Trumpworld adjusts to the growing influence of vaccine skeptics within its ranks

 https://www.politico.com/news/2022/01/31/vaccine-skeptics-gop-politics-trump-00003759

A few weeks ago, Donald Trump decried politicians who did not share their Covid-19 vaccine booster status as “gutless”—a seeming swipe at other Republicans with presidential ambitions, mainly Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who were keeping mum on the matter.

Days later, Trump took the stage in Arizona and didn’t mention his vaccination status or encourage others to get it, as he had at past rallies. He has not talked about booster shots since.

The silence from the former president is not coincidental. Within Trump’s circles, there is a growing sense that encouraging vaccines too aggressively could carry political risks. Like much of the rest of the GOP, the current calculation has been to rail against vaccine mandates but keep quiet on the push for the vaccines themselves.

Children suffer from neurological effects of COVID, Israeli data shows

 https://www.ynetnews.com/health_science/article/rjixjlbcy

Several cases of children who suffered from seizures have also been identified, and it is still unclear how vast this phenomenon is and how many children suffer from it in Israel.

The Coronavirus National Information and Knowledge Center, an IDF taskforce charged with helping battle the pandemic, said that children who developed encephalitis during or after the disease suffer from symptoms such "as headaches, balance disorder, seizures, and confusion"
"In the United States and South Africa, seizures have been prevalent in children infected with Omicron, and they were described as unusual and unfamiliar."
A recent article in a leading pediatric neurology journal found that 44% of children hospitalized with COVID suffered from at least one neurological phenomenon, including headaches reported in some 20% children, blurred consciousness reported in 16% children, and seizures reported in 8%.

The Great Resignation is fueling a rabbinic hiring crisis that could leave synagogues without leaders

 https://forward.com/fast-forward/481766/the-great-resignation-is-fueling-rabbinic-hiring-crisis/?utm_source=Iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=campaign_3619870

In early December, Judaism’s Conservative movement sent a disquieting message to dozens of synagogues looking for a new rabbi: Many of you won’t make a hire this year.

At least 80 Conservative synagogues anticipated rabbi vacancies — approximately one of every seven affiliated with the movement, the email said. At most, 50 to 60 rabbis would be looking for new jobs.

“We are not presenting this information to alarm, but rather to help you prepare for and navigate the challenges of this search season,” said the email, which was signed by the “career search team” of the Rabbinical Assembly, the Conservative movement’s rabbis association, and United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, the group that represents its nearly 600 congregations.

‘Omicron the Pandemic Killer’ Idea Ignores Dangers of Long COVID

 https://www.infectioncontroltoday.com/view/-omicron-the-pandemic-killer-idea-ignores-dangers-of-long-covid

A preprint study by Oxford University investigators on the medRxiv website, compares brain scans for SARS-CoV-2 infections in 394 COVID-19 patients who tested positive for the infection against 388 patients in a control group. “We identified significant effects of COVID-19 in the brain with a loss of grey matter in the left parahippocampal gyrus, the left lateral orbitofrontal cortex and the left insula,” the study states. “When looking over the entire cortical surface, these results extended to the anterior cingulate cortex, supramarginal gyrus and temporal pole.”

Omicron amps up concerns about long COVID and its causes

 https://apnews.com/article/long-covid-omicron-research-45986f5b42e47e656d5b385bd51b2bb2

More than a year after a bout with COVID-19, Rebekah Hogan still suffers from severe brain fog, pain and fatigue that leave her unable to do her nursing job or handle household activities.

Long COVID has her questioning her worth as a wife and mother.

“Is this permanent? Is this the new norm?” said the 41-year-old Latham, New York, woman, whose three children and husband also have signs of the condition. “I want my life back.’’

More than a third of COVID-19 survivors by some estimates will develop such lingering problems. Now, with omicron sweeping across the globe, scientists are racing to pinpoint the cause of the bedeviling condition and find treatments before a potential explosion in long COVID cases.

COVID-19 vs. COVID-19 vaccine: Risk of neurological complications

 https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/covid-19-vs-covid-19-vaccine-risk-of-neurological-complications

A recent study found that the risk of neurological complications was higher in people with a positive COVID-19 test than in those who had received COVID vaccines.

IDF draft bill for haredim passes in Knesset in second attempt

 https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/politics-and-diplomacy/article-695111

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s coalition succeeded in passing the first reading of the IDF draft bill for haredim (ultra-Orthodox) in a 51-48 vote on Monday night, two weeks after the coalition embarrassingly failed to pass it.

The bill sets out annual targets for the number of ultra-Orthodox men to be enlisted per year beginning in 2021, with very slowly increasing rates of enlistment for the annual cohort of ultra-Orthodox men turning 18.

