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Category Archives: Corona Virus

2024 CDC COVID-19 guidelines: Isolation, masks, what you should know – The Arizona Republic

Posted: February 29, 2024 at 11:14 pm

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2024 CDC COVID-19 guidelines: Isolation, masks, what you should know - The Arizona Republic

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Long Covid and Impaired Cognition More Evidence and More Work to Do | NEJM – nejm.org

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Prospective Memory Assessment before and after Covid-19 | NEJM – nejm.org

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A pandemic that won’t go away as COVID enters its 5th year, NZ needs a realistic strategy – The Conversation

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February 28 marks four years since COVID-19 was first reported in Aotearoa New Zealand. Many of us are probably surprised this virus is still causing a pandemic.

The World Health Organization refers to COVID-19 as a continuing pandemic. As Scientific American put it recently, it has been the elephant in every room sometimes confronted and sometimes ignored but always present.

It wasnt meant to be like this. The main wave of the 1918 influenza pandemic swept through New Zealand in eight weeks, killing 9,000 people almost 1% of the population. Then it was largely gone, returning as a new seasonal flu virus.

In doing so, it defined how pandemics were expected to behave. This model was written into pandemic plans and collective thinking across the globe.

But COVID is still circulating four years after New Zealand reported its first case, and more than two years after the Omicron variant arrived and infection became widespread.

Constantly present, it is also occurring in waves. Unexpectedly, the current fifth wave was larger than the fourth, suggesting we cant rely on the comforting assumption that COVID will get less severe over time.

These waves are driven by the interaction of the organism (SARS CoV-2 virus), the host (human characteristics such as immunity and behaviour), and environmental factors (such as indoor ventilation).

Continuing viral evolution is a major contributor to the changing dynamic. The virus has demonstrated an ability for large, unpredictable evolutionary shifts that dramatically alter its genome and spike protein.

The result is an enhanced ability to evade prior immunity and infect more people. This jump was seen with the highly mutated BA.2.86 subvariant in mid-2023.

Its offspring, JN.1, has acquired additional changes and is causing such a wave of new infections it could potentially be the next variant of concern, with its own Greek letter. It is now driving epidemic increases across the globe, including in New Zealand. This dominance by a single subvariant takes us back to the first year of Omicron in 2022.

Read more: I have COVID. How likely am I to get long COVID?

The pandemic continues to have a large, visible health impact. It is a leading cause of serious illness and death, mainly in older populations and those with existing long-term health conditions.

In 2023, it caused more than 12,000 hospitalisations and 1,000 deaths in New Zealand.

But COVID-19 also has an important and largely unmeasured burden of disease as the cause of long COVID, which may become its biggest health impact. A growing number of studies are describing an estimated incidence of long COVID of 5% to 15% of all infections.

For example, a recent large study of almost 200,000 Scottish adults reported that, after adjustment for factors that might confuse the results, long COVID prevalence following an infection was 6.6% at six months, 6.5% at 12 months, and 10.4% at 18 months.

These findings illustrate an important feature of long COVID: recovery can take two years or more, with symptoms that fluctuate over time.

New Zealand now needs a strong, integrated response to COVID-19 and other respiratory infections.

The major pandemic interventions have not changed: vaccination, public health and social measures to prevent infection, and antivirals for more vulnerable groups. The evidence has firmed up that long COVID risk is reduced by vaccination, but research is less certain for antivirals.

Read more: Vaccination, testing, clean air: COVID hasn't gone away here's where Australia needs to do better

But growing pandemic complacency from political leaders and the public has changed things. Some of this apparent indifference can be put down to understandable fatigue with response measures. But it remains dangerous in the face of a continuing pandemic.

One way to keep a focus on prevention and control would be to include these measures in an integrated respiratory infectious disease strategy. This would combine COVID-19 control measures with those used to protect against influenza, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and other respiratory infections.

Measles could be added to the list, given the rising threat to New Zealand from a global resurgence of the disease.

This integrated strategy would include vaccination, promoting testing and self-isolation when sick, and measures to reduce transmission in critical indoor environments such as healthcare, public transport and education settings.

Read more: Long COVID stemmed from mild cases of COVID-19 in most people, according to a new multicountry study

Such a programme would need to be supported with community engagement, education, surveillance and research.

