Mortality of very low birth weight infants varies widely between regions and countries; however, the variation in morbidities after adjusting for confounders has not been adequately studied.

Composite outcome of mortality or short-term morbidity for very low birth weight infants was lower in Japan than in Canada. However, marked variations in mortality and individual morbidity exist, revealing areas for improvement in each country. (Read the full article)

Previous studies report Hispanic adults have lower access to rehabilitation services, especially among those who only speak Spanish, and higher disability after traumatic brain injury (TBI) compared with non-Hispanic white subjects. No studies have examined disparities in disability after TBI for Hispanic children.

Hispanic children experience disparities in long-term disability after TBI. Compared with non-Hispanic white children, Hispanic children report significantly larger reductions in health-related quality of life, participation in activities, and ability to communicate and care for themselves 3 years after injury. (Read the full article)

Tympanometry provides a measure of middle ear function. There has been no description of the relationship between measurements of middle ear function in the absence of gross anatomic defects and clinical outcome among children with acute nontraumatic coma.

This study reveals an unexpected association between abnormal middle ear function and death in childhood acute coma. These findings call for more investigations on the relationship between middle and inner ear anatomy and function and intracranial dynamics and clinical outcomes. (Read the full article)

A large and growing literature has demonstrated significant associations between the use of spanking and later child aggression, but we know less about paternal spanking, effects of spanking on cognitive development, and longer-term effects.

Accounting for a broad array of risk factors, spanking predicts both aggression and receptive vocabulary across the first decade of life. Importantly, we include paternal spanking, cognitive outcomes, and a longitudinal span longer than that of much of the literature. (Read the full article)

In-person peer counseling to pregnant and new mothers has been shown to improve breastfeeding modestly in three US RCTs. But this level of support for WIC is unlikely to be scaled up nationally in the current fiscal environment.

We randomly assigned WIC clients to a telephone peer counseling program relative to standard WIC support for breastfeeding. Nonexclusive breastfeeding among Spanish-speakers increased at 1, 3, and 6 months, but the program had much less of an effect on English-speaking clients. (Read the full article)

In most previous studies, transcutaneous bilirubin measurement has been found to provide an accurate estimate of total serum bilirubin levels. However, most of these studies were conducted in settings that optimized accuracy.

This study provides a "real-world" assessment of the accuracy of transcutaneous bilirubin measurements in multiple clinical settings and identification of sources of discrepancy between transcutaneous and total serum bilirubin measurements. (Read the full article)

Otorrhea is common in children with tympanostomy tubes: annually, 2 of 3 children develop 1 or more episodes. Antibiotic-glucocorticoid eardrops are the most effective treatment in both the short- and long-term.

Treatment with antibiotic-glucocorticoid eardrops costs less than oral antibiotics and initial observation in children with tympanostomy tubes who develop otorrhea. Non–health care costs constitute a substantial proportion of the total costs of this condition. (Read the full article)

The requests put the nation's special education administrators in conflict with disability rights advocates who fear waivers will place millions of special education students at risk.

Digital curricula repositories are helping to fill the growing need for more and better multimedia content.

Antonín Panenka tells us about the idea and technique behind his classic 1976 UEFA European Championship final winning penalty.

The McGregor BFA table showed surprising ‘all-rounder’ listings in the top 30 rankings.

To history buffs, the Covid-19 pandemic must seem eerily familiar, says Noah Smith.

Government went to war against Covid-19 with very low supplies in citizen trust and financial reserves, says Solly Moeng.

Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences is staying connected to alumni during the COVID-19 pandemic by moving its monthly Alumni Society board meetings and other alumni activities online.

A 10-year study by a blue-ribbon panel of scientists concludes that high-stakes testing and other accountability measures have largely failed to translate to real improvements in student achievement.

A 10-year study by a blue-ribbon panel of scientists concludes that high-stakes testing and other accountability measures have largely failed to translate to real improvements in student achievement.

