(Timeline)
Here are selected news stories relative to the Covid-19 pandemic (and directly or indirectly the science behind it) for the month of May 2020, starting with the most recent news. (Let me know if you hit a paywall or if you find scientific misinformation.)
Return to the latest news on the timeline
Back to June 1, 2020
Note that you may click on dark blue words or terms to see their meaning in the glossary.
May 31, 2020
NYT: Will Protests [in the US] Set Off a Second Viral Wave?
BNR: In 2021, Bulgaria expects to reach economic level before Covid-19
- “The forecasts are that in 2021 Bulgaria will be able to restore the economic conditions before the pandemic.”
- “The 60% state support measure for salaries and social security contributions has saved 240,000 jobs. Without the “60/40″ measure, unemployment in the country would now be 18%, the minister stressed.”
Bulgaria seems to be one of the countries that have best managed to survive the first wave of the pandemic. It was the last European Union country to have its first Covid-19 case. It learned from the hard hit countries to the west and took measures early. It followed advice from the WHO and the ECDC. Strict measures focused on restricting events and business-customer interactions, and also imposed night curfews and restrictions of non-essential travel from city to city, without however disrupting daily life as much as has happened in other countries. – MH
May 30, 2020
CNN: One in 10 Covid-19 patients with diabetes die within a week, study finds
- In one study by French researchers at day 7 of hospitalization about 20% of diabetic Covid-19 patients were already on ventilators and another 10% had already died.
- “So, basically being above the age of 70 and being male with diabetes and being overweight or obese really had a major [effect] on the outcome.”
CNN: How Vietnam managed to keep its coronavirus death toll at zero
- Official numbers for Vietnam are 328 cases and 0 deaths.
- Vietnam took very conservative measures early without waiting for any guidelines from the WHO. Authorities assumed the worst.
- “Fighting this epidemic is like fighting the enemy,” the Prime Minister said.
- Immediate lockdown of a community after cases were detected.
- Rigorous contact tracing
- Use of media to search for all contacts plus contacts of contacts
- Direct contacts were quarantined in official centers
- 43% of the first 273 cases were asymptomatic.
- Clear communication and propaganda
- Situation updates online and through phone apps
- “Telephone hotlines”
- Through loudspeakers, posters, media
- Catchy hand-washing song
- Earlier epidemics have helped Vietnam prepare.
May 29, 2020
nature: Coronavirus research updates: The nose could be the body’s entry point to infection
Update May 5, 2021
- “The authors speculate that [think that maybe] the virus gets a foothold in the nose, then sneaks down the respiratory tract when breathed into the airways. They say the results support the use of masks and preventative measures such as nasal cleansing.”
This is the first time I see findings that suggest the effectiveness of “nasal cleansing” as a “preventative measure”. I’m wondering if this might soon be advised by experts. – MH
NYT: It’s Not Whether You Were Exposed to the Virus. It’s How Much.
nature: Safety fears over hyped drug hydroxychloroquine spark global confusion
- “Early laboratory studies suggested that the drug, as well as a similar medicine named chloroquine, might interfere with replication of the coronavirus, but trials in humans have been inconclusive so far.”
- “Researchers have been waiting for results from a number of randomized, controlled clinical trials testing hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 treatment.” Because of negative publicity many trials have now been halted. Yet many scientists find it is very important to continue with these trials.
NYT: Scientists Question Validity of Major Hydroxychloroquine Study
STAT: Contact tracing could help avoid another lockdown. Can it work in the U.S.?
Shareable Science: Misinformation
- One interesting point regards how people are not comfortable with “uncertainty”.
One of the best reports of why there is misinformation. – MH
STAT: When did the coronavirus start spreading in the U.S.? Likely in January, CDC analysis suggests
NPR: New Zealand Now Has Just 1 Active COVID-19 Case
May 28, 2020
SciAm: COVID-19 Vaccine Developers Search for Antibodies That ‘First Do No Harm’
SciAm: A Day in the Life of a COVID-19 Physician
STAT: Digital event: Confronting a Pandemic — Part 4: The foundations of reopening
- “The first part took place on May 7 and discussed new biopharma collaborative models for Covid-19. The second part took place on May 14 and discussed telemedicine during the Covid-19 pandemic. The third part took place on May 21.”
STAT: Wastewater testing gains traction as a Covid-19 early warning system
- Wastewater testing offers a possibility of detecting Covid-19 infections from RNA fragments passed through stools in order to warn of rising levels.
- As there have been problems with testing in the US, this might be a more accurate indicator.
- Finland, Germany, and the Netherlands already have wastewater testing programs for Covid-19.
- “Work is moving in a direction where you may be able to count the cases in a community, but we aren’t there yet.”
Science: Yemen was facing the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. Then the coronavirus hit
- In an ongoing civil war since 2015, many hospitals have been destroyed, 3.6 million people are displaced and 2.3 million people are affected by a cholera outbreak.
- The WHO is expecting Covid-19 to infect about half of Yemen’s population of around 30 million people and kill around 30,000 to 40,000 people, but it could be many more if the UN cannot obtain the necessary funds.
NPR: 14 Million People In Latin America, Caribbean At Risk Of Hunger, U.N. Report Says
May 27, 2020
Science: Can plasma from COVID-19 survivors help save others?
- Convalescent plasma has been known to help in recovery with other illnesses, such as the Spanish Flu of 1918. Some reports are promising with regards to Covid-19, but more trials are needed.
- “The difference in mortality—12.8% in the plasma group and 24.4% in the control group—was not statistically significant, but when the team compared the patients’ supplemental oxygen needs after transfusion, those on plasma did significantly better.”
STAT: How researchers will study Covid-19 vaccines (VIDEO)
nature: How countries are using genomics to help avoid a second coronavirus wave
- Genomics here refers specifically to using the data found in the entire RNA strand of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. This helps with contact tracing. As minor mutations occur regularly, a comparison of the entire genome (the entire strand) helps in finding links and clusters.
- So far the data of 32000 genomes has been shared online.
nature: Coronavirus misinformation needs researchers to respond
- “Researchers must be transparent and acknowledge what is known and what isn’t.”
- “It might be that a definite answer isn’t known, or that there are a range of possible answers. That is often the case in science. The study and practice of public engagement in science has shown that involving communities in the kinds of conversations that researchers have — conversations about how scientists search for evidence, and being transparent about what is known and not known — all helps to create and maintain trust.”
I agree that researchers should be communicating more with the public about what it knows, what it doesn’t know and how science research is done. Otherwise it is too easy for the brightest of individuals to be misinformed. – MH
DW: Dogs can sniff out COVID-19
Science: As India’s lockdown ends, exodus from cities risks spreading COVID-19 far and wide
SciAm: How Anti-Science Attitudes Have Impacted the Coronavirus Pandemic in Brazil
May 26, 2020
STAT: He experienced a severe reaction to Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine candidate. He’s still a believer
- Ian Haydon, 29, a Seattle resident was one of four trial volunteers (out of a total of 45) who experienced “Grade 3” adverse events in Moderna’s candidate vaccine trial. “Grade 3” refers to “side effects that are severe or medically significant but not immediately life-threatening”. Three of them, including Haydon, received the highest dose and experienced a systemic reaction. Haydon had a fever of over 103 °F (about 39.5 °C) and later fainted.
