#medical news

[reasonsforhope]

"The Biden Administration last week [early December, 2023] announced it would be seizing patents for drugs and drug manufacturing procedures developed using government money.

A draft of the new law, seen by Reuters, said that the government will consider various factors including whether a medical situation is leading to increased prices of the drug at any given time, or whether only a small section of Americans can afford it.

The new executive order is the first exercise in what is called “march-in-rights” which allows relevant government agencies to redistribute patents if they were generated under government funding. The NIH has long maintained march-in-rights, but previous directors have been unwilling to use them, fearing consequences.

“We’ll make it clear that when drug companies won’t sell taxpayer funded drugs at reasonable prices, we will be prepared to allow other companies to provide those drugs for less,” White House adviser Lael Brainard said on a press call.

But just how much taxpayer money is going toward funding drugs? A research paper from the Insitute for New Economic Thought showed that “NIH funding contributed to research associated with every new drug approved from 2010-2019, totaling $230 billion.”

The authors of the paper continue, writing “NIH funding also produced 22 thousand patents, which provided marketing exclusivity for 27 (8.6%) of the drugs approved [between] 2010-2019.”

How we do drug discovery and production in America has a number of fundamental flaws that have created problems in the health service industry.

It costs billions of dollars and sometimes as many as 5 to 10 years to bring a drug to market in the US, which means that only companies with massive financial muscle can do so with any regularity, and that smaller, more innovative companies can’t compete with these pharma giants.

This also means that if a company can’t recoup that loss, a single failed drug can result in massive disruptions to business. To protect themselves, pharmaceutical companies establish piles of patents on drugs and drug manufacturing procedures. Especially if the drug in question treats a rare or obscure disease, these patents essentially ensure the company has monoselective pricing regimes.

However, if a company can convince the NIH that a particular drug should be considered a public health priority, they can be almost entirely funded by the government, as the research paper showed.

Some market participants, in this case the famous billionaire investor Mark Cuban, have attempted to remedy the issue of drug costs in America by manufacturing generic versions of patented drugs sold for common diseases."

-via Good News Network, December 11, 2023

#united states #us politics #biden administration #executive order #prescription drugs #medical news #healthcare #healthcare access #biden #big pharma #drug prices #public health #nih #national institutes of health #good news #hope

[thoughtportal]

https://www.news-medical.net/news/20220224/Study-reports-persistent-SARS-CoV-2-lingering-within-tissues-of-patients-with-long-COVID.aspx

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/long-covid-even-mild-covid-linked-damage-brain-months-infection-rcna18959

#tweet #tweets #twitter #COVID-19 #pandemic #medical news #article

[reality-detective]

THE INJECTABLE BIOWEAPON IS REAL

After taking the covid shot:

The 300% increase in all-case-mortality is real

The dying suddenly is real!

The myocarditis is real.

Pericarditis is real.

Gillian Barre Syndrome is real.

Turbo Cancer is real.

VAIDS is real!

Sterility is real!

THE GENOCIDE IS REAL !

#pay attention #educate yourselves #educate yourself #knowledge is power #reeducate yourself #reeducate yourselves #think about it #think for yourselves #think for yourself #do your homework #do some research #do your own research #ask yourself questions #question everything #media manipulation #medical news #medical tyranny #medical corruption #government corruption

[lookingforcactus]

"The Food and Drug Administration announced Thursday it would end its ban on allowing blood donations from men who have recently had sex with men. New guidelines instead advise asking all potential donors the same questions about their recent sexual history, regardless of their sexual orientation, sex or gender.

At the same time, the agency said they would not allow donations from people taking PrEP to prevent HIV, because the medication can cause a false negative test for HIV/AIDS.

The new policy is based on multiple scientific studies and follows the lead of Canada and the United Kingdom, which have adopted similar approaches. The update has the potential to “expand the number of people eligible to donate blood, while also maintaining the appropriate safeguards to protect the safety of the blood supply,” the FDA said in a press release.

