The University of Texas Medical Branch can process up to 7,000 COVID-19 tests a day, said Juan David Garcia, the administrative director of lab services at the medical branch. During the recent surge in demand, they’ve been doing about 3,000 a day. “It has been hard,” Garcia said. “We’re the first one to feel the cases.”

Global data on COVID-19 has been essential to better understand changes that COVID-19 presents. Researchers at the University of Texas at Galveston have developed a computational method that would allow researchers to keep one step ahead of new mutations that may arise. “In the future, we will be able to develop vaccines for variants before they arise,” said Catherine Schein, one of the authors.

The University of Texas Medical Branch requires at a minimum a surgical mask certified by the American Society of Testing and Materials, said Mary Ann DeMaet, the operation manager for infection control. “The variants became more contagious and easily spread,” DeMaet said. “We're seeing high transmissibility between individuals. So, we started requiring a higher-level mask. I think the cloth masks were OK in the beginning. But I think now that we know a little bit more, we probably need a higher-level mask to protect ourselves against the variants.”

One question UTMB’s Dr. Samuel Mathis often hears is about the use and importance of protein powder supplementation with a workout. “When it comes to the amount of protein we get in our diet, supplementation isn’t usually required,” Mathis writes. “In general, protein powders are safe to use, but it’s cheaper, safer and more efficient to use natural sources of protein to supplement your diet and exercise routine.”

What’s the secret to becoming a centenarian? Drs. Norbert Herzog and David Niesel write in their recent Medical Discovery News column about many factors including a new report from Japan that centenarians have unique gut microbiomes that reduce their risk for chronic diseases and infections.

Injuries are the leading cause of death in school-aged children, Dr. Sally Robinson writes in her recent column. Having a plan in case of a power outage or fire is essential. “Fire alarms are loud, but it’s helpful for all to recognize the sound and know what to do,” she writes. “Practice what you and your child would do if you had a fire.”

Scientists don’t yet know why omicron spreads so fast, but they have ideas. The first, explained Vineet Menachery, a microbiologist and immunologist who studies coronaviruses at the University of Texas Medical Branch, is that some of the mutations in the spike protein allow the virus to escape existing immunity from vaccination or an infection. “It’s different enough that your antibodies don’t recognize it,” he said. That means the virus has a larger pool of people vulnerable to infection. How well do vaccines protect against omicron? “The data argues that if you’re vaccinated twice and boosted, that’s the highest level of protection that you can get,” Menachery said.