CoronaVirus

Jan 18th, 2021 - Making people stand in front of a scanner to have their body temperature read can result in a large number of false negatives, allowing people with Covid-19 to pass through airports and hospitals undetected. Leading experts in physiology have suggested instead that taking temperature readings of a person’s fingertip and eye would give a significantly better and more reliable reading and help identify those with fever. The study, co-led by a human physiologist and an expert in temperature regulation, Professor Mike Tipton, is published in Experimental Physiology . If scanners are not giving ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - F or the last nine months, my team of anthropologists and I have been asking people across the United States to tell us their experiences of living during a global pandemic. We have seen a dangerous theme emerge: the belief that dangers of the virus come from strangers and that friendship and family ties can cancel contagion. Though logical, these interpretations of biology are wrong — sometimes dead wrong. Stories help people make sense of a world in crisis. They can also lead to potentially harmful behaviors that can interfere with the ability to stay healthy or protect loved ones from ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - The potentially deadly coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) that has swept the world over the last 12 months has not affected animals with corresponding severity. In order to understand the mechanism of severe disease, animal models have been used. This includes a mouse model that expresses human angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (hACE2) under the cytokeratin 18 promoter (K18-hACE2). A new preprint appearing on the * server indicates that this may not be a faithful model of human lethal infection with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). In most cases, COVID-19 causes ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - Footage obtained by Al Jazeera shows the early days of the COVID-19 outbreak and Chinese government censorship attempts. Video footage from Wuhan during the earliest days of the COVID-19 outbreak shows how the Chinese government could have done more to prevent the coronavirus from spreading, and its attempts to stop journalists from reporting on it. In 3 Days that Stopped the World , two Chinese journalists, through undercover filming and diaries, reveal the almost overnight transformation of the city of 11 million people as nonchalance about the virus was replaced by panic and overcrowded ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - The agency on Monday reported 63 additional confirmed deaths related to COVID-19, including one in Charlton County, bringing the state’s total to 11,095 confirmed deaths since the start of the pandemic. According to the state Department of Public Health, 5,957,306 tests have been performed in the state, which had a 10.9% positivity rate, as of Monday. On Monday, 122 additional hospitalizations were reported, bringing the state’s total to 46,741 since the outbreak began. Common symptoms of COVID-19 include fever, cough, breathing trouble, sore throat, muscle pain, and loss of taste or ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - People in their 70s and the clinically extremely vulnerable in England are now among those being offered the vaccine. However, Health Secretary Matt Hancock said UK data showed more people were in hospital with Covid than ever - and urged people to follow lockdown rules. He said: "Do not blow it now. We are on the route out. We have to stick at it." Speaking during a Downing Street briefing, Mr Hancock said more than half of those over 80 and half of elderly care home residents had been vaccinated. He said that in some parts of the country the "vast majority" of people in their 80s had had ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - A study led by researchers at University of Westminster shows that small single stranded genetic material may play a role in how COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) passes from animals to humans and why some animal carriers of the virus may show no symptoms while it can be deadly in humans. The findings, published in the journal Viruses in collaboration with Gebze Technical University and University of Bedfordshire, indicate that in particular pangolins and bats, but also cows and pigs, are the most likely carriers of the virus capable of passing it on to a human , known as zoonotic carriers. The study ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - A team of scientists from the United States and Sweden has recently demonstrated that increased levels of a proinflammatory cytokine, angiopoietin-2, is responsible for hypercoagulation observed in severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients. The study is currently available on the * preprint server. Background Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) – the causative pathogen of COVID-19 – is associated with a number of symptoms, ranging from mild fever and cough to severe respiratory distress with bilateral pneumonia and cardiovascular complications. Despite ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - The most severe cases of COVID-19 begin with leaky blood vessels. Breaches in the vascular system cause inflammation and coagulation, as fluid floods the lungs. Meanwhile, a host of seemingly unrelated symptoms set in. Blood pressure drops, arrhythmias test the heart, and the central nervous system takes a beating. Some studies suggest that such disparate symptoms may have a single culprit—a tiny molecule known as bradykinin —and scientists now suspect that SARS-CoV-2 is capable of toppling the delicate system that keeps this signaling substance in check. The result is a runaway ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - As coronavirus cases in Los Angeles County surpass one million, with 13,848 reported deaths, air quality regulations have been temporarily lifted to accommodate the county's growing backlog of cremations, which poses a threat to public health. The South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) has suspended "permit conditions limiting the number of cremations or amount of human remains cremated for qualifying human crematoria that are located in Los Angeles County," through January 27, according to an executive order released Sunday. "The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - Fox News Flash top headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on Foxnews.com. California health officials on Sunday warned of a separate coronavirus variant, known as L452R, on the rise across the state since last November. It is too early to say whether the strain is more transmissible than others, including the highly contagious variant first identified in the U.K. , Dr. Erica Pan, state epidemiologist for the public health department, said in a statement . Nevertheless, officials are urging the public to wear masks, avoid socializing with nonhousehold members and isolate after exposure. ... [Read More]

Jan 18th, 2021 - A new CDC rule will require passengers flying into the US to provide documentation of a negative COVID test before boarding. The new measure goes into effect on January 26 and was created in response to the emergence of more contagious COVID strains. The CDC believes a COVID mutation from the UK could become the dominant strain in the US within the next two months. With the coronavirus still surging across all corners of the US, the CDC this week announced a new precautionary measure that some people believe should have been implemented months ago. The new measure, which is expected to go ... [Read More]

Jan 17th, 2021 - Florida Posted: Updated: TAMPA (WFLA) – The Florida Department of Health reported 11,093 new COVID-19 cases Sunday afternoon. Additionally, over one million vaccinations have been administered across the state. So far 915,897 people have received their initial dose of the COVID-19 vaccine and 91,819 people have received their second dose. New cases reported (1,571,279 total since start of pandemic): Sunday: 11,093 Saturday: 12,119 Friday: 16,875 Thursday: 13,720 Wednesday: 13,990 Percent positive : The Florida Department of Health said it received 143,327 PCR or antigen lab results from ... [Read More]

Jan 17th, 2021 - PHOTHARAM, Thailand — The bat caves reeked of bat. In the murk of the grottoes, in a cave complex west of Bangkok, Thais in headlamps and with flashlights went about their business. Pilgrims to the temple that owns the complex prayed to Buddha figurines in one of the caves, the statues’ carved expressions betraying no reaction to the plip-plop-ploop of bat droppings falling on their shoulders. Collectors of bat dung, or guano, scraped up the droppings to sell as fertilizer, hefting bags of manure through an obstacle course of stalactites and stalagmites. And medical researchers, overseen ... [Read More]

Jan 17th, 2021 - Outgoing State Secretary Mike Pompeo claims that the US government has reason to believe several researchers from the Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick in autumn 2019, long before the first admitted cases of COVID-19. Pompeo said that the symptoms were consistent with COVID-19 without revealing more details about the claims. The press release calls for the WHO to press China’s government for more details surrounding the alleged infections at the Wuhan lab, experiments on a bat coronavirus strain studied in the lab, and military ties to the Wuhan lab. Just as the World Health ... [Read More]

Jan 17th, 2021 - When the World Health Organization described January, it said it was going to be “a tough one...It really is all hands on deck.” This is evident from the picture in mid January across Europe and the U.K.: The Local This country-by-country guide shows the different measures put in place by EU countries to try to curb alarming rises in infection and death rates. Many countries will review policies at the end of January, in line with the effectiveness too of vaccination efforts, which . There is a list of EU-approved, third-party countries which currently includes Australia, Japan, New ... [Read More]