Gepotidacin, a triazaacenaphthylene bacterial type II topoisomerase inhibitor, is in development for treatment of uncomplicated urinary tract infection (uUTI). This Phase 2a study in female participants with uUTI evaluated the pharmacokinetics (primary objective), safety, and exploratory efficacy of gepotidacin. Eligible participants (N = 22) were confined to the clinic at baseline, received oral gepotidacin 1,500 mg twice daily for 5 days (on-therapy; Days 1 to 5), and returned to the clinic for test-of-cure (Days 10 to 13) and follow-up (Day 28±3). Pharmacokinetic, safety, clinical, and microbiological assessments were performed. Maximum plasma concentrations were observed approximately 1.5 to 2 hours postdose. Steady state was attained by Day 3. Urinary exposure over the dosing interval increased from 3,742 μg.h/ml (Day 1) to 5,973 μg.h/ml (Day 4), with trough concentrations of 322 to 352 μg/ml from Day 3 onward. Gepotidacin had an acceptable safety-risk profile with no treatment-limiting adverse events and no clinically relevant safety trends. Clinical success was achieved in 19 (86%) and 18 (82%) of 22 participants at test-of-cure and follow-up, respectively. Eight participants had a qualifying baseline uropathogen (growth; ≥10⁵ CFU/ml). A therapeutic (combined clinical and microbiological [no growth; <10³ CFU/ml]) successful response was achieved in 6 (75%) and 5 (63%) of 8 participants at test-of-cure and follow-up, respectively. Plasma area under the free-drug concentration-time curve over 24 hours at steady state divided by the MIC (fAUC_0-24/MIC) and urine AUC_0-24/MIC ranged from 6.99 to 90.5 and 1,292 to 121,698, respectively. Further evaluation of gepotidacin in uUTI is warranted. (NCT03568942)

The off-label use of third generation cephalosporin (3GC) during in ovo vaccination or vaccination of newly hatched chicks, was a common practice worldwide. CMY-2-producing Escherichia coli have been disseminated among broiler production. The objectives of this study were to determine the epidemiological linkage of bla_CMY-2-positive plasmids among broilers both within and outside Japan because grandparent stock and parent stock were imported in Japan. We examined the whole genome sequences of 132 3GC-resistant E. coli isolates collected from healthy broilers during 2002-2014. The predominant 3GC-resistance gene was bla_CMY-2, which was detected in the plasmids of 87 (65.9%) isolates. The main plasmid replicon types were IncI1-I (n=21; 24.1%), IncI (n=12; 13.8%), IncB/O/K/Z (n=28; 32.2%), and IncC (n=22; 25.3%). Those plasmids were subjected to gene clustering and network analyses and plasmid multi-locus sequence typing (pMLST). The chromosomal DNA of isolates was subjected to MLST and single nucleotide variant (SNV)-based phylogenetic analysis.

MLST and SNV-based phylogenetic analysis revealed high diversity of E. coli isolates. ST429 harboring bla_CMY-2-positive IncB/O/K/Z was closely related to isolates from broiler in Germany harboring bla_CMY-2-positive IncB/O/K/Z. pST55-IncI and pST12-IncI1-I and pST3-IncC were prevalent in western Japan. pST12-IncI1-I and pST3-IncC were closely related to those detected in E. coli isolates from chicken in American continent, whereas 26 IncB/O/K/Z were related to those in Europe. These data will be useful to reveal the whole picture of transmission of CMY-2-producing bacteria in and out of Japan.

Google has made it easier to join the company's Advanced Protection Program, which is designed to stop the most sophisticated hackers from breaking into your Gmail account. Before you needed two security keys to enroll. Now you just need a smartphone.

Avast is harvesting users' browser histories on the pretext that the data has been 'de-identified,' thus protecting your privacy. But the data, which is being sold to third parties, can be linked back to people's real identities, exposing every click and search they've made.

Benetech, a Palo Alto, Calif. based software company, is embarking on is third 5-year award with the U.S. Department of Education to create books for students with print disabilities.

The Penn State Smeal College of Business Center for the Business of Sustainability recently hosted the first in a series of virtual fireside discussions titled “The Impact of Coronavirus on Sustainability and Social Impact,” to explore how recent momentum in sustainability efforts has been altered.

The Penn State Center for Structural Oncology is shifting some of its focus from fighting cancer to fighting COVID-19, with three projects.

Both in and out of the virtual classroom, Penn State Lehigh Valley departments are connecting with students during remote learning

Effective immediately and for the foreseeable future, the Entrepreneurship and Assistance Clinic is expanding its scope and service offerings to small Pennsylvania businesses, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Penn Staters across the Commonwealth are embodying the “We Are” spirit by keeping campus food pantries open and shelves stocked to continue to serve students in need during the coronavirus pandemic.