LGBTQ advocacy groups have long criticized the ban on blood donations from gay men — ostensibly a way to prevent the spread of HIV — as discriminatory. In 2015, the FDA ended its lifetime ban on donations from gay men, replacing it with a requirement for one year of abstinence before a donation would be accepted.

The latest policy eliminates screening questions specific to men who have sex with men and their partners. Instead, anyone who reports having anal sex, or sex with new or multiple partners, in the past three months could have their blood donation delayed to reduce the risk of taking donations from people who have recently been infected with HIV, the agency’s press release said.

GLAAD’s president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis posted a statement on Twitter lauding “the FDA’s decision to follow science,” calling the updated guidelines “the beginning of the end of a dark and discriminatory past rooted in fear and homophobia.”"

-via Rolling Stone, 5/11/23

#homophobia #queerphobia #gay men #bi men #queer men #lgbtq #cdc #united states #us politics #blood #medical news #good news #hope

[gumjrop]

The Weather

This week we see a sharp increase of COVID in all regions, likely due to increased travel around the recent holiday long weekend and dropping temperatures that bring a lot of gatherings indoors. As the holiday season continues, we remind our readers to use layers of protection — such as ventilation, air purification, masking with a KN95/N95 or better, and testing via PCR or NAAT or testing serially with rapid antigen tests — to protect themselves and their loved ones both during travel and at your holiday gatherings.  Repeat COVID infection has serious implications for everyone, not just the elderly or those with preexisting conditions. Even if you experience a mild case, COVID is a vascular disease that causes multiple organ damage, autoimmune conditions, inflammation and immune system dysregulation that you might not necessarily experience at the time of your infection. It’s important to note that if you or your loved ones have experienced previous COVID infections, you may have entered a high risk group for severe effects and hospitalization without realizing it.  Some people may feel worn down by the current state of the virus, by fatigue of lack of resources, or from the energy spent protecting one’s self from an infection; with increasing wastewater levels and the onset of a new dominant variant this week, now is really the crunch time to stay strong and endure. For those who have stopped precautions, we invite you to return to masking and other levels to minimize transmission. This is the most important time to return to masking to protect yourself and others.

The Current Wastewater Viral Activity Map shows viral activity by state. As of 12/02/23, many states are reporting “very high” to “high” COVID levels with 5 states reporting low levels. Seven states reported no data. The CDC currently rates our nationally reported COVID wastewater viral activity levels as “high”.

Levels are at an incline in all regions, but the Midwest takes a strong lead with a viral activity level of 10.94. This is a wastewater value that surpasses all readings for the Midwest in the past 2 years, and is the third highest of any reading since the onset of the Omicron variant in January of 2022 where we saw the highest levels of spread we have experienced in the entirety of the pandemic. Current Midwestern wastewater levels were surpassed only by a viral activity level of 13.02 in the South on 12/31/2022 and of 11.79 in the West on 07/02/2023. As with Biobot data, the most recent two weeks (indicated by gray shading on the graph) are subject to change due to reporting delays. As we enter the cold and flu season when many in-person gatherings are held, we encourage you to continue monitoring local reports for a more accurate measure of levels. Also, please continue to use and support others in using layers of protection. And as we continue to report on advocacy successes, remember that our actions and voices can enact change — this level of unchecked spread is unacceptable and we must demand better resources and protections from our policy makers!

Deaths

Percentage of total deaths in the US caused by COVID has risen 25% in the past week. Remember that these numbers are an undercount related to reporting delays in place since the Biden Administration ended the Public Health Emergency. Alarmingly, the current increase in deaths is large enough to show despite these changes.

COVID remains the third leading cause of death according to the CDC in the US. COVID is the highest single cause of death, only second to Heart Disease and Cancer which are both umbrella headings for more specific diseases. We mourn all those who have died due to COVID, and in that mourning, call you to take measures to prevent death and disablement for yourself, your loved ones, and your communities.

