A survey of 1,007 U.S. adults published in JAMA Network Open said front-line healthcare workers, children, and older adults should receive priority if or when a COVID-19 vaccine is available, reports United Press International . Ninety-two percent of respondents felt front-line doctors treating patients infected with the virus should be vaccinated first, while 81 percent said younger people and seniors need to be at or near the head of the list. "Our findings demonstrate that Americans do perceive that high risk of death is an important criterion for vaccine allocation," explained University of Minnesota Professor Sarah Gollust. Other groups respondents categorized as warranting priority for available vaccines included "middle-aged" adults at high risk (75 percent) and non-medical "essential" workers (72 percent), while 64 percent of respondents said pregnant women also should be assigned priority. "In the survey, we told all respondents that 'at least at first, there may not be enough to go around,' so all respondents who answered the survey would have read this, but we can't assess from this study whether they were already aware of this idea, though.," Gollust noted.

San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg has signed the national Aging Connected pledge to help get local seniors online, reports News 4 San Antonio . The pledge was launched by the nonprofit Older Adults Technology Services (OATS) and the Humana Foundation as an initiative to connect at least 1 million U.S. seniors to the Internet by June 2022, ensuring their access to affordable broadband. "I was pleased to be the first mayor to sign the 'Mayors for Aging Connected Pledge,'" Nirenberg stated. "COVID-19 has greatly affected in-person means of social connection, information sharing, and social service for everyone, but especially for older adults. Factor in no access to Internet or a device, and the consequences become more severe: lack of access to public health information, diminished social support, and high rates of social isolation." OATS called its plan a category of network linking service providers and elected officials. "This pledge will help hold community leaders accountable in taking actionable steps to move the needle forward," said OATS Texas State Director DeAnne Cuellar. "We may have started in San Antonio, but we are calling on mayors across geographies to help make a change."

The 40 West Arts District in Colorado received a $9,000 grant from the AARP to help connect multigenerational communities through art, reports NBC 9 Colorado . One application of that grant was a socially distanced and masked performance at the Residences at Creekside senior community in Lakewood, staged on Wednesday by the Handsome Little Devils company. The performance included a giant blow-up squid. "This is very silly and it's very frivolous, but it's done with a much higher intention and that intention I think is what resonates," said artistic director Cole Huling. "And there's an authenticity to that." Creekside resident Helen Mossman called the performance "awesome, very awesome. We needed this uplifting with all of this stuff with the virus going on and everything. And a lot of my friends here have been real depressed."

A study in JAMA Network Open has validated a dementia marker that may help doctors identify patients who have the condition or are at risk of developing it, reports the Harvard Gazette . Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers compiled the Brain Age Index (BAI), a model that uses artificial intelligence and sleep data to estimate the difference between a person's chronological age and the biological age of their brain when computed by electroencephalogram during sleep. A higher BAI indicates deviation from normal brain aging, which could signal the presence and severity of dementia. The team computed values for 5,144 sleep tests in 88 persons with dementia, 44 with mild cognitive impairment, 1,075 with cognitive symptoms but no impairment diagnosis, and 2,336 without dementia. BAI values increased across the groups with the degree of cognitive impairment, and subjects with dementia had an average value of about four years older than those without dementia. BAI values also correlated with neuropsychiatric scores from standard cognitive evaluations performed before or after the sleep study. "BAI has potential as a screening tool for the presence of underlying neurodegenerative disease and monitoring of disease progression," suggested Alice D. Lam at MGH.

A new Northwestern Medicine study published in the Journal of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences found some older adults whose brains exhibit tangles and sticky plaques that can interfere with cognition and memory may have more cognitive resilience than others because of their personalities, reports News-Medical . Those with a stronger tendency toward self-discipline, organization, diligence, high achievement, and motivation — also known as higher conscientiousness — were more cognitively resilient. Meanwhile, more neurotic individuals had a greater likelihood of worse cognitive function than expected given the amount of neuropathology detected postmortem. "These findings provide evidence that it is possible for older adults to live with the neuropathology associated with Alzheimer's disease and related dementias while maintaining relatively healthy levels of cognitive function," said Northwestern Professor Eileen Graham. She added that "since it is possible for personality to change, both 'volitionally' and through interventions, it's possible that personality could be used to identify those who are at risk and implement early interventions to help optimize function throughout old age."

