jpd459/healthver_resplit huggingface dataset:
Question: what is the origin of COVID-19
Claim: The novel coronavirus is a zoonotic disease, meaning an infection that can jump between different species
Evidence: This provides evidences strongly supporting scientific hypotheses that bats and pangolins are probable hosts for the COVID-19 virus. At the whole genome analysis level, our findings also indicate that bats are more likely the hosts for the COVID-19 virus than pangolins.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: The results obtained from various AI-enabled experiments using clