Category: Covid-19

A pharmacist gives Jennifer Haller a shot in the first-stage safety clinical trial of a potential vaccine for COVID-19 on March 16 at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle. U.S. officials say they are already seeing efforts by foreign actors to steal information from U.S. firms working on a vaccine and treatments for the virus. Ted S. Warren/AP hide caption

A pharmacist gives Jennifer Haller a shot in the first-stage safety clinical trial of a potential vaccine for COVID-19 on March 16 at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle. U.S. officials say they are already seeing efforts by foreign actors to steal information from U.S. firms working on a vaccine and treatments for the virus.

As researchers around the globe race to develop a coronavirus vaccine, U.S. authorities are warning American firms to exercise extreme caution in safeguarding their research against China and others with a track record of stealing cutting-edge medical technology.

"We are imploring all those research facilities and hospitals and pharmaceutical companies that are doing really great research to do everything in their power to protect it," Bill Evanina, the director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, said in an interview with NPR.

"We don't want that company or the research hospital to be the one a year from now, two years from now, identified as having it all stolen before they finished it," said Evanina, whose center falls under the director of national intelligence.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Britain's National Cyber Security Center recently issued a statement saying hackers are "actively targeting organisations ... that include healthcare bodies, pharmaceutical companies, academia, medical research organisations, and local government."

The statement did not name China or any other country. Reuters reported that hackers linked to Iran tried to break into email accounts at the U.S. drugmaker Gilead Sciences, which has a potentially promising drug to treat the COVID-19 virus. Iran denied the report.

China's record

Meanwhile, Evanina says China, far more than any other country, has been aggressively stealing valuable medical technology for years. Information on a possible vaccine would be a huge prize.

"We have full expectation that China will do everything in their power to obtain any viable research that we are conducting here in the U.S.," Evanina said. "That will be in line with their capabilities and intent the last decade plus, and we are expecting them to continue to do so."

A number of drug makers, research labs and government health bodies have announced efforts to seek a vaccine or treatment for COVID-19. That's made them a target, FBI Deputy Assistant Director Tonya Ugoretz said recently.

"We certainly have seen reconnaissance activity, and some intrusions, into some of those institutions," she said. "It kind of makes them a mark for other nation-states that are interested in gleaning details about what exactly they're doing and maybe even stealing proprietary information."

China has long denied involvement in corporate espionage and has called for international cooperation to accelerate progress on COVID-19 vaccines and therapies. Beijing points to its sharing of the coronavirus' gene sequence as evidence of its sincerity. Meanwhile, Chinese labs say they are racing ahead to find a homegrown vaccine.

President Trump and his administration have frequently criticized China for its handling of the coronavirus. Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have said the virus may have escaped from a lab in the central city of Wuhan. But they have not provided evidence, and this has led to skepticism about some administration claims regarding what has happened inside China in recent months.

'Made in China 2025'

However, the U.S. national security community has shared a broad consensus for years about what they say is a sustained Chinese government effort to acquire, lawfully or not, a wide range of intellectual property, including medical research.

U.S. officials often point to China's President Xi Jinping and his "Made in China 2025" plan, which calls for the country to be a world leader in the most important technologies of the 21st century artificial intelligence, renewable energy, quantum computing, driverless cars and wide range of medical technologies.

In the past couple years, the Justice Department has filed charges in multiple cases involving Chinese nationals or people suspected of working for China to steal medical technology, often involving cancer research.

U.S. officials describe these efforts as taking several different forms.

One is widespread and persistent hacking attempts directed at tech companies or research labs working on technology China has identified as important.

A second method is sending students or researchers to work in the U.S., often for extended periods. In a case last year, the Justice Department filed charges against a Chinese couple that worked for 10 years at an Ohio lab that researches pediatric diseases, including childhood cancers. U.S. authorities accuse the couple of stealing research at the Ohio lab for use in a company the husband-and-wife team had established back in China.

U.S. officials say a third path is China's Thousand Talents Program. China identifies promising research, often at a U.S. university, then offers funding through its Thousand Talents Program with the expectation it will get access to the research as well. U.S. academics are required to tell the U.S. government if they receive such foreign funding.

Security briefings

To combat the theft of U.S. technology, Evanina works with law enforcement and other government partners to brief company CEOs, university presidents and other leaders of organizations that are being targeted.