The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will be among the first public health organizations in the United States to receive federal funding to expand services for people with dementia under the Building Our Largest Dementia Infrastructure for Alzheimer's (BOLD) Act, reports the Portland Press Herald . The organization said it will receive $200,000, which can be renewed annually through 2023. The BOLD Act was signed into law at the end of 2018, and empowers the U.S. CDC to allocate up to $20 million a year for five years to local entities that deliver dementia care and support. Maine CDC said it is among the first 15 public health groups to receive this funding.

Best Buy's health unit has launched a new flip phone — LivelyFlip — that can interface with Amazon's Alexa voice assistant and offer telehealth features to connect seniors to on-demand providers, reports the Business Insider . The device's Amazon voice-powered technology lets seniors make calls and send texts, while its urgent call button links users directly to 24/7 access to care teams at GreatCall. With more seniors adopting virtual care, the rollout of senior-focused telehealth tech should remove lingering obstructions to widespread adoption, including limited technology access and experience. The COVID-19 pandemic has spurred rapid adoption of telehealth services for seniors as social distancing recommendations forced them to opt for virtual care. Yet impediments like lack of smartphones or tech knowledge have kept other seniors from these same services. It is believed that designing easy-to-access solutions should help sustain the momentum of telehealth adoption among seniors after the pandemic.

A study in JAMA Internal Medicine suggested more than half of all clinical trials of vaccines and potential treatments for COVID-19 are "at high risk for excluding older adults," reports United Press International . Moreover, 23 percent of the 847 trials reviewed had an age "cutoff" that would exclude adults 65 to 80 years old. Just 30 percent of the trials had no aged-based exclusion criteria. Fifty-three percent of the trials had either age-based exclusions or exclusions "preferentially affecting older adults," which placed them at "high risk for excluding older adults." "Older adults, particularly those in their 70s and 80s, may be systematically excluded from the clinical trials necessary to develop and test COVID-19 vaccines and treatments," warned Sharon Inouye at the Marcus Institute for Aging Research's Aging Brain Center. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Americans 60 and older accounted for less than 20 percent of new COVID-19 cases across the country in August, attributed to improved prevention measures. Yet Inouye said adults 65 and older have comprised roughly 40 percent of those hospitalized and 80 percent of those who die from COVID-19. "My biggest concern is that without clinical trial testing, older adults will ultimately be denied treatments and vaccines — as a result, equitable distribution to this population will not be possible, and this will be an egregious oversight," Inouye said.

Join experts from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and the Administration for Community Living at Health and Human Services (HHS) for a free webinar. Due to popular demand, a second session of this webinar is now being offered on Thursday, October 8, 2020 from 11-12 am ET. The FTC will begin the program with an overview of coronavirus-related scams targeting older adults. The CFPB will share resources to help older adults avoid financial distress due to the pandemic. HHS will conclude the webinar with a discussion of the role of the aging network, including Adult Protective Services, legal services attorneys and Long-term Care Ombudsman program experts. The panelists will share government resources for aging service providers and older consumers. Presenters include Hilary Dalin - HHS, Administration for Community Living; Lisa Weintraub Schifferle - CFPB, Office for Older Americans; and Colleen Tressler - FTC, Division of Consumer and Business Education.

President Trump on Monday announced the federal government would ship 150 million rapid tests to U.S. states, reports Reuters . He said the tests would mainly be used for opening schools and ensuring safety at senior communities. Trump added that 50 million tests will go to the "most vulnerable communities," including nursing and assisted living communities. He stated that 6.5 million tests will be shipped this week and the rest in the weeks ahead. The rapid tests were procured from Abbott Laboratories in August. Abbott said it would scale production capacity to 50 million tests monthly by October, and that it could currently produce "tens of millions," meaning full distribution to all states and territories will take at least several months. Trump, Vice President Mike Pence, and White House virus adviser Scott Atlas cautioned that more positive COVID-19 cases may result from accelerated testing.