- “The goal of studies is to establish a threshold at which something might go wrong.” Safety standards for vaccines must be higher than for drugs because they are given to healthy people.
NPR: Virus Hunters Seek To Solve The Mystery Of Coronavirus Origins (VIDEO)
nature: Scientific networks are helping African countries to access coronavirus lab supplies
- Researchers in Africa are switching over to work with Covid-19 and are receiving donations of needed supplies, which have become too expensive for Africans, through their international connections
Science: Japan ends its COVID-19 state of emergency
- Japan, lacking the legal right to impose lockdown, has so far succeeded in driving down (within 1.5 months) the rate of new cases per day to nearly 0.5 per 100,000 people “with voluntary and not very restrictive social distancing and without large-scale testing”. They concentrated their efforts instead on finding clusters through contact tracing and then taking appropriate measures based on causes, for example by urging people to avoid “closed spaces, crowds, and close-contact settings”.
- However, there were many outbreaks in hospitals and nursing homes and the health-care system was stretched to “the point of collapse”.
- The state of emergency has been lifted but guidelines continue for events.
STAT: As Covid-19 tears through Navajo Nation, young people step up to protect their elders
NYT: Hunger Program’s Slow Start Leaves Millions of Children Waiting
May 25, 2020
Science: Study tells ‘remarkable story’ about COVID-19’s deadly rampage through a South African hospital
- The contagion throughout the hospital was mostly by staff and through the surfaces of medical devices, likely “from hands and shared patient care items like thermometers, blood pressure cuffs, and stethoscopes.”
This story is “remarkable” in how it could be reconstructed in such detail. This provides some evidence as to how very contagious the virus is through surfaces.
SCMP: Coronavirus spread would dramatically drop if 80% of a population wore masks, AI researcher says
NPR: Stockholm Won’t Reach Herd Immunity In May, Sweden’s Chief Epidemiologist Says
May 24, 2020
CNN: Report: Brazil’s indigenous people are dying at an alarming rate from Covid-19
- Activists claim that illegal land clearing in the Amazon, which has risen in the past year, increases the threat of the pandemic on the indigenous population.
- The average distance of these people to an ICU is 315 km. For 10% of them it is 700 to over 1000 km. Many are not reachable except by boat or plane. “There isn’t a single field hospital just for indigenous people.”
NPR: Brazilian Farmers Hatch A Plan To Send Healthy Food To The Favelas (PHOTOS)
May 23, 2020
CNBC: Why scientists are changing their minds and disagreeing during the coronavirus pandemic
NYT: Federal Scientists Finally Publish Remdesivir Data
May 22, 2020
nature: Coronavirus research updates: DNA vaccines protect monkeys from coronavirus
Updated May 5, 2021
- A team at Harvard Medical School tested six DNA vaccines they developed on rhesus macaques (monkeys). Their DNA instructs cells to create protein antigens based on the SARS-CoV-2 spike proteins. This elicited (produced) an antibody response. After these animals were then infected with the virus, their illness was less severe (with a lower viral load) than that of the unvaccinated (control) group.
Science: ‘The house was on fire.’ Top Chinese virologist on how China and U.S. have met the pandemic
Reuters: Beyond politics, gold-standard COVID-19 trials test malaria drug taken by Trump
STAT: What a big new study on malaria drugs as Covid-19 treatments tells us — and what it doesn’t
- A recent study on choroquine and hydroxychloroquine failed to give significant evidence that these drugs are effective against Covid-19. Moreover, it showed that these drugs have a dangerous side effect of causing irregular heart rhythms.
To obtain conclusive results, a drug trial must take into account the placebo effect, whereby the belief by either the patient or the doctor that a medication will have a specific effect can bias results. It is an accepted scientific “fact” that belief alone may affect the outcome of taking a drug. There are currently ongoing double-blind trials where neither the patient nor the doctor know whether the patient is taking the drug being tested or a placebo. Although it seems that many scientists are not expecting positive results from these trials, it will be interesting to see what they tell us. – MH
MNT: Using convalescent blood to treat COVID-19: The whys and hows
AP: Virus accelerates across Latin America, India, Pakistan
- Bihar is the Indian city with the most new cases. Some people walked great distances for over a month and in crowds to return there from work in other cities.
- ICUs are overburdened in Peru, Chile and Ecuador, even after strict shutdowns and quarantines.
- “The crematoriums are saturated” in the suburb of Ecatepec, Mexico City.
May 21, 2020
STAT: ‘It’s something I have never seen’: How the Covid-19 virus hijacks cells
- Interferon is a signaling molecule that tells neighboring cells to activate genes that slow down a viral attack. Chemokines are signaling molecules that summon B cells (that make antibodies) and “killer” T cells. Normally, interferon slows down the replication of the virus for a few days until the chemokines call for the cells that ultimately produce antibodies and finish the counterattack.
- SARS-CoV-2, in a way never seen before, blocks the set of genes in the host cell that produce interferon, but activates the set of genes that produce chemokines. In this way, viral replication is not slowed down, but the immune cells are called to action. This kills cells in the lungs that are a part of oxygen exchange, causing severe respiratory distress. [As chemokines are a subset of cytokines, this can explain the cytokine storm that has so far mystified scientists. – MH]
- It is the ORF3b gene in the viral RNA that produces a protein that blocks the genes that produce interferon.
- The elderly and individuals with comorbidities already have a weaker response to interferon, thus giving an explanation for their more severe cases.
- A new idea is therefore to treat patients with “type 1” interferon. One study showed that interferon can slow down the replication of SARS-CoV-2 (by a factor of up to 10,000) in lab-grown cells. However, there are some serious side effects to consider when treating with interferon. Clinical trials are already underway.
Science: Doctors race to understand rare inflammatory condition associated with coronavirus in young people
- A small number of children with Covid-19 have what the CDC now calls multisystem inflammatory syndrome, which is either the rare Kawasaki disease (known to affect only between one and three children in 10,000) or something similar to it. Among other symptoms, it includes inflammation in medium-size blood vessels throughout the body. It can lead to heart problems, loss of blood pressure or shock.
- This is accompanied by a cytokine storm that is more similar to that seen in many adults with severe symptoms of Covid-19 than to a typical case of Kawasaki disease.
- It is believed that there is a “genetic component” for risk to this condition. Research is being done through genetic testing that may lead to future treatments for children found to be at higher risk.
- One “puzzle” is that this condition has not been found in Covid-19 patients in Asia. This may be because it is so rare or because of a mutation in a strain coming from Europe.
- Two research projects are discussed that analyze data of children world-wide that have had this condition.
