Pandemic News and Research

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A pandemic is a global disease outbreak. During a pandemic, transmission can be anticipated in the workplace, not only from patient to workers in health care settings, but also among co-workers in general work settings. A pandemic would cause high levels of illness, death, social disruption, and economic loss. Everyday life would be disrupted because so many people in so many places become seriously ill at the same time. Impacts could range from school and business closings to the interruption of basic services such as public transportation and food delivery.

Spatiotemporal patterns of Delta variant progression and its associated health interventions

In a new study, researchers adopted a prospective space-time scan method to conduct spatiotemporal analysis at the district level in the seven selected countries in SEA from June 2021 to October 2021.

23 Dec 2021

Impact of the rapid spread of the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant in Southern Africa

A new study has focused on the genomic profile and early transmission dynamics of Omicron. This study revealed the dominance of the Omicron variant in regions with high levels of population immunity.

23 Dec 2021

Exploring why children have milder COVID-19 infections compared to adults

A new study has revealed that an activated pre-exposure innate interferon response in airways together with significantly reduced systemic interferon-stimulated populations are associated with relatively milder severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection in children.

23 Dec 2021

Armed Forces members to support the Welsh Ambulance Service NHS Trust

An extra 184 Armed Forces members have been made available to support the Welsh Ambulance Service NHS Trust (WAST), to increase the resilience of emergency responders during the winter period.

23 Dec 2021

Over 4 million doses of University of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine donated by UK to Bangladesh

The UK donated over 4 million doses of the University of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, made by Oxford Bio-medica in Oxford and packaged in Wrexham, North Wales, to Bangladesh through the COVAX vaccine sharing mechanism.

23 Dec 2021

Exploring immunity and severe disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant

A new study describes the findings of a seroprevalence survey intended to establish the infection rates and the incidence of severe COVID-19 through December 15, 2021, in Gauteng, a crowded province that compresses a quarter of the country’s people into less than 2% of its area.

23 Dec 2021

Mapping access to HIV care

In this interview, we speak to Professor Diego Cuadros about his latest research in which he mapped individuals' access to HIV care in Africa.

23 Dec 2021

Record number of Americans sign up for ACA health insurance

A record 13.6 million Americans have signed up for health coverage for 2022 on the Affordable Care Act marketplaces, with nearly a month remaining to enroll in most states, the Biden administration announced Wednesday.

23 Dec 2021

Nursing homes bleed staff as amazon lures low-wage workers with prime packages

The sleek corporate offices of one of Amazon's air freight contractors looms over Villaspring of Erlanger, a stately nursing home perched on a hillside in this Cincinnati suburb.

23 Dec 2021

Deep roots help this Chicago pharmacist avoid creating another drugstore desert

Del-Kar Pharmacy in the North Lawndale neighborhood has had a front-row seat to history. Martin Luther King Jr. bought his daily newspaper there when he lived in Chicago in the late 1960s.

23 Dec 2021

As patients fell ill with covid inside hospitals, government oversight fell short

One by one, the nurses taking care of actress Judi Evans at Riverside Community Hospital kept calling out sick.

23 Dec 2021

BUSPH researcher partners with journalists, academics to reveal COVID-19's hidden mortality

Dr. Andrew Stokes, assistant professor of global health, is providing mortality data and modeling to the Documenting COVID-19 project and Muckrock in a collaboration that aims to identify the scope of underreported COVID-19 deaths in US counties.

22 Dec 2021

Survey finds acceptable levels of COVID-19 awareness and preparedness among healthcare workers

A survey of healthcare workers in 57 countries found that while overall preparedness for and awareness of the COVID-19 pandemic were at levels deemed acceptable during the first wave, significant differences in these levels were seen across worker groups and countries.

22 Dec 2021

The transmission dynamics of SARS-CoV2 Omicron variant

In a recent study posted to the medRxiv* preprint server, researchers developed a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) model-inference system in South Africa to determine transmission dynamics and immune evasion associated with severe acute respiratory syndrome-associated coronavirus disease (SARS-CoV-2) Omicron variant.

22 Dec 2021

New allocation model to optimize the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, treatments

Lulu Kang, associate professor of applied mathematics at Illinois Institute of Technology and a team of researchers from the University of Illinois Chicago put a new twist on traditional resource allocation models to optimize the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines, treatments, testing supplies, and other related resources, publishing their findings, "Fair and Diverse Allocation of Scarce Resources," in Socio-Economic Planning Sciences.

22 Dec 2021

Researchers explore problematic smartphone use during COVID-19 pandemic

A new survey study has identified links between problematic smartphone use and low sense of control, repetitive thinking, and fear of missing out (FOMO) during the COVID-19 pandemic in the spring of 2021, suggesting possible avenues for reducing the severity of such use.

22 Dec 2021

How the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant grew to dominate the UK epidemic

Researchers examine SARS-CoV-2 genomes in England to evaluate the effectiveness of COVID-19 policies.

22 Dec 2021

World leaders meet to discuss about COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics

The heads of the International Monetary Fund, World Bank Group, World Health Organization and World Trade Organization held high-level consultations with Gavi and UNICEF on 17 December, 2021 aimed at increasing the use of COVID-19 vaccines and other critical medical countermeasures in low-income (LIC) and lower middle-income (LMIC) countries and supporting countries to be better prepared, resourced, and ready to roll out vaccines.

22 Dec 2021

All carers are encouraged to 'Get Boosted Now'

A new study, published today by the University of Birmingham and UCL, adds further evidence to the importance of a booster vaccine for both carers and care home residents as they are encouraged to Get Boosted Now.

22 Dec 2021

Study assesses the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on dental faculty well-being

As the COVID-19 pandemic forced the world to withdraw for safety in 2020, faculty at dental schools did not report significant decreases in measures of their well-being, according to results from a study led by Carlos S. Smith, D.D.S., at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Dentistry.

22 Dec 2021