Author | Lightnews

Kathryn

Kathryn

@kathrynas.bsky.social

4.2K followers 460 following 76 posts

Past-Chair of the Women’s Caucus at CASWE-ACFTS, MSW, Long COVID research, therapist, equity advocate, intersectional feminist, mom. Not totally here. Still more there. Thoughts my own.

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · 3d

Spoiler 1: The news is that this poster won first place. 🥇

Spoiler 2: This is because people are hungry for truth, rigour, accountability, and positive change.

👇👇👇

Mark Ungrin @mark-ungrin.bsky.social · 3d

The 3rd annual Canadian Long COVID symposium wrapped up yesterday. It was a great meeting, and I got some nice news at the end!

PDF of the poster is here: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/e8wh6...

MP3 of a 5-minute verbal overview is here: www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ej0lw...

A photo of a projection screen reading "Long COVID Web Impact Poster Awards:
1. Mark Ungrin
2. Kayli Jamieson
3. Kriti Agarwal
4. Jill Cameron

This poster contains too much text to fit in the ALT text box, or to condense to a meaningful summary that would fit. The full text is accessible in the PDF linked directly from the post.

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Agreed. There are plenty of good reasons to wash your hands, even if preventing COVID probably isn’t one of the most important.

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

There are so many structural failings that discourage prosocial behaviour when it comes to illness. The system is maintaining itself by chewing through workers.

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Just because it hasn’t changed YET doesn’t mean it won’t. But it will take pressure from citizens, parents, advocacy groups, and any other concerned individuals to get bureaucrats moving. That’s just the reality of the situation.

Thank you for attending my TED talk.

End 🧵

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Common Criticism 5: If the schools were ever going to get HEPAs, they would have done it during COVID. There’s no point trying now.

Answer: ‘During COVID’ is now & we will need airborne mitigations now and for the foreseeable future. Remember, policy moves slower than science...

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Common Criticism 4: It’s good for the kids’ immune system to get sick!

Answer: No, it is not, but that outdated information is sticky as fly paper. It needs to be addressed. The moms feel abandoned by institutional leaders & are turning to each other - a dangerous echo chamber.

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

The cost of running an appropriate HEPA that can greatly reduce the likelihood of illness & associated costs is nothing compared to the cost of perpetual illness. Imagine if this was divided between 30 students. Even 300 per year is $10 a student or just over $1 per school month.

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Second: Is anyone considering how expensive it is to have a sick child and/or to be sick themselves? Even with socialized medicine in Canada, it costs 💰 to take time off. It costs 💰to fill scripts. And there are many secondary costs that aren’t even figured into this equation…

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Common Criticism 3: Are you going to pay for them?! (They’re too expensive.)

Answer: First of all, the school boards *should* be purchasing & maintaining HEPAs. With all of the hand waving about absences, you’d think investing in staff & student health would be a no brainer…

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Common Criticism 2: HEPAs won’t do anything. Just make the kids wash their hands.

Answer: Airborne viruses aren’t stopped by hand washing. You are approximately 10,000 xs more likely to get C19 through the air than from touching an object.

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

Common Criticism 1. We don’t even have air conditioning in classrooms, and you’re worried about HEPAs?!

Answer: Has it occurred to anyone that kids need BOTH and not neither?

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Jun 26

A new development in the sociological experiment of denial, backlash, and normalization: The moms are piling on the poor soul who sought suggestions to on how to get HEPAs into the classroom.

🧵

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · May 25

Any time!

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · May 17

Everything is Better with Googly Eyes: a child-led guide to finding joy in unexpected places

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · May 13

Almost…🙃

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · May 13

"’This suggests a need for a robust approach to HAI prevention among hospitalized patients with COVID-19 to prevent MRSA bacteremia, a finding that may also be relevant for future pandemic preparedness planning,’ they wrote.”

www.cidrap.umn.edu/antimicrobia...

COVID-19 fueled increase in hospital-onset MRSA, study finds

While incidence of community-associated and healthcare-associated community-onset MRSA bacteremia declined during the pandemic, hospital-onset cases rose substantially.

www.cidrap.umn.edu

Reposted by Kathryn

Dr. Jen Irwin @drjenirwin.bsky.social · May 11

I haven’t eaten inside a restaurant since February 2020.

Why?

~400,000 peer-reviewed journal articles.

Reposted by Kathryn

Dr. Jen Irwin @drjenirwin.bsky.social · Apr 11

“This study confirms that SARS-CoV-2 can persist in the semen of patients who have recovered from COVID-19…the male genital tract may be a reservoir for the virus. …highlights the need for further research into the reproductive implications of COVID-19… .”

www.auajournals.org/doi/abs/10.1...

PD06-09 SARS-COV-2 PERSISTENCE IN SEMEN AS A WINDOW TO STUDY LONG COVID | Journal of Urology

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVE:Long COVID, a chronic condition following SARS-CoV-2 infection, has raised concerns regarding its effects on the male reproductive system, particularly viral persistence in ...

www.auajournals.org

Reposted by Kathryn

Kelly @broadwaybabyto.bsky.social · Apr 11

Stop saying “post covid”. People are confusing the end of the public health emergency with the end of the pandemic.

The pandemic is not over. “During COVID” is now.

If we want to end it, we need to first acknowledge this fact. Then mask up, clean the air & develop better vaccines & treatments.

Suggesting the world is “post COVID” contributes to an unwitting shift in research priorities

Reposted by Kathryn

Dr David Joffe MB BS(Hons), PhD, FRACP @davidjoffe64.bsky.social · Apr 11

For those who thought Omicron was the "off ramp" to reopen schools and go back to work.

Kids and cardiac sequelae. Over a million in the study.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Cardiovascular post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 in children and adolescents: cohort study using electronic health records - Nature Communications

Post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection affecting the cardiovascular system have been reported, but evidence in young people is limited. Here, the authors quantify the incidence of a range of outc...

Reposted by Kathryn

Harrison @harristwice.bsky.social · Apr 11

There’s a really good Sarah Kendzior quote that comes to mind.

@sarahkendzior.bsky.social

Screenshot of text that reads:

"When wealth is passed off as merit, bad luck is seen as bad character.
This is how ideologues justify punishing the sick and the poor. But poverty is neither a crime nor a character flaw. Stigmatise those who let people die, not those who struggle to live."
- Sarah Kendzior

Reposted by Kathryn

Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior.bsky.social · Apr 5

It's great to see these protests nationwide. Keep at it. Don't bow down, don't submit -- don't ever stop looking out for each other.

Anna Lewis @annaklewis.bsky.social · Apr 5

Great turn-out at the protests in Madison, inspiration from @sarahkendzior.bsky.social as per usual.

Reposted by Kathryn

Alt National Park Service @altnps.bsky.social · Apr 5

People often ask what a coalition of 200,000 can do. The answer’s simple — with all our free time (since a lot of us got fired), we’re out here causing a lot of good trouble.

Reposted by Kathryn

Naomi Klein @naomiaklein.bsky.social · Feb 3

The corporate coup is global.

Trump's mad tariffs do not mark the end of neoliberalism or free trade or whatever you want to call it.

They mark the end game of what we have been fighting for decades: corporate rule.

They do not believe in the public. They believe in their wealth.

Kathryn @kathrynas.bsky.social · Feb 28

The Stockdale Paradox is where it’s at for this timeline.