Midwestern states are starting to see surges in coronavirus cases, just as Southern and Western states are scrambling to contain their own outbreaks of COVID-19. Missouri, Montana and Oklahoma are among those witnessing the largest percentage surge of infections over the past week, the Washington Post reported. At the same time, the number of new cases in Florida, Mississippi and Alabama still outpaced all other states. Experts also see worrying trends in major East Coast and Midwest cities, the Post reported, and they anticipate major outbreaks in college towns when classes resume in August. Still, President Trump continued his push to fully reopen schools on Monday. “Ideally, we want to open those schools. We want to open them,” Trump said during a White House coronavirus task force briefing. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious diseases expert, on Monday agreed with that sentiment, telling CNN that schools and college campuses across the country should be able to reopen, but officials need to make safety a priority. The default position with kindergartens, grade schools and high schools should be to reopen them, Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN. On college campuses, Fauci said plans should include testing people before they arrive on campus, when they arrive and quarantining them for 14 days. “If done properly, it would not be…  read on >

Older Americans are feeling stressed by COVID-19 and prolonged social isolation, but they’re also showing their resiliency, a new study finds. Most of these adults have turned to a range of tools to stay in touch, researchers report. “Many of the social venues that help older adults stay engaged are effectively cut off now with social distancing. While the internet can help with some connections, it is hard to replace human contact,” said researcher Kerstin Emerson, a clinical associate professor of gerontology at the University of Georgia’s Institute of Gerontology. “And for some, these remote connections aren’t possible due to no reliable internet.” For the study, Emerson surveyed more than 800 adults aged 60 and older between March 30 and April 12, when they had been in lockdown for 17 days. “Part of the reason I did that was because I wanted to see if there was a difference by age groups, among the ‘younger old’ and ‘older old,’ who may have different work responsibilities and living situations,” she said in a university news release. Emerson found that about 40% of 60- to 70-year-olds felt moderately or very stressed and out of control of their lives. Among this group, more drinking and eating was seen. Also, some exercised more and some less than usual. Those aged 71 and older seemed to cope with stress better…  read on >

As the daily U.S. coronavirus death toll averaged more than 1,000 for the ninth straight day on Tuesday, governors from seven states banded together to shorten turnaround time for COVID-19 test results. Three Republican governors and three Democratic governors signed an interstate testing agreement on Tuesday, The New York Times reported. Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Ohio and Virginia will work with the Rockefeller Foundation and two U.S. manufacturers of rapid tests to buy 3 million tests, the newspaper said. A seventh state, North Carolina, later joined the pact, CNN reported. The bipartisan plan illustrates just how bad testing delays are across the country. The United States is testing about 755,000 people a day, up from about 640,000 per day a month ago, the Times reported. But with testing chemicals and other equipment in short supply, and a surge in coronavirus cases nationwide, many Americans are still having to wait many days for results, the Post reported. Most people who are tested do not receive results within the 24 to 48 hours recommended by public health experts to slow the virus’s spread and quickly conduct contact tracing, according to a new survey by researchers from Harvard University, Northeastern University, Northwestern University and Rutgers University, the Times reported. People who had been tested for the virus in July reported an average wait time of about four days,…  read on >

If you’re younger than 65 years old and obese, COVID-19 poses a special danger to you. A new study reports that the more obese you are, the more likely you are to either die from infection with the new coronavirus or require lifesaving mechanical ventilation to survive. Morbidly obese COVID-19 patients are 60% more likely to die or require intubation, compared with people of normal weight, researchers found. Patients who were mildly obese were 10% more likely to die or need a breathing machine, while those who were moderately obese were 30% more likely, according to the study. “Increasing obesity was associated with an increased risk of lung failure or death in COVID-19,” said lead researcher Dr. Michaela Anderson, a pulmonologist at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York City. But obesity only posed a risk for people under 65, researchers added. Anderson said that’s probably because older folks are sicker, more frail, and more likely to develop respiratory failure with COVID-19 due to health problems unrelated to their weight. She and her colleagues reviewed medical records for nearly 2,500 patients hospitalized for COVID-19 in March and April at Columbia University Irving Medical Center. They looked at body mass index (BMI), which is based on height and weight. Obesity begins at a BMI of 30; morbid obesity is 40 or over. “At the beginning…  read on >

People getting their COVID-19 information from social media are more likely to receive misinformation, Canadian researchers report. But those who trust traditional media are less likely to have misperceptions. And they’re more likely to stick to public health recommendations such as social distancing, the research team found. For the study, researchers looked at millions of tweets, thousands of news stories and a survey of Canadians. “Platforms like Twitter and Facebook are increasingly becoming the primary sources of news and misinformation for Canadians and people around the world,” said researcher Aengus Bridgman, from McGill University in Montreal. “In the context of a crisis like COVID-19, however, there is good reason to be concerned about the role that the consumption of social media is playing in boosting misperceptions,” Bridgman said in a university news release. False information about COVID-19 is more readily found on social media like Twitter than on traditional news outlets, Bridgman and colleagues found. And they spotted big differences in behaviors and attitudes among people who get their news from social media instead of traditional news. These differences remained even after accounting for factors like scientific literacy and socioeconomic differences. Those who use social media regularly are less likely to keep social distancing and to see COVID-19 as a threat, but for those who get their information from regular news media it’s the opposite,…  read on >