Ventilation and Air Filtration

Moving activities outdoors or ensuring your indoor setting has consistent fresh airflow is key to ensuring high quality ventilation. We recommend monitoring carbon dioxide levels and making adjustments as needed. Air filtration is important as well. If you’re looking for a HEPA air purifier or Corsi-Rosenthal Box for your family, it is important to get a filtration device that is powerful enough to change out the air for your particular room size. Clean Air Stars has created a free tool to calculate which filter could be right for you depending on the size of the rooms that you wish to clean and how many people will be attending your gathering.

Testing

Whether you are making the trip home or staying in one place this holiday season, with the current level of spread it is important to know your COVID status before engaging in social activity. Rapid antigen tests are designed to be “the most rapid” at telling those who are symptomatic whether the symptoms they are experiencing are or are not caused by COVID. If you are asymptomatic, presymptomatic, or less than 5 days out from your COVID exposure, using one single rapid test is not an effective way of determining whether or not a person is currently infected with and contagious with COVID. Persons using rapid antigen tests should take at least 2 rapid antigen tests 48 hours apart from one another and isolate in between, in order to avoid spreading their unconfirmed case as well as avoid exposure to COVID during this waiting period, which could produce a false test negative result. Persons who are experiencing COVID symptoms but test negative on an initial rapid antigen test also need to isolate themselves from others, assume they have COVID, and test again in 48 hours. Persons who are asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic who experience 2 negative serial tests must mask or isolate and wait a final 48 hours to test a third time in order to confirm a negative COVID case. For this reason, rapid antigen tests are only ideal to use in preparation for events where the user has a week prior available to test multiple times and isolate. FDA approved home Nucleic Acid Amplification Tests or NAATs are a more sensitive home test option, some brands of which have been found to, with only one test, verify both positive and negative results at 92.9% and 98.7% respective accuracy. NAATs can be a more sensitive, quicker option to use in preparation for events. Another more recent clinical trial found that performing a combined throat and nose sample increased sensitivity for healthcare worker and self-collected specimens. When testing at home with a rapid antigen test, it is worth it to take a combination sample like this one. To ensure the most sensitive results for both symptomatic and asymptomatic cases, get a PCR test. No-cost PCR testing sites that are available via the federal ICATT program can be found via this search tool. Remember to also check for regional offerings such as NYC’s COVID express test centers that test for COVID, RSV, FLU A and FLU B free of cost with results typically returned by end of day, that could be a more convenient option for you. PCR testing is the gold standard if you are making plans to be in a social setting.  If you do not have fast free PCR testing in your area, demand that it be made publicly available by the government at all levels!

Wins

Grassroots organizing group and “Mask Blocs” continue to take to social media encouraging Pro-Palestine protesters to continue to wear masks in their organizing spaces and during protests highlighting historic use of unrestricted and eugenic viral spread as a weapon of occupation and colonization. The National Institutes of Health’s Home Test to Treat program has upgraded its free test offerings and now instead of rapid antigen tests, will provide LUCIRA by Pfizer home NAAT tests can that effectively detect asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic COVID infections as well as Flu A and Flu B. Those who are uninsured or underinsured can sign up for this program to access free NAAT testing, telehealth services, and treatment medications for COVID and the Flu. If your household has not placed a new order for more rapid tests from the federal government through covidtests.gov, you can still place an order for 4 free rapid antigen tests here.    

Take Action

If you are out protesting this weekend or planning your trip home to visit family for the holidays, connect with your local COVID advocacy group to pick up high quality masks for yourself and to pass on to those around you. This Tuesday, December 12th, the director of the CDC and the American Medical Association are hosting a virtual fireside chat to discuss Fall & Winter Respiratory Virus Season (prior registration required). We encourage you to attend. You might ask the CDC why they aren’t ensuring precautions in healthcare settings? Or you could ask why they’re relying on a reactive, vaccine-only approach instead of layers of protection to proactively prevent COVID?

#op #img #covid #covid news #covid pandemic #covid 19 #covid-19 #covid19 #coronavirus #pandemic #medical #medical news #pcdc #people's cdc #wear a mask #covid isn't over #described in alt text

[spooniestrong]

#spooniestrong #spoonie #medical news #inverse vaccine #autoimmune disease

[thesecretlifeofmecfs]

A very important medical journal recently published that discusses the harm in falsely labeling ME/CFS as psychosomatic.

