Peer-reviewed | Observational | People
Study based on 26.5 million Medicare records finds significant racial and ethnic disparities in uptake of seasonal flu vaccine in people living in the USA aged 65 years and older during the 2015-2016 flu season.
Inequities persist among those who were vaccinated, with racial and ethnic minority groups 26-32% less likely to receive the High Dose Vaccine, which is more effective in older people, compared with white older adults.
Authors note that while these results are from the 2015-2016 flu season, the findings point to systemic failings that may hamper efforts to vaccinate against COVID-19, which disproportionately affects minority populations.
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A new study looking at how COVID-19 affects people with asthma provides reassurance that having the condition doesn t increase the risk of severe illness or death from the virus.
George Institute for Global Health researchers in Australia analysed data from 57 studies with an overall sample size of 587,280. Almost 350,000 people in the pool had been infected with COVID-19 from Asia, Europe, and North and South America and found they had similar proportions of asthma to the general population.
The results, published in the peer-reviewed
Journal of Asthma, show that just over seven in every 100 people who tested positive for COVID-19 also had asthma, compared to just over eight in 100 in the general population having the condition. They also showed that people with asthma had a 14 percent lower risk of acquiring COVID-19 and were significantly less likely to be hospitalized with the virus.
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IMAGE: (A) Change of TSCI in Wuhan from December 2019 through May 2020 in the form of a percentage of the average pre-lockdown level in December 2019 (100%). (B) The enlarged. view more
Credit: WorldPop, University of Southampton
A combination of robust vaccination programmes and strict physical distancing rules could avoid recurring peaks of COVID-19 without the need to rely on stay-at-home restrictions, according to a new study by epidemiologists and demographers from WorldPop at the University of Southampton, in collaboration with The Chinese University of Hong Kong.
This research used anonymised mobile phone geolocation data with epidemiological and coronavirus case data from China to model the potential impact of vaccination and physical distancing on virus transmission. They predicted the effect of different combinations of interventions on low, medium and high density cities in the country.
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Several University of Illinois Chicago faculty members have addressed the issue of how to ethically conduct research with Black populations.
In their paper Ethics of Research at the Intersection of COVID-19 and Black Lives Matter: A Call to Action, authors Natasha Crooks, an assistant professor, Phoenix Matthews, a professor, both of the UIC College of Nursing, and Geri Donenberg, director of the Center for Dissemination and Implementation Science at the UIC College of Medicine, highlight the historical issues that impact research involving Black populations. They also provide recommendations for researchers to ethically engage Black populations in research. The article is published online in the
E-Mail People who are racial, sexual, and gender minorities continue to be affected by HIV at significantly higher rates than white people, a disparity also reflected in the COVID-19 pandemic. The US HIV epidemic has shifted from coastal, urban settings to the South and rural areas. Despite its role as the largest funder for HIV research and global AIDS programs worldwide, the USA has higher rates of new HIV infections and a more severe HIV epidemic than any other G-7 nation. Series authors call for a unified effort to curb the HIV epidemic in the USA, including universal health coverage, programs to address disparities in HIV services, and actions to end discrimination and racism in health care.