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.

Criticisms of COVID-19 models appear to undermine public trust in science

Criticisms of COVID-19 models by Democratic elites in May 2020 appeared to undermine public support for the models' use - and trust in science more broadly - according to a series of survey experiments conducted with the participation of more than 6,000 Americans.

26 Sep 2020

Masks and face coverings are effective in reducing the spread of airborne particles

Laboratory tests of surgical and N95 masks by researchers at the University of California, Davis, show that they do cut down the amount of aerosolized particles emitted during breathing, talking and coughing.

26 Sep 2020

Yale designates three independent laboratories to perform SalivaDirect COVID-19 test

Yale has designated three independent laboratories to perform the university-developed SalivaDirectTM COVID-19 test.

26 Sep 2020

Study reveals the differences in non-COVID-19 hospital admissions during rebound period

While declines in U.S. hospital admissions during the onset of COVID-19 has been well-documented, little is known about how admissions during the rebound varied by age, insurance coverage and socioeconomic groups.

26 Sep 2020

Combination of heat and high relative humidity can disinfect N95 mask materials

As the COVID-19 pandemic swept around the world early this year, shortages of protective equipment such as N95 masks left healthcare workers little choice but to reuse the masks they had - increasing the risk of infection for both them and their patients.

26 Sep 2020

New research projects intend to alleviate farmer and rancher stress

The stress level in rural communities is off the charts. Farm and ranch closures, land forfeitures, labor issues and more contribute, and according to a 2015 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention - a full five years before the COVID-19 pandemic hit - rates of suicide in rural communities measured twice that of urban areas.

26 Sep 2020

Addressing the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on global mental health

In a special session addressing global mental health before, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic held at the ESCMID Conference on Coronavirus Disease (ECCVID) Professor Vikram Patel H(arvard Medical School, USA) will present a new review of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on global mental health.

26 Sep 2020

SARS-CoV-2 emergence linked with decrease in circulation of common respiratory viruses

Analysis of samples taken to test for respiratory viruses over the past five years suggests that the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 was associated with a large drop in circulation of other common respiratory viruses during the first wave.

26 Sep 2020

ECMO appears to be saving the lives of many critically ill COVID-19 patients

It saved lives in past epidemics of lung-damaging viruses. Now, the life-support option known as ECMO appears to be doing the same for many of the critically ill COVID-19 patients who receive it, according to a new international study.

26 Sep 2020

University of Minnesota receives funding to initiate research on diabetes drug as a COVID-19 treatment

University of Minnesota Medical School researchers received funding from the Parsemus Foundation to initiate research on the widely-used diabetes medication, metformin, available globally as an inexpensive generic drug for prevention and treatment for COVID-19.

25 Sep 2020

3D-printed alternative performs as well as the standard nasal swabs for COVID-19 testing

As COVID-19 quickly spread worldwide this spring, shortages of supplies, including the nasopharyngeal (nasal) swabs used to collect viral samples, limited diagnostic testing.

25 Sep 2020

Ultrapotent antibody mix locks infection machinery, inhibits SARS-CoV-2 attachment to cells

A mix of ultrapotent antibodies from recovered COVID-19 patients has been shown to recognize and lock down the infection machinery of the pandemic coronavirus and keep it from entering cells. Each of the antibody types performs these overlapping tasks slightly differently.

25 Sep 2020

Students without pre-existing mental health issues more severely affected by COVID-19 stressors

Surprisingly, university students without pre-existing mental health concerns seem to be suffering greater psychological distress during the pandemic than their peers with pre-existing mental health problems according to a study of close to 800 university students in Toronto carried out by researchers from McGill and University of Toronto.

25 Sep 2020

Personality traits are associated with cognitive resilience in older adults

Our aging brains collect tangles and sticky plaques that can interfere in our cognition and memory. But some older adults with this neuropathology have more cognitive resilience than others, reports a new Northwestern Medicine study.

25 Sep 2020

People with musculoskeletal pain report worsening symptoms during lockdown

People with bone, joint and muscle pain saw their symptoms worsen during lockdown - according to new research from the University of East Anglia.

25 Sep 2020

Study examines the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on health care disparities

A new Viewpoint piece published online in the Annals of the American Thoracic Society examines the ways in which COVID-19 disproportionately impacts historically disadvantaged communities of color in the United States, and how baseline inequalities in our health system are amplified by the pandemic.

25 Sep 2020

Conflict, climate instability, and COVID-19 are affecting the health of women and children

Fragile gains made to advance women and children's health are threatened by conflict, the climate crisis and COVID-19, according to a new report from Every Woman Every Child.

25 Sep 2020

D614G mutation now the dominant variant in the global COVID-19 pandemic

Now, a new study published on the preprint server medRxiv in September 2020 shows that a significant variant characterized by the D614G mutation has higher infectivity, which may account for its rapid rise to the dominant position in all regions where it has emerged.

25 Sep 2020

Social inequities in Black and South Asian immigrants increase risk of severe COVID-19 infection

Black, South Asian and Aboriginal populations from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds in Canada are nearly four times more likely to have three or more medical conditions that have been identified as risk factors for severe illness from COVID-19.

25 Sep 2020

Investigators assess the experience of using test-based protocol in infected health care workers

One of the of the most important questions in managing a hospital's response to the COVID-19 pandemic is determining when healthcare workers infected with COVID-19 can return to the job.

25 Sep 2020

Pandemic News and Research

Further Reading

Criticisms of COVID-19 models appear to undermine public trust in science

Masks and face coverings are effective in reducing the spread of airborne particles

Yale designates three independent laboratories to perform SalivaDirect COVID-19 test

Study reveals the differences in non-COVID-19 hospital admissions during rebound period

Combination of heat and high relative humidity can disinfect N95 mask materials

New research projects intend to alleviate farmer and rancher stress

Addressing the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on global mental health

SARS-CoV-2 emergence linked with decrease in circulation of common respiratory viruses

ECMO appears to be saving the lives of many critically ill COVID-19 patients

University of Minnesota receives funding to initiate research on diabetes drug as a COVID-19 treatment

3D-printed alternative performs as well as the standard nasal swabs for COVID-19 testing

Ultrapotent antibody mix locks infection machinery, inhibits SARS-CoV-2 attachment to cells

Students without pre-existing mental health issues more severely affected by COVID-19 stressors

Personality traits are associated with cognitive resilience in older adults

People with musculoskeletal pain report worsening symptoms during lockdown

Study examines the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on health care disparities

Conflict, climate instability, and COVID-19 are affecting the health of women and children

D614G mutation now the dominant variant in the global COVID-19 pandemic

Social inequities in Black and South Asian immigrants increase risk of severe COVID-19 infection

Investigators assess the experience of using test-based protocol in infected health care workers

Best practices - optimize qPCR processes for pathogen detection eBook

Designing fluidic architecture for scalable diagnostic platforms

Evaluating new approaches for rare disease genomics

Expanding access to NMR with the Fourier 80 Duo

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