Health

(ATLANTA) — Most American adults are not getting enough of their fruits and vegetables, according to a new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, with even greater disparities found for those living in poverty.

The report, published Thursday, found that only 10% of adults are eating the recommended daily serving of vegetables, and slightly more — 12.3% — are consuming enough fruit.

The recommendations are based on dietary guidelines from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and Health and Human Services, which advise that adults incorporate 2 to 3 cups of vegetables and 1 1/2 to 2 cups of fruit into their diet each day. Eating sufficient fruits and vegetables “can help protect against some chronic conditions that are among the leading causes of mortality in the United States,” the study noted.

Researchers identified notable regional and demographic differences.

Some 16% of Connecticut adults met fruit recommendations while only 8% of West Virginia adults did. Meanwhile, 16% of Vermont adults met fruit recommendations but only 6% of Kentucky adults did.

Women met the recommendations more often than men, while people over 50 met them more often than their younger counterparts, researchers found. Additionally, Black people reached the vegetable goal less often than white or Hispanic people.

Those living below or close to the poverty level were the least likely to meet vegetable recommendations, at 6.8%, the study found.

“Additional policies and programs that will increase access to fruits and vegetables in places where U.S. residents live, learn, work, and play, might increase consumption and improve health,” the study stated.

The study was conducted through the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, which has been collecting information on American fruit and vegetable consumption for over 30 years, and included 294,566 participants.

The survey included data from 2019, before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The researchers noted that barriers to healthy foods, such as cost and limited availability and access, “might have worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Among its recommendations, the CDC advised that states and communities can support community retail programs “to attract grocery stores and supermarkets to underserved communities to improve community food quality,” as well as promote participation in federal nutrition assistance programs that help low-income people buy healthy foods.

Pandemic-related supply chain issues have particularly impacted people in food deserts, Geri Henchy, director of nutrition policy for the Food Research & Action Center, told ABC News.

“People who live in communities that had issues around the availability of quality, affordable produce, those issues have gotten worse during COVID because of the supply chain problems,” she said.

MORE: How to help feed your community with virtual food drives, donations this holiday season
Henchy also agreed that promoting participation in federal food assistance programs, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, or WIC, will be key, especially after boosts to both during the pandemic.

This past fall, the average SNAP benefit increased by $36.24 per person each month, and the government extended increased fruit and vegetable WIC benefits through March. Those measures should have a positive impact on food and vegetable consumption, though “of course we have a lot of people who are eligible who aren’t in the programs,” said Henchy.

Just over 80% of eligible Americans participate in SNAP, while about half of those eligible for WIC participate, according to the most recent federal data.

ABC News’ Sony Salzman contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — In the midst of a new pandemic surge, another seemingly new ailment is now grabbing headlines: flurona.

Despite the catchy name, “flurona” is not new. It is a term coined to describe what happens when a person tests positive for the flu and COVID-19 at the same time.

“Both are common, so it is not unexpected that some people would be infected at the same time,” said Dr. Dan Barouch, director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston.

Flurona is not a new disease, experts stress, nor is it a new variant of COVID-19. The flu virus and COVID-19 virus are from two very different virus families. Scientists are not concerned about the two viruses mixing to create a new virus.

There are many different types of viruses that are capable of infecting people. Viruses that cause the flu and COVID-19 are two examples, but there’s also HIV, the chicken pox virus, rabies virus, the common cold and many others.

It has always been possible for one person to be infected with two or more different viruses at once. And with flu season coinciding with a new COVID-19 surge, there’s a greater chances that a handful of people will test positive for both viruses at the same time.

Doctors call these instances co-infections. Though uncommon, last year’s flu season also saw a handful of cases of flu and COVID-19 in the same person at the same time.

“It has not been a big issue for us because of the low levels of influenza circulating in the community,” Dr. Jonathan Grein, director of Hospital Epidemiology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, told the hospital’s website. Cedars-Sinai said it had recently seen one mild case of the co-infection.

“It’s obviously not good to be infected with two viruses rather than one, but there’s no clear indication that this is a particularly bad combination,” Grein added.

With the flu and COVID circulating at the same time, people can reduce the risk of becoming severely ill with either virus by getting vaccinated against the flu and COVID, wearing a mask in crowded spaces and washing your hands.

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(NEW YORK) — As U.S. COVID-19 cases continue to surge, some health care facilities have been forced to shut down facilities or departments as staffing shortages worsen.

