Health Sciences In The Media

Students at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson share their experiences as they study medicine amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

To better protect those serving on the front lines of battlefields or dealing with an event like the COVID-19 health crisis or potential future pandemics, scientists at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix are leading an effort to develop a device that could easily, quickly and accurately detect pathogens and biological threats.

University of Arizona President Robert C. Robbins confirmed that the fall semester will begin as scheduled on Aug. 24 with a mix of in-person and remote instruction. More than half of all classes will include an in-person component.

Preliminary data shows hardly anyone has immunity against COVID-19, but the University of Arizona is hoping to expand both testing and research on the subject.

Saskia Popescu, an infectious disease epidemiologist at the University of Arizona, is one of three authors of the color-coded COVID-19 Risk Index. Popescu simultaneously released it on Twitter, where it has been liked more than 2,300 times. "We wanted people to understand, as life opens up, that there is a range of possible risks, and there are things you can do to stay safe, and things you might want to avoid," Popescu said.

University of Arizona President Robert C. Robbins discusses the university's response to the COVID-19 pandemic in PBS NewsHour's "Rethinking College" series.

As schools try to figure out how to get kids back in the classroom safely, there’s a term you’re going to hear more of as a possible solution called cohorting. It means keeping students together to try and narrow children's exposure to COVID-19. And as many Valley parents are faced with deciding whether or not to send their kids back to school, pediatrician Dr. Gary Kirkilas from the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix is asked about child safety almost daily.

Several research groups, including teams in the United States, Canada and the Netherlands, are working on nasal coronavirus vaccines. The hope is that mucosal vaccines will do all that their intramuscular competitors can and more, mounting a multipronged attack on the coronavirus from the moment it tries to breach the body's barriers, said Deepta Bhattacharya, an immunologist at the University of Arizona.

A heat wave swept through much of the United States this week, with some of the highest temperatures forecasted in Southwestern states battling some of the most troubling coronavirus outbreaks in the country. "In the context of this escalating pandemic, weather is pretty far down on the list of things that influence spread," said Katherine Ellingson, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the University of Arizona.

Amanda Wilson, an environmental health sciences doctoral candidate in the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health, is lead author on a recent study published in the Journal of Hospital Infection that assessed the ability of a variety of nontraditional mask materials to protect a person from infection after 30 seconds and after 20 minutes of exposure in a highly contaminated environment.