Month: January 2021

USA TODAY is keeping track of the news surrounding COVID-19 as a pair of vaccines join the U.S. fight against a virus that has killed nearly 390,000 Americans since the first reported fatality in February. Keep refreshing this page for the latest updates surrounding the coronavirus, including who is getting the vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, as well as other top news from across the USA TODAY Network. Sign up for our Coronavirus Watch newsletter for updates directly to your inbox, join our Facebook group or scroll through our in-depth answers to reader questions for everything you need to know about the coronavirus. In the headlines: ► President-elect Joe Biden is scheduled to share more details Friday afternoon on his $1.9 trillion spending package that aims to speed distribution of t...

The U.S. has shipped over half a million doses of antibody treatments that have the potential to keep high-risk Covid patients out of hospitals if given early enough in their infection. This would help already overburdened hospitals avoid additional strain, but the drugs are still being underutilized despite their promising results, Trump administration health officials said Thursday. That's because many patients don't know how to access them, and hospitals aren't prescribing the medications or arranging the infusion sites necessary to administer the drugs, they said. "I want my colleagues to hear me," U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams told reporters. "You need to think about and be willing to prescribe these medications much more frequently as a way to protect your patients...

Attack rate in Manaus Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) incidence peaked in Manaus, Brazil, in May 2020 with a devastating toll on the city's inhabitants, leaving its health services shattered and cemeteries overwhelmed. Buss et al. collected data from blood donors from Manaus and São Paulo, noted when transmission began to fall, and estimated the final attack rates in October 2020 (see the Perspective by Sridhar and Gurdasani). Heterogeneities in immune protection, population structure, poverty, modes of public transport, and uneven adoption of nonpharmaceutical interventions mean that despite a high attack rate, herd immunity may not have been achieved. This unfortunate city has become a sentinel for how natural population immunity could influence future tran...

A new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences projects that Covid-19 will reduce US life expectancy in 2020 by 1.13 years, with a disproportionate number of deaths occurring among Black and Latino populations. When combined with provisional estimates of US death rates for the first half of the year, the data show a clear rise in the mortality rate as the pandemic took hold of the nation. "Estimated reductions for the Black and Latino populations are three to four times that for Whites. Consequently, Covid-19 is expected to reverse over 10 years of progress made in closing the Black−White gap in life expectancy and reduce the previous Latino mortality advantage by over 70%," according to the researchers of the study, Theresa Andrasfay of the University of Sout...

Sutter Health plans to begin vaccinating seniors ages 75 and older on Friday."The new state guidance that adds 65+ to Phase 1b has some nuance in the language that says to prioritize 75+ when vaccine supplies are limited, which is certainly the case right now," according to Santa Cruz County Deputy Public Health Director, Dr. David Ghilarducci.On Thursday, the hospital saw a rush to sign up on the Sutter Health's My Health Online account, forcing the site to crash. It has now back online.There was a test run for drive-thru vaccinations held by Sutter Health. It was front-line health care workers who were administered COVID-19 vaccines. Friday it'll be seniors, 75 years of age and olderTwenty Encompass Community Service employees checked in for the Moderna COVID-19 vaccinations by app...