Holy Cross Health in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, was forced to close labor and delivery units, while keeping open, at least for now, NICU and postpartum units.

“Holy Cross Health has reached critical staffing levels in Labor and Delivery,” the hospital said in a statement to ABC News. “In the best interest of patient safety, the Labor and Delivery unit is on diversion until further notice.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated guidance last month for health care workers, reducing their isolation periods to align with “understanding of the disease trajectory,” which affected staffing measures.

Three Aurora Urgent Care facilities in Wisconsin were forced to close last week until at least Jan. 26.

“Managing the COVID surge combined with staffing shortages have contributed to temporary closures at three lower volume urgent care centers in Menomonee Falls, Brookfield and on River Center Drive in Milwaukee,” a representative for Advocate Aurora Health told ABC News in a statement. “This allows those team members to be deployed to busier urgent cares in the area. All other non-urgent care services offered at these three facilities are currently open.”

Pulaski Memorial Hospital in Indiana also told ABC News it’s closing its OB/Maternity department in mid-January due to staffing shortages.

“With so few maternity nurses available, our medical staff and senior leadership felt it best to close the OB/Maternity Department instead of trying to operate at less than optimal staffing levels,” hospital CEO Tom Barry said in a statement. “Over the past several months, we have had significant difficulty recruiting additional staff to our OB/Maternity Department in order to maintain the high-quality standards that all patients deserve and expect from PMH.”

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(ATLANTA) — The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday clarified its guidelines around what to do when you get COVID-19, a move that comes after criticism last week that their newest guidance to shorten the isolation down to five days without calling for a negative test was confusing and lax.

The latest update still does not include a recommendation for people to get a negative COVID test before leaving isolation, but gives guidance for people who “have access” and “want to test” — language that reflects the challenges many Americans have faced in recent weeks trying to get their hands on them — while still holding ground that a negative rapid test isn’t an all-clear.

People who test positive after five days should isolate for another five days, the CDC says, while people who test negative should still follow the guidance for those who don’t test: until day 10, wear a mask, avoid high-risk people, don’t travel and don’t eat or drink around others.

The CDC said the decision was based on data that negative rapid tests do not necessarily mean someone has stopped spreading the virus, and PCR tests — the most accurate type — can’t be relied on either, because they continue to show positive results for weeks afterward even when someone isn’t contagious.

“As such, regardless of the test result, wearing a well-fitting mask is still recommended,” the guidance said.

While more detailed, the updated guidance is not significantly different from last week’s guidelines, which changed the recommended isolation period for a person with COVID from 10 days down to five, followed by five days of masking around other people. It applies to everyone, vaccinated or not, who gets COVID, so long as people are largely clear of symptoms by Day 5.

But the decision rankled public health experts who thought a shorter isolation without a negative test would lead to more spread.

“CDC’s new guidance to drop isolation of positives to 5 days without a negative test is reckless,” Dr. Michael Mina, an epidemiologist and chief scientific officer at eMed tweeted last week following the initial announcement. “I absolutely don’t want to sit next to someone who turned [positive] five days ago and hasn’t tested [negative].”

Federal officials pushed back in the criticism, insisting that the new recommendations were based on science and not on social pressure.

“You can get people safely back out in a five-day period so long as they wear a mask if they are without symptoms. That is the science,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to the White House, told ABC News last week. “The impact of that is to try and not be in a situation where we essentially have to shut down the entire country.”

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky also defended the guidance, saying it was based on behavioral studies showing that only one-third of people were following the previous guidelines, and data showing up to 90% of COVID spread occurs in the first five days that someone has it.

“It really had a lot to do with what we thought people would be able to tolerate,” she said in an interview last week with CNN.

And on Tuesday, the guidance largely stuck to that stance, though it further clarified what people should do in all scenarios, including if they decide to test.

Here’s the latest:

If you get COVID, you should isolate for five days, the CDC says.

Day 0 is the first day of symptoms and day 1 is considered “first full day after your symptoms developed.” For example, if you have symptoms on Monday, Tuesday is Day 1 and Saturday is Day 5.

If your case is asymptomatic, Day 0 is the day you tested positive. But the CDC’s guidance on Tuesday clarified that if people test positive without any symptoms, and then develop symptoms in the days afterward, they should reset their isolation clock back to zero on the day they have symptoms and isolate for another five days.

