Sheryl Kubiak, School of Social Work dean, wrote an op-ed supporting jail reform. “Before the Michigan Jails Task Force released its report earlier this year, it wasn’t well known that tens of thousands of people were jailed in our state for driving on a suspended license or for unpaid tickets, fees, and child support. It wasn’t well known that rural counties in our state were outpacing Wayne and Kent Counties in jail population and seeing extremely high rates of serious mental illness among those jailed. Somewhere along the way, as Michigan’s jails tripled in size, their purpose got muddled. They became a tool for debt collection. A tool for responding to homelessness, mental illness, and addiction. To address this problem, we have to sharpen our focus on public safety. At each point in our justice system — from issuing warrants, to making arrests, to deciding who should be released pending trial, and how those found guilty should be punished — our laws should focus police, judges, and other decision-makers on immediate safety threats rather than money, addiction, and nuisances.”

Researchers at Wayne State University have completed an analysis that studied specific industry characteristics to guide industry openings in a way that lowers contagion risks and maximizes economic benefits until broader COVID-19 testing becomes available and immunity testing becomes efficient and reliable enough. “With protective gear and testing still in limited supply, there is a need to find the safest way to open and operate businesses to avoid a resurgence of the virus,” says Dr. Phillip Levy, professor of emergency medicine and assistant vice president for translational science and clinical research innovation at WSU, and chief innovation officer for the WSU Physician Group. “It is critical that we look at alternatives to lower contagion risks and maximize economic benefits. Using specific industry characteristics to guide industries in their reopening efforts will be key to lowering the further spread of the virus.” Shooshan Danagoulian, assistant professor of economics, led the research. Levy and Zhe Zhu, assistant professor of economics, also worked on it. The scope for physical distancing and remote work will vary by industry and region. The team focused on Michigan and metro Detroit.

Just when you think you understand COVID, it changes. It's a very deceptive virus; to keep up with it, it is a challenge,” says Dr. Teena Chopra, corporate medical director for Hospital Epidemiology and Infection Control at Detroit Medical Center and a Wayne State University professor. “And particularly, it is manifesting differently by age, by race, by sex. Very early on, we were able to understand that, particularly in the city of Detroit.” One set of her COVID patients, especially the younger ones, are developing pulmonary embolisms – blood clots that get stuck in the lungs and can be deadly. “They are manifesting as sudden onset shortness of breath,” Dr. Chopra says. “And some of them are showing higher mortalities than others.”  Meanwhile, patients coming from nursing homes (a big part of DMC’s patient population) may not even appear to have COVID during a first examination, says Dr. Chopra. They may not have a fever or chills. “These older patients do not have the same symptoms,” she says. “They don't mount up the same immune response.” Yet many of them are testing positive for the virus. “We are beginning to test every patient coming from a nursing home, whether they have symptoms or not, because we want to assume they have it.”

Arash Javanbakht, director of the Stress, Trauma, and Anxiety Research Clinic and a professor of psychiatry at Wayne State University, talked about the venting and complaining while quarantined at home during the coronavirus epidemic.

Professor of Pharmacy Victoria Tutag Lehr penned an article for The Conversation about the role of pharmacists in the battle against the opioid epidemic. “When you stop at your local pharmacy to pick up a toothbrush or an antacid, soon you may also be able to buy an over-the-counter drug to reverse an opioid overdose. The lifesaving drug, naloxone, currently requires a prescription, but it may become available as an over-the-counter purchase in 2020. Despite the national decrease in opioid prescriptions since 2012, the opioid crisis continues. Access to prescription opioids have decreased due to stricter legislation, insurance regulations and the Centers for Disease Control Guideline for Prescribing Opioids for Chronic Pain. At the same time, the use of heroin and illegally manufactured synthetic opioids, such as fentanyl and counterfeit prescription opioids, has escalated.

Erica Bocknek, associate professor of educational psychology, wrote a piece for The Conversation offering four good practices for families caring for quarantined children. About 55 million U.S. schoolchildren attend schools that have been closed or are being directly affected by the new coronavirus social distancing rules. Bocknek, a family therapist who studies early childhood development, parenting and family resilience, encourages parents and others raising kids to focus on the 4 R’s: routines, rules, relationships and rituals.