#mecfs #cfsme #myalgic encephalomyelitis #chronic fatigue syndrome #medical news #spoonie #mecfs research #medical journal

[maisha-online]

The Increased Risk of Arrhythmias Following COVID-19: What You Need to Know

The Increased Risk of Arrhythmias Following COVID-19: What You Need to Know #Covid19 #Arrhythmia #SARS #CoronaVirus #CardiacArrhythmia #Heart #HeartHealth

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought to light the numerous complications associated with the disease caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). While the respiratory symptoms of COVID-19 are well-known, there is growing evidence suggesting an increased risk of cardiovascular complications, including arrhythmias, in individuals who have contracted the virus. In this…

View On WordPress

#Arrhythmias #Can COVID cause cardiac arrhythmias? #Corona Virus #Covid #Covid-19 #Heart Problems after COVID-19 #Medical News #SARS #SARS-CoV-2

[gay-jewish-bucky]

Honestly, the most believable part of this is that she hasn't returned the FDA's calls...

(Source MAUDE Adverse Event Report: MRI SCANNER SYSTEM, NUCLEAR MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING (fda.gov))

#nsft #i don't even know how to tag this #id in alt #i was reading a snopes article and here i am #the fact “don't wear sex toys into a fucking magnet” has to be said... #personcole #medicine #medical news #i guess #fda

[workersolidarity]

🇨🇳 🏨 🚨 CHINA IMPLEMENTS DRONE PROGRAM FOR BLOOD TRANSPORTATION IN SHENZHEN PROVINCE

📸 Photos from the implementation of a new drone transportation platform for blood transfusion emergencies at the Shenzhen Blood Center in Shenzhen, in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong.

The new program was implemented by the Shenzhen Blood Center and is seen here being used for the transportation of blood from the Shenzhen Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital for the first time on Friday, January 19th, 2024.

Integrating both Artificial Intelligence (AI) and 5G communications technology, the new platform is said to help "ensure safety and improved efficiency of blood transportation," according to an article published in China's Xinhua News Agency.

#source

@WorkerSolidarityNews

#china #china news #chinese news #blood transportation #blood transfusion #medical news #technology #tech news #news in china #politics #news #geopolitics #world news #global news #international news #breaking news #current events #medical technology #medicine in china #chinese politics

[littlesugarwords]

potentially about to get some bad medical news today so :(((((

fingers crossed it isn't bad!! i'll provide updates once my appointment is over.

#announcement #update #anxiety #medical news #just anxiety things

[reasonsforhope]

Story from the Washington Post here, non-paywall version here.

Washington Post stop blocking linksharing and shit challenge.

"The young woman was catatonic, stuck at the nurses’ station — unmoving, unblinking and unknowing of where or who she was.

Her name was April Burrell.

Before she became a patient, April had been an outgoing, straight-A student majoring in accounting at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. But after a traumatic event when she was 21, April suddenly developed psychosis and became lost in a constant state of visual and auditory hallucinations. The former high school valedictorian could no longer communicate, bathe or take care of herself.

April was diagnosed with a severe form of schizophrenia, an often devastating mental illness that affects approximately 1 percent of the global population and can drastically impair how patients behave and perceive reality.

“She was the first person I ever saw as a patient,” said Sander Markx, director of precision psychiatry at Columbia University, who was still a medical student in 2000 when he first encountered April. “She is, to this day, the sickest patient I’ve ever seen.” ...

It would be nearly two decades before their paths crossed again. But in 2018, another chance encounter led to several medical discoveries...

Markx and his colleagues discovered that although April’s illness was clinically indistinguishable from schizophrenia, she also had lupus, an underlying and treatable autoimmune condition that was attacking her brain.

After months of targeted treatments [for lupus] — and more than two decades trapped in her mind — April woke up.