After five full days, you can leave isolation if you are mostly all better. What does that mean? Fever-free and on the mend.

“You can end isolation after 5 full days if you are fever-free for 24 hours without the use of fever-reducing medication and your other symptoms have improved,” according to CDC guidance.

Loss of taste and smell, two common COVID symptoms, can last “for weeks or months after recovery” and do not qualify as symptoms that should keep you in isolation​.

Then, after five days, you should wear a “well-fitting mask around others at home and in public for 5 additional days (day 6 through day 10) after the end of your 5-day isolation period,” the guidance says.

If you’re unable to mask, or if you can mask but will be around high-risk people, opt instead for the isolation, the CDC says.

“If you are unable to wear a mask when around others, you should continue to isolate for a full 10 days. Avoid people who are immunocompromised or at high risk for severe disease, and nursing homes and other high-risk settings, until after at least 10 days,” according to the CDC.

If you still want to test, and can find one

As for the testing component, the CDC recommends that people who can and want to test should do so around day five, if they have been fever-free for 24 hours.

“If your test result is positive, you should continue to isolate until day 10,” the guidance says.

And, importantly, a negative test is not an all-clear, according to the CDC.

“If your test result is negative, you can end isolation, but continue to wear a well-fitting mask around others at home and in public until day 10,” the guidance says.

The CDC recommends against traveling, going anywhere where you are unable to wear a mask like restaurants and gyms, and avoid eating around people — both at home and in public — “until a full 10 days after your first day of symptoms,” even with a negative test.

Walensky, asked about the guidance in an interview with “The Late Show” host Stephen Colbert on Monday night, said she would interpret even a negative test as possibly having “some transmissibility ahead of you.”

“If you have access to a test, and if you want to do a test at day five, and if your symptoms are gone and you’re feeling well, then go ahead and do that test,” Walensky said.

“But here’s how I would interpret that test. If it’s positive, stay home for another five days. If it’s negative, I would say you still really need to wear a mask. You still may have some transmissibility ahead of you,” she said.

“You still should probably not visit grandma. You shouldn’t get on an airplane. And you should still be pretty careful when you’re with other people by wearing your mask all the time.”

While the rollout of the guidance has been met with much criticism, experts have noted that its ultimately a fast-paced environment with no easy one-size-fits-all solution.

“The CDC is sending a mixed message — but I don’t think there’s any way around that,” Dr. David Dowdy, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told ABC News.

“And I don’t think we should be too quick to judge mixed messages in the context of a rapidly evolving situation. We want our guidelines to reflect the most recent knowledge we have, meaning that those guidelines are going to change, sometimes quickly,” he said.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Food and Drug Administration on Monday approved Pfizer boosters for 12- to 15-year-olds.

The moves comes as schools reopen after the holiday break.

In a release, the FDA said it has amended the emergency use authorization for the Pfizer vaccine to also shorten the time between the completion of primary vaccination of the Pfizer vaccine and a booster dose to at least five months, instead of six, and to allow for a third primary series dose for certain immunocompromised children 5 through 11 years of age.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(NEW YORK) — Amid pushback from some public health officials on new Centers for Disease Control guidance for individuals who have tested positive for COVID-19, which does not require a negative test to end isolation after five days, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease specialist, said changes to the guidance are being considered.

“You’re right there has been some concern about why we don’t ask people at that five-day period to get tested. That is something that is now under consideration. The CDC is very well aware that there has been some pushback about that,” Fauci told This Week anchor George Stephanopoulos on Sunday.

He continued, “Looking at it again, there may be an option in that, that testing could be a part of that. And I think we’re going to be hearing more about that in the next day or so from the CDC.”

The CDC issued new guidelines for those who test positive on Tuesday, recommending a five-day isolation period, if asymptomatic at that point, followed by five days of masking when around other people.

The CDC said in a statement: “The change is motivated by science demonstrating that the majority of SARS-CoV-2 transmission occurs early in the course of illness, generally in the 1-2 days prior to onset of symptoms and the 2-3 days after. Therefore, people who test positive should isolate for five days and, if asymptomatic at that time, they may leave isolation if they can continue to mask for five days to minimize the risk of infecting others.”

Some prominent public health officials, including former U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams, criticized the new guidelines. The nation’s largest nurses’ union and a major flight attendant union also expressed dissatisfaction with the new guidelines.

