Soniya writes:
Hi Daniel and Vincent-
Thank you, Thank you so much for being such a comforting, reliable source of information during this pandemic! I have been a loyal listener for the last 1.5 years! I am a pediatrician in Wisconsin and need to clarify about the interval because it seems like the recommendation has changed. Is it as soon as the isolation period is over or is it 3 months from start of symptoms? I see the CDC recommends 3mo but wanted to make sure you concur- Thank you and I will be contributing to Parasites without Borders!
Soniya
Merideth writes:
Dear Dr Griffin
Thank you so much for your COVID-19 Clinical Updates. Getting solid and current information about testing, vaccination and treatment week after week has reduced my anxiety around this pandemic immeasurably.
Would age, history of serious pulmonary illness and a congregate living situation qualify my 88 year old dad for pre-exposure prophylaxis with Evusheld? He’s fully vaccinated and twice-boosted, but spent months last winter getting through an RSV infection. In the past he’s also had pneumonia serious enough to need intubation/mechanical ventilation.
His assisted living facility is dealing with yet another outbreak of SARS-CoV2 infections. In the abstract, I know this is sort of a “fact of life” sort of thing at this point in the pandemic. But I’ve only got this one, now fragile, dad and if there’s a way to protect him with “store-bought” antibodies I’d rather work on getting them now rather than waiting for a confirmed exposure.
Thanks again,
Merideth
Seattle WA
(dad’s in Nevada County, CA, which isn’t a major metro hub of health care)
Joni writes:
Hi Dr. Griffin!
I’m a primary care doc in NW Georgia and have been listening to your updates faithfully since the very beginning after recommendation by my friend Trudy Rey! I recently recommended a patient of mine to look into Evusheld and discuss it with her rheumatologist because she has rheumatoid arthritis and is taking methotrexate. She messaged me this week stating that her rheumatologist told her she wasn’t a candidate for Evusheld because her dose of MTX was too low. Is this right? I didn’t know there was a dosing threshold for the immunocompromise….The patient decided to get a 4th Booster shot instead. Thanks so much for your help on this! I appreciate all you do to keep us up-to-date and taking care of our patients!
Sincerely,
Joni
Peter writes:
Daniel: I’m a non-practicing ID doc and thanks for your continuing brilliantly informative clinical updates. I have not seen any data on the 325 people still dying of COVID in the US each day. Who are these people? Are they mostly the unvaccinated? What can we learn from this group to give confidence to those who are fully vaccinated?
Thanks, Peter