- It is also uncertain if adults might also be getting this condition.
nature: Structure of replicating SARS-CoV-2 polymerase
One animation is such a beautiful rendering of the structure of the enzyme that makes copies of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in a host cell. Another visualization shows how this polymerase enzyme makes a copy of an RNA strand. (The blue helical strand is the original RNA and the red strand is the new RNA strand being created.)
Forbes: How Low-Dose Radiation Could Be The Trick For Treating COVID-19
- “It’s the anti-inflammatory effects of radiation, not its antiviral action, that could be invaluable to helping patients with COVID-19.”
- 77 scientists who have received a Nobel prize have criticized the US government for stopping the funding of the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) in China, which researches bat viruses. Some people believe that the Covid-19 pandemic began with the virus escaping this lab, but there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that supports this idea. These scientists know of scientific reasons for why the research done in this lab is very important for learning more about SARS-CoV-2.
It is important that the US government and the public understand why the WIV researches bat viruses and its importance for helping to end this pandemic and for preventing future pandemics. Start to learn why by reading yesterday’s SciAm article on “spillover”. – MH
May 20, 2020
SciAm: Human Viruses Can Jump into Animals, Too—Sowing the Seeds of Future Epidemics
- There are somewhere between 260,000 and 1.6 million different animal viruses, but only slightly over 200 that affect humans.
- As viruses can exchange genetic material between them, creating novel viruses, it is particularly dangerous if they jump from humans to animals and back.
- The 2009 H1N1 flu virus (from pigs) had genetic material from humans, birds and two different species of pigs.
- Although a spillover from pigs is usually not that contagious between humans, there are great chances in the future of a severely contagious novel virus.
- However, Covid-19 is not likely to be spread from cats, dogs, etc. back to humans.
PopSci: Vets, farmers, and zookeepers can help prevent the next pandemic
PopSci: People who’ve had COVID-19 show promising disease-fighting cells in their blood
Updated on August 15, 2020?
- It is not yet certain that survivors of Covid-19 acquire long-lasting immunity, but one study gives us some evidence that they do, by discovering T cells, one kind of immune cell, in individuals with a mild case. These were seen to fight fragments of the virus in an expected manner.
- All 20 adults tested had one kind of T cell (“helper T cells“) and 70% had another kind (“killer T cells“).
- Moreover, they found “helper” T cells from half of a set of blood samples from 2015 to 2018 that also reacted to SARS-Cov-2 fragments, most likely from previous coronavirus infections causing the common cold.
STAT: Life with lupus: Trump’s hydroxychloroquine hype puts my treatment — and himself — at risk
- The author suffers from lupus (a disease that inflames the skin) and needs hydroxychloroquine, a drug that works for her condition. She fears that the hype (the exaggerated publicity) of this drug, for which there is too little evidence that it can treat Covid-19, will keep her and others from obtaining it for a disease it is known to treat effectively.
DW: Why infectious diseases like COVID-19 are on the rise (VIDEO)
MOVED OR REMOVED
A well-made video that explains various reasons for the increase of infected diseases in the world. The more people learn about science and search for the answers to such questions, the more one sees the consistency in explanations where science has advanced our knowledge of the world, as I see in the information given in this video. – MH
May 19, 2020
nature: Coronavirus research updates: An antibody blocks the new coronavirus and an older relative
Updated May 5, 2021
- An antibody (an immune signaling molecule) from a person who survived SARS has just been found to prevent today’s SARS-CoV-2 virus from infecting a human cell.
- It attaches to a different location on the spike than other kinds of antibodies. A cocktail (combination) of different antibodies appears to improve their effect.
STAT: Vaccine experts say Moderna didn’t produce data critical to assessing Covid-19 vaccine
- This article criticizes US drug maker Moderna of not providing important data in their press release two days ago describing optimistic results of the Phase I trial of its Covid-19 vaccine candidate. (See yesterday’s article below, also by STAT.)
- Moderna’s stock price rose sharply following their report, but several scientists criticized that this is not the way science is usually done. Results of any experiment or trial are supposed to be accompanied by data. Phase I is a short trial, it’s only the beginning of the long process towards an approved vaccine, lab tests were only completed on eight of the 45 participants, the remaining 37 participants might show different results and other experts need to see data because there’s always the chance that scientific results can be interpreted in other ways.
- It is also interesting that Moderna has obtained considerable US government money and is collaborating with the NIAID (headed by Dr. Fauci), yet there has been no report about this from them.
- The wording was also vague concerning how many antibodies were produced in the body as it was compared with those found in convalescent patients, who are known to have widely varying amounts of the antibody.
- There are still many open questions, for example whether or not these antibodies will last long enough in human bodies for the vaccine to be practical.
I can believe it is quite understandable that science cannot advance in an ideal way during a crisis. On the one hand scientific results need to be analyzed carefully, but on the other hand it is trying to advance as quickly as possible. It can be argued that the company’s motivation was to impress its stockholders rather than do its best to advance science. A very similar thing happened at the end of April with Gilead, where they provided results without data. Hopefully all scientists in both companies were honest in their interpretation of the results, but there is always the possibility of deceiving when data is withheld. – MH
STAT: Ventilators can save people with serious Covid-19. The people behind them are even more important
- A recent study indicates that 76% of NYC patients between the ages of 18 and 65 who were placed on ventilator died.
- The author, a medical care worker at a pediatric ICU (PICU) in NYC, gives reasons for why no ventilated patients had died in her unit although severely sick: much younger patients (maximum age in their 40s); patients had survived the transfer, meaning they were more stable; but also a higher staffing ratio (one or two patients per nurse vs. four); proper training vs. new or retrained personnel without the proper training.
- The focus during the height of the crisis in NYC was “ventilators”, but much more needs to be done for the patients on them.
Science: Why do some COVID-19 patients infect many others, whereas most don’t spread the virus at all?
- The existence of “superspreaders” makes it much more difficult to determine which kind of activities have a higher risk of spreading Covid-19 in order to avoid them.
- An expert at UCLA says “most people do not transmit”. Superspreaders might be only 10% of those infected and contribute to 80% of the spread. This can explain how the disease spread undetected globally for weeks and then appeared in clusters.
- Ideas for why include:
- Talking or singing loudly, perhaps producing aerosols
- As in a meat-processing plant or in a church choir
- Being infectious for only a short period of time.
- Talking or singing loudly, perhaps producing aerosols
CNBC: Wearing a mask can significantly reduce coronavirus transmission, study on hamsters claims
- A “first of its kind” study in Hong Kong where a fan blew air between cages containing hamsters. “Masks” were placed either on the cage with the healthy hamster or the infected hamster and any resulting contagion was compared to the situation without masks. The mask significantly reduced the transmission.
NYT: What We Know About Your Chances of Catching the Virus Outdoors
- Droplets can stay in the air for up to 14 minutes, but it is far less likely that these droplets would be infectious outdoors.
