Dr. Howard Smith Reports

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/kdgBhghwTy4

CoVid vaccine hesitancy has dropped 50% over the past 4 months and continues to decline month by month.  This the conclusion of a study from epidemiologists at the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie-Mellon University.

Using online survey data from 732,308 Facebook users 18 to 64 years of age, the researchers find only 22.1% are now likely to decline CoVid vaccination.  Compare this with the 44% who were vaccine hesitant during December 2020.  Hesitancy varied by occupation: scientists, educators, and lawyers were the lowest with about 10%, next were healthcare providers at 14%, business and finance people at 15-16%, healthcare support staff at 16%, architects and engineers at 18%, food prep and service people at 25%, salespeople at 27%, building maintenance and military at 28%, truckers at 34%, farmers at 41%, and construction people most likely to decline vaccination at 46%.

Hopefully the trend toward CoVid vaccine acceptance will increase.  Those who refuse the vaccine are more likely to become infected or die, and thus the overall CoVid immunity of the American population will increase.  We'd all prefer it do so without extreme suffering and loss of life.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.20.21255821v1.full.pdf+html

#CoVid #vaccine #hesitancy #immunity

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/kdgBhghwTy4

CoVid vaccine hesitancy has dropped 50% over the past 4 months and continues to decline month by month.  This the conclusion of a study from epidemiologists at the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie-Mellon University.

Using online survey data from 732,308 Facebook users 18 to 64 years of age, the researchers find only 22.1% are now likely to decline CoVid vaccination.  Compare this with the 44% who were vaccine hesitant during December 2020.  Hesitancy varied by occupation: scientists, educators, and lawyers were the lowest with about 10%, next were healthcare providers at 14%, business and finance people at 15-16%, healthcare support staff at 16%, architects and engineers at 18%, food prep and service people at 25%, salespeople at 27%, building maintenance and military at 28%, truckers at 34%, farmers at 41%, and construction people most likely to decline vaccination at 46%.

Hopefully the trend toward CoVid vaccine acceptance will increase.  Those who refuse the vaccine are more likely to become infected or die, and thus the overall CoVid immunity of the American population will increase.  We'd all prefer it do so without extreme suffering and loss of life.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.20.21255821v1.full.pdf+html

#CoVid #vaccine #hesitancy #immunity

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/sKbulaz20-4

From the research followup department comes a Boston University meta-analysis refuting previous work indicating that persons with certain ABO blood groups fare better in terms of CoVid infections.  The BU epidemiologists used strict criteria to select for analysis 24 population-level studies looking at the CoVid-ABO blood group relationship.

When these studies were critically reviewed, only 2 of them were sufficiently free of methodological issues and intrinsic bias as to be considered reliable.  These gold standard studies showed no true relationship between a person’s ABO blood group and their vulnerability to CoVid.

Those of you with the O blood group thinking that you had some protection against CoVid better think again.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.20.21255816v1.full.pdf

#CoVid #abo #bloodtypes

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/sKbulaz20-4

From the research followup department comes a Boston University meta-analysis refuting previous work indicating that persons with certain ABO blood groups fare better in terms of CoVid infections.  The BU epidemiologists used strict criteria to select for analysis 24 population-level studies looking at the CoVid-ABO blood group relationship.

When these studies were critically reviewed, only 2 of them were sufficiently free of methodological issues and intrinsic bias as to be considered reliable.  These gold standard studies showed no true relationship between a person’s ABO blood group and their vulnerability to CoVid.

Those of you with the O blood group thinking that you had some protection against CoVid better think again.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.20.21255816v1.full.pdf

#CoVid #abo #bloodtypes

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/kLFxUFnwlbc

Previous studies show that mRNA CoVid vaccines induce stronger Covid 

neutralizing antibody responses than do natural CoVid infections, but a new Israeli study shows these infections protect equally well against a second infection and its consequences.

The numbers show that a natural infection is 94.8% protective against a recurrent one, 94.1% protective against hospitalization, and 96.4% protective against a severe case of CoVid.  In comparison, the Pfizer vaccine was 92.8% protective against a CoVid infection, 94.2% protective against hospitalization, 94.4% protective against a severe CoVid infection.

This data suggests that limited CoVid vaccine resources should go first to those never infected with CoVid.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.20.21255670v1.full.pdf+html

#CoVid #vaccination #infection

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/kLFxUFnwlbc

Previous studies show that mRNA CoVid vaccines induce stronger Covid 

neutralizing antibody responses than do natural CoVid infections, but a new Israeli study shows these infections protect equally well against a second infection and its consequences.

The numbers show that a natural infection is 94.8% protective against a recurrent one, 94.1% protective against hospitalization, and 96.4% protective against a severe case of CoVid.  In comparison, the Pfizer vaccine was 92.8% protective against a CoVid infection, 94.2% protective against hospitalization, 94.4% protective against a severe CoVid infection.

This data suggests that limited CoVid vaccine resources should go first to those never infected with CoVid.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.20.21255670v1.full.pdf+html

#CoVid #vaccination #infection

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/2MytwFMumnw

Today’s medical discoveries that point to future therapy.

New developments for:  

Nanoparticle Antibacterials, Radical Prostatectomy, Preventing Abdominal Aortic, Aneurysms, Glioblastoma, Nanorobots

All this on  Medicine of the Future.

Bacteria are getting smarter and more resistant to all known antibiotics, and many of them resist treatment by hiding in cells where antibiotics cannot penetrate.  Swiss bioengineers have developed bacterial-toxic cerium oxide nanoparticles that do get inside cells and their components.  They successfully tested these nanoparticles against MRSA, the highly resistant version of staph aureus. 

