Articles: sars-cov-2.
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Since December 2019, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has infected over four million people worldwide. There are multiple reports of prolonged viral shedding in people infected with SARS-CoV-2 but the presence of viral RNA on a test does not necessarily correlate with infectivity. ⋯ In addition, asymptomatic and presymptomatic transmission may occur, and infectivity may be highest early after onset of symptoms, meaning that contact tracing, isolation of exposed individuals and social distancing are essential public health measures to prevent further spread. This review aimed to summarise the evidence around viral shedding vs infectivity of SARS-CoV-2.
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Sheba Medical Center, Tel Hashomer, is a tertiary hospital located in the center of Israel. It is the largest hospital in Israel and was the first to face coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) patients in the country at the beginning of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic. ⋯ Our triage method was successful in separating COVID-19 positive from negative patients and maintained the regular hospital clean of COVID-19 allowing treatment continuation of regular non-COVID-19 patients.
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Expert review of vaccines · Aug 2020
Vaccination against SARS-CoV-2 and disease enhancement - knowns and unknowns.
The world is currently fighting a COVID-19 pandemic, perhaps the most disruptive infectious disease outbreak since the 1918 Spanish influenza. Governments have taken drastic measures to curb the spread of SARS-CoV-2, and the development of safe and efficacious vaccine candidates is being accelerated. The possibility of vaccine-mediated disease enhancement with coronavirus vaccines has been flagged as a potential safety concern, and, despite the urgent need, should be thoroughly assessed as vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 are being tested. ⋯ We compile and propose avenues to investigate the risk of vaccine-mediated disease enhancement both during pre-clinical and early clinical development. While the pressing need for a vaccine against COVID-19 (and future epidemic coronaviruses) cannot be ignored, we advocate to keep safety at the center of the debate. Protecting individuals with effective and safe vaccines should be a priority, even during extraordinary times like the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Int. Immunopharmacol. · Aug 2020
Neutrophil to CD4+ lymphocyte ratio as a potential biomarker in predicting virus negative conversion time in COVID-19.
Since December 2019, novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2)-infected pneumonia (COVID-19) occurred in Wuhan, and rapidly spread throughout China. Our study aimed to evaluate the robustness of neutrophil to CD4+ lymphocyte ratio (NCD4LR) in predicting the negative conversion time (NCT) of SARS-CoV-2 in COVID-19 patients. ⋯ This study suggests that NCD4LR is a potential and useful biomarker for predicting the virus negative conversion time in COVID-19 patients. Furthermore, due to the NCDLR value is easily calculated, it can be widely used as a clinical biomarker for disease progression and clinical outcomes in COVID-19 patients.