title: CogMol: Target-Specific and Selective Drug Design for COVID-19 Using Deep Generative Models

text: The novel nature of SARS-CoV-2 calls for the development of efficient de novo drug design approaches. In this study, we propose an end-to-end framework, named CogMol (Controlled Generation of Molecules), for designing new drug-like small molecules targeting novel viral proteins with high affinity and off-target selectivity. CogMol combines adaptive pre-training of a molecular SMILES Variational Autoencoder (VAE) and an efficient multi-attribute controlled sampling scheme that uses guidance from attribute predictors trained on latent features. To generate novel and optimal drug-like molecules for unseen viral targets, CogMol leverages a protein-molecule binding affinity predictor that is trained using SMILES VAE embeddings and protein sequence embeddings learned unsupervised from a large corpus. CogMol framework is applied to three SARS-CoV-2 target proteins: main protease, receptor-binding domain of the spike protein, and non-structural protein 9 replicase. The generated candidates are novel at both molecular and chemical scaffold levels when compared to the training data. CogMol also includes insilico screening for assessing toxicity of parent molecules and their metabolites with a multi-task toxicity classifier, synthetic feasibility with a chemical retrosynthesis predictor, and target structure binding with docking simulations. Docking reveals favorable binding of generated molecules to the target protein structure, where 87-95 % of high affinity molecules showed docking free energy<-6 kcal/mol. When compared to approved drugs, the majority of designed compounds show low parent molecule and metabolite toxicity and high synthetic feasibility. In summary, CogMol handles multi-constraint design of synthesizable, low-toxic, drug-like molecules with high target specificity and selectivity, and does not need target-dependent fine-tuning of the framework or target structure information.


title: Organ Transplantation during COVID-19 Pandemic: Making the Best Patient Care Decision

text: It is with great interest and sadness that we read the experience of Akalin et al. and Pereira et al. with unprecedented mortality (18-28%) in transplant recipients in New York City, New York. High mortality reports in transplant patients have created anxiety among some community practitioners as evidence as to why transplants should not be performed at this time, contrary to the recommendations from multiple transplant organizations.


title: Drs. Cron and Chatham reply

text: We value Dr. Caricchio's and Dr. Criner's appreciation of our commentary on the role of rheumatologists in the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic1 We applaud Temple University for collaborating in the care of hospitalized patients with COVID-19, many of whom are experiencing a cytokine storm syndrome (CSS)2.


title: Adjusted preoperative variables to predict perioperative red blood cell transfusion in coronary artery bypass grafting

text: BACKGROUND: The variables for predicting blood transfusion perioperatively are not completely clear in coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) patients. OBJECTIVES: To construct a comprehensive model to predict perioperative RBC transfusion in patients undergoing isolated CABG using adjusted preoperative variables. METHODS: Perioperative data of 1253 patients who underwent isolated CABG by the same surgical team were collected from April 2018 to March 2019. Logistic regression analyses were used to establish equations to construct two models for predicting intraoperative and postoperative RBC transfusions, respectively. All significant variables included in the two models were combined to form a comprehensive model to predict perioperative RBC transfusion. Area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve (AUC) was used to evaluate the discriminatory power of the models. RESULTS: The total RBC transfusion rate for CABG patients during hospitalization was 29.05%. The rate of intraoperative and postoperative RBC transfusions was 6.9% and 26.7%, respectively. Eight variables in a total of 30 risk factors constituted the intraoperative prediction model, 12 variables constituted the postoperative prediction model, and 13 variables for the combined model. The AUC of the three models were 0.87, 0.82, and 0.83, respectively, demonstrating moderate discriminatory power for RBC transfusion during the intraoperative, postoperative, and perioperative periods. CONCLUSION: The comprehensive model combined with all variables of predicting intraoperative and postoperative RBC transfusion is feasible for predicting perioperative RBC transfusion.


title: Managing Cancer Care during the COVID-19 Pandemic and Beyond

text: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is posing insurmountable challenges to healthcare systems globally. Cancer therapy is complex, and outcomes are centered on timing. Many oncology societies and health ministries have issued guidelines for cancer care to enable oncologists and patients to navigate the crisis. Lessons learned should inform care models for future pandemics.


title: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19): challenges and management of aerosol-generating procedures in dentistry

text: Data sources Experimental investigation.Study design A retrospective review to evaluate the use of a negative-pressure otolaryngology viral isolation drape (NOVID) system to reduce cross-infection through aerosol. The apparatus consists of a plastic drape suspended over the surgical field in the head and neck region with a smoke evacuator suction placed inside the chamber with an ultra-low penetrating air (ULPA) efficiency rating and a fluid suction high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter compartment. Spread of patient secretions and droplet formation was evaluated using 1% fluorescein dye in 10 ml of normal saline and ultraviolet light. The dye was applied topically in the nasal cavity and nasopharynx preoperatively and intraoperatively prior to the use of instruments such as micro-debrider, electrocautery and high-speed drilling. Following completion of the surgical procedure, an ultraviolet Wood's lamp was used to evaluate the presence of droplets on the surgical drapes and surgical gowns of the operating team.Results The study sample consisted of four patients who underwent endonasal endoscopic surgical procedures; two of these patients required concurrent endoscopic sinus surgery. A micro-debrider was used in three cases; electrocautery in three cases, while a high-speed drilling was employed in two cases. Presence of fluorescein was identified around the patients' nares; on the chest wipe and instrument tray in all four patients. Dye contamination was noted on the gauze placed over the smoke evacuator (two cases of skull base surgery); no fluid droplets were identified beyond the nares or the smoke evacuator (two cases of sinus surgery). However, fluid contamination was identified underneath barrier several centimetres away from the nares (one case of trans-sphenoidal surgery). Droplets were also identified on the surgeon's gown in the abdominal region in all cases and on the arm region in one case. In one case, droplets were also identified on the abdominal region of the nurse, but this was attributed to cross contamination from surgical gauze and instruments. Conclusions This retrospective study provides preliminary data on aerosol and droplet contamination during endonasal and transoral surgery performed under a negative pressure isolation drape system. Although the authors did not screen patients for SARS-CoV-2, they propose smoke evacuator ULPA filter attachment is appropriate to capture particles down to 0.1 microns including SARS-CoV-2 which is 0.125 microns. It would be helpful to see direct evidence to support this claim in future studies. The authors have not provided details regarding set-up time and training requirements for effective application of the isolation drape apparatus or the associated costs etc. It would have also been helpful if the authors could comment on any potential difficulties in undertaking the surgical procedure with the isolation system in place. The sample size is limited to four patients and variations in the magnitude and extent of aerosol contamination needs to be investigated further before drawing any conclusions. Although unlikely, this study design did not capture the presence of aerosol/droplets in the air within the operating room which may follow removal of the isolation drape system or from exposed surgical instruments. Notwithstanding the limitations of the design, negative-pressure aspiration of air under a chamber barrier is likely to minimise the contamination from aerosol and droplet during endonasal and transoral surgery.


Balancing Choices to Recover From the COVID-19 Pandemic


title: The Fallibility of Contact-Tracing Apps

text: Since the onset of the COVID-19's global spread we have been following the debate around contact tracing apps -- the tech-enabled response to the pandemic. As corporations, academics, governments, and civil society discuss the right way to implement these apps, we noticed recurring implicit assumptions. The proposed solutions are designed for a world where Internet access and smartphone ownership are a given, people are willing and able to install these apps, and those who receive notifications about potential exposure to the virus have access to testing and can isolate safely. In this work we challenge these assumptions. We not only show that there are not enough smartphones worldwide to reach required adoption thresholds but also highlight a broad lack of internet access, which affects certain groups more: the elderly, those with lower incomes, and those with limited ability to socially distance. Unfortunately, these are also the groups that are at the highest risks from COVID-19. We also report that the contact tracing apps that are already deployed on an opt-in basis show disappointing adoption levels. We warn about the potential consequences of over-extending the existing state and corporate surveillance powers. Finally, we describe a multitude of scenarios where contact tracing apps will not help regardless of access or policy. In this work we call for a comprehensive and equitable policy response that prioritizes the needs of the most vulnerable, protects human rights, and considers long term impact instead of focusing on technology-first fixes.


Should we unstress SARS-CoV-2 infected cells?


COVID-19 pneumonia: ARDS or not?


title: [Diagnosis, treatment, control and prevention of SARS-CoV-2 and coronavirus disease 2019: back to the future]

text: The ongoing outbreak of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) as named by the World Health Organization has millions of confirmed cases around the world and has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives. The virus was named SARS-CoV-2 in February by International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses. COVID-19 presents as fever, dry cough, dyspnea, headache and pneumonia. In a small subset of severe cases, the disease quickly progresses to respiratory failure and even death. Since the 21st century, there have been three major outbreaks caused by human coronaviruses, including the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) that broke out in 2003, the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) in 2012, and the recent pandemic of COVID-19. Since 2003, significant progress has been made in the study of SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV concerning their natural origins, pathogenesis, antiviral development and vaccine design. Since SARS-CoV-2 and SARS-CoV are closely related, previous findings on SARS-CoV are highly relevant to a better understanding as well as diagnosis, treatment, prevention and control of SARS-CoV-2. In this review, we highlight recent progresses in the field; compare the biological characteristics of SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2; summarize the urgently-needed diagnostic, treatment, prevention and control options; and provide future perspectives for the outcome of the outbreak and research questions to be answered, including some of the difficulties in vaccine development. Hopefully, our comments and suggestions would prove useful for the control of the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in China and the world.


