Assessing Need and Access to LGBTQ+ Affirming and Affordable Behavioral Healthcare in Chicago

Overall LGBTQ+ individuals are 2.5 times more likely to experience depression, anxiety, and substance abuse compared to heterosexual individuals. Howard Brown Health worked in partnership with other community-based organizations (CBOs) that provide behavioral health services throughout Chicago to research and better understand barriers and facilitators to accessing affordable and LGBTQ+ affirming behavioral healthcare in the greater Chicago area. The research also illustrates unmet mental and behavioral healthcare needs and highlights existing gaps in LGBTQ+ affirming and affordable behavioral health services in Chicago

Temporary changes in STI & HIV testing & diagnoses across different phases of the COVID-19 pandemic, Chicago IL

IntroductionWhile the U.S. has seen a sustained rise in STI cases over the past decade, the impact of the COVID-19 on STIs and HIV is unclear.MethodsTo examine the short- and medium-term impacts of COVID-19 and HIV and STI testing and diagnosis, we compared pre-pandemic trends to three periods of the pandemic: early- pandemic, March-May 2020; mid-pandemic June 2020-May 2021; and late-pandemic, June 2021-May 2022. We compared average number of monthly tests and diagnoses, overall and by gender, as well as the monthly change (slope) in testing and diagnoses.ResultsWe find that after decreases in average monthly STI and HIV testing and diagnoses during the early- and mid-pandemic, cases were largely back to pre-pandemic levels by the late-pandemic, with some variation by gender.ConclusionChanges in testing and diagnoses varied by phase of the pandemic. Some key populations may require additional outreach efforts to attain pre-pandemic testing levels

Wastewater sequencing reveals early cryptic SARS-CoV-2 variant transmission.

As SARS-CoV-2 continues to spread and evolve, detecting emerging variants early is critical for public health interventions. Inferring lineage prevalence by clinical testing is infeasible at scale, especially in areas with limited resources, participation, or testing and/or sequencing capacity, which can also introduce biases1-3. SARS-CoV-2 RNA concentration in wastewater successfully tracks regional infection dynamics and provides less biased abundance estimates than clinical testing4,5. Tracking virus genomic sequences in wastewater would improve community prevalence estimates and detect emerging variants. However, two factors limit wastewater-based genomic surveillance: low-quality sequence data and inability to estimate relative lineage abundance in mixed samples. Here we resolve these critical issues to perform a high-resolution, 295-day wastewater and clinical sequencing effort, in the controlled environment of a large university campus and the broader context of the surrounding county. We developed and deployed improved virus concentration protocols and deconvolution software that fully resolve multiple virus strains from wastewater. We detected emerging variants of concern up to 14 days earlier in wastewater samples, and identified multiple instances of virus spread not captured by clinical genomic surveillance. Our study provides a scalable solution for wastewater genomic surveillance that allows early detection of SARS-CoV-2 variants and identification of cryptic transmission

Wastewater sequencing uncovers early, cryptic SARS-CoV-2 variant transmission

Summary As SARS-CoV-2 continues to spread and evolve, detecting emerging variants early is critical for public health interventions. Inferring lineage prevalence by clinical testing is infeasible at scale, especially in areas with limited resources, participation, or testing/sequencing capacity, which can also introduce biases. SARS-CoV-2 RNA concentration in wastewater successfully tracks regional infection dynamics and provides less biased abundance estimates than clinical testing. Tracking virus genomic sequences in wastewater would improve community prevalence estimates and detect emerging variants. However, two factors limit wastewater-based genomic surveillance: low-quality sequence data and inability to estimate relative lineage abundance in mixed samples. Here, we resolve these critical issues to perform a high-resolution, 295-day wastewater and clinical sequencing effort, in the controlled environment of a large university campus and the broader context of the surrounding county. We develop and deploy improved virus concentration protocols and deconvolution software that fully resolve multiple virus strains from wastewater. We detect emerging variants of concern up to 14 days earlier in wastewater samples, and identify multiple instances of virus spread not captured by clinical genomic surveillance. Our study provides a scalable solution for wastewater genomic surveillance that allows early detection of SARS-CoV-2 variants and identification of cryptic transmission