“Regardless of what CDC says, you really should try to obtain an antigen test (I know – easier said than done) and confirm it’s negative prior to leaving isolation and quarantine. There’s not a scientist or doctor I’ve met yet who wouldn’t do this for themselves/their family,” Adams tweeted.

The revised guidelines come as the number of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. reaches record levels. The CDC recorded more than 580,000 cases in the U.S. on Thursday, a pandemic record. That number shattered Wednesday’s record of about 488,000.

However, Fauci said Sunday the time has come to focus less on case counts, as “infections become less severe.” Instead, he said, “it is much more relevant to focus on the hospitalizations.”

As cases have skyrocketed, hospitalizations and deaths have not apparently followed the trend. Fauci expressed optimism about emerging evidence that the omicron variant could be less damaging, although he cautioned “hospitalizations are often late, lagging indicators.”

Even with the rising case numbers, Fauci said he believes it’s the correct decision to return children to in-person schooling after the holiday break as “it’s very clear there are really serious effects about” children not having a physical presence — and because most teachers are vaccinated and children 5 and up are eligible for COVID vaccinations.

“I plead with parents to please seriously consider vaccinating your children, wearing masks in the school setting, doing tests to stay,” he added. “I think all those things put together, it’s safe enough to get those kids back to school, balanced against the deleterious effects of keeping them out.”

Despite some promising data on omicron, Fauci warned there remains a heightened potential for stress on the nation’s hospitals and health care workers.

“We’ve got to be careful about that. Because even if you have a less of a percentage of severity, when you have multi, multi, multifold more people getting infected, the net amount is, you’re still gonna get a lot of people that are going to be needing hospitalization. And that’s the reason why we’re concerned about stressing and straining the hospital system,” Fauci told Stephanopoulos.

Still, Fauci expressed hope that what he described as a “severe surge” will peak within a few weeks.

“One of the things that we hope for, George, is that this thing will peak after a period of a few weeks and turn around,” Fauci told Stephanopoulos. “We’ve seen that happen in South Africa with a head of major surge, but as quickly as the surge went up, it turned around.”

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(WASHINGTON) — Hundreds to thousands of calls come in to the Disability Information and Access Line (DIAL) each week from disabled people across the country with questions about COVID-19, vaccinations, testing spots and more.

As one of the first call centers to focus specifically on the needs of disabled people, the federally funded hotline continues to pick up speed, filling a service previously unmet, according to the line’s director Sara Clark. The more people know about it, she says, the more calls they’re fielding.

“It’s important for people with disabilities to know that they can turn to a trusted source for accurate information,” Clark said.

DIAL was created in May 2021 and serviced and supported by national disability advocacy groups.

The call center has since been inundated with requests to assist disabled people in getting vaccinated, finding vaccination sites, in-home vaccination availability, educating callers about vaccine information, and overcoming physical or systemic barriers to accessing the vaccine and booster shots.

“Now that the word about us, it’s showing us that there’s a lot more people that have needed this but didn’t necessarily know about it,” Clark said.

The CDC reports that disabled adults were more likely to endorse the vaccine as protection against COVID, but are more likely to report difficulties in getting vaccinated than did adults without a disability.

Some 82.4% of disabled people have at least one dose of the vaccine, compared to 85.3% of non-disabled adults, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Among disabled adults over the age of 65, the gap in vaccination widens to about five percentage points.

“The disability community didn’t have a national call center until DIAL was created,” said Sandy Markwood, the CEO of the national disability and elderly advocacy organization USAging. “It focuses primarily on COVID but people are also calling looking for supportive services, which are needed now more than ever.”

The effort was funded by the U.S. Administration for Community Living and the CDC but is being run by USAging and other disability advocacy networks such as the National Disability Rights Network, the National Association of Councils on Developmental Disabilities and more.

Some 61 million adults in the United States live with a disability, the CDC reports — that’s about 1 in 4 adults who have some type of disability.

Curt Decker, the executive director of the National Disability Rights Network, said the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted some of the ways that ableism in policies and procedures has impacted access to healthcare and safety for disabled people.

He said that the disabled community is often “left behind” in disasters and the COVID-19 pandemic is just the latest example of this.

“You’ve really got to think through all the different populations, different needs and design your programs to meet that whole range of people,” said Decker. “Surprise, surprise — here comes a pandemic and we didn’t initially plan how our response is going to impact these very vulnerable populations.”

