Sairam Parthasarathy, MD, chief of the Division of Pulmonary, Allergy, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine in the UArizona College of Medicine – Tucson, leads the Arizona effort to reduce disparities in underrepresented communities in COVID-19 research and clinical trials.

The Phoenix Biomedical Campus, which includes the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix, serves as a natural extension of the learning environment. Allison Otu, executive director of corporate and community relations for UArizona Health Sciences, is quoted.

The tele-ultrasound training program for lung point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) will enable rural emergency departments to more effectively identify and treat suspected COVID-19 patients.

To be sure, it is painful and often lonely to abandon social rituals - all of them, not just Thanksgiving and Christmas but funerals, weddings, graduations, birthday parties and religious observances. "They all affirm our social identity," says Elizabeth Connick, chief of the infectious diseases division at the University of Arizona College of Medicine at Tucson. "I fear that some people simply can't bear to stay away. They will attend social gatherings, and some will get infected."

While only one gathering over 100 people was reported the week of Oct. 19, seven were reported the week of Oct. 26 to CART, a collaboration between the university and the Tucson Police Department, said Campus Reentry Task Force Director Dr. Richard Carmona, 17th U.S. surgeon general and a Distinguished Professor in the Mel & Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health.

"I think you have to kind of learn by doing here. I think you start low and you go up slow," said Dr. Shad Marvasti, director of public health, prevention and health promotion with the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix. Masks and social distancing are a must, he added. "I think if we can take that seriously, then we can have the opportunity to enjoy ourselves and watch sports."

Similar to COVID-19, the symptoms for Valley Fever can range from fatigue, cough, and fever, to muscle and joint aches or pain along with rashes on your body. Dr. John Galgiani, director of the Valley Fever Center for Excellence at the University of Arizona, said it’s important to know the symptoms. “If the COVID test is negative those patients should be tested for Valley Fever. If they have an illness that they thought might be the coronavirus, they also might have caught coccidioidomycosis."

Arizona has maintained relatively low case numbers since the summer, but they are now creeping to levels seen just a few weeks before its surge. And as a conflagration engulfs the Midwest and Mountain West, public health experts and elected officials in Arizona are pleading with residents to maintain mitigation measures they say played a critical role in beating back the virus and hold lessons for other states – including mask mandates that covered 85% of the population. "I'm becoming more of a firm believer that face masks are a truly effective intervention in this particular outbreak and should be considered our first line of defense," said Joe Gerald, a University of Arizona public health researcher who tracks coronavirus trends in the state.