Thursday Miscellany

David Ermer–COVID-19, COVID-19 vaccine, Federal employment benefits, U.S. Healthcare–
Photo by Josh Mills on Unsplash

From the Omicron and siblings front, the Wall Street Journal reports

The recent rise in Covid-19 cases in the U.K. has U.S. health experts watching closely, as the Delta and Omicron variant trends in Europe have tended to presage those in the U.S. * * *

While hospitalizations have risen in the U.K. recently, the number of patients requiring ventilators hasn’t increased at the same pace, according to U.K. health data.

Counts of newly admitted Covid-19 patients in U.S. hospitals are at their lowest recorded level after any prior surge. The seven-day average for newly admitted confirmed cases slid to 1,836 on Wednesday, down from a record that reached 22,000 in January, a Wall Street Journal analysis of federal data shows. The number of hospitalized Covid-19 patients is also nearing a post-surge low.

The American Medical Association informs us

With pregnancy typically comes a whole set of urgent concerns about health, yet despite the widely known threat of COVID-19 pregnant women are among the least likely to be vaccinated to protect against the disease’s most severe outcomes.

The low vaccination rate of pregnant women in the U.S. is concerning because of the increased risk of pregnancy complications due to SARS-CoV-2 infection, which include hospitalization and delivering a pre-term or stillborn infant. Two recent studies highlight the importance of COVID-19 vaccination to protect moms and their babies.

Published in JAMA, the research letter “Durability of Anti-Spike Antibodies in Infants After Maternal COVID-19 Vaccination or Natural Infection” shows that vaccination resulted in significantly greater antibody persistence in infants than in natural infection from SARS-CoV-2. At 6 months old, 57% of infants born to mothers whopu were vaccinated had detectable antibodies, compared with only 8% among infants born to moms infected with SARS-CoV-2.

Additionally, a new study from the Centers for Disease, Control and Prevention (CDC) showed that “infants whose mothers received two doses of an mRNA COVID vaccine during pregnancy are less likely to be admitted to the hospital for COVID in the first six months of their life,” Andrea Garcia, MPH, director of science, medicine and public health at the AMA, said during an episode of the “AMA COVID-19 Update” about supporting vaccination during pregnancy. “Overall, the researchers found that maternal vaccination was 61% effective at preventing infant hospitalization.”

From the federal employees benefits front, Fedweek explains how to perform a cost-benefit analysis of [important] survivor annuity choices facing federal and postal employees.

Also, the Office of Personnel Management announced “federal employees may now receive up to four hours of administrative leave to vote in federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial elections. OPM also announced that federal employees may now use up to four hours of administrative leave per year to serve as non-partisan poll workers or observers.”

From the public health front, the Food and Drug Administration “took additional actions [explained here] as part of the agency’s work to ensure any electronic nicotine delivery system (ENDS) products available for sale have demonstrated that marketing of the products is appropriate for the protection of the public health.”

From the healthcare business front —

Building on earlier search updates that helped users check for in-network providers and languages spoken in office, Google is launching new functionality in the coming weeks that will give users a list of available appointments when searching for a specific provider. 

Google is partnering with CVS’ MinuteClinic as well as online scheduling companies to support the new tool. It will initially roll out nationwide in English, but Jackie DeJesse, product manager at Google, said the project is still in the early stages and will continue to be developed over time. 

  • Becker’s Hospital Review reports

From plans to scale its direct-care delivery service to recruiting new leadership to head its healthcare ecosystem, Amazon continues to strengthen its healthcare presence. Here are six most recent healthcare moves from the company as reported by Becker’s.

1. Amazon Web Services is seeking a physician lead to join its healthcare industry team to engage with key leaders from various healthcare organizations to facilitate their adoption of AWS services for medical imaging, telemedicine and analytics.

2. Aaron Martin, former chief digital officer at Renton, Wash.-based Providence, is leaving the health system March 25 to join Amazon as a vice president of health.

3. Amazon Pharmacy created MedsYourWay, a discount savings card, to help Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Nebraska, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Alabama, Florida Blue, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas members save on prescriptions.

4. Amazon Alexa partnered with Teladoc to get patients connected with physicians via Echo devices.

5. Amazon Web Services will support the effort to donate 50 Medtronic GI Genius intelligent endoscopy modules to facilities that primarily serve communities with low screening rates or where access to this technology is not currently available.

6. Amazon Care rolled out virtual health services nationwide and is preparing to launch in-person services for more than 20 new cities in 2022.