As more Michiganders file for unemployment and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's stay at home order is extended through April 30, the question now turns to how do we get Michigan open again, when some of the restrictions are lifted and people can start going back to work? Everywhere you look it's like a ghost town. Businesses are closed and millions of people are looking for work. However, after all of this passes – how do businesses get back on track and bring customers back? How does Michigan open up again? "Well to put it into perspective, the Michigan economy has already taken a very hard hit," said Marick Masters, a business professor at Wayne State University. With hundreds of thousands of businesses closed across Michigan, the state's economy is feeling the pain. "Payroll has gone down from about 4.5 million to under 3.3 million," Masters said. "It’s estimated that in Michigan this quarter unemployment will jump to 24 percent." However, Masters says there is some hopeful news. Depending on when this pandemic starts to slow down, we could start seeing a resurgence of local businesses.

Sick people fill intensive care units of already overtaxed southeastern Michigan hospitals at a pace of about 100 new coronavirus patients a day. So far, 111 Michiganders have died, and at least 4,650 had confirmed cases of COVID-19 as of Saturday afternoon, according to the state Department of Health and Human Services. What we do know is that the official coronavirus case count is currently doubling about every three days in Michigan. "Southeast Michigan is burning right now," said Dr. Teena Chopra, medical director of infection prevention and hospital epidemiology at DMC Harper University Hospital and a professor at Wayne State University. "Our hospital systems are being overrun at this point," Chopra said. "They are all struggling. ... We are under-resourced and we need to make sure that we get more help. You know, we are asking, all of us are asking, for help. And the governor knows that." It has been just 19 days since the state reported its first two confirmed cases of COVID-19 on the evening of March 10. Eight days later, a Southgate man in his 50s was the first to die of the disease, and that's when the case counts around the state began to rise rapidly because of "a combination of increased detection of cases through laboratory testing as well as community-wide transmission," said Dr. Paul Kilgore, an associate professor at Wayne State University's Eugene Applebaum College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. Reducing the rate of COVID-19 infections hinges on how well people adhere to the governor's order, said Kilgore. "The way I've been looking at social distancing is that it's really kind of our vaccine. You're the vaccine. I'm the vaccine. And the extent to which we apply this intervention to the population is exactly the way that we would apply a vaccine. The more people that do social distancing, or the greater the percentage of the population that social distance, that will determine the effectiveness or efficacy of social distancing, just like you would evaluate a vaccine," Kilgore said. 

Arash Javanbakht, assistant professor of psychiatry, wrote an article for The Conversation about how the pandemic has changed our normal lives. “The COVID-19 pandemic is different from many crises in that it has affected all of us regardless of politics, economics, religion, age or nationality. This virus is a good reminder that humanity is vulnerable to what nature throws at us, and that we are all in this together. This pandemic has profoundly changed our way of living. Overnight, dining out, exercising at the gym or seeing friends in person became impossible for millions of Americans. Remote working, reduced work hours and income, and uncertainty are indeed stressful. Most of us are having to make important adjustments and quickly learn new skills, such as how to do virtual meetings or be motivated to work from home. Given we are creatures of habit, these adjustments can be hard. We are also stressed by continuous exposure to sad news, often contradictory predictions and recommendations coming from different sources. The constantly changing and evolving nature of this situation is very frustrating.”

Nearly 3.3 million people are out of work in the United States, according to the most recent jobs report from the U.S. Department of Labor; quadrupling the previous record set in 1982. "These numbers are unprecedented. 3.3 million jobless claims. I think the high water mark in the 80s was 600,000. No one saw this coming," said Matthew Roling, executive director of Wayne State's Office of Business Innovation. And in Michigan, unemployment claims are also way up. There's been a 550 percent increase in the number of claims filed compared to those usually filed during this time of year, according to the Michigan Unemployment Insurance Agency. "And I think it speaks to the total lack of clarity that most employers feel right now," Roling said. He added that small businesses in the state have been hit especially hard under the "Stay Home, Stay Safe" executive order. “Employers don’t really have the freedom or flexibility with their balance sheets the money that they have available, to keep these employees on. And so the most humane thing for them to do is to let these folks go so that they can seek benefits," he said. But Roling also pointed out that Detroit's automakers shifting gears during this crisis, to help make vital medical equipment, is moving Michigan in the right direction in the both the short and long-term. “While obviously making ventilators might not employ the same number of people as making pick-up trucks, a lot of Michigan’s economy is based manufacturing," he said, noting that industry tends.

