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Tuberculosis Has Overtaken COVID as World’s Deadliest Infectious Disease
Tuberculosis (TB) is once again the infectious disease responsible for the most deaths worldwide, according to a Tuesday announcement from the World Health Organization (WHO).
The contagious disease was responsible for 1.25 million global deaths in 2023, WHO reported, including 161,000 people with HIV. COVID-19 had overtaken TB as the world’s leading infectious killer for the previous three years.
TB is a preventable and curable disease caused by bacteria that typically impacts the lungs, according to WHO. “If you breathe, you can catch TB — so all people are at risk,” Masae Kawamura, M.D., a former TB control director in San Francisco and a tuberculosis clinician, told Fox News Digital. Kawamura calls TB a “social disease of crowding and mobility.”
Study Finds COVID-19 Pandemic Worsened Patient Safety Measures
A new study — published in Nursing Research — has found that the COVID-19 pandemic significantly impacted patient safety indicators in U.S. hospitals. The study, from Penn Nursing’s Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research (CHOPR), examined data from the National Database of Nursing Quality Indicators to assess trends in nursing-sensitive quality indicators from 2019 to 2022. The prevention of these very distressing, uncomfortable conditions is considered to be under the nurse’s purview and directly influenced by nursing care.
The investigation found that rates of falls, bloodstream infections from central line catheters, urinary tract infections from urinary catheters, pressure injuries from devices or immobility, and pneumonia associated with ventilator use, all increased significantly during the pandemic. While some of these rates have begun to decline, they have not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels. When a patient falls, develops a pressure injury, or suffers a hospital-acquired infection, these adverse events delay the patient’s ability to go home, to be comfortable, and to heal.
“The pandemic placed an immense strain on health care systems and frontline workers, and the impact on patient safety is evident in these data,” said Eileen T. Lake, Ph.D., RN, FAAN, the Edith Clemmer Steinbright Professor in Gerontology; Professor of Nursing in the Department of Biobehavioral Health Sciences; and Associate Director of CHOPR. “It’s crucial that we address the ongoing challenges faced by nurses and invest in this professional workforce.”
‘Perfect Storm’ of Distrust Deepened Inequalities During COVID-19 Pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent vaccination rollout enabled a “perfect storm” for deepening health inequalities in Greater Manchester, the results of a study have shown.
Research led by University of Manchester academics, examined the attitudes of people from minoritized ethnic groups, young adults and those with long-term physical and mental health conditions toward the COVID-19 vaccination program. Researchers found that a “perfect storm” of marginalization and experience of structural inequalities led to distrust of the COVID-19 vaccination drive — and that marginalized communities felt “left behind” by policy and decision-makers prior to and during the pandemic.
The study, published in BMC Public Health, concludes that wider social inequalities, combined with experiences of marginalization and discrimination, have long-lasting and widespread implications for vaccination uptake and health outcomes.
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House COVID Panel Says Andrew Cuomo Lied to Congress, Calls for DOJ to Prosecute
House Republicans have referred former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) to the Justice Department for criminal charges, alleging he lied to the panel about his knowledge of a state health department report that was used to deflect criticism of his administration’s pandemic-era nursing home policies.
Cuomo told members of the House panel investigating the coronavirus pandemic that he was not involved in the review or drafting of the report and had no knowledge of anyone outside the state health department who reviewed the report before its release in July 2020.
The report blamed staff for bringing the virus inside nursing homes and causing excess COVID-19 deaths, rather than the Cuomo administration’s policies. But the House panel, led by Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), said it found “overwhelming evidence … that proves that Mr. Cuomo reviewed, edited, and even drafted portions” of the report.
Long COVID Inflammation Damages the Heart, Blood Analysis Finds
University of Queensland-led research has found inflammatory markers in the blood of long COVID patients which could explain why many experience ongoing cardiovascular issues.
Associate Professor Kirsty Short said the team set out to investigate the cause of persistent chest pain and heart palpitations commonly reported by many long COVID sufferers. “We discovered elevated levels of cytokines, proteins which help control inflammation in the body, in the blood samples of people at about 18 months post-infection with SARS-CoV-2,” Dr. Short said.
