FDA Panel Endorses Moderna’s Coronavirus Vaccine

Vaccine advisers to the US Food and Drug Administration voted easily and quickly to recommend that the agency give emergency use authorization to Moderna’s coronavirus vaccine. CNN reports: The Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) voted 20-0 with one abstention to recommend EUA for the Moderna vaccine, which is very similar in design, composition, safety and efficacy to Pfizer/BioNTech’s…

Researchers Find Flaws in Algorithm Used To Identify Atypical Medication Orders

Can algorithms identify unusual medication orders or profiles more accurately than humans? Not necessarily. From a report: A study coauthored by researchers at the Universite Laval and CHU Sainte-Justine in Montreal found that one model physicians used to screen patients performed poorly on some orders. The study offers a reminder that unvetted AI and machine learning may negatively impact outcomes in…

Scientific American Endorses Joe Biden For Its First Presidential Endorsement In 175 Years

goombah99 shares a report from The Washington Post: Four years ago, the magazine flagged Donald Trump’s disdain for science as “frightening” but did not go so far as to endorse his rival, Hillary Clinton. This year, its editors came to a different conclusion. “A 175-year tradition is not something you break lightly,” editor in chief, Laura Helmuth told The Washington Post…

More than 1.6 million learners around the world benefit from partner contributions in Coursera’s response to the pandemic

By Betty Vandenbosch, Chief Content Officer, Coursera COVID-19 continues to remain a global health crisis, disrupting on-campus learning, driving widespread unemployment, and leaving many searching for answers about the virus itself. Amid the uncertainty, I’m honored to be able to support Coursera’s partner community as it has come together to serve the world through learning […]
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Misleading Virus Video, Pushed By the Trumps, Spreads Online

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: In a video posted Monday online, a group of people calling themselves “America’s Frontline Doctors” and wearing white medical coats spoke against the backdrop of the Supreme Court in Washington, sharing misleading claims about the virus, including that hydroxychloroquine was an effective coronavirus treatment and that masks did not slow…

Coronavirus genome like a shipping label that lets epidemiologists track where it’s been

Every time the virus copies itself it makes mistakes, creating a trail that researchers can use to build a family tree with information about where it’s traveled, and when. Source: https://earthsky.org/human-world/coronavirus-genome-epidemiologists-track…

Researchers To Doctors: Stop Putting COVID-19 Patients On Invasive Ventilators

Rei writes: A paper recently published by The American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene adds further support to recent CDC guidelines for minimizing the use of invasive ventilators. As physicians had been voicing concern that doctors were being too eager to put patients on invasive ventilation and may be doing more harm than good, the investigators looked into outcomes of…

As Coronavirus Spreads, Poison Hotlines See Rise In Accidents With Cleaning Products

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: A study released Monday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that calls to poison hotlines this year for cases involving cleaners and disinfectants rose significantly compared with the same period over the previous two years, and charts a dramatic spike in March for both categories. Some of…