Category: Featured
What infectious disease doctors want you to know as the COVID-19 pandemic enters its 4th year
(Boston.com) The trends for COVID-19 are looking more promising as January comes to a close, after a spike in cases and hospitalizations earlier this month prompted officials in the area to urge the use of masks in indoor public spaces to help prevent transmission. The wave of cases even prompted some local schools, including Chelsea Public Schools and […]
Jan 27, 2023
Mink-farm outbreak shows bird flu can spread between mammals
(Nature) A new variant of H5N1 influenza could pose an increased risk to people and wild animals. An outbreak of avian influenza on a mink farm in Spain provides the strongest evidence so far that the H5N1 strain of flu can spread from one infected mammal to another. The outbreak of H5N1 flu, described in […]
Jan 24, 2023
(Fortune) The H5N1 strain of avian flu responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of birds in the U.S. in recent months, and countless more worldwide, poses an existential threat to the poultry industry in the U.S.—and a potentially widespread human health threat, experts say. The strain—first identified in domestic waterfowl in China in […]
Jan 24, 2023
The doctor won’t see you now: Covid winters are making long hospital waits the new normal
(Washington Post) As the United States enters its third full covid winter, a top administration official is warning that the permanence of the coronavirus in the disease landscape could mean brutal and long-lasting seasonal surges of cold-weather illnesses for years to come, resulting in hospitals struggling to care for non-covid emergencies and unable to give patients timely, lifesaving treatments. Winter […]
Jan 17, 2023
(NYT) Some of the worst days of Covid in the U.S. have come as winters have settled in, and surges led hospitals to overflow and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths. A comparable surge has yet to materialize on a similar timeline this winter. By now, hospitalizations in particular would have started to sharply rise. […]
Jan 17, 2023
WHO recommends that China monitor excess COVID-19 mortality
(Reuters) The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday it recommended that China monitor excess mortality from COVID-19 to gain a fuller picture of the impact of the surge in cases there.
Jan 17, 2023
China Reports Nearly 60,000 Covid-Linked Deaths Since Lifting Restrictions
(NYT) The unexpected disclosure was made as the country faces mounting criticism for providing unreliable data on its latest coronavirus outbreak.
Jan 17, 2023
China’s COVID surge prompts CDC to expand a hunt for new variants among air travelers
(NPR) It’s early morning at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C.,and Ana Valdez is already hard at work at one of the international gates. “Hello everybody. Welcome,” she shouts with a big smile as arriving travelers flood through two large swinging doors. “Do you like to help the CDC to find new variants for COVID?” […]
Jan 14, 2023
Inside the High-Security Lab Where Scientists Are Fighting the Next Pandemic
(Washingtonian) We visited a military facility that works with some of the world’s scariest pathogens. When you roll up to the military’s premier biodefense lab, the security situation is intense. USAMRIID—the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases—is a complex of buildings at Maryland’s Fort Detrick, surrounded by a scary black fence. Along the […]
Jan 10, 2023
China’s Covid-19 Infections Hit Peak in Populous Regions, Officials Say
(WSJ) (Video at the link )Some of China’s most populous provinces have passed the peak in the current wave of Covid-19 infections sweeping across the country, officials said Monday. In central China’s Henan province, 89% of the 100 million residents had already been infected by the Omicron variants by Friday, said Kan Quancheng, director of the provincial health commission. Link […]
Jan 10, 2023