Widespread COVID testing has revealed uncomfortable truths about medical tests: A test result is rarely a definitive answer, but instead a single clue. A result may be falsely positive or negative, or it may show an abnormality that doesn’t matter. And as COVID testing has made too clear, even an accurate, meaningful result is useless unless it’s acted on appropriately.
State and local public health officials are sure that bars and restaurants are spreading COVID. But they don’t always have much concrete evidence to support their convictions.
Four workers died at a facility with one of the largest U.S. outbreaks, but the Occupational Safety and Health Administration never conducted an inspection. It’s a pattern that’s played out across the nation, a KHN investigation finds.
Across the nation, primary care practices that were already struggling are closing, victims of the pandemic’s financial fallout. And this is reducing access to health care, especially in rural and other regions already short on doctors.
A Trump administration maneuver allows executives who are leading the federal effort to keep investments in drug companies that would benefit from the pandemic response.
COVID-19 cases are surging across the U.S., and most workplaces are still open for business. As workers fear catching the disease while on the clock, why aren’t more companies footing the bill for testing employees?
Small-business owners struggling to remain afloat are increasingly defying new shutdown orders, in some cases pointing to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s French Laundry dinner as a reason not to comply.
Critically ill rural patients are often sent to city hospitals for high-level treatment, and as their numbers grow, some urban hospitals are buckling under the added strain. Meanwhile, mask-wearing and other pandemic prevention measures remain spotty in rural counties.
COVID-19’s toll weighs heavily on nurses, who can suffer stress and other psychological problems if they don’t believe they are able to help their patients sufficiently.
A shortage of nurses has turned hospital staffing into a sort of national bidding war, with hospitals willing to pay exorbitant wages to secure the nurses they need. That threatens to shift the supply of nurses toward more affluent areas.
