12/20/2020
FROM HOPKINS:
1. People Thought Covid-19 Was Relatively Harmless for Younger Adults. They Were Wrong. (New York Times) Young adults are dying at historic rates. In research published on Wednesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, we found that among U.S. adults ages 25 to 44, from March through the end of July, there were almost 12,000 more deaths than were expected based on historical norms.
2. How Do Home Tests for Coronavirus Work? Where Can I get One? (Washington Post) The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday authorized another rapid coronavirus test for home use, this one called Abbott BinaxNOW — the third such test to be authorized in recent weeks. And more home tests are coming, with at least two dozen companies racing to develop versions. These rapid tests allow people to test themselves at home and know within minutes whether they have the novel coronavirus, which causes the illness covid-19.
3. REGN-COV2, a Neutralizing Antibody Cocktail, in Outpatients with Covid-19 (NEJM) In this ongoing, double-blind, phase 1–3 trial involving nonhospitalized patients with Covid-19, we investigated two fully human, neutralizing monoclonal antibodies against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) spike protein, used in a combined cocktail (REGN-COV2) to reduce the risk of the emergence of treatment-resistant mutant virus.
“…Our analysis suggests that an antibody cocktail against SARS-CoV-2 can also be an effective antiviral therapy, enhancing viral clearance and thus leading to improved outcomes, particularly in patients whose own immune response to the virus is slow to initiate. Further studies, including the continuing phase 3 portion of this trial, are needed to confirm these effects.”
(J. Harris: New treatments for Covid infection are coming.)
4. Texas Doctors in Rural Hotspots Left Out in Cold On Vaccine (Reuters) Running in between patients, Dr. Eileen Sprys pauses to catch her breath, tries to gather herself, but cannot mask her frustration: The health care workers in her COVID-besieged West Texas hospital were left out of the first shipment of the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine, and they have no idea when they may get it
J. Harris: Christus has vaccine arriving very soon for their health care workers.
POTENTIAL PARTIAL SHUTDOWN TRAUMA AREA G ?
(This is a fabulous East Texas web site. Harrison County routine data is not included at this site, but Harrison County is in Trauma Area G along with most of these counties.)
“The ‘COVID-19 Community Spread Levels’ infographic is a visual overview of the 7-Day Rolling Rate of COVID-19.
Positive cases of COVID-19 include rapid tests and PCR tests (Probable and Confirmed cases) among persons who physically live within the NET Health Disease Surveillance Division.
Recent media coverage has expanded public awareness of the Trauma Service Area G (TSA-G), operated by the Piney Woods Regional Advisory Council, aka RAC-G.
These include Anderson, Camp, Cherokee, Franklin, Freestone, Gregg, Harrison, Henderson, Houston, Marion, Panola, Rains, Rusk, Shelby, Smith, Trinity, Upshur, Van Zandt. and Wood counties.
Decreased customer capacity of businesses within the RAC-G area will occur if there are 7 consecutive days in which the number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients as a percentage of hospital capacity goes above 15 percent. Below are calculations from recent days:
- Sunday December 13th – 14.72% (431 COVID patients in hospitals within RAC-G / 3132 available hospital beds)
- Monday December 14th – 14.26% (440 COVID patients in hospitals within RAC-G / 3086 available hospital beds)
- Tuesday December 15th – 15.28% (474 COVID patients in hospitals within RAC-G / 3103 available hospital beds)
- Wednesday December 16th – 15.16% (478 COVID patients in hospitals within RAC-G / 3153 available hospital beds)
- Thursday December 17th – 15.16% (478 COVID patients in hospitals within RAC-G / 3153 available hospital beds)
- Friday December 18th – 16.5%
- Saturday December 19 -16.7
***********************************
GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK. CLICK ON “COMMENT” TO TELL US WHAT YOU THINK or use one of the alternative methods for providing feedback.
iEXPOSED.us Blog 
