(Commentary co-written by Isaac Barnes May, assistant professor of American studies) Joseph Smith designed an innovative and humanitarian system of church discipline that protected the rights of the accused. So what happened in the Natasha Helfer case and others?
At the UVA Medical Center, people were able to drive through and drop off unused medications and prescriptions, all with the goal of keeping these pills off the streets. “Across the country, across the state, across the county, there are multiple sites where people can go and drop off these medications,” resident physician Harrison Plunkett said.
(Editorial) What a relief to hear doctors at the University of Virginia diagnose the COVID pandemic as easing a bit. “We’re in a good place,” said Dr. Costi Sifri, director of hospital epidemiology at the UVA Medical Center. “We’re increasing the number of people who are protected and we’re going to continue to the see the results – meaning fewer cases of COVID, fewer hospitalizations due to COVID and fewer deaths from COVID.”
“Dummies, because you have to design and build them and they [require] many years and millions of dollars to develop – there just aren’t that many of them out there,” says Jason Forman, a principal scientist at UVA’s Center for Applied Biomechanics and lead author of the 2019 study that showed females were 73% more likely to be severely injured in crashes. Indeed, a new crash-test dummy can cost upward of a million dollars.
Despite the growing number of vaccinated people, the Rappahannock-Rapidan Health District is one of three in the commonwealth that is seeing a surge in COVID-19 cases, according to a report from the UVA Biocomplexity Institute. What’s more, the decline in hospitalization rates seems to have plateaued. “Virginians aged 50-69 are now experiencing more hospitalizations than they were last summer and fall,” the report said. “The rise in variants of concern is likely driving this increase in hospitalizations.
Across the state, the U.K. variant (B.1.1.7) is driving a slight rise in weekly cases, according to the latest weekly report from UVA’s Biocomplexity Institute. The institute continues to warn that the commonwealth could see another surge reaching as high as an average of 100 daily cases per 100,000 residents by July 11 if residents relax precautions – including mask-wearing and social distancing – while the variants of concern take hold.
The Lord Fairfax Health District reported close to 4,000 new COVID-19 vaccinations over the weekend but as of Friday has also been classified “in surge,” according to the latest Friday update from the University of Virginia’s COVID-19 Model.
In Virginia, there had been an across-the-board drop in hospitalizations since January, according to a recent COVID-19 report by the University of Virginia’s Biocomplexity Institute in partnership with the Virginia Department of Health. But that decline has since halted, analysts wrote in the report. That’s along with overall case rates plateauing.
Big money is headed to a University of Virginia research team to study new molecular pathways to treat Alzheimer’s disease. The Alzheimer’s Association has awarded almost $300,000 to John Lukens and his team at UVA.
Claudia Allen, a UVA professor of family medicine and director of behavior science, is tracking children’s mental health throughout the pandemic. Over the past year, she’s seen cases of depression soar, likely due to isolation. “It’s just not natural for kids and teenagers to not be able to be with their peers, not to be able to be out and be physically active,” Allen said.
An experimental COVID-19 vaccine could potentially provide universal protection against future COVID variants as well as other coronaviruses – maybe even the ones responsible for the common cold. And it’s dirt cheap – less than $1 a dose, researchers say.
Scientists at UVA and Virginia Tech working on a vaccine for a specific virus that affects pigs may have inadvertently created a prototype for a universal coronavirus vaccine – one that protects against all coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2 and, theoretically, its mutations. Such a vaccine would be a boon in fighting the ever-mutating SARS-CoV-2 virus, for which some subsequent mutations have been discovered to be more resistant to the existing approved vaccines.
Scientists at UVA and Virginia Tech working on a vaccine for a specific virus that affects pigs may have inadvertently created a prototype for a universal coronavirus vaccine – one that protects against all coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2 and, theoretically, its mutations. Such a vaccine would be a boon in fighting the ever-mutating SARS-CoV-2 virus, for which some subsequent mutations have been discovered to be more resistant to the existing approved vaccines.
Scientists at UVA and Virginia Tech working on a vaccine for a specific virus that affects pigs may have inadvertently created a prototype for a universal coronavirus vaccine – one that protects against all coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2 and, theoretically, its mutations. Such a vaccine would be a boon in fighting the ever-mutating SARS-CoV-2 virus, for which some subsequent mutations have been discovered to be more resistant to the existing approved vaccines.
Researchers at the University of Virginia have developed a new imaging technique to help determine the best target to stop epilepsy seizures.
The University of Virginia will also return to in-person instruction. The University will provide more details about health and safety plans by July 15. “After a year in which the pandemic disrupted nearly everything about the UVA experience, we are eager to get back to living, learning, and working together here in Charlottesville and we know you are too,” UVA President Jim Ryan, Provost Liz Magill and Chief Operating Officer J.J. Davis wrote in a statement.
Many public universities are still sorting through legal issues, including the University of Virginia. “We also recognize that many in our community are wondering whether we will take the step that other institutions have and require members of our community to be fully vaccinated before the start of the fall term,” the UVA provost, Liz Magill, and Chief Operating Officer J.J. Davis, wrote Thursday in a message to the campus. “We are working with medical experts and legal advisers on that important question and will make an announcement at a future date, as soon as that process is complete.”
This fall semester, students from the University of Virginia will take part in the Books Behind Bars: Life, Literature, and Leadership course program, bringing Russian literature to the Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail. The program is a combined initiative by jail superintendent Martin Kumer, Charlottesville Commonwealth attorney Joe Platania, and assistant director of community-engaged learning initiatives and UVa Russian literature professor Andrew Kaufman. Kaufman explained that he had been planning this with Kumer for over a year now.
The University of Virginia’s Edge program is a one-year undergraduate experience for working adults. It strives to help students build valuable skills while earning credits that can go toward a college degree.
University of Virginia’s business school ranked in a tie for 13th among U.S. colleges offering master of business administration programs, according to a new study by U.S. News that examined 364 schools.