People’s behaviour will determine success of Covid-19 app, psychologists say

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The NHS tracking app is coming in the next few weeks (Getty)

People’s behaviour will determine the success or failure of the coronavirus contact tracing app, psychologists have warned.

The NHS Covid-19 symptoms tracking app was due to be rolled out in mid-May following a trial on the Isle of Wight as an aid towards the Government’s track and trace effort, but it is now expected in the ‘coming weeks’.

According to experts at the British Psychological Society (BPS), behavioural science should be integrated within the app itself, as well as in any communications associated with it if the app is to be fit for purpose.

The body said it has identified at least four inter-related behaviours resting on the public to carry out.

Madelynne Arden, professor of health psychology at Sheffield Hallam University, said these are: to download the app, carry a functional phone at all times, identify they have Covid-19 symptoms and report them on the app, and act on messages from the app to self-isolate.

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‘Reducing the spread of Covid-19 is paramount and the Government’s track and trace app is a key tool in its strategy,’ she said.

‘However, it is people’s behaviour that will determine if it is a success.’

The app needs widespread engagement to work (Credits: Getty Images)

She added that for people to perform these behaviours, they must ‘have the capability, opportunity and motivation to do so’.

Dr Angel Chater, health psychologist and chair of the BPS behavioural science and disease prevention taskforce, said: ‘Understanding the drivers and barriers behind the behaviours for different groups is essential to both the uptake and engagement of the app.

‘Messaging that encourages people to use it should draw from behavioural science, highlighting clear and achievable behavioural strategies and outcomes.’

On Thursday, business minister Nadhim Zahawi told Question Time the app should be in place by the end of June.



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Commission approves support scheme for energy-intensive companies in #Croatia

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The European Commission has approved, under EU state aid rules, a Croatian scheme that grants reductions to energy-intensive companies on a surcharge to finance support for renewable electricity production. Croatian support for renewable energy is at present financed through contributions from electricity consumers, based on their consumption.

The scheme, which will apply until 31 December 2021 and will have a provisional annual budget of €10 million, will benefit companies active in Croatia in sectors that are particularly energy-intensive (hence with higher electricity consumption) and more exposed to international trade. The beneficiaries will obtain a reduction of up to a maximum of 80% of their contribution to the financing of support to renewable energy. Croatia also submitted an adjustment plan to align with State aid rules the level of reductions from which a number of eligible and non-eligible companies have benefitted since 2013.

The Commission assessed the measure and the adjustment plan under EU state aid rules, in particular, the Guidelines on state aid for environmental protection and energy 2014-2020. The Guidelines authorize reductions – up to a certain level – in contributions levied on energy-intensive companies active in certain sectors and exposed to international trade, in order to ensure their global competitiveness.

The Commission found that the compensation will only be granted to energy intensive companies exposed to international trade, in line with the requirements of the Guidelines. Furthermore, the measure will promote the EU energy and climate goals and ensure the global competitiveness of energy-intensive users and industries, without unduly distorting competition. On this basis, the Commission concluded that the measure and the adjustment plan are in line with EU state aid rules.

More information will be available on the Commission’s competition website, in the State Aid Register under the case number SA. 54887.

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Central Bankers Have Crossed Bright Lines to Aid Economies

“The government is handing out $100 bills when there is nowhere open to spend them,” Mr. Harvey wrote in a recent article. He pointed out that food prices were already rising sharply in Britain, which he attributed to “more money chasing after significantly fewer goods and services.”

But the prevailing view among economists is that central bankers have no alternative, and some ask the opposite question: Will the extraordinary efforts by central banks to stoke demand even be enough to quickly restore low unemployment and encourage stable inflation?

“Under current circumstances, when the world came to a full stop in a month, there is no such thing as doing too much,” said Carl Weinberg, chief economist at High Frequency Economics a research firm. “If there is inflation, that is a small price to pay. The big social-political-economic problem is the loss of jobs and income.”