This began several years ago, and includes senior leaders in the medical community. Sometimes they are called to Washington for a briefing where the organizations may also hear from Sen. Richard Burr, the North Carolina Republican who heads the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the ranking Democrat.

"We provide (the organizations) a one-day classified briefing. We make sure they understand the complexity of the threat. We've done that for multiple sectors that include hospitals, medical centers and research institutions and the pharmaceutical community as well," said Evanina.

Greg Myre is an NPR national security correspondent. Follow him @gregmyre1.

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U.S. Officials: Beware Of China And Others Trying To Steal COVID-19 Research - NPR

Tobacco kills more than 8 million people globally every year. More than 7 million of these deaths are from direct tobacco use and around 1.2 million are due to non-smokers being exposed to second-hand smoke.

Tobacco smoking is a known risk factor for many respiratory infections and increases the severity of respiratory diseases. A review of studies by public health experts convened by WHO on 29 April 2020 found that smokers are more likely to develop severe disease with COVID-19, compared to non-smokers.

COVID-19 is an infectious disease that primarily attacks the lungs. Smoking impairs lung function making it harder for the body to fight off coronaviruses and other diseases. Tobacco is also a major risk factor for noncommunicable diseases like cardiovascular disease, cancer, respiratory disease and diabetes which put people with these conditions at higher risk for developing severe illness when affected by COVID-19. Available research suggests that smokers are at higher risk of developing severe disease and death.

WHO is constantly evaluating new research, including research that examines the link between tobacco use, nicotine use, and COVID-19. WHO urges researchers, scientists and the media to be cautious about amplifying unproven claims that tobacco or nicotine could reduce the risk of COVID-19. There is currently insufficient information to confirm any link between tobacco or nicotine in the prevention or treatment of COVID-19.

Nicotine replacement therapies, such as gum and patches are designed to help smokers quit tobacco. WHO recommends that smokers take immediate steps to quit by using proven methods such as toll-free quit lines, mobile text-messaging programmes, and nicotine replacement therapies.

Within 20 minutes of quitting, elevated heart rate and blood pressure drop. After 12 hours, the carbon monoxide level in the bloodstream drops to normal. Within 2-12 weeks, circulation improves and lung function increases. After 1-9 months, coughing and shortness of breath decrease.

WHO stresses the importance of ethically approved, high-quality, systematic research that will contribute to advancing individual and public health, emphasizing that promotion of unproven interventions could have a negative effect on health.

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WHO statement: Tobacco use and COVID-19 - World Health Organization

RALEIGH - More than 9,000 North Carolina residents are presumed to have recovered from COVID-19 as of May 11, according to calculations by the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has yet to establish a standard definition of "recovery" for COVID-19, and the long-term impacts of the virus on the respiratory system and other vital organs remains unclear.

More: Henderson mother cared for baby with COVID-19. As bills mounted, strangers helped.

NCDHHS calculated that 9,115 North Carolinians about 60.9% of the state's total lab-confirmed cases have likely recovered from COVID-19.

That's based on a median recovery time of two weeks for COVID-19 patients who don't have to be hospitalized and 28days for patients who are hospitalized, according to Dr. Mandy Cohen, Secretary of the NC Department of Health and Human Services.

More: COVID-19 may be novel, but history shows a pandemic path we can learn from | OPINION

Those medians exclude patients who ultimately die from COVID-19, she added.

Each patient's actual recovery times could be shorter or longer based on a number of factors, the NCDHHS emphasized among them the patient's age and underlying health conditions, as well as when they first seek treatment.

The 14 and 28-day figures were chosen since the time between sample collection and the resolution of symptoms hasn't been reported for all of North Carolina's COVID-19 cases, a May 11 release said.

Are people who have recovered fromCOVID-19 still contagious?

Experts still aren't certain exactly when during the course of recovery a COVID-19 patient is no longer able to transmit the virus to others.

Researchers have established that COVID-19 patients can infect others even before they experience their first symptom, such as a dry cough or fever.

Preliminary studies suggest that viral shedding the mechanism by which viruses are spread is highest at the very start of the illness for patients with mild cases of COVID-19 and declines at the onset of symptoms, according to the CDC and preprint studies on medRXiv.

More: Think you have COVID-19? Buncombe now has a digital 'self-checker' for symptoms

It remains unknown whether someone who has recovered from COVID-19 can contract the virus again.