If you love Metal Gear Solid, have some money to burn, and live in Japan, Sony has something special for you.

Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides can already be saved and edited offline using the web app, but Google is expanding offline access to all file types, as long as you're using Chrome.

The requests put the nation's special education administrators in conflict with disability rights advocates who fear waivers will place millions of special education students at risk.

While many Penn State students are facing uncertainty amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Penn State offices continue diligently working so that students have the resources they need to succeed.

Arizona's ambitious expansion of its school voucher program has officially been put on hold after opponents filed enough signatures to at least temporarily block the new law.

Proposition 305 had become one of the most contentious ballot-box battles over school choice in the 2018 midterm elections. But its loss is not necessarily a defeat for school choice advocates.

A ballot measure to expand the state's eligibility for so-called education savings account is contentious and confusing.

T. Michael O'Shea
Jul 1, 1999; 104:15-21
ARTICLES

Students enrolled in a crisis management course are examining the pandemic and its lessons and developing recommendations that the government and even individuals can follow. It's the kind of real-world experience that students can expect to have at Penn State Abington.

A Penn State Abington faculty member is teaching students enrolled to integrate the content into their daily lives to help them manage the impact of the coronavirus.

As the world continues to face the ongoing impacts of the global coronavirus pandemic, Penn State President Eric Barron outlined Friday the University’s actions over the past five months to address the challenges, protect the health and safety of the University community, and prepare for the future.

Denver Newsroom, Apr 21, 2020 / 03:15 pm (CNA).- An Argentine archbishop has proposed 13 measures that would aim to allow churches to reopen churches during the coronavirus pandemic while reducing the risk of contagion.

The proposal is an effort to balance safety and the need for Catholics to receive the Eucharist, Archbishop Víctor Fernández of La Plata said this week.

In response to the pandemic, Argentina has been under lockdown since March 20. According to John Hopkins University, there are 3,031 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with 145 deaths in the country.

Fernández said that although the Church is providing material sustenance to those hardest hit by the pandemic “when we think about sustaining the interior life of the faithful and encouraging its growth, we find ourselves in the serious difficulty of seeing them deprived of the Eucharist for a long time, and we can also foresee that this situation could last for several months.”

In a letter dated April 19 and addressed to the conference’s executive committee, the bishop said the Second Vatican Council teaches that “no Christian community is built up if it is not rooted and centered on the celebration of the Holy Eucharist,” and that Saint John Paul II emphasized that the Mass “rather than an obligation, should be felt as a requisite deeply inscribed in Christian existence.”

Fernández said the letter he sent puts together the suggestions of several bishops and that it is understandable “that many of the faithful are calling on us to find some way to make the Eucharist accessible again.”

“We tell them that they can experience other forms of prayer, and they do, but as Saint John Chrysostom has said “’You can also pray in your home, however, you cannot pray the same way you do in church where the brethren are gathered together.’”

Fernández noted that Pope Francis “teaches that God ‘in the culmination of the mystery of the Incarnation, chose to reach our intimate depths through a fragment of matter.’ It’s good that our faithful have learned that and so it’s not the same thing for them,” he said, adding that Catholics are eager “the food of the love that is the source of supernatural life.”

“It won’t be easy to prove that this situation is lasting too long, nor can we simply wait till the pandemic is completely over,” the prelate noted.

“We know that exposing yourself to infection is irresponsible especially because it involves exposing others to infection and indirectly could lead to a public health crisis that we don’t want to see in our country,” he said.

Aiming to send “a clear message to our People of God to show that we’re truly concerned and that we intend to take some steps that would allow us to resolve this situation as soon as possible,” without neglecting “the health concerns of the authorities” Fernández proposed a series of obligatory measures to celebrate the Eucharist publicly:
1) Keep a distance of two meters between people to the side, front and back. This will require removing or closing off half the pews in the church.
2) No more than two people per pew.
3) Once the pews are occupied in that manner, no more people are to be allowed to enter the church.
4) In the churches where there is usually a lot of people in attendance, the number of Masses should be increased so the faithful can spread themselves out over Saturday and Sunday at different times. Given the prevalence and closeness of churches this will not involve using transportation.
5) Mass should not be celebrated publicly at the most frequently visited shrines due to the difficulty of establishing appropriate controls.
6) There should be no line for communion, instead the Eucharistic ministers should go to the people positioned at the ends of the pews and place the Eucharist in the hand.
7) Every Eucharistic minister should wash his hands with soap before and after and apply alcohol gel.
8) The sign of peace and any physical contact should be omitted.
9) Mass should last no more than 40 minutes.
10) People should leave the church progressively, not all at once, and avoid greeting each other.
11) No intentions should be taken at Mass time, only those previously received by phone, mail or messages.
12) Those people who because of their age are prevented from attending may receive Communion at home.
13) The dispensation from the Sunday obligation should be temporarily maintained so that people who prefer to exercise extreme caution don’t feel obliged to attend.

