By Suprina Berenyi - March 13, 2020 in Prevue Meetings and Incentives
Paralytic business practices during a pandemic like the coronavirus require equally extreme measures of prudence and will result in a new normal. I forecast that the next two to three years in the conference industry success stories will be about hyper-vigilance
Could an ounce of prevention from illnesses like the coronavirus be worth billions of dollars and what will a new normal be?
The virus can stay on surfaces for a few hours or up to several days (depending on the type of surface), is life-threatening, and highly contagious. Venues must increase cleaning protocols and ensure that the people attending are also healthy, a new normal. That being said, a clean place is still empty in the wake of a pandemic without the transparency that builds confidence.
In a utopian world, a “just-in-time certificate of health” for those working and attending the conference would be most ideal. A daily confirmation of best practices from the Board of Health for each day of the event, along with comprehensive and transparent sanitary practices would certainly be beneficial. These two protocols are not bulletproof but will offer legitimate means of limiting risk and mitigating fear, a new normal. It would also allow corporations a means of overriding policy and allowing employees to perform their roles by taking comfort in the fact that the venue is deemed to comply with their employee safety thresholds.
Scheduling an independent review of a venue from the Health Department can seem daunting but would be of significant value, as will maintaining up to date health and sanitation methods as they are identified and evolve in this pandemic.
To read more:
By David Meyer and Amanda Woods- June 30, 2020 in the New York Post
The MTA on Tuesday began installing vending machines packed with personal protective equipment at subway stations, where straphangers can buy face masks and hand sanitizer, the agency announced.
The dozen PPE machines also offer gloves and sanitizing wipes and have been rolled out at 10 stops, mostly in Manhattan, according to the MTA.
“The national increase in Covid-19 cases shows how important it is for us to maintain vigilance on use of masks and other PPE,” interim transit president Sarah Feinberg said in a statement.
“We want to make it as easy as possible for customers who may not have masks to get them so they can ride the subway. Wearing a mask is the single most important thing our customers can do to protect themselves and those around them – and more than that, it’s absolutely required to ride the system.”
To read more:
https://nypost.com/2020/06/30/mta-installs-ppe-vending-machines-at-subway-stations/
By Melissa Wiley - June 16, 2020 in Business Insider
Airbnb homes are about to get a lot cleaner.
Last week, the company released a 38-page handbook detailing guidelines for hosts on cleaning and sanitizing rooms. Part of Airbnb's Enhanced Cleaning Protocol initiative, the guidelines were developed in consultation with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and experts including former Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy.
According to the handbook, hosts should wear personal protective equipment (PPE) from head to toe when cleaning rooms and shared spaces after a guest stay.
To read more:
https://www.businessinsider.com/airbnb-new-cleaning-sanitation-handbook-for-hosts-guidelines-2020-6
By Brittany Wang - April 10, 2020 in HuffPost
For COVID-19 patients, a hospital stay can be especially scary: You’re in a foreign environment, battling a virus that didn’t exist months ago, without friends and family there to comfort you. The only people you do see are your medical team, and even they’re suited up in head-to-toe protective gear that conceals most of their faces.
San Diego respiratory therapist Robertino Rodriguez wanted to do something about that. Last week, he geared up as usual before his shift at Scripps Mercy Hospital, but then he did something a little different.
To read more:
By Markian Hawryluk - April 6, 2020 In Kaiser Health News
While the focus of the COVID-19 pandemic has been on respiratory problems and securing enough ventilators, doctors on the front lines are grappling with a new medical mystery.
In addition to lung damage, many COVID-19 patients are also developing heart problems — and dying of cardiac arrest.
As more data comes in from China and Italy, as well as Washington state and New York, more cardiac experts are coming to believe the COVID-19 virus can infect the heart muscle. An initial study found cardiac damage in as many as 1 in 5 patients, leading to heart failure and death even among those who show no signs of respiratory distress.
That could change the way doctors and hospitals need to think about patients, particularly in the early stages of illness. It also could open up a second front in the battle against the COVID-19 pandemic, with a need for new precautions in people with preexisting heart problems, new demands for equipment and, ultimately, new treatment plans for damaged hearts among those who survive.
