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COVID 19 Tech

FDA head: Omicron is a “natural disaster… most people are gonna get COVID”

Enlarge / Dr. Janet Woodcock, acting commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, testifies during a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing on Capitol Hill on January 11, 2022 in Washington, D.C. (credit: Getty | Shawn Thew) US officials are comparing the ultratransmissible omicron coronavirus variant to a natural disaster as the country […]

COVID 19 Tech

Hospitals nationwide are buckling under omicron as cases continue to spike

Enlarge / A medical worker in PPE works with a patient with Covid-19 in a negative pressure room in the ICU ward at UMass Memorial Medical Center in Worcester, Massachusetts on January 4, 2022. The hospital says it is overflowing with patients and doesn’t have many beds left. (credit: Getty | Joseph Prezioso) Hospitals nationwide […]

COVID 19 Tech

CDC head talks screwups, 4th doses, omicron’s wave in long-awaited briefing

Enlarge / The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquarters stands in Atlanta, Georgia, on Saturday, March 14, 2020. (credit: Getty | Bloomberg) The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Friday held its first COVID-19 press briefing in over a year. The briefing covered a wide range of pandemic-related topics, from the […]

Tech

Omicron is not mild and is crushing health care systems worldwide, WHO warns

Enlarge / World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus speaks during a press conference on December 20, 2021 at the WHO headquarters in Geneva. (credit: Getty| Fabrice Coffrini) The World Health Organization on Thursday pushed back on the consistent chatter that the ultratransmissible omicron coronavirus is “mild,” noting that the variant is, in fact, […]

COVID 19 Tech

US sets global record with over 1 million COVID cases in one day

Enlarge / Long lines at a mobile COVID-19 testing tent in Queens, New York, on December 29, 2021. (credit: Getty | Universal Images Group ) The United States reported over one million new cases of COVID-19 on Monday, setting a global record for a single-day total as the ultra-transmissible omicron coronavirus variant continues its savage […]

COVID 19 Tech

Children’s hospitals are filling nationwide amid tidal wave of omicron

Enlarge / A Boston Medical Center pediatrician performs a checkup on an 8-month-old while her father provides her comfort in a pediatrics tent set up outside of Boston Medical Center in Boston on April 29, 2020. (credit: Getty | Birkenstock boston Globe ) The number of children hospitalized with COVID-19 in the US is skyrocketing […]

COVID 19 Tech

Omicron smashes US case records as experts are still trying to understand it

Enlarge / A healthcare worker conducts a test at a drive-thru COVID-19 testing site at the Dan Paul Plaza on December 29, 2021 in Miami, Florida. In response to the increasing demand for COVID-19 tests, Miami-Dade County opened two new testing sites and expanding hours at the Zoo Miami testing location. (credit: Getty | Joe […]

COVID 19 Tech

With US swamped by omicron, Biden scraps travel bans

Enlarge (credit: Craig Hastings | Getty Images) President Joe Biden on Tuesday issued a proclamation revoking controversial travel restrictions targeting southern Africa where the ultra-transmissible omicron coronavirus variant was first detected in late November. The travel limitations on eight countries in southern Africa—Botswana, Eswatini/Swaziland, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, and Zimbabwe—will be lifted at […]

COVID 19 Tech

CDC draws criticism for shorter COVID quarantine, isolation as omicron bears down

Enlarge / Travelers wait in line to check-in at LaGuardia Airport in New York, on December 24, 2021. -On Christmas Eve, airlines, struggling with the Omicron variant of Covid-19, have canceled over 2, 000 flights globally, 454 of which are domestic, into or out of the US. (credit: Getty | YUKI IWAMURA ) As the […]