Urgent! GEMA Request for Mass Immunization Volunteers

Thank you if you previously supplied your contact information to volunteer to assist with Covid-19 immunizations in the state.

Today, we have a specific request from Georgia Emergency Management Agency (GEMA) for volunteers to assist with mass immunizations in four locations (Atlanta, Macon, Albany, and Habersham/Cornelia) in the state. Volunteers need only be qualified to draw syringes, not administer the vaccine.

There is a short time frame on this request as they need volunteers who can be available by Weds, February 24th

If you are interested in volunteering, please click here and fill out the form — GPhA will forward your information to GEMA. They need 2 to 3 volunteers at each location.

Encore! Encore!

As season 1 winds down, the writers have been teasing the villain for season 2. Could it be murder hornets? (We haven’t heard from them in a while.) Covid-20? Martian germs?

The latest tease comes from Russia, which is reporting the first known case of the avian flu in humans. At the moment it was just bird to human transmission; there’s no evidence of it jumping from human to human. Yet.

Still, better set up a Google alert for “H5N8”.

Pills … in spaaaaace

You’ve probably been wondering “Do pills still work after being in space?” What with radiation, wild temperature swings, microgravity, and the potential of being fried by one of Marjorie Taylor Greene’s space lasers — who knows what would happen?

Lucky for us, the Aussies have stepped up. They’ve sent to the International Space Station a package of 60 pills that will be duct-taped to the outside of the station* for six months “to discover how exposure to microgravity and space radiation affects the stability of pharmaceutical tablet formulations.”

Materials used in the tablets being tested, which are packaged in blister packs as they would be if available commercially, include ibuprofen as a pharmaceutical active ingredient and vitamin C, and excipients which are found in abundance in the lunar surface such as silica, magnesium silicate (talcum) and calcium phosphate.

*Or however they actually do the attaching

State eases clinic punishment

The other day we told you about how the state seized Elberton Medical Center’s Covid-19 vaccines because the clinic had been vaccinating teachers with its leftover supplies. (It was following CDC guidelines, but at the time the state had removed teachers from the vaccination list.)

But now the state has taken a step back. It’s reduced Elberton’s penalty — the medical center will be able to offer vaccinations again in mid-March, instead of late July.

Building a better T-cell

Anyone who’s read comic books knows that, when in doubt, a super soldier is always helpful. Canadian cancer researchers want to modify the DNA of T-cells and “[turn them] into ‘super soldiers’ by boosting their ability to kill cancer cells.”

They discovered that in some cases where a tumor was being treated with epigenetic therapy, the T-cells — also affected by the therapy — were helping it work better. So why not treat those T-cells directly?

“We imagine a future clinical trial where we collect T-cells from the patient for treatment with epigenetic therapy in the lab. This could expand the army of cancer killing cells effectively creating an ‘army of super soldiers.’ These cells can then be re-infused into the patient, to potentially enhance their built-in immune response to the tumour.”

Small pharmacies: Thank you for your service

Now here’s the bill.

Georgia hospitals rated, some penalized

Every year, Medicare announces which hospitals are being penalized with payment cuts for high rates of readmissions or high numbers of infections and patient injuries.

For 2021-22, a big shout out to Emory Hillandale Hospital, Emory University Hospital Midtown, Grady General Hospital, Habersham County Medical Center, and University McDuffie County Regional Medical Center. — for the first time in five years, each of those hospitals has avoided a Medicare penalty for readmissions or infections/patient injuries.

A bunch of others in Georgia have never had a penalty, and several have been penalized just about every year. You can look up which is which at the KHN site.

Think statins, not aspirin

Seniors looking to avoid heart issues may be relying on aspirin too much, when statins are a better choice — at least, according to University of Connecticut researchers.

Looking at the medical records of more than 11,000 people, they found that not enough of them (looking to reduce their risk of heart attack or stroke) were taking statins: “Only about 70% of adults over age 60 who were eligible for statins were taking them, and less than 70% of adults over 75.”

While adults aged ≥75 do not benefit from the use of aspirin to prevent the first CVD, many continue to take aspirin on a regular basis. In spite of the clear benefit of statin use to prevent a subsequent CVD event, many older adults in this risk category are not taking a statin.

The air in here

Writing in the Atlantic, Sarah Zhang points out “that things would have gone better in the pandemic if we still believed in miasma theory.”

Who would have thought that the key to fighting this novel coronavirus would be as simple as fresh air? Only everyone 100 years ago.