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The nation’s top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, said the U.S. is “certainly” still in the middle of a Covid-19 pandemic and he is “very troubled” by the divisive state of American politics. “As a public health official, I don’t want to see anyone suffer and die from Covid,” he told NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. (Capoot, 11/27)

With the Biden administration urging people to get both a COVID-19 booster and a flu shot as soon as possible, the White House's Dr. Ashish Jha said Sunday that updated vaccinations will help people "move on" from the pandemic. "It's been, obviously, a long two and a half years for Americans, and we understand that people want to move on," Jha, the White House COVID-19 coordinator, told ABC "This Week" co-anchor Martha Raddatz of the virus that has killed more than 1 million people in the U.S. "The good news is people can move on if they keep their immunity up to date." (MacPherson, 11/27

Top Biden administration health experts were cautiously optimistic Sunday about their new campaign for Covid-19 boosters, even as they admitted vaccination and booster rates continued to be lower than they should be. “I think we’re going to see a lot more people getting vaccinated in the upcoming weeks. This is why we’re launching the campaign we are right now,” Ashish Jha, coordinator of the White House’s Covid-19 response, said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” Many people typically get flu shots in November, December and January, Jha said. (Olander, 11/27)

Anthony Fauci, the retiring top official in the United States response to the Covid-19 pandemic, said Sunday he has “a completely open mind” about the origins of the respiratory virus. “I have a completely open mind about that, despite people saying that I don’t,” Fauci said, when asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” about the theory that the virus may have leaked from a lab in China in 2019. (Olander, 11/27)

“They’re very suspicious of anybody trying to accuse them,” Fauci said of the Chinese government. “We need to have an open dialogue with their scientists and our scientists, keep the politics out of it.” (Schonfeld, 11/27)

Anthony Fauci on Sunday pushed back against former Vice President Mike Pence’s claims that the White House adviser aligned himself with Democratic governors during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, saying he is a “public health person” who made decisions based on science. (Dress, 11/27)

For the first time, a majority of Americans dying from the coronavirus received at least the primary series of the vaccine. Fifty-eight percent of coronavirus deaths in August were people who were vaccinated or boosted, according to an analysis conducted for The Health 202 by Cynthia Cox, vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation. (Beard, 11/23)

The paper described a "troubling trend" as the share of deaths of people who were vaccinated has been "steadily rising" over the past year. "In September 2021, vaccinated people made up just 23 percent of coronavirus fatalities. In January and February this year, it was up to 42 percent," the Washington Post's Fenit Nirappil and Dan Keating wrote. (Pandolfo, 11/23)

Patients with nasopharyngeal cancer are often treated with drugs that activate their immune system against the tumor. Scientists feared that vaccination against COVID-19 could reduce the success of cancer treatment or cause severe side effects—until now. A recent study now gives the all-clear in this regard. According to the study, the cancer drugs actually worked better after vaccination with the Chinese vaccine SinoVac than in unvaccinated patients. (11/25)

A new study out of Denmark suggests COVID-19 vaccines offer good protection against reinfection in people who had already acquired the virus, sometimes up to 9 months. The study, which looked at protection offered during the Alpha, Delta, and Omicron waves is published in PLOS Medicine. The study population included more than 700,000 people. (Soucheray, 11/23)

A US study of the vaccine effectiveness (VE) of the new bivalent mRNA COVID-19 boosters estimates that they confer 28% to 56% more protection against symptomatic infections than two to four doses of the original mRNA vaccines. (Van Beusekom, 11/23)

The California 4th District Court of Appeal ruled against the San Diego Unified School District’s COVID-19 student vaccine requirement this week. On Tuesday, the appellate court agreed with a lower court's ruling from last year that the school district does not have the authority to establish its own mandate. (Musto, 11/25)

The Texas Department of State Health Services will no longer provide updates on the number of COVID-19 vaccinations being administered statewide as it transitions to reporting coronavirus data on a weekly basis. (MacDonald, 11/23)

