The US doesn't have to wait for a vaccine to get Covid-19 under control, US Surgeon General says

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Fri, 2020-09-18 09:02 — mike kraft

The US doesn't have to wait for a vaccine to get Covid-19 under control, nation's top doctor says With the timeline of a widely available vaccine still unknown, the nation's top doctor says the US doesn't have to wait to get Covid-19 under control. Christina Maxouris, CNN CNN

(CNN) With the timeline of a widely available vaccine still unknown, the nation's top doctor says the US doesn't have to wait to get Covid-19 under control.

"We can do it right now," US Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams said Thursday. "The tools to stop this virus are already in our communities."

It's been done before -- in places like New York, Adams said.

The state was the hardest-hit by the virus in early spring, implemented one of the earliest shutdown orders in the US and reopened regions only when they met several health requirement s. In recent weeks, New York has maintained an infection rate lower than 1%. ...

It may sound like a simple solution to a complex problem, but health officials across the country have said that widespread adherence to safety measures like widespread mask usage could be nearly as powerful as another lockdown. And researchers with the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation project more than 115,000 lives could be saved by January if 95% of Americans wore masks.

These measures, if implemented, could also mean a milder flu season this year, according to a new study.

"If extensive community mitigation measures continue throughout the fall, influenza activity in the United States might remain low and the season might be blunted or delayed," according to a study published Thursday in the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. ...

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