Structural inequalities mean Mori, Pacific peoples, and those living in relative deprivation, are less vaccinated, less protected from infection, less tested and less likely to have antivirals.

Consequently, they are more likely to be hospitalised and die from COVID-19. These inequities are currently not being systematically tracked and acted on.

Read more: COVID: there's a strong current of pandemic revisionism in the mainstream media, and it's dangerous

As we enter the fifth pandemic year, we need a change in thinking about COVID-19. This infection has pathological features in common with the other severe coronaviruses (SARS and MERS).

It is wishful thinking to imagine it will suddenly transform into a common cold coronavirus. As a recent review article concluded:

Transition from a pandemic to future endemic existence of SARS-CoV-2 is likely to be long and erratic [] endemic SARS-CoV-2 is by far not a synonym for safe infections, mild COVID-19 or a low population mortality and morbidity burden.

In the face of this continuing pandemic threat, we need a response that is evidence-informed rather than evidence-ignored.

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A pandemic that won't go away as COVID enters its 5th year, NZ needs a realistic strategy - The Conversation

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Older US adults should get another COVID-19 shot, advisers say – Detroit News

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Vaping increases susceptibility to COVID-19 infection, study finds – News-Medical.Net

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Vapers are susceptible to infection by SARS-CoV-2, the virus that spreads COVID-19 and continues to infect people around the world, a University of California, Riverside, study has found.

The liquid used in electronic cigarettes, called e-liquid, typically contains nicotine, propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin, and flavor chemicals. The researchers found propylene glycol/vegetable glycerin alone or along with nicotine enhanced COVID-19 infection through different mechanisms.

Study resultsappear in the American Journal of Physiology.

The researchers also found that the addition of benzoic acid to e-liquids prevents the infection caused by propylene glycol, vegetable glycerin, and nicotine.

Users who vape aerosols produced from propylene glycol/vegetable glycerin alone or e-liquids with a neutral to basic pH are more likely to be infected by the virus, while users who vape aerosols made from e-liquids with benzoic acid -; an acidic pH -; will have the same viral susceptibility as individuals who do not vape."

Rattapol Phandthong, postdoctoral researcher, Department of Molecular, Cell and Systems Biologyand research paper's first author

The researchers obtained airway stem cells from human donors to produce a 3D tissue model of human bronchial epithelium. They then exposed the tissues to JUUL and BLU electronic cigarette aerosols to study the effect on SARS-CoV-2 infection. They found all tissues showed an increase in the amount of ACE2, a host cell receptor for the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Further, TMPRSS2, an enzyme essential for the virus to infect cells, was found to show increased activity in tissues exposed to aerosols with nicotine.

Prue Talbot, a professor of the graduate division and Phandthong's advisor, said e-cigarette users should be cautious about vaping as some products will increase their susceptibility to SARs-CoV-2 infection.

"It would probably be best for vapers to quit vaping for the protection of their health and to stop nicotine dependency," she said. "If they cannot stop vaping, it is better to vape aerosols produced from an e-liquid with acidic pH or with benzoic acid to prevent the enhanced SARS-CoV-2 infection caused by nicotine, propylene glycol, and vegetable glycerin. However, inhalation of benzoic acid has its own risk, and data is still limited on this topic."

The researchers acknowledge that the relationship between e-cigarettes and SARS-CoV-2 susceptibility is complex.

"The complexity is attributed to a wide range of available e-liquids, the chemical composition of each e-liquid, and different models of e-cigarettes," Phandthong said. "Our study only used Classic Tobacco Flavor JUUL e-cigarette and BLU Classic Tobacco e-cigarette. Even with just these two e-cigarettes, we found the aerosols and individual ingredients produced different effects on SARS-CoV-2 infection."

Phandthong and Talbot hope the Food and Drug Administration will use their findings to implement regulatory laws on e-cigarette products.

"Our findings could also help improve the design of clinical trials involving the use of tobacco products and SARS-CoV-2 infection," Phandthong said. "In the meantime, it is worth bearing in mind that the scientific literature has shown that a vaper who contracted SARS-CoV-2 has more complications during the recovery period and is more likely to develop long COVID-19, which can be serious and last many months post-infection. We hope our findings encourage vapers to stop vaping and discourage non-users from starting to vape."

Phandthong acknowledged the team only investigated the initial stage of SARS-CoV-2 infection.