“Lab studies showed these trace-level cytokines had a direct effect on the functionality of cardiomyocytes, the cells of the heart responsible for its pump function.
“These particular types of cells are fundamental building blocks for our heart, so damaging them can lead to cardiovascular symptoms.”
Dr. Short said until now, the role of chronic inflammation in cardiovascular symptoms hadn’t been clear, particularly in individuals with symptoms persisting for over a year after infection.
Key SARS-CoV-2 Enzyme Behind Virus’s Infectiousness, Researchers Say
SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is more infectious than severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) viruses because it contains an enzyme that can efficiently circumvent a host cell’s innate defense mechanism, Kobe University–led researchers in Japan suggest in the Journal of Virology.
The innate immune system attaches the molecular tag ISG15 to SARS-CoV-2’s nucleocapsid protein, which contains the virus’s genetic material, inhibiting viral replication. The team’s laboratory experiments suggest that the virus’s papain-like protease can remove the tag, recovering its ability to assemble new viruses and escape the innate immune response.
While the SARS and MERS viruses belong to the same virus family and also have an enzyme that can remove the ISG15 tag, their versions are less efficient and have a different primary target than that of SARS-CoV-2.
Emerging Insights Into COVID Household Transmission
Since early in the COVID-19 pandemic, epidemiologic studies demonstrated that household transmission was a key driver in the spread of SARS-CoV-2. However, nearly five years later, less is known about more nuanced dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 viral transmission in households, particularly in the setting of evolving variants and pre-existing immunity.
Two studies presented at this year’s IDWeek annual meeting focused on leveraging genomic analysis to gain a better understanding of whether COVID infections in households represent transmission between household members or the introduction of new infections.
Household density, vaccine status of exposed household members, and individual immunologic factors are all associated with the spread of SARS-CoV-2 among households, said Kathryn Stephenson, M.D., MPH, of Harvard Medical School in Boston, during a presentation.
During the Alpha wave, the secondary attack rate for household contacts — the risk of transmission of SARS-CoV-2 stemming from a household index infection — was about 36%, dropping to approximately 30% during the Delta wave, but then rising to about 43% during the early Omicron period, as reported in a systematic review and meta-analysis.
New Model Uses Infection ‘Signatures’ to Predict Who Lives or Dies of COVID-19
A critical challenge during the early COVID-19 pandemic was determining whether a patient would survive the infection or die from it. And even though a host of lifesaving therapeutics now spares substantially more lives than four years ago, the art of predicting COVID-19 outcomes remains a matter of scientific pursuit.
Data from an international team of researchers in Scotland and Brazil suggest that their prediction model defines specific characteristics of SARS-CoV-2 infection that can be used to forecast disease outcomes and triage sick patients in hospitals.
The data in the new study are based on infections that occurred in 2020, and team members contend that their forecasting method is useful. But they worry that in 2024, patients’ protection against COVID-19 via vaccines could raise questions whether their method is a timely model. The study is published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
Post-Acute Infection Syndrome Is Not Unique to COVID-19, Study Shows
Patients hospitalized with COVID-19 often report a wide range of symptoms months after their initial illness. But a new study from NDORMS shows that post-acute infection syndrome is not unique to COVID-19 and can also occur after other respiratory infections.
The study, published in JAMA Network Open, provides important insights into the long-term impacts of severe respiratory infections on patient health. The research, led by Dr. Junqing Xie from NDORMS, looked at data from 190,000 participants from the U.K. Biobank, categorizing them into three groups: those hospitalized with COVID-19, those hospitalized with other lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs), and a reference group with no LRTI hospitalizations. Participants completed surveys reporting on 45 different physical and psychological symptoms.
“Our findings show that the post-acute effects of COVID-19 are not unique — they can also occur with other severe respiratory infections,” explained Junqing. “Patients hospitalized with COVID-19 saw higher risks of 23 out of 45 symptoms observed across multiple bodily systems, so do 18 out of 45 for patients hospitalized for non-COVID LRTIs.”
