With the U.S. Social Security Administration set to officially announce its 2021 cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) in about a month, data suggests seniors who depend on Social Security for their retirement may be disappointed, reports CNBC . The Senior Citizens League estimates that the COLA could be about 1.3 percent, based on Consumer Price Index data through August. That is compared to the 1.6% increase in benefits in 2020, while last year's bump was 2.8 percent. The Senior Citizens League's Mary Johnson said a 1.3 percent adjustment would be the fifth instance since 2010 of a small or no increase. The COLA was zero in 2010, 2011, and 2016, while in 2017 it was 0.3 percent. The average COLA has been 1.4 percent 2010, while annual hikes averaged 3 percent between 1999 and 2009. Critics say the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers used to calculate the adjustment does not account for the price changes that impact older consumers, especially housing and medical costs. Johnson noted that the 1.3 percent estimate could possibly rise to 1.4 percent by October, barring a further drop in the price of gasoline.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has lifted restrictions on senior long-term care communities imposed since COVID-19 hit the state in March, reports the Gwinnett Daily Post . As of 5:30 p.m. Tuesday, nursing, personal-care, assisted-living, hospice, and other senior-care communities have been permitted to reopen, subject to continuing measures aimed at reducing the spread of the virus. They will be allowed to reopen via a three-phase process, with the last phase being the least restrictive. Decisions on which phase to implement are determined by factors like the number of coronavirus cases in the local community or inside the facility; access to personal protective equipment; whether the community has adequate staffing; and local hospital capacity. Phase 1 restrictions will ban visits for the most part, while non-medically necessary trips should be avoided and screening of residents and staff will be held three times daily under both phases 1 and 2. Visits are permitted under phases 2 and 3, with outside visits preferable. Limited non-medically necessary trips also will be allowed under the second and third phases, while screening of residents and staff will only be required once a day in Phase 3.

One in four baby boomers say they are postponing retirement because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the uncertainty it adds to their investment portfolio, reports FOX59 . "Their investments are a hodge-podge of assets accumulated of 20 or 30 years but there really isn't a sound financial planning strategy in place," says Strategic Wealth Designers adviser Mike Reeves. "We see clients all the time who come in with a bunch of statements but they really don't know if their investments are working together and what kind of safety nets are in place to protect against the huge crash like we saw in early March." Many boomers are anxious that not only are their assets volatile, but that a full Social Security benefit will be unavailable to them. Reeves recommends that they compose a financial plan that makes Social Security an add-on bonus rather than an imperative for everyday life. "Social Security is a great additional piece of an investment portfolio but it has to act in a supporting role and not as the main character," he explains. "Build your investment portfolio by putting back at least 10 percent of what you make every month, take advantage of company matches in your 401K, and build a robust financial plan that will endure every worst-case scenario that could arise, just like what has happened in 2020."

Howard University Radio's WHUR News will be airing a special two-part series titled "Making It Plain . . . African-Americans and the COVID-19 Vaccine" on Wednesday, Sept. 16 and Thursday, Sept. 17. The programs will be streamed here and present facts from Black experts about the current status of clinical trials, how a coronavirus vaccine would work, and if it will be the African-American community's best defense against the pandemic. "Making It Plain" is being presented in partnership with the Black Coalition Against COVID-19.

Professor Michal Schwartz of Israel's Weizmann Institute of Science is preparing for the launch of a Phase 1 clinical trial of a potentially transformative treatment for Alzheimer's disease, reports the Jerusalem Post . The therapy, devised by ImmunoBrain Checkpoint and based on two decades of work by Schwartz, highlights the importance of the immune system in maintaining healthy brain function and repair. The trial will assess ImmunoBrain Checkpoint's proprietary antibody, IBC-Ab002, which is targeted to augment immunity and activate brain repair processes in individuals with Alzheimer's. The Alzheimer's Association earmarked a $1 million grant to ImmunoBrain Checkpoint earlier to move forward on the trial. "Although the brain is the highest tissue in terms of consumption of oxygen and it is dependent on robust blood supply, there is no direct contact between the blood vessels and the brain's tissue," said Schwartz. "Accordingly, the brain has long been considered to be isolated from the immune system." Schwartz's investigations revealed that cognitive performance of the brain is impaired if the immune system is compromised. Moreover, immune system function impacts the timing of Alzheimer's disease onset and progress, and fortifying immunity can alter the disease.

