Life In The Time Of COVID It Ain’t Over ‘Til It’s Over On Monday evening, January 30, the White House announced that the COVID-19 emergency will end on May 11. The emergency, which was initially declared by President Donald Trump in 2020, has been renewed every 90 days since. If the Biden administration simply fails to renew the current 90-day declaration, the emergency would lapse in April rather than May. The White House stated that an “abrupt end to the…
Online home of The Freeman's Journal and Hometown Oneonta
Advertisement
richard sternberg
Column by Dr. Richard Sternberg Fauci Recollected as Humble, Inclusive Dr. Anthony Fauci retires from federal service this month, leaving the National Institute of Health where he has worked for 54 years, the last 38 as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. He has been an advisor to seven presidents. Until the COVID crisis, he was known primarily for his work on HIV/AIDS. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2008 by president George…
Column by Richard Sternberg Why I Am Masking Up Again (and it’s Not Just COVID) It would be a safe thing to say that I was one of the strongest advocates in Central New York for masking up, having vaccinations up to date—it should be two original, at least the most recent vaccine for the Omicron variants and having been boostered for last year—avoiding crowded indoor spaces, and generally keeping your distance from other people whenever possible. When I now…
Treatments of Long COVID Explored By Richard Sternberg, M.D. As we continue into the third year of the COVID pandemic, increasing interest and concern is becoming evident by the set of symptoms called Long COVID. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention definition, on their website, says that Long COVID (also known by other names) is the experiencing of symptoms following infection with the virus that causes COVID, SARS-CoV-2. Their definition does not list a specific point in time of…
Camera Policy on Hold for Now COOPERSTOWN – At the November meeting of the Cooperstown Village Board of Trustees, a public hearing was held on a proposed policy for the installation and operation of cameras to monitor activity occurring in public places within the village. The policy was discussed at length and, following public comments, the board took a vote which failed to pass. A committee comprised of Trustees Cindy Falk, Richard Sternberg and Joe Membrino has been tasked to…
Clarification: Cooperstown Smoking Ban During a recent Cooperstown Board of Trustees meeting, a ban on smoking on Main Street Cooperstown was passed. “We’ve been talking about the smoking ban for a year. What are we going to do if we allow marijuana shops, how can we keep people from smoking on Main Street and the whole street smelling like marijuana?” Trustee Richard Sternberg said. “We couldn’t just single out smoking marijuana. We set a public hearing, we had the public…
Column by Richard Sternberg, M. D. Diligence Called for, Now More Than Ever Again, just when it seemed we reached the point where we can go out with people and decrease our use of masks, COVID strikes back and possibly with more virulence than previous strains. The number of new strains to consider is large. New strains include BA.5.2.6, BA.4.1.9, BE.1.2, BA.4.7, BF.13 and XBB, among others. Already BA.5 and BA.4 strains have high penetrance in the U.S. The new…
Column by Richard Sternberg M.D. World Polio Day Celebrated Next Week October 24 is World Polio Day, an international commemoration of the efforts to eliminate poliomyelitis in the entire world, recognize those fighting the disease, and bring awareness to the public of the danger of the disease and how they can help to end it. The eradication of polio is, or maybe better to say was, in the last mile of a marathon, but complacency and a decreased emphasis on…
Column by Richard Sternberg Correlation Doesn’t Imply Causation I read a news report of a scientific article recently that was originally published in a reputable scientific journal that said something to the effect that multivitamins were good for the brain. I shared this with my daughters via text, one of whom is a real biomedical scientist. She retorted back almost immediately, “Dad, did you look at the original paper?” I hadn’t. She did. “Not only is the study flawed but…
Column by Richard Sternberg COVID’S Silver Lining Sometimes, out of the worst experiences something good happens. At the end of my column on MASH last week, I mentioned that I have learned about creating family where you found it. Amazingly, because of COVID, I found my family that I wasn’t even aware of for the past 45 years. At the very beginning of the COVID epidemic in March 2020, a friend of mine from college who lived on the same…