Since early March 2023 when COVID-19 restriction measures in Hong Kong were abated, a resurgence of local cases, caused predominantly by Omicron XBB and its descendant lineages, has been observed.^1,2 Given the enduring threat of COVID-19 infection and long COVID, vaccination remains the key prevention strategy to safeguard public health, particularly the high risk group.  In a recent interview with Omnihealth Practice, Prof. Thomas, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology in SUNY Upstate Medical University, shared his insights on the effectiveness of the new bivalent BNT162b2 vaccine (original/BA.4-5 strains) and the future global vaccination strategies in response to the emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants.

Multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) is a novel post-infectious inflammatory condition associated with Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), characterized by prolonged fever, gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms and rash.¹ To some extent, the disease resembles Kawasaki disease (KD), toxic shock syndrome (TSS), and hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH), increasing the difficulty in differential diagnosis in clinical practice.¹ In an interview with Omnihealth Practice, Dr. Cheung, Wai-Yin Eddie discussed the challenge of evaluating suspected MIS-C cases in real-life scenarios and emphasized the importance of timely intervention among children who were infected with or recently recovered from COVID-19. He also shared a clinical case of a 7-year-old girl with MIS-C who presented with early MIS-C symptoms and was managed with immunomodulatory treatment, swiftly achieving favorable outcomes.