On Nov. 26, 2021, the World Health Organization announced that a concerning new variant of the coronavirus, known as Omicron, had been discovered in southern Africa. It soon swept to dominance across the world, causing a record-breaking surge in cases. Now, a year later, Omicron still has biologists scrambling to keep up with its surprising evolutionary turns. The variant is rapidly gaining mutations. But rather than a single lineage, it has exploded into hundreds, each with resistance to our immune defenses and its own alphanumeric name, like XBB, BQ.1.1 and CH.1. (Zimmer, 11/26)

A year after omicron began its assault on humanity, the ever-morphing coronavirus mutant drove COVID-19 case counts higher in many places just as Americans gathered for Thanksgiving. It was a prelude to a wave that experts expect to soon wash over the U.S. Phoenix-area emergency physician Dr. Nicholas Vasquez said his hospital admitted a growing number of chronically ill people and nursing home residents with severe COVID-19 this month. “It’s been quite a while since we needed to have COVID wards,” he said. “It’s making a clear comeback.” (Ungar, 11/25)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revealed Friday it is now tracking a new COVID-19 variant of concern around the U.S. known as XBB, which has grown to make up an estimated 3.1% of new infections nationwide. (Tin, 11/25)

An estimated 94% of people in the U.S. have been infected with the COVID-19 virus at least once, according to according to a new paper from researchers at Harvard’s School of Public Health. The big reason for the surprising surge? The omicron variant’s record-shattering case rates early this year and middling booster rates that fell short of what experts had hoped to see. (Blair Rowan, 11/26)

A mild runny nose, headache or sore throat could now precede a positive test result with one of the many offshoots of omicron. Other indicators commonly reported during earlier phases of the pandemic, such as loss of taste and smell, have dropped down the list. (Vaziri, 11/26)

Covid-19 put life on hold for Dub Crochet. The Bellaire, Tex., man had contracted a bad case of the coronavirus in August 2021 before being confined to a hospital for months — keeping him from enjoying milestones and holidays. He missed the birth of his new grandson. He wasn’t home to host Thanksgiving dinner last year. Nor was he out of the hospital in time to celebrate his 70th birthday. (Salcedo, 11/26)

For the burgeoning population of covid long-haulers, there is an abundance of new treatment options: Specially formulated nutraceuticals imported from India that promise to “get you life back from covid.” Pure oxygen delivered in a pressurized chamber. And, if time and money are no obstacle, a process known as “blood washing” that’s available in Cyprus, or $25,000 stem cell treatments in the Cayman Islands. (Sellers, 11/25)

A South African laboratory study using Covid-19 samples from an immunosupressed individual over six months showed that the virus evolved to become more pathogenic, indicating that a new variant could cause worse illness than the current predominant omicron strain. (Sguazzin, 11/26)

Spiking cases of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) among children are currently at a critical juncture in the U.S. but will hopefully begin declining from their peak soon, outgoing NIAID director Anthony Fauci told CBS' "Face the Nation" Sunday. (Saric, 11/27)

Schools are preparing for another winter marked by mass sickness, as the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) continues to spike among children, prompting precautions that mirror those seen during COVID-19. (Lonas and Choi, 11/26)

The flood of children sick with respiratory syncytial virus, better known as RSV, along with patients who have influenza and COVID-19 have led two Michigan hospitals to file emergency appeals to state health regulators to expand hospital bed capacity. (Jordan Shamus, 11/23)

Since October, California has had 17 flu deaths, according to the state Department of Public Health. For weeks, public health officials have been bracing for a sickly winter that includes the alarming early start of flu season, rising COVID-19 cases and a surge of cases of respiratory syncytial virus, known as RSV. (Evans, 11/26)

Around 76% of U.S. hospital inpatient beds are full, according to data from the Department of Health and Human Services. Pediatric beds are at a similar level, though six states have 90% or more of their pediatric beds full, according to an NBC News analysis of HHS data. (Bendix, 11/24)

There's nothing novel about a child coming home from school in November with a runny and stuffy nose or a cough. But for parents, the stakes feel especially high right now: Is it just a cold? The flu? Or are these tell-tale signs of RSV or COVID? (Doherty, 11/25)