The impact of COVID-19 on Brazilian mental health through vicarious traumatization


title: Infection par le SARS-CoV-2 chez les femmes enceintes : état des connaissances et proposition de prise en charge par CNGOF./ [SARS-CoV-2 infection during pregnancy. Information and proposal of management care. CNGOF]

text: A new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) highlighted at the end of 2019 in China is spreading across all continents. Most often at the origin of a mild infectious syndrome, associating mild symptoms (fever, cough, myalgia, headache and possible digestive disorders) to different degrees, SARS-Covid-2 can cause serious pulmonary pathologies and sometimes death. Data on the consequences during pregnancy are limited. The first Chinese data published seem to show that the symptoms in pregnant women are the same as those of the general population. There are no cases of intrauterine maternal-fetal transmission, but cases of newborns infected early suggest that there could be vertical perpartum or neonatal transmission. Induced prematurity and cases of respiratory distress in newborns of infected mothers have been described. Pregnancy is known as a period at higher risk for the consequences of respiratory infections, as for influenza, so it seems important to screen for Covid-19 in the presence of symptoms and to monitor closely pregnant women. In this context of the SARS-Covid-2 epidemic, the societies of gynecology-obstetrics, infectious diseases and neonatalogy have proposed a French protocol for the management of possible and proven cases of SARS-Covid-2 in pregnant women. These proposals may evolve on a daily basis with the advancement of the epidemic and knowledge in pregnant women. Subsequently, an in-depth analysis of cases in pregnant women will be necessary in order to improve knowledge on the subject.


title: Self-amplifying RNA SARS-CoV-2 lipid nanoparticle vaccine candidate induces high neutralizing antibody titers in mice

text: The spread of the SARS-CoV-2 into a global pandemic within a few months of onset motivates the development of a rapidly scalable vaccine. Here, we present a self-amplifying RNA encoding the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein encapsulated within a lipid nanoparticle (LNP) as a vaccine. We observe remarkably high and dose-dependent SARS-CoV-2 specific antibody titers in mouse sera, as well as robust neutralization of both a pseudo-virus and wild-type virus. Upon further characterization we find that the neutralization is proportional to the quantity of specific IgG and of higher magnitude than recovered COVID-19 patients. saRNA LNP immunizations induce a Th1-biased response in mice, and there is no antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE) observed. Finally, we observe high cellular responses, as characterized by IFN-Î³ production, upon re-stimulation with SARS-CoV-2 peptides. These data provide insight into the vaccine design and evaluation of immunogenicity to enable rapid translation to the clinic.


title: Clinical features and short-term outcomes of elderly patients with COVID-19

text: BACKGROUND: The outbreak of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) has become a global public health emergency. METHODS: 204 elderly patients (≥60 years old) diagnosed with COVID-19 in Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University from January 31st to February 20th, 2020 were included in this study. Clinical endpoint was in-hospital death. RESULTS: Of the 204 patients, hypertension, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) were the most common coexisting conditions. 76 patients died in the hospital. Multivariate analysis showed that dyspnea (hazards ratio (HR) 2.2, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.414-3.517; p < 0.001), older age (HR 1.1, 95% CI 1.070-1.123; p < 0.001), neutrophilia (HR 4.4, 95% CI 1.310-15.061; p = 0.017) and elevated ultrasensitive cardiac troponin I (HR 3.9, 95% CI 1.471-10.433; p = 0.006) were independently associated with death. CONCLUSION: Although so far the overall mortality of COVID-19 is relatively low, the mortality of elderly patients is much higher. Early diagnosis and supportive care are of great importance for the elderly patients of COVID-19.


Environmental virus surveillance in the isolation ward of COVID-19


title: Examining boundaries to understand the impact of COVID-19 on vocational behaviors

text: The COVID-19 has posed an unprecedented challenge to the global workforce. To better understand the impact of the pandemic on work and careers, I call for research taking a closer look at the boundaries in the career context. Specifically, both the micro (boundaries that demarcate role domains) and macro (national borders) boundaries should be considered. The pandemic changes the existing boundaries and challenges the "usual" practices; while it blurs the micro, cross-domain boundaries, it strengthens the macro, cross-country boundaries. I propose that the changes in the micro and macro boundaries are one of the important mechanisms in how COVID-19 affects many individuals' vocational behaviors and career outcomes. In this essay, I explain why we should pay more attention to the boundaries to learn about the impact of COVID-19 on vocational and career behaviors. I conclude with a discussion of several directions for future research.


title: A Semantically Enriched Dataset based on Biomedical NER for the COVID19 Open Research Dataset Challenge

text: Research into COVID-19 is a big challenge and highly relevant at the moment. New tools are required to assist medical experts in their research with relevant and valuable information. The COVID-19 Open Research Dataset Challenge (CORD-19) is a"call to action"for computer scientists to develop these innovative tools. Many of these applications are empowered by entity information, i. e. knowing which entities are used within a sentence. For this paper, we have developed a pipeline upon the latest Named Entity Recognition tools for Chemicals, Diseases, Genes and Species. We apply our pipeline to the COVID-19 research challenge and share the resulting entity mentions with the community.


title: Clonal haematopoiesis and COVID-19: A possible deadly liaison

text: We provide evidence for a linear correlation between the frequency of clonal haematopoiesis and COVID-19 mortality rate. We discuss the mechanistic explanations for this association mediated by a pathological inflammatory response. Our hypothesis can be tested in COVID-19-infected patients and eventually lead to new approaches to risk stratification and therapy.


docid: yvlcorrg

title: Clinical trials of repurposed antivirals for SARS-CoV-2

text: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has prompted the repurposing of drugs on the basis of promising in vitro and therapeutic results with other human coronavirus diseases such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS). These repurposed drugs have mainly included remdesivir, favipiravir, lopinavir/ritonavir, ribavirin, interferons, and hydroxychloroquine. Unfortunately, the first open-label, randomized controlled trials are showing the poor efficacy of these repurposed drugs. These results highlight the necessity of identifying and characterizing specific and potent SARS-CoV-2 antivirals.


docid: efylpdoh

title: Physical inactivity and cardiovascular disease at the time of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)


title: The Mental Health Consequences of Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic in Dentistry

text: With the spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), strict isolation strategies to limit virus transmission have been applied worldwide. The lockdown has affected and challenged different medical areas. Doctors, nurses, dentists, and other health care workers are concerned about contagion, not only for themselves, but also for their families and colleagues. Furthermore, the oral mucosa has been accepted as a high-risk route of transmission for COVID-19. In many countries, dentists have been forced to stop working during quarantine until further notification. Isolation and its financial impact have produced physical and psychological pressure, depression, social anxiety, and other mental health concerns. This article aims to provide a comprehensive review of the consequences of past epidemics on mental health and to assess possible aspects that might be associated with mental implications in dentists during the COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, some concrete actions to avoid subsequent potential consequences are recommended.


title: A COVID-19 pandemic guideline in evidence-based medicine

text: Data sources This review article scrutinised 16 clinical studies (clinical trials and observational studies) concerning coronavirus disease of 2019 (COVID-19). Additionally, 18 guidelines about the COVID-19 were reviewed and the key points were represented in this study.Study selection The review included human trials, in-vitro studies, review articles, and credible news reports about severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and COVID-19 complications, treatment guidelines, management strategies, and epidemiological features. There were no exclusion criteria reported in this review and the included information was in English and Chinese languages.Data extraction and synthesis A descriptive review of the literature was conducted, taking a comprehensive approach. The paper consisted of three main parts: introduction, presentation, and management. The introduction part presented basic information about the SARS-CoV-2, its evolution and transmission, and the course of disease. The presentation section introduced the signs and symptoms, diagnosis, high risk groups, and complications of COVID-19. Eventually, some evidence was presented about the prevention, medical management, and measuring responses to the treatments in the management section.Results Based on the results of this study, non-pharmaceutical interventions, including strict social isolation and distancing measures, might reduce the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 by nearly 99.3 percent (reproduction number mitigating from 406 to 2.5 in 30 days). In the supportive management section, monitoring vital signs and neonatal feeding were stated as the most important factors to consider. For symptomatic neonates, medical management and intervention were mentioned as essential. It was claimed that for adults with mild infection, the best option would be home quarantine with further medical monitoring or hospitalisation if required. The following sequence was also suggested as early supportive therapy and monitoring: intravenous fluid administration, oxygen therapy, and application of corticosteroids. Management of critical patients with critical COVID-19 included admission to intensive care unit, use of continuous positive airway pressure and bi-level positive airway pressure in certain circumstances, endotracheal intubation, invasive mechanical ventilation, extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, and fluid resuscitation and vasopressors. Additionally, this study suggested oseltamivir, iopinavir, remdesivir, chloroquine, baricitinib, ruxolitinib, and fedratinib as possible drugs to help manage COVID-19. A soaring c-reactive protein level and decreased albumin content in the blood were reported to be associated with a deteriorating status in COVID-19 patients. To keep the number of exposures to a minimum, two separate viral clearance tests taken at least 24 hours apart, were stated as necessary laboratory results before the discharge of patients with COVID-19.Conclusions The study warns about possible exponential spread of COVID-19 and proposes to adhering to tighter restrictions of social distancing. Besides the clinical guidelines presented within the study, it also encourages further up-to-date and evidence-based management guidelines for patients with COVID-19.


Impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic on postgraduate medical education in a Singaporean academic medical institution


title: Self-supervised edge features for improved Graph Neural Network training

text: Graph Neural Networks (GNN) have been extensively used to extract meaningful representations from graph structured data and to perform predictive tasks such as node classification and link prediction. In recent years, there has been a lot of work incorporating edge features along with node features for prediction tasks. One of the main difficulties in using edge features is that they are often handcrafted, hard to get, specific to a particular domain, and may contain redundant information. In this work, we present a framework for creating new edge features, applicable to any domain, via a combination of self-supervised and unsupervised learning. In addition to this, we use Forman-Ricci curvature as an additional edge feature to encapsulate the local geometry of the graph. We then encode our edge features via a Set Transformer and combine them with node features extracted from popular GNN architectures for node classification in an end-to-end training scheme. We validate our work on three biological datasets comprising of single-cell RNA sequencing data of neurological disease, \textit{in vitro} SARS-CoV-2 infection, and human COVID-19 patients. We demonstrate that our method achieves better performance on node classification tasks over baseline Graph Attention Network (GAT) and Graph Convolutional Network (GCN) models. Furthermore, given the attention mechanism on edge and node features, we are able to interpret the cell types and genes that determine the course and severity of COVID-19, contributing to a growing list of potential disease biomarkers and therapeutic targets.


