Media Coverage

Dr. Robert Kushner, the medical director of the Center for Lifestyle Medicine at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago, a professor of medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and author of the book, Six Factors to Fit: Weight Loss that Works for You!, told TODAY that while a higher body weight isn’t always linked to poorer health outcomes, excessive body fat does present a health risk to many people.

Dr. Robert Murphy, a professor of infectious diseases at Northwestern University and the executive director of the Institute for Global Health, is a fan. “The antigen tests are not PCR and can never be as sensitive as one of those, however, they are much faster — approximately 15 minutes — and don’t require the PCR supply-chain of reagents which is also problematic. The cost is lower because the test is much more simple,” he explained.

Dr. Namratha Kandula of Northwestern University echoed that theory. She also cautioned against generalizing about the underlying health of Asian Americans as a whole, noting that they are a diverse group from many different nations and cultures. “It’s not enough to clump them all together because it does not tell the whole story,” she said.

“It’s not something I would feel comfortable doing for a long time,” said Dr. Sadiya Khan, an epidemiologist and assistant professor in preventive medicine at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. Another epidemiologist was even more blunt: “It’s just about the last thing I’d do right now,” Michigan-based Dr. Abdul El-Sayed told the A.V. Club.

The surgery was performed by Dr. Dinee Simpson who said she’s all too familiar with patients who are fearful or do not trust their doctors. “Based on a lot of misinformation and myths that tend to circulate in the African American community, patients will decide not to move forward with something that can be life-saving and life-changing,” she said.

“The Midwest was relatively spared. We were prepared because what happened in New York; [it] was such a catastrophe that things got very serious out here in the Midwest — Republican and Democratic governors alike — really were very careful. And that was good, so we had really a low rate of cases,” explained Dr. Rob Murphy, a professor of infectious diseases and of biomedical engineering, and the executive director of the Institute for Global Health, at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

Dr. Sadiya Khan with Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine says more data is needed. “I don’t want people to let down their guard or get overly optimistic about this because we still need to be wearing masks, trying to physical distance as much as much as we did yesterday,” she said. Convalescent plasma treatment is already in use at Chicago area hospitals.

“Waiting for days between each new food introduction to infants limits food diversity in the infant diet and may delay peanut introduction,” said study lead author Dr. Waheeda Samady, an assistant professor of pediatrics. “There is now evidence that food diversity helps to decrease the development of allergic diseases in infants, and early peanut introduction is an important peanut allergy prevention strategy,” she said in a hospital news release. “The current guidelines on solid food introduction to infants might interfere with efforts to prevent food allergies, and may need to be reevaluated, especially in light of the variability in pediatric practice found in our study.”

When a bunch of old U.S. national team soccer jerseys were found in the basement of the Soccer House, a stately old mansion that serves as U.S. Soccer’s headquarters in Chicago, the federation’s chief medical officer, Dr. George Chiampas, thought they could be put to a unique use. “Several of our staff, our federation said, ‘What can we do to use this beautiful game to be able to support frontline workers? To disseminate a message to make a difference?’” said Chiampas, who works at Chicago’s Northwestern Memorial hospital.

During six weeks on life support at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, Ramirez said, she had terrifying nightmares that she couldn’t distinguish from reality. “Most of them involve me drowning,” she said. “I attribute that to me not being able to breathe, and struggling to breathe.”