HEALTH AND SCIENCE HIGHLIGHTS

October 28,  2020 (San Diego's East County) -- Our Health and Science Highlights provide cutting edge news that could impact your health and our future.

HEALTH

• Biden slams White House statement taking credit for ‘ending’ coronavirus pandemic (Fox)
• OxyContin maker Purdue to plead guilty over opioid practices, deal sparks opposition (Reuters)
• CDC Reduces Consecutive Minutes Of COVID-19 Exposure Needed To Be A 'Close Contact' : Coronavirus Live Updates  (NPR)
• New USDA Ruling Allows for Chicken to Be Produced From Diseased Birds (MSN)
• Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly Pause COVID-19 Drug Trials  (NPR)
• The Swedish COVID-19 Response Is a Disaster. It Shouldn’t Be a Model for the Rest of the World (Time)

SCIENCE AND TECH

• More Companies Are Using Technology To Monitor For Coronavirus In The Workplace  (NPR)
• Apple, Google and a Deal That Controls the Internet (New York Times)
• Pair of studies confirm there is water on the moon’s surface and hint at widespread lunar ice (Washington Post)
• Anika Chebrolu just discovered a potential covid-19 treatment. She’s 14. (Washington Post)

For excerpts and links to full stories, click “read more” and scroll down.

HEALTH

Biden slams White House statement taking credit for ‘ending’ coronavirus pandemic (Fox)

The Trump administration statement came in a press release from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, which was accompanied by a 62-page report detailing scientific highlights during Trump’s tenure as president. More than 226,000 people in the U.S. have died from the coronavirus since the pandemic swept the country in February and March, with nearly 8.8 million cases. New cases and deaths have surged in recent weeks in the U.S. and around the globe. On the day the White House report was issued, more than 73,000 new cases and 985 deaths nationwide linked to COVID-19 were reported by public health officials.

OxyContin maker Purdue to plead guilty over opioid practices, deal sparks opposition (Reuters)

Purdue agreed to pay $225 million toward a $2 billion criminal forfeiture, with the Justice Department foregoing the rest if the company completes a bankruptcy reorganization dissolving itself and shifting assets to a “public benefit company,” or similar entity, that steers the $1.775 billion unpaid portion to thousands of U.S. communities suing it over the opioid crisis. 

CDC Reduces Consecutive Minutes Of COVID-19 Exposure Needed To Be A 'Close Contact' : Coronavirus Live Updates  (NPR)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has changed the amount of time it takes for someone to be considered a "close contact" of a person with COVID-19. Previous language defined a close contact as someone who spent at least 15 minutes within 6 feet of a person with a confirmed case. The CDC now defines a close contact as someone who was within 6 feet of an infected person for a total of 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period.

New USDA Ruling Allows for Chicken to Be Produced From Diseased Birds (MSN)

When the president invoked the Defense Production Act in April, to keep essential goods in production through the pandemic, it had some unexpected consequences on the food supply chain.

Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly Pause COVID-19 Drug Trials  (NPR)

…Johnson & Johnson paused all clinical trials of its experimental COVID-19 vaccine after a study participant became sick with an "unexplained illness." …Less than 24 hours later, Eli Lilly also stopped a study that was testing another product called ACTIV-3, a monoclonal antibody designed to stop the virus from infecting cells.

The Swedish COVID-19 Response Is a Disaster. It Shouldn’t Be a Model for the Rest of the World (Time)

....Many sick elderly were not seen by a doctor because the country’s hospitals were implementing a triage system that, according to a study published July 1 in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, appeared to have factored in age and predicted prognosis. “This likely reduced [intensive care unit] load at the cost of more high-risk patients”—like elderly people with confirmed infection—dying outside the ICU.” Only 13% of the elderly residents who died with COVID-19 during the spring received hospital care, according to preliminary statistics from the National Board of Health and Welfare released Aug.....

SCIENCE AND TECH

More Companies Are Using Technology To Monitor For Coronavirus In The Workplace  (NPR)

 As businesses look to reopen, technology firms are offering an array of monitoring systems to try to control the coronavirus.

Apple, Google and a Deal That Controls the Internet (New York Times)

In a landmark antitrust complaint, the Justice Department is targeting a secretive partnership that is worth billions of dollars to both companies.

Pair of studies confirm there is water on the moon’s surface and hint at widespread lunar ice (Washington Post)

There is water on the moon’s surface, and ice may be widespread in its many shadows, according to a pair of studies published Monday in the journal Nature Astronomy. The research confirms long-standing theories about the existence of lunar water that could someday enable astronauts to live there for extended periods.

Anika Chebrolu just discovered a potential covid-19 treatment. She’s 14. (Washington Post)

As the world’s biggest pharmaceutical companies race to find treatments for the novel coronavirus, one scientist has been working for months on a potential treatment in her bedroom. Her name is Anika Chebrolu, and she’s only 14. A freshman at Independence High School in Frisco, Tex., Chebrolu this week won the 3M Young Scientist Challenge and $25,000 for her discovery: a compound that can bind to the coronavirus, inhibiting its ability to infect people.