News weekly update: Nov 21st 2025

Greetings, public health PHANs! This is our weekly news update for November 21st, 2025, with a selection of upcoming events and articles about COVID, other airborne pathogens, and clean airAir free of pollutants, including viruses, bacteria, and harmful particles.. Some of our activities include:

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Twitter Space,

Thurs, November 20: FAR-UVC

Yesterday, November 20, we co-hosted a Twitter Space with the great folks at Air Support Project (ASP) about Far-UVC, a technology using a specific spectrum of light that does not damage human skin or eyes but does kill COVID in the air along with nearly every other airborne pathogenA microorganism that can cause disease.. Our guest speakers were Kyle Stevens, founder of Clean AirAir free of pollutants, including viruses, bacteria, and harmful particles. Events, an event organizing company in Seattle, WA, and Tania Powers, a Long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More patient and a Far-UVC advocate.

Do you have ideas for guests or topics for a future Twitter Space? If you do, please email melissa@airsupportproject.com and theresa@publichealthactionnetwork.org. We'd love to hear your ideas! Thank you for staying engaged in science that matters.

LOCAL AIR QUALITY AND WASTEWATER DATA AT YOUR FINGERTIPS with our AirAware tool

Now you can get local air quality and wastewater data at your fingertips with a great new tool on our website called AirAware. It's available on any page on our website, just click the small triangle in the AirAware title bar to collapse or expand it. It shows your local air quality and wastewater data for COVID-19A disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, leading to respiratory illness., Influenza A, and RSV, and it lets you click through to the sources. We've also made the code available on GitHub, which has instructions on how to set up the widget on your own website.

Try out the widget and let us know what you think. We would love to hear your suggestions and feedback. You can contact us with questions or comments at info@publichealthactionnetwork.org, or you can message or tag us on any of our social media accounts: Bluesky, Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

On December 17 we’ll host a special Zoom meeting to demonstrate two projects we’ve been working on. We'll provide more details in the weeks before the meeting, but we want to provide a peek into what we're working on.

SAFER is a global directory of COVID-aware organizations and businesses, including mask blocs, clean airAir free of pollutants, including viruses, bacteria, and harmful particles. clubs, restaurants, healthcare providers, schools, online-only organizations, events, and other entities that advocate for COVID-aware practices or offer COVID-aware services and advocacy. This tool will include the ability to add relevant businesses or organizations that will be reviewed by our team, and it will include specific information about what kinds of COVID-aware practices are being used. We believe this will not only give COVID-aware folks more visibility into organizations and businesses that engage in COVID-aware practices, but it will also encourage more businesses to offer COVID-aware practices.

CARE is a smart chat-bot linked to over 10,000 peer-reviewed research papers about COVID, Long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More, masking, air purification, vaccines, and other COVID mitigations. This tool will let you ask questions on any of those topics, with the option to include anecdotal data from Twitter, Bluesky, and Reddit. This information comes directly from patients that may not be accessible in any other manner. The answers will include citations to research papers that are readable from within the application. The tool is designed to let you have a conversation with it, where you can ask follow-up questions of your own or click links for suggested follow-up questions, and you can ask it to provide a simpler response or a more technical one. The tool will also create draft emails to family members, healthcare providers, schools, and employers to explain why they should be masking, or why they should put COVID-aware practices in place, or what kind of accommodations you might need if you’re a Long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More patient. We believe this tool could revolutionize access to verified information and make it easier for COVID-aware folks to share verified information with others.

ONGOING WEEKLY

COVID COMMUNITY MEETINGS

Every Saturday evening: PandemicA global outbreak of a disease. Pals meetings on Zoom. Every Saturday at 5 pm PT/8 pm ET, the PandemicA global outbreak of a disease. Collaborative hosts a Zoom call with several breakout rooms based on age groups, life situations, and special interests. Check their Google Document the day of the call for that week's Zoom link.

Every Monday & Sunday: Rising Hope meetings on Zoom. Rising Hope is a community of COVID-conscious folks that meet Monday evenings, plus Sunday mornings for church services. Contact them via Reddit.

Daily: The World Health Network hosts COVID-aware community meetings every day. Community care starts with conversation! Their Welcome page explains how to connect with their meeting groups.