- In a study of over 7,300 cases in China only one individual was known to have caught Covid-19 outside, but he was talking to someone who had been in Wuhan.
I understand that being completely alone outdoors, far from other people, you are expected to be quite safe if you (or your clothes or anything that you are carrying) don’t touch anything and you don’t touch your face. – MH
PopSci: Herd immunity, contact tracing, and other terms to help you understand COVID-19
Updated on July 31, 2020
- An explanation of 18 scientific terms related to Covid-19.
SciAm: How COVID-19 Deaths Are Counted
- A death certificate contains spaces for the following information:
- Immediate cause of death.
- The events that led to the disease or incident.
- Contributing factors.
- In a hospital it is generally easy to know whether or not Covid-19 was the “final straw” that caused death. Outside of the hospital it might be difficult to know who died “of” vs. “with” Covid-19. To know for sure would require an autopsy, which is expensive, time-consuming and also now dangerous. Moreover, at least in the US there already was before the pandemic a shortage of people who are qualified to perform one.
- As state and local regulations differ in the US, this has increased public misunderstanding of how deaths should be recorded.
nature: Tackle coronavirus in vulnerable communities
- “The pandemic has hit care homes, prisons and low-income communities hardest. Researchers are ready to help, but need data to be collected and shared.”
- “Evidence-based strategies are urgently needed to prevent the spread of infection in shared settings, and to detect cases early.”
SciAm: Stopping Deforestation Can Prevent Pandemics (June 2020 issue)
- “The more we clear, the more we come into contact with wildlife that carries microbes well suited to kill us—and the more we concentrate those animals in smaller areas where they can swap infectious microbes, raising the chances of novel strains. Clearing land also reduces biodiversity, and the species that survive are more likely to host illnesses that can be transferred to humans.”
May 18, 2020
STAT: Early data show Moderna Covid-19 vaccine generates immune response
- US drug maker Moderna is conducting the Phase I trial for its vaccine candidate. Early results show that it produces neutralizing antibodies. The production of antibodies from combined low and middle doses in eight of the participants appears to be comparable to that “generally” produced by the virus. Safety results were also promising.
nature: Animal source of the coronavirus continues to elude scientists
- Computer models, cell studies and animal experiments are used to search for the exact animal that humans got the virus from.
- A geneticist says it would be “exceptionally lucky” if we can find it.
- We think it originally came from horseshoe bats, from which RNA was obtained that has a 96% match with SARS-CoV-2, maybe by way of an intermediate animal.
- A 96% match means the RNA had a common ancestor around 50 years ago.
- Scientists are checking samples that had been taken from bats, pangolins, etc.
- Scientists are also looking at RNA patterns that viruses may copy from their hosts.
- Scientists know so far that cats, fruit bats, ferrets, rhesus macaques, hamsters, pet dogs, tigers and lions at zoos, and farmed mink can carry the virus. Horseshoe bat cells can be infected in the lab, but not necessarily in the wild (in nature).
- Computers can check if the structure of the virus’s spike (a protein) can activate the ACE2 receptor to enter a cell (like a key that matches a lock).
- Scientists are focusing on farm animals that bats can access at night.
AP: Ukraine’s overburdened doctors in desperate virus fight
- “We are like in a war situation here, like on a front line!”
- Some Ukrainians returned from temporary work abroad with Covid-19.
- 20% of Covid-19 cases in Ukraine are of hospital workers.
- Knowing about the “weaknesses in the health care system,” a strict lockdown was ordered early on March 12, closing most companies. A partial reopening began on May 11 “under pressure from desperate farmers, businessmen and others”.
SciAm: From Headaches to ‘COVID Toes,’ Coronavirus Symptoms Are a Bizarre Mix
- There seems to be two possible main causes for the wide range of complications:
- Inflammation, a response of an immune system that is overreacting.
- Blood clotting anywhere in the blood vessels.
The Paris Review: How to Draw the Coronavirus
- An animated rendering of the SARS-CoV-2 spike:
May 17, 2020
NYT: ‘Straight-Up Fire’ in His Veins: Teen Battles New Covid Syndrome
- 14-year-old had heart failure from Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children caused by Covid-19.
- Once the heart and blood vessels fail, other organs can follow.
- “She told me if I go home now, by tomorrow, I’ll be dead.”
NYT: In the Shadows of America’s Smokestacks, Virus Is One More Deadly Risk
NPR: Senegal Pledges A Bed For Every Coronavirus Patient — And Their Contacts, Too
- In Senegal, everyone diagnosed with Covid-19, regardless of how mild the symptoms, is given a bed in a health center or in a hospital in order to be isolated and observed – “a key element to Senegal’s strategy to contain the virus”.
- Senegal’s Health Emergency Operation Center began in December 2014 to protect from Ebola that was spreading in Africa. The WHO and other countries have since helped Senegal to be prepared for a pandemic.
BBC: How Covid-19 is threatening Central America’s economic lifeline
- Many people in Central America depend on money being sent from family members working in the US, but now many of them have lost their jobs.
May 16, 2020
BBC: Coronavirus: A third of hospital patients develop dangerous blood clots
- Quickly spreading molecules in the blood may be causing blood clots.
- Blood thinners for preventing clots don’t always work, but increasing doses can cause bleeding and death.
- Another way to treat is by reducing the inflammation in the lungs that leads to clots.
PopSci: Where to find trustworthy information about COVID-19 and other health issues
I think the best way to combat misinformation online, in particular regarding controversial theories, is to present scientific information – as the vast majority of scientists understand it – at the right time, in the right place in the right way. We should not censor information, but we should make it clear to the public when most scientists are not in agreement with a particular “outlier” theory and explain why. Otherwise, the public gets the impression that the authorities are trying to suppress the truth. Science, because it deals with “objective truth” has the power to enlighten when people are honest and open to explaining it and understanding it. – MH
Reuters: Crowds at Wuhan clinics fear coronavirus testing could rekindle disease
- People waiting for Covid-19 tests in Wuhan (where the pandemic began) say they’re scared that they could catch the disease from others waiting for the test.
BBC: The unsurpassed 125-year-old network that feeds Mumbai
I added this page here, because if areas of the world social distance to flatten the curve, based on scientific predictions, we also must be prepared to feed the underprivileged. – MH
May 15, 2020
STAT: FDA says Abbott’s 5-minute Covid-19 test may miss infected patients
- This Covid-19 test seems to have many false negatives (someone who tests negative might still be infected). However, someone who tests positive is quite certain to be infected.
STAT: Testing everyone for Covid-19 doesn’t make sense. We need to test smarter, not harder
- False negatives happen very often in testing, which badly hinders success in contact tracing.
- There may also be “false alarms” as the RNA detected is still present while the individual has recovered and is no longer contagious.
nature: The sprint to solve coronavirus protein structures — and disarm them with drugs
- To stop the pandemic, it might be necessary to quickly find out the virus’s protein structures in order to design drugs and vaccines.
