Fauci speaks to the perilous moment in Harvard Chan School lecture
It’s typical for an academic lecture to borrow from years- or decades-old data. On Friday, Anthony Fauci, the nation’s most prominent pandemic expert, offered Harvard students and faculty something...
View ArticleRemdesivir-resistant COVID case sets off few alarms
As the latest coronavirus variant upends expectations about the pandemic’s coming months, drug manufacturers are working to expand treatment options to fight those stricken with severe disease. Even as...
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Omicron could peak in U.S. fairly soon. Maybe.
Based on the quick rise and precipitous drop of Omicron in South Africa, Harvard experts are cautiously hopeful about a possible decline of the surging COVID variant in the very near future, even as...
View Article‘Schools should not close’
Chicago’s public school system closed this week when the teachers’ union and the city clashed over in-person learning amid a spike in Omicron cases. The Gazette sought reaction from public health...
View ArticleNo Omicron immunity without booster, study finds
An additional “booster” dose of Moderna or Pfizer mRNA-based vaccine is needed to provide immunity against the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, according to a study by...
View ArticleHarvard advisers on Omicron surge, shifting protocols
Cases of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 are surging to record high numbers across the country, moving toward a predicted peak in the coming weeks. The situation at Harvard is similar, with the number...
View ArticleDelta danger in pregnancy scrutinized
A growing body of evidence has linked the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, with an increased risk for pregnancy complications, including stillbirths. Now, for the first...
View ArticleWhy do more men die of COVID? It’s likely not what you think
Researchers agree that men die of COVID at a higher rate than women, but they haven’t been sure why. A new Harvard GenderSci Lab study of more than 30 million confirmed coronavirus cases in the U.S....
View ArticleOmicron optimism and shift from pandemic to endemic
With Omicron’s surge peaking in some U.S. states, experts this week sounded a wary note of optimism that better times are weeks to months away, but they warn that prospects of an “end” are murky, with...
View ArticleHow the pandemic may affect baby’s brain
The COVID-19 pandemic has been hard on so many people in so many ways. For babies born during this pandemic, a study published in JAMA Pediatrics suggests that the damage has potential to be lifelong....
View ArticleWilling but unable to get COVID shot
People of color in the U.S. and UK were up to three times likelier than white people to report being unsure or unwilling to get a COVID-19 shot during the initial vaccine rollout, found a study...
View ArticleIs Omicron really ‘milder’? Not exactly.
The SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant’s “milder” outcomes are likely due to more population immunity rather than the virus’ properties, according to a paper by William Hanage, associate professor of...
View ArticleThe COVID treatment that missed its target
People over age 65 at the highest risk for severe COVID-19 have often been the least likely to receive monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) — a highly effective treatment for the disease, according to new...
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Hints of a long COVID wave as Omicron fades
As weary Americans hold out hope that the decline of Omicron signals an end to the pandemic’s emergency phase, physicians who treat long COVID are worried about the potential for a new wave of cases....
View ArticleNew page in pandemic playbook
As more governors end mask mandates, and as Omicron fades and a range of new anti-COVID tools emerge, risk-reduction experts say that now is the time to redefine pandemic living. “Just like it was not...
View ArticleThe politics behind ineffective COVID treatments
Two treatments that have been shown to be ineffective against COVID-19 — hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin — were more heavily prescribed in the latter part of 2020 in U.S. counties with a higher...
View ArticleBrain inflammation may strike the uninfected
Even for those never infected with SARS-CoV-2, new research shows that lifestyle disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic may have triggered inflammation in the brain contributing to fatigue,...
View ArticleDoes nerve damage contribute to long COVID symptoms?
A new study suggests that some patients with long COVID have lasting nerve damage that appears to be caused by infection-triggered immune dysfunction, which is potentially treatable. Long COVID...
View ArticleWhat’s behind post-COVID brain fog?
As a neurologist working in the COVID Survivorship Program at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, I find that my patients all have similar issues. It’s hard to concentrate, they say. They can’t think...
View ArticleOmicron subvariant taking hold, but so far, life goes on
Harvard pandemic experts monitoring the global spread of the Omicron subvariant BA.2 say that early tracking in the U.S. suggests a milder impact than the dramatic case surge some nations have...
View ArticleThe price of a pre-pandemic lifestyle
As COVID numbers fall and mandates lift, the question remains: Is it possible to avoid trade-offs between returning to pre-pandemic lifestyles and an uptick in COVID-19-related deaths? To find an...
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Cost of distancing may outweigh benefits for healthy adults
Arthur C. Brooks wants people to lift people up. But the behavioral social scientist whose recent work has focused on helping people lead happier lives is worried that mixed messages from officials...
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Snapshot of pandemic’s mental health impact on children
Home from school and separated from peers during crucial developmental phases, young children and adolescents were clearly among the people most negatively impacted, in various ways, by the pandemic...
View ArticleHarvard to transition to voluntary COVID testing
Amid low rates of severe illness and hospitalization due to COVID-19, Harvard has announced it will transition away from scheduled mandatory surveillance testing in favor of optional testing for...
View ArticleSubvariants cause for alarm, hybrid immunity hard to beat
Jacob Lemieux, an infectious disease specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital and instructor at Harvard Medical School, said this week that recent COVID data out of South Africa is “alarming,” as...
