Sara writes:
Hi Dr Griffin,
Are the monoclonal antibody therapies appropriate for patients who have already been vaccinated?
Thanks!
Sara in Tallahassee, FL
Mike writes:
Dear Dr. Griffin and the TWiV Family,
Thank you for all that you have done and continue to do in educating the public and professionals like me on the virology of the SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic.
In your most recent clinical update #747, you mentioned in your reply to the retired health and safety professional listener’s question as to why authorities are not recommending N95 respirators to the public that you would recommend such N95 masks in certain high risk situations or high risk environments. You then relayed your own story of how you recommended to your family members to wear KN95 masks when they flew on an airplane. The listener mentioned that he thought the KN95 Chinese masks available to him locally were likely made of similar materials and of similar quality to the 3M N95 masks. When they first came out, I was initially confused by the different KN95 designation on the respirators that were advertised from overseas and have been following the U.S. Government’s evaluation of these KN95 masks since that time. Unfortunately, such U.S. Government testing has revealed that the overseas KN95 testing standards for such overseas masks have not been rigorously quality controlled, and many of such masks tested did not reliably come close to 95% filtration efficiency. Here is a link to The National Personal Protective Technology Laboratory (NPPTL)’s latest report on such masks:
https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/npptl/respirators/testing/NonNIOSHresults.html
Thus, in the interest of being fully transparent to the listener who wrote in and to the public, I would suggest that KN95 respirators may provide you with more protection against SARS-CoV-2 than a cloth mask but are overall are not as quality controlled and would suggest the listener and public consult the above web link for more information.
Please keep up your great educating work during this trying time.
Best wishes.
Sincerely,
Mike Stein, MD
Infectious Disease
Tacoma, WA
Vincent writes:
Hi Daniel,
Thanks for all your hard work and sound advice.
2 questions if you can address for me, I’d appreciate it.
1.I recently immunized a 49-year-old lady who has a history of Parkinson’s and an active left septic bursitis with the Johnson and Johnson product. Should I have held off due to her bursitis? Or was I right in doing so.
2. In light of the recent Johnson and Johnson fiasco, with this diad of thrombocytopenia and cerebral sinus thrombosis, does it stand to reason to treat with aspirin prophylactically or to just wait it out?
Respectfully,
Vincent A Cantone MD,FAAP,FACP
Chris writes:
Hi Daniel —
In the most recent clinical update you said that responsible summer camps should all be doing testing because there is funding for it now. I’m on the board of a summer camp and this is (good) news to me and our director! I have been Googling as hard as I can and I can’t figure out what the resources are that you mentioned, though, and nothing about increased testing funding appears on https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/schools-childcare/summer-camps.html. Can you please point us to more info about this?
— Chris in Cambridge