As the body fights off an infection like COVID-19, itproduces proteins called antibodies that help the immune system identifyeach viral particle for destruction.

More: With her husband dying from COVID-19, Asheville woman fought the virus, too

After defeating some diseases, including the measles,the body continues to produce antibodies for that virus for the rest of its life that's how the body "remembers" a disease and is immune to it.

Blood antibody tests are commercially available for COVID-19 and have been used to determine whether a patient has had the new coronavirus in the past.

But researchers are still unsure how long the body produces antibodies after recovering from COVID-19, and how strong their immunity is while antibodies persist.

Even people who have recovered from COVID-19 should abide by all social distancing mandates, public health officials say, and behave as though they could contract the virus again.

Elizabeth Anne Brown is the trending news reporter for the Citizen Times. Reach her ateabrown@citizentimes.com, or follow her onTwitter @eabrown18.

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Coronavirus: How many people have recovered from COVID-19 in NC? - Citizen Times

Life under lockdown has turned our everyday world upside down. With economic activity on hold in many countries, some once-prosperous businesses face an uncertain future. But for some, the pandemic has had an altogether different impact.

Here are the sectors finding an unexpected boost during the pandemic:

1. Cycling

In some countries, cycling offers a way to escape the confines of lockdown.

Image: REUTERS/Molly Darlington

People are taking to two wheels in droves, both as a way to exercise while obeying social distancing rules and to avoid crowded public transport. Bike stores have been declared an essential service in the UK, with many shops seeing a spike in demand.

The Association of Cycle Traders (ACT) told the Guardian newspaper its members were reporting strong sales of more moderately priced new cycles and a boom in repair services. A growing number of people are dusting down their old bikes and rediscovering the joys of cycling. Business at the London Cycle Workshop has doubled, according to the BBC, as people seek repairs.

A similar trend is happening in places like Berlin, where city streets are being converted into bike lanes to encourage more cyclists. (In other countries like France, Spain and Italy, riding bikes was not permitted during lockdown.)

2. Home fitnessAs quarantines kept people indoors, they increasingly turned to home fitness regimes to stay healthy.

In China, where the first COVID-19 lockdown was implemented, sales of home exercise equipment soared. JD.com said sales of machines such as ellipticals and treadmills nearly doubled, while rowers jumped 133%.

This trend is echoed in other parts of the world, as people stay away from crowded gyms and exercise classes. Online sales of yoga mats have climbed the top-sellers list of major retailers in the US. And UK department stores like John Lewis are seeing a significant increase in home gym equipment, according to the BBC.

3. Drive-in movies

Drive-in movie theatres like this one in Florida allow people to go out while obeying social distancing rules.

Image: REUTERS/Marco Bello

In the US, drive-in movie theatres could be making a comeback, following years of decline due to cinemas moving into shopping malls and services like Netflix bringing the big screen to peoples homes.

Social distancing rules have closed many regular movie theatres. Drive-ins offer a way to escape the confines of home quarantine and be entertained while keeping interaction with others to a minimum.

While major cinema chains in the US and Canada have suffered the industry's lowest box office weekend sales in 20 years, some open air cinemas are thriving. Drive-ins in California, Kansas, Oklahoma and Missouri are open for business with some reporting higher ticket sales, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Many independent and smaller grocery stores have seen business increase during the COVID-19 pandemic. As more customers shop for groceries online and large supermarkets run out of stock of essential lines, people are turning to local grocers to top up their shopping.

Coronavirus has changed our shopping habits.

Image: YouGov

Research by YouGov in the UK shows nearly a quarter of people in Britain have visited local grocery stores more since lockdown restrictions were imposed. The survey found a 5% increase in peoples use of local butchers or fishmongers, and a small increase in visits to speciality food shops.

The same trend is happening in the US. President of Americas National Grocer Association Greg Ferrara told ABC News that independent grocers are helping large chains meet unprecedented demand.

A new strain of Coronavirus, COVID 19, is spreading around the world, causing deaths and major disruption to the global economy.

Responding to this crisis requires global cooperation among governments, international organizations and the business community, which is at the centre of the World Economic Forums mission as the International Organization for Public-Private Cooperation.

The Forum has created the COVID Action Platform, a global platform to convene the business community for collective action, protect peoples livelihoods and facilitate business continuity, and mobilize support for the COVID-19 response. The platform is created with the support of the World Health Organization and is open to all businesses and industry groups, as well as other stakeholders, aiming to integrate and inform joint action.