Growth could recover steadily as businesses reopen and consumers begin to spend government stimulus checks and savings built up during the shutdowns. Unemployment in the United States fell to 13.3 percent in May, suggesting that the early stage of that rebound is already underway. But a more pessimistic reality also looks possible.

The economy could take years to get back to full strength as consumers and businesses brace for a second wave of infections, companies cut investment, and restaurants and retailers find that they cannot make money at partial capacity. In that world, central banks may be needed to nudge businesses to make their next machinery investment, or to encourage consumers to opt for the more expensive car.

Rock-bottom interest rates should help. But rates have been low for most of the last decade, so cheap borrowing costs may not offer the economic booster shot that they once did. The Fed slashed interest rates in March to near zero from a range of just 1.5 to 1.75 percent, less than half the pre-2008 starting point. In Europe and Japan, rates were already negative going into the crisis.

While officials around the world have shown a willingness to buy bonds — exploding their balance sheets from already historically large levels — those policies might also prove less potent in 2020. When the Fed started its financial crisis bond purchases, aiming to push down longer-term rates, the interest rate on 10-year government bonds stood above 3 percent. Today, rates are around 0.8 percent, leaving far less room to lower them.

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‘The Future Is Blue, Not Purple’: Is This the Year Georgia Flips?

If no candidate receives 50 percent support in the crowded primary field, there will be a runoff.

“Part of this is the collapse of the G.O.P.’s Southern strategy,” Mr. Ossoff said in an interview, referring to the controversial political playbook, attributed to former President Richard M. Nixon, that Republicans used to win over white voters in the South.

“We were meant to be distracted by racial and cultural division, but Georgia has moved beyond that,” he said. “And the coalition that’s already being built statewide right now transcends race, transcends urban and suburban and rural divides, and transcends regionalism. And we’re seeing that play out across the South.”

DuBose Porter, a former State House Democratic leader and party chairman who ran for governor in 2010, said that if Mr. Biden wanted to emphasize Georgia’s importance — both to the Electoral College and the Senate — he would select Ms. Abrams as his running mate.

“I think we’ll get there already,” Mr. Porter said. “But if Joe Biden were to select Stacey Abrams, I think that could put us over the top and create some excitement in such an important cycle.”

He did not mention Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms of Atlanta, who is also seen as a possible choice for Mr. Biden’s number two.

All told, Georgia Democrats see 2020 as a culmination of years of planning, arguing that their previous electoral shortcomings were not failures but building blocks. Their confidence comes as Democrats across the country believe they are well positioned to make Mr. Trump a one-term president, and public polling shows Mr. Biden with a lead that has only improved in recent weeks.

Mr. Trump’s reaction to both the coronavirus pandemic and the national protests over police brutality has drawn criticism from even some members of his own party. And in Georgia, where growing metropolitan areas have led to an influx of new residents and suburban voters have flocked to Democrats in increasing numbers, the president’s actions could hold particular weight.

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Afraid of COVID-19 During Sex? Wear a Mask, Experts Say

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MONDAY, June 8, 2020 (HealthDay News) — Social distancing isn’t possible during sex, so wearing a mask might be the best way to prevent COVID-19 infection, CNN reported Friday.

That’s the advice of three Harvard doctors who urge people who haven’t been in lockdown together to wear a mask and avoid kissing.

They give more advice in a paper published in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

Whether the virus can be spread by sex isn’t known, but what is known is that coughing, sneezing and spitting expel droplets rife with corinavirus.

“The sexual health implications of these recommendations have received little attention, even though it appears that all forms of in-person sexual contact carry risk for transmission of the virus,” researcher Dr. Jack Turban, a resident at Harvard Medical School, told CNN.

The closeness of sex puts infected people who may not have symptoms next to someone who may not be infected — leaving the door open for spreading the virus.