Overmedication in COVID-19 context: a report from Peru


COVID-19: A perspective of a frontline worker


From Viral City to Smart City: Learning from Pandemic Experiences


Concomitant acute aortic thrombosis and pulmonary embolism complicating COVID-19 pneumonia


title: Pattern of early human-to-human transmission of Wuhan 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), December 2019 to January 2020

text: Since December 2019, China has been experiencing a large outbreak of a novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) which can cause respiratory disease and severe pneumonia. We estimated the basic reproduction number R0 of 2019-nCoV to be around 2.2 (90% high density interval: 1.4-3.8), indicating the potential for sustained human-to-human transmission. Transmission characteristics appear to be of similar magnitude to severe acute respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and pandemic influenza, indicating a risk of global spread.


title: Infectious Diseases Society of America Guidelines on the Treatment and Management of Patients with COVID-19

text: BACKGROUND: There are many pharmacologic therapies that are being used or considered for treatment of COVID-19. There is a need for frequently updated practice guidelines on their use, based on critical evaluation of rapidly emerging literature. OBJECTIVE: Develop evidence-based rapid guidelines intended to support patients, clinicians and other health-care professionals in their decisions about treatment and management of patients with COVID-19. METHODS: IDSA formed a multidisciplinary guideline panel of infectious disease clinicians, pharmacists, and methodologists with varied areas of expertise. Process followed a rapid recommendation checklist. The panel prioritized questions and outcomes. Then a systematic review of the peer-reviewed and grey literature was conducted. The Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) approach was used to assess the certainty of evidence and make recommendations. RESULTS: The IDSA guideline panel agreed on 7 treatment recommendations and provided narrative summaries of other treatments undergoing evaluations. CONCLUSIONS: The panel expressed the overarching goal that patients be recruited into ongoing trials, which would provide much needed evidence on the efficacy and safety of various therapies for COVID-19, given that we could not make a determination whether the benefits outweigh harms for most treatments.


title: Organización y gestión interna del servicio de farmacia./ Pharmacy Department management and organization

text: The WHO declared the SARS- CoV-2 outbreak a pandemic in March 11, 2020. Spain has been the third country with the highest number of reported cases of COVID-19. In the face of the pandemic, the authorities of the Autonomous Community of Madrid led an unprecedented transformation of hospital services by increasing the number of beds available, setting up temporary field hospitals in fairgrounds, and transforming hotels into support centers for patients with mild symptoms of COVID-19. In the light that this crisis will continue to be a real threat for the years to come, our hospital pharmacies need to be better prepared for similar outbreaks in the future. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Department of Hospital Pharmacy of Hospital General Universitario Gregorio Marañón has faced four challenges: an exponential increase in the demand for resources, constant changes to therapeutic protocols and approaches, regulatory changes, and a dramatic impact on hospital staff (strain on human resources and psychological impact). This article is aimed at describing the main organizational changes implemented to the Department of Hospital Pharmacy of Hospital GU Gregorio Marañón and its relationship with other hospital pharmacies of the Community of Madrid. An account is provided of the strategies to be adopted for reorganizing a Department of Hospital Pharmacy and achieve a safe and effective use of medications. Strategies range from the creation of integral hospital task groups (COVID-crisis task group, protocolization task group, research task group) to the adaptation of the internal organization of the Department of Hospital Pharmacy, which encompasses aspects related to management and leadership; a communication plan (internal and external); staff management, and the reorganization and adaptation of processes. People, patients and professionals are at the core of these strategies. This paper is a reflection on key factors of "humanization in COVID times".


title: Ophthalmologische Betreuung von stationären, intensivpflichtigen SARS-CoV-2-positiven Patienten./ [Ophthalmological care of SARS-CoV-2 positive patients in intensive care units]

text: Early ophthalmological care of patients in intensive care with SARS-CoV2 (Severe-Acute-Respiratory-Syndrom-Corona-Virus-2) infections is very time-consuming; however, this approach might prevent other ophthalmological diseases, such as lagophthalmos. There is no difference in ophthalmological treatment between SARS-CoV2 positive and other intensive care patients. Due to the small number of cases in our observational study, a specific ophthalmological clinical pattern related to SARS-CoV2 infections cannot currently be identified; however, the increased occurrence of subconjunctival hemorrhage in intensive care SARS-CoV2 patients is remarkable. It remains unclear how ocular symptoms in SARS-CoV2 infections are related or how they occur in different stages of the disease. Therefore, further studies are necessary for representative statements.


title: Three kinds of treatment with Homoharringtonine, Hydroxychloroquine or shRNA and their combination against coronavirus PEDV in vitro

text: BACKGROUND: Porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV) of the family Coronaviridae has caused substantial economic losses in the swine husbandry industry. There's currently no specific drug available for treatment of coronaviruses or PEDV. METHOD: In the current study, we use coronavirus PEDV as a model to study antiviral agents. Briefly, a fusion inhibitor tHR2, recombinant lentivirus-delivered shRNAs targeted to conserved M and N sequences, homoharringtonine (HHT), and hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) were surveyed for their antiviral effects. RESULTS: Treatment with HCQ at 50 µM and HHT at 150 nM reduced virus titer in TCID50 by 30 and 3.5 fold respectively, and the combination reduced virus titer in TCID50 by 200 fold. CONCLUSION: Our report demonstrates that the combination of HHT and HCQ exhibited higher antiviral activity than either HHT or HCQ exhibited. The information may contribute to the development of antiviral strategies effective in controlling PEDV infection.


Initial effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on pediatric asthma emergency department utilization


title: Safety Recommendations for Evaluation and Surgery of the Head and Neck During the COVID-19 Pandemic

text: Importance: The rapidly expanding novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, has challenged the medical community to an unprecedented degree. Physicians and health care workers are at added risk of exposure and infection during the course of patient care. Because of the rapid spread of this disease through respiratory droplets, health care workers who come in close contact with the upper aerodigestive tract during diagnostic and therapeutic procedures, such as otolaryngologists-head and neck surgeons, are particularly at risk. A set of safety recommendations was created based on a review of the literature and communications with physicians with firsthand knowledge of safety procedures during the COVID-19 pandemic. Observations: A high number of health care workers were infected during the first phase of the pandemic in the city of Wuhan, China. Subsequently, by adopting strict safety precautions, other regions were able to achieve high levels of safety for health care workers without jeopardizing the care of patients. The most common procedures related to the examination and treatment of upper aerodigestive tract diseases were reviewed. Each category was reviewed based on the potential risk imposed to health care workers. Specific recommendations were made based on the literature, when available, or consensus best practices. Specific safety recommendations were made for performing tracheostomy in patients with COVID-19. Conclusions and Relevance: Preserving a highly skilled health care workforce is a top priority for any community and health care system. Based on the experience of health care systems in Asia and Europe, by following strict safety guidelines, the risk of exposure and infection of health care workers could be greatly reduced while providing high levels of care. The provided recommendations, which may evolve over time, could be used as broad guidance for all health care workers who are involved in the care of patients with COVID-19.


title: CovidAID: COVID-19 Detection Using Chest X-Ray

text: The exponential increase in COVID-19 patients is overwhelming healthcare systems across the world. With limited testing kits, it is impossible for every patient with respiratory illness to be tested using conventional techniques (RT-PCR). The tests also have long turn-around time, and limited sensitivity. Detecting possible COVID-19 infections on Chest X-Ray may help quarantine high risk patients while test results are awaited. X-Ray machines are already available in most healthcare systems, and with most modern X-Ray systems already digitized, there is no transportation time involved for the samples either. In this work we propose the use of chest X-Ray to prioritize the selection of patients for further RT-PCR testing. This may be useful in an inpatient setting where the present systems are struggling to decide whether to keep the patient in the ward along with other patients or isolate them in COVID-19 areas. It would also help in identifying patients with high likelihood of COVID with a false negative RT-PCR who would need repeat testing. Further, we propose the use of modern AI techniques to detect the COVID-19 patients using X-Ray images in an automated manner, particularly in settings where radiologists are not available, and help make the proposed testing technology scalable. We present CovidAID: COVID-19 AI Detector, a novel deep neural network based model to triage patients for appropriate testing. On the publicly available covid-chestxray-dataset [2], our model gives 90.5% accuracy with 100% sensitivity (recall) for the COVID-19 infection. We significantly improve upon the results of Covid-Net [10] on the same dataset.


title: Immunological determinants of clinical outcomes in COVID-19: A quantitative perspective

text: Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has a variable clinical presentation that ranges from asymptomatic, to severe disease with cytokine storm. The mortality rates also differ across the globe, ranging from 0.5-13%. This variation is likely due to both pathogen and host factors. Host factors may include genetic differences in the immune response genes as well as variation in HLA and KIR allotypes. To better understand what impact these genetic variants in immune response genes may have in the differences observed in the immune response to SARS-CoV-2, a quantitative analysis of a dynamical systems model that considers both, the magnitude of viral growth, and the subsequent innate and adaptive response required to achieve control of infection is considered. Based on this broad quantitative framework it may be posited that the spectrum of symptomatic to severely symptomatic presentations of COVID19 represents the balance between innate and adaptive immune responses. In asymptomatic patients, prompt and adequate adaptive immune response quells infection, whereas in those with severe symptoms a slower inadequate adaptive response leads to a runaway cytokine cascade fueled by ongoing viral replication. Polymorphisms in the various components of the innate and adaptive immune response may cause altered immune response kinetics that would result in variable severity of illness. Understanding how this genetic variation may alter the response to SARS-CoV-2 infection is critical to develop successful treatment strategies.


title: Pharmacy Services and the Novel Coronavirus

text: Pharmacists around the world can expect to be affected by the coronavirus, especially those who provide care for older people who are at a much higher risk for grave consequences from the virus. It is critical that pharmacists maintain awareness of the evolving pandemic and access reliable information to remain familiar with developments.


