The convergence of the flu season and the COVID-19 pandemic calls for vigilance with masks, handwashing, social distancing – and a flu shot.

Continuing coverage: Investigators have determined that treating patients with an advanced form of age-related macular degeneration with levodopa, a safe and readily available drug commonly used to treat Parkinson's disease, stabilized and improved their vision. It reduced the number of treatments necessary to maintain vision, and as such, will potentially reduce the burden of treating the disease, financially and otherwise. Dr. Robert W. Snyder, head of the Department of Ophthalmology at the University of the Arizona, is the study's lead investigator.

Continuing coverage: Molecular clock analysis showed no widespread community distribution of the highly contagious coronavirus disease in Arizona until mid-February.

Continuing coverage: Colleges and universities across the U.S. are looking into using wastewater-based epidemiology to track the spread of COVID-19. Wastewater samples from the Likins dorm on the University of Arizona campus came back positive for COVID-19, according to University of Arizona President Robert C. Robbins. Ian Pepper, director of the WEST Center and a BIO5 Institute member, is leading a study that uses municipal wastewater to monitor the incidence of the virus in communities across the United States.

Labs and factories around the globe are racing to test and produce more than a billion doses of coronavirus vaccine. To shrink a 10-year marathon into a 10-month sprint, they are merging institutional knowledge with novel bioscience methods. "This first round of vaccines is certainly using more of what we would call experimental platforms – things that don't have a lot of track record yet," said Deepta Bhattacharya, a cell biologist and immunologist at the University of Arizona. "Now, that's not to say that it won't work. And to be honest, all of the early data that I'm seeing so far, it looks really quite promising."

As cancer care costs continue to increase in the United States, a focus on chemotherapy stewardship may result in cost savings for health systems and patients. During a session of the Hematology/Oncology Pharmacy Association Practice Management 2020 Virtual Learning Event, presenter Ali McBride, clinical coordinator of hematology/oncology for the University of Arizona Cancer Center, said a 2011 projection by the National Cancer Institute estimated there would be 18.1 million cancer survivors in the United States in 2020, which represents a 30% increase in the number of cancer survivors since 2010.

By the end of the month, tens of thousands of rapid-response antigen tests will be delivered to athletic departments across the Pac-12. One school – the University of Arizona – began using the tests months ago. The university has run 25,000 Quidel tests on students, athletes, staff members and ICU patients since the spring. David Harris, who oversees the program, said the results have been impressive. "It only seems to get better the more you do it," he said.

Just over two in five Arizona adults got a flu shot last year, a number state officials are desperate to improve on before the onset of both influenza and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic this fall. "It's difficult to tell what the response will be each year" to the call for people to get vaccinated, said Dr. Daniel Derksen, director of the University of Arizona Center for Rural Health. "You want to protect those vulnerable populations."

Continuing coverage: Efforts are underway to bring to market a vaccine for a fungal infection that occurs in the deserts of the Southwest. With recent studies showing promise, there is a renewed push. Dr. John Galgiani, director of the University of Arizona's Valley Fever Center for Excellence, is heading up vaccine research there and believes the vaccine shown to prevent valley fever in mice should be available for dogs, which also get infected in large numbers, as soon as next year. A veterinary vaccine company, Anivive, is developing it. "It's very promising," said Galgiani.