The archbishop also pointed out in his letter that “if the economic impact has to be foreseen, it’s also appropriate to place a value on those things that provide consolation and strength to people during hard times.”

 

A version of this story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA's Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

Penn State Brandywine’s Sustainovation Team has partnered with Tyler Arboretum to host an online discussion club for podcasts, offering a creative solution for the local community to stay connected during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Susan Brantley, director of the Earth and Environmental System Institute, and Lee Kump, John Leone Dean in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, will lead a panel discussion on the future of energy education at 4 p.m. Monday, May 18, via Zoom.

Penn State Health St. Joseph has moved swiftly to tackle the COVID-19 crisis, converting portions of its hospital as COVID-19 clinics, applying tried-and-true methods and learning on the fly.

Reports of suspected child abuse have declined in Pennsylvania since the onset of social distancing guidelines. But experts in the Penn State Center for the Protection of Children say this does not correlate with an actual decline in abuse cases.

House Democrats are demanding that companies return federal dollars that they say were intended for smaller businesses

Penn State Law in University Park will host "A Take on the Term" with Sarah Harrington and Erin Murphy, beginning at 4:30 p.m. Thursday, March 5, in the Sutliff Auditorium of the Lewis Katz Building.

When Penn State Law in University Park transitioned its annual Careers in the Law event to a virtual one due to COVID-19 concerns, Assistant Dean of Career Services Magen Mihok offered the sponsoring firms a choice: to receive a full refund of their registration fee, or to consider a donation to Penn State Law’s Future Fund to support students impacted by COVID-19. The result was a true embodiment of the "We Are" spirit.

The Nittany Neighbors program created at Penn State New Kensington in response to the coronavirus pandemic is testament to the fact that, as campus director of student affairs Theresa Bonk said, "we are a family, and like any family, we take care of our own."

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to impact communities throughout Pennsylvania, Penn State staff members are fighting food insecurity by donating to food banks and organizations across the state.

The Internet of Things promises synergy between devices, but convenience comes at a cost: security. Users are (rightfully) wary to trust major tech companies with their information. A Google Survey poll found 48 percent of respondents distrust Facebook's involvement in IoT.

Source: www.consumeraffairs.com - Friday, May 08, 2020
There are a couple of simple ways to stay ahead of the situation, and there's possible relief for those who can't By Gary Guthrie of ConsumerAffairs May 8, 2020 var myLink = "https://my.consumeraffairs.com/tax-relief/get-matched/"; var mySubTitle = "Get matched with an Accredited Tax Relief Partner"; window.onload = function changeLink(){var linkForm = document.getElementsByClassName("wzrd-wg__form")[0];var titleForm = document.getElementsByClassName("wzrd-wg__sbtl")[0];linkForm.setAttribute("action", myLink);if (mySubTitle != ""){titleForm.innerHTML = " " + mySubTitle + " ";}}; The hits keep on comin'! On Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that the economy lost 20.5 million jobs in April, with the unemployment rate at 14.7 percent. Thank you, COVID-19. All told, upwards of 22 million Americans have lost their jobs during the pandemic, forcing many to collect unemployment to make ends meet. For some, a bonus of $600 each week in coronavirus relief is being added on. All that is fine and dandy for now, but most of those check recipients are unaware that they're going to have to pay taxes on that money because the IRS views it as "taxable income." Note: the "economic impact payment" Americans received is NOT taxable. "Most people don't realize it. They're thinking in the moment. They don't have much savings, credit is not great and then come April 15, 2021, you have a big tax bill you're not expecting," Ken Lin, the

Source: www.thestar.com - Friday, May 08, 2020
The unemployment rate jumped 5.2 points in April to 13 per cent in the first full month of economic restrictions.