(2020-03-24). Death By Tweetstorm: a Win-Win for Trump. counterpunch.org For lack of respirators, patients with severe respiratory distress from COVID-19 will die as the epidemic unfolds. A drug to treat the disease is urgently needed. But the US press subjected news about hydroxychloroquine, a potential treatment, to an excess of caution in response to a Trump tweetstorm. Journalists and health care professionals alike were whipsawed by the president's irresponsible ballyhooing of the drug amid deprecatory assertions of "anecdotal" evidence by Anthony Fauci at the CDC.
(2020-03-24). 'We need joint action, not fake news': Moscow slams HRW chief for touting story on Russia's rich grabbing life-saving ventilators. rt.com 
Russia's top diplomat in the US has demanded the Human Rights Watch chief stops spreading misinformation about Russia's readiness to fight Covid-19, after he touted an article claiming it's letting the wealthy buy up ventilators. | www.facebook.com/RusEmbUSA/posts/1265573… | Anatoly Antonov, Russia's envoy in Washington, has penned a scathing rebuke to the group's executive director, Kenneth Roth, who tweeted that the Kremlin was "doing nothing to stop wealthy Russians from buying up ventilators," all that while "leaving ordinary Russians with a likely shortage of this life-saving eq…
(2020-03-23). Due to Coronavirus, Israel to Transfer Tax Funds to PA. imemc.org Israeli media said on Sunday that Israeli authorities decided to deliver a fund of 120 million New Israeli Shekels (30 Million US Dollars), to the Palestinian Authority (PA). The fund is a part of tax money, collected by Israel on behalf of the PA, on Israel-controlled commercial crossings. Israeli TV …
(2020-03-21). [Department of Error] Department of Error. thelancet.com Hoffman MK, Goudar SS, Kodkany BS, et al. Low-dose aspirin for the prevention of preterm delivery in nulliparous women with a singleton pregnancy (ASPIRIN): a randomised double-blind placebo-controlled trial. Lancet 2020; 395: 285—93—In the appendix to this Article, Umesh S Charantimath, MS Ganachari, Narayan V Honnungar, Avinash Kavi, Yogesh Kumar Shashikanth, Sunil S Vernekar, Ashalata A Mallapur, and Umesh Y Ramadurg should have been included in the ASPIRIN Study Group. This correction has been made to the online appendix as of March 19, 2020.
(2020-03-21). The Coronavirus Is Not the Plague: The Plague Is US. dissidentvoice.org Two categories of propaganda must be distinguished. The first strives to create a permanent disposition in its objects and constantly needs to be reinforced. Its goal is to make the masses 'available,' by working spells upon them and exercising a kind of fascination. The second category involves the creation of a sort of temporary impulsiveness …
(2020-03-18). Big Tech Firms are Using Automation to Censor News About the Coronavirus. mintpressnews.com Social media is awash with people angry that their posts have been removed for no legitimate reason. MintPress was no exception, with a story about Cuba's response to the coronavirus flagged and blocked.
(2020-03-18). China's Damning US Human Rights Report May Be Propaganda, but It's Not Wrong. mintpressnews.com China just released a 13,000-word report on the state of human rights in the United States. While the report clearly has an agenda, it's not inaccurate.
(2020-03-15). Corporate Media Condone Destruction of Venezuela's Voting Machines. fair.org 
The vast majority of Venezuela's voting machines were incinerated on March 7 in a fire that engulfed the main warehouse of the National Electoral Council. Corporate outlets followed the familiar script of blaming the victim, repeating the US State Department talking point that the Venezuelan electoral system is "rigged" and floating outlandish conspiracy theories.
(2020-02-28). [Articles] Feasibility of controlling COVID-19 outbreaks by isolation of cases and contacts. thelancet.com In most scenarios, highly effective contact tracing and case isolation is enough to control a new outbreak of COVID-19 within 3 months. The probability of control decreases with long delays from symptom onset to isolation, fewer cases ascertained by contact tracing, and increasing transmission before symptoms. This model can be modified to reflect updated transmission characteristics and more specific definitions of outbreak control to assess the potential success of local response efforts.
(2020-02-21). Paul Paz y Miño, Saqib Bhatti & Beverly Bell on Environmental Justice & Cross-National Solidarity. fair.org 
There will only be an increasing number of frontline struggles between extractive, climate-disrupting industry and those willing to stand up to it. Corporate media's inadequate attention, and unwillingness to truly call out the moneyed interests causing present and future harms, make them more often part of the problem than the solution.
(2020-02-13). [Correspondence] Therapeutic and triage strategies for 2019 novel coronavirus disease in fever clinics. thelancet.com In December, 2019, numerous unexplained pneumonia cases occurred in Wuhan, China. This outbreak was confirmed to be caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome corona virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), belonging to the same family of viruses responsible for severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS).1 The SARS epidemic in 2003 was controlled through numerous measures in China. One effective strategy was the establishment of fever clinics for triaging patients. Based on our first-hand experience in dealing with the present outbreak in Wuhan, we have established the following clinical s…
(2020-02-07). [Comment] Corticosteroids in acute respiratory distress syndrome: a step forward, but more evidence is needed. thelancet.com Debate continues about the potential role of corticosteroids as therapy for acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS).1—3 In The Lancet Respiratory Medicine, Jesús Villar and colleagues4 report the results from a multicentre, open-label, randomised controlled trial investigating prolonged dexamethasone treatment in patients with established moderate-to-severe ARDS, which adds important new data to this debate. In this study, patients in the dexamethasone group had reduced duration of ventilation and mortality compared with those in the control group;4 the primary outcome, ventilator-free days at 28 days, w…
(2020-02-03). Efficacy and safety of methotrexate in the management of inflammatory bowel disease: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized, controlled trials. thelancet.com Current data support the efficacy of parenteral MTX monotherapy for maintenance of clinical remission in CD. MTX is not confirmed to be effective for treatment of UC or for induction of remission in CD. No evidence supports concomitant MTX to improve efficacy of IFX (no other biologics investigated).
(2020-01-13). [Comment] A critical approach to personalised medicine in ARDS. thelancet.com Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is characterised by different pathogenetic pathways leading to similar clinical presentations. The mechanisms leading to ARDS are now better understood than ever; nevertheless, mortality remains high, probably due to biological heterogeneity, which hinders identification of an effective therapy.1 Therefore, recent studies have focused on identifying specific ARDS phenotypes in an attempt to improve diagnosis, optimise therapeutic interventions, and allow better selection of patients for future randomised controlled trials.
(2020-01-13). [Articles] Development and validation of parsimonious algorithms to classify acute respiratory distress syndrome phenotypes: a secondary analysis of randomised controlled trials. thelancet.com ARDS phenotypes can be accurately identified with parsimonious classifier models using three or four variables. Pending the development of real-time testing for key biomarkers and prospective validation, these models could facilitate identification of ARDS phenotypes to enable their application in clinical trials and practice.
(2019-12-17). [Spotlight] Organising international research in critical care medicine: current challenges and potential solutions. thelancet.com During the first years of intensive care medicine, many of its treatments were introduced because they were thought to be beneficial to patients, despite there being a lack of evidence from high-quality research to support these premises. However, in the last 20 years intensive care medicine research has picked up the pace and countless randomised controlled trials have been performed, supplying clinical care with the much needed scientific foundation, discarding obsolete treatments, and saving lives.