title: D'une épidémie à l'autre : quelles leçons apprises sont transférables à la réduction de l'impact psychosocial du confinement lié au Covid-19 ?/ [From one epidemic to the next: how can the learned experience serve to alleviate the psychosocial impact of Covid-19 confinement?]

text: The confinement of the population for an indefinite period within the framework of the national French prevention strategy of Covid-19 has a negative psychosocial impact already documented in other countries. In the past, several epidemics have built different strategies of prevention. It is urgent to consider how strategies used in other epidemics might be useful and helpful to manage the quarantine used to prevent the epidemics of COVID-19.


title: Forecasting the Impact of Coronavirus Disease During Delivery Hospitalization: An Aid for Resources Utilization

text: Background: The ongoing Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has severely impacted the United States. In cases of infectious disease outbreak, forecasting models are often developed for resources utilization. Pregnancy and delivery pose unique challenges, given the altered maternal immune system and the fact that the majority of American women choose to deliver in the hospital setting. Objectives: The aim of our study is to forecast the incidence of COVID-19 in general population and to forecast the overall incidence, severe cases, critical cases and fatal COVID-19 cases during delivery hospitalization in the United States. Study design: We use a phenomenological model with generalized logistic growth models to forecast the incidence of COVID-19 in the United States from 4/15/2020 - 12/31/2020. Incidence data from 3/1/2020 - 4/14/2020 were used to provide best-fit model solution. Subsequently, Monte-Carlo simulation was performed for each week from 3/1/2020 - 12/31/2020 to estimate the incidence of COVID-19 in delivery hospitalizations using the available data estimate. Results: From 3/1/2020 - 12/31/2020, our model forecasted a total of 860,475 cases of COVID-19 in general population across the United States. The cumulative incidence for COVID-19 during delivery hospitalization is anticipated to be 16,601 (95% CI, 9,711 - 23,491) cases. Among those, 3,308 (95% CI, 1,755 - 4,861) cases are expected to be severe, 681 (95% CI, 1324 - 1,038) critical and 52 (95% CI, 23 - 81) maternal mortality. Assuming similar baseline maternal mortality rate as the year of 2018, we projected an increase in maternal mortality rate in the US to at least 18.7 (95% CI, 18.0 - 19.5) deaths per 100,000 live birth as a direct result of COVID-19. Conclusions: COVID-19 infection in pregnant women is expected to severely impact obstetrical care. From 3/1/2020 - 12/31/2020, we project 3,308 severe and 681 critical cases, with about 52 COVID-19 related maternal mortalities during delivery hospitalization in the United States. These data might be helpful for counseling and resource allocation.


Examining Older Adult Cognitive Status in the Time of COVID-19


title: Revealing COVID-19 transmission in Australia by SARS-CoV-2 genome sequencing and agent-based modeling

text: In January 2020, a novel betacoronavirus (family Coronaviridae), named severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), was identified as the etiological agent of a cluster of pneumonia cases occurring in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China1,2. The disease arising from SARS-CoV-2 infection, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), subsequently spread rapidly causing a worldwide pandemic. Here we examine the added value of near real-time genome sequencing of SARS-CoV-2 in a subpopulation of infected patients during the first 10 weeks of COVID-19 containment in Australia and compare findings from genomic surveillance with predictions of a computational agent-based model (ABM). Using the Australian census data, the ABM generates over 24 million software agents representing the population of Australia, each with demographic attributes of an anonymous individual. It then simulates transmission of the disease over time, spreading from specific infection sources, using contact rates of individuals within different social contexts. We report that the prospective sequencing of SARS-CoV-2 clarified the probable source of infection in cases where epidemiological links could not be determined, significantly decreased the proportion of COVID-19 cases with contentious links, documented genomically similar cases associated with concurrent transmission in several institutions and identified previously unsuspected links. Only a quarter of sequenced cases appeared to be locally acquired and were concordant with predictions from the ABM. These high-resolution genomic data are crucial to track cases with locally acquired COVID-19 and for timely recognition of independent importations once border restrictions are lifted and trade and travel resume.


title: Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the daily management of biotechnological therapy in inflammatory bowel disease patients: Reorganisational response in a high-volume Italian inflammatory bowel disease centre

text: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is having a major clinical as well as organisational impact on the national health-care system in Italy, particularly in high-volume hospitals which are usually active for many essential clinical needs, including inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Here, we report major clinical and organisational challenges at a high-volume Italian IBD centre one month after the start of the Italian government's restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. All routine follow-up IBD visits of patients in remission were cancelled or rescheduled for 8-12 weeks' time. However, access to the hospital for therapy or for unstable/relapsing patients was not considered postponable. Everyone attending the centre (e.g. physicians, nurses, administrative personnel and patients) were advised to respect the general recommended rules for hand hygiene and social distancing, to disclose if they had a fever or cough or flu-like symptoms and to wear a surgical mask and gloves. At the entrance of the therapy area, a control station was set up in order to double-check all patients with a clinical interview and conduct thermal scanning. A total of 1451 IBD patients under biotechnological or experimental therapy actively followed in the CEMAD IBD centre were included in the study. About 65% of patients maintained their appointment schedules without major problems, while in 20% of cases planned infusions were delayed because of the patient's decision or practical issues. About 10% of patients receiving subcutaneous therapy were allowed to collect their medicine without a follow-up visit. Finally, 10% of patients living outside the Lazio region requested access to their therapy at a local centre closer to their home. At present, five patients have been found to be positive for SARS-CoV-2 infection but with minimal symptoms, 22 are in 'quarantine' for contact considered to be 'at risk' for the infection. Up to now, none of them has experienced significant symptoms. This study represents the first observational detailed report about short-term impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on patient organisation and management in a high-volume IBD centre.


Reducing mortality from 2019-nCoV: host-directed therapies should be an option


docid: tmfektuv

title: Adjustments in analyses of vitamin D status, allowing for vitamin D determinants, for Covid-19 risks


The practical challenges of making clinical use of the quantitative value for SARS-CoV-2 viral load across several dynamics


title: Features of enteric disease from human coronaviruses: Implications for COVID-19

text: Coronaviruses have long been studied in both human and veterinary fields. Whereas the initial detection of endemic human respiratory coronaviruses was problematic, detection of these and newly discovered human coronaviruses has been greatly facilitated with major advances in the laboratory. Nevertheless, technological factors can affect the accuracy and timeliness of virus detection. Many human coronaviruses can be variably found in stool samples. All human coronaviruses have been variably associated with symptoms of gastroenteritis. Coronaviruses can occasionally be cultured from enteric specimens, but most detection is accomplished with genetic amplification technologies. Excretion of viral RNA in stool can extend for a prolonged period. Culture-positive stool samples have been found to exceed a fourteen day period after onset of infection for some coronaviruses. Virus can also sometimes be cultured from patients' respiratory samples during the late incubation period. Relatively asymptomatic patients may excrete virus. Both viable and nonviable virus can be found in the immediate environment of the patient, the health care worker, and less often the public. These lessons from the past study of animal and human coronaviruses can be extended to presumptions for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. Already, the early reports from the coronavirus disease-2019 pandemic are confirming some concerns. These data have the cumulative potential to cause us to rethink some current and common public health and infection control strategies.


title: Alternative splicing and allosteric regulation modulate the chromatin binding of UHRF1

text: UHRF1 is an important epigenetic regulator associated with apoptosis and tumour development. It is a multidomain protein that integrates readout of different histone modification states and DNA methylation with enzymatic histone ubiquitylation activity. Emerging evidence indicates that the chromatin-binding and enzymatic modules of UHRF1 do not act in isolation but interplay in a coordinated and regulated manner. Here, we compared two splicing variants (V1, V2) of murine UHRF1 (mUHRF1) with human UHRF1 (hUHRF1). We show that insertion of nine amino acids in a linker region connecting the different TTD and PHD histone modification-binding domains causes distinct H3K9me3-binding behaviour of mUHRF1 V1. Structural analysis suggests that in mUHRF1 V1, in contrast to V2 and hUHRF1, the linker is anchored in a surface groove of the TTD domain, resulting in creation of a coupled TTD-PHD module. This establishes multivalent, synergistic H3-tail binding causing distinct cellular localization and enhanced H3K9me3-nucleosome ubiquitylation activity. In contrast to hUHRF1, H3K9me3-binding of the murine proteins is not allosterically regulated by phosphatidylinositol 5-phosphate that interacts with a separate less-conserved polybasic linker region of the protein. Our results highlight the importance of flexible linkers in regulating multidomain chromatin binding proteins and point to divergent evolution of their regulation.


title: Gas Aerosol Jetstreams from Trocars during Laparoscopic Surgery- A Video Vignette

text: Minimally invasive surgical (MIS) procedures have been restricted during the COVID-19 pandemic, in part to reduce inpatient occupancy and minimize pressure on critical care and anaesthesia but also because of concern for the potential for transmission of infection via aerosols created by laparoscopy. Viral particles have now been identified in the blood, stool and peritoneal fluid of infected patients although the infectious potential of any such particles that may be carried via surgical gases is unclear.


title: Challenging times: ethics, nursing and the COVID-19 pandemic

text: Globally nurses and midwives are working hard to detect cases of COVID-19, to save lives or give comfort in the face of death, to educate themselves and the public about protective measures to stop the viral spread, while still caring for those not infected with the virus. In many countries nurses are working under virtual siege from this pandemic, with not enough resources or personal protective equipment, overwhelming numbers of patients, staff shortages, underprepared health systems and supply chain failures. Nurses and other health and emergency workers are suffering physical and emotional stress, and moral distress from conflicting professional values. They are faced with unpalatable and complex ethical issues in practice, with moral conflicts, high levels of acuity and patient deaths, and long working hours. A rising number of nurses are infected with SARS-CoV-2 or dying in the line of duty. Nurses need strong moral courage, stamina and resilience to work on the front lines of the pandemic, often while separated from their loved ones.


