• Examining Which Approaches Are Most Effective at Reducing COVID-19 Spread

    Researchers have found that physical distancing is universally effective at reducing the spread of COVID-19, while social bubbles and masks are more situation-dependent. The researchers developed a model to test the effectiveness of measures such as physical distancing, masks or social bubbles when used in various settings.

  • Germany Worried about “Violent Potential” among Anti-Lockdown Protesters

    Germany’s domestic intelligence agency has identified an “intensified escalation potential” within Querdenker movement that includes coronavirus skeptics. Querdenker adherents, including coronavirus-skeptics and anti-lockdown protesters, claim the COVID-19 pandemic and long-established federal and regional laws aimed at halting the pathogen’s spread infringe on citizens’ liberties.

  • Coronavirus: Five Ways Some States Have Used the Pandemic to Curtail Human Rights and Democracy

    In the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak, at least 95 countries declared a national emergency, empowering governments to act in ways they would not normally to protect citizens. Such exceptional periods pose major risks for democracy and human rights, providing opportunities for leaders and states to consolidate power.

  • In Responding to COVID, Nations Copy Policies of Regimes with Similar Political Ideology

    Public policy researchers found that nationalistic governments around the globe are more likely to copy other nationalistic governments in responding to the current pandemic. “While leaders often claim responses are based on the best available advice from scientists and public health experts, recent policy diffusion research suggests that countries are emulating the COVID-19 policies of their neighbors and political peers instead of responding to domestic conditions,” one researcher said.

  • L.A. Imposes Sweeping COVID Restrictions

    Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles has issued an order for residents to stay at home and minimize other contacts. The order, which supersedes one from June, prohibits public and private gatherings of people from more than one household and states that all businesses in the city which require people to work on location must stop operations. Walking, driving, travel on public transport, bikes, motorcycles and scooters are prohibited, other than for those undertaking essential activities.

  • WHO Trial Finds No Benefit of 4 Drugs for Hospital COVID Patients

    None of the four once-promising drugs evaluated for the treatment of COVID-19 in the ongoing World Health Organization (WHO) Solidarity Trial—remdesivir, hydroxychloroquine, lopinavir, or interferon-beta-1a—prevented in-hospital death, reduced the need for ventilation, or shortened the duration of hospitalization.

  • IBM Detects Hacking Ploy to Target COVID Vaccine Supply

    Researchers from technology giant IBM say hackers have tried to collect information on the global initiative for distributing coronavirus vaccine to developing countries. They said a nation state appeared to be involved.

  • CDC Panel Moves Health Workers, Nursing Home Residents to Front of COVID Vaccine Line

    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) vaccine advisory group, in an emergency meeting Monday, approved an interim recommendation for who should receive the first COVID-19 vaccine doses once authorized, which puts healthcare workers and nursing home residents at the front of the line.

  • Britain Becomes First Nation to Approve Pfizer COVID-19 Vaccine

    Britain has given emergency approval to a new COVID-19 vaccine developed by U.S.-based pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, becoming the world’s first western nation ready to begin mass inoculations against a disease that has sickened nearly 64 million people worldwide, including more than 1.4 million deaths.

  • Valuing “Natural Capital” Vital to Avoid Next Pandemic

    Pandemics will emerge more often, kill more people than COVID-19 and do even more damage to the world economy unless urgent steps are taken to address risk drivers such as deforestation, warns a major new report on biodiversity and pandemics.

  • Here's How the Three COVID-19 Vaccines Compare

    With pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca’s announcement Monday that its vaccine successfully prevented coronavirus infection, three candidates appear to be promising vital tools to curtail the COVID-19 pandemic. However, scientists caution that all they know about these vaccines is what the companies have said in press releases. Like movie trailers, “They provide some exciting scenes but leave a lot unsaid. You have to go see the whole movie,” said Vanderbilt University infectious diseases professor William Schaffner.

  • Face Masks Cut Disease Spread in the Lab, but Have Less Impact in the Community. We Need to Know Why

    In controlled laboratory situations, face masks appear to do a good job of reducing the spread of coronavirus (at least in hamsters) and other respiratory viruses. However, evidence shows mask-wearing policies seem to have had much less impact on the community spread of COVID-19. Why this gap between the effectiveness in the lab and the effectiveness seen in the community? The real world is more complex than a controlled laboratory situation. The right people need to wear the right mask, in the right way, at the right times and places.

  • Landmark Danish Study Shows Face Masks Have No Significant Effect

    Do face masks work? Carl Heneghan and Tom Jefferson write that a just-published study reports the results of a trial in Denmark – a study which hopes to answer that very question. “In the end, there was no statistically significant difference between those who wore masks and those who did not when it came to being infected by Covid-19,” they write.

  • U.S. COVID-19 Crisis Deepens as Deaths Top 250,000

    As COVID-19 deaths topped 250,000 yesterday, the White House coronavirus task force signaled that the nation’s pandemic situation is worsening, with more overrun hospitals and deaths potentially approaching 2,000 a day in the lead-up to Christmas—unless strong mitigation measures are taken. Meanwhile, the global COVID-19 total topped 56 million yesterday, as Europe’s cases slowed but its deaths rose.

  • Questions Persist over Face Mask Efficacy

    Face masks have become the ubiquitous symbol of a pandemic that has sickened 35 million people and killed more than 1 million. For the variety of masks in use by the public, the data are messy, disparate, and often hastily assembled. On top of that, the use of masks has been accompanied by a divisive political discourse. A new study finds that “the recommendation to wear a surgical mask when outside the home among others did not reduce, at conventional levels of statistical significance, the incidence of SARS-CoV-2 infection in mask wearers in a setting where social distancing and other public health measures were in effect.”