What You Need to Know During the school year, kids tend to get sick more often — and spread germs to their friends and classmates. COVID-19 can cause serious health problems, so it’s more important than ever to protect your child’s health. You can help your child stay healthy and protect the people around them all school year long. Read the Guide: Protect Your Child from COVID-19, the Flu, and Other Illnesses | CDC
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Arexvy, the first respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine approved for use in the United States. Arexvy is approved for the prevention of lower respiratory tract disease caused by RSV in individuals 60 years of age and older.“Older adults, in particular those with underlying health conditions, such as heart or lung disease or weakened immune systems, are at high risk for severe disease caused by RSV,” said PeterContinue…
In November 2022, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) co-hosted a virtual workshop on the importance and challenges of developing mucosal vaccines for SARS-COV-2. The highlights of this workshop have now been published as a report in npj Vaccines.Although vaccines currently available for COVID-19 are usually effective at preventing severe disease, hospitalizations and death, researchers recognize the need for improvement. A vaccine more effective at preventing transmission or infection with SARS-CoV-2 couldContinue…
Last week, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) reported seven children, six in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and one in neighboring Burundi, had recently been paralyzed by poliovirus strains derived from a vaccine meant to prevent the disease. Unfortunately, such cases are so common—786 were reported last year in Africa, Yemen, and elsewhere—that these seven might not have stood out against the noise. But there was a key difference, GPEI said inContinue…
Coccidioidomycosis, more commonly known as Valley fever, is a fungal infection of increasing public health concern in the United States. Clinical manifestations range from mild flu-like disease to severe disseminated infection that can require life-long therapy. Valley fever is most common to the arid regions of the southwestern United States, Mexico and Central and South America. In 2019, more than 20,000 cases were reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and thisContinue…
The Republic of Korea has donated over 500,000 doses of the bivalent Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine to Thailand to mark the 65th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries.The donation means that for the first time since vaccine rollouts began, Thailand has access to the updated Covid-19 vaccine, which targets both the original variant of the virus, as well as its subsequent mutations. Source: Seoul donates next-gen Covid jabs
Moderna has announced it will provide its COVID vaccine for free to people without insurance, even after government money dries up. Source: Moderna says its COVID vaccine will remain free for all consumers, even those uninsured
Scores of mainland Chinese travellers are rushing to Hong Kong to receive mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, which are not available on the Chinese mainland, as the country grapples with a torrent of infections which have overwhelmed its health system. Source: Mainland Chinese head to Hong Kong for mRNA COVID vaccines
COVID-19 vaccines reduced the potential global death toll during the pandemic by more than half in the year following their implementation, according to estimates from a mathematical modeling study published on June 23, 2022, in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.19.8 million out of a potential 31.4 million COVID-19 deaths were prevented worldwide in the first year of the vaccination program according to estimates based on excess deaths from 185 countries and territories.The researchers estimate that aContinue…
WHO/Europe is launching the campaign “Keeping COVID-19 and influenza at bay this autumn/winter. Prepare, prevent, protect” to raise awareness about the pressing need for vulnerable populations to protect themselves from serious illness or death by getting vaccinated against both influenza and COVID-19. The campaign calls on countries in the WHO European Region to relaunch mitigation efforts and be ready to respond to an increased burden on their health-care systems amid concerns over an autumn andContinue…