- One day after receiving the SARS-CoV-2 genome online on January 10, a world-wide network of scientists were ready to focus on this work.
- “The rate at which people are working at this is an order of magnitude faster than they’ve been able to work on other problems.”
Although this Nature article is a rather technical, in particular in its use of technical terms, I still recommend reading it, even if you can’t understand all of it. – MH
Science: New helmet and tent aim to protect health care workers from the coronavirus
- “Devices would use negative pressure to capture virus-laden particles during medical procedures”
CSM: From pandemic to famine: Can world meet food crisis fast enough?
Updated May 28, 2020
If we’re social distancing to save lives, we should certainly prevent people from dying in other ways, such as of hunger. (Unfortunately, even if a society does not formally social distance, the poor may sometimes easily be forgotten during a crisis.) – MH
nature: COVID-19 economics — first book hits shelves
DW: Autopsies reveal: Coronavirus is more than a lung infection (VIDEO)
May 14, 2020
nature: Dogs caught coronavirus from their owners, genetic analysis suggests
- Two dogs in Hong Kong probably caught Covid-19 from their owners according to genetic tests. As only two out of 15 dogs in the household tested positive, the chance of spreading from humans to dogs appears low.
- There’s no evidence that dogs can transmit the virus to people or other dogs, but it is not certain, so it must be researched further.
BBC: Coronavirus may never go away, World Health Organization warns
- Covid-19 might stay as an endemic virus as HIV has done.
- We need to realize that this pandemic will not go away soon.
- There is some “magical thinking” (optimistic, unscientific thinking) that locking down and reopening work well, but they are both dangerous.
DW: Coronavirus: Pandemic slowing in Europe, WHO says
- The WHO says there is “no room for complacency (feeling we already did enough)”.
- Germany will start opening borders on Saturday, but borders are expected to operate normally by June 15.
nature: Dozens of coronavirus drugs are in development — what happens next?
- One major challenge is the supply-chain (series of steps in obtaining materials, producing, transporting, etc.) negatively affected by the pandemic.
- Another major challenge is manufacturing up to hundreds of millions of doses.
- Remdesivir depends on a complex chemical synthesis [production] that takes several weeks and would be badly hurt by shortages of required ingredients.
- Demand will surely be much greater than the supply of the first drugs available.
STAT: Gilead should ditch remdesivir and focus on its simpler and safer ancestor
- Remdesivir is a pro-drug (the patient’s body needs first to process it chemically) requiring five steps in the body before it becomes GS-441524 triphosphate, the active compound.
- Gilead has also developed GS-441524, also a pro-drug, but GS-441524 triphosphate is produced in the body in only three steps. GS-441524 also can be manufactured in three steps instead of the seven steps for remdesivir.
Science: T cells found in COVID-19 patients ‘bode well’ for long-term immunity
- Two studies show people infected with Covid-19 have T cells (specific immune cells) that react to the virus and may help their recovery. They also found some people that never had Covid-19 but have these T cells, most likely because they had in the past been infected with other coronaviruses [for example with colds].
- Killer T cells “kill” infected cells. “The severity of disease can depend on the strength of these T cell responses.”
- “Before these studies, researchers didn’t know whether T cells played a role in eliminating SARS-CoV-2, or even whether they could provoke a dangerous immune system overreaction.”
NPR: FDA Cautions About Accuracy Of Widely Used Abbott Coronavirus Test
- A study reported that the Abbott test might be missing up to 48% of the infections. These are called false negatives.
- “The Trump administration has promoted the test as a key factor in controlling the epidemic in the U.S., and it’s used for daily testing at the White House.”
- FDA office says they are continuing to look into this.
- Abbott says that a special solution they were transported in known as “viral transport media” could be to blame and that one should only test samples placed directly into the device.
DW: Coronavirus: When will the second wave of infections hit?
PopSci: We have the tools to contain COVID-19 misinformation, we just aren’t using them
I think the best way to combat misinformation online is to present scientific information – as the vast majority of scientists understand it – at the right time, in the right place in the right way. We should not censure information, but we should make it clear to the public when most scientists are not in agreement with a particular “outlier” theory and why. Otherwise, the public gets the impression that the authorities are trying to suppress the truth. Science, because it deals with “objective truth” has the power to enlighten when people are honest and open to explaining it and understanding it. – MH
SciAm: COVID-19 Is like an X-ray of Society
- “The disease’s unequal impacts on different segments of the population are illuminating long-standing structural injustices.”
NYT: India’s ‘Maximum City’ Engulfed by Coronavirus
- “Overflowing hospitals. Exhausted cops. Desperate slums. Here are images from Mumbai as the coronavirus upends the metropolis.”
Science: From Black Death to fatal flu, past pandemics show why people on the margins suffer most
- “Inequality made historical pandemics ‘worse than they had to be’”
Science: The coronavirus’ rampage through the body (VIDEO)
May 13, 2020
STAT: Cats can catch Covid-19 from other cats, study finds. The question is: Can we?
- None of the cats in this study looked like they were sick, but during six days they shed the virus from their nasal passages.
- They shed from 30,000 to 50,000 virus particles per swab. It is not known how many virus particles are infectious to humans, as such an experiment would be unethical.
- Still, the researchers advise people to consider keeping cats indoors, as it might be possible for cats to infect humans, although it seems much less likely than humans infecting cats.
STAT: Covid-19 experts lament dismissal of early warnings and disease’s impact on communities of color
- “Minorities in the U.S. and other countries, especially African Americans, have been infected with Covid-19 — and have been dying — at rates that far outnumber the percentage of the population these groups make up.”
- “To address the seemingly intractable trends, … governments need to work more aggressively toward equal access to high-quality medical care. Black people and members of other minority groups are subject to unconscious bias from health care workers and tend to receive poorer quality of care”.
NPR: Different … Models Are Starting To Converge: 110,000 Dead In U.S. By June 6
- A team at UMass Amherst, USA have combined different models into one ensemble projection.
- “The scientists are getting new data; they are updating their methods as they calibrate their models against the reality to date; and Americans have stopped social distancing to the same degree as they had been in March and April — requiring models that assumed a longer stay-at-home period to adjust their forecasts upward.”
- Individual models are sensitive to the latest data “in different ways” and therefore need to be modified every week, but with an ensemble projection “there’s a certain consistency and robustness”.
- “We’ve been sort of building the car as we’re driving it at 90 miles an hour down the highway. And we’re learning as we go.”
STAT: Testing failures have plagued the U.S. response to Covid-19. How did we get here?
CSM: Why Washington state was so prepared for its pandemic challenge
Updated May 20, 2020
BBC: Coronavirus: What does a ‘Covid-secure’ office look like? (VIDEO)
- Guidelines developed in the UK for companies to follow.
