MidAtlantic AIDS Education and Training Center Receives $400,000 in CARES Act Funding to support efforts to ‘prevent or minimize the impact of this pandemic on people with HIV’
COVID-19 is one of three novel coronavirus outbreaks in the past 20 years that originated in animals. How is the current outbreak similar and different from the previous ones? What course will COVID-19 take in Pennsylvania? IDM's Amy Hartman puts the current outbreak in perspective with what we know (and don’t know) about SARS-CoV-2. EPI's Donald Burke discusses the epidemiological and environmental factors that will shape the likely ph...
NBC NEWS – IDM's Charles Rinaldo said that many have tried to come up with vaccines that use two or three proteins out of the approximately 75 that make up the virus. Those would be safe, but have not protected well. Another approach has been to use a weakened form of the whole virus. In that attenuated, its replication capacity is weakened but it’s not as safe. These failures “are why this is such a monster.”
IDM’s Tatiana Garcia-Bates signed up to volunteer through the Allegheny County Health Department for the Medical Reserve Corps (MRC), where she instructed a local nursing center's staff on proper N-95 respirator fit.
Graduating master's student in IDM's community practice track Rajeev Salunke (IDM '20) has been accepted into the internal medicine residency program at the University of Connecticut. Hear directly from Rajeev about his background, his experiences at Pitt Public Health, and his aspirations for the future.
SCIENCE - IDM's Douglas Reed, who is developing and testing COVID-19 vaccines in monkey studies, says the number of animals was too small to yield statistically significant results. His team also has a manuscript in preparation that raises concerns about the way the Sinovac team grew the stock of novel coronavirus used to challenge the animals: It may have caused changes that make it less reflective of the ones that infect humans.
VICE MEDIA – Emerson Boggs (IDM PhD candidate) says, “I’m a virologist, so I probably spend more time than average looking at outbreaks. I started off as a fervent commenter, and then I wanted the ability to intervene because the science stuff got bad pretty quickly.” The subreddit is also rapidly outpacing traditional outbreak reporting. The ability to communicate back and forth easily has helped a lot of people.
SCIENCE – Dozens of research teams are racing to develop animal models that can help find effective COVID-19 vaccines and treatments. IDM’s Douglas Reed is staging experiments in air chambers that attempt to infect monkeys through this route, which both might increase pathogenicity and offer clues about transmission risks. He explains, “We’re trying to get enough virus into them to get some kind of disease.”
PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE - Peter Salk, IDM faculty and director of The Jonas Salk Legacy Foundation, worries that "the [polio] eradication program is going to take a hit from some of the coronavirus efforts, because of the focus [in funding and research] on the coronavirus.” But he's happy that teams of researchers at his and his father's academic home, the University of Pittsburgh, have announced two different COVID-19 vaccine projects.
Congratulations to Gabrielle Kyle-Lion (IDM '21) and Claire McCreavy (IDM '21), two MPH students in the infectious disease management, intervention, and community practice track who selected as 2020-21 Pittsburgh Schweitzer Fellows. Working with the Catholic Charities of Pittsburgh, their project will address the lack of preventative breast cancer screenings for immigrant women. Our four graduating fellows will be recognized at the 2020 Pittsbu...