COVID

A highly contagious strain of COVID-19 has a Rapid City health care professional urging people to get their booster shot prior to this year's Sturgis Motorcycle Rally.

Shankar Kurra, MD, is vice-president of medical affairs at Monument Health. He joins us to discuss the latest omicron subvariant and what you can do to protect yourself and your community.

Shankar Kurra, M.D., discusses how to reduce COVID exposure risk now that a judge has voided the federal mask mandate on public transportation.

Dr. Joshua Crabtree is senior vice president of clinical operations at Sanford Health. He joins us with a COVID update where we look to the pandemic horizon as well as discuss the basics for dealing with COVID here at home.

"I'm telling folks to weigh their risks and understand their health conditions. I think we can have really good confidence in the recommendations from the FDA and CDC. And hopefully, with time we get more evidence to support the safety and the efficacy of the vaccines."

A partnership between Avera Research Institute and the Arkansas Children's Research Institute will study the long-term effects of COVID-19. This study is open to children and young adults under the age of 25. Amy Elliott is Chief Clinical Research Officer at Avera Research Institute.

BA.2 is a sub-lineage of the Omicron variant of COVID-19. It's more prevalent overseas, but there are cases in the United States. How should we behave in the face of this new information?

There are 64 people with COVID-19 in South Dakota hospitals. The number of South Dakotans actively infected with COVID has fallen to about 2,400.

Chinese authorities are reporting a new, fast-spreading variant of COVID-19.

The CDC reports that all of South Dakota is now at low or medium COVID-19 spread level. They say vulnerable populations should continue taking basic precautions.