Dr. Scott Cypers is seeing four different types of more significant anxiety responses to COVID-19 in his practice. He directs stress and anxiety programs at the Helen and Arthur E. Johnson Depression Center at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Center. The first group are people who are typically highly anxious and now, they’re actually feeling relieved, “like, ‘Oh my God, now you know how I feel all day long.’”
"You always want to go ahead and make a vaccine to a virus that is this deadly because guaranteed, we are going to see it again on this planet," said David Kroll, PhD and professor of pharmacology, at the Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at the CU Anschutz Medical Campus. "
“With these powers also come costs and the possibility of raising concerns among interest groups and the public,” Glen Mays, professor of health policy Colorado School of Public Health. He doesn’t fault Polis for moving relatively slowly. “That may be a factor: is just to kind of proceed with caution based on what we know.”
Dr. Michelle Barron, the medical director of infection prevention at the University of Colorado Hospital, pointed to other disease outbreaks as a demonstration of what can happen. She described how the SARS virus exploded in Toronto in 2003, with early transmission of the disease to a number of people leading to many others getting sick. “It can have that domino effect,” she said.
"Wash your hands, wash your hands, wash your hands, wipe down surfaces with sanitizing wipes. Keep your phone clean too," said Dr. Michelle Barron, medical director for Infection Control and Prevention at the University of Colorado Hospital on the Anschutz Medical Campus. "Stay hydrated, eat healthy. I mean, common things we recommend for flu actually are very much applicable for this as well."
"The reality is that people don't actually need the masks," said Dr. Michelle Barron, medical director for Infection Control and Prevention at the University of Colorado Hospital on the Anschutz Medical Campus. "I think almost everyone I've seen outside of the hospital, that's wearing these in public, don't even have them on properly … I think [what] ends up happening is that it gives them a false sense of security and then they don't realize that their hands are far more likely to be the way they're going to catch this."
Faculty members at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus collaborated with gun shop owners, firearms trainers and public health researchers at the Colorado Firearm Safety Coalition to develop the resource. Dr. Emmy Betz was a leader on the project and a link between the two entities. She is an emergency physician at CU and the co-founder of the Colorado Firearm Safety Coalition. “This project initially started because we know that when folks are at risk of suicide, it can be a good idea to either lock up the gun or ideally move it outside of the home until the person's feeling better,” Betz said.
The firms did not test for asbestos or lead. The types of cancer the employees were diagnosed with -- liver, lung and two cases of breast cancer -- aren’t common outcomes for asbestos and lead, said Jonathan Samet, epidemiologist and dean of the Colorado School of Public Health, at the town hall. Because there were no cancers or diseases associated with asbestos or lead, and because the university regularly tests for these components, they weren’t included in the tests. Samet said that the investigation would have been different had the cancers been related to known exposures. He used the example of Legionnaires disease, a type of pneumonia caused by bacteria.