CSM: ‘In each other’s shadows’: Behind Irish outpouring of relief for Navajo
May 12, 2020
CNN: Covid-19 isn’t just a respiratory disease. It hits the whole body
- A 38-year old man had an aortic occlusion (a large blood clot in the main artery exiting the heart) that kept blood from reaching his leg. This is fatal in 20% to 50% of patients and rarely occurs in a 38-year-old.
- Covid-19 can also cause more than one organ to fail.
- It seems the virus causes inflammation that leads blood clots. The virus must be attacking the arteries directly.
- If the virus affects blood vessels, then any organ can be affected. “It is a very confusing picture. It’s going to take time to understand.”
- “It might cause children’s immune systems to overreact.”
NatGeo: Coronavirus in the U.S.: Where cases are growing and declining
Updated up to February 16, 2023
Visual Capitalist: Where COVID-19 is Rising and Falling Around the World
NYT: Latin America’s Outbreaks Now Rival Europe’s. But Its Options Are Worse.
NPR: Wuhan To Test All 11 Million Residents After New Coronavirus Cases Emerge
NPR: Argentina Reacted Early And Kept The Coronavirus Largely Contained
SciAm: How Coronavirus Spreads through the Air: What We Know So Far
- The virus that causes COVID-19 can persist in aerosol form, some studies suggest, the potential for transmission depends on many factors, including infectiousness, dose and ventilation
TBIJ: Stretched, secret supply chains hold Covid-19 patients’ lives in the balance
May 11, 2020
DW: How the novel coronavirus attacks our entire body
STAT: Inside the NIH’s controversial decision to stop its big remdesivir study
- “The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has described to STAT in new detail how it made its fateful decision: to start giving remdesivir to patients who had been assigned to receive a placebo in the study, essentially limiting researchers’ ability to collect more data about whether the drug saves lives — something the study, called ACTT-1, suggests but does not prove. In the trial, 8% of the participants given remdesivir died, compared with 11.6% of the placebo group, a difference that was not NYT: Fauci to Warn Senate of ‘Needless Suffering and Death’
- Dr. Anthony Fauci “top infectious disease expert” in the US has appeared often lately in the media.
- “If we skip over the checkpoints in the guidelines to: ‘Open America Again,’ then we risk the danger of multiple outbreaks throughout the country. This will not only result in needless suffering and death, but would actually set us back on our quest to return to normal.” – Dr. Fauci
- It seems unfortunate that the current pandemic has been very much politicized in the US during a period when political ideologies are split between Republicans (on the conservative side) and Democrats (on the liberal side). As I’ve indicated on my home page, knowing science is not enough for combating this pandemic, but it is my firm belief that knowing science is essential. We must also consider ethics during this situation of an unprecedented moral dilemma. I don’t have answers as to how much the lives cost of those who are dying with Covid-19. Science cannot and should not answer that question. Obviously, exaggerated measures will cause people to die in other ways. I believe the US should try to rise above political differences during this difficult time in order to reach compromises and avoid a potential tragedy from not properly respecting the truths that science can provide us with (from sources such as Dr. Fauci) and also knowing science’s limits and the importance of debating ethics above politics in as honest a way as possible. – MHstatistically significant.”
NYT: 64,000 Missing Deaths: Tracking the True Toll of the Coronavirus Outbreak
Updated February 9, 2021
nature: High risk of COVID-19 death for minority ethnic groups is a troubling mystery
Updated May 5, 2021
- “People who are not white face a substantially higher risk of dying from COVID-19 than do white people — and pre-existing health conditions [such as diabetes] and socioeconomic factors explain only a small part of the higher risk.”
- “The researchers say that there is an urgent need for better measures to protect people in minority ethnic groups from the disease.”
MXP: Researchers develop system to control COVID-19-related fever and coughing
- A clever use of cameras and AI (Artificial Intelligence), developed in Spain, is able to alert care home managers of residents with a fever or coughing.
May 10, 2020
NYT: Why the Path to Reopening New York City Will Be So Difficult
- “New York State is moving cautiously, anticipating a partial reopening later this month, mostly in rural areas.”
- “Nobody can tell you,” New York governor answers about when New York City can reopen.
- “The key to reopening is containing the virus, and that will take a vast infrastructure of testing and contact tracing unlike anything the United States has ever seen, public health experts say.”
- New York City mayor “is working to close up 100 miles of city streets to make it easier for residents to practice social distancing”.
- Measures considered for opening businesses include
- three shifts rather than one,
- temperature checks,
- not having big meetings,
- using shields and face guards when employees work near each other,
- removing salt and pepper shakers in cafeterias,
- not allowing reusable water bottles, and
- strict warnings when employees talk too near each other.
- NYC governor “ordered that city subways cease round-the-clock service, a practical change to clean cars and remove those sleeping in them, but one that struck at the very heart of New York’s up-all-night identity.”
Washington Post: Doctors keep discovering new ways the coronavirus attacks the body
- “Damage to the kidneys, heart, brain — even ‘Covid toes’ — prompts reassessment of the disease and how to treat it
NYT: Surviving Covid-19 May Not Feel Like Recovery for Some
- “Debilitating symptoms can last long after a person’s body has gotten rid of the coronavirus, a reality Italians are now confronting.”
- “It’s not the sickness that lasts for 60 days, it is the convalescence,” [an Italian hospital director] said. “It’s a very long convalescence.”
- “Any pneumonia damages the lungs, which can take months to heal, and doctors warn that the harm might not be completely reversible.”
- “Lack of energy and the sensation of broken bones…”
NYT: How Pandemics End
- Learn here about how pandemics in world history have ended.
Reuters: Northeast China hit by coronavirus infections, Wuhan reports new case
- “Chinese authorities reported on Sunday what could be the beginning of a new wave of coronavirus cases in northeast China, with one city in Jilin province being reclassified as high-risk, the top of a three-tier zoning system.”
- “[T]he first case for more than a month was [detected] in the city of Wuhan in central Hubei province where the outbreak was first detected late last year.”
BBC: Coronavirus: How lockdown is being lifted across Europe
- This is a good overview of how Europe is planning on reopening step by step.
BBC: Coronavirus lockdown around the world in pictures
Doctor Mike: Doctor Fact-Checks PLANDEMIC Conspiracy (VIDEO)
May 9, 2020
NPR: Public Health Experts Say Many States Are Opening Too Soon To Do So Safely
- “The early lesson that was learned, really, we learned from the island of Hokkaido in Japan, where they did a really good job of controlling the initial phase of the outbreak,” said Bob Bednarczyk, assistant professor of global health and epidemiology at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University in Atlanta. Because of that success, many of the restrictions on the island were lifted. But cases and deaths surged in a second wave of infections. Twenty-six days later, the island was back on lockdown.
DW: Coronavirus latest: Germany’s infection rate rises again
- “Germany’s R number rose to about 1.1, meaning that [on average] every infected patient passes the coronavirus to more than one other person.”
May 8, 2020
nature: Coronavirus blood-clot mystery intensifies
- “Studies from the Netherlands and France suggest that clots appear in 20% to 30% of critically ill COVID-19 patients.”
