June 20, 2023

Global ‘pandemic treaty’: nations wrestle with how to fairly share virus data (Nature)

Nature: Global ‘pandemic treaty’: nations wrestle with how to fairly share virus data. “During the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers in countries from Brazil to South Africa to India kept tabs on how SARS-CoV-2 was evolving by determining the genetic sequences of viruses collected from infected people. They then uploaded those sequences to online data-sharing platforms, enabling the development of vaccines. But many of the countries that uploaded sequences were slow to receive the shots, if they got them at all. This disconnect sets up a situation in which disease-affected countries might one day decide to keep information to themselves — an outcome that could be disastrous globally.”

COVID-19 0
April 7, 2022

New York Times: Is This What Endemic Disease Looks Like?

New York Times: Is This What Endemic Disease Looks Like?. “For months, some American and European leaders have foretold that the coronavirus pandemic would soon become endemic. Covid-19 would resolve into a disease that we learn to live with. According to several governors, it nearly has. But we are still in the acute phase of the pandemic, and what endemic Covid might look like remains a mystery. Endemic diseases can take many forms, and we do not know yet where this two-year-old disease will fall among them.”

COVID-19 0
December 31, 2021

‘Decoupling’: The COVID-19 trend doctors hope to see in 2022 (WBNS)

WBNS: ‘Decoupling’: The COVID-19 trend doctors hope to see in 2022. “Over 2020 and 2021, we’ve seen the pattern of waves. When cases increase, we see the number of hospitalizations go up as well. Unfortunately, when there’s an increase in hospitalizations, the number of deaths has gone up. Eventually the waves peak, crest, and the numbers decrease again. With omicron, we are going to see more cases. However, as more people get vaccines and boosters, will that be enough to ease the hospitalizations and deaths?”

COVID-19 0
November 2, 2021

Associated Press: COVID-19′s global death toll tops 5 million in under 2 years

Associated Press: COVID-19′s global death toll tops 5 million in under 2 years. “The global death toll from COVID-19 topped 5 million on Monday, less than two years into a crisis that has not only devastated poor countries but also humbled wealthy ones with first-rate health care systems. Together, the United States, the European Union, Britain and Brazil — all upper-middle- or high-income countries — account for one-eighth of the world’s population but nearly half of all reported deaths. The U.S. alone has recorded over 745,000 lives lost, more than any other nation.”

COVID-19 0
August 22, 2021

Route Fifty: The Coronavirus Is Here Forever. This Is How We Live With It.

Route Fifty: The Coronavirus Is Here Forever. This Is How We Live With It.. “Endemicity as the COVID-19 endgame seems quite clear, but how we get there is less so. In part, that is because the path depends on us. As my colleague Ed Yong has written, the eventuality of endemic COVID-19 does not mean we should drop all precautions. The more we can flatten the curve now, the less hospitals will become overwhelmed and the more time we buy to vaccinate the unvaccinated, including children. Letting the virus rip through unvaccinated people may get us to endemicity quickest, but it will also kill the most people along the way.”

COVID-19 0
November 5, 2020

CNN: What we can learn from 1918’s deadly second wave

CNN: What we can learn from 1918’s deadly second wave. “The 1918 pandemic transpired in three waves, from the spring of 1918 to the winter of 1919 — ultimately killing 50 million to 100 million people globally. The first wave in the spring of 1918 was relatively mild. A majority of 1918 flu deaths occurred in the fall of 1918 — the second, and worst, wave of the 1918 flu.”

COVID-19 0
August 19, 2020

New York Times: The Mask Slackers of 1918

New York Times: The Mask Slackers of 1918. “More than a century ago, as the 1918 influenza pandemic raged in the United States, masks of gauze and cheesecloth became the facial front lines in the battle against the virus. But as they have now, the masks also stoked political division. Then, as now, medical authorities urged the wearing of masks to help slow the spread of disease. And then, as now, some people resisted. In 1918 and 1919, as bars, saloons, restaurants, theaters and schools were closed, masks became a scapegoat, a symbol of government overreach, inspiring protests, petitions and defiant bare-face gatherings. All the while, thousands of Americans were dying in a deadly pandemic.”

COVID-19 0
July 16, 2020

The Anti-Mask League of 1919: The Cultural Battle of an Enduring Pandemic (Untapped New York)

Untapped New York: The Anti-Mask League of 1919: The Cultural Battle of an Enduring Pandemic. “Before discussing the actions of the anti-mask league, it is critical to remember just how widespread and deadly the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 was. The flu infected 500 million people around the world, 27% of the world’s population, and killed anywhere from 17 million to 50 million people. In New York City, 33,000 residents died — with 65% of the deaths occurring in the second wave. In the first year of the pandemic, the average life expectancy in the United States dropped by a staggering 12 years.”

COVID-19 0
July 2, 2020

Washington Post: Coronavirus cases rose by nearly 50 percent last month, led by states that reopened first

Washington Post: Coronavirus cases rose by nearly 50 percent last month, led by states that reopened first. “Coronavirus infections in the United States surged nearly 50 percent in June as states relaxed quarantine rules and tried to reopen their economies, data compiled Wednesday showed, and several states moved to reimpose restrictions on bars and recreation. More than 800,000 new cases were reported across the country last month, led by Florida, Arizona, Texas and California — bringing the nation’s officially reported total to just over 2.6 million, according to data compiled by The Washington Post.”

COVID-19 0
June 23, 2020

Guelph Now: Researchers Develop New Method Of Analyzing Social Media Data To Identify Potential Disease Outbreaks

Guelph Now: Researchers Develop New Method Of Analyzing Social Media Data To Identify Potential Disease Outbreaks. “A new method to analyze social media data could help predict future outbreaks of diseases and viruses like COVID-19 and the measles. In a new study, researchers from the University of Waterloo examined computer simulations to develop a new method of analyzing interactions on social media that can predict when a disease outbreak is likely.”

Research & Opinion 0
June 21, 2020

Coronavirus lockdowns may be driving another virus wave: Dengue fever (Straits Times)

Straits Times: Coronavirus lockdowns may be driving another virus wave: Dengue fever. “Getting people to hunker down at home has helped stem the coronavirus pandemic, but in parts of South-east Asia, it’s spurred another potentially deadly disease: dengue. The mosquito-borne viral illness, sometimes known as break-bone fever because of the joint-pain it inflicts, has skyrocketed in the tropical region just as the usual dengue-spreading season begins.”

COVID-19 0
June 18, 2020

New York Times: Slowing the Coronavirus Is Speeding the Spread of Other Diseases

New York Times: Slowing the Coronavirus Is Speeding the Spread of Other Diseases. “This spring, after the World Health Organization and UNICEF warned that the pandemic could spread swiftly when children gathered for shots, many countries suspended their inoculation programs. Even in countries that tried to keep them going, cargo flights with vaccine supplies were halted by the pandemic and health workers diverted to fight it. Now, diphtheria is appearing in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal.”

COVID-19 0
June 8, 2020

Washington Post: Shutdowns prevented 60 million coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds

Washington Post: Shutdowns prevented 60 million coronavirus infections in the U.S., study finds. “Shutdown orders prevented about 60 million novel coronavirus infections in the United States and 285 million in China, according to a research study published Monday that examined how stay-at-home orders and other restrictions limited the spread of the contagion. A separate study from epidemiologists at Imperial College London estimated that the shutdowns saved about 3.1 million lives in 11 European countries, including 500,000 in the United Kingdom, and dropped infection rates by an average of 82 percent, sufficient to drive the contagion well below epidemic levels.”

COVID-19 0

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