Contagion

Omicron survives longer on plastic, skin than prior variants; nose swabbing found best for rapid tests --studies

Tue, 2022-01-25 11:24 — mike kraft

Omicron survives longer on plastic, skin than prior variants; nose swabbing found best for rapid tests The Omicron variant can survive longer than earlier versions of the coronavirus on plastic surfaces and human skin, Japanese researchers found in laboratory tests. Its high "environmental stability" - its ability to remain infectious - might have helped Omicron replace Delta as the dominant variant and spread rapidly, they said.

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New Hampshire schools struggle to keep students in class, help them get vaccinations

Tue, 2022-01-25 10:48 — mike kraft

New Hampshire schools hold vaccination clinics as COVID-19 surge continues

MANCHESTER, N.H. —

Some New Hampshire school districts are still struggling to keep students in class, but officials are hopeful that the COVID-19 winter surge is nearing an end.

The Department of Health and Human Services dashboard currently lists more than 1,000 active COVID-19 cases in New Hampshire schools, with 299 clusters, although the dashboard is not always up to date.

School officials said they're not only trying to control the spread of COVID-19, but also trying to keep children in school in the future. Woodsville Elementary School is closed through Wednesday because of 30 active cases, making up more than 10% of the students in the school.

"I am hopeful that the three days of school closure will provide time for some of our positive cases to clear and allow for deep cleaning," Superintendent Laurie Melanson said. "We are providing student meals during these three days for pick up at the school."

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Masks: New York state judge strikes down mask mandate; LA mandates non-cloth masks; Atlanta makes masks optional

Tue, 2022-01-25 10:29 — mike kraft

New York state judge strikes down mask mandate -- but education department says schools must follow mask rule A state judge struck down New York state's mask mandate Monday, ruling the governor and state Department of Health did not have the authority to enact such a mandate without approval from the legislature. Artemis Moshtaghian, CNN CNN

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Omicron BA.2 Variant May Be Extra Transmissible

Tue, 2022-01-25 10:15 — mike kraft

Omicron BA.2 Variant May Be Extra Transmissible 'Only having a transmissibility advantage at this stage of the game isn't a total showstopper' Kristina Fiore medpagetoday

The Omicron sublineage BA.2 is making headlines for its potentially increased transmissibility as its prevalence rises in some countries, but experts aren't too concerned about the variant just yet.

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Pfizer and BioNTech announce plans to test omicron-specific COVID-19 vaccine in adult trials

Tue, 2022-01-25 10:00 — mike kraft

Pfizer and BioNTech announce plans to test omicron-specific COVID-19 vaccine in adult trials Pfizer and BioNTech will conduct three simultaneous trials in adults to determine if an omicron-specific vaccine is more effective than current shots. YahooNews

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You can catch the flu and Covid. No, 'flurona' isn't real.

Mon, 2022-01-24 19:31 — mike kraft

Scientists want to clear the air on a 'misleading' trend: 'Flurona' isn't real It would have been hard to know in March 2020 that Covid-19 testing limitations in New York City would help lead doctors at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bro NBC News

It would have been hard to know in March 2020 that Covid-19 testing limitations in New York City would help lead doctors at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx to a fascinating surprise.

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Small Towns With Small Work Forces have Big Problems when COVID strikes

Mon, 2022-01-24 19:00 — mike kraft

In Marvell, Ark., a tiny Mississippi Delta town of 855 residents tucked into a sea of cotton, soy bean and corn fields, Lee Guest is a particularly essential essential worker.

He is the mayor and the assistant fire chief, and his day job is as a rural mail carrier. If the four employees of the local water utility don’t show up, he knows enough about the system to keep the water flowing, too.

“There’s a handful of us — we can go get stuff taken care of,” he said. ...

Out of 13 full-time and 11 part-time employees, six have gotten Covid-19. One, who went to a hospital but wasn’t admitted, got sick in 2020. The rest of the cases have tested positive in the last three weeks.

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Rich countries' hiring foreign nurses during Omicron raises ethical concerns, group says

Mon, 2022-01-24 18:43 — mike kraft

Rich countries' access to foreign nurses during Omicron raises ethical concerns, group says The Omicron-fuelled wave of COVID-19 infections has led wealthy countries to intensify their recruitment of nurses from poorer parts of the world, worsening dire staffing shortages in overstretched workforces there, the International Council of Nurses said. Emma Farge

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BA.2, newest COVID-19 variant, found in Washington state, health officials say

Mon, 2022-01-24 17:26 — mike kraft

BA.2, newest COVID-19 variant, found in Washington state, health officials say State health officials confirmed to KOMO News on Monday that BA. 2, the newest variant of COVID-19, has been detected in Washington state, which is still grappling with a surge in cases from the omicron and delta variants.

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Rapid COVID tests: Their accuracy and efforts to improve them

Mon, 2022-01-24 10:39 — mike kraft

Why rapid COVID tests aren't more accurate and how scientists hope to improve them

How much should you trust the results of a rapid antigen test? That's a question many people are asking these days amid recent research and anecdotes suggesting these tests may be less sensitive to omicron. Researchers are working fast to figure out what's going on and how to improve the tests.

That includes people like Dr. Wilbur Lam, a professor of pediatrics and biomedical engineering at Emory University and one of the lead investigators assessing COVID-19 diagnostic tests for the federal government. His research team began evaluating rapid antigen tests against live samples of the omicron variant last December in the lab, and in early assessments, he says, some tests failed to detect the coronavirus "at a concentration that we would have expected them to catch it if it were another variant."

That finding prompted the Food and Drug Administration to update its online guidance in late December to note that, while rapid antigen tests do detect the omicron variant, "they may have reduced sensitivity."

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