Telemedicine services thrive during Covid-19


Radiothérapie mammaire dans le contexte de la pandémie de COVID-19 : astuces pratiques en période épidémique et conseils pour la reprise de l'activité en fin de crise./ [Breast radiation therapy during COVID-19 outbreak: Practical advice]


title: Profiles of COVID-19 clinical trials in the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry

text: The COVID-19 pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), is a global public health crisis since its initial reports in China. Since no effective vaccine or drug has been developed to treat and combat the COVID-19, the current approaches for clinical management focus on supportive care. There is a pressing need for evidence-based interventions to address the devastating clinical and public health effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Chinese scientists supported by private and government resources have adopted extensive efforts to identify effective drugs against the virus. To date, a large number of clinical trials addressing various aspects of COVID-19 have been registered in the Chinese Clinical Trial Registry (ChiCTR), including more than 200 interventional studies. Under such an urgent circumstance, the scope and quality of these clinical studies vary significantly. Hence, this review aims to make a comprehensive analysis on the profiles of COVID-19 clinical trials registered in the ChiCTR, including a wide range of characteristics. Our findings will provide a useful summary on these clinical studies, since most of these studies will encounter major challenges from the design to completion. It will be a long road for the outcomes of these studies to be published and international collaboration will help the ultimate goals of developing new vaccines and antiviral drugs. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT04252664.. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT04257656..


title: Aboriginal artefacts on the continental shelf reveal ancient drowned cultural landscapes in northwest Australia

text: This article reports Australia's first confirmed ancient underwater archaeological sites from the continental shelf, located off the Murujuga coastline in north-western Australia. Details on two underwater sites are reported: Cape Bruguieres, comprising > 260 recorded lithic artefacts at depths down to -2.4 m below sea level, and Flying Foam Passage where the find spot is associated with a submerged freshwater spring at -14 m. The sites were discovered through a purposeful research strategy designed to identify underwater targets, using an iterative process incorporating a variety of aerial and underwater remote sensing techniques and diver investigation within a predictive framework to map the submerged landscape within a depth range of 0-20 m. The condition and context of the lithic artefacts are analysed in order to unravel their depositional and taphonomic history and to corroborate their in situ position on a pre-inundation land surface, taking account of known geomorphological and climatic processes including cyclone activity that could have caused displacement and transportation from adjacent coasts. Geomorphological data and radiometric dates establish the chronological limits of the sites and demonstrate that they cannot be later than 7000 cal BP and 8500 cal BP respectively, based on the dates when they were finally submerged by sea-level rise. Comparison of underwater and onshore lithic assemblages shows differences that are consistent with this chronological interpretation. This article sets a foundation for the research strategies and technologies needed to identify archaeological targets at greater depth on the Australian continental shelf and elsewhere, building on the results presented. Emphasis is also placed on the need for legislation to better protect and manage underwater cultural heritage on the 2 million square kilometres of drowned landscapes that were once available for occupation in Australia, and where a major part of its human history must lie waiting to be discovered.


title: COVID-19 and the Widening Gap in Health Inequity

text: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has brought to light significant health inequities that have existed in our society for decades. Blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans, and immigrants are the populations most likely to experience disparities related to burden of disease, health care, and health outcomes. Increasingly, national and state statistics on COVID-19 report disproportionately higher mortality rates in blacks. There has never been a more pressing time for us to enact progressive and far-reaching changes in social, economic, and political policies that will shape programs aimed at improving the health of all people living in the United States.


ISEV and ISCT statement on EVs from MSCs and other cells: considerations for potential therapeutic agents to suppress COVID-19


title: Lung Scintigraphy Imaging Features in a Young Patient With COVID-19

text: A 31-year-old man developed diarrhea, fatigue, and intermittent fever for 2 weeks. The past few days he had experienced increasing dyspnea and dry cough. Ambulatory reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction testing was positive for SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2). Because of elevated D-dimer (1.5 mg/L), a lung scintigraphy (V/Q scan) was performed as SPECT/CT. Ventilation SPECT showed reduced ventilation with central nuclide deposition, whereas perfusion SPECT was inconspicuous, excluding pulmonary embolism. However, the low-dose CT revealed bilateral ground-glass opacities as previously described in COVID-19. This case highlights the procedure and findings of V/Q scanning (without embolism) in COVID-19.


title: Long-term surveillance of bat coronaviruses in Korea: Diversity and distribution pattern

text: Bats harbour diverse coronaviruses (CoVs), some of which are associated with zoonotic infections, as well as inter-species transmission. In this study, a total of 512 bat faecal samples from the bat habitats at different geographical locations in South Korea were investigated between 2016 and 2019. Seventy-eight samples were positive for coronaviruses (15.2%), comprising 68 alphacoronaviruses (13.3%) and 10 betacoronaviruses (2.0%). The positive rates tended to increase during the awakening (April) period. Notably, betacoronaviruses were only found in the site where Rhinolophus ferrumequinum was the major species of bats, and were related to SARS- and MERS-related CoVs identified in China and South Korea, respectively. No betacoronaviruses were closely related to SARS-CoV-2 in this study. Alphacoronaviruses were detected in the sites where Hypsugo alaschanicus, Miniopterus fuliginosus, Miniopterus schreibersii, Rhinolophus ferrumequinum, Myotis bombinus, Myotis macrodactylus and Myotis petax were found to be the major bat species. Furthermore, alphacoronaviruses had higher genetic diversity than betacoronaviruses and had a wider distribution in Korea. Considering that different bat species are co-roosting in crowded conditions in the same habitat, the diverse coronaviruses in Korean bats are likely to undergo cross-species transmission events due to the richness in host species. Therefore, continuous monitoring should be performed, especially at the awakening time of the hibernating bats in the habitats where diverse bat species co-roost, to better understand the evolution of coronaviruses in bats.


title: A case of COVID-19 and pneumonia returning from Macau in Taiwan: Clinical course and anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG dynamic

text: A 46-year-old woman presented to the emergency department with 2-day fever and cough at seven days after returning from Macau. COVID-19 and pneumonia was diagnosed based on the positive real-time RT-PCR tests for oropharyngeal swab samples and the presence of anti-SARS-COV-2 IgG starting from the illness day 11 and post-exposure 18-21 days.


title: Fair Classification with Noisy Protected Attributes

text: Due to the growing deployment of classification algorithms in various social contexts, developing methods that are fair with respect to protected attributes such as gender or race is an important problem. However, the information about protected attributes in datasets may be inaccurate due to either issues with data collection or when the protected attributes used are themselves predicted by algorithms. Such inaccuracies can prevent existing fair classification algorithms from achieving desired fairness guarantees. Motivated by this, we study fair classification problems when the protected attributes in the data may be ``noisy''. In particular, we consider a noise model where any protected type may be flipped to another with some fixed probability. We propose a ``denoised'' fair optimization formulation that can incorporate very general fairness goals via a set of constraints, mitigates the effects of such noise perturbations, and comes with provable guarantees. Empirically, we show that our framework can lead to near-perfect statistical parity with only a slight loss in accuracy for significant noise levels.


title: Evaluating the use of posterior oropharyngeal saliva in a point-of-care assay for the detection of SARS-CoV-2

text: During the Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, logistic problems associated with specimen collection limited the SARS-CoV-2 testing, especially in the community. In this study, we assessed the use of posterior oropharyngeal saliva as specimens for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 in an automated point-of-care molecular assay. Archived nasopharyngeal swab (NPS) and posterior oropharyngeal saliva specimens of 58 COVID-19 patients were tested with the Xpert® Xpress SARS-CoV-2 assay. SARS-CoV-2 was detected in either NPS or saliva specimens of all patients. Among them, 84.5% (49/58) tested positive in both NPS and saliva, 10.3% (6/58) tested positive in NPS only, and 5.2% (3/58) tested positive in saliva only. No significant difference in the detection rate was observed between NPS and saliva (McNemar's test p = 0.5078). The detection rate was slightly higher for N2 (NPS 94.8% and Saliva 93.1%) than that of the E gene target (Saliva: 89.7% vs 82.8%) on both specimen types. Significantly earlier median Ct value was observed for NPS comparing to that of saliva on both E (26.8 vs 29.7, p = 0.0002) and N2 gene target (29.3 vs 32.3, p = 0.0002). The median Ct value of E gene target was significantly earlier than that of the N2 gene target for both NPS (26.8 vs 29.3, p < 0.0001) and saliva (29.7 vs 32.3, p < 0.0001). In conclusion, posterior oropharyngeal saliva and NPS were found to have similar detection rates in the point-of-care test for SARS-CoV-2 detection. Since posterior oropharyngeal saliva can be collected easily, the use of saliva as an alternative specimen type for SARS-CoV-2 detection is recommended.


title: [Source of the COVID-19 pandemic: ecology and genetics of coronaviruses (Betacoronavirus: Coronaviridae) SARS-CoV, SARS-CoV-2 (subgenus Sarbecovirus), and MERS-CoV (subgenus Merbecovirus).]

text: Since the early 2000s, three novel zooanthroponous coronaviruses (Betacoronavirus) have emerged. The first outbreak of infection (SARS) caused by SARS-CoV virus occurred in the fall of 2002 in China (Guangdong Province). A second outbreak (MERS) associated with the new MERS-CoV virus appeared in Saudi Arabia in autumn 2012. The third epidemic, which turned into a COVID-19 pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 virus, emerged in China (Hubei Province) in the autumn 2019. This review focuses on ecological and genetic aspects that lead to the emergence of new human zoanthroponous coronaviruses. The main mechanism of adaptation of zoonotic betacoronaviruses to humans is to changes in the receptor-binding domain of surface protein (S), as a result of which it gains the ability to bind human cellular receptors of epithelial cells in respiratory and gastrointestinal tract. This process is caused by the high genetic diversity and variability combined with frequent recombination, during virus circulation in their natural reservoir - bats (Microchiroptera, Chiroptera). Appearance of SARS-CoV, SARS-CoV-2 (subgenus Sarbecovirus), and MERS (subgenus Merbecovirus) viruses is a result of evolutionary events occurring in bat populations with further transfer of viruses to the human directly or through the intermediate vertebrate hosts, ecologically connected with bats. This review is based on the report at the meeting «Coronavirus - a global challenge to science¼ of the Scientific Council «Life Science¼ of the Russian Academy of Science: Lvov D.K., Alkhovsky S.V., Burtseva E.I. COVID-19 pandemic sources: origin, biology and genetics of coronaviruses of SARS-CoV, SARS-CoV-2, MERS-CoV (Conference hall of Presidium of RAS, 14 Leninsky Prospect, Moscow, Russia. April 16, 2020).