Should enlistment targets not be met, the bill provides for a reduction in the state budget for yeshivas, money that is distributed to recognized yeshivas for the purposes of paying students a monthly stipend

Donald Trump Says He Wanted Mike Pence to Overturn the Election for First Time

 https://www.newsweek.com/trump-mike-pence-overturn-election-1674410

Donald Trump has admitted that he wanted former Vice President Mike Pence to have "overturned the Election" while the 2020 results were being certified during his ceremonial role as presiding officer of the Senate.

In a statement released on Sunday night attacking bipartisan efforts to reform the Electoral Count Act, the former president suggested Pence had the power to stop the results being certified in favor of Joe Biden.

However, Trump's remarks are the first time he has described his intention as overturning the election results, which Pence "unfortunately" failed to do.

Top Cyprus court acquits UK woman of making false rape claim against Israelis

 https://www.timesofisrael.com/top-cyprus-court-acquits-uk-woman-of-making-false-rape-claim-against-israelis/

The Cypriot Supreme Court on Monday overturned the conviction of a young British woman for lying about being gang raped by Israeli tourists.

The unnamed woman, who was 18 at the time of her arrest, alleged that she was raped by up to 12 Israeli tourists, aged 15 to 22, in a hotel room in the seaside holiday resort of Ayia Napa in July 2019.

Defense lawyers successfully argued there had been a miscarriage of justice when a district court in January 2020 found her guilty of public mischief and handed her a suspended four-month jail term.

COVID-19: Hamsters can infect humans with the coronavirus - study

 COVID-19: Hamsters can infect humans with the coronavirus - study

The Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19, can be transmitted from humans to hamsters and then be transferred back to humans, according to a new study.

The ongoing coronavirus pandemic has spread all over the world since it began in late 2019 in Wuhan, China. Millions of people have died due to the virus, which continues to rage throughout the world.

While the exact origins of the virus are under debate, it is widely thought that it spread from animals (specifically bats) to humans in what is known as zoonotic transmission. And according to this new study, published in The Lancet in pre-print and awaiting peer-review, hamsters are one such animal that can spread the virus to humans.

Reuniting Beth with Her Sons - Campaign Launch - Live Stream

Long Covid study finds abnormality in lungs that could explain breathlessness

 https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/jan/29/long-covid-study-finds-abnormality-in-lungs-that-could-explain-breathlessness

Abnormalities have been identified in the lungs of long Covid patients that could offer a potential explanation for why some people experience breathlessness long after their initial infection.

The findings, from a pilot study involving 36 patients, raise the possibility that Covid may cause microscopic damage to the lungs that is not detected using routine tests.

Breathlessness is a symptom in the majority of long Covid patients, but it has been unclear whether this is linked to other factors such as changes in breathing patterns, tiredness, or something more fundamental.

Bari Weiss' decision to be 'done' with Covid is a slap in the face to health care workers

 https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/28/opinions/bari-weiss-bill-maher-done-with-covid-horton/index.html

In all fairness, Weiss is hardly the first person I have heard say they are done with the pandemic. I hear it almost every day from colleagues, resident doctors, nurses and medical students. Some of them are weeping when they say it. Some seem like shadows of themselves and are now under the care of psychiatrists and therapists. Many more are suffering without treatment. They have not had time to watch "Tiger King," or to listen to Spotify. They too would like to change the channel. But they have been too busy intubating, palliating, showing up day after day to do the hard things people do for one another in health care. They are anxious and depressed, without a way to "end it." It is awful. They are done. But many politicians and health care systems exploited the good, decent instincts of health care workers before the pandemic, and that phenomenon will probably never end.

‘Science is flawed’: COVID-19, ivermectin, and beyond

 https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/science-is-flawed-covid-19-ivermectin-and-beyond

In early 2020, people were desperate for any kind of treatment for COVID-19. A melange of partial evidence emerged.

This included: a laboratory study showing that the drug acted as a strong antiviral in a petri dish, a study in a French nursing home where the residents took ivermectin to treat a scabies outbreak and seemed to subsequently enjoy higher survival rates, and preprint reporting that ivermectin reduced the mortality from COVID-19 by 90%.

All three were weak evidence in different ways. Single in vitro studies are very poorly predictive of eventual clinical outcomes, and the nursing home paper was an accidental and uncontrolled observational study — what if the residents had never been exposed to SARS-CoV-2 in the first place?

The ivermectin story somehow got even worse from there. In late 2020, studies started popping up showing what can only be described as simply incredible results for the medication — a 90% mortality benefit or a 100% reduction in cases when used as a prophylactic.

After nearly a year, myself and other data sleuths demonstrated that many of these studies probably never happened, but the damage was well and truly done long before the first fake paper was retracted.