Two new studies paint a comprehensive picture of current long COVID cases in the United States, and both suggest the condition limits daily activities for a significant proportion of those affected.
Comments closedTag: SARS-CoV-2
Topic: Nova ScotiaView all posts for the topic: Nova Scotia
Judge certifies Nova Scotia COVID-19 lawsuit as a class action
⚠️ Content warning: mention of deaths.
A Nova Scotia judge has certified a class action lawsuit against Northwood, a company that was described as at the epicentre of COVID-19 deaths in the province at the height of the pandemic in 2020.
Some 53 people died in the Northwood complex in north-end Halifax.
A lawsuit was launched shortly after the deaths. On Thursday, Nova Scotia Supreme Court Justice Scott Norton certified it as a class action.
Comments closedTopic: OntarioView all posts for the topic: Ontario
Why doesn’t Doug Ford’s government want you to know if you have this dangerous disease?
Comments closedTransparency is crucial to public health, but far too little effort has gone into informing the public about the long-term health hazards posed by repeated COVID-19 infections. That needs to change. A good place to start is by providing free rapid tests to enable Ontarians to gauge their risk and that of their loved ones. Its messaging would be clear: Results still matter.
Topic: pro-virus policiesView all posts for the topic: pro-virus policies
America’s Public Health Breakdown Is Just Getting Started
The United States has a health-care system that is terrible and getting worse. It also has a health science system that is the best in the world and about to be dismantled.
The impending return of Donald Trump to the White House seems likely to collapse American health science, with consequences as disastrous for the rest of the world as for the approximately 340 million Americans in the U.S. Canada may be able to soften the impact here, but it will not be easy.
Comments closedTopic: hydroxychloroquineView all posts for the topic: hydroxychloroquine
Invalidation of a landmark study on COVID-19 published by a French doctor
“Concerns have been raised” relating to respect for “publication ethics” of the journal’s publisher, and “the appropriate conduct of research involving human participants, as well as concerns raised by three of the authors themselves regarding the article’s methodology and conclusions,” stated Elsevier, the publisher of the scientific journal International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents, in a lengthy note justifying this rare retraction.
The article, signed by 18 authors, notably Philippe Gautret, then a professor at the Marseille IHU, and Didier Raoult, who directed this institute, intended to demonstrate the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine, combined with an antibiotic – azithromycin – against COVID-19.
Comments closedTopic: cardiovascular diseaseView all posts for the topic: cardiovascular disease
COVID-19 linked to more heart complications than flu, RSV
A new study published in BMC Cardiovascular Disorders shows that pediatric and young adult COVID-19 patients are more at risk for cardiac complications than flu or RSV patients of the same age.
The study was based on hospitalized US patients from 2020 through 2021 tracked through the National Inpatient Sample. In total 212,655 respiratory virus admissions were recorded, including 85,055 from COVID-19, 103,185 from RSV, and 24,415 from influenza.
Comments closedTopic: pro-virus policiesView all posts for the topic: pro-virus policies
Trump nominees should ‘steer clear’ of undermining polio vaccine, McConnell says
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who had polio as a child, says any of President-elect Donald Trump’s nominees seeking Senate confirmation should “steer clear” of efforts to discredit the polio vaccine.
“Efforts to undermine public confidence in proven cures are not just uninformed — they’re dangerous,” McConnell said in a statement Friday. “Anyone seeking the Senate’s consent to serve in the incoming Administration would do well to steer clear of even the appearance of association with such efforts.”
The 82-year-old lawmaker’s statement appeared to be directed at Trump’s pick for health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., after a report that one of his advisers filed a petition to revoke approval for the polio vaccine in 2022. That vaccine is widely considered to have halted the disease in most parts of the world.
Comments closedTopic: AlbertaView all posts for the topic: Alberta
Over 300 COVID outbreaks hit Alberta acute care facilities last year
Comments closedThe reality is that people are dying from COVID in our hospitals, and we really are doing very little to prevent them getting ill and getting infected. And we wouldn’t do the same for any other infectious disease.
Topic: OntarioView all posts for the topic: Ontario
Guelph wastewater testing will continue for COVID-19 and more by university researchers
Wastewater in Guelph will continue to be monitored for COVID-19, influenza and other illnesses through a new partnership between researchers at the University of Guelph and Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health.
The researchers will get samples of wastewater three times a week, then will submit their findings to public health, which will in turn publish it to a public online dashboard.
Provincial funding for wastewater testing was cut on July 31 with the Ontario government citing a federal program that tests wastewater; however, none of the testing sites are in Waterloo region or Guelph.
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Topic: British ColumbiaView all posts for the topic: British Columbia
Advocates Urge BC to Reinstate Healthcare Mask Protections Amid Rising Risks
DoNoHarm BC, Protect Our Province BC and the Canadian Covid Society warn of infection risks in healthcare
December 10, 2024 (British Columbia, Canada) – Advocacy groups in BC are calling on policy-makers to immediately reinstate healthcare mask requirements. The call comes as BC faces severe risks from COVID-19, a rise in “walking pneumonia,” local measles warnings, and Canada’s first human case of H5N1 avian influenza – which health officials warn could potentially turn into another pandemic.
Comments closedTopic: long COVIDView all posts for the topic: long COVID
We can, and must, do more to protect students in higher education from the risks of post-COVID condition
Canada’s postsecondary institutions have a responsibility to protect students and others on campus from the risks of post-COVID condition as a matter of campus safety.
Canada’s Chief Science Advisor, Mona Nemer, recently released the report, Dealing with the Fallout: Post-COVID Condition and its Continued Impacts on Individuals and Society.
Post-COVID condition (PCC), also known as “long COVID,” refers to the poorly understood and often serious health damage left by the SARS-CoV-2 virus after the acute illness appears to have passed.
Universities, colleges and schools have a duty to take reasonable precautions to protect students, staff and faculty from foreseeable harms. They must ensure the water on campus is safe to drink. They must install fire and carbon monoxide detectors and make evacuation plans. Many have adopted a smoke-free policy on campus as part of a commitment to an international charter on health promotion in universities and colleges. Yet there is little pandemic health promotion on Canadian campuses.
Comments closedTopic: the pandemic is not overView all posts for the topic: the pandemic is not over
Opinion: This holiday season, let’s spread kindness, not COVID
Comments closedIt can be surprisingly simple to protect our health and the health of others — by masking in public with high-quality masks (such as KN95 or N95), testing before gatherings, increasing ventilation, and staying home if sick.
Topic: long COVIDView all posts for the topic: long COVID
Almost a third of preteens, teens with long COVID still not recovered at 2 years, study shows
A new study from UK investigators shows that — while most COVID-19 patients ages 11 to 17 who reported long-COVID symptoms 3 months after the initial infection no longer experienced lingering symptoms at 2 years — 29% still did.
The findings, published in the journal Communications Medicine, come from the National Long COVID in Children and Young People cohort study, which followed up on thousands of young people after their COVID-19 diagnoses.
Comments closedTopic: vision lossView all posts for the topic: vision loss
Experimental study shows connection between COVID infection and age-related blindness
An experimental study in mice shows that SARS-CoV-2 infection can damage the retinas, with long-term implications for vision. Post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection include various neurocognitive symptoms, suggesting the virus can affect the central nervous system. The eyes are also part of the central nervous system, but little is known about the virus’s effects on these organs.
Comments closedTopic: multiple sclerosisView all posts for the topic: multiple sclerosis
Severe COVID-19 may be a risk factor for multiple sclerosis
COVID-19 may be a risk factor for multiple sclerosis (MS). This has been shown by new research at Örebro University and Örebro University Hospital, Sweden. The study is published in the journal Brain Communications.
“We saw a raised risk of MS among people who had severe COVID-19. However, only an extremely small number of people who had severe COVID-19 received a subsequent MS diagnosis,” says Scott Montgomery, professor in clinical epidemiology.
Comments closedA Kingston family doctor is being ordered to repay more than $600,000 to the Ontario government for what the province says was reimbursement for improperly billed medical services related to mobile COVID-19 vaccination clinics.
Dr. Elaine Ma has been told by the Health Services Appeal and Review Board to repay $600,962.61, plus interest, to the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP), to reimburse money she billed the province for vaccinations administered during drive-in COVID-19 vaccination clinics between July 2021 and January 2022.
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