An experimental vaccine provided broad protection against all 20 known influenza A and B virus subtypes in initial tests in mice and ferrets, potentially opening a pathway to a universal flu shot that might help prevent future pandemics, according to a U.S. study published on Thursday. The two-dose vaccine employs the same messenger RNA (mRNA) technology used in the COVID-19 shots developed by Pfizer with BioNTech, and by Moderna. It delivers tiny lipid particles containing mRNA instructions for cells to create replicas of so-called hemagglutinin proteins that appear on influenza virus surfaces. (Lapid, 11/25)

Measles, the preventable but highly infectious disease, could be on the verge of a comeback after a lull in the immediate months following the emergence of the coronavirus, the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday. Calling measles an “imminent threat in every region of the world,” the two public health bodies said in a report that almost 40 million children missed their vaccine doses last year. (Jeong, 11/24)

The WHO and CDC said continued drops in vaccination, weak disease surveillance and delayed response plans due to COVID-19, in addition to ongoing outbreaks in more than 20 countries, mean that “measles is an imminent threat in every region of the world.” Scientists estimate that at least 95% of a population needs to be immunized to protect against epidemics; the WHO and the CDC reported that only about 81% of children receive their first dose of measles vaccine while 71% get their second dose, marking the lowest global coverage rates of the first measles dose since 2008. (11/23)

The rate of pertussis has fallen sharply in Maine, which not long ago had one of the highest rates of the infectious disease in the country. Pertussis is also called whooping cough and it’s an infection that causes a severe, hacking cough and can be especially dangerous to babies. Maine had the second-highest rate of the disease in the U.S. in 2019 at more than 28 cases per 100,000 residents. (11/26)

Drownings, child neglect and firearms contributed to an increase in child deaths in Arizona during 2021, marking the highest rate of child deaths in the last 10 years, according to an annual report issued by the state. The review released earlier this month by the state Child Fatality Review Program said Arizona’s child mortality rate increased by 4.7% from 51 deaths per 100,000 children in 2020 to 53.4 deaths per 100,000 children in 2021, The Arizona Republic reported. (11/26)

The Georgia Supreme Court on Wednesday reinstated the state’s ban on abortions after roughly six weeks of pregnancy, abruptly ending access to later abortions that had resumed days earlier. In a one-page order, the justices put a lower court ruling overturning the ban on hold while they consider an appeal. Doctors who had resumed providing abortions after six weeks had to immediately stop. (Thanawala, 11/23)

When State Sen. Jessica Garvin, R-Duncan, invited about a dozen experts to participate in an interim study on some of the biggest issues facing Oklahoma women last month, domestic violence prevalence, economic inequality and poor access to healthcare were included. Abortion was not. (Fife, 11/23)

Encouraged by six victories — and zero defeats — in this month’s midterm elections, abortion rights advocates are considering another round of ballot measures in 2024 that would enshrine reproductive freedom in state constitutions. (Vestal, 11/23)

From 1,800 feet in the air, the pilot of this tiny, four-seater plane points to a stretch of land marked by a smattering of farms and one arterial road. “That’s the Wisconsin border,”  he says. “Doesn’t look like much from up here.” But that sliver of land now marks a barrier between legal and illegal abortion care after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. (Fishman, 11/27)

The nation’s 17 million college students have confronted a new and chaotic reality on campus this fall: a fast-changing legal landscape and entirely new norms in the wake of the Dobbs decision on abortion. For some, the changes are joyful, a protection of human life. For others, they are terrifying, pushing them to consider scenarios that would have been unthinkable just months ago, such as having to drop out of school if they became pregnant. (Vitkovskaya and Svrluga, 11/23)

Blood bag shortages nationwide, particularly for the only universal blood type, O-negative, has been causing organizations to issue an urgent appeal to donors, multiple sources report. The Arkansas Blood Institute reported losing hundreds of units of Type O-negative blood a month because of recent blood bag shortages. (Schoonover, 11/23)

Mark Cuban is in talks with hospitals to identify generic drugs that often run in short supply, which he aims to make in a robotics-driven manufacturing plant currently in development in Dallas. Mr. Cuban appeared on the Motley Fool podcast Nov. 23 with host Chris Hill to talk about disrupting healthcare, which Cost Plus Drugs has managed to do since its establishment in May 2020. (Gamble, 11/23)