Physiologists and urologists at New York’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine discovered a small interfering RNA molecule that promotes nerve regeneration when packaged in gel nanoparticles and sprayed on tissues.  The researchers successfully tested this siRNA-gel compound in a mouse model with damaged erectile nerves by applying the agent immediately following nerve damage.  This therapy may not only prevent the devastating downside to radical prostatectomy but may also help recovery of spinal cord injury victims.

Abdominal aortic aneurysms that grow progressively and burst in a deadly, bloody tsunami cannot be stopped with current therapy.  Now University of Michigan surgeons identify a gene that is turned on in those suffering from these potentially fatal aneurysms.  They successfully stopped the formation and progression of abdominal aortic aneurysms in  afflicted mice by blocking this gene’s function.  Hopefully, this same genetic engineering will work in humans.

The brain glioblastoma that killed Senators Ted Kennedy and John McCain is the most aggressive from of brain cancer and fewer than 7% survive.  University of Minnesota neurosurgeons, analyzing those few lucky patients to discover their body’s survival secrets, find that their immune cells resisted recruitment and shut down by their tumors.  This process is mediated by a protein PI3K.  The investigators went further and now show that drugs targeting PI3K prolong survival in an animal brain cancer model. Hopefully such drugs or gene therapy to block PI3K production will work in humans.

These and other cutting edge solutions are coming to your doctor’s office and our hospitals…….some day soon!

https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2021/NR/D0NR08285F#!divAbstract

https://insight.jci.org/articles/view/138484

https://rupress.org/jem/article-abstract/218/6/e20201839/211922/Inhibition-of-macrophage-histone-demethylase-JMJD3?redirectedFrom=fulltext

https://www.pnas.org/content/118/16/e2009290118

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/2MytwFMumnw

Today’s medical discoveries that point to future therapy.

New developments for:  

Nanoparticle Antibacterials, Radical Prostatectomy, Preventing Abdominal Aortic, Aneurysms, Glioblastoma, Nanorobots

All this on  Medicine of the Future.

Bacteria are getting smarter and more resistant to all known antibiotics, and many of them resist treatment by hiding in cells where antibiotics cannot penetrate.  Swiss bioengineers have developed bacterial-toxic cerium oxide nanoparticles that do get inside cells and their components.  They successfully tested these nanoparticles against MRSA, the highly resistant version of staph aureus. 

Physiologists and urologists at New York’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine discovered a small interfering RNA molecule that promotes nerve regeneration when packaged in gel nanoparticles and sprayed on tissues.  The researchers successfully tested this siRNA-gel compound in a mouse model with damaged erectile nerves by applying the agent immediately following nerve damage.  This therapy may not only prevent the devastating downside to radical prostatectomy but may also help recovery of spinal cord injury victims.

Abdominal aortic aneurysms that grow progressively and burst in a deadly, bloody tsunami cannot be stopped with current therapy.  Now University of Michigan surgeons identify a gene that is turned on in those suffering from these potentially fatal aneurysms.  They successfully stopped the formation and progression of abdominal aortic aneurysms in  afflicted mice by blocking this gene’s function.  Hopefully, this same genetic engineering will work in humans.

The brain glioblastoma that killed Senators Ted Kennedy and John McCain is the most aggressive from of brain cancer and fewer than 7% survive.  University of Minnesota neurosurgeons, analyzing those few lucky patients to discover their body’s survival secrets, find that their immune cells resisted recruitment and shut down by their tumors.  This process is mediated by a protein PI3K.  The investigators went further and now show that drugs targeting PI3K prolong survival in an animal brain cancer model. Hopefully such drugs or gene therapy to block PI3K production will work in humans.

These and other cutting edge solutions are coming to your doctor’s office and our hospitals…….some day soon!

https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2021/NR/D0NR08285F#!divAbstract

https://insight.jci.org/articles/view/138484

https://rupress.org/jem/article-abstract/218/6/e20201839/211922/Inhibition-of-macrophage-histone-demethylase-JMJD3?redirectedFrom=fulltext

https://www.pnas.org/content/118/16/e2009290118

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41563-021-00978-5

#nanoparticle #antibacterial #mrsa #prostatectomy #siRNA #nerveregeneration #aneurysm #glioblastoma #nanorobot

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/Do2i-QOVXYQ

The FDA and Shearer’s Foods LLC have recalled Raley’s Salt & Vinegar Flavored Potato Chips.  This product contains undeclared milk.  Those with a milk allergy may develop a severe or life-threatening allergic reaction upon ingesting this product.  Do not consume these potato chips but return them to the place of purchase for a refund.  To obtain more information, reach Shearer’s Foods at 1-800-428-6843.

https://www.fda.gov/safety/recalls-market-withdrawals-safety-alerts/shearers-foods-llc-issues-allergy-alert-undeclared-milk-raleys-salt-vinegar-flavored-potato-chips

#potatochips #raleys #milk

Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/Do2i-QOVXYQ

The FDA and Shearer’s Foods LLC have recalled Raley’s Salt & Vinegar Flavored Potato Chips.  This product contains undeclared milk.  Those with a milk allergy may develop a severe or life-threatening allergic reaction upon ingesting this product.  Do not consume these potato chips but return them to the place of purchase for a refund.  To obtain more information, reach Shearer’s Foods at 1-800-428-6843.

https://www.fda.gov/safety/recalls-market-withdrawals-safety-alerts/shearers-foods-llc-issues-allergy-alert-undeclared-milk-raleys-salt-vinegar-flavored-potato-chips

#potatochips #raleys #milk