Metro Detroit has become one of the nation’s COVID-19 hotspots. And experts predict the situation will get even more dire in the next several weeks. The city of Detroit is a hotspot within the hotspot. As of Thursday, the city reported 888 COVID-19 cases, with 19 deaths so far. Why is that? Jonathan Stillo, a medical anthropologist and assistant professor at Wayne State University, said some of the explanation for Detroit’s numbers in particular comes down to simple geography—densely-populated urban centers foster the spread of communicable diseases, and Detroit may just be a bit ahead of the curve compared to some other places. “But we’re still nowhere near where we need to be in terms of seeing the whole picture,” Stillo said. “Right now, we’re only seeing little snapshots, and those are totally dependent on how much testing is happening. “It makes the job of researchers, and folks who are trying to figure out what’s going on and make policy to address it, really hard. We’re flying blind, I think, in a lot of ways.” Stillo said data on racial demographics would be helpful. So would data about whether groups of people who are disproportionately sick and dying have certain underlying conditions. Although it’s difficult to tell whether specific racial groups such as African Americans might be at higher risk from COVID-19, Stillo said some basic public health and social science data tell us that’s probably the case. “African American folks in Detroit have higher rates of asthma, they have higher rates of diabetes, they have higher rates of some of these conditions that we think may make outcomes worse,” Stillo said. “You’re sort of layering biological problems on top of already-existing social problems.

Tamara Hew-Butler, associate professor of exercise and sports science, and Mariane Fahlman, professor of kinesiology, health and sport studies, wrote an article offering practical tips on how much people should (and should not) exercise. “Both too much and too little are bad while somewhere in the middle is just right. Scientists commonly refer to this statistical phenomenon as a “J-shaped” curve. Research has shown exercise can influence the body’s immune system. 

Arash Javanbakht, M.D., director of the Stress, Trauma, and Anxiety Research Clinic (STARC) at Wayne State University, wrote a piece for Psychology Today about surviving in the age of COVID-19. Javanbakht wrote: “There are aspects of all of our lives that are affected by the new pandemic, regardless of our political, religious, age, or national background. This virus is a reminder that we humans are all vulnerable to what nature throws at us, and in it together. Overnight, our ability to dine out, be at a coffee shop, or exercise declined. This is important especially for those who had routines including these activities, or those with less social support, whose social interactions were limited to such activities, or their social life did involve such activities like spending time with friends at the gym. Remote working, reduced work hours and income, and inability to predict future of work, especially for those with limited financial resources, or jobs mainly affected by the crisis are highly stressful. We all are also stressed by the news, especially given the inherent emotionally triggering nature of the U.S. news media, and too much focus on disaster pornography, as well as contradicting news, predictions, and recommendations coming from different outlets and authorities. The constantly changing and evolving nature of such news is also stressing on all those who follow them.”

Last week President Donald Trump announced the closure of the U.S./Mexico border to stem the spread of the coronavirus. Mexico is also suspending air travel from Europe. For more on this, KCBS news anchors Jeff Bell and Patti Reising spoke with Lance Gable, associate professor of law at Wayne State University Law School.

People looking for the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Oakland County on Thursday morning found two numbers: the state said there were 23 confirmed cases, while a report based off the county’s numbers said 94. They’re different because the state’s data lags. The state initially reported it at 6 p.m. every day, then switched to 2 p.m., reporting the confirmed cases from across the state as of midnight the day before. On Thursday the state data lagged even more as officials added in information from private labs and got the latest state number out – 336 confirmed cases, 105 in Oakland County – a little after 3 p.m. And the discrepancy with Oakland County is just one of many around Michigan as some county health departments and local hospitals release their own data in a patchwork. “It is understandable that people want as much data as possible, and government and others should work aggressively to provide that data,” said Matthew W. Seeger, dean and professor of Wayne State University’s Department of Communication. “They should do so with as much context as possible, and that’s really hard in a crisis situation.” It’s important that information is coming from trusted government sources, Seeger said, because a crisis creates an information void. That void can increase the chance of misinformation spreading. "Crisis creates an information vacuum which is going to be filled. It can be filled by subject matter experts and government officials, or it can be filled by your friend from high school,” Seeger said. He encouraged people to consult official sources like the CDC, and correct misinformation they may hear or see on social media.