Amid a shortage of the antibiotic amoxicillin, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has issued guidance on alternatives to the oral powder formulation for suspension in its Red Book Online. (11/23)

Drugmakers have offered little insight into the reasons for the shortages, other than to blame surging demand. In the case of amoxicillin, demand has become particularly acute amid a so-called tripledemic of Covid, respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, and the flu that are converging this season. (Wile, 11/23)

Ken Frazier, the former chief executive of Merck, has been the preeminent pharmaceutical CEO of his era. He is also likely the most prominent CEO to have spoken out against the former president, Donald Trump. (Herper, 11/28)

Starting next year the highest-grossing drug of all time, AbbVie‘s Humira, will finally face competition from copycat biologics in the U.S. Yet the makers of the complex generics known as biosimilars won’t necessarily be the biggest winners. The top beneficiaries could instead be the middlemen such as Cigna and CVS Health, which will negotiate and dispense the drugs to patients. (Wainer, 11/27)

As disease raced through her body, Ruby suffered unrelenting pain for years. She’s the patient John Yost had in mind when he decided to open a charitable pharmacy in Kansas City, Kansas, for people who can’t afford their prescriptions. Researching the need, the data about drug costs and usage in the United States stunned him. (Gutierrez, 11/27)

Urgency is building in the Senate to get cannabis legislation passed before the year is over. The specter of a Republican-led House has lit a fire under proponents of cannabis banking legislation, according to three House and Senate staffers involved in discussions on both sides of the aisle. (Fertig, 11/23)

To most parents, the idea of giving marijuana to their underage children is simply unimaginable. But a few say they had no other choice. (Adams, 11/25)

A wing of an abandoned rural hospital in South Carolina’s Chester County has been transformed into a health facility for inmates that could start accepting patients before the end of the year. The $3.3 million project by the state’s Department of Corrections over the past few years has fortified the new wing with prison bars, specially secured doors and cameras throughout the building. The move gives the state Department of Corrections a medical resource while at the same time saves a community hospital from disappearing. (11/25)

Unchanged since the last patient left Los Angeles County General Hospital 14 years ago, the operating room encapsulates the rich opportunities and huge challenges for an institution that became too old and decrepit to go on as it was but is too much of a civic treasure to discard. (Smith and Campa, 11/27)

Portland, Ore.-based Doernbecher Children's Hospital, part of Oregon Health & Science University, is adding a new program to its Child Life Therapy Program: video game therapy. (Taylor, 11/23)

Cases of once-rare “superbug” Candida auris have climbed to 600 in Southern Nevada, with more than one-third identified at just two hospitals. Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center, the largest general acute-care hospital in the state, has reported 122 cases of the drug-resistant fungus, the most of any hospital or skilled nursing facility. The first pediatric cluster of C. auris cases in the U.S. was identified at the Las Vegas hospital in May. (Hynes, 11/25)

Kidada Hawkins, who took over as president of Winter Haven (Fla.) Hospital earlier this year, has resigned amid allegations that he solicited for prostitution, The Ledger reported Nov. 23. Clearwater, Fla.-based BayCare Health System named Mr. Hawkins president of its Winter Haven and Winter Haven Women's hospitals in early 2022. (Gooch, 11/23)

The state commission that oversees employment relations ruled Friday that UW Health hospital is not required by law to negotiate a collective bargaining contract or recognize its recently created nurses union. (Van Egeren, 11/26)

In the mornings, Rosa Andresen showers hurriedly before her daughter wakes up, worried the 24-year-old might suffer a seizure or tumble out of the bed while she is still shampooing her hair. Her daughter Amanda Andresen, who does not speak, was born with a condition affecting the part of the brain that bridges its left and right sides. Her walking is unsteady, and she needs to be assisted from the moment she gets up. (Alpert Reyes, 11/27)

A little under 10 years ago, Leigh Krauss was almost done with her schooling to become a physical therapist. A former guard on the women’s basketball team at Trinity College in Hartford, Conn., she had always been active and healthy. That is, until one day, walking to class, she lost vision in one eye. (Cueto, 11/28)

