Editor's Note Food & Drug Administration (FDA) approval of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine could happen in October, the July 12 Time reports. The company was granted FDA Fast Track designation for the vaccine. Pfizer’s vaccine, being developed with its German biotech partner BioNTech, uses a messenger-RNA, genetics-based approach. Pfizer CEO Albert…

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Editor's Note In this review article, researchers from the US, UK, Netherlands, and Australia discuss current evidence on the pathophysiology, transmission, diagnosis, and management of COVID-19. Among their findings: COVID-19 is spread primarily via respiratory droplets during close face-to-face contact. Infection can be spread by asymptomatic, presymptomatic and symptomatic carriers.…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) on July 10 reported that health-related workplace absenteeism rates were significantly higher than expected in March and April for some occupational groups in essential critical infrastructure categories. The following significantly exceeded their epidemic thresholds: personal care and services, including childcare…

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Editor's Note Critically ill COVID-19 patients who received a single IV dose of tocilizumab, a drug that calms an overreacting immune system, were 45% less likely to die and more likely to leave the hospital or be off ventilator within a month, finds this new study from the University of…

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Editor's Note This July 10 report from the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) provides detailed demographic and clinical information on a subset of 10,647 people who died with COVID-19 (ie, decedents) in 16 US public health jurisdictions between February 12 and May 18. The researchers found that: 60.6%…

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Editor's Note Current research shows that unhealthy lifestyle choices, including smoking and lack of exercise, along with emotional stressors like social isolation and interpersonal conflicts are important risk factors for developing upper respiratory infections, and it is possible these same factors increase the risk of contracting COVID-19, researchers from Carnegie…

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Editor's Note The Joint Commission announced July 1 that it has made two sets of standards changes for deemed-status hospitals and critical access hospitals. The first set of changes, which went into effect July 1, was made in response to hospital deeming renewal applications with the Centers for Medicare &…

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Editor's Note Cleveland Clinic researchers have found a significant increase in patients with stress cardiomyopathy during the COVID-19 pandemic. For the study, cardiologists examined 1,914 patients coming to the Cleveland Clinic with heart symptoms between March 1 and April 30 and compared them with patients in four time periods before…

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Editor's Note In this Letter to the Editor, epidemiologist and researcher Cori L. Ofstead, MSPH, and colleagues caution that because of high bronchoscope contamination rates found during routine use in previous studies, the possibility of bronchoscopy-associated transmission of COVID-19 or other pathogens must be considered. Though high-level disinfection should eliminate…

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Editor's Note A new COVID-19 test that uses blood, saliva, and urine samples and can deliver results within 30 to 45 minutes without expensive lab equipment has been developed by researchers at Beaumont Research Institute, Royal Oak, Michigan. The test can be used at the point of risk, such as…

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