March 17, 2023 – Erroneous Consonance. How inaccurate beliefs about physician opinion influence COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy “Because PCPs are largely trusted on issues related to COVID-19 operate outside of government bureaucracy, and frequently interact with members of the public on an individual basis, we think that better public health messaging is needed to inform the public about PCP perceptions and scientific consensus regarding COVID-19 responsibility. This could include PCPs taking an active role in communicating with patients regarding scientific consensus on COVID-19 and the responsibility that individuals and other entities ought to play in curbing its spread.
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March 17, 2023 – Patients’ Post-/Long-COVID Symptoms, Vaccination and Functional Status—Findings from a State-Wide Online Screening Study “Implications to prevent post-/long-COVID can only partially be drawn from this study. However, reviewing the current evidence, we can conclude that vaccinations are just one strategy to prevent severe infections and the long-term, post-acute sequelae of infection. Attempts to overcome post-/long-COVID should take more options than vaccinations into account, such as behavioral interventions and medical rehabilitation treatments addressing the coping mechanisms, and appropriate, safe patient behavior is required.

March 17, 2023 – Two new vaccines against bird flu effective in Dutch lab -govt “Avian influenza, commonly called bird flu, has been spreading around the world in the past year, killing more than 200 million birds – and six million in the Netherlands alone – sending egg prices rocketing and raising concern among governments about human transmission.”

March 17, 2023 – The Strongest Evidence Yet That an Animal Started the Pandemic A new analysis of genetic samples from China appears to link the pandemic’s origin to raccoon dogs.

March 17, 2023 – Trends in Reported Babesiosis Cases — United States, 2011–2019 “Incidence increased significantly in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Vermont (p<0.001), with the largest increases reported in Vermont (1,602%, from two to 34 cases), Maine (1,422%, from nine to 138), New Hampshire (372%, from 13 to 78), and Connecticut (338%, from 74 to 328).”

March 16, 2023 – Pfizer’s Paxlovid Antiviral Gets FDA Panel’s Nod for Full Approval “FDA Panel Backs Full Approval of Paxlovid for COVID-19
— “Besides oxygen, Paxlovid has probably been the single most important treatment,” says panelist“

March 16, 2023 – Warning over worldwide boom in labs designed to handle deadliest pathogens – as top scientists fear ‘leak’ from poorly-run  sites in Asia “More than 100 facilities tasked with storing and experimenting on viruses like Ebola and bird flu now exist globally. . . . The report warns this may ‘exacerbate’ the potential impact of an accidental release with the labs holding pathogens like arbor pathogens like smallpox, Ebola and Lassa fever.”The report warns this may ‘exacerbate’ the potential impact of an accidental release with the labs holding pathogens like arbor pathogens like smallpox, Ebola and Lassa fever.“

March 16, 2023 – Multiorgan Abnormalities on MRI in People with “Long COVID”  “On MRI of 536 participants at baseline, 59% and 23% had impairment in ≥1 and ≥2 organs, respectively (Figure 2(c)), although impairment was usually mild (Table S6), e.g. among participants with cardiac impairment, none had severe heart failure. Liver steatosis, kidney fibro-inflammation and splenomegaly at baseline were more frequent in all symptom groups (Table S4). Liver steatosis was associated with systemic symptoms and severe breathlessness (Figure S5). In the follow-up group, . . . Multi-organ impairment did not improve (29% to 27%; p = 0.336). Individuals without organ impairment had lower symptom burden compared to those with at least one organ impairment (Figure S6). At baseline, lung impairment (lower fractional area change) and impairment in ≥3 organs had the highest symptom burden. Healthcare workers were more likely to have liver impairment (p = 0.015 at baseline and p = 0.034 at follow-up) than the rest of the cohort.”

March 16, 2023 – Addressing the Long-term Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Children and FamiliesA Report From the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine “In the US more than 265 000 children have lost a parent or caregiver to COVID-19. The number of bereaved US children is high overall but there are important differences: 1 in 753 White children lost a parent or caregiver to COVID-19, but rates for Black (1 in 310), Latino (1 in 412), and Native American (1 in 168) children are even higher, and portend a cascade of negative effects that can follow if appropriate supports are not ensured for these children and their families throughout their continued development.

March 16, 2023 – Millions of Avoidable Deaths from COVID-19 “In the recent pandemic, a common reason many people died is the failure to use widely available, highly effective, safe, and inexpensive treatments that have proven to drastically reduce morbidity and mortality from this disease. Over the last several centuries and especially within the last decades, we have gained a huge amount of medical knowledge about biochemistry and nutrition — and how important this is for maintaining a strong, resilient body and immune system. For example, cardiologist Dr. Thomas Levy wrote entire books that describe how extremely high dose vitamin C can treat or cure a wide spectrum of infectious diseases. He cites more than 1,000 studies and reports from doctors and scientists who published lifesaving results from the use of nutrition supplements.”

February 17, 2023 – Genetic and epidemiological description of an outbreak of circulating vaccine-derived polio-virus type 2 (cVDPV2) in Angola, 2019–2020 – “Therefore, any changes in cVDPV2 detection are likely due to a true decrease of the virus in the environment. Further, all Sabin 2 isolates were detected after SIA operations with mOPV2 had been launched in the same districts where the environmental samples had been collected. This finding supports the statement that Sabin 2 was introduced by response operations alone.
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