As an organization, the Forum has a track record of supporting efforts to contain epidemics. In 2017, at our Annual Meeting, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) was launched bringing together experts from government, business, health, academia and civil society to accelerate the development of vaccines. CEPI is currently supporting the race to develop a vaccine against this strand of the coronavirus.

5. DIY and Home improvementIreland has seen a sales boom in DIY and home repairs as people fill quarantine time by painting walls, fixing woodwork and tending to the garden.

The Irish Times reports unprecedented demand at some DIY stores, with long queues standing the recommended 2-metre distance from one another. The same distancing rules are in force at the checkout, but customers describe busy scenes inside some shops as people stock up on household products and take advantage of plant sales.

In Wales, Wrexham plant seed seller Justseed has stopped taking orders for some products due to excessive demand. Were catching up with a massive surge the company told the BBC.

Garden centre Marshalls in the UK has asked customers to be patient when ordering in the face of unprecedented demand.

Other lockdowners are turning to baking, knitting and handicrafts. Londons Liberty department store has seen a 380% increase in sewing accessories and almost 230% uptick in craft kits, the BBC reports.

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Consumers have flocked to these 5 industries under COVID-19 - World Economic Forum

PIERRE, S.D. (KELO) The death toll from COVID-19 increased to 39 on Tuesday when the latest test results were reported by the South Dakota Department of Health.

The five new deaths included one male and four females. One death was listed as a man age 30-39, the first in South Dakota listed in that age range. One was listed age 50-59, one was 60-69 and two were listed as 80-years old or older. All the new deaths were reported in Minnehaha County, which accounts for 34 deaths in the state.

Active cases in South Dakota decreased to 1,315, down 78 from Monday (1,393).

Total positive cases are at 3,663, up 49 from Monday (3,614). Total recoveries are at 2,309, up 122 from Monday (2,187). There were 73 more recoveries than new positive cases announced Tuesday.

Current hospitalizations are at 74, down four from Monday (78). Total hospitalizations are at 271, up eight from Monday (263).

Negative tests are at 21,534, up from Monday (20,964).

There were 619 tests reported Tuesday. For the past six days, testing has been over 600 tests reported each day.

Total cases in Minnehaha County increased to 2,978. There have been 1,851 recoveries and 34 deaths for a total of 1,127 active cases in the states largest county.

Lincoln County is listed at 190.

Brown County increased to 132, five more from Monday (127).

Stay with KELOLAND News for more coverage.

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Five new COVID-19 related deaths announced Tuesday - KELOLAND.com

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Covid-19: why are some people losing their taste and smell? podcast - The Guardian

Hamilton Medical of Reno and General Motors joined forces to build factory capable of building thousands of ventilators in weeks. Reno Gazette Journal

The state has added a number of new charts, graphs and other data points to its online COVID-19 dashboard, greatly increasing the amount of information publicly available to Nevadans.

Some of those new graphs are just new ways to visualize data that was already available like three new charts displaying how many people weretested on a given day, how many tested positiveand how many people died but others are entirely new, and answer some pressing questions about the coronavirus pandemic in Nevada.

A chart showing the cumulative number of cases in Nevada and how many people tested positive on a given day.(Photo: Nevada Health Alliance)

The charts featuring new information there's three of them pertain to the growth rates of Nevada's COVID-19 cases and related deaths, hospitalizations and capacity, and the state's cumulative positivity rate.

But what does all this new information mean, and why's it important?

The Reno Gazette Journal asked the Nevada Health Alliance to explain the new information on its dashboard. Kyra Morgan, Nevada's state biostatistician, sent an explanation of the new data.

Charts showing the daily growth rate of new COVID-19 cases and deaths.(Photo: Nevada Health Alliance)

Wondering how quickly COVID-19 is spreading in Nevada? This tab on the dashboard is for you.

These two charts, one for cases and one for deaths, represent the amount cases and deaths have grown over time.

"The growth rate of COVID-19 may change over time due to actual changes in the growth, or for reasons such as implementation of new testing strategies or changes to control measures that are in place," Morgan wrote in an email to the RGJ.

As the state works to slow the growth of the virus, progress can be seen in these charts.

