Another day of social distancing, another newsletter. Keep on sending me those emails, links and memes. If you missed a prior newsletter, you can find it  here . And continuous thanks for staying home, staying safe, washing hands and masking up!
 
First, some newsworthy science…
Does   coronavirus discriminate based on gender ? Global data points to many more deaths among men than women. But why? It is likely due to a combination of factors, ranging from lifestyle (men tend to drink and smoke more) to the robustness of the immune system (women seem to have the upper hand here).
 
I have resisted talking about  false negative test results  until now, but it’s time. Two weeks ago, I had heard whispers that the false negative rate for coronavirus tests was as high as 30% - last week the rumors  hit the headlines . A 30% false positive rate means that 3 out of every 10 people tested for coronavirus and told they do not have the infection actually  do  have it. And this, in turn, means that  coronavirus surveillance program like this one launching at CDC  and a rollout of antibody tests documenting immune system response to the virus will be ever more important.
 
Innovation in every direction – check out this piece about  MIT engineers who are hacking ventilators , building makeshift versions to bridge the gap until more machines arrive.
 
And now, I am going to do something a little different in this newsletter…  It’s the stories of coronavirus that move us to action, and so below are a few I want to share. A link to a narrative blog post by a surgeon on the front lines; a plea from an epidemiologist; a description of what infection actually feels like inside the chest; and a fact-packed list describing every basic you need to know about coronavirus in order to avoid getting infected.
 
  • From the front lines, Dr. Craig Smith, Chair of the Department of Surgery at Columbia University writes an incredibly moving daily post with literary and historical reference thrown in.
 
  • Thanks to my friends from all over for sending emails packed with wisdom and data. This comes from one who is doing everything she can to spread the word about the importance of social distancing – and why we cannot bend the rules even a little bit. It comes from a powerful post written by an epidemiologist. I encourage you to read the whole thing, but if you don’t, then just read this line: If your son visits his girlfriend, and you later sneak over for coffee with a neighbor, your neighbor is now connected to the infected office worker that your son's girlfriend's mother shook hands with.
 
  • Another dear friend sent this, forwarded by a doctor on the front lines who herself just came out the other end of 2 weeks of illness. That doc wanted to share symptoms that may not be widely written about, but get reported repeatedly: Patients keep saying they have this feeling of awareness of breathing and have to take a deep breath but not frank shortness of breath They also complain of sternal pain and lungs feeling sore, like when I ran a marathon.
 
  • And finally, there’s this list, originally penned by a doctor at my alma mater, Johns Hopkins. It has circulated for a couple of weeks now, but every time it arrives again in my inbox I find it helpful. So I am passing it along, in its entirety, to you all.