California Attorney General Rob Bonta sailed to victory in the Nov. 8 election, riding his progressive record on reproductive rights, gun control, and social justice reform. As he charts a course for his next four years, the 50-year-old Democrat wants to target racial discrimination in health care, including through an investigation of software programs and decision-making tools used by hospitals to treat patients. (Kreidler, 11/27)

KHN: When Malpractice Occurs At Community Health Centers, Taxpayers Pay 

Silvia Garcia’s 14-year-old son was left permanently disabled and in a wheelchair after a community health center doctor in New Mexico failed to diagnose his appendicitis despite his complaint of severe stomach pain. The teenager’s appendix ruptured before he could get to a hospital, and complications led to septic shock. Akimbee Burns had a Pap smear at a community health center in Georgia that showed abnormal cells. But she was not told of the results. About eight months later, she was diagnosed with cervical cancer that had spread to her lymph nodes. She died within two years, at age 38. (Galewitz and Sable-Smith, 11/28)

KHN: Should Older Seniors Risk Major Surgery? New Research Offers Guidance 

Nearly 1 in 7 older adults die within a year of undergoing major surgery, according to an important new study that sheds much-needed light on the risks seniors face when having invasive procedures. Especially vulnerable are older patients with probable dementia (33% die within a year) and frailty (28%), as well as those having emergency surgeries (22%). Advanced age also amplifies risk: Patients who were 90 or older were six times as likely to die than those ages 65 to 69. (Graham, 11/28)

KHN: Readers And Tweeters Decry Medical Billing Errors, Price-Gouging, And Barriers To Benefits

KHN gives readers a chance to comment on a recent batch of stories. (11/28)

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have developed a new gene editing technology that they say can “drag-and-drop” large sequences of DNA into the human genome. (Cross, 11/24)

Eating more flavonols, antioxidants found in many vegetables, fruits, tea and wine, may slow your rate of memory loss, a new study finds. The cognitive score of people in the study who ate the most flavonols declined 0.4 units per decade more slowly than those who ate the fewest flavonols. The results held even after adjusting for other factors that can affect memory, such as age, sex and smoking, according to the study recently published in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. (LaMotte, 11/28)

Despite volunteering and working out at the gym several days each week, socializing frequently with friends and family, reading all manner of books and doing daily crossword puzzles, 85-year-old Carol Siegler is restless. “I’m bored. I feel like a Corvette being used as a grocery cart,” said Siegler, who lives in the Chicago suburb of Palatine. (LaMotte, 11/27)

Dr. Thomas Perls has for decades studied so-called super agers, people who live deep into their 90s and beyond, essentially unburdened by the typical diseases of old age. He is convinced that the secret to this remarkable longevity is buried in people’s genes and passed down through generations. (Lazar, 11/27)

Retired running coach Bob Sevene, 79, struggled after his 2019 Parkinson’s disease diagnosis. The longtime runner suddenly began leaning to the right and was unable to straighten up. He started wearing a back brace and using a walker. A year ago, Sevene began twice-weekly exercise classes designed for Parkinson’s patients that include high-intensity bouts of noncontact boxing. He also started daily 25-minute speed sessions on a stationary bike and running brief sprints in the hallway outside his apartment. (Cimons, 11/26)

When analyzing the results of the scans, researchers noticed those with chronic or episodic migraines had much enlarged perivascular spaces – the fluid-filled spaces that surround blood vessels in the brain and clear the area of waste – compared to those that don't have migraines. (Mendoza, 11/24)

Susan Downard’s father died of lung cancer; one of her grandfathers was also diagnosed with the disease. Then, about 12 years ago, doctors found a node on one of Downard’s lungs. It wasn’t cancerous, but given her family history, she was concerned. “You have that in your head forever,” she said. (Johnston, 11/27)

Haze. Slow. Drunk. Lost. These are the words some people use to describe “brain fog.” The condition, a form of cognitive dysfunction, has been plaguing people with certain chronic illnesses for years. But now, a new wave of people with long covid are experiencing it, casting a spotlight on the often debilitating condition. (Beyer, 11/28)