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Getting through it together
This article is the first entry in a three-part series about family life during the pandemic. Read the second and third. It was March of 2020 and Elijah Suh ’22 was at a San Diego hospital listening to...
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Good days, tough days
This is the second entry in a three-part series about family life during the pandemic. Read the first and third. When the pandemic forced Anastasia Onyango to leave Harvard in March of 2020, she...
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Don’t let latest COVID surge overshadow progress, says Hanage
With COVID cases once again on the rise, hopes for a summer relatively free of pandemic anxiety seem to be in jeopardy. William Hanage, an epidemiologist at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health...
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United by lockdown, divided by ‘Seinfeld’
This is the third entry in a three-part series about family life during the pandemic. Read the first and second. In March 2020, India was under strict lockdown as health and government officials...
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Sifting the damage of pandemic-era drinking
It’s been more than 500 days since Marisa Silveri had a drink. When the pandemic hit, Silveri, a single mother of two, considered herself a social drinker. But lockdown layered extra home duties on top...
View Article‘Shadow pandemic’ of domestic violence
Violence against women increased to record levels around the world following lockdowns to control the spread of the COVID-19 virus. The United Nations called the situation a “shadow pandemic” in a 2021...
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Drivers who are frustrated, distracted, mad — and somewhat rusty
It’s like we forgot how to drive, one Harvard expert observed recently about the two-year spike in traffic-related deaths, which marked an abrupt end to years of American roads becoming progressively...
View ArticleSurgeries fail to return to pre-pandemic levels
Reductions in many types of surgical procedures precipitated by SARS-CoV-2 have not fully recovered to their pre-pandemic levels, resulting in severe backlogs and deferred surgeries that could have...
View ArticleRacial discrimination during COVID led to rise in depression
Everyday discrimination experienced by people of racial and ethnic minority groups during the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic was associated with significantly increased odds of moderate to severe...
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Using AI as a pandemic crystal ball
A team of researchers recently developed an artificial intelligence model that can predict which coronavirus variants will likely dominate and cause surges. The work was led by Jacob Lemieux, an...
View ArticlePsychological, not physical factors linked to long COVID
Psychological distress, including depression, anxiety, worry, perceived stress, and loneliness, before COVID-19 infection was associated with an increased risk of long COVID, according to researchers...
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Does the world need COVID novels?
The pandemic may not be over, but pandemic fiction is off and running. Among the COVID-shadowed novels that have hit the shelves in the past year and a half are “Our Country Friends” by Gary...
View ArticleIs pandemic finally over? We asked the experts.
Public health officials agree that the end of the pandemic is in sight but not here yet. So where does it leave educators, top business executives, and public health experts? Adjusting to a world of...
View ArticleStudy details better outcomes for Omicron BA.2 patients
In a study that represents the largest to date to examine the severity of Omicron BA.2 — the COVID subvariant making a re-emergence this fall — a team led by investigators at Massachusetts General...
View ArticleSevere COVID-19 linked with brain aging
In a series of experiments, scientists at Harvard-affiliated Beth Israel Deaconess Medical found that patients with severe COVID-19 exhibit a drop in cognitive performance that mimics accelerated...
View ArticleMeasuring the power of vaccines
Researchers have designed a mathematical model that can predict the course of vaccine-induced immunity against COVID-19 in different patient populations — including otherwise-healthy individuals and...
View ArticleLifestyle influences long COVID risk
Women who followed most aspects of a healthy lifestyle, including healthy body weight, not smoking, regular exercise, adequate sleep, high quality diet, and moderate alcohol consumption, had about half...
View ArticleWilliam Hanage on COVID lessons we haven’t learned
The pandemic has progressed through a now-familiar pattern the past several months, with the latest variant — XBB.1.5 — infecting a lot of people in December and January before starting to fade. Recent...
View ArticleSpeaking from experience on what makes a global killer
In 1970s India, the physician and epidemiologist Larry Brilliant played an important role in efforts that eradicated smallpox caused by the deadliest form of the virus, variola major. Since then, he...
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Vaccine reduces transmission in breakthrough cases
Yonatan Grad of Harvard Chan School said the findings will help to understand whether COVID breakthrough cases are as contagious as infections among the unvaccinated. Kris Snibbe/Harvard file photo...
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Omicron ‘astonishing to behold,’ says Hanage
Health Omicron ‘astonishing to behold,’ says Hanage Harvard epidemiologist shares early impression of variant as first U.S. case is identified in California Alvin Powell Harvard Staff Writer December...
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‘This virus is a shape-shifter’
Panorama Images/iStock/Getty Images Plus Health ‘This virus is a shape-shifter’ Jake Miller HMS Communications December 2, 2021 8 minutes New study sheds light on COVID mutations, immune escape In an...
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Time of day matters when getting vaccine
Symptoms of some diseases and the action of numerous medications vary by time of day, according to researchers.iStock Health Time of day matters when getting vaccine Anita Slomski MGH News and Public...
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2 early vaccination surveys worse than worthless thanks to ‘big data...
Health 2 early vaccination surveys worse than worthless thanks to ‘big data paradox,’ analysts say Findings hold warning for tracking efforts as governments, health officials navigate pandemic Alvin...
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Scientists race to define Omicron threat, worried about ‘surge upon a surge’
Flight crew members in hazmat suits walk through Los Angeles International Airport as the circle of countries reporting Omicron cases widens.AP Photo/Jae C. Hong Health Scientists race to define...
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