- Scientists are beginning to do studies based on the latest hypotheses, but are also trying to test anti-clotting medications.
- “Blood thinners don’t reliably prevent clotting in people with COVID-19, and young people are dying of strokes.”
- “D-dimer“, a piece of a protein produced when a clot dissolves is a “powerful predictor of mortality in hospitalized patients infected with coronavirus”.
- Clots are also found in capillaries (the smallest blood vessels in the body).
- “’This is really very new.’ It might explain “critically low blood-oxygen readings, and why mechanical ventilation often doesn’t help”.
- It might be that endothelial cells in the lining of blood vessels, which we have very recently discovered are targeted by Covid-19, lose their ability to keep the blood from clotting. Another possibility is that the overreaction of the immune system, known to occur in many patients, is indirectly causing the clotting.
- Patients might have “risk factors for clotting”, “a genetic predisposition to clotting”, or be “taking medications that increase the risk”.
- A “[r]ace to new therapies” based on these findings is also discussed.
NPR: The Coronavirus Is Mutating. That’s Normal. Does That Mean It’s More Dangerous?
- “[S]mall changes” are occurring “at a relatively predictable and steady rate of around 1-2 changes per month”.
- “Viruses mutate naturally as part of their life cycle.”
- “These small, cumulative changes are useful to researchers, because they act as identification cards that help trace the pathway of the virus through groups of people over time.”
- “[A] mutation in this virus strain, which changes one amino acid in the part of the coronavirus that finds and binds to cells”, might be causing the virus “to spread more easily” but more experimental evidence is needed.
- “[T]he mutations are not directly on the receptor binding domain”, so these aren’t affecting the development of treatments and vaccines.
NatGeo: They don’t struggle to breathe—but COVID-19 is starving them of oxygen
- One alarming symptom robs many patients of blood oxygen well before they notice. Doctors are racing to understand it.
- Silent hypoxia: “Unlike many other respiratory diseases, COVID-19 can slowly starve the body of oxygen without initially causing much shortness of breath.” Individuals dangerously low on oxygen are surprisingly “awake, calm, and responsive”.
- “There have not yet been thorough studies of whether early detection of silent hypoxia can improve COVID-19 outcomes,” but “prolonged hypoxia may strain the heart and perhaps other bodily systems”.
- The overactivation of the “immune response” could trigger cell damage that “could hinder the passage of oxygen from alveoli to the blood, while carbon dioxide … is less impacted”.
- Another possibility may be that the disease creates a mismatch between oxygen’s movement in the lungs and the flow of blood”. More blood might be “flowing to damaged lung areas, while less is passing through healthy parts”.
- “Blood flow to oxygen-rich zones of the lung might alternatively be hindered by tiny clots in the blood vessels. … Some doctors are debating the use of blood thinners.”
- COVID-19 patients are being recruited “for a study using an array of biosensors, including pulse oximetry, for remotely tracking patients’ conditions” to potentially catch patients early in the disease’s progression”.
Univ. of Cincinnati: By the third day most with COVID-19 lose sense of smell
- “At least 61% of the patients [in a study] reported reduced or lost sense of smell.”
- “We also found in this study that the severity of the loss of smell is correlated with how bad your other COVID-19 symptoms will be.”
- A “decreased sense of smell may be an indicator” of which patients should then be treated early with an antiviral drug such as remdesivir.
NYT: In the Fight to Treat Coronavirus, Your Lungs Are a Battlefield
MXP: Canadian study finds temperature, latitude not associated with COVID-19 spread
SFC: Latinos’ coronavirus burden
AP: ICU nurse details challenges in virus fight (VIDEO)
National Geographic: Fear, anger, desperation: How Bogotá’s residents are coping with COVID-19
- “Bogotá, the capital [of Colombia], went into strict lockdown on March 18, even earlier than the rest of the country, and most residents are allowed to walk only to nearby pharmacies, hospitals, or food stores for now. Despite these measures, the coronavirus numbers are bad, and climbing rapidly.”
Visual Capitalist: Hunger Pandemic: The COVID-19 Effect on Global Food Insecurity
- We must not forget the poor who are hungry during this pandemic. If our primary goal is to save lives from Covid-19, we should not lose lives in other ways. Every life is precious. -MH
Science: Fact-checking Judy Mikovits, the controversial virologist attacking Anthony Fauci in a viral conspiracy video (May 8, 2020)
- In [the movie] Plandemic, a former chronic fatigue syndrome researcher makes countless unsubstantiated claims and accusations
May 7, 2020
STAT: A snapshot of coronavirus in the U.S.: A high plateau of new cases portends more spread
- “One thing that has been at least an idea I’ve heard expressed many times is, ‘Well we’ve reached a peak and therefore it’s time to reopen,’” [a Harvard epidemiologist] said. “But viruses don’t know where they were in the past, they only know where they are in the present. And what I mean by that is if we had X number of cases per day at the start of imposing restrictions, and now we have a lot more than X cases per day, as seems to be the case in most places, but we’ve slowed down the increase, we’re in a worse position now than we were then.”
DW: COVID-19 death rate sinking? Data reveals a complex reality
- “Experts say we should be looking at all-cause death numbers instead — they tell a very different story.”
nature: How do children spread the coronavirus? The science still isn’t clear
- “[L]ess than 2% of reported infections in China, Italy and the United States have been in people under 18 years old.”
- “If children are driving the spread of the virus, infections will probably spike in the next few weeks in countries where children have already returned to school, say scientists.”
- Household studies in Australia gave evidence “that children are rarely the first person to bring the infection into a home”, but these studies may be biased “because the households weren’t randomly selected”.
- Children might produce lower levels of cytokine, but are they “sicker because they have higher cytokine levels, or do they have higher cytokine levels because they are sicker?” (In science, finding correlations is usually far easier than locating the cause.)
nature: Ignoring coronavirus outbreaks in homeless shelters is proving perilous
- “[T]he situation is out of control. Tests are rare. And outbreaks are spreading below the radar.”
- “Missed cases are a major problem because the disease has been shown to spread like wildfire in shared living spaces such as nursing homes, prisons and shelters.”
- Singapore seemed to have “controlled the epidemic, until thousands of cases were discovered among migrant workers living in over-crowded dormitories.”
- “The moment you get a positive test, there’s a spider web of decisions to make.”
- “Health departments in the United States have started implementing interventions, such as relocating homeless to stadiums, where beds are spaced two metres apart.”
- “California is releasing thousands “from prisons and jails to decrease the risk of outbreaks there, but they aren’t testing them first – and many have nowhere to go.”
- “As scientists, it’s our role to raise up these issues and help the public understand how viruses do discriminate since we live in an inequitable world.”
nature: Coronavirus research updates: A strong antibody response is common in people who’ve recovered
Updated May 5, 2021
- “Nearly everyone who recovers from COVID-19 makes antibodies against the new coronavirus, according to a study of more than 1,300 people who had symptoms of the disease.”