Disabled people have been disproportionately impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic: “the increased risk of poor outcomes from the disease itself, reduced access to routine health care and rehabilitation, and the adverse social impacts of efforts to mitigate the pandemic,” the CDC reports.

The pandemic has exacerbated pre-existing oppression on the disabled community. The World Health Organization notes that disabled people are more likely to be older, poorer, and have comorbidities — all of which increase the risk of severe consequences from the virus.

“The disability community is very diverse, with all kinds of disabilities,” Decker said. “Unfortunately, we’ve discovered that there are some people that are just not thinking about the population and what their needs are.”

Markwood says that the lack of access to reliable information and vaccination sites has hampered vaccination efforts among this demographic.

“There was a lot of misinformation about what the impact of vaccines would be on people who had disabilities,” Markwood said.

For people with intellectual disabilities and for people who are immunocompromised to some degree, advocates say that the fear of vaccination, lack of understanding of medical jargon, and lack of communication from doctors on individual health impacts was greatly unaddressed.

Many of the people calling DIAL’s hotline, Clark says, are just looking for information and insight.

“Maybe the initial question would be: ‘where can I get vaccinated?'” Clark said. “Then, it’s the ‘how’ of getting there, getting the transportation. In some cases, people need assistance with getting into the appointment, waiting there, knowing what to expect next, and the peer support that our Centers for Independent Living offer.”

Then come the issue of physically accessing the vaccine.

“If a person is using a wheelchair, will they be able to get to the vaccination site?” Clark said. “If it’s a person who has sensory issues, they might get overwhelmed with a lot of people or a lot of noises or a situation they’re not used to.”

She added, “If they’re trying to get into a spot that you know, wasn’t wheelchair accessible or they they’re a person who needs American Sign Language, but they’re not able to communicate with people there — they could also call us. We’ve trained and prepare people for that.”

Some people with disabilities live in group homes or detention facilities, some cannot verbally communicate, some need transportation or communication assistance, Decker and Markwood said.

Some people are homebound or are under the guardianship of someone who may be against vaccines, they added.

Many factors create hostile or challenging scenarios for the vaccination rollout among disabled patients: if vaccination spots are difficult to travel to or navigate; if at-home vaccine administration is hard to come across; if a care provider or guardian is not adequately relaying accurate information or if medical information is not being understood or if websites and call centers are not disability-friendly.

“We actually went into a group home in one state where the residents wanted to be vaccinated, and the provider wouldn’t do it — so we had to get a mobile unit out there from the local health department could give them access to the vaccine,” Decker said.

CDC states that reducing these barriers to vaccine scheduling and making vaccination sites more accessible “might improve vaccination rates among persons with disabilities.”

The CDC has started acting on this by funding the Administration on Community Living’s efforts to connect with the aging and disabled — which includes backing DIAL.

Considering the ever-increasing demand for DIAL’s services, there is still a clear need for resources to address the needs that are holding disabled people back from vaccination access.

“[Call center users] are so happy that there’s someone to answer the phone because so often they call places and it’s just an automated message,” Clark said. “They are really just happy and grateful that there is someone at the other end of the line that can listen to them and hear their needs and not only hear their needs, but also point them in the right direction.”

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(NEW YORK) — As the COVID-19 pandemic has swept the globe, more than 5.4 million people have died from the disease worldwide, including over 824,000 Americans, according to real-time data compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Systems Science and Engineering.

About 62% of the population in the United States is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern.

 

Dec 31, 5:13 pm

People infected with omicron variant have reduced risk of hospitalization: Study

A report published on Friday by the U.K. Health Security Agency found that people who were infected with the omicron variant had a reduced risk of requiring hospitalization, as compared to people who were infected with the delta variant.

The risk of hospital admissions among those with omicron was about half of that for delta, researchers found.

Individuals who had a booster dose were also found to have a “substantial reduction” in the risk of hospitalization, compared to those who are unvaccinated.

Researchers noted that these lower risks do not necessarily correlate to a reduced hospital burden during a COVID-19 surge, particularly given the higher growth rate and immune evasion seen with omicron.

Preliminary analyses also estimated a lower risk of hospitalization among omicron cases in school-aged children 5 to 17 years old, compared to delta cases in the same age group.