The voluntary recall, issued last week, affects about 10,500 units, according to an alert on the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission's website. The recall applies to the Green Sprouts 6-ounce Stainless Steel Sippy Cup, Sip & Straw Cup and its 8-ounce Stainless Steel Straw Bottle. (Bowman, 11/28)

The Food and Drug Administration said this week it is advising consumers not to eat, and restaurants and other retailers not to sell, Dai One Food Co. frozen half shell oysters that have a harvest date of Feb. 6, 2022. The South Korean firm has recalled oyster products from “the same harvest area,” according to the FDA. (Pitofsky, 11/25)

After his father died of Covid last fall, Donkan Martinez was overwhelmed by grief and turned to an unlikely outlet: virtual reality. (Yang, Abad and Wilson, 11/25)

Marlee Nicolos had thought it to be almost a forgone conclusion that she would someday tear an ACL. It seemed to happen to everyone, and someday it would for her too. That didn’t soften the blow when the Santa Clara women’s soccer goalie suffered the knee injury at the end of her freshman season. Then, when she tore it again in September 2021, it just seemed cruel. (Ingemi, 11/24)

Some people turn on closed captions because they like how it helps them understand the plotlines of shows and movies, and multitask in front of the tube. Others turn them on because they can’t hear what actors are saying. That doesn’t always mean they are hard of hearing. (James, 11/26)

A canker sore—a painful white ulcer inside the mouth—might be brought on by stress. Or the wrong toothpaste. Or certain foods: tomatoes, peanuts, cinnamon. Or an iron deficiency. Or an allergy. Or a new prescription. Or an underlying autoimmune disease. (Mimbs Nyce, 11/26)

Houston is under a boil water notice after a power outage caused low water pressure across the city, according to Houston Public Works. Power went out at a water purification plant at about 10:30 a.m Sunday. Power and water pressures have since been restored, but the boil water notice is still in effect. (Archie, 11/28)

Alana Bradley darted around a UTHealth Science Center laboratory on a gloomy November afternoon, gathering supplies — gloves, gown, a pen-sized biopsy tool and a blue icebox — for the morbid task ahead. A text flashes on the 26-year-old research assistant’s cellphone, from a doctor at the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences. (Gill, 11/25)

Carrie Jackson and her family of three fondly remember their home in Denton, Texas. They had moved to the Dallas suburb from the tiny town of Malakoff, Texas, back in 2016. Jackson landed a job she liked as a lead counselor for the Aubrey Independent School District. Carrie said her 17-year-old high school junior, Cass, who is transgender, was thriving. (Connell-Bryan, Kenen and Holzman, 11/27)

Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller announced a final settlement has been reached in the lawsuit against Allergan, which is now part of AbbVie, and Teva Pharmaceuticals for its role in the ongoing opioid epidemic. A dozen states, including Iowa, argued the companies failed to take sufficient action in preventing opioid drugs from being diverted to illegal trade. (Ramm, 11/23)

Governor Charlie Baker last month quietly reappointed the state’s chief medical examiner to a new five-year term, a move that could keep the executive branch’s highest-paid employee in place through his successor’s upcoming term. (Stout, 11/23)

A 19-year-old woman’s petition to attend the imminent execution of her father in Missouri has been denied by a federal judge because she is under 21 years old, the minimum legal age to witness an execution in the state. ... In an order denying the motion, also shared by the ACLU, U.S. District Judge Brian Wimes acknowledged the age bar could cause Ramey emotional harm, but did not find that it violated her First and 14th Amendment rights, as her lawyers argued. (Sands, 11/27)

Unsure where to go for help, a homeless single mother named Mary made an important call after she had a baby in 2020. She dialed 211, a social service hotline that put her in touch with transitional housing. (McCoppin, 11/26)

With only two boxes left to unpack, Mary Jensen was hesitant to dive into the rest of her belongings. Having just moved into her third nursing home in four months, she worried that this facility could close unexpectedly, forcing her and her roommate, Sharon Grudzinski, to move — again. (Schabacker, 11/27)

