STREAM Study Shows Point-of-Care Viral Load Testing Can Improve HIV Outcomes

The Simplifying HIV TREAtment and Monitoring (STREAM) study, led by Global Health professor Paul Drain and recently published in The Lancet HIV, found that point-of-care HIV viral load monitoring and task shifting significantly improved viral suppression and retention in HIV care, as compared to standard laboratory-based HIV viral load testing. This study was the first randomized controlled trial to compare rapid point-of-care HIV viral load testing against standard of care lab-based HIV viral load testing, which usually takes several weeks to return results to patients.

Health Alliance International: A COVID-19 Information Hub

Health Alliance International (HAI), a center of the University of Washington Department of Global Health, has launched their spin on a COVID information hub. The hub is providing updates on the pandemic in Mozambique, Timor-Leste, and Côte d’Ivoire, while also highlighting the adaptation and resilience of health workers and resource-limited health systems. 

Amid Hydroxychloroquine Uproar, Real Studies of Drug Are Suffering (New York Times, quotes Christine Johnston)

President Trump’s enthusiastic embrace of a malaria drug that he now says he takes daily — and the resulting uproar in the news media — appears to be interfering with legitimate scientific research into whether the medicine might work to prevent coronavirus infection or treat the disease in its early stages.

DGH Grad Student Wins Population Health Fellowship, Will Help Launch Clean Drinking Water Tech (UW School of Public Health, includes Juan Osorio-Valencia)

Juan Osorio-Valencia from the Department of Global Health at the University of Washington Schools of Public Health and Medicine is one of four graduate students from the UW awarded Social Entrepreneurship Fellowships by the Population Health Initiative.

EarthLab announces Innovation Grant Recipients for 2020 (UW News, includes Coco Alarcon)

Research projects funded for 2020 by EarthLab’s Innovation Grants Program will study how vegetation might reduce pollution, help an Alaskan village achieve safety and resilience amid climate change, organize a California river’s restoration with tribal involvement, compare practices in self-managed indigenous immigrant communities and more.

COVID-19 Raises Risk for Women Who are Obese and Pregnant (UW Medicine Newsroom, quotes Kristina Adams Waldorf and Erica Lokken)

The novel coronavirus can severely affect pregnant women who are overweight or obese before becoming pregnant, new research suggests.

Published today by the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, the findings show that women who contract the virus may have a higher incidence of preterm birth.

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