UPCOMING EVENTS

November: November is Lung Cancer Awareness Month. We know that COVID affects every organ including the lungs, and that COVID increases the chances of getting cancer.

November 25, 2025: Time to Speak: The Business Case for Clean AirAir free of pollutants, including viruses, bacteria, and harmful particles.. The event is being hosted in London and takes place at 2am PT/5am ET.

December 9, 2025: State Guide to Clean Indoor Air. In September, the PandemicA global outbreak of a disease. Center at the Brown University School of Public Health published a 42-page report on improving air quality at the state and local level. Dr. Georgia Lagoudas, Senior Fellow, at the PandemicA global outbreak of a disease. Center at the Brown University School of Public Health, will present the team's findings from the report. The webinar takes place at 11am PT/2pm ET.

THE STORY SO FAR…

Some of the more important stories that have come out this year:

May 27, 2025: Long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More is now the most common chronic health condition among children. Long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More has now surpassed asthma as the most common chronic health condition for kids.

Sept. 23, 2025: Groundbreaking “Healthy Indoor Air” high-level side event at the United Nations General Assembly in New York City. This event led to the creation of Air Club, an international organization for anyone interested in healthy indoor air.

Sept. 30, 2025: Children and teenagers are twice as likely to develop Long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More after an initial infection, a large new study has found.

LATEST NEWS

PMC COVID Update, Week of Nov 10, 2025 (U.S.). This is the most recent report that the PMC is providing. Because the CDC is expected to update their wastewater data page today (Nov. 21), the PMC will not issue another update until November 24, 2025. For additional data for other pathogens and other countries, visit the PMC Data website, and follow PMC Data author Mike Hoerger on Twitter.

🔹301,000 new daily infections based on wastewater-derived models

🔹1 in 162 people (0.6%) actively infectious

🔹Levels the past 2 months corrected upward by Biobot

🔹"Lull point" estimated between Nov 5-21. Rising soon.

“The central estimate of the forecast suggests we will surpass 500,000 new daily infections on Nov 22. There's a 25% chance of a prolonged lull like last year. More likely, we are in wave territory by the end of the month.”

November 17, 2025: Long-time disability activist Alice Wong passed away at the age of 51. Alice was well-known through her activism on social media and in her home city of San Francisco. Her death is being mourned by disability advocates around the world.

November 17, 2025: Strange structures found in the blood of those with Long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More, which may lead to identifying biomarkers and providing treatments. “In 2022, Thierry and his colleagues showed that patients with long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More have elevated levels of neutrophil extracellular traps, or NETs. These are sticky webs of DNA and enzymes released by white blood cells to capture and contain pathogens invading the body…Patients with long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More, the analysis revealed, had a dramatically higher number of microclots than the healthy controls – a 19.7-fold increase on the median. These clots were also larger than the microclots seen in healthy blood.An increase in NETs also correlated with the rise in microclots in long COVIDPersistent and new symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19. More patients. But then the researchers found something new: The NETs appeared to be physically embedded within the microclots, an association that had never before been reported.”

November 17, 2025: First ever human case of H5N5 avian flu confirmed in Washington state. "’The affected person has a mixed backyard flock of domestic poultry at home that had exposure to wild birds. The domestic poultry or wild birds are the most likely source of virus exposure; however, a public health investigation is ongoing,’ the health department said in a press release.”

November 19, 2025: US measles cases pass 1,750 as Utah-Arizona outbreak grows.

November 19, 2025: The CDC has revised their website’s page about autism and vaccines to say that “The claim "vaccines do not cause autism" is not an evidence-based claim because studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism.”

November 20, 2025: The UK COVID-19A disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, leading to respiratory illness. Inquiry, an independent public team charged with investigating the UK response to COVID, today released an 800-page report that found the actions of the UK's four governments "repeatedly amounted to a case of ‘too little, too late’". The report suggests that if the nation-wide lockdownA public health measure restricting movement to prevent disease spread. that began on March 23, 2020 had been instituted just one week earlier, it would have prevented up to 23,000 deaths from COVID.

and now for your moment of zen

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