The awakening of April — and the successful treatment of other people with similar conditions — now stand to transform care for some of psychiatry’s sickest patients, many of whom are languishing in mental institutions.

Researchers working with the New York state mental health-care system have identified about 200 patients with autoimmune diseases, some institutionalized for years, who may be helped by the discovery.

And scientists around the world, including Germany and Britain, are conducting similar research, finding that underlying autoimmune and inflammatory processes may be more common in patients with a variety of psychiatric syndromes than previously believed.

Although the current research probably will help only a small subset of patients, the impact of the work is already beginning to reshape the practice of psychiatry and the way many cases of mental illness are diagnosed and treated.

“These are the forgotten souls,” said Markx. “We’re not just improving the lives of these people, but we’re bringing them back from a place that I didn’t think they could come back from.” ...

Waking up after two decades

The medical team set to work counteracting April’s rampaging immune system and started April on an intensive immunotherapy treatment for neuropsychiatric lupus...

The regimen is grueling, requiring a month-long break between each of the six rounds to allow the immune system to recover. But April started showing signs of improvement almost immediately...

A joyful reunion

“I’ve always wanted my sister to get back to who she was,” Guy Burrell said.

In 2020, April was deemed mentally competent to discharge herself from the psychiatric hospital where she had lived for nearly two decades, and she moved to a rehabilitation center...

Because of visiting restrictions related to covid, the family’s face-to-face reunion with April was delayed until last year. April’s brother, sister-in-law and their kids were finally able to visit her at a rehabilitation center, and the occasion was tearful and joyous.

“When she came in there, you would’ve thought she was a brand-new person,” Guy Burrell said. “She knew all of us, remembered different stuff from back when she was a child.” ...

The family felt as if they’d witnessed a miracle.

“She was hugging me, she was holding my hand,” Guy Burrell said. “You might as well have thrown a parade because we were so happy, because we hadn’t seen her like that in, like, forever.”

“It was like she came home,” Markx said. “We never thought that was possible.”

...After April’s unexpected recovery, the medical team put out an alert to the hospital system to identify any patients with antibody markers for autoimmune disease. A few months later, Anca Askanase, a rheumatologist and director of the Columbia Lupus Center,who had been on April’s treatment team, approached Markx. “I think we found our girl,” she said.

Bringing back Devine

When Devine Cruz was 9, she began to hear voices. At first, the voices fought with one another. But as she grew older, the voices would talk about her, [and over the years, things got worse].

For more than a decade, the young woman moved in and out of hospitals for treatment. Her symptoms included visual and auditory hallucinations, as well as delusions that prevented her from living a normal life.

Devine was eventually diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, which can result in symptoms of both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. She also was diagnosed with intellectual disability.

She was on a laundry list of drugs — two antipsychotic medications, lithium, clonazepam, Ativan and benztropine — that came with a litany of side effects but didn’t resolve all her symptoms...

She also had lupus, which she had been diagnosed with when she was about 14, although doctors had never made a connection between the disease and her mental health...

Last August, the medical team prescribed monthly immunosuppressive infusions of corticosteroids and chemotherapy drugs, a regime similar to what April had been given a few years prior. By October, there were already dramatic signs of improvement.

“She was like ‘Yeah, I gotta go,’” Markx said. “‘Like, I’ve been missing out.’”

After several treatments, Devine began developing awareness that the voices in her head were different from real voices, a sign that she was reconnecting with reality. She finished her sixth and final round of infusions in January.

In March, she was well enough to meet with a reporter. “I feel like I’m already better,” Devine said during a conversation in Markx’s office at the New York State Psychiatric Institute, where she was treated. “I feel myself being a person that I was supposed to be my whole entire life.” ...

Her recovery is remarkable for several reasons, her doctors said. The voices and visions have stopped. And she no longer meets the diagnostic criteria for either schizoaffective disorder or intellectual disability, Markx said...

Today, Devine lives with her mother and is leading a more active and engaged life. She helps her mother cook, goes to the grocery store and navigates public transportation to keep her appointments. She is even babysitting her siblings’ young children — listening to music, taking them to the park or watching “Frozen 2” — responsibilities her family never would have entrusted her with before her recovery.