The coronavirus pandemic: How can design help?


Toward Universal Deployable Guidelines for the Care of Patients With COVID-19


[Prevention and control strategies and methods of novel coronavirus epidemic infection in department of otolaryngology head and neck surgery in hospital]


China's Coronavirus-Induced Paralysis Threatens U.S. Drug Supply Chain


title: Asymptomatic COVID-19 in pregnant woman with typical chest CT manifestation: a case report/ 中华围产医学杂志

text: We report a case of maternal asymptomatic COVID-19 in a patient with typical CT image of pneumonia in the third trimester, and both the mother and baby were well. The patient, a 30-year-old female, was transferred to Yichun People's Hospital at 37 +3 gestational weeks because of a positive 2019 novel coronavirus nucleic acid result over seven hours. Her husband and mother-in-law were diagnosed with COVID-19 eight days before her admission and on the same day, respectively. The patient reported no discomfort before admission, and there were no abnormalities in the prenatal course during her pregnancy. On February 13 (the second day of admission), a patchy blurred shadow was observed in the lower lobe of the right lung in chest CT scan, and a live baby girl was delivered by a precaution-based emergent cesarean section because of suspected fetal distress shown in electrical fetal heart monitoring. Both the mother and the newborn were isolated separately after the operation without etiological examination of amniotic fluid, umbilical cord blood, placenta, etc. All the medical staff involved in the cesarean section were isolated as well. The mother was healthy and remained asymptomatic after delivery, while antiviral and anti-inflammatory treatment was offered. COVID-19 nucleic acid tests of pharyngeal swab were negative on the 4 th and 6 th day after operation. Chest CT on the 5 th day after delivery showed inflammation in the lower lobe of the right lung, and reexamination on the 8 th day showed a slight absorption of the inflammation. Samples of peripheral blood and pharynx swab were obtained from the newborn on the day of birth and four and seven days after birth and novel coronavirus nucleic acid test were all negative. The mother and baby dyad were discharged nine days after operation. And novel coronavirus nucleic acid tests were all negative in all medical staff involved.


title: Leveraging WiFi Network Logs to Infer Social Interactions: A Case Study of Academic Performance and Student Behavior

text: On university campuses, social interactions among students can explain their academic experiences. However, assessing these interactions with surveys fails to capture their dynamic nature. While these behaviors can be captured with client-based passive sensing, these techniques are limited in scalability. By contrast, infrastructure-based approaches can scale to a large cohort and infer social interactions based on collocation of students. This paper investigates one such approach by leveraging WiFi association logs archived by a managed campus network. In their raw form, access point logs can approximate a student's location but with low spatio-temporal resolution. This paper first demonstrates that processing these logs can infer the collocation of 46 students in 34 lectures over 3 months, with a precision of 0.89 and a recall of 0.75. Next, we investigate how this WiFi-based coarse collocation reflects signals of social interaction. With 163 students in 54 project groups, we find that member performance shows a correlation of 0.75 with performance determined from collocation of groups through 14 weeks. Additionally, this paper presents preliminary insights for other campus-centric applications of automatically inferred social interactions. Finally, this paper discusses how repurposing archival WiFi logs can facilitate applications for other domains like mental wellbeing and physical health.


Novel Coronavirus Disease 2019 in a Patient on Durable Left Ventricular Assist Device Support


title: Comparison of Image Quality Models for Optimization of Image Processing Systems

text: The performance of objective image quality assessment (IQA) models has been evaluated primarily by comparing model predictions to human judgments. Perceptual datasets (e.g., LIVE and TID2013) gathered for this purpose provide useful benchmarks for improving IQA methods, but their heavy use creates a risk of overfitting. Here, we perform a large-scale comparison of perceptual IQA models in terms of their use as objectives for the optimization of image processing algorithms. Specifically, we evaluate eleven full-reference IQA models by using them as objective functions to train deep neural networks for four low-level vision tasks: denoising, deblurring, super-resolution, and compression. Extensive subjective testing on the optimized images allows us to rank the competing models in terms of their perceptual performance, elucidate their relative advantages and disadvantages for these tasks, and propose a set of desirable properties for incorporation into future IQA models. The implementations are available at https://github.com/dingkeyan93/IQA-optimization.


title: Diagnostic Performance of CT and Reverse Transcriptase-Polymerase Chain Reaction for Coronavirus Disease 2019: A Meta-Analysis

text: Background Recent studies have suggested that chest computed tomography (CT) scans could be used as a primary screening or diagnostic tool for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in epidemic areas. Purpose To perform a meta-analysis to evaluate diagnostic performance measures, including predictive values, of chest CT and initial reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Materials and Methods MEDLINE and Embase were searched from January 1, 2020 to April 3, 2020 for studies on COVID-19 that reported the sensitivity and/or specificity of CT scans and/or RT-PCR assays. The pooled sensitivity and specificity were estimated by using random-effects models. The actual prevalence (i.e., the proportion of confirmed patients among those tested) in eight countries was obtained from web sources, and the predictive values were calculated. Meta-regression was performed to reveal the effect of potential explanatory factors on the diagnostic performance measures. Results The pooled sensitivity was 94% (95% CI: 91%, 96%; I2=95%) for chest CT and 89% (95% CI: 81%, 94%; I2=90%) for RT-PCR. The pooled specificity was 37% (95% CI: 26%, 50%; I2=83%) for chest CT. The prevalence of COVID-19 outside China ranged from 1.0% to 22.9%. For chest CT scans, the positive predictive value (PPV) ranged from 1.5% to 30.7%, and the negative predictive value (NPV) ranged from 95.4% to 99.8%. For RT-PCR,the PPV ranged from 47.3% to 96.4%, while the NPV ranged from 96.8% to 99.9%. The sensitivity of CT was affected by the distribution of disease severity, the proportion of patients with comorbidities, and the proportion of asymptomatic patients (all p < 0.05). The sensitivity of RT-PCR was negatively associated with the proportion of elderly patients (p = 0.01). Conclusion Outside of China where there is a low-prevalence of COVID-19 (1-22.9%), chest CT screening of patients with suspected disease had low positive predictive value (1.5-30.7%).


title: Clinical characteristics of non-critically ill patients with novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19) in a Fangcang Hospital

text: OBJECTIVES: To describe the clinical characteristics of patients in a Fangcang Hospital. METHODS: Non-critically ill individuals with positive SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR tests admitted between 7 February and 12 February 2020 to Dongxihu Fangcang Hospital, which was promptly constructed because of the rapid, exponential increase in COVID-19 patients in Wuhan, China, were included; clinical course through to 22 February was recorded. RESULTS: A total of 1012 non-critically ill individuals with positive SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR tests were included in the study. Thirty (of 1012, 3.0%) individuals were asymptomatic on admission. During hospitalization, 16 of 30 (53.3%) asymptomatic individuals developed different symptoms. Fourteen of 1012 patients (1.4%) remained asymptomatic from exposure to the end of follow up, with a median duration of 24 days (interquartile range 22-27). Fever (761 of 1012, 75.2%) and cough (531 of 1012, 52.4%) were the most common symptoms. Small patchy opacities (355 of 917, 38.7%) and ground-glass opacities (508 of 917, 55.4%) were common imaging manifestations in chest CT scans. One hundred patients (9.9%) were transferred to designated hospitals due to aggravation of illness. Diarrhoea emerged in 152 of 1012 patients (15.0%). Male, older age, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, chills, dyspnoea, So2 value of ≤93%, white blood cell counts of >10 × 109/L and large consolidated opacities on CT images were all risk factors for aggravation of illness. CONCLUSIONS: Non-critically ill individuals had different clinical characteristics from critically ill individuals. Asymptomatic infections only accounted for a small proportion of COVID-19. Although with a low incidence, diarrhoea was observed in patients with COVID-19, indicating the possibility of faecal-oral transmission.


Managing COVID-19-Positive Maternal-Infant Dyads: An Italian Experience


The emotional impact of over suspicion in the corona virus pandemic


title: General thoracic surgery services across Asia during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic

text: The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 posed an historic challenge to healthcare systems around the world. Besides mounting a massive response to the viral outbreak, healthcare systems needed to consider provision of clinical services to other patients in need. Surgical services for patients with thoracic disease were maintained to different degrees across various regions of Asia, ranging from significant reductions to near-normal service. Key determinants of robust thoracic surgery service provision included: preexisting plans for an epidemic response, aggressive early action to "flatten the curve", ability to dedicate resources separately to COVID-19 and routine clinical services, prioritization of thoracic surgery, and the volume of COVID-19 cases in that region. The lessons learned can apply to other regions during this pandemic, and to the world, in preparation for the next one.


Drug Repurposing for COVID-19: Ethical Considerations and Roadmaps


Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19)-Associated Guillain-Barré Syndrome: Case Report


Covid-19 and Health Care's Digital Revolution


title: When Blackness Does Not Fade After a Pandemic: An Appeal to Acknowledge the Unequal Burden of Social Isolation

text: Social distancing is one of the few tools that the everyman has to combat the Coronavirus disease. However, for those who are subject to racialized stereotypes about work productivity, educational ability, and other assumptions, the choice to socially distance can have many unintended consequences. This article is an appeal to our posterity, inviting a conversation about how we will remember the Coronavirus' impact on our lives. Will we selectively provide compassion for the racial groups we perceive more favorable when this is over? Or will we play favorites when it is time to pick up the pieces? This article provides scenarios and commentary on how social distancing could affect Black American populations - regardless of income or socioeconomic status. It argues that history has not been kind to Black Americans who have bought into mass national causes, and that there is an opportunity here to act differently.


title: COVID-19 Contact Tracing: Eight Privacy Questions Explored

text: We respond to a recent short paper by de Motjoye et el. on privacy issues with Covid-19 tracking. Their paper, which we discuss here, is structured around three"toy protocols"for the design of an app which can maximise the utility of contact tracing information while minimising the more general risk to privacy. On this basis, the paper proceeds to introduce eight questions against which they should be assessed. The questions raised and the protocols proposed effectively amount to the creation of a game with different categories of players able to make different moves. It is therefore possible to analyse the model in terms of optimal game design.


