How ordinary lives have changed in the age of COVID-19

All of our lives have changed in some way. Whether we are hard at work getting ready for a surge of cases or managing stir-crazy kids at home, the basic rhythms of the day have changed.

I’ve been talking a lot with the media to make sure the general public has the information they need to make good decisions. I won’t post all the links here but was really proud to be quoted by Jodi Kantor in The New York Times in her great story, “No Longer Just a Walk in the Park.“ Beyond the thrill of being quoted in the paper I read every day, Jodi was incredibly charming and bright.

Hospitals Are Ground Zero

The MERS coronavirus has now spread from the Middle East to home town USA.

Since both US victims of this resurgent respiratory virus - one in Indiana and another in Florida - are healthcare workers, all eyes have turned to nosocomial transmission. In some locales nosocomial transmission has outpaced the former frontrunner for the MERS transmission prize: camel spit.

Proper infection control, therefore, is hugely important. The CDC recommends special airborne infection rooms, masks, eye protection, gowns and gloves. I remember taking these precautions when the SARS epidemic came through town. In some cases, patients were incredibly sick and it was scary; other times folks with SARS had the sniffles and we made a big deal over very little. Let's hope that as we learn more about MERS, the early reports of 30% case fatality will turn into less sobering statistics. 

Along the way, it's good that the macho culture of medicine has been changing. When I was in training, it was common and even admirable for doctors to work sick. I remember idolizing a medicine resident who did morning rounds with an IV pole at his side. Yet now we know - how could we not have clued in then?!  - that this risks spread of infectious diseases to our fragile patients.

In a nice story just out today titled "Second MERS Case Shows Hospitals Are Ground Zero for MERS," Maggie Fox of CBS News quoted me and others about MERS infection control. 

HIV and the Global Sex Tally

Every year 2.5 million people are newly infected with HIV. This figure is simultaneously catastrophic and hard to understand, but the silver lining in that viral cloud is that we can use it to calculate how much sex people are having.

To find out how, read my full article at the Scientific American.