To make less risky the researchers recommend:

  • Abstinence — not a viable option for some, of course.
  • Reduce the number of sexual partners.
  • Avoid sex with people who have COVID-19, or with fever, cough, fatigue and loss of taste or smell.
  • Shower before and after.
  • Avoid sex acts that involve the oral transmission of bodily fluids.
  • Clean the area after with soap or alcohol wipe.

The paper also includes recommendations for masturbation and online sex.

Even sex between partners who have been in isolation together has some risks, because one person might be infected and not know it, the research team noted. They do not say that a mask is needed in this situation, however, CNN noted.


Copyright © 2019 HealthDay. All rights reserved.





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Nursing Homes a Hotspot for COVID-19 Deaths

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FRIDAY, June 5, 2020 (HealthDay News) — It’s a grim fact: In many U.S. states, the bulk of coronavirus deaths have occurred in long-term care facilities, a new study finds.

By the end of May, the proportion of COVID-19 deaths in Massachusetts from nursing homes and group homes jumped from 54% to 63%, researchers report.

In other states, the proportion of deaths occurring in long-term care facilities is even higher. In Minnesota and Rhode Island, the figure rose to 81%. Meanwhile, proportions jumped to 71% in Connecticut and to 70% in New Hampshire. Among another 22 states studied, 50% of the COVID-19 deaths occurred in long-term care facilities.

But some states haven’t reported COVID-19 deaths in long-term care facilities, which means those deaths are underreported, the researchers noted.

“Once we get accurate counts of the COVID-19 deaths in all states, we will likely see a big increase in the total number of deaths in the United States,” researcher Dr. Thomas Perls said in a Boston University news release. He is a professor of medicine at BU’s School of Medicine.

Other countries are also reporting that most COVID-19 deaths are happening in long-term care facilities.

In Canada, for example, 82% of COVID-19 deaths were in long-term care facilities, and the World Health Organization said half of all COVID-19 deaths in Europe and the Baltics were in long-term care facilities.

But Hong Kong, New Zealand and South Korea are reporting very few COVID-19 deaths in long-term care facilities.

Long-term care facilities are a breeding ground for the virus, said researcher Dr. Lisa Caruso, an assistant professor of medicine at BU’s School of Medicine.

“The asymptomatic spread of this virus allows it to easily sneak into these facilities where essential staff go from nursing home to nursing home, like X-ray technicians, phlebotomists, nurses and nursing assistants who have to work more than one job to make ends meet,” she explained in the release.

“Checking temperatures of visitors and staff is obviously not enough,” Caruso added. “Everyone visiting or working in a long-term care facility needs to either be found to have immunity to the virus or to be regularly tested.”

The report was published June 5 in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

— Steven Reinberg

MedicalNews
Copyright © 2020 HealthDay. All rights reserved.





QUESTION


What is the Wuhan coronavirus?
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References


SOURCE: Boston University School of Medicine, news release, June 5, 2020

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COVID-19: Bleach on Food, Gargling Cleaners – MedicineNet Health News

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By Dennis Thompson
HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, June 8, 2020 — Nearly two out of five Americans are using bleach and other household cleaners in potentially dangerous ways in an effort to protect themselves against COVID-19 infection, a new survey reveals.

About 20% Americans say they have applied bleach to their fruits and vegetables as a means of disinfection, a practice not recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Other unsafe practices some Americans have adopted to ward off infection, according to a survey published online June 5 in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, include:

  • Using household cleaning products on hands or skin (18%).
  • Misting the body with a cleaning or disinfecting spray (10%).
  • Inhaling vapors from cleaners or disinfectants (6%).
  • Drinking or gargling diluted bleach solution, soapy water or other cleaners or disinfectants (4%).

Overall, 39% of Americans reported engaging in at least one of these practices, which “pose a risk of severe tissue damage and corrosive injury and should be strictly avoided,” the report warned.

People engaging in at least one high-risk practice were more than twice as likely to suffer chemical-related health problems compared to those who were safer, 39% versus 16%.

The study blamed these risky behaviors on “important knowledge gaps in the safe use of cleaners and disinfectants among U.S. adults.”