-ABC News’ Arielle Mitropoulos

Dec 31, 4:24 pm

Rep. Ayanna Pressley latest lawmaker to test positive

Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., is the latest lawmaker to test positive for COVID-19. Pressley announced the news Friday afternoon, saying she was experiencing “relatively mild ” symptoms and isolating.

She also took the opportunity to say she was vaccinated and boosted and advocate for others to do the same.

“Vaccines save lives,” she said in a statement. “With this unprecedented pandemic continuing to rage, I am deeply grateful for the scientists, researchers, and frontline healthcare workers who have worked tirelessly to develop vaccines that are safe and effective, and ensure that our communities are protected.”

Pressley, who has garnered national attention as a member of “The Squad” alongside Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar, is one of more than a dozen members of Congress to test positive in the past two weeks. Illinois Rep. Chuy Garcia announced Thursday that he had also tested positive for a breakthrough case and was experiencing mild symptoms.

Dec 31, 2:24 pm

COVID surge continues in New York, single-day case record broken

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases continues to surge in New York. The state is reporting more than 76,000 positive cases over the last 24 hours, marking another single-day record for the state.

“We’re breaking records every day,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said Friday at a COVID-19 briefing.

Meanwhile, nearly 8,000 New Yorkers were in the hospital with the virus on Thursday, an increase of more than 500 from the previous day.

Hochul announced that students in the State University of New York and City University of New York systems will need to receive their booster shot by Jan. 15, or whenever they are eligible for the extra shot. The requirement affects roughly 2.3 million students across the state.

The governor also said she is extending the mandate that businesses require either masks or vaccines, by two weeks, to Feb. 1.

Hochul pushed the importance of vaccines, especially for 5 to 11-year-olds, only 28% of whom have received their first dose, according to Hochul.

“We are not going to leave any stone unturned in terms of finding out how we can get parents to do the right thing for their children,” she said.

In a piece of encouraging news, the number of hospitals in the state with less than 10% capacity has dropped from 35 to 21, according to Hochul, who signed an executive order in November that required hospitals with such limited capacity to pause non-essential surgeries.

-ABC News’ Will McDuffie

Dec 31, 12:40 pm

Texas governor requests federal COVID-19 aid

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has requested resources for federally-supported COVID-19 testing locations, medical personnel, as well as additional federal allocations of monoclonal antibodies.

“Detecting COVID-19 and preventing COVID-related hospitalizations are critical to our fight against this virus,” Abbott said in a press release Friday.

Texas has seen more than 104,000 confirmed COVID cases in the past week, with a 22.30% testing positivity rate, according to Johns Hopkins University’s Coronaivrus Research Center. The center also reports that the state has a 58.45% vaccination rate.

Dec 31, 10:47 am

US breaks weekly COVID-19 case record

The United States has recorded 2.2 million confirmed COVID-19 cases over the last week, setting a grim record as the highest number of cases confirmed in one week.

The previous record was set just a few days earlier from Dec. 22 to Dec. 29, when the U.S. confirmed 1.9 million COVID-19 cases. Before that, the previous record totaled 1.75 million cases from Jan. 5 to Jan. 11 at the start of 2021.

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(NEW YORK) — COVID-19 has touched all corners of the world — and fear, anxiety, and grief have followed in its wake. The pandemic has taken a toll on the mental health and well-being of many, due to the climbing death toll, the social isolation, the constant internal monologue for some asking “do I have the virus?” and more, experts say.

Mental and physical health are intertwined and sometimes stress can manifest itself physically, according to experts. So if you’re having migraines, have missed a period, lost hair, or had other irregularities in your daily life, it may be due to pandemic stress, they said.

“Think about it like erosion,” said Craig Sawchuk, a psychologist at the Mayo Clinic, in an interview. “It just leads to wear and tear across time.”

However, there may be other underlying causes for these issues. Ailments that someone experiences during a stressful time should not solely be attributed to stress, and the Mayo Clinic recommends that symptoms be evaluated by a medical professional.

According to psychology experts, when people are under mental stress, there is a fight or flight response from the central nervous system.

Sawchuk said the body uses a high amount of energy to deal with whatever the threat may be, which is why people can experience a rush of adrenaline, an elevated heart rate, increased blood pressure, heavier breathing and tense muscles.

Because of the amount of energy needed to tackle what’s causing stress, vital organs, muscles, and systems steal resources from other non-essential systems in the body, said Kory Floyd, a professor of communication and psychology at the University of Arizona.