It’s the time of year when millions of North Carolinians will pore through health insurance offerings trying to determine what will be the best coverage for them this coming year. Just under half of the state’s residents receive insurance from their employers, the state’s 710,000 Medicare recipients need to update their enrollment, and about a million people in the state don’t have access to health insurance at all. (Donnelly-DeRoven, 11/28)

The protests that erupted against China’s Covid Zero strategy represent one of the most significant challenges to Communist Party rule since the Tiananmen crisis more than 30 years ago. How Xi Jinping responds to it may end up being just as pivotal for the country’s future. From the capital Beijing to the far western outpost of Kashgar, Chinese residents frustrated by lockdowns and mass-testing campaigns have taken to the streets in recent days to urge change. In Shanghai -- stricken by a grueling two-month Covid clampdown earlier this year -- one crowd called for Xi to step down, defying the risk of a long prison term. Demonstrations ranged from a few people to street rallies of hundreds. (Murphy and Wilkins, 11/28)

China won’t likely make major changes to its Covid policy in the near future despite this weekend’s protests, analysts said. One of the reasons for public unrest was the local implementation of recent central government policy, they said. “Without a clear guidance from the top, local officials are inclined to play safe by sticking to the existing zero-Covid stance,” said Larry Hu, chief China economist at Macquarie. “It upset many people, who expect[ed] more loosening following the ’20 measures’” announced earlier this month. (Cheng, 11/28)

In addition to the human misery for the world's most populous country, the effects will be felt around the globe. Supply chains are likely to be disrupted, causing prices to rise in an already rocky global economy. (Allen-Ebrahimian, 11/26)

China’s state broadcaster is cutting close-up shots of maskless fans at the Qatar World Cup, after early coverage sparked anger at home where street protests have erupted over harsh Covid-19 restrictions. (11/27)

Mexico’s Public Health Department said Thursday that a worrisome outbreak of 61 meningitis cases in the northern state of Durango this month was linked to anesthetic procedures used at local hospitals. At least a dozen people have died and a dozen more are listed in serious condition because of the meningitis outbreak. (11/24)

Europe’s hottest summer on record likely resulted in more than 20,000 excess deaths in France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom, according to official data. (Millan Lombrana, 11/24)

Dr. Oleh Duda, a cancer surgeon at a hospital in Lviv, Ukraine, was in the middle of a complicated, dangerous surgery when he heard explosions nearby. Moments later, the lights went out. Duda had no choice but to keep working with only a headlamp for light. The lights came back when a generator kicked in three minutes later, but it felt like an eternity. (Karmanau, Mednick and Litvinova, 11/28)

This “tripledemic” of flu, Covid and RSV is a reminder that even as the pandemic ends, the threat of seasonal respiratory viruses remains. Thankfully, our toolkit for tackling them is similar to what works to suppress Covid alone, starting with the most basic and flexible level of protection: masking. (Abdullah Shihipar, William Goedel and Abigail Cartus, 11/27)

Amid the holiday season, understanding the dynamics of how viruses surge and plunge helps explain why so many people, especially young children, are sick right now — or will be this winter. (Florian Krammer and Aubree Gordon, 11/28)

For three days, my 1-year-old grandson Monroe was treated for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) in an empty infusion room in the emergency department of a large children’s hospital. (Coleen Hubbard, 11/24)

Have you ever been so sick you couldn’t get into bed? Yes, you read me right. I’ve had the experience of being too sick to get out of bed before. But when COVID-19 hit me, I was too sick to get into bed. (Clarence Page, 11/27)

The NYC Abortion Access Hub continues our city’s legacy of serving as a reproductive health refuge. Abortion is an essential part of basic reproductive health care, and access to abortion care is a public health issue. (Ashwin Vasan, Leslie Hayes and Laura Louison, 11/27)

Late on a Friday, I sit reviewing some of my patients’ old medical records instead of heading home to be with my family. I’ll likely be doing it next Friday, and the one after that. This wasn’t my idea. The health system I work for discovered that some patients for whom CT scans were ordered never got them over the ensuing two to three years. (Walter J. O'Donnell, 11/28)