Charts on the Nevada Health Alliance dashboard showing confirmed and suspected COVID-19 hospitalizations.(Photo: Nevada Health Alliance)

These charts, fueled by data from the Nevada Hospital Association, shows how taxed the state's healthcare system is by COVID-19.

This data, specifically if the trend of hospitalizations is decreasing,was one of the metrics used by the governor's office to determine if the state could move into phase 1 of reopening.

Ventilator use, the number of COVID-19 patients currently in the ICU and day-over-day changes in hospitalizations are also measured here.

Hospitalizations, ICU bed use and ventilator use all were on a relatively downward trajectory, but appear to betrending back up as ofMay 9, the day phase 1 reopening began.

It's not clear what metrics will be used to determine if the state is ready for phase 2 of reopening, thoughGov. Steve Sisolak said phase 1 would likely last until the end of the month.

A chart showing Nevada's test positivity rate compared against the World Health Organization's maximum positivity rate recommended before reopening.(Photo: Nevada Health Alliance)

Another metric the governor's office used to enter phase 1 of reopening, a chart measuring Nevada's test positivity rate is now available on the Nevada Health Alliance dashboard.

This chart shows the percentage of people who tested positive on a given dayout of the total number of people tested that day.

"In general, if a high percentage of tests are coming back positive, that is indicative that there are many more cases that have gone undetected," Morgan explained.

Right now, this chart paints a good picture of Nevada's fight against COVID-19.

"Nevada'sdata shows that as we expand testing, the test positivity rate goes down," Morgan wrote."We have seen a significant decline in this measure since April 25."

The chart also compares Nevada's positivity rate against the maximum positivity rate recommended by the World Health Organization before an area reopens.

Nevada dipped below the WHO's maximum recommended rate of 10 percentfor the first time on May 11.

Visitdhcfp.nv.gov/covid19/and click on the "COVID-19 Data Dashboard" link to see the dashboard.

Sam Gross is a breaking news reporter for the Reno Gazette Journal who covers wildfires, emergencies and more. Support his work by subscribing to RGJ.com.

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There's new data on Nevada's COVID-19 dashboard. Here's what it means, why it's important - Reno Gazette Journal

A modelling group convened by the World Health Organization and UNAIDS has estimated that if efforts are not made to mitigate and overcome interruptions in health services and supplies during the COVID-19 pandemic, a six-month disruption of antiretroviral therapy could lead to more than 500 000 extra deaths from AIDS-related illnesses, including from tuberculosis, in sub-Saharan Africa in 20202021. In 2018, an estimated 470 000 people died of AIDS-related deaths in the region.

There are many different reasons that could cause services to be interruptedthis modelling exercise makes it clear that communities and partners need to take action now as the impact of a six-month disruption of antiretroviral therapy could effectively set the clock on AIDS-related deaths back to 2008, when more than 950 000 AIDS-related deaths were observed in the region. And people would continue to die from the disruption in large numbers for at least another five years, with an annual average excess in deaths of 40% over the next half a decade. In addition, HIV service disruptions could also have some impact on HIV incidence in the next year.

The terrible prospect of half a million more people in Africa dying of AIDS-related illnesses is like stepping back into history, said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization.

We must read this as a wake-up call to countries to identify ways to sustain all vital health services. For HIV, some countries are already taking important steps, for example ensuring that people can collect bulk packs of treatment, and other essential commodities, including self-testing kits, from drop-off points, which relieves pressure on health services and the health workforce. We must also ensure that global supplies of tests and treatments continue to flow to the countries that need them, added Dr Tedros.

In sub-Saharan Africa, an estimated 25.7 million people were living with HIV and 16.4 million (64%) were taking antiretroviral therapy in 2018. Those people now risk having their treatment interrupted because HIV services are closed or are unable to supply antiretroviral therapy because of disruptions to the supply chain or because services simply become overwhelmed due to competing needs to support the COVID-19 response.

The COVID-19 pandemic must not be an excuse to divert investment from HIV, said Winnie Byanyima, Executive Director of UNAIDS. There is a risk that the hard-earned gains of the AIDS response will be sacrificed to the fight against COVID-19, but the right to health means that no one disease should be fought at the expense of the other.

When treatment is adhered to, a persons HIV viral load drops to an undetectable level, keeping that person healthy and preventing onward transmission of the virus. When a person is unable to take antiretroviral therapy regularly, the viral load increases, impacting the persons health, which can ultimately lead to death. Even relatively short-term interruptions to treatment can have a significant negative impact on a persons health and potential to transmit HIV.