Biotechnology firm Cassava Sciences announced that its Alzheimer's drug, sumifilam, had positive results in treating Alzheimer's patients in a phase 2 study, with findings to be presented at H.C. Wainwright's 22nd Annual Global Investment Conference, reports Forbes . Sumifilam targets filamin A, a protein that may influence the toxic proteins that cause Alzheimer's, when modified. "Amyloid disrupts the protein tau, and in order to do that it requires . . . filamin A," says Cassava' Sciences' Lindsay Burns. She adds that restoring filamin A to its normal form will not cause amyloid to disrupt tau. The study indicated that among 64 subjects, sumifilam recipients showed improvements in multiple disease-indicating biomarkers and cognition tests versus participants treated with a placebo. Those treated with 100 milligrams of sumifilam exhibited an 18 percent decrease in total tau levels and a 14 percent increase in amyloid beta42. Those on sumifilam also did better on memory tests. Cassava Sciences also is developing a diagnostic blood test for Alzheimer's, which would allow people to start treatment early, and hopefully decelerate or even reverse the disease.

A new study of 565 Hispanic older adults in the Journal of Applied Gerontology suggests a culturally adapted exercise program has potential for improving their physical functioning, reports the University of Illinois News Bureau . Most participants, who were primarily women, reported having at least two chronic conditions at the outset, with 84 percent overweight or obese, and many exhibiting moderate physical impairment in lower extremities. Participants met weekly for a one-hour group exercise class focused on muscle strength, balance, endurance, and flexibility; they also met once weekly for a group discussion led by a bilingual health educator on either general health topics for the controls or an age-reattribution curricula highlighting physical activity to prevent or diminish aging-affiliated chronic health conditions. "Regardless of whether they were in the treatment group or the control group, participants showed significant improvements in their physical capabilities after 12 and 24 months compared with baseline," noted Brett Burrows with the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Yet the age-reattribution curricula did not apparently bring any additional benefits to treatment group members, like boosting their motivation to stay physically active or changing self-defeating cultural ideas that link aging to poor health. One implication is that Hispanic older adults are willing to pursue recreational physical activities that improve them physically when low-cost, culturally adapted programs are available.

The National Poll on Healthy Aging indicates that loneliness among older adults doubled in the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic, reports EurekAlert . In June 2020, 56 percent of people older than 50 said they sometimes or often felt isolated from others, versus 27 percent who felt that way in a 2018 survey. Nearly half of those polled in June also felt more isolated than they had just before the pandemic's U.S. arrival, while a third said they felt they had less companionship than before. Moreover, 46 percent of older adults said in June that they infrequently engaged with friends, neighbors, or family outside their household compared with 28 percent who reported this in 2018. Still, those respondents who said they interacted with people in their neighborhood at least once a week were less likely to say they had suffered forms of loneliness. Technology also helped many reach out to others, including the 59 percent who reported using social media at least once weekly, and the 31 percent who used video chat at least once weekly. In addition, many older adults said they engaged in healthy behaviors despite the pandemic, including 75 percent who went outdoors or interacted with nature, and 62 percent who exercised several times a week. "The intersection of loneliness and health still needs much study, but even as we gather new evidence, all of us can take time to reach out to older neighbors, friends, and relatives in safe ways as they try to avoid the coronavirus," explained University of Michigan School of Public Health Professor John Piette.

Remote-work employees lack recognition rituals, without which many working from home during in the COVID-19 crisis can feel unmoored, reports Gallup Workplace . Such rituals are more critical than ever, as the pandemic has motivated many workers to heroically step up to maintain the business. According to Gallup, one in four employees worldwide agree that they have received recognition or praise for doing good work in the last week — and if organizations could raise that ratio to six in 10, they could witness a 28 percent improvement in quality and a 31 percent shrinkage in absenteeism. Technology-based recognition tools and peer-to-peer recognition systems lack the spontaneity of authentic and individualized feedback, while Gallup finds that the most meaningful recognition comes from a manager, a high-level leader, or the company CEO. Remote-work recognition rituals that leaders can offer include initiating team meetings by recognizing someone on the call who did outstanding work in the past week. Another suggestion is to highlight three very helpful people each Friday. Making recognition special creatively, like sending a note through traditional mail, can yield benefits as well. Employers whose teams are fully remote also can set up regular, nonrequired virtual hangouts for social connection, as venues for offering encouragement, support, and praise.

A study from researchers at Saint Louis University's College for Public Health and Social Justice published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that doctors affiliated with health systems had better performance scores, fewer payment penalties, and more payment bonuses under the Medicare merit-based incentive payment system (MIPS) than unaffiliated clinicians, reports Healthcare Finance News . MIPS will increasingly link outpatient physicians' Medicare payments with their performance, and payment penalties and bonuses will account for 9 percent of total Medicare reimbursement by 2022. The management, administration, and technological infrastructure for reporting performance measures to the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will be critical for maximizing success in MIPS. Analysis of 636,552 clinicians' performance determined that those affiliated with health systems saw mean performance scores of 79 versus 60 for unaffiliated clinicians on a scale of 0 to 100. Doctors affiliated with health systems were 99 percent less likely to be hit with payment penalties and 29 percent more likely to gain exceptional performance bonus payments than those not affiliated with health systems. The financial impact of MIPS is that system-affiliated clinicians will have more Medicare payment resources at the cost of unaffiliated clinicians.