Coronavirus-Pandemie: So werden die Leistungen am Patienten vergütet : Wie Sie an das extrabudgetäre Honorar kommen


title: Pandemic Paradox

text: The COVID-19 crisis continues. Worldwide, there have been roughly 6.3 million cases and 380,000 deaths. In the United States, at the time of this writing, there were 106,200 deaths. As life has changed on many fronts, some predictable effects of the pandemic have occurred, including socioeconomic hardships, social isolation, and political unease. Although the intensity of the need for effective treatments and a vaccine is ongoing, other issues have arisen that were not widely anticipated in the early days of the pandemic. Several of these consequences have brought a focus on issues that are at the heart of oncology nursing.


title: A real-time policy dashboard can aid global transparency in the response to coronavirus disease 2019

text: There has been great provision of open data across the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic response, with, for example, dashboards presenting real-time descriptions of new daily cases and risk factors. Transparency has been an important discussion point and there have been concerns and criticisms of governments for not publishing the evidence base that is informing their decision-making. A 'policy dashboard' could act as a hub to show the localised reasoning behind COVID-19 policy decisions and allow the global health community to provide further support to governments and international stakeholders.


Controversies in CO2 Insufflation and COVID-19


COVID-19 and Lessons to Be Learned from Prior Coronavirus Outbreaks


title: Transfusion Thresholds for Adult Respiratory Extracorporeal Life Support: an Expert Consensus Document

text: Severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) can complicate novel pandemic coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Extracorporeal life support (ECLS) represents the final possible rescue strategy. Variations in practice, combined with a paucity of rigorous guidelines, may complicate blood product resource availability and allocation during a pandemic. We conducted a literature review around venovenous extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (VV-ECMO) transfusion practices for platelets, packed red blood cells, fresh frozen plasma, prothrombin complex concentrate, and antithrombin. Pertinent society guidelines were examined, and the practice of Canadian ECLS experts was sampled through an environmental scan. This paper represents a synthesis of these explorations, combined with input from the Canadian Cardiovascular Critical Care (CANCARE) Society, Canadian Society of Cardiac Surgeons, and the Canadian Critical Care Society. We offer a pragmatic guidance document for restrictive transfusion thresholds in non-bleeding VV-ECMO patients, which may attenuate transfusion-related complications, and simultaneously shield national blood product inventory from strain during pandemic-induced activation of the National Plan for the Management of Shortages of Labile Blood Components.


title: Atividade antibiofilme de substâncias de Croton urucurana em Staphylococcus aureus isolado de mastite bovina/ Antibiofilm activity of Croton urucurana compounds against Staphylococcus aureus isolated from mastitis in dairy cattle

text: A mastite bovina é a enfermidade que causa maior impacto na produção leiteira, sendo o microrganismo Staphylococcus aureus o mais prevalente. Este gênero possui a capacidade de produzir biofilmes que é um importante mecanismo de resistência aos antibióticos. Considerando a capacidade terapêutica das plantas, a espécie Croton urucurana, nativa do Cerrado, foi alvo do presente estudo, que teve como objetivo avaliar a atividade antibiofilme in vitro do extrato vegetal e substâncias isoladas desta espécie, frente Staphylococcus aureus, isolados de leite de vacas com mastite, bem como dos antibióticos gentamicina e vancomicina. A atividade antibiofilme foi avaliada por meio do cristal violeta e da contagem de unidades formadoras de colônia. As imagens foram obtidas por microscopia eletrônica de varredura. O extrato bruto e frações de C. urucurana apresentaram atividade antibiofilme superior à gentamicina e semelhante à vancomicina, enquanto a substância isolada α-Costol foi significativamente mais ativa quando comparada aos demais tratamentos avaliados, reduzindo cerca de 6 ciclos logarítmicos da população bacteriana em biofilme. Conclui-se que os fitocomplexos e a substância α-Costol isolados de Croton urucurana são promissores no combate a um dos principais agentes etiológicos da mastite bovina.(AU)


Let's conquer COVID-19 and sustain our abilities


SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 pandemic, "coronawar" oops; something was forgotten. Cardiovascular disease is still here! The collateral damage


title: Clinical performance of the Luminex NxTAG CoV Extended Panel for SARS-CoV-2 detection in nasopharyngeal specimens of COVID-19 patients in Hong Kong

text: In December 2019, the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) was first reported in the Hubei Province of China and later spread all over the world. There was an urgent need of a high-throughput molecular testing for screening the COVID-19 patients in the community. The Luminex NxTAG CoV Extended Panel is a high-throughput FDA emergency use authorized molecular diagnostic assay for SARS-CoV-2 detection. This system targets three genes (ORF1ab, N and E gene) of SARS-CoV-2, ORF1ab region of SARS-CoV and ORF5 region of MERS-CoV.In this study, we evaluated the diagnostic performance of this system with nasopharyngeal swab specimens of 214 suspected COVID-19 patients in Hong Kong. The results were compared with our routine COVID-19 RT-PCR protocol with LightMix SarbecoV E-gene kit and an in-house RdRp/Hel RT-PCR assay. The NxTAG CoV Extended panel demonstrated a 97.8% sensitivity and 100% specificity to SARS-CoV-2 in nasopharyngeal specimens. On low viral load specimens, the sensitivity of the NxTAG panel could still maintain at 85.71%. High agreement was observed between the NxTAG panel and the routine COVID-19 RT-PCR protocol (kappa value = 0.98). Overall the E gene target of the NxTAG panel demonstrated the highest sensitivity among the three SARS-CoV-2 targets while the N gene targets demonstrated the least.In conclusion, the NxTAG CoV Extended Panel is simple to use and it has high diagnostic sensitivity and specificity to SARS-CoV-2 in nasopharyngeal specimens. we recommend this diagnostic system for high-throughput COVID-19 screening in the community.


title: Antibodies to coronaviruses are higher in older compared with younger adults and binding antibodies are more sensitive than neutralizing antibodies in identifying coronavirus-associated illnesses

text: Human coronaviruses (HCoV) are common causes of respiratory illnesses (RI) despite preexisting humoral immunity. Sera were obtained near the onset of RI and 3 to 4 weeks later as part of a prospective study of 200 subjects evaluated for RI from 2009 to 2013. Antibodies against common HCoV strains were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and neutralization assay comparing older adults with cardiopulmonary diseases (99 subjects) to younger, healthy adults (101 subjects). Virus shedding was detected in respiratory secretions by polymerase chain reaction. Of 43 HCoV-associated illnesses, 15 (35%) occurred in 14 older adults (aged ≥60 years) and 28 (65%) in 28 younger adults (aged 21-40 years). Binding and neutralizing antibodies were higher in older adults. Only 16 (35.7%) of RI with increases in binding antibodies also had increases in neutralizing antibodies to HCoV. Increases in binding antibodies with RI were more frequent than increased neutralizing antibodies and virus shedding, and more frequent in younger compared to older adults. Functional neutralizing antibodies were not stimulated as often as binding antibodies, explaining in part a susceptibility to reinfection with HCoV. Monitoring binding antibodies may be more sensitive for the serologic detection of HCoV infections.


title: Clinical Features and Short-term Outcomes of 102 Patients with Corona Virus Disease 2019 in Wuhan, China

text: OBJECTIVE: In December, 2019, a series of pneumonia cases of unknown cause emerged in Wuhan, Hubei, China. In this study, we investigate clinical and laboratory features and short-term outcomes of patients with Corona Virus Disease 2019(COVID-19). METHODS: All patients with COVID-19 admitted to Wuhan University Zhongnan Hospital in Wuhan, China, between January 3 and February 1, 2020 were included. All those patients were with laboratory-confirmed infection. Epidemiological, clinical, radiological characteristics, underlying diseases, laboratory tests treatment, complications and outcomes data were collected. Outcomes were followed up at discharge until Feb 15, 2020. RESULTS: The study cohort included 102 adult patients. The median (IQR) age was 54 years (37-67years) and 48.0% were female. A total of 34 patients (33.3%) were exposed to source of transmission in the hospital setting (as health care workers, patients, or visitors) and 10 patients (9.8%) had a familial cluster. Eighteen patients (17.6%) were admitted to the ICU, and 17 patients died (mortality, 16.7%; 95% confidence interval [CI], 9.4%-23.9%). Among patients who survived, they were younger, more likely were health care workers and less likely suffered from comorbidities. They were also less likely suffered from complications. There was no difference in drug treatment rates between the survival and non-survival groups. Patients who survived less likely required admission to the intensive care unit (14.1% vs. 35.3%). Chest imaging examination showed that death patients more likely had ground-glass opacity (41.2% vs. 12.9%). CONCLUSIONS: The mortality rate was high among the COVID-19 patients described in our cohort who met our criteria for inclusion in this analysis. Patient characteristics seen more frequently in those who died were development of systemic complications following onset of the illness and the severity of disease requiring admission to the ICU. Our data support those described by others that COVID-19 infection results from human-to-human transmission, including familial clustering of cases, and nosocomial transmission. There were no differences in mortality among those who did or did not receive antimicrobial or glucocorticoid drug treatment.