This research brought together five teams of modellers using different mathematical models to analyse the effects of various possible disruptions to HIV testing, prevention and treatment services caused by COVID-19.

Each model looked at the potential impact of treatment disruptions of three months or six months on AIDS mortality and HIV incidence in sub-Saharan Africa. In the six-month disruption scenario, estimates of excess AIDS-related deaths in one year ranged from 471 000 to 673 000, making it inevitable that the world will miss the global 2020 target of fewer than 500 000 AIDS-related deaths worldwide.

Shorter disruptions of three months would see a reduced but still significant impact on HIV deaths. More sporadic interruptions of antiretroviral therapy supply would lead to sporadic adherence to treatment, leading to the spread of HIV drug resistance, with long-term consequences for future treatment success in the region.

Disrupted services could also reverse gains made in preventing mother-to-child transmission of HIV. Since 2010, new HIV infections among children in sub-Saharan Africa have declined by 43%, from 250 000 in 2010 to 140 000 in 2018, owing to the high coverage of HIV services for mothers and their children in the region. Curtailment of these services by COVID-19 for six months could see new child HIV infections rise drastically, by as much as 37% in Mozambique, 78% in Malawi, 78% in Zimbabwe and 104% in Uganda.

Other significant effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the AIDS response in sub-Saharan Africa that could lead to additional mortality include reduced quality clinical care owing to health facilities becoming overstretched and a suspension of viral load testing, reduced adherence counselling and drug regimen switches. Each model also considered the extent to which a disruption to prevention services, including suspension of voluntary medical male circumcision, interruption of condom availability and suspension of HIV testing, would impact HIV incidence in the region.

The research highlights the need for urgent efforts to ensure the continuity of HIV prevention and treatment services in order to avert excess HIV-related deaths and to prevent increases in HIV incidence during the COVID-19 pandemic. It will be important for countries to prioritize shoring up supply chains and ensuring that people already on treatment are able to stay on treatment, including by adopting or reinforcing policies such as multimonth dispensing of antiretroviral therapy in order to reduce requirements to access health-care facilities for routine maintenance, reducing the burden on overwhelmed health-care systems.

Every death is a tragedy, added Ms Byanyima. We cannot sit by and allow hundreds of thousands of people, many of them young, to die needless deaths. I urge governments to ensure that every man, women and child living with HIV gets regular supplies of antiretroviral therapysomething thats literally a life-saver.

Sources:

Jewell B, Mudimu E, Stover J, et al for the HIV Modelling consortium, Potential effects of disruption to HIV programmes in sub-Saharan Africa caused by COVID-19: results from multiple models. Pre-print, https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.12279914.v1, https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.12279932.v1.

Alexandra B. Hogan, Britta Jewell, Ellie Sherrard-Smith et al. The potential impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on HIV, TB and malaria in low- and middle-income countries. Imperial College London (01-05-2020). doi: https://doi.org/10.25561/78670.

UNAIDS

The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) leads and inspires the world to achieve its shared vision of zero new HIV infections, zero discrimination and zero AIDS-related deaths. UNAIDS unites the efforts of 11 UN organizationsUNHCR, UNICEF, WFP, UNDP, UNFPA, UNODC, UN Women, ILO, UNESCO, WHO and the World Bankand works closely with global and national partners towards ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030 as part of the Sustainable Development Goals. Learn more at unaids.org and connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

WHO

The World Health Organization provides global leadership in public health within the United Nations system. Founded in 1948, WHO works with194 Member States, across six regions and from more than 150 offices,to promote health, keep the world safe and serve the vulnerable. Our goal for 2019-2023 is to ensure that a billion more people have universal health coverage, to protect a billion more people from health emergencies, and provide a further billion people with better health and wellbeing.

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The cost of inaction: COVID-19-related service disruptions could cause hundreds of thousands of extra deaths from HIV - World Health Organization

The pandemic that has shuttered economies around the world has also battered education systems in developing and developed countries. Some 1.5 billion students close to 90% of all primary, secondary and tertiary learners in the world are no longer able to physically go to school. The impact has been dramatic and transformative as educators scramble to put in place workable short-term solutions for remote teaching and learning, particularly in emerging markets, where students and schools face additional challenges related to financing and available infrastructure.