These gaps extend to the highest office in the land. President Donald Trump mused during an April news briefing whether bleach or isopropyl alcohol could be used internally to prevent COVID-19 (it can’t).

The CDC survey also revealed a lack of understanding about how to carefully use household cleaners.

Just 23% said that only room temperature water should be used to dilute bleach. Only 35% knew bleach shouldn’t be mixed with vinegar, and just 58% knew that it’s dangerous to mix bleach with ammonia.

About one-quarter of people said they’d wound up sickened as a result of using cleaners or disinfectants.

Health problems included nose or sinus irritation (11%), skin irritation (8%), eye irritation (8%), dizziness or headache (8%), stomach upset or nausea (6%) or breathing problems (6%), according to the report by Radhika Gharpure of the CDC’s COVID-19 Response Team, and colleagues.

The authors of the report concluded that future messages about COVID-19 prevention “should include specific recommendations for the safe use of cleaners and disinfectants, including the importance of reading and following label instructions, using water at room temperature for dilution (unless otherwise stated on the label), avoiding mixing of chemical products, wearing skin protection and considering eye protection for potential splash hazards, ensuring adequate ventilation, and storing and using chemicals and hand sanitizers out of the reach of children and pets.”

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QUESTION


What is the Wuhan coronavirus?
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References


SOURCE: Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, June 5, 2020, online.

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Ex-Smokers Who Take Up Vaping Are More Prone to Relapse: Study

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By Dennis Thompson
HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, June 5, 2020 (HealthDay News) — Far from helping them avoid cigarettes, longtime ex-smokers who try vaping are taking a big risk that they’ll relapse, a new study finds.

People who’ve spent a year off smokes are nearly four times more likely to start lighting up again if they experiment with vaping, compared with those who don’t, according to findings published June 5 in JAMA Network Open.

“Even sampling nicotine can prime the brain for wanting more,” said lead researcher Dr. Wilson Compton, deputy director of the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse in Bethesda, Md. “Once you’re off of nicotine completely, the safest approach is to stay off of it 100%.”

But another study using the same source of data found that flavored e-cigarettes might actually make it easier for adult smokers to kick the habit.

Adult smokers using e-cigs with candy or fruit flavors were more than twice as likely to quit compared to smokers vaping tobacco flavors, researchers report.

“It’s possible that the taste of the e-cigarette will have a stronger link to smoking if people are tasting the same tobacco-like flavor,” said lead researcher Abigail Friedman, offering one possible explanation for her findings. Friedman is an assistant professor of public health at Yale School of Medicine.

Together, the studies “suggest that vaping is probably a mixed bag” for current and former smokers, said Timothy Baker, a professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in Madison. Baker co-authored an editorial that accompanied the two studies.

For the first, Compton’s team analyzed data on nearly 2,300 former smokers collected between 2013 and 2018 by the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH), an ongoing study of tobacco use in the United States.

Successful quitters were all found to be at risk of relapse if they sampled an e-cigarette, researchers found.

The risk was greatest for long-term ex-smokers, who were 3.8 times as likely to relapse if they experimented with an e-cigarette. Smokers who quit within the last year were 63% more likely to pick up the habit if they tried vaping.

Use of other tobacco products produced similar relapse risks, researchers added.

The data appear to show that smokers’ brains are “primed” to respond to any future exposure to nicotine, Compton and Baker said.

“You can almost think of addiction as having a memory trace that can be reactivated if you give a person the drug they were addicted to,” Baker said. “If you have a human who hasn’t used an addictive drug like nicotine for a long period of time, then you give them a dose of that drug, it primes their addiction. It rekindles the memory and thrusts them back into the state where they want to use again.”

The second study also relied on the PATH data, using it to analyze whether flavored e-cigarettes contribute to smoking initiation or cessation among teens or young adults.

Researchers compared nearly 12,000 young nonsmokers to nearly 6,000 teens and young adult smokers, to see how flavored e-cigarettes affected their smoking behavior.