To read more:
https://khn.org/news/mysterious-heart-damage-not-just-lung-troubles-befalling-covid-19-patients/
By Anna Maria Barry-Jester - February 11, 2020 in Medscape
While the focus of the COVID-19 pandemic has been on respiratory Even as U.S. authorities have taken the drastic steps of quarantining residents returning from China, and temporarily banning foreign visitors who recently traveled to affected Chinese regions, they have urged the vast majority of U.S. residents to go about their regular activities...
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By Bryan Robinson - January 5, 2020 in Forbes
Your inbox slog overwhelms you. The colleague who fails to meet his part of the team’s deadline infuriates you. A coworker talks over you in a meeting and you seethe with anger. Your computer crashes, and you slam your fist. The morning commuter cuts you off in traffic, and you give him the finger. I could go on and on, but you get the idea. This is your lizard brain (also known as the reactive brain or survival brain) in action. We all get upset at work once in a while, but there comes a point when unbridled reactions can sabotage your career advancement.
You’re Destined To Lose Your Cool
Quick and protective, your lizard brain, residing in your DNA, has an important evolutionary origin. It kept your ancestors from getting eaten by wild animals or attacked by vicious tribes. When our laid-back predecessors didn’t worry about danger and ignored warning signs, unsuspected attackers killed them off. The vigilant ones survived thanks to the diligence of the lizard brains’ warning system, which Mother Nature tailor-made to take charge in threatening situations to ensure we survive at all costs.
Once threatened, your lizard brain doesn’t waste time in thoughts. In lightning speed, it brings past experiences and well-worn assumptions to present situations. It hijacks your “thinking brain”—your prefrontal cortex or executive functioning—throws it off line before you realize it and prepares you for fight or flight to keep you out of harm’s way. When your buttons are pushed, it issues a warning, and the cells of your body heed its call, drenching you in a cocktail of neuropeptides that create a rapid-fire reaction to threat. You can feel the exact moment your lizard brain dumps a tonic of heart-pounding enzymes into your bloodstream. The surging adrenaline and cortisol act like a tidal wave, hijacking your rational thoughts, leaving your emotions to rush to action. You may sizzle on the inside or rant and rave on the outside—but you survive.
The problem is that ancient lizard brains were designed for a very different time, with a specific and limited set of threats. Your twenty-first century lizard brain ramps up into survival mode not only over immediate physical danger, but more psychological concerns as well. It doesn’t know the difference between lethal and non-lethal situations. It’s just as likely to blast a colleague for challenging your ideas, the server when you’re stuck in a long slow-moving lunch line, or your hard-nosed, demanding boss for belittling you in a meeting. It will unleash its ire on you, too, for slip-ups such as misplacing your cell phone, accidentally dinging another car, or missing an appointment.
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By Ana Sandoiu - October 25, 2019 in Medical News Today
Dr. Giuseppe Faraco, an assistant professor of research in neuroscience in the Feil Family Brain and Mind Research Institute at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York, is the lead author of the new study, which appears in the journal Nature Neuroscience.
As Dr. Faraco and team explain in their paper, an excessive intake of salt has always had associations with poor cerebrovascular function, and high salt intake is an independent, well established risk factor for dementia.
But the more intriguing question is, how does excessive salt trigger dementia?
Previous research in rodents led by Dr. Faraco — together with Dr. Costantino Iadecola, director of the Feil Family Brain and Mind Research Institute and a co-author of the new study — started to elucidate this mechanism.
In the previous study, the researchers found that a diet high in sodium leads to dementia in mice by triggering the overproduction of a molecule that promotes inflammation.
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By Emma Upshall - October 18 2019 in Food Bev Media
Tyson Fresh Meats, the beef and pork subsidiary of Tyson Foods, has announced plans to prohibit the use of feed additive ractopamine in hogs in order to meet the global growing demand for US pork. The policy will be put in place at the beginning of next year.
Ractopamine is a feed ingredient that helps increase the amount of lean meat in hogs. While it is FDA-approved and considered safe for use, some countries such as China prohibit the import of pork from hogs that have been given the product.
To read more:
https://www.foodbev.com/news/tyson-bans-ractopamine-use-in-pork-to-meet-global-demand/?