Shadow of a Pandemic: Persistence of Prenatal SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies in Newborn Blood Spots.

To investigate COVID-19 surveillance among pregnant women, the California Genetic Disease Screening Program conducted a screening performance and seroprevalence evaluation of maternal SARS-CoV-2 antibodies detected in banked newborn dried blood spots (DBS). We obtained seropositive results for 2890 newborn DBS from cohorts in 2020 and 2021 using Enable Bioscience's Antibody Detection by Agglutination-PCR (ADAP) assay for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. To infer maternal infection, we linked 312 women with a known laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 episode with their newborn's DBS SARS-CoV02 antibody result.

First Three Years' Experience of Mucopolysaccharidosis Type-I Newborn Screening in California.

Objective: To report on the first 3 years of mucopolysaccharidosis type I (MPS I) newborn screening (NBS) in the large and diverse state of California.

Study Design: The California Genetic Disease Screening Program began universal NBS for MPS I on August 29, 2018. The screening uses a 2-tiered approach: an α-L-iduronidase (IDUA) enzyme activity assay followed by DNA sequencing for variants in the IDUA gene.

Minimizing the Impact of COVID-19 in a County Jail Environment to Protect a Vulnerable Population.

At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, there was conflicting information about the spread of the virus. Despite this, early and aggressive protective measures were implemented by a multidisciplinary team within the Riverside County Department of Corrections to mitigate the potential impact of the pandemic on its five county jails. We believe this helped result in a low incidence of severe COVID-19 infections, low rate of spread, and low mortality in these jails, even while local community spread was much higher.

Impact of prenatal heavy metal exposure on newborn leucocyte telomere length: A birth-cohort study.

Arsenic, cadmium and lead are toxic environmental contaminants. They were shown to be associated with telomere length (TL) in adults. Although they can cross the placental barrier, the effect of prenatal exposure of these metals on newborn TL is unknown.

Association of cadmium and arsenic exposure with salivary telomere length in adolescents in Terai, Nepal.

Background: Cadmium and arsenic are ubiquitous metals commonly found in the environment which can harm human health. A growing body of research shows telomere length as a potential biomarker of future disease risk. Few studies have examined the effects of metals on telomere length and none have focused on adolescents.