Vaping increased the odds of smoking by 6.7 times among teens and 3.2 times among young adults.

But the results found that non-tobacco flavors were no more strongly associated with the start of youth smoking than tobacco flavors, researchers said.

The study also found that adults who began vaping flavored e-cigarettes were nearly 2.3 times more likely to quit smoking than those who used e-cigs flavored like traditional tobacco.

One possible reason might be that tobacco-flavored e-cigarettes “cue” a person’s nicotine addiction, Friedman said.

“What we know about substance abuse generally is if people who are trying to quit go back to a context or person or situation that they associate with that drug, it’s much harder to quit. You see more relapse,” she said.

Friedman said it’s possible that flavored e-cigarettes don’t cue conventional smoking as much as tobacco cigarettes. “In that case, the habits are less intertwined, and it may be easier for smokers to quit,” she added.

Other potential explanations could be that people who are more motivated to quit will try flavored e-cigarettes, or young adults experimenting with both may simply decide that they prefer flavored vaping and toss away their smokes, Friedman added.

Her team concluded that efforts to ban flavored e-cigarettes could increase smoking, since flavors might help adults quit but don’t appear to be associated with smoking uptake among teens.




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How to Quit Smoking: 13 Tips to End Addiction
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The authors of both papers stressed that their results were based on observation, and cannot prove a cause-and-effect relationship between e-cigarettes and smoking behavior.

More research is needed to show whether e-cigarettes can serve as a reliable smoking-cessation tool, Baker said.

In the meantime, he recommends federally approved nicotine replacement therapy — some combination of patch, gum and lozenge, along with supportive counseling.

“Those we know double or triple a smoker’s chances of quitting successfully,” Baker said. “That should be the first strategy a smoker should try.”

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References


SOURCES: Wilson Compton, M.D., deputy director, U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse, Bethesda, Md.; Abigail Friedman, Ph.D., assistant professor, public health, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, Conn.; Timothy Baker, Ph.D., professor, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, Madison; JAMA Network Open, June 5, 2020



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Biomedical studies are including more female subjects (finally) | Science News

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Biomedical science has historically been a male-dominated world — not just for the scientists, but also for their research subjects. Even most lab mice were male (SN: 6/18/19). But now, a new study shows that researchers are starting to include more females — from mice to humans — in their work.

In 2019, 49 percent of
articles surveyed in biomedical science used both male and female subjects, almost
twice as many
as a decade before,
according to findings published June 9 in eLife.

A study of articles published
in 2009 across 10 biomedical disciplines showed a
dismal picture
. Only 28 percent of 841
research studies included both males and female subjects. The results were
published in 2011 in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews.

The scientific world took
note. In 2016, the U.S. National Institutes of Health instituted the Sex as a Biological Variable policy in an effort to correct the imbalance.
Scientists had to use both males and females in NIH-funded research unless they
could present a “strong justification” otherwise. 

Annaliese Beery, a
neuroscientist at Smith College in Northhampton, Mass., conducted the original study
showing the extent of sex bias in research. In 2019, she and Nicole Woitowich,
a chemist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., wanted to see if sex
bias was still as strong as it was in 2009.

Have things improved? After
scanning another 720 articles across nine of the 10 original disciplines, Beery
and Woitowich have shown that yes, they have, with nearly half of all journal articles
including both males and females. Behavioral research was the most inclusive,
with both sexes in 81 percent of studies. Overall, six out of nine fields
surveyed showed a significant increase in studies that included both sexes.  

But it’s not all good news.
Most studies that used only one sex offered no rationale for doing so. In
addition, many of the studies that used both sexes did not state whether they
had analyzed the results for sex differences.

Science News talked with Beery about her current findings, and the
changes underway in biomedical science. The interview has been edited for
length and clarity.

SN: Why is it important to study both males and females in biomedical research?

