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At a World Health Organization (WHO) briefing today, Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, said COVID-19 deaths for 2022 alone passed 1 million this week, as he pressed countries to do more to vaccinate all healthcare workers, older people, and others at highest risk. Since the pandemic began in early 2020, 6,472,848 deaths have been reported, according to the Johns Hopkins online dashboard.
Within days of confirming a new Ebola case in North Kivu province, medical teams in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) today launched an Ebola vaccination campaign in Beni, the area where the fatal case was reported.
On Twitter, the World Health Organization (WHO) said it provided 200 vaccine doses and is supporting the country's ring vaccination campaign.
Whether the increase was caused by COVID-19 or other factors remains unclear.
In other developments, global COVID-19 cases and deaths declined again last week.
Beginning today, those getting a monkeypox vaccine in New York City will receive an intradermal injection of the Jynneos vaccine as part of a dose-sparing strategy. The city immediately opened 12,000 vaccine slots upon announcing the decision yesterday.
In other US news, North Carolina reported a pediatric monkeypox case.
In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, life expectancy in the United States fell by 4.5 and 3.6 years for Hispanic and Black males, respectively, while declining 1.5 years for their White counterparts, finds a study published yesterday in PNAS.
In addition, Brazil has confirmed 77 cases of the poxvirus in children.
In another development, Pfizer said the vaccine for younger kids still shows strong efficacy as it prepares to file an EUA for a BA.5/BA.4 bivalent booster for kids as young as 6 months.
At least 2.5 hours of moderate activity or 1.2 hours of vigorous exercise weekly was linked to lower risk.
A study published yesterday in JAMA Pediatrics suggests that long COVID is uncommon in children and teens and that risk factors include severe SARS-CoV-2 infection, younger age, and complex underlying chronic diseases.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines long COVID as continuous, relapsing, or new symptoms or conditions persisting at least 1 month after the initial infection.
A randomized clinical trial in Niger found that mass distribution of azithromycin to preschool-aged children was no more effective at reducing incidence of trachoma than placebo, researchers reported today in JAMA Network Open.
In related developments, the FDA OKs emergency use of the Novavax vaccine for teens.
The average for all variants was 6.6 days, but it ranged from 5.0 for Alpha to 3.4 for Omicron.
California health officials are confronting growing numbers of monkeypox cases, with numbers doubling in Los Angeles County over the past 2 weeks.
Over the weekend, the World Health Organization (WHO) African regional office reported a suspected Ebola case in the Democratic Republic of the Congo's (DRC's) North Kivu province, and today an official from the country's national lab confirmed the finding, according to media reports.
Nonhospitalized, high-risk, vaccinated COVID-19 patients who received nirmatrelvir-ritonavir (NMV-r, or Paxlovid) saw a 45% drop in their relative risk of emergency department (ED) visits, hospitalization, and death by 30 days, suggests a study published late last week in Clinical Infectious Diseases.
Rates of "brain fog," dementia, psychotic disorders, and epilepsy or seizures remained elevated.
Multiple surface sites tested positive for virus DNA in the home of 2 patients.
Our weekly wrap-up of antimicrobial stewardship & antimicrobial resistance scans
A study of hospitalized pneumonia patients in Denmark found similar outcomes between short-course and prolonged-course antibiotic therapy, Danish researchers reported yesterday in Clinical Microbiology and Infection.