“The mind is saying to itself, ‘those systems are important, but they’re not important if our survival is at stake.'” Floyd told ABC News. “When you pull resources away from those systems, they don’t function optimally, which is why we end up with stomach aches or why we end up having a hard time getting pregnant, why we end up with a headache or having a difficult time sleeping.”

When that acute stress lasts for long periods of time — like a pandemic that is almost two years old — it can cause trouble for the less essential systems of the body and disrupt their functions.

“It’s almost like that sympathetic nervous system volume knob has just been cranked this entire time,” Sawchuk told ABC News. “It’s causing other systems to shut down, like digestion and reproduction. This is where you get things like missed periods, low sex drive … hair loss and skin-related problems because we’re not getting into a restoration mode.”

Stress begins to deeply affect people physically. It may look different on every individual, experts say, but some symptoms are more common than others.

“The body can only produce so many symptoms,” Sawchuk said. “When we look at each individual, they may tend to express their distress or experience that stress in different ways. So for some people, it may show up in their skin,” such as acne or psoriasis.

Sawchuk added, “For other people, it may show up in terms of just being exhausted.”

The clinical psychologists interviewed by ABC News say they’ve seen an increase in reports of headaches, migraines and sleep disruptions among patients during the pandemic.

Chronic stress can also cause digestive issues and stomach-related problems. Low sex drive and missed menstruation cycles — that are not caused by pregnancy — may also be signs that stress is starting to disrupt one’s reproductive systems.

One study in the Journal of Dermatological Treatment found that short-term stress-related cases of alopecia areata, an autoimmune disorder that causes hair loss, increased following the start of the pandemic, and researchers expected the number to continue to rise. Other psychiatry-related dermatologic diseases were also expected to rise, including psoriasis and chronic hives.

Aches and pains in the body, especially tension in the jaw and neck may also be due to stress.

Cindy Ackrill, an editor at the American Institute of Stress, says there is no shame in taking steps to alleviate stress and better one’s mental health. These issues won’t be reversed in the blink of an eye, Ackrill says, and there are simple ways to start the process towards healing.

“The first thing is to notice what tends to rev you up and what tends to calm you down,” Ackrill said. “You can start to balance those out again — what depletes your energy, what re-energizes you — so that you can strategize to put those back together in the immediate feeling of stress.”

Experts say leaving stress-related issues unchecked can lead to serious, long-term health problems. If you may be exhibiting symptoms of chronic or intense stress, seek help.

“Look for tiny little differences you can make,” Ackrill advised. “Going to bed five minutes earlier, spending five minutes on the phone with a friend. Look for tiny little shifts you can make that don’t feel like a lot of work.”

Ackrill added, “We live in a world that’s very stressful and we are all on a journey together to figure out how to do it.”

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(NEW YORK) – New Year’s Eve celebrations for 2021 were significantly scaled back due to COVID, with hopes of larger celebrations to mark 2022. But with case numbers surging, are this year’s festivities safe?

It depends what your plans are, according to Dr. Anthony Fauci.

“What I would suggest people do not do is to go to very large, 50 to 60 person parties where people are blowing whistles and all that sort of thing and celebrating and you don’t know the vaccination status of the people in that environment. That would be a risky situation that I would recommend against,” he said in an ABC News Live interview.

With COVID cases surging, many cities are heading Fauci’s advice.

New York City’s celebration will be larger than last year’s but still extremely scaled back. Only 15,000 masked and fully vaccinated attendees will be allowed to watch the ball drop in Times Square — a quarter of the number normally in attendance.

Other cities have gone even further. Atlanta canceled its annual Peach Drop, Annapolis canceled the in-person portion of its celebration and Seattle’s New Year’s firework show is only available for viewing online or on television.

Paris, London, Berlin and many other cities have also canceled large-scale in-person events.

Sydney Australia, known for being the first place to ring in the new year, will have a celebration only accessible to a limited number of vaccinated ticketed guests.

So how can you celebrate?

“If you’re vaccinated and you’re boosted and you want a family gathering in your home with other vaccinated and boosted people, although the risk is not zero, the risk is very low,” Fauci said.

It might not be the party some had expected, but according to World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, changing your plans could save a life.

“An event canceled is better than a life canceled,” Ghebreyesus said. “It’s better to cancel now and celebrate later, than to celebrate now and grieve later.”

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