In a recent investigation notice, CDC warned that at least 26 people across 11 states have recently been infected in a salmonella outbreak linked to small turtles, with at least nine being hospitalized, in today's bite-sized hospital and health industry news from the District of Columbia, Georgia, and Massachusetts.

• District of Columbia: The Biden administration on Tuesday announced it is granting $1.4 billion through the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response via HHS to a group of pharmaceutical companies, nonprofits, and nongovernmental organizations to fund the development of "a new generation of tools and technologies to protect against COVID-19 for years to come." HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra said the program is "really going to help us make sure we're ready for whatever comes around the corner. And we don't want to wait till we get to the corner to figure out what that is." (Choi, The Hill, 8/22)
• Georgia: CDC in a recent investigation notice warned that at least 26 people across 11 states have recently been infected in a salmonella outbreak linked to small turtles, with at least nine being hospitalized. "Don't kiss or snuggle your turtle, and don't eat or drink around it," CDC warned. "This can spread Salmonella germs to your mouth and make you sick." The agency added that turtles with shells less than four inches long are "a known source of illness." (Cho, Washington Post, 8/23)
• Massachusetts: The risk of death for patients 65 and older who were hospitalized with COVID-19 and later discharged is twice as high as older patients who were hospitalized with the flu and discharged, according to a recent study from Harvard Medical School published in the British Medical Journal. For the study, researchers looked at the outcomes of 1 million Medicare beneficiaries admitted to hospitals with COVID-19 between March 2020 and August 2022 and compared that to 58,000 Medicare beneficiaries admitted to hospitals with the flu between March 2018 and August 2019. Dhruv Kazi, co-author of the study and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard, said the goal of the study was "to better understand long-term outcomes after patients are discharged from the hospital so as to help tailor support strategies and guide resource allocation for future surges of COVID-19 or during future pandemics." (Hollowell, Becker's Clinical Leadership, 8/22)