The U.S. coronavirus death count climbed past 150,000 on Wednesday, a milestone that none had predicted would come so soon. In April, Dr. Anthony Fauci said he hoped that no more than 60,000 people in the country would die from the coronavirus, The New York Times reported. In May, a renowned research center predicted that number would be just over 70,000 by early August. When the death tally spiked in May, President Donald Trump predicted that between 75,000 and 100,000 people could die from the new coronavirus, the newspaper said. But the daily COVID-19 death tallies have kept piling up: On Wednesday, more than 1,300 new deaths nationwide were reported, with Washington state’s death count not yet recorded, the Washington Post reported. That’s the highest one-day count since the latter half of May. Thirteen states reached their highest seven-day averages for novel coronavirus deaths, the newspaper reported. California, Florida, Idaho and North Carolina broke their records for virus-related deaths reported in a single day on Wednesday. With 217 new deaths on Wednesday, Florida joined Texas as one of eight states that have counted 200 single-day deaths at some point during the pandemic, the Post reported. “The mortality is going to march in lockstep with our transmission,” Dr. Sarah Fortune, chair of immunology and infectious diseases at the T.H. Chan School of Public Health at Harvard,…  read on >

A ton of dangerous lead dust may have been deposited around Notre Dame cathedral in Paris when it burned in April 2019 — far more than had been estimated, a new study suggests. The cathedral’s roof and spire were covered in 460 tons of lead — a neurotoxic metal that’s especially dangerous to children — and questions have been raised about how much lead was released into nearby neighborhoods. An analysis of 100 soil samples from sites around the cathedral concluded that 2,200 pounds of lead dust landed within 1 kilometer (0.6 of a mile). That’s six times the current estimate for lead fallout within 12 miles of the site. Lead levels downwind were twice that in areas outside the smoke plume’s path, the study found. For a brief time, people within a kilometer downwind probably had greater exposure to lead fallout than suggested by French authorities, according to the study published recently in the journal GeoHealth. Fewer than 100 milligrams of lead would be expected in a kilogram of non-contaminated soil, the researchers said. But samples collected within a kilometer of the cathedral averaged 200 mg/kg. Lead levels collected northwest of the cathedral averaged nearly 430 mg/kg — double that of the surrounding area, and above France’s 300 mg/kg limit. “Our final estimation of the total amount of excess lead is much larger compared…  read on >

The COVID-19 pandemic has America’s hospitals on the fiscal ropes, with many facing financial ruin without continued aid from the federal government, a new report predicts. Average hospital margins across the nation could sink to −7% in the second half of 2020 without further help, with half of all hospitals potentially operating in the red, the American Hospital Association’s new analysis estimates. “The COVID crisis continues to cripple the financial health of hospitals and health systems,” said Rick Pollack, president and CEO of the American Hospital Association (AHA). “As today’s analysis shows, this pandemic is the greatest financial threat in history for hospitals and health systems, and is a serious obstacle to keeping the doors open for many,” Pollack added. U.S. hospitals have had to spend more on personal protective equipment to keep their employees safe from COVID-19, even as revenues have dropped due to state-level lockdowns that canceled all but the most desperately needed services and surgeries. The analysis, prepared by the financial advisory firm Kaufman, Hall & Associates, considered two potential scenarios — an optimistic slow but steady decrease in COVID-19 cases, and a pessimistic outlook based on periodic surges in infections that would place additional stress on hospital operations. U.S. hospitals typically operate at an average 3.5% annual profit, “which is very thin” compared with other industries, said Ken Kaufman, managing director…  read on >

America saw its coronavirus case count pass 4 million on Thursday, as health officials across the country reported a third day of more than 1,000 new COVID-19 deaths. Alabama posted a record-setting 2,390 new cases on Thursday, while four other states — Hawaii, Indiana, Missouri and New Mexico — also hit their single-day peak for new cases, The New York Times reported. Meanwhile, Florida and Tennessee each had more virus-related deaths than on any other previous day. The rapid spread of coronavirus this summer is sobering, taking just 15 days to go from 3 million cases to 4 million, the Washington Post reported. This spring, it took 45 days to jump from 1 million cases to 2 million, while the leap to 3 million then took 27 days. California has been slammed twice during the pandemic: it was the first state to issue a stay-at-home order this spring, to slow an early outbreak. But after a reopening that some health officials warned was too fast, cases surged. That triggered a statewide mask mandate and the closure of bars and indoor dining again, the Times reported. With over 422,000 cases, California has surpassed New York to have the most COVID-19 cases of any state. It set a single-day record on Wednesday, with more than 12,100 new cases and 155 new deaths. In the face of climbing…  read on >

Summer means long, carefree days outside, but don’t let that sabotage your slumber, sleep experts say. An American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) survey found that 36% of U.S. adults said they sleep less in the summer, with the highest rates in the West (42%) and Midwest (40%). “The lure of the outdoors and more daylight can make it tempting to delay bedtimes, but it’s important to get healthy sleep in every season,” AASM president Dr. Kannan Ramar said in an academy news release. During the summer, go to bed at a time that allows you to get enough sleep to wake up feeling refreshed and alert. The AASM’s bedtime calculator can help you determine an appropriate bedtime for your schedule. The AASM also offers the following advice to help avoid sleep loss: Keep a consistent sleep schedule. If you tend to stay up later, make sure you allow enough time in bed to get a full night of sleep on a regular basis. Turn off your electronic devices 30 minutes to an hour before bedtime. Silence your notifications and charge your devices away from your bed so you’re not tempted to check social media or news alerts. Don’t have caffeine after lunch and avoid alcohol near bedtime, as both can disrupt sleep. Create a comfortable bedroom environment. Keep your room quiet, dark and a…  read on >