- This suggests “that they are immune from reinfection,” however “for an unknown length of time.”
NPR: How What You Flush Is Helping Track The Coronavirus
- As testing in the US is not yet at levels necessary to restart the economy, one way to determine how widespread an infection is in an area is to test wastewater, as the virus’s RNA is still intact and detectable at wastewater plants.
STAT: Photos: One day inside a Boston hospital’s response to Covid-19
May 6, 2020
- Some evidence suggests that patients experience low oxygen saturation days before they appear in the ER. If so, is there a way to treat patients earlier?
- Young adults are having strokes with COVID-19. Does this suggest the illness is more of a vascular disease than a lung disease in that age group?
- The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently updated its official list of symptoms. Does this suggest anything unusual about COVID-19?
- How can so many people experience such mild symptoms and others quickly die from it?
- The disease appears now to affect various other organs—heart and kidney, for example. What does this suggest?
- Why are some countries not experiencing as much COVID-19 as the U.S., Europe and China?
NYT: ‘An Anvil Sitting on My Chest’: What It’s Like to Have Covid-19
STAT: Giving blood thinners to severely ill Covid-19 patients is gaining ground
- “Treating Covid-19 patients with medicines to prevent blood clots might help reduce deaths in patients on ventilators, based on new observational data.”
- “A team from Mount Sinai Health System in New York on Wednesday reported better results for hospitalized Covid-19 patients who received anticoagulant drugs compared to patients who didn’t.”
PopSci: How the CDC plans to track the mutating coronavirus
- “The findings of this study suggest that strict disease control strategies should be implemented early to mitigate the demand for inpatient and intensive care unit beds during a coronavirus disease 2019 outbreak.” (This basically means we should social distance early to prevent overloading hospitals.)
Shareable Science: Treatments and Vaccines (VIDEO)
May 5, 2020
NMLS: Israeli scientists discover monoclonal antibody that neutralizes SARS-CoV-2
- “Israel … has been successful in ‘flattening the curve.'”
- “Monoclonal antibodies are laboratory-produced molecules engineered to serve as substitute antibodies that can restore, enhance, or mimic the immune system’s attack …”
- To neutralize means to prevent a virus from attaching to and infecting a cell. Antibodies attach to the virus in such a way that it can’t attach to a cell.
NPR: How The Novel Coronavirus Hijacks Our Defenses (VIDEO)
STAT: Antibodies, immunity, and what they mean for Covid-19, explained (VIDEO)
MGH: Researchers release COVID-19 symptom tracker app
nature: What stopped the epidemic in China? Two teams show there’s no easy answer
Updated May 5, 2021
NPR: U.N. Warns Number Of People Starving To Death Could Double Amid Pandemic
CNN:
The Standard: UK scientists create coronavirus antibody test with ‘99.8% accuracy and results in 35 minutes’
May 4, 2020
STAT: Watch: How does Gilead’s experimental drug remdesivir work against the coronavirus? (VIDEO)
- The polymerase enzyme that copies the virus’s RNA inside the host cell may confuse nearby remdesivir molecules with the adenine unit of the RNA and add it instead to the new strand. This molecule then blocks any more units from being added (after about five more are added), thus sabotaging the process.
nature: Portraits of a viral enzyme could aid hunt for drugs
- A research team in Germany used “cryo-electron microscopy” to determine the shape of the polymerase enzyme that copies SARS-CoV-2 RNA in a host cell (see STAT article summary above). A better understanding of this enzyme could lead to the development of antiviral drugs that affect its function.
nature: Profile of a killer: the complex biology powering the coronavirus pandemic
- “Coronaviruses are also one of the few RNA viruses with a genomic proofreading mechanism — which keeps the virus from accumulating mutations that could weaken it. That ability might be why common antivirals [have failed to] weaken viruses by inducing mutations.”
- “[C]oronaviruses have a special trick that gives them a deadly dynamism: they frequently recombine, swapping chunks of their RNA with other coronaviruses.”
- “[T]he virus can … bypass the throat cells and go straight down into the lungs. Then patients might get pneumonia without the usual mild symptoms such as a cough or low-grade fever that would otherwise come first.”
- “SARS-CoV-2 can shed viral particles from the throat into saliva even before symptoms start, and these can then pass easily from person to person. SARS-CoV was much less effective at making that jump, passing only when symptoms were full-blown, making it easier to contain.”
- “The virus might be able to infect various organs or tissues wherever the blood supply reaches.”
- “[A]lthough genetic material from the virus is showing up in … various tissues, it is not yet clear whether the damage there is being done by the virus or by a cytokine storm.“
DW: Coronavirus latest: Up to 1.8 million cases in Germany, researchers find
- “A study has found that the German infection rate may be 10 times higher than reported. It comes as Germany edges closer to normality with the reopening of some schools and businesses.”
PopSci: Oxford University’s timeline for a COVID-19 vaccine is shorter than previous estimates
Shareable Science: Symptoms and Testing – May 4 Update (VIDEO)
May 3, 2020
NYT: The Covid-19 Riddle: Why Does the Virus Wallop Some Places and Spare Others?
- Factors suggested “that could help explain where the virus thrives and where it doesn’t: demographics, culture, environment and the speed of government responses”.
- It may be due to a combination of these factors: Age; cultural distance (between individuals); heat and light; “early and strict lockdowns”; plain luck.
May 2, 2020
DW: How Greece’s crisis is helping it bend the COVID-19 curve
- “The lockdown was imposed much earlier than in most countries in the western world. The government reacted in a very competent manner, listening to the right people and making the right judgement.”
- Based on the numbers mentioned in this article, Greece had only 17.4% of the Covid-19-related deaths per capita that Italy had.
- Unfortunately, the country is facing today an economic crisis.
CR: What It’s Like to Recover From COVID-19
- It could take weeks or months to bounce back from the sometimes serious damage to the lungs and heart
c&en: How structural biologists revealed the new coronavirus’s structure so quickly
May 1, 2020
- “The experimental drug remdesivir has been approved to treat hospitalized patients with severe Covid-19, the US Food and Drug Administration said in a letter on Friday. Remdesivir is the first authorized therapy drug for Covid-19 in the United States.”
NYT: What Is ‘Covid Toe’? Maybe a Strange Sign of Coronavirus Infection
- “At first, the toes look swollen and take on a reddish tint; sometimes a part of the toe is swollen, and individual lesions or bumps can be seen. Over time, the lesions become purple in color.”
- “One hypothesis is that they are caused by inflammation, a prominent feature of Covid-19.”
- “Other hypotheses are that the lesions are caused by inflammation in the walls of blood vessels, or by small micro clots in the blood.”
NPR: Coronavirus FAQS: What’s A Pulse Oximeter? Is It A Good Idea To Buy One?
CNN: States are easing coronavirus restrictions and ‘it’s going to cost lives,’ researcher says
Continue with the news timeline for April 2020.