Expanding the search for more patients

While it is likely that only a subset of people diagnosed with schizophrenia and psychotic disorders have an underlying autoimmune condition, Markx and other doctors believe there are probably many more patients whose psychiatric conditions are caused or exacerbated by autoimmune issues...

The cases of April and Devine also helped inspire the development of the SNF Center for Precision Psychiatry and Mental Health at Columbia, which was named for the Stavros Niarchos Foundation, which awarded it a $75 million grant in April. The goal of the center is to develop new treatments based on specific genetic and autoimmune causes of psychiatric illness, said Joseph Gogos, co-director of the SNF Center.

Markx said he has begun care and treatment on about 40 patients since the SNF Center opened. The SNF Center is working with the New York State Office of Mental Health, which oversees one of the largest public mental health systems in America, to conduct whole genome sequencing and autoimmunity screening on inpatients at long-term facilities.

For “the most disabled, the sickest of the sick, even if we can help just a small fraction of them, by doing these detailed analyses, that’s worth something,” said Thomas Smith, chief medical officer for the New York State Office of Mental Health. “You’re helping save someone’s life, get them out of the hospital, have them live in the community, go home.”

Discussions are underway to extend the search to the 20,000 outpatients in the New York state system as well. Serious psychiatric disorders, like schizophrenia, are more likely to be undertreated in underprivileged groups. And autoimmune disorders like lupus disproportionately affect women and people of color with more severity.

Changing psychiatric care

How many people ultimately will be helped by the research remains a subject of debate in the scientific community. But the research has spurred excitement about the potential to better understand what is going on in the brain during serious mental illness...

Emerging research has implicated inflammation and immunological dysfunction as potential players in a variety of neuropsychiatric conditions, including schizophrenia, depression and autism.

“It opens new treatment possibilities to patients that used to be treated very differently,” said Ludger Tebartz van Elst, a professor of psychiatry and psychotherapy at University Medical Clinic Freiburg in Germany.

In one study, published last year in Molecular Psychiatry, Tebartz van Elst and his colleagues identified 91 psychiatric patients with suspected autoimmune diseases, and reported that immunotherapies benefited the majority of them.

Belinda Lennox, head of the psychiatry department at the University of Oxford, is enrolling patients in clinical trials to test the effectiveness of immunotherapy for autoimmune psychosis patients.

As a result of the research, screenings for immunological markers in psychotic patients are already routine in Germany, where psychiatrists regularly collect samples from cerebrospinal fluid.

Markx is also doing similar screening with his patients. He believes highly sensitive and inexpensive blood tests to detect different antibodies should become part of the standard screening protocol for psychosis.

Also on the horizon: more targeted immunotherapy rather than current “sledgehammer approaches” that suppress the immune system on a broad level, said George Yancopoulos, the co-founder and president of the pharmaceutical company Regeneron.

“I think we’re at the dawn of a new era. This is just the beginning,” said Yancopoulos."

-via The Washington Post, June 1, 2023

#mental illness #schizophrenia #schizoaffective #psychotic disorders #psychology #neurology #autoimmune #autoimmine disease #neuroscience #medical news #medical research #catatonia #immunotherapy #immune system #clinical trials #good news #hope

[reality-detective]

Video from the news that covered for them with the jabber-dohickies over 10 years ago explains how Pfizer gets around breaking the law. They knew this a long time ago but it's still happening. 🤔

#pay attention #educate yourselves #educate yourself #knowledge is power #reeducate yourself #reeducate yourselves #think about it #think for yourselves #think for yourself #do your homework #do some research #do your own research #ask yourself questions #question everything #medical corruption #medical news #news

[jennifermnhi]

Five US Navy sailors hospitalized watercraft hits jetty near naval base in San Diego in training op [Video]

#CaliforniaHospitalNews #MedicalNews #California #CaliforniaHealthcare #California Hospital News #Medical News #California Healthcare

[gumjrop]

The Weather

The CDC has finally released their own wastewater dashboard with state-level and regional trends. After public pressure to expand wastewater surveillance in September, including from all of us, it’s great to see some progress. The CDC’s National Wastewater Surveillance System (NWSS) landing page now includes dashboards to check national wastewater viral activity for COVID and Mpox. Additional dashboards for National and Regional trends, State and Territory trends, a wastewater viral activity map, and variants in wastewater are available.