"There are many later stages involved in infection, such as viral replication," he said. "It is likely that these additional stages can also be affected by inhalation of e-cigarette aerosols."

Phandthong and Talbot were joined in the study by Man Wong, Ann Song, and Teresa Martinez.

The research was funded by grants from the Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Center for Tobacco Products of the Food and Drug Administration, and California Institute of Regenerative Medicine.

Source:

Journal reference:

Phandthong, R., et al. (2023). Does Vaping Increase the Likelihood of SARS-CoV-2 Infection? Paradoxically Yes and No.American Journal of Physiology-Lung Cellular and Molecular Physiology. doi.org/10.1152/ajplung.00300.2022.

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Older U.S. adults should get another covid-19 shot, advisers say – TribLIVE

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NEW YORK Older U.S. adults should roll up their sleeves for another covid-19 shot, even if they got a booster in the fall, an influential government advisory panel said Wednesday.

The panel voted 11-1 to say Americans 65 and older should get another dose of the updated vaccine that became available in September if at least four months has passed since their last shot. The committee advises the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who will decide whether to sign off on the recommendation.

The panels decision came after a lengthy discussion about whether to say older people may get the shots or if they should do so. That reflects a debate among experts about how necessary another booster is and whether yet another recommendation will add to the publics growing vaccine fatigue.

Some doctors say most older adults are adequately protected by the fall shot, which built on immunity derived from earlier vaccinations and exposure to the virus itself. And preliminary studies so far have shown no substantial waning in vaccine effectiveness over six months.

However, the bodys vaccine-induced defenses tend to fade over time, and that happens faster in seniors than in other adults. The committee had recommended covid-19 booster doses for older adults in 2022 and 2023.

Covid-19 remains a danger, especially to older people. There are still more than 20,000 hospitalizations and more than 2,000 deaths each week due to the coronavirus, according to the CDC. And people 65 and older have the highest hospitalization and death rates.

Some members of the advisory panel said a should recommendation is meant to more clearly prod doctors and pharmacists to offer the shots.

Most people are coming in either wanting the vaccine or not, said Dr. Jamie Loehr, a committee member and family doctor in Ithaca, New York. I am trying to make it easier for providers to say, Yes, we recommend this.

In September, the government recommended a new covid-19 shot recipe built against a version of the coronavirus called XBB.1.5. That single-target vaccine replaced combination shots that had been targeting both the original coronavirus strain and a much earlier omicron version.

The CDC recommended the new shots for everyone 6 months and older, and allowed that people with weak immune systems could get a second dose as early as two months after the first.

Most Americans havent listened. According to the latest CDC data, 13% of U.S. children have gotten the shots and about 22% of U.S. adults have. The vaccination rate is higher for adults 65 and older, at nearly 42%.

In each successive vaccine, the uptake has gone down, said Dr. David Canaday, a Case Western Reserve University infectious diseases expert who studies covid-19 in older people.

People are tired of getting all these shots all the time, said Canaday, who does not serve on the committee. We have to be careful about over-recommending the vaccine.

But there is subset of Americans those at higher danger of severe illness and death who have been asking if a another dose is permissible, said Dr. William Schaffner, a Vanderbilt University vaccines expert who serves on a committee workgroup that has been debating the booster question.

Indeed, CDC survey data suggests that groups biggest worry about the vaccine is whether its effective enough.

Agency officials say that among those who got the latest version of the covid-19 vaccine, 50% fewer will get sick after they come into contact with the virus compared with those who didnt get the fall shot.

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Older U.S. adults should get another covid-19 shot, advisers say - TribLIVE

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Vapers More Susceptible to COVID-19 Infection Than Tobacco Smokers, Reveals Study | Weather.com – The Weather Channel

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Vapers More Susceptible to COVID-19 Infection Than Tobacco Smokers, Reveals Study | Weather.com  The Weather Channel

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Vapers More Susceptible to COVID-19 Infection Than Tobacco Smokers, Reveals Study | Weather.com - The Weather Channel

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How we met: She was in the next hospital bed and I loved her accent – The Guardian

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How we met: She was in the next hospital bed and I loved her accent  The Guardian

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Fleet To Hit Record Size In 2024 But Still Suffering Covid Hangover – Forbes

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Fleet To Hit Record Size In 2024 But Still Suffering Covid Hangover  Forbes

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