About the public’s health
Fever checks are a flawed way to flag Covid-19 cases. Experts say smell tests might help: “‘My impression is that anosmia is an earlier symptom of Covid-19 relative to fever, and some infected people can have anosmia and nothing else,’ said physician Andrew Badley, who heads a virus lab at the Mayo Clinic. ‘So it’s potentially a more sensitive screen for asymptomatic patients.’
In a recent study, Badley and colleagues found that Covid-19 patients were 27 times more likely than others to have lost their sense of smell. But they were only 2.6 times more likely to have fever or chills, suggesting that anosmia produces a clearer signal and may therefore be a better Covid-catching net than fever.”
Characteristics of Adult Outpatients and Inpatients with COVID-19 — 11 Academic Medical Centers, United States, March–May 2020: “In a multistate telephone survey of 350 adult inpatients and outpatients who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 infection, only 46% reported recent contact with a COVID-19 patient. Most participants’ contacts were a family member (45%) or a work colleague (34%). Two thirds of participants were employed; only 17% were able to telework.” In other words, 54% of infected persons did not know where they got the disease.
Healthcare added 358K jobs in June with hospitals adding jobs after dip in May: “Healthcare employment continued to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic in June with 358,000 jobs added to the industry and hospital jobs started to increase, according to the latest federal jobs report. The report released Thursday represents a slight increase from the 315,000 jobs the industry added in May. It showed that hiring in physician and dentist offices continues to recover, and hospitals added 6,000 jobs after declining by 26,000 in May.”
Discrimination and Hypertension Risk Among African Americans in the Jackson Heart Study: An interesting and timely study on the Social Determinants of Disease: “Higher stress from lifetime discrimination was associated with higher hypertension risk after adjustment for demographics (hazard ratio for high versus low, 1.19 [95% CI, 1.01–1.40]), but the association was attenuated after adjustment for hypertension risk factors (hazard ratio, 1.14 [95% CI, 0.97–1.35]). Lifetime discrimination may increase the risk of hypertension in African Americans.”
Trump says he's 'all for masks' despite reluctance to wear one: “‘I’m all for masks. I think masks are good,’ Trump told Fox Business in an interview, adding that he would wear a face covering if he were in a ‘tight situation’ with other people.
Trump noted that he hasn’t had to wear a mask because people who come in contact with him are tested for the coronavirus. Asked whether he would wear a mask publicly, Trump said he would have ‘no problem’ with doing so.”
Estimation of Excess Deaths Associated With the COVID-19 Pandemic in the United States, March to May 2020:”In this cohort study, the number of deaths due to any cause increased by approximately 122 000 from March 1 to May 30, 2020, which is 28% higher than the reported number of COVID-19 deaths…
Official tallies of deaths due to COVID-19 underestimate the full increase in deaths associated with the pandemic in many states.”
COVID-19 strain in Beijing outbreak may have come from Southeast Asia: Harvard study:”The outbreak in Beijing has raised concerns about China’s vulnerability to a ‘second wave’ of infections. The virus found in Beijing cases is an imported strain of COVID-19, according to the China Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.” The three genome samples “showed the greatest resemblance to cases in Europe from February to May, and to cases in South and Southeast Asia from May to June.”
About health insurance
The COVID-19 Pandemic: Insurer Insights into Challenges, Implications, and Lessons Learned: Among the findings from these Urban Institute interviews of insurance executives:
“Insurers appear well-positioned financially to navigate the COVID-19 crisis, at least for now.
While insurers expect the economic downturn to have a significant impact on their employer business, to date, most insurers report that their employer block of business remains surprising stable. Still, there are concerns that small employers, in particular, will begin to drop coverage in the coming months.
Medicaid enrollment is on the rise, but expected increases in individual market enrollment have yet to materialize in a significant way.
Most insurers are concerned that the financial impact of COVID-19 on some medical practices will lead to further consolidation among providers.
Though insurers face a significant degree of uncertainty, they believe the crisis will have less of an impact on 2021 premiums than initially feared.
Most insurers feel that the COVID-19 crisis has not prompted a need to change benefit designs to any great degree, though they believe telehealth benefits are here to stay.
Insurers acknowledge that further changes to the health care system are needed to address health disparities, especially racial and ethnic disparities.”