News

A coronavirus mutation that has been found in the U.S. may be less deadly but more infectious than the original virus, an expert from Singapore said this week.  Paul Tambyah, the senior consultant at the National University of Singapore, said the D614G mutation has been associated with lower death rates, which implies it is less deadly, Reuters reported Monday.

U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Tuesday that Democrats in Congress are willing to cut their coronavirus relief bill in half to get an agreement on new legislation, which a senior aide said did not signal a change to her position.

COVID-19 is currently the third-leading cause of death in the U.S., eight months after the first case of coronavirus was confirmed in the country.   The coronavirus is behind only heart disease and cancer among causes of death in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Potential accuracy issues with a widely used coronavirus test could lead to false results for patients, U.S. health officials warned.  The Food and Drug Administration issued the alert Monday to doctors and laboratory technicians using Thermo Fisher’s TaqPath genetic test. Regulators said issues related to laboratory equipment and software used to run the test could lead to inaccuracies.

Texas surpassed 10,000 confirmed Coronavirus deaths Monday as the lingering toll of a massive summer outbreak continues, and health experts expressed concerns that recent encouraging trends could be fragile as schools begin reopening for 5 million students across the state.  Roughly four in every five of those deaths were reported after June 1.

A review of 18 US and international public health and governmental websites with COVID-19 information for the public—including those of the World Health Organization and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)—has found that all exceeded the recommended reading level and used sentence structures and technical terminology that would hinder understanding.