Beery: If
you only study one sex, [you don’t know if] that information you learn applies
to the other sex. But by studying both sexes, you can learn, is this shared? Is
this uncommon? Is this one of the areas in which there isn’t a sex difference,
or is there something different happening here between the sexes?

SN: Why weren’t people including females in their scientific studies a decade ago?

Beery: Researchers were
making an active choice to exclude females from their studies. One
rationale for this is that a lot of people assume that females are more variable
than males
[due to their
hormone cycles]. There
have now been several papers that have looked explicitly at that question
and shown that no, females aren’t more variable than males.

Male
bias also gets historically entrenched. If everyone in your field has studied
males, and the body of knowledge that’s been built up has always used male-only
subjects, then you might be inclined to continue studying male-only subjects…. I
think that’s been part of perpetuating the male bias for a long time.

SN: Were you surprised by the difference that took place over the last decade?

Beery: I was
pleasantly surprised by the increase in female inclusion. I expected that it
would be there, but it was substantial.

SN: On the downside, the studies frequently don’t analyze if there were differences between the sexes. Why?

Beery: I’m
pretty stumped, honestly. I really can’t think of a good statistical argument to not include sex as a factor in your analysis. If
it matters, it’s really important. And if it doesn’t matter, that seems like a
really nice thing to be able to contribute to the literature.

SN: Why is it important to keep track of sex bias in preclinical research?

Beery: I think it’s important to know what we know. And I think that’s why the 2011 paper had the reception that it did. Everybody knew that there was a male bias in the field. To be able to say “this is how bad it is” can make an important contribution to both measuring whether it’s getting better and really understanding what the limits of our knowledge are.

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COVID-19 Concerns Shouldn’t Shut Down Police Brutality Protests: Health Experts

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FRIDAY, June 5, 2020 (HealthDay News) — A letter signed by nearly 1,300 public health professionals, infectious diseases professionals and community stakeholders says fear of COVID-19‘s spread is no excuse to stop people from joining police brutality protests in cities across America.

Instead, it supports the anti-racist demonstrations and suggests ways that demonstrators can limit their risk of infection.

“We are witnessing continuing demonstrations in response to ongoing, pervasive and lethal institutional racism set off by the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, among many other black lives taken by police,” the authors of the letter wrote.

The authors called racism and white supremacy “a lethal public health issue that predates and contributes to COVID-19.”

When it comes to the ongoing demonstrations, they said “as public health advocates, we do not condemn these gatherings as risky for COVID-19 transmission. We support them as vital to the national public health and to the threatened health specifically of black people in the United States.”

The professionals offer this guidance:

  • Support the right to protest.
  • Don’t stop protests as an excuse for maintaining public health.
  • Call for protesters to not be arrested or put in jails or police vans.
  • Oppose the use of tear gas, smoke or other respiratory irritants.
  • Call for police to maintain distance from protesters and wear masks.
  • Reject messages that face masks are for concealment and support them as protective of the public’s health.
  • Prepare for more infections in the days after a protest.

The letter also offered tips on protesting safely:

  • Use of face masks.
  • Keep at least 6 feet between protesters, where possible.
  • Demonstrate with one group, rather than intermingling with many groups.
  • Stay home when sick.

People planning demonstrations should:

  • Provide masks, hand-washing stations or hand sanitizer.
  • Provide eye protection, like face shields or goggles.
  • Bring wrapped, single-serving food containers or drinks.
  • Provide chalk to encourage distancing between protesters.
  • Supply ropes that can be knotted at 6-foot intervals, to maintain spacing.
  • Donate to bail funds.

“These are strategies for harm reduction. It is our sincere hope that all participants will be able to follow these suggestions for safer public demonstrations, assisted by allies where possible and necessary, but we recognize that this may not always be the case,” the letter stated.

“Even so, we continue to support demonstrators who are tackling the paramount public health problem of pervasive racism,” they wrote.

— Steven Reinberg

MedicalNews
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What is the Wuhan coronavirus?
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References


SOURCE: Health Professionals’ Letter, news release, June 5, 2020

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