Pregnancy Study On Vaccine’s Effects Debunks Social Media Rumors

CNN: Covid Vaccines Do Not Harm Placenta, Contrary To Social Media Misinformation, Study Finds 
There's no biological basis behind ongoing social media claims that Covid-19 vaccines can harm the placenta, the organ that provides a growing baby oxygen and nutrients during pregnancy. "There's no theoretical reason to believe these vaccines would be harmful," Dr. Richard Beigi, who sits on the Immunization, Infectious Disease, and Public Health Preparedness Expert Work Group of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, told CNN in a Q&A on the subject. "There's never been any vaccine that's been linked with infertility," he said. (LaMotte, 5/11)

CIDRAP: COVID-19 Death Rates Low In Pregnant, Hospitalized Women, Study Finds
Compared with non-pregnant women hospitalized with COVID-19, pregnant women with COVID-19 had lower in-hospital death rates, according to a research letter in the Annals of Internal Medicine today. University of Texas (UTHealth) and University of Maryland researchers looked at 1,062 pregnant and 9,815 non-pregnant patients hospitalized with COVID-19 and viral pneumonia from April to November 2020. All were 15 to 45 years old. (5/11)

In other covid research news —

CIDRAP: Data Show 2% Of COVID Patients May Carry 90% Of Community's Virus
Just 2% of COVID-19–infected individuals could carry 90% of the SARS-CoV-2 virions circulating within communities, according to a Proceedings of the National Academy of Science study comparing presymptomatic and asymptomatic patients with hospitalized patients. The results, published yesterday, included 1,405 positive COVID-19 cases from the University of Colorado Boulder's 2020 fall semester testing program and compared them with 404 data points from previous research on hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Overall, more than 72,500 saliva samples were tested for COVID-19 on the college campus, all from people who were asymptomatic or presymptomatic. (5/11)

CIDRAP: Those With Mild COVID-19 Seek More Primary Care Than Uninfected Peers
Although nonhospitalized COVID-19 patients are at low risk for delayed complications, they visit their general practitioner or clinic more often than their uninfected peers in the 6 months after testing positive, finds a population-based study published yesterday in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. The study, led by researchers from the University of Southern Denmark, involved comparing 8,983 living, nonhospitalized COVID-19 patients with 80,894 Danish residents who tested negative for the virus from Feb 27 to May 31, 2020. Both groups were followed for 2 weeks to 6 months after testing. (Van Beusekom, 5/11)

Axios: Study: 99.75% Of Hospitalized COVID-19 Patients Weren't Vaccinated 
The Cleveland Clinic on Tuesday released a study showing that 99.75% of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 between Jan. 1 and April 13 were not fully vaccinated, according to data provided to Axios. Real-world evidence continues to show coronavirus vaccines are effective at keeping people from dying and out of hospitals. The Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines have been found to be 95% and 94% effective, respectively, at preventing symptomatic infections. (Gonzalez, 5/11)

Also —

The New York Times: Is It Covid Or The Flu? New Combo Tests Can Find Out
In January, a man in his 60s with heart disease and diabetes went to a South Dakota hospital with a cough and fever, worried he had Covid. A nurse swabbed the inside of his nose, and the sample went into a small device resembling an inkjet-printer cartridge, which was then placed into a machine about the size of a printer. This so-called quad test, now available at thousands of hospitals and clinics around the country, could detect not only the coronavirus, but two types of influenza and the respiratory syncytial virus, or R.S.V. A little more than a half-hour later, Dr. Blake Gustafson had the patient’s result: He had the flu. (Khamsi, 5/11)

Stat: Health Execs Weigh In On How Tech Can Help With Covid — And How It Can’t
For all the progress on Covid-19, we are still far from a post-pandemic world. “If you’re living on Planet Earth, I assure you the pandemic is not over,” Geeta Nayyar, executive medical director of Salesforce, said at the 2021 STAT Health Tech summit on Tuesday. “India and Brazil are great examples of the forest still being on fire. When we don’t go to help our fellow global neighbors, we can rest assured that the fire is spreading.” (Goldhill, 5/11)

CNBC: Abbott CEO Says It Has A Team Of 'Virus Hunters' On New Covid Variants
Abbott Labs has a team of “virus hunters” working with health officials around the world to monitor Covid-19 variants, as some mutated strains show an ability to evade detection, CEO Robert Ford said during an interview that aired Tuesday as part of CNBC’s Healthy Returns event. “They’re constantly looking for new viruses, and in this case we set up a team to be able to monitor all the mutations that could exist,” he said of its pandemic defense coalition. “It can’t just be a U.S. thing, you have to partner with all the countries, all the universities, all the different collection sites, then I think that’s the way to go.” (Mendez, 5/11)