As of 11/25/23, the Current Wastewater Viral Activity Map shows viral activity by state. Many states are reporting high to moderate COVID levels with very few reporting low levels. Approximately 350 sites delayed testing since September 15, 2023. After these sites have resumed testing for six weeks, their data will be added to the dataset. However, we’d suggest the CDC reconsider its color choices, as the calming blue shades they’ve chosen for “high” COVID transmission are misleading at best. They can refer to our red-shaded transmission map for reference.

Also updated 11/25/23, the national wastewater viral activity level is high and seems to be trending upward. The West is in decline while the Midwest, South, Northeast and National levels are at an incline. As with Biobot data, the most recent two weeks (indicated by gray shading on the graph) are subject to change due to reporting delays. Trends mentioned in this text are based on the areas before the shaded area shown in the graph. As we enter the cold and flu season, many in-person gatherings are held. We encourage you to continue monitoring local reports for a more accurate measure of levels. Also, please continue to, and support others in using, layers of protection. And as we continue to report on advocacy successes, remember that our actions and voices can enact change!

Hospitalizations

Weekly hospitalizations are trending upward in the last three weeks according to the CDC’s COVID data tracker, with over 19,000 weekly admissions reported 11/25/23. Since we last reported deaths on 10/28/23, there have been an additional 3731 deaths reported, for an average of almost 750 deaths per week. Remember that these numbers are an undercount related to reporting delays in place since the Biden Administration ended the Public Health Emergency. Remember also that COVID deaths follow hospitalization numbers, so we expect these numbers to increase in the weeks to come.

COVID remains the third leading cause of death according to the CDC in the US. We mourn all those who have died due to COVID, and in that mourning, call you to take measures to prevent death and disablement for yourself, your loved ones, and your communities. 

Wins

Early this month, school districts across the United States will be able to order free Covid-19 rapid tests from the national stockpile to be distributed to schools with the HHS encouragement to share them with, “students, staff, family members and others in the community.” While this school project of the Biden Administration feels long overdue, we hope new access to free tests aids in preventing the spread of Covid-19, if used correctly.  If your household has not placed a new order for more rapid tests from the federal government through covidtests.gov, you can still place an order for 4 free rapid covid tests here. The Horward Zinn Book Fair this weekend is requiring masks indoors, and outdoors, within 15 feet outdoors of the venue.  Increasingly progressive groups in this country are connecting the dots between our governments’ attempts to erase the ongoing pandemic in an effort to restore business as usual and the necessity of centering public health and disability justice in our social movements. Send them a note of thanks here. 

Take Action

We urge you to take a moment to read and sign on to this letter, authored by public health and medical professionals, demanding CDC Director Mandy Cohen reject HICPAC’s (Healthcare Infection Control Practice Advisory Committee) Guideline for Isolation Precautions: Preventing Transmission of Infectious Agents in Healthcare Settings. Current draft guidelines are incredibly insufficient, inappropriate, and fail to protect both patients and healthcare workers.  Letter can be found HERE. You also still have time to sign on to the National Nurses United letter urging the CDC “to reject HICPAC’s weak draft and create a new one that protects health care workers and their patients!” Sign-on deadline for both letters is this Friday, December 8, 2023.

#op #covid #covid news #covid pandemic #covid 19 #covid-19 #covid19 #coronavirus #pandemic #coronavirus pandemic #people's cdc #pcdc #medical #medical news #covid isn't over

[wanderervenom]

From CNN: FDA advisers vote in support of RSV vaccine to protect newborns

FDA advisers vote in support of RSV vaccine to protect newborns

#us news #medical news