Dr. Boarhead’s Summary of Global Updates on the 2019 Novel Coronavirus: 25th October 2020
1.
Nature
:
Researchers examined the spatial variability of the basic reproductive numbers of SARS-CoV-2 across provinces and cities in China and showed that environmental variables alone could not explain this variability. The findings suggest that changes in weather (i.e., increase in temperature and humidity as spring and summer months arrive in the Northern Hemisphere) will not necessarily lead to decline in case counts without the implementation of drastic public health interventions.
<12 Oct.>
[key info]
Temperature alone will not necessarily influence the spread of the virus.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-74089-7
2. medRxiv:
Researchers analyzed data from 4,182 incident cases of COVID-19. Of them, 558 (13.3%) had symptoms lasting >4 weeks, 189 (4.5%) >8 weeks, and 95 (2.3%) >12 weeks. Long duration of the disease was characterized by symptoms of fatigue, headache, dyspnoea, and anosmia and was associated with increased age, BMI, and the female sex. Experiencing more than five symptoms during the first week of illness was associated with long duration.
<19 Oct.>
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Old women are more likely to suffer from COVID-19 for over 4 weeks.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/21/women-aged-50-60-at-greatest-risk-of-long-covid-experts-suggest
3.
Nature Medicine
:
In Jun., researchers surveyed 13,426 people in 19 countries to determine potential factors influencing acceptance of a COVID-19 vaccine. Of these, 71.5% of participants reported that they would be very or somewhat likely to take a COVID-19 vaccine, and 61.4% reported that they would accept their employers’ recommendation to do so. Differences in acceptance rates ranged from almost 90% (in China) to less than 55% (in Russia). Respondents reporting higher levels of trust in information from government sources were more likely to accept a vaccine and take their employers’ advice to do so.
<20 Oct.>
[key info]
The Chinese people are much more willing to receive COVID-19 shots than Russians.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-1124-9
4. Imperial College London:
UK researchers are set to explore a human challenge study with SARS-CoV-2, the first such study anywhere in the world. The first stage of the project will explore the feasibility of exposing healthy volunteers to live SARS-CoV-2. In this phase, the aim will be to discover the smallest amount of virus it takes to cause a person to develop COVID-19. Once the first phase is completed, clinical researchers aim to use this human challenge model to study how vaccines work in the body to stop or prevent COVID-19, to look at potential treatments, and to study the immune response.
<20 Oct.>
[key info]
The UK prepares to start a human challenge study in which healthy volunteers will be exposed to live SARS-CoV-2.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/206893/uk-researchers-explore-human-challenge-studies/
5.
Science
:
Scientists found that neuropilin-1 (NRP1), known to bind furin-cleaved substrates, significantly potentiated SARS-CoV-2 infectivity, an effect blocked by a monoclonal blocking antibody against NRP1. A SARS-CoV-2 mutant with an altered furin cleavage site did not depend on NRP1 for infectivity.
<20 Oct.>
[key info]
Neuropilin-1 facilitates SARS-CoV-2 infectivity.
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2020/10/19/science.abd2985?rss=1
6.
New England Journal of Medicine
:
In a study that involved 243 patients, the hazard ratio for intubation or death in the tocilizumab group as compared with the placebo group was 0.83, and the hazard ratio for disease worsening was 1.11. By day 14, 18.0% of the patients in the tocilizumab group and 14.9% of the patients in the placebo group had experienced worsening of disease. The median time to discontinuation of supplemental oxygen was 5.0 days in the tocilizumab group and 4.9 days in the placebo group. Patients who received tocilizumab had fewer serious infections than patients who received the placebo.
<21 Oct.>
[key info]
Tocilizumab is not effective in preventing intubation or death in COVID-19 patients.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2028836?query=featured_home
7.
New York Times
:
In the US, about one in four deaths from SARS-CoV-2 is recorded in a rural county. That stands in contrast to Mar. and Apr., when almost every death was in a metropolitan area, as the virus tore through the Northeast, after early clusters in the Seattle area and populous parts of California. With the national case count and hospitalization rates approaching a third peak, none of the country’s biggest hotspots are in a large city. Almost all the counties with the largest outbreaks have populations under 50,000, and most have populations under 10,000. Nearly all are in the Midwest or the Mountain West.
<22 Oct.>
[key info]
The worst virus outbreaks in the US are now in rural areas.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/10/22/us/covid-rural-us.html
8.
Lancet
:
Individual non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), including school closure, workplace closure, public events ban, ban on gatherings of more than ten people, requirements to stay at home, and internal movement limits, are associated with reduced transmission of SARS-CoV-2, but the effect of introducing these NPIs is delayed by 1–3 weeks, with this delay being longer when lifting NPIs.
<22 Oct.>
[key info]
Non-pharmaceutical interventions may take effect 1 to 3 weeks since their implementation.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(20)30785-4/fulltext
9. Gilead:
The US FDA has approved the antiviral drug Veklury (remdesivir) for the treatment of patients with COVID-19 requiring hospitalization. As an antiviral drug, Veklury works to stop replication of SARS-CoV-2. Previously authorized by the FDA for emergency use to treat COVID-19, Veklury is now the first and only approved COVID-19 treatment in the US. The drug is now widely available in hospitals across the country.
<22 Oct.>
[key info]
The US FDA approved remdesivir for treatment of hospitalized COVID-19 patients.
https://www.gilead.com/news-and-press/press-room/press-releases/2020/10/us-food-and-drug-administration-approves-gileads-antiviral-veklury-remdesivir-for-treatment-of-covid19
10. AstraZeneca:
Clinical trials for the Oxford coronavirus vaccine, AZD1222, have resumed across the world with regulators in the US, the UK, Brazil, South Africa, and Japan confirming that it was safe to do so. As part of the standard review process for trial safety events, a voluntary pause to vaccination across all global trials was triggered on 6 Sep. to allow the examination of safety data by independent monitoring committees.
<23 Oct.>
[key info]
AZD1222 clinical trials have resumed globally.
https://www.astrazeneca.com/media-centre/press-releases/2020/fda-authorises-restart-of-the-covid-19-azd1222-vaccine-us-phase-iii-trial.html
This is issue forty-three
, edited on the basis of information from the official websites including but not limited to those of
The World Health Organization,
The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control,
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of the United States of America, &
The Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy of the University of Minnesota
and from the forums of FluTrackers.com.
This issue is edited by Alex Sun, Fred Wong, Dorothy Fang, and Dora Zhang under the supervision of Dr. Jason Chu and Conch Zhang.
2020 © The Chung Kwong Wui
