Banning Hendriks says health care workers are fatigued after two years of the pandemic and notes hiring new employees has been challenging for hospitals.

Dawn Nolt, M.D., recommends parents vaccinate their children younger than five if the FDA authorizes the Pfizer vaccine for that age group, noting that even though children generally experience less severe COVID-19, they can spread it to others who are vulnerable.

William Messer, M.D., Ph.D., and Fikadu Tafesse, Ph.D., discuss how the pandemic might progress, including whether COVID-19 will become endemic and how those who experience a breakthrough case can develop super immunity.

Hiroyuki Nakai, M.D., Ph.D., develops adeno-associated virus-based gene therapy technology that targets specific cells and has been transferred to Vancouver, Washington-based Capsigen Inc. The company is collaborating with biotech firm Biogen to evaluate the technology in a trial.

Research led by Alison Edelman, M.D., finds COVID-19 vaccination can temporarily change a vaccine recipient’s menstrual cycle.

In a story about a sister version of the omicron variant, Marcel Curlin, M.D., says infection from one likely protects against infection from the other: “You’ve still got this screaming-hot antibody response, so the same thing that ended your current infection should prevent you from getting a new one.”

Arpita Gandhi, M.D., discusses how clinical trials have found the Orca-T engineered donor graft has worked well and been tolerated by myelofibrosis patients who received it after undergoing myeloablative allogeneic stem cell transplantation.

In an op-ed calling for increased support for primary care and its clinicians, Deborah Cohen, Ph.D., notes these teams are being stretched too thin, which is leading to decreased quality of life in society: “The U.S. is not only falling behind other developed countries for health outcomes, it continues to lose ground. Decades of improvement in life expectancy are being reversed, due in part to primary care supply chain problems.”

News of Oregon’s plan to lift its indoor mask requirement by March 31 cited OHSU’s weekly COVID-19 forecast and OHSU data that indicate more than 8 in 10 Oregonians are continuing to wear masks in public.

Noting it’s common for people to have a detected PCR test result 15 days after first getting sick, Marcel Curlin, M.D., recommends people get an initial result via a PCR test, get a rapid antigen test five days later, and continue to isolate for a full 10 days if they have a detected result via an antigen test. He notes the antigen test is better at tracking an individual’s infectiousness.