If you or someone you know may be considering suicide, call 988 or message the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741.
Right now, the government has paid around $20 per dose of COVID vaccine from Pfizer and Moderna, on average. When that ends (which it will soon without congressional action) and they transition to the commercial market, Pfizer has indicated that a single dose will cost $110-$130, and Moderna’s will cost $82-$100, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. But for those with insurance, vaccines are still likely to be no-cost or low-cost for individuals. People who are uninsured may face financial barriers, and local and community public health organizations will likely have to spend money to support their access.
Yes! College campuses have unique employee and guest health concerns because they’re hotspots for infectious diseases that spread in close quarters. First and foremost, norovirus loves college campuses. Some of the biggest noro outbreaks in the news have started on or near campuses, so making sure you have excellent noro sanitizing protocols should be step one. Other illnesses like meningitis and mono are much more common, too. Train managers to keep an ear to the ground, emphasize the importance of staying home when sick, and consider ramping up to daily wellness checks or symptom surveys if there are any outbreaks happening around campus or if an employee is diagnosed with an infectious illness.
Legionnaires’ Disease is a lung infection caused by the Legionella bacteria. Generally, people don’t spread Legionnaires’ to each other but get it from standing water where the bacteria has had the chance to grow and then gets aerosolized and inhaled, like shower heads, cooling towers, or decorative fountains. It’s especially common after a prolonged closure or shutdown when the water in the building was still. If one employee has Legionnaires’ and you weren’t recently shut down for a long period of time, there’s a good bet that it’s not anything related to the workplace - maybe they live in an older building with a water system that wasn’t maintained, or recently went on a cruise or to a hotel. But if multiple employees or guests are diagnosed, then you should expect a visit from the health department ASAP, and you should look at your water system to identify a source of Legionella bacteria. ZHH and Zedic clients can give us a call if this ever happens - we’ll help walk you through the process.
A new review article found that more than 65 million people worldwide may have long COVID, a number so big it’s hard to fathom. What that means for businesses is that you almost certainly have employees suffering from long COVID symptoms, which can be frustratingly amorphous. It can affect basically every major organ system. The good news is that recent studies show that it tends to get better - in many, though not all, who had symptoms a few months after infection, those were gone at the one-year mark. But for those who have persistent symptoms, it should be treated as any other disability - you’ll need to engage your HR team to come up with accommodations that work for each employee’s specific situation.
Will America's Public Health Reckoning Ever Come? - Stat News