A study including all Danish adults published yesterday in JAMA Psychiatry suggests an increased risk of new-onset mental illness only in SARS-CoV-2–positive patients aged 70 and older. It also finds that worsened mental health after COVID-19 hospitalization is common but no more so than after other, similarly severe respiratory infections.

A team led by Copenhagen University Hospital researchers used national registry data to compare the risk of new-onset mental disorders and psychotropic drug prescriptions among 526,749 adults who tested positive for COVID-19 with that of 501,119 untested, 3,124,933 COVID-negative, and hospitalized adults living in Denmark from January 1 to March 1, 2020.

Follow-up was conducted until December 31, 2021. About half of the participants were women, and the average age was 48.8 years.

Higher risk among hospitalized patients

The risk of new-onset mental illness was higher in both COVID-positive (hazard rate ratio [HRR], 1.24) and -negative (HRR, 1.42) adults than in those never tested. Relative to COVID-negative participants, the risk of mental illness in infected participants was 25% lower in those aged 18 to 29 years (HRR, 0.75), while those 70 and older were at 25% greater risk (HRR, 1.25).

A comparable trend was seen for first-time psychotropic medication use, with a lower risk in 18- to 29-year-olds (HRR, 0.81) and a higher risk in those 70 and older (HRR, 1.57). The risk of mental disorders was much higher in hospitalized COVID-19 patients than among the general population (HRR, 2.54) but no more so than among those hospitalized for other respiratory infections (HRR, 1.03).

Future studies should include even longer follow-up time.

Compared with COVID-negative participants, COVID-positive adults were at higher risk of filling anti-anxiety medication prescriptions (HRR, 1.22) and lower risk of taking antidepressants (HRR, 0.85), with no significant difference as to antipsychotic and antidementia drugs.

"Future studies should include even longer follow-up time and preferentially include immunological biomarkers to further investigate the impact of infection severity on postinfectious mental disorder sequelae," the study authors wrote.

The Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), the federal spontaneous reporting system for vaccine safety, is poorly named, thus leaving it vulnerable to criticism and misuse argues a new report from the Annenberg Public Policy Center.

With a name change to "Vaccination Safety Monitor" or "Vaccination Safety Watch," the federal government would be able to counter misperceptions that arose during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) use VAERS to monitor the safety of all vaccines licensed in the United States, but because anyone in the United States can submit a report to VAERS, the system can be misused, and the public is not aware that any adverse event or death reported to VAERS is not confirmed.

Such misuse and misunderstanding became more common after November of 2020, when COVID-19 vaccines were first being used under emergency authorization in the United States. The report cites national polls conducted in 2022, which show only 27% of US adults knew that VAERS deaths were not confirmed to have been caused by COVID vaccinations.

A lot of coincidental events wind up being submitted.

"The public needs to understand that VAERS includes valuable information that makes it possible for the CDC and FDA to monitor vaccine safety," the report states. "But because these agencies want to know about any possible effects of vaccination and anyone can report any event they consider vaccine-related, a lot of coincidental events wind up being submitted."

To clarify, the report says a name change to "Vaccine Safety Watch" and changing "Adverse Event" to "Incident" signals that the incidents of concern are unverified, relate to safety, and are part of a monitoring system.

Yesterday federal officials and leaders from Kansas formally opened the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) in Manhattan, Kansas, marking the culmination of plans that have been in the works since 2006 to replace the 68-year-old Plum Island Animal Disease Facility, a biosafety level 3 (BSL-3) facility in New York.

The NBAF is the nation's only large-animal BSL-4 facility that is designed to handle pathogens that don't have any treatments or countermeasures. When the site was under consideration, environmental impact studies raised concerns about a risk of a pathogen leak in an area located not far from livestock operations. However, factors that tipped the balance toward the Kansas site included its location near research facilities at Kansas State University and animal health companies in the Kansas City area.

In a press release, US Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Tom Vilsack said farmers, ranchers, and consumers depend on federal researchers for their work on better understanding and quickly responding to high-consequence animal pathogens. "This new, innovative facility will give USDA scientists access to cutting-edge, safe, and secure technology so they can continue to lead the world in animal health research, training, and diagnostics to protect our food supply, agricultural economy, and public health."

This new, innovative facility will give USDA scientists access to cutting-edge, safe, and secure technology.

No research has started at the lab yet, and staff are still doing compliance, regulatory work, inspections, development and testing of protocols, equipment preparations, and training, according to the Topeka Capital-Journal. NBAF Director Alfonso Clavijo, DVM, said clearance to start lab work is expected by late 2024.

The Department of Homeland Security led the design and construction of the NBAF, which will be owned and operated by the USDA, with the USDA's Animal Research Service and the Animal Plant Health and Inspection Services sharing operating responsibilities.

A review and meta-analysis of randomized clinical trials suggests shorter antibiotic durations are as safe and effective as longer durations in children with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), researchers reported today in Pediatrics.

To evaluate the evidence on antibiotic treatment durations for children with CAP, a team of Chinese and Canadian researchers reviewed and analyzed 16 randomized controlled trials conducted in high- and low-income countries comparing shorter (5 days or less) with longer antibiotic durations in 12,774 patients. Guidelines from the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society and the Infectious Diseases Society of America recommend 7 to 10 days of antibiotics but acknowledge that shorter courses may be just as effective, while the World Health Organization recommends 3 to 5 days for children in low- and middle-income countries.

The meta-analysis found no substantial differences between shorter-duration and longer-duration antibiotics in clinical cure (odds ratio 1.01; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.87 to 1.17; risk difference [RD] ,0.1%; moderate certainty), treatment failure (relative risk [RR], 1.06; 95% CI, 0.93 to 1.21; RD, 0.3%; moderate certainty), and relapse (RR, 1.12, 95% CI 0.92 to 1.35; RD, 0.5%; moderate certainty). Compared with longer-duration antibiotics, shorter-duration antibiotics do not appreciably increase mortality (RD, 0.0%; 95% CI, −0.2 to 0.1; high certainty), and probably have little or no impact on the need for change in antibiotics (RR, 1.03; 95% CI, 0.72 to 1.47; RD, 0.2%; moderate certainty), need for hospitalization (RD, −0.2%; 95% CI −0.9 to 0.5; moderate certainty), and severe adverse events (RD, 0.0%; 95% CI −0.2 to 0.2; moderate certainty).

We showed with reasonable certainty that shorter-duration therapy appears to be as efficacious and as safe as longer-duration therapy across a range of settings.

The study authors say the review is the most comprehensive yet to show the efficacy and safety of shorter versus longer antibiotic durations in children with CAP.

"Though it may be that there are differences in the typical phenotype of a child with CAP in different regions, and management guidelines are likely to vary, we showed with reasonable certainty that shorter-duration therapy appears to be as efficacious and as safe as longer-duration therapy across a range of settings," they wrote.