Some local groceries have been picked thin in the wake of thousands of Metro Detroiters stocking up in preparation for quarantine. But instead of frozen and canned foods, one Wayne State nutritionist says creating your own soups and grain-based dishes is a healthier way to feed yourself and your family during this crisis. “You don’t want to be throwing anything away right now. You want to maximize what you have,” said Wayne State University nutritionist Diane Cress. Cress says, before you go shopping again, pay attention to what can still be used at home. “Get your nutrients from food and then you get the right doses. If you get them from supplements, things are imbalanced. Food is cheaper and tastes better.”

Schools are closed, bars and restaurants shut down, and many temporarily laid off or working from home. Disruptions to daily life are growing more severe in Michigan, where 54 cases of coronavirus were confirmed late Monday. And if other parts of the country and globe should serve as an indication, a weeks-long lockdown curtailing travel outside the home could be next. As Michiganders face a new reality, the question many are asking is “how long will it last?” Gov. Gretchen Whitmer has closed schools through April 5 and activity centers — including gyms and libraries — through March 30, but a local infectious disease specialist says it could be months before life returns to normal in Michigan. Chopra’s assessment of what’s in store for Michigan dovetails with recent comments from President Trump, who said in a Monday news conference that the outbreak may not end in the U.S. until July or August at the earliest. He added that he may advocate for quarantine or curfew in local “hot spots.” The San Francisco Bay Area on Monday announced a near-lockdown to last through April 7. Once things are under control, Chopra warns there will likely be a second wave of the virus as people resume social activity. That could be less severe and limited to local clusters, however, as the country will presumably be better prepared. A vaccine will still take up to 18 months to produce, she said.

Kirsten Carlson, associate professor of law and adjunct associate professor of political science, wrote an article for The Conversation about the oversight relationship between the branches of government.

Amid an outbreak where vaccines, drug treatments and even sufficient testing don’t yet exist, communication that is delivered early, accurately and credibly is the strongest medicine in the government’s arsenal. But the Trump administration’s zigzagging, defensive, inconsistent messages about the novel coronavirus continued Friday, breaking almost every rule in the book and eroding the most powerful weapon officials possess: Public trust.  “For those of us in this field, this is profoundly and deeply distressing,” said Matthew Seeger, a risk communication expert at Wayne State University who developed the CDC guidebook alongside many top doctors, public health researchers, scientists, consultants and behavioral psychologists. “It’s creating higher levels of anxiety, higher levels of uncertainty and higher levels of social disruption. … We spent decades training people and investing in developing this competency. We know how to do this.” Since taking office, Trump has ousted scientists, muzzled researchers and suppressed basic information on climate change. Public health officials worry that his erosion of public trust of science, coupled with the ongoing conflicting messaging between experts and politicians, is making it unclear whom the public should listen to. “I’m fearful we’ve continued to undermine our belief that subject matter experts are people we should listen to,” said Seeger. “We’ve done a good job over the last couple decades of undermining science and telling people scientists aren’t to be believed.”

Since it was first defined more than 2,000 years ago, mathematicians have tried to find pi’s exact value. Pi has many fans, who celebrate National Pi Day on March 14 (3/14). The U.S. House of Representatives passed a non-binding resolution recognizing Pi Day in 2009. In recent years, Raskind says Wayne State has ramped up its efforts to spread awareness and appreciation of pi. “We have a STEM day,” Raskind says. “I did a session on everything you always wanted to know about pi. I had about 35 students or so, and they loved it.” Raskind says he hopes promoting pi day will help people appreciate math more, and break stereotypes about those who are interested in mathematics.