the COVID-19 death…

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Former vaccine chief Rick Bright warns of ‘darkest winter in modern history’ without ramped up coronavirus response

Former vaccine chief Rick Bright warns of ‘darkest winter in modern history’ without ramped up coronavirus response

CNN reports: Dr. Rick Bright, the ousted director of a key federal office charged with developing medical countermeasures, will testify before Congress on Thursday that the Trump administration was unprepared for the coronavirus pandemic and warn that the the US will face “unprecedented illness and fatalities” without additional preparations. “Our window of opportunity is closing. If we fail to develop a national coordinated response, based in science, I fear the pandemic will get far worse and be prolonged, causing unprecedented…

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Sweden’s coronavirus strategy isn’t what it seems

Sweden’s coronavirus strategy isn’t what it seems

Ishaan Tharoor writes: As societies battened down the hatches and imposed quarantines, one European country appeared to take a different approach. In Sweden, there have been no invasive lockdowns to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus. Restaurants and even nightclubs are operating, though under guidelines to enforce social distancing. Schools for students under the age of 16 remain open. Large gatherings are restricted to a maximum of 50 people, a far cry from the enforced confinement imposed on entire cities…

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Scientist who fought Ebola and HIV reflects on facing death from Covid-19

Scientist who fought Ebola and HIV reflects on facing death from Covid-19

Science reports: Virologist Peter Piot, director of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, fell ill with COVID-19 in mid-March. He spent a week in a hospital and has been recovering at his home in London since. Climbing a flight of stairs still leaves him breathless. Piot, who grew up in Belgium, was one of the discoverers of the Ebola virus in 1976 and spent his career fighting infectious diseases. He headed the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS…

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Fauci warns against triggering ‘an outbreak that you may not be able to control’ by reopening too soon

Fauci warns against triggering ‘an outbreak that you may not be able to control’ by reopening too soon

The Week reports: Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, on Tuesday warned the Senate about the dangers of states reopening too quickly amid the coronavirus pandemic, saying this could result in more “suffering and death.” Fauci, a member of President Trump’s coronavirus task force, remotely testified before the Senate on Tuesday and said that the “consequences could be really serious” if states reopen their economies too quickly without following the White House’s guidelines,…

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