While each level of education faces its unique challenges, it is the higher education segment that may end up, by necessity, triggering a learning revolution. Universities are distinctive in that their students are both old enough to handle the rigours of online work and technologically savvy enough to navigate new platforms. The real challenge lies for the institutions in which they have enrolled. Can traditional, campus-based universities adapt by choosing the right technologies and approaches for educating and engaging their students? The successes and failures that unfold should give us all a better grasp of what is possible.

Right now, video-conferencing apps like Zoom and Webex are throwing universities a lifeline. However, lecturers are still struggling to maintain the same depth of engagement with students they could have in a classroom setting. They need to find solutions and fast to avoid a dip in the quality of education they are providing. Online education platforms such as Coursera, an IFC client with a global presence, can play a useful role by tapping their expertise in online programme design, choice of tech platform, and digital marketing to develop the best content either with or for the traditional players.

With the online segment still comprising a small fraction of the $2.2 trillion global higher education market less than 2%, according to market intelligence firm HolonIQ the market is ripe for disruption. The appetite from students for online offerings will likely grow because of COVID-19. Even before the pandemic, many universities were seeing declines in enrolment for campus-based programmes and parallel increases in uptake of their online courses. With COVID-19, we are seeing how yesterdays disruptors can become todays lifeguards. While traditional institutions once viewed online education as a threat, it has come to their rescue.

The adoption of online solutions in recent months has been unprecedented. In the short term, educators are applying a first aid solution by switching entirely from in-person to remote instruction, a move that has been forced upon them by sudden mandatory campus closures. But they are quickly realizing that remote learning is just a baby step experiment in the long journey to offering online education that has been conceived as such, which includes effective student engagement tools and teacher training. Some of the partnerships sparked between universities, online education companies and tech providers may continue beyond the pandemic.

As painful and stressful a time as this is, it may fashion a long overdue and welcome rebirth of our education systems. The pandemic has been a great leveller in a way, giving all stakeholders (educators, learners, policy-makers and society at large) in developed and developing countries a better understanding of our current education systems vulnerabilities and shortcomings. It has underscored how indispensable it is for our populations to be digitally literate to function and progress in a world in which social distancing, greater digitalization of services and more digitally-centered communications may increasingly become the norm. More fundamentally, COVID-19 is causing us to challenge deep-rooted notions of when, where, and how we deliver education, of the role of colleges and universities, the importance of lifelong learning, and the distinction we draw between traditional and non-traditional learners.

This pandemic has also made people realize how dependent we are on so-called low-skilled workers to keep our lives going. During shutdowns, lockdowns, curfews, its these workers who are on the front lines, working multiple shifts to maintain delivery and take care of our basic needs. Over time, automation will continue to eat into these jobs. While there will always be services provided by low-skilled workers, most new jobs will require higher skills levels. Being able to reskill and upskill in this rapidly changing world is not only a necessity but an economic imperative.

COVID-19 has struck our education system like a lightning bolt and shaken it to its core. Just as the First Industrial Revolution forged todays system of education, we can expect a different kind of educational model to emerge from COVID-19.

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SALT LAKE CITY (CBS Local) Researchers in Utah say they are developing a new way to detect COVID-19 with your smartphone.

What started as a device to help detect a Zika virus could become be programmed to identify COVID-19 instead, say researchers in Utah.

Our prototype is going to be on the order of the size of a quarter, and it would be communicating with a cellphone using the Bluetooth link, Massood Tabib-Azar, a University of Utah professor and the lead engineer on the project, told KSTU.

The device would be able to test for COVID-19 if someone were to breathe, cough, sneeze or blow on a sensor. The results would then be displayed on a cell phone within 60 seconds.

It could also test for the virus on surfaces by using a swab and placing it onto the sensor.

The sensor will be reusable because it would destroy the previous sample with a small electrical current.

Tabib-Azar says he wants to make it possible to send the results to health agencies, too.

Youd push the button and it can send to a central location, Centers for Disease Control or any other authority that youd select in your options, and then in real time can update the map, he said.

Tabib-Azar says he hopes to have a working prototype in two months. Clinical trials would take another month.

In principle, we can put these devices in everybodys hand, and once we produce them in large scale inexpensively, then its like any other thing that people want to have with them, he said.

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Researchers Developing Device That Could Detect COVID-19 Using Your Smartphone - WCCO | CBS Minnesota