American coronavirus: Faster test results and ‘robust’ immune response may offer hope of curbing pandemic, experts say

Testing has been delayed and infrequent, as the United States has exceeded 5.4 million cases, leaving many uncertain about their risk of spreading the virus. And as researchers rush to develop vaccines, there is little evidence to say whether the antibodies that protect against Covid-19 last long enough to control the virus. But the researchers’ developments on Monday brought optimistic prospects on both fronts.

It is still unclear how long this protection will last, but studies indicate that it could last for months.

And surgeon general Dr Jerome Adams said that even as testing improves, the nation needs to stick with prevention efforts.

“We cannot test our way out of this problem,” Adams said. “We have to rely on prevention, and that is making sure everyone wears a mask, washes their hands and watches their distance from others.”

The United States has the worst response of any major country

The United States’ response to the virus is not always lacking, Harvard Global Institute of Health director Dr Ashish Jha said Monday, “the worst response of any major country.”

“We didn’t get here overnight. It really has been one accident after another,” Jha said. “The only factor that really sets us apart from everyone else is the denial that permeated our entire approach.”

Even after the public and the federal government accepted the virus’s existence, many downplayed its severity, Jha said. And now they believe a vaccine will soon end the pandemic in just two months, which Jha says it doesn’t.

But there was no good excuse for the lack of response as the United States braces for a pandemic like this, a former U.S. Food and Drug Administration commissioner said on Monday.

“For several decades, efforts have been made to better prepare our country for a series of biological threats, to invest in certain critical resources, but also to train against simulated threats,” said Margaret Hamburg, former commissioner of the FDA. said at an American Society for Microbiology briefing. “By every sort of assessment that had been made on readiness, we expected that, while far from perfect, we would have been better prepared than we were,” she said.

At a panel discussion hosted by Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, Birx said Americans did not appear to be responding well to the bans, but concessions could still be made.

“Tens of thousands of lives can be saved if we wear masks, and we don’t have parties in our backyards … by removing those masks,” Birx said.

Schools at decision point as researchers learn more about coronavirus in young people

Health experts who are learning more about how young people contract and spread the virus must decide whether and how to get students back to school for the new school year.

A common perception is that young people don’t have to worry about getting infected, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease director Dr Anthony Fauci said on Monday. But researchers have found that even people who are not hospitalized can have “really bothersome” long-term effects.

“In young, healthy people, who do not require hospitalization but who get sick and symptomatic enough to stay in bed for a week or two or three and then recover, they clear the virus – they have residual symptoms for weeks and sometimes months, ”he said at an American Society for Microbiology briefing.

“These are people who would have recovered from Covid-19,” he said.

Meanwhile, many schools that resumed in-person teaching quickly reported infections.

In the first week of in-person instruction, at least three school districts in Florida said they had to quarantine students. The last of them, Baker County School District, has reported at least three positive cases, according to the Florida Department of Health.

West Virginia Governor Jim Justice said the state was grappling with a return to in-person teaching, responding to accusations of giving in to the pressure.

“No one is going to pressure me in any way to put our teachers, our service staff, our children especially in a situation that I feel in my heart that is not as sure as possible,” said Justice.

Trends vary by state

The virus and its spread vary widely from state to state.

Los Angeles County, a hotspot in California, has seen steady progress in the fight against the virus, LA County Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer said on Monday. Daily hospitalizations fell 37% last month.

“We continue to be cautiously optimistic that all of the sacrifice and hard work that we’ve seen in our county is working and that we’re actually back to slow the spread,” Ferrer said.

But other states do not see such optimism.

Texas surpassed 10,000 coronavirus-related deaths on Monday. And Florida nearly doubled the number of coronavirus deaths in just one month, bringing the total to 9,539.

However, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis tweeted Monday that the state reports the lowest number of Covid-19 cases in a day since mid-June at 2,760; adding that the number of coronavirus-positive patients currently hospitalized in the state is down nearly 40% since July 21.