Category: Emerging Infectious Diseases
Long COVID: Could mono virus or fat cells be playing roles?
(AP) A British historian, an Italian archaeologist and an American preschool teacher have never met in person, but they share a prominent pandemic bond. Plagued by eerily similar symptoms, the three women are credited with describing, naming and helping bring long COVID into the public’s consciousness in early 2020.
Dec 27, 2022
(STAT – by Helen Branswell) People who study infectious diseases and who work in public health have long known a bad pandemic would one day come. They knew such an event would overwhelm hospitals, strain supply chains, and place stresses on society that we would be ill-equipped to meet. Countries like the United States have […]
Dec 27, 2022
Increase in Pediatric Invasive Group A Streptococcal Infections
(CDC) The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is issuing this Health Alert Network (HAN) Health Advisory to notify clinicians and public health authorities of a recent increase in pediatric invasive group A streptococcal (iGAS) infections. In November 2022, CDC was notified of a possible increase in iGAS infections among children at a hospital […]
Dec 27, 2022
China will end its COVID-19 quarantine requirement for incoming passengers
(NPR) China will drop a COVID-19 quarantine requirement for passengers arriving from abroad starting Jan. 8, the National Health Commission announced Monday in the latest easing of the country’s once-strict virus-control measures. Currently, arriving passengers must quarantine for five days at a hotel, followed by three days at home. That is down from as much […]
Dec 27, 2022
‘Tragic Battle’: On the Front Lines of China’s Covid Crisis
(NYT) Medical staff are outnumbered and working sick as the nation’s health care system buckles under the strain of a spiraling crisis. Slumped in wheelchairs and lying on gurneys, the sickened patients crowd every nook and cranny of the emergency department at the hospital in northern China. They cram into the narrow spaces between elevator […]
Dec 27, 2022
COVID infections surge in Beijing causing hospital shortages
(NPR) AUDIO For nearly three years, China focused on keeping the virus outside of its borders. But now COVID is spreading largely unchecked across the country, leaving hospitals filled and medical resources scarce. In Beijing, so many people are ill, there aren’t enough ambulances. NPR’s Emily Feng brings us this report.
Dec 27, 2022
China’s COVID-19 surge raises odds of new coronavirus mutant
(AP) Could the COVID-19 surge in China unleash a new coronavirus mutant on the world? Scientists don’t know but worry that might happen. It could be similar to omicron variants circulating there now. It could be a combination of strains. Or something entirely different, they say. “China has a population that is very large and […]
Dec 27, 2022
Higher-Dose Steroids Upped Risk of Death in Non-Ventilated COVID-19
(MedPageToday) Higher-dose corticosteroids increased the risk of death in patients with COVID-19 and hypoxia, and who were receiving either no oxygen or simple oxygen only, compared with usual care that included low-dose corticosteroids, an analysis of the randomized RECOVERY trial showed.
Dec 27, 2022
Meet the man preparing Britain for the next pandemic (from a cabin)
(UK Telegraph) Despite facing a funding shortfall, Sir Professor Peter Horby is hard at work devising a defence blueprint for the next outbreak. As a pre-eminent scientist, whose drug research saved more than a million lives during the pandemic, and knight of the realm, Sir Professor Horby would be forgiven for demanding the highest of […]
Dec 20, 2022
One of our best Covid-19 treatments doesn’t work anymore. What now?
(Vox) Covid-19 is once again trending upward in the United States, with new cases reaching more than 450,000 and deaths climbing up to 3,000 per week. But hospitals will have to face this year’s winter surge without a valuable tool. In late November, the Food and Drug Administration revoked its emergency use authorization for bebtelovimab, a monoclonal antibody […]
Dec 20, 2022