Letter by Cerase et al Regarding Article, "Temporary Emergency Guidance to US Stroke Centers During the COVID-19 Pandemic"


Covid conspiracies: misleading evidence can be more damaging than no evidence at all


title: Repurposing of well-known medications as antivirals: hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine; from HIV-1 infection to COVID-19

text: INTRODUCTION: Chloroquine (CQ) and hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), originally were prescribed for prevention or treatment of malaria, but now successfully are used in several rheumatologic diseases. In addition, in recent decades considering their immunomodulatory effects, high tolerably and low cost, they are evaluated for various viral infections from HIV to COVID-19. AREAS COVERED: In this review we tried to summarize all available studies on HCQ and CQ efficacy for management of viral infections and the probable mechanisms of action. The data were collected by searching "Hydroxychloroquine", "Choloroquine", "Viral infection", and names of various viral infections in PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus, and Google Scholar databases from commencement to June 2020. Out of 95 search results, 74 most relevant works were gathered. EXPERT OPINION: HCQ/CQ showed acceptable efficacy in HIV especially as an adjuvant treatment beside routine HAART. However, for some viral infections such as ZIKA, EBOLA, SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV, human studies are lacking. In the COVID-19 pandemic, in vitro and preliminary human studies showed encouraging findings. However, later well-designed trials and retrospective studies with large sample size, not only reported non-significant efficacy but also showed more cardiac adverse reactions. Alkalinisation of acid vesicles is the most important mechanism of action.


title: Lausanne medical dispatch centre's response to COVID-19

text: The COVID-19 crisis is an unprecedented event. It is therefore essential for dispatch centres to share their experiences while the crisis is underway, similar to hospitals, so that we will all benefit from feedback.This letter to the editor describes the Lausanne dispatch centre response to COVID-19 and the lessons learned so far.


title: The challenges of covid-19 testing: Time for pathologists to rise to the occasion

text: An outbreak of novel coronavirus (Covid-19) was first reported in Wuhan, China in the late December 1 Since then, the positive cases have increased exponentially to 1 4 million (as of 8 April 2020) 2 The ability of a country to cope with increasing number of Covid-19 testing is the ultimate test Teaching/university hospitals should pull their resources and man-power to provide the muchneeded assistance to the demand of Covid-19 testing Inadequate testing could result in unrecognised Covid-19 infected individuals, roaming freely in the population The other issue is the sensitivity of test if samples were obtained from different sites Classically, the confirmation of diagnosis of Covid-19 depends on real time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) analysis to detect viral genetic material in either a nasal swab or bronchioalveolar lavage sample Wang et al (2020) reported that bronchioalveolar lavage sample has the highest sensitivity in identifying Covid-19, followed by sputum and nasal swab with positive rates of 93%, 72% and 63%, respectively 3 Furthermore, they found that nasal swab contained the highest concentration of viral load as it required less number of cycles to achieve higher copy numbers In some patients, viral genetic material was also identified in faeces and blood 3 While the reliability of testing is a concern, the safety of the laboratory staff also has to be kept in mind In this issue, there are three review articles on Covid-19, first article described the general properties of coronavirus, second article described the diagnostic performance of Covid-19 serology assay and third article described the importance of the site of sampling for Covid-19 4-6


title: [Dynamic inflammatory response in a critically ill COVID-19 patient treated with corticosteroids]

text: OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effect of corticosteroids therapy on the inflammatory response in a critically ill coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patient. METHODS: A 55-year old female patient with critical ill COVID-19 was admitted in Taizhou Hospital on January 19, 2020. The patient was treated with methylprednisolone 80 mg on the 2nd day after admission. Thereafter, the dose was adjusted in a timely manner and the therapy lasted for 13 days. The peripheral lymphocyte subsets (CD3+T, CD4+ T, CD8+ T, NK cells, B cells), as well as serum levels of lymphocyte factors (IL-2, IL-4, IL-6, IL-10, TNF-α, IFN-Î³) were dynamically monitored. RESULTS: On D1 of admission, the numbers of peripheral blood CD3+ T, CD4+ T, CD8+ T, and NK cells were significantly lower than the normal range. With the improvement of the disease, the numbers of CD3+ T, CD8+ T and CD4 + T cells gradually recovered and showed a linear growth trend (linear fitting equation: Y=18.59X+109.4, P<0.05). On D2 of admission, the patient's IL-6 and IL-10 levels were significantly higher than normal values, IFN-Î³ was at a normal high value, and then rapidly decreased; IL-2, IL-4, and TNF-α were all in the normal range. On the D6 and D7, the IL-6 and IL-10 decreased to the normal range for the first time. On the D18, the sputum virus nucleic acid test was negative for the first time, and the fecal virus nucleic acid test was still positive; on the D20 the sputum and fecal virus nucleic acid test were both negative. On D34, the patient recovered and was discharged. At the discharge the muscle strength score of the patient was 44 and the daily life ability evaluation was 90. CONCLUSIONS: In the absence of effective antiviral drugs, early use of appropriate doses of corticosteroids in critically ill patient with COVID-19 can quickly alleviate inflammatory response and improve clinical symptoms, however, it may reduce the number of T cells, and to adjust the dose in time is necessary.


docid: cohmaswo

title: COVID-19 response and containment strategies in the US, South Korea, and Iceland: Lessons learned and future directions


title: CO.ME.T.A. -- covid-19 media textual analysis. A dashboard for media monitoring

text: The focus of this paper is to trace how mass media, particularly newspapers, have addressed the issues about the containment of contagion or the explanation of epidemiological evolution. We propose an interactive dashboard: CO.ME.T.A.. During crises it is important to shape the best communication strategies in order to respond to critical situations. In this regard, it is important to monitor the information that mass media and social platforms convey. The dashboard allows to explore the mining of contents extracted and study the lexical structure that links the main discussion topics. The dashboard merges together four methods: text mining, sentiment analysis, textual network analysis and latent topic models. Results obtained on a subset of documents show not only a health-related semantic dimension, but it also extends to social-economic dimensions.


Editor's Introduction: The Postpandemic World


title: Electron currents from temporal gradients in tilted Dirac cone materials: Electric energy enabled by spacetime geometry

text: Tilted Dirac/Weyl fermions admit a geometric description in terms of an effective spacetime metric. Using this metric, we formulate the hydrodynamics theory for tilted Dirac/Weyl materials in $d+1$ spacetime dimensions. We find that the mingling of spacetime through the off-diagonal components of the metric gives rise to: (i) heat and electric currents proportional to the {\em temporal} gradient of temperature, $\partial_t T$ and (ii) a non-zero Hall condductance $\sigma^{ij}\propto \zeta^i\zeta^i$ where $\zeta^j$ parametrizes the tilt in $j$'th space direction. The finding (i) above suggests that naturally available sources of $\partial_t T$ in hot deserts can serve as new concept for the extraction of electricity from the spacetime geometry. We find a further tilt-induced non-Drude contribution to conductivity which can be experimentally disentangles from the usual Drude pole.


Publishing in the time of pandemic: Editorial policy of a dermatology journal during COVID-19


COVID-19 pandemic and cardiac imaging: EACVI recommendations on precautions, indications, prioritization, and protection for patients and healthcare personnel


title: First detection and genome sequencing of SARS-CoV-2 in an infected cat in France

text: After its first description in Wuhan (China), SARS-CoV-2 the agent of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) rapidly spread worldwide. Previous studies suggested that pets could be susceptible to SARS-CoV-2. Here, we investigated the putative infection by SARS-CoV-2 in 22 cats and 11 dogs from owners previously infected or suspected of being infected by SARS-CoV-2. For each animal, rectal, nasopharyngeal swabs and serum were taken. Swabs were submitted to RT-qPCR assays targeting 2 genes of SARS-CoV-2. All dogs were tested SARS-CoV-2 negative. One cat was tested positive by RT-qPCR on rectal swab. Nasopharyngeal swabs from this animal were tested negative. This cat showed mild respiratory and digestive signs. Serological analysis confirms the presence of antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 in both serum samples taken 10 days apart. Genome sequence analysis revealed that the cat SARS-CoV-2 belongs to the phylogenetic clade A2a like most of the French human SARS-CoV-2. This study reports for the first time the natural infection of a cat in France (near Paris) probably through their owners. There is currently no evidence that cats can spread COVID-19 and owners should not abandon their pets or compromise their welfare.


Life at the Editorial "COVID Frontline". The American Thoracic Society Journal Family


title: AiR -- An Augmented Reality Application for Visualizing Air Pollution

text: Air quality is a term used to describe the concentration levels of various pollutants in the air we breathe. The air quality, which is degrading rapidly across the globe, has been a source of great concern. Across the globe, governments are taking various measures to reduce air pollution. Bringing awareness about environmental pollution among the public plays a major role in controlling air pollution, as the programs proposed by governments require the support of the public. Though information on air quality is present on multiple portals such as the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), which provides Air Quality Index that could be accessed by the public. However, such portals are scarcely visited by the general public. Visualizing air quality in the location where an individual resides could help in bringing awareness among the public. This visualization could be rendered using Augmented Reality techniques. Considering the widespread usage of Android based mobile devices in India, and the importance of air quality visualization, we present AiR, as an Android based mobile application. AiR considers the air quality measured by CPCB, in a locality that is detected by the user's GPS or in a locality of user's choice, and visualizes various air pollutants present in the locality $(PM_1{}_0, PM_2{}_.{}_5, NO_2, SO_2, CO, O_3 \&NH_3)$ and displays them in the user's surroundings. AiR also creates awareness in an interactive manner about the different pollutants, sources, and their impacts on health.


title: Convalescent plasma in Covid-19: Possible mechanisms of action

text: Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is responsible of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Therapeutic options including antimalarials, antivirals, and vaccines are under study. Meanwhile the current pandemic has called attention over old therapeutic tools to treat infectious diseases. Convalescent plasma (CP) constitutes the first option in the current situation, since it has been successfully used in other coronaviruses outbreaks. Herein, we discuss the possible mechanisms of action of CP and their repercussion in COVID-19 pathogenesis, including direct neutralization of the virus, control of an overactive immune system (i.e., cytokine storm, Th1/Th17 ratio, complement activation) and immunomodulation of a hypercoagulable state. All these benefits of CP are expected to be better achieved if used in non-critically hospitalized patients, in the hope of reducing morbidity and mortality.