Prognosis: Breakthrough

As states grapple with the question of when it will be safe to reopen businesses and relax social distancing, there's increasing urgency to better understand who's immune to Covid-19. Does having the virus and recovering mean you can't get it again, or at least that you can’t be reinfected for some time? No one yet has good answers to these questions. Kristen V. Brown looked into what we do, and don't, know about the science of coronavirus immunity.

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The Trump administration announced a plan yesterday to ramp up coronavirus testing. But even as it announces this new push, the Federal government has pushed much of the responsibility for testing to states. Experts say the lack of Federal leadership has led to a free-for-all, where states compete to get their hands on tests, and few states are left in a good position to reopen. Emma Court and John Tozzi report on the difficult logistics required to mount a meaningful testing operation.

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Iceland has become one of the best places in the world to study Covid-19. That’s because the country is an island nation with only one real port of entry and a small population. It also introduced widespread testing as soon as the virus arrived in March. Bloomberg reporter Kristen V. Brown traveled to Reykjavik, the capital, just as the global scale of the pandemic was starting to become clear. She reports that the rest of the world is learning from Iceland about how the virus moves through a population.

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Ventilators have become prized in hospitals across the U.S. and beyond because they are desperately needed to treat very ill Covid-19 patients. But they are also feared for the damage they can inflict, and for the slim odds of survival they offer. Michelle Fay Cortez and Olivia Carville report that it's not yet clear what the long-term consequences ventilators have for those lucky enough to recover after having been on one.

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Millions in Wuhan, China, the city where the novel coronavirus first emerged, are trying to figure out what life looks like in the bustling industrial city after the worst pandemic in a century. Bloomberg’s Beijing bureau chief Sharon Chen went to Wuhan recently to explore life after lockdown. She found a world that still feels far from normal, and a population that’s keenly aware of both the threat of disease, and the watchful eye of China’s surveillance state.

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The pandemic is putting care on hold for a lot of people with other serious health conditions, like cancer.

Doctors are delaying procedures and surgeries in order to save resources like hospital beds and ventilators for Covid-19 patients, and prevent the infection from spreading. Emma Court reports on the difficult choices doctors are forced to make, and the danger that we're creating another health care crisis.

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The shortages of protective masks that keep healthcare workers safe from Covid-19 are well documented by now. To meet the need, U.S. hospitals have taken the extreme step of turning directly to Chinese manufacturers. Reporter Riley Griffin reports that the demand has helped spur a Wild West scenario, where Profiteering middlemen ratchet up prices. Buyers must sometimes go to extraordinary lengths to try to ensure quality.

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Before COVID-19 started spreading around the U.S., the country was already attempting to deal with another health crisis: opioid dependency. Although opioid-treatment programs are considered essential public facilities and are allowed to stay open during statewide stay-at-home orders, experts are worried the coronavirus could exacerbate the opioid epidemic, possibly leading to more overdoses.

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There’s a sliver of hope for people very ill with Covid-19. It’s a bold new treatment that involves taking the blood plasma of people who have recovered from the disease, and injecting it into people who are very sick. 

The secret is in the antibodies: a protein that is produced when someone’s immune system has fought the virus. But using antibodies to treat the sick is more complicated than just transferring them from one person to another. Jason Gale reports on what researchers are doing to sift through the many antibodies out there, and find the right ones to help people recover from being infected.

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As data about the health outcomes of the new coronavirus come in, it's clear that black people are dying at disproportionate rates to their percentage of the population. But a new report shows it’s not just black Americans’ health that will suffer. The virus will likely have a devastating effect on their jobs and future earnings. Donald Moore talked to researchers about the economic and physical traps the virus is setting for the demographic.

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