Seniors Should Stay Fit, Body & Mind – Chula Suggests Ways to Exercise Safely at Home to Keep COVID-19 Away

Chula physical therapy specialist invites seniors to exercise to boost their immunity against COVID-19 and stay fit even during home quarantine with easy ways to exercise at home during the lockdown.

Pandemic Quarantine Acoustically Contributes to Mental, Physical Health Degradation

The prolonged impact of the COVID-19 pandemic created widespread lockdown fatigue and increased social tension in multiunit housing, but small improvements in quality-of-life routines may help people cope. During the 180th ASA Meeting, Braxton Boren from American University will discuss noise prevention techniques and the use of alterative acoustic stimulation to help those who find themselves in pandemic-related lockdowns. The session, “The Soundscape of Quarantine,” will take place Wednesday, June 9.

Children, teens with type 1 diabetes had better glucose control during COVID-19 lockdown

Blood glucose levels improved among children and teens with type 1 diabetes during the first 12 weeks of COVID-19 lockdown in the United Kingdom, according to a study presented virtually at ENDO 2021, the Endocrine Society’s annual meeting.

Rutgers Expert Available to Discuss Coronavirus Risks a Year After Lockdowns Began

New Brunswick, N.J. (March 11, 2021) – Rutgers University–New Brunswick Professor Donald W. Schaffner is available for interviews on the likelihood of becoming infected by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus via shopping, groceries, surfaces and airborne/aerosol transmission after a year of lockdowns due to the global pandemic.…

Higher Pollen Levels Correlated With Increased Coronavirus Infection Rates

New Brunswick, N.J. (March 9, 2021) – Rutgers University–New Brunswick allergy specialist Leonard Bielory is available for interviews on a study he co-authored that correlates higher airborne pollen concentrations with increased SARS-CoV-2 infection rates. High-risk individuals should wear particle filter…

Random Effects Key to Containing Epidemics

To control an epidemic, authorities will often impose varying degrees of lockdown. In the journal Chaos, scientists have discovered, using mathematics and computer simulations, why dividing a large population into multiple subpopulations that do not intermix can help contain outbreaks without imposing contact restrictions within those local communities. When infection numbers are high, random effects can be ignored. But subdividing a population can create communities so small that the random effects matter.

Addressing Teen Mental Health During the Pandemic

It has been more than seven months since the pandemic initially shut schools, raising concerns about the mental health of adolescents, says Ann Murphy, an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatric Rehabilitation and Counseling Professions at Rutgers School of Health Professions.

As director of the Northeast and Caribbean Mental Health Technology Transfer Center, Murphy has been providing trainings and consultation services for school personnel across New Jersey, along with PJ Wenger, a senior training and consultation specialist at the Center who has been providing mental health first-aid trainings in schools. Murphy and Wenger discuss how the pandemic has impacted adolescents’ mental health and how adults can help.

Clubs Closed? Study Finds Partygoers Turn to Virtual Raves and Happy Hours During Pandemic

People have traded in nightclubs and dance festivals for virtual raves and Zoom happy hours as a result of lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic—yet, many are using drugs in these socially distanced settings, according to a new study by researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine and the Center for Drug Use and HIV/HCV Research at NYU School of Global Public Health.

Self-regulation prime reason for slowed mobility during coronavirus lockdown, experts say

To get a clearer picture of people’s mobility in the U.S. during the lockdown period, Notre Dame researchers gathered and analyzed all U.S. coronavirus-related state and local orders and compared them with geolocation data collected across 40 million cellular devices that have opted-in to location sharing services.

Research team sees major shift in relationship between state-by-state traffic and COVID-19 cases, offering insights into outcomes of lockdown policies

“In many states, traffic appears to be a leading indicator, increasing first, with COVID-19 cases rising after a delay of up to 11 days,” said Northern Arizona University professor Kevin Gurney, head of the NAU research group analyzing the data. Pawlok Dass, a postdoc in the School of Informatics, Computing, and Cyber Systems, is the lead research scientist on the project.

Modeling COVID-19 Data Must Be Done With Extreme Care

As the virus causing COVID-19 began its devastating spread, an international team of scientists was alarmed by the lack of uniform approaches by various countries’ epidemiologists. Data modeling to predict the numbers of likely infections varied widely and revealed a high degree of uncertainty. In the journal Chaos, the group describes why modeling and extrapolating the evolution of COVID-19 outbreaks in near real time is an enormous scientific challenge that requires a deep understanding of the nonlinearities underlying the dynamics of epidemics.

People Who Felt Knowledgeable About COVID-19 at Time of Outbreak More Likely to Report Positive Mood

Johns Hopkins Carey Business School Assistant Professor Haiyang Yang finds in a new study that people who perceived themselves as knowledgeable about COVID-19 – regardless of the actual amount of their knowledge – experienced more happiness during the outbreak than those who didn’t perceive themselves as informed about COVID-19.