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Showing results for tags 'Transmission'.
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Nearly 20 major healthcare bodies are appealing to the Prime Minister for better personal protection against coronavirus. They say at least 930 health and care workers have died of COVID-19 and more are experiencing long-term effects. In a letter, they say measures to stop airborne spreading are "inadequate" and call for urgent improvement in masks and other defences against variants. The government said it was monitoring evidence on airborne transmission and would update advice "where necessary". The organisations involved represent a wide range of health professionals, fr -
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Covid coughing study suggests NHS staff at far greater risk than thought
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The NHS has been urged to rethink safety for thousands of frontline staff after new research suggested that Covid patients’ coughing is putting them at far greater risk of catching the virus than previously thought. The study found that coughing generated at least 10 times more infectious “aerosol” particles than speaking or breathing – which could explain why so many NHS staff have fallen ill during the pandemic. The research has led to fresh demands that anyone caring for someone with Covid-19, or suspected Covid-19, should be provided with the most protective equipment – including -
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People who recover from coronavirus have a similar level of protection against future infection as those who receive a Covid vaccine – at least for the first five months, research suggests. A Public Health England (PHE) study of more than 20,000 healthcare workers found that immunity acquired from an earlier Covid infection provided 83% protection against reinfection for at least 20 weeks. The findings show that while people are unlikely to become reinfected soon after their first infection, it is possible to catch the virus again and potentially spread it to others. “Overall I -
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Vaccination centres: minimising the risks to vulnerable people
Patient Safety Learning posted an article in Blogs
Last Friday I took my mother-in-law, Margaret, for her vaccination at a local vaccination centre in Chiswick, London. First let me start with what is being done well. We received a call from our GP practice nurse on Thursday offering Margaret an appointment for the Pfizer vaccine the following day. Margaret is 77 and, because several over-80s had cancelled or declined appointments, GP practices had been contacted to open up the appointments to the clinically vulnerable over 75s. Once defrosted, the Pfizer vaccine has to be used; so to avoid waste, they had proactively sought -
News Article
Deaths from COVID-19 in England in the first half of 2021 could exceed those seen in the whole of 2020 unless the vaccination programme is vastly increased and a national lockdown implemented—with educational settings closed for at least a month—researchers have warned. In a preprint released on 24 December, researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine used modelling to compare the effects of varying COVID-19 restrictions on the virus spread, hospital and intensive care admissions, and deaths from 15 December 2020 to 30 June 2021. The model took account of the new v -
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Hospital acquired covid infections hit record high
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The number of COVID-19 infections likely to have been acquired in hospital are rising again for the first time in three weeks and their proportion of all cases has reached record levels for the second wave, HSJ can reveal. NHS England data covering the week to 6 December (the latest available) shows 1,787 COVID-19 cases were acquired in-hospital – a rise of almost 14% on the week before. The number of hospital-acquired, or “nosocomial”, infections had been falling since the week to 15 November, when 1,794 were recorded. This week, hospital acquired covid infections amounted to 21% of -
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Inspectors moving between Covid-hit England care homes without tests
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Health inspectors in England have been moving between care homes with high levels of COVID-19 infection without being tested, raising fears they have put more residents at risk of catching the virus, leaks to the Guardian have revealed. In recent weeks all care home inspections carried out in the north of England have been of infected homes, including a facility where 38 of the 41 people receiving care and 30 staff – almost half of the workers – had tested positive, internal documents from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) show. Over the last two months inspectors have been checking -
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Coronavirus: Doctors spell out how to exit England's lockdown
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Lifting lockdown must be handled better this time round to avoid a surge in Covid that could overwhelm the NHS, doctors say. The British Medical Association has published a blueprint for how it thinks England should proceed with any easing. It includes replacing the "rule of six" with a two-households restriction to reduce social mixing and banning travel between different local lockdown tiers. Government has yet to say if or exactly how England will exit on 2 December. It will decide next week, based on whether cases have fallen enough and how much strain hospitals are under. -
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Physician predicts 'unprecedented surge' in US COVID-19 cases after Thanksgiving
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Coronavirus cases in the US will spike after Thanksgiving, further stressing health care systems and prompting new restrictions, an emergency physician said Saturday, as states continued to report soaring numbers of new cases, hospitalizations and deaths. Dr. James Phillips, chief of disaster medicine at George Washington University Hospital, told CNN's Erica Hill he is "terrified" about what's going to happen this holiday season. "We're going to see an unprecedented surge of cases following Thanksgiving this year, and if people don't learn from Thanksgiving, we're going to see it af -
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COVID-19: Liverpool to pilot city-wide coronavirus testing
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
People in Liverpool will be offered regular COVID-19 tests under the first trial of whole city testing in England. Everyone living or working in the city will be offered tests, whether or not they have symptoms, with follow-up tests every two weeks or so. Some will get new tests giving results within an hour which, if successful, could be rolled out to "millions" by Christmas, the government says. Liverpool has one of the highest rates of coronavirus deaths in England. The latest figures show the city recorded 1,754 cases in the week up to 30 October. The average area in England had -
News Article
NHS staff and their families accounted for one in six patients in hospital with Covid, due in part to inadequate personal protective equipment (PPE), new research suggests. A study of hospitals from March to June revealed that healthcare workers in patient-facing roles were around three times more likely to be hospitalised with the virus than the general population. Writing in the BMJ, the study's authors called for an urgent focus on how COVID-19 spreads around hospitals to prevent a similar toll in future waves of the pandemic. They also call for hospitals to consider re-deplo- Posted
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Hospital Covid ‘hotspots’ mapped out in a new HSIB report
Clive Flashman posted a news article in News
Hospital hotspots for COVID-19 have been highlighted in a new report by safety investigators. The report by the Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch (HSIB) makes a series of observations to help the health service reduce the spread of coronavirus in healthcare settings. Hospital hotspots for COVID-19 included the central nurses’ stations and areas where computers and medical notes were shared, the HSIB found. The investigation was initiated after a Sage report in May which found that 20% of hospital patients were reporting symptoms of Covid-19 seven days following admission – sugge- Posted
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News Article
Almost half of hospital patients have been discharged without receiving the results of their coronavirus test – including some patients who were sent to care homes, new research from Healthwatch and British Cross has revealed. Independent national patient body Healthwatch England said it had learned many patients were discharged from hospitals between March and August this year without proper assessments with many vulnerable people sent home without medication, equipment or the care they needed. At the start of the pandemic thousands of patients were discharged to care homes as NHS E -
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Key findings 82% of respondents did not receive a follow-up visit and assessment at home and almost one in five of these reported an unmet care need. Some people felt their discharge was rushed, with around one in five (19%) feeling unprepared to leave hospital. Over a third (35%) of people were not given a contact who they could get in touch with for further advice after discharge, despite this being part of the guidance. Overall patients and families were very positive about healthcare staff, praising their efforts during such a difficult time. Around a third (30 -
News Article
Levels of protective antibodies in people wane "quite rapidly" after coronavirus infection, say researchers. Antibodies are a key part of our immune defences and stop the virus from getting inside the body's cells. The Imperial College London team found the number of people testing positive for antibodies has fallen by 26% between June and September. They say immunity appears to be fading and there is a risk of catching the virus multiple times. More than 350,000 people in England have taken an antibody test as part of the REACT-2 study so far. In the first round of testin- Posted
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News Article
Women aged 50-60 at greatest risk of ‘long Covid’, experts suggest
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Women aged 50-60 are at greatest risk of developing “long Covid”, analysis suggests. Older age and experiencing five or more symptoms within the first week of illness were also associated with a heightened risk of lasting health problems. The study, led by Dr Claire Steves and Prof Tim Spector at King’s College London, analysed data from 4,182 COVID Symptom Study app users who had been consistently logging their health and had tested positive for the virus. In general, women were twice as likely to suffer from Covid symptoms that lasted longer than a month, compared with men – but on -
News Article
Ministers have denied care home inspectors access to weekly testing for coronavirus – despite fears they could contribute to the spread of COVID-19 as cases rise across the country, The Independent can reveal. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) was told by the Department of Health and Social Care last month it could not have access to regular testing for inspection teams as the watchdog prepares for 500 inspections of care homes during the next six weeks. Officials said the teams, who are assessing care conditions for the vulnerable and elderly, did not get close enough to people to p -
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Senior doctors specialising in infectious diseases have written an open letter expressing "concern" about the rapid increase in COVID-19 cases in Northern Ireland. The letter is signed by 13 medics from hospitals across Northern Ireland. It calls for the public to stick to government guidance on reducing social interactions and also warns against "stigmatising people and areas with high levels of infection." The letter reads: "We need to support people who test positive. This pandemic requires us to work together to bring it under control urgently. We need to reduce the potential fo -
News Article
Did early focus on hand washing and not masks aid spread of COVID-19?
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
From the moment coronavirus reached UK shores, public health advice stressed the importance of washing hands and deep-cleaning surfaces to reduce the risk of becoming infected. The advice was informed by mountains of research into the transmission of other respiratory viruses: it was the best scientists could do with such a new pathogen. But as the pandemic spread and data rolled in, some scientists began to question whether the focus on hand hygiene was as crucial as it seemed. The issue has resurfaced after Monica Gandhi, a professor of medicine at the University of California, San -
News Article
A technical glitch that meant nearly 16,000 cases of coronavirus went unreported has delayed efforts to trace contacts of people who tested positive. Public Health England (PHE) said 15,841 cases between 25 September and 2 October were left out of the UK daily case figures. They were then added in to reach Saturday's figure of 12,872 new cases and Sunday's 22,961 figure. PHE said all those who tested positive had been informed. But it means others in close contact with them were not. The issue has been resolved, PHE said, with outstanding cases passed on to tracers by 01:00 BST -
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Covid infection rates among doctors, nurses, and other hospital and care home staff have risen more than fivefold over the past month in London, scientists have discovered. The figures – provided by the Francis Crick Institute – have triggered considerable concern among scientists, who fear similar increases may be occurring in other regions of the UK. Increasing numbers of infected healthcare workers raise fears that the spread of COVID-19 into wards and care homes – which triggered tens of thousands of deaths last spring – could be repeated unless urgent action is taken. “It is ver