Hospitals no longer have to report COVID-19 hospitalization data, CDC says (wtvr.com)

Study gauges effectiveness of COVID-19 burden mitigation policies

In a new study published in JAMA Network Open, researchers have created a dataset and data visualization dashboard to evaluate the effectiveness of state and territory-level policies enacted to reduce the severity of COVID-19's impact on older people served by home health care agencies and nursing homes.

The authors found many policies within states and territories did not correspond with reductions in community or nursing home-level COVID-19 burden (i.e. number of cases and mortality counts). This suggests that policy effectiveness may depend on implementation and compliance. The study also found that policies focused less on home health care agencies compared with nursing homes, despite both settings serving vulnerable older populations.

https://thehill.com/policy/equilibrium-sustainability/4636172-new-york-cities-blackouts-climate-change-study/

Climate change is pushing some New York City neighborhoods into dozens of nearly daylong blackouts per year, a new study has found.

Large swaths of the state’s principal towns and cities faced repeated, protracted and dangerous weather-driven power outages between 2017 and 2020, according to findings published Wednesday in the Public Library of Science.

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Global survey shows COVID booster uptake in question A new survey of 23,000 adults in 23 countries taken in October 2023 finds a lower intent to get a COVID-19 booster vaccine (71.6%), compared with 2022 (87.9%). CIDRAP

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Moreover, 60.8% expressed being more willing to get vaccinated for diseases other than COVID-19 as a result of their experiences during the pandemic, while 23.1% reported being less willing. ...

Officials warn of risks to ‘certain groups’ of people amid bird flu outbreak in cows - POLITICO

The Biden administration said Wednesday it’s working to strengthen federal testing guidance and the overall public health response should the bird flu outbreak in cows spread among humans.

State health labs have sent “around 25” human test samples to the CDC for reference testing amid the current dairy outbreak, according to officials. More than 100 workers are being monitored. Officials declined to answer questions from reporters about where in the country the monitored workers are, saying only that officials are “following the herd” of infected cows.

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EU drug watchdog urges COVID-19 vaccine update The EU's drug watchdog urged Tuesday that anti-COVID jabs be updated before another round of vaccinations to counter a new variant of the virus, which is still claiming thousands of lives. Science X Medical Xpress

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The most widely circulating COVID variant worldwide is now JN.1, having overtaken the XBB family that is the target of the most recent vaccines, the European Medicines Agency said.

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Walmart to shut all health clinics in US over lack of profitability Walmart said on Tuesday it will close all 51 of its health clinics and shut its virtual health care operations, saying it could not see it as a sustainable business model to continue. Siddharth Cavale,Granth Vanaik Reuters

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Spikes of flu virus in wastewater raise questions about spread of bird flu | CNN Spikes of influenza A virus seen in wastewater samples from 59 sewer systems across 18 different states this spring may point to the spread of the H5N1 avian influenza virus that is currently infecting dairy cattle, a new study suggests. Brenda Goodman CNN

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So far, the US Department of Agriculture has reported more than 30 herds of dairy cows infected with H5N1 influenza across nine states. But there are questions about how large the outbreak might be and whether the US can adequately track it.

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Research finds negativity about vaccines surged on Twitter after COVID-19 shots became available There was a marked increase in negativity about vaccines on Twitter after COVID-19 vaccines became available, according to a presentation at the ESCMID Global Congress (formerly ECCMID) in Barcelona, ... Science X Medical Xpress

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The analysis also found that spikes in the number of negative tweets coincided with announcements from governments and health care authorities about vaccination.

Pandemic fatigue and vaccine hesitancy continue to affect global public health, new 23-country study finds (medicalxpress.com)

While it found that global uptake of at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose was robust, a new survey published in Nature Medicine revealed mixed signals about the current acceptance of vaccines generally, especially COVID-19 boosters. ...

"The repercussions of pandemic disruptions in health care services, the effects of the inequitable and slow global vaccine distribution, and the prevalence of misinformation and mistrust in health authorities continue to be felt," says Jeffrey V. Lazarus, Professor of Global Health at CUNY SPH, head of the Health Systems Research Group at Barcelona Institute for Global Health, and coordinator of the study.