Depression, anxiety and inactive lifestyles are all too common among college students, and a new study finds they may have escalated during the initial outbreak of COVID-19. Using a mix of smartphone data and online surveys from more than 200 students, researchers at Dartmouth College determined that the coronavirus pandemic had an immediate impact on the mental health of this particular undergraduate group. The students involved in the study were participating in a research program tracking mental health at the New Hampshire university. They reported spikes in depression and anxiety at the beginning of the pandemic in early March, just as the school pushed students to leave campus and begin remote learning. While their self-reported anxiety and depression lessened slightly later on in the semester, the study found that their overall anxiety and depression levels remained consistently higher than in previous years. “We observed a large-scale shift in mental health and behavior compared to the observed baseline established for this group over previous years,” said study author Jeremy Huckins, a lecturer at Dartmouth. In addition, around spring break period in mid-March, the students reported that their day-to-day lives were dramatically more sedentary than previous terms. “This was an atypical time for these college students. While spring break is usually a period of decreased stress and increased physical activity, spring break 2020 was stressful and confining…  read on >

New data shows that many of the community outbreaks of coronavirus that have cropped up in the United States this summer have originated in restaurants and bars. In Louisiana, roughly a quarter of the state’s 2,360 cases since March that were outside of places like nursing homes and prisons had their origins in bars and restaurants, The New York Times reported. Meanwhile, 12% of new coronavirus cases in Maryland last month were traced to restaurants, while 9% of cases in Colorado have been traced to bars and restaurants, the newspaper said. Whether the infections started among workers or patrons is unclear, but the clusters concern health officials because many restaurant and bar employees are in their 20s and can silently fuel household transmissions, which have soared in recent weeks through the Sun Belt and the West, the Times reported. This summer, scores of restaurants, including ones in Nashville, Las Vega, Atlanta and Milwaukee, have had to close temporarily because of COVID-19 cases among employees, the Times reported. Texas and Florida also had to shut down bars following surges in new cases in those states. In a recent week in San Diego, 15 of the 39 new community cases were traced to restaurants. And in Washington, D.C., cases have climbed since the city reopened indoor dining, the newspaper reported. Indoor dining remains banned in New York…  read on >

America logged its highest single-day coronavirus death total of the summer on Wednesday, as the toll from an earlier surge in cases in Sun Belt states continued to mount. At least 1,470 deaths were tallied on Wednesday, The New York Times reported. With the exception of three anomalous days this summer (when New York and Texas reported large numbers of backlogged COVID-19 deaths from unspecified days), that death total was the country’s highest since late May, the newspaper said. Wednesday’s deaths were concentrated in Sun Belt states that have witnessed dramatic coronavirus case spikes in June and July, the Times reported. Even as case counts have started to level off or drop in some of those states, deaths have stayed high. On Wednesday, more than 300 deaths were recorded in Texas, while more than 200 were confirmed in Florida. Arizona, California and Georgia all reported more than 100 COVID-19 deaths each, the newspaper said. For the past two weeks, the country has averaged more than 1,000 deaths per day, more than twice as many as recorded in early July. Because some people do not die until weeks after contracting the virus, death counts can remain high long after new cases start falling, the newspaper noted. Where did all the new cases start this summer? New data shows that many of the community outbreaks of coronavirus…  read on >

This school year comes with special challenges for kids as the United States grapples with a coronavirus pandemic, but experts say parents can help their children navigate the tough emotional terrain. Whether returning to a school building, continuing online learning or adjusting to a hybrid school environment, it is normal for children and adolescents to have some stress or anxiety about going back to school, said Samanta Boddapati, a child clinical psychologist and prevention coordinator at Big Lots Behavioral Health Services at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. Fears of getting sick or following school safety protocols for COVID-19 may make the transition even more difficult. In a survey of parents by Nationwide Children’s, 2 out of 5 said they had concerns about their kid’s social and emotional well-being. Very young children can suffer from separation anxiety about being away from family and in new environments. For these children, experts recommend making a special goodbye part of your routine and reminding your child when you will see each other again. Some kids like a transitional object — an item that reminds them of mom or dad while at school. Older children being in a classroom might be uncomfortable. “Maintaining a routine is important, especially for families who are continuing to do online learning full-time. Create a part of your child’s day that is structured and…  read on >

As coronavirus cases continue to surge across America, scientists on Wednesday called for widespread adoption of simpler, less accurate tests, as long as they’re given often and quickly. “Even if you miss somebody on Day 1,” Omai Garner, director of clinical microbiology in the UCLA Health System, told The New York Times. “If you test them repeatedly, the argument is, you’ll catch them the next time around.” The strategy hinges on having an enormous supply of testing kits. But many experts believe more rapid, frequent testing would spot people who need immediate medical care while also identifying those most likely to spread COVID-19, the Times reported. Of the dozens of coronavirus tests that have been granted emergency use authorization by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, most rely on complex laboratory procedures, such as PCR, the Times reported. Only a few tests are quick and simple enough to be run in a doctor’s office or urgent care clinic, without the need for lab equipment. And these tests are still relatively scarce nationwide, though government officials say they plan to ramp up production of such tests by the fall, the newspaper said. “If you had asked me this a couple months ago, I would have said we just need to be doing the PCR tests,” Susan Butler-Wu, a clinical microbiologist at the University of Southern California,…  read on >

As the U.S. coronavirus case count neared 5 million on Thursday, a new model predicted that nearly 300,000 Americans could die of COVID-19 by December if more people don’t wear masks or practice better social distancing. Researchers from the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) on Thursday issued a forecast of 295,011 deaths from coronavirus by Dec. 1. However, if 95 percent of people were to wear a face mask in public, some 66,000 lives could be saved, they added. “We’re seeing a rollercoaster in the United States,” institute director Christopher Murray said in a statement. “It appears that people are wearing masks and socially distancing more frequently as infections increase, then after a while as infections drop, people let their guard down and stop taking these measures to protect themselves and others which, of course, leads to more infections. And the potentially deadly cycle starts over again.” His team’s model also identifies which states will need to re-impose mask mandates between now and the winter to slow the spread of transmission. In other pandemic news, the U.S. State Department on Thursday lifted its 5-month-old blanket warning against international travel for Americans. Instead, the department will now issue travel recommendations by country. Why the change? “Health and safety conditions improving in some countries and potentially deteriorating in others” influenced its decision,…  read on >

Researchers say a new test can tell which patients with gonorrhea will benefit from treatment with the antibiotic ciprofloxacin. The low-cost drug has been out of use amid concern that the bacterium that causes gonorrhea was becoming resistant to it. In this study, 106 patients identified as having a gonorrhea strain called wild-type gyrA serine were cured with a single dose of ciprofloxacin. A test to screen for that strain has been available for three years, but this is the first time it has been systematically studied in humans, researchers said. “Gonorrhea is one of the most common drug-resistant infections worldwide and is becoming harder to treat. Current treatment methods require an antibiotic injection, which is expensive and painful,” said lead author Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, a professor of medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles. “This new test could make it easier and safer to treat gonorrhea with different antibiotics, including one pill given by mouth. Using a pill instead of a shot would also make it easier and faster to treat sex partners of patients with gonorrhea,” he added in a UCLA news release. The DNA test that researchers developed identifies a genetic mutation that makes the gonorrhea bacterium resistant to ciprofloxacin. Ciprofloxacin works against infections without that mutation. In 2007, the U.S. Centers for Disease…  read on >