Did the last week mark the end of wishful thinking in our battle against COVID-19? It did for me. I’d been clinging to hope about the safe returns of baseball, live music and gatherings with double-digit attendees, ideally ones at which copious volumes of grilled meats were served. All such hope feels delusional as infection rates soar in the United States – 41 states saw an increase in cases during the last two weeks – and elsewhere.
Kudos to the countries and people who had the will to break this thing. Here’s hoping we catch up with you before the year is out.
This week’s Haymarket Media Coronavirus Briefing is 1,072 words and will take you six minutes to read.
The return
And yet we’re still planning for returns to school and the office. On some psychological level, we probably need to keep doing so, regardless of the reality on the ground.
- Add Los Angeles and San Diego to the list of areas where students won’t return to schools at the start of the new academic year. Many districts are ignoring guidance from Washington.
- Health experts shared their recommendations for the safe reopening of schools in the fall. Better air filtration and more time outdoors headline the list.
- People Management’s Maggie Baska reports on a study that confirms what most economists suspected: that lower-paid workers have borne the brunt of coronavirus-related job disruption. People Management also asks HR pros and employment law experts about their contingency plans for local lockdowns.
- Civic Science reveals that slightly more remote workers are uncomfortable (46%) than comfortable (44%) about the prospect of returning to the office prior to the arrival of a COVID vaccine. Anyone else surprised that it’s this close?
- Senate Democrats are calling on the Trump Administration to make an eventual coronavirus vaccine free for all Americans, MM&M’s Alison Kanski reports.
- Texas isn’t doing great. Neither are Florida, California, Arizona, South Carolina and any number of others. Gotta figure that some even tougher and more politically fraught decisions on school reopenings – and business re-closings – will have to be made before too long.
The takeaway
My kids’ school just shared a tentative plan for reopening in September. It errs on the side of caution, even though the district is located in one of the four CovidExitStrategy.org “green” states. I can’t begin to imagine how schools in the new “bruised red” category are going to pull it off.
The research
Whatever issues you may or may not have with your government’s handling of the pandemic, you can’t shunt any of the blame over to the scientific, medical or research communities. They’ve been searching for answers with a tenacity usually associated with Olympic-grade athletes and door-to-door salespeople. They’re heroes. They’re badasses.
- Moderna’s coronavirus vaccine candidate, which was found to induce immune responses in volunteers who received it during a Phase 1 study, will begin Phase 3 trials later this month.
- Infectious Disease Advisor’s Sweta Gupta reports that more research is needed to determine whether there’s a seasonal effect to COVID-19.
- McKnight’s Long-Term Care News shares tips from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association on more effectively communicating while wearing masks.
- In Rheumatology Advisor, Meghna Rao details the American College of Rheumatology’s position statements for telemedicine use.
- Social distancing works, says science. So do masks. Nutty idea here, but hear me out – maybe wear a mask while socially distancing? Thanks.
The takeaway
Imagine where we’d be right now without the research community. On second thought, don’t.
The reckoning
These questions have been asked any number of times since the scope of the pandemic became evident, but there’s still nothing approaching a satisfying answer. How do we heal? How do we fix everything that’s broken?
- On The MM&M Podcast, WebMD chief medical officer Dr. John Whyte discusses the emotional toll of covering COVID-19 and the challenges intensified due to our collective lack of health literacy.
- A recently unveiled federal COVID relief package provided aid for nursing homes, hospitals and dentistry practices but largely excluded assisted living and other senior-living communities, Lois A. Bowers reports in McKnight’s Senior Living.
- In McKnight’s Long-Term Care News, two administrators from Brooke Grove Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Sandy Spring, MD, laud the “heroes in the hot zone.”
- Horticulture Week’s Matthew Appleby assesses the damage wrought on the garden industry by COVID-related lockdowns.
- Long-term care facilities should consider loosening their restrictive COVID-era visitation policies, several experts tell McKnight’s Long-Term Care News’ Danielle Brown.
The takeaway
Public health experts are burning out. Patients are dying without being heard. Not ideal.
The media and marketers
Success stories abound in the media and marketing world – not just in what organizations have produced, but in how they’ve adapted to a set of circumstances that, many thought, would gut them. These stories contain actual good news. Celebrate them.
- STAT’s story on developing a plan to defeat COVID-19 in the United States begins thusly: “There’s no point in sugar-coating this. The U.S. response to the Covid-19 pandemic is a raging dumpster fire.” So, how do you really feel? Among the suggestions: Teach people to think in terms of harm reduction (doable!) and cut out the politics (perhaps a tad less so!).
- In Campaign US, Verizon Media’s chief business officer Iván Markman notes the ways that COVID-19 has accelerated the adoption of augmented reality by a range of demographic groups.
- Ford Motor Company chief communications officer Mark Truby tells PRWeek’s Steve Barrett about his company’s coronavirus-era pivots.
- MM&M details how Meredith launched People en Español Salud, a publication circulated in physician’s offices, amid the pandemic.
- The Onion’s coronavirus coverage is both funny and righteously indignant. That’s a tricky tonal line to toe.
The takeaway
Many media organizations and brands have acted responsibly and even nobly during these last four months. Direct your ire towards the ones that haven’t.
The rest
- Apparently we’re using fax machines to share important information related to COVID-19. I am not making this up. Send me a telegram if you don’t believe me.
- Remember all those contact-tracing apps for smart phones that were going to save us?
- Around 17,000 people are scheduled to arrive in Orlando over the next nine days for an AAU junior national volleyball tournament. Insert “maybe they should… spike it!” joke here.
…and some songs.
- National Health, The Kinks
- Keep Your Distance, Richard Thompson
- Stay Away, Nirvana
- Say No Go, De La Soul
We say it every week, but we mean it: Thanks for reading. Look for the next Haymarket Media Coronavirus Briefing on Wednesday, July 22. Wishing you and yours good health and as much summer fun as possible (and legal) under the circumstances.
