Month: October 2020

BOZRAH, Conn. (AP) — A coronavirus outbreak at a Colchester nursing home has prompted the deployment of a rapid response team from the state Department of Public Health. Forty people, including 32 residents of the Harrington Court Nursing home have tested positive for the virus since last week. Russell Melmed, director of the Chatham Health District, told the Hartford Courant that there have been no deaths so far, but that the outbreak is not contained. The Health Department is conducting rapid tests of all residents and staff using one of its mobile testing units. Harrington Court, which is owned by Genesis Health Care, houses more than 80 residents. Some of the residents who tested positive have been moved to another Genesis facility, the Quinnipiac Valley Center in Wallingford, which h...

COVID-19 cases in a jail have thrust a town with otherwise low rates of the virus into the highest risk category on Massachusetts' weekly map of virus spread. Middleton moved into the Red category Wednesday, marking the town as one of 23 communities in the state with an average daily incidence rate of 8 cases per 100,000 residents over the previous two weeks. State guidelines limit the reopening progress that can occur in Red communities and suggest changes for school instructional strategies. However, 17 of Middleton's 18 current active cases of COVID-19 are located within the walls of the Essex County House of Correction, according to a statement from town public health director Derek Fullerton and town administrator Andrew Sheehan. "Based on recent contact tracing, there is NO kno...

New Jersey reported another 663 coronavirus cases and five additional deaths Thursday as the statewide rate of transmission increased again, to 1.16 — the highest it has been in nearly two months and above the key benchmark of 1 that indicates the outbreak here is growing. Hospitalizations also surpassed 500 patients for the first time since early September. The Garden State’s transmission rate has been above 1 since Sept. 4 and hit 1.15 on Wednesday after hovering at that mark for three days last week. The rate reported Thursday is the highest it has been since Aug. 6. Any number above 1 means each newly infected person, on average, is spreading the virus to at least one other person. Any number below 1 means the virus is decreasing. “COVID is still with us,” Gov. Phil Murphy said dur...

The heart monitoring feature on the Apple Watch may lead to unnecessary health care visits, according to a new study published this week. Only around 10 percent of people who saw a doctor at the Mayo Clinic after noticing an abnormal pulse reading on their watch were eventually diagnosed with a cardiac condition. The finding shows that at-home health monitoring devices can lead to over-utilization of the health care system, said study author Heather Heaton, an assistant professor of emergency medicine at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, in an email to The Verge. That may be expensive for patients and for the system as a whole, and it may take up doctor and patient time unnecessarily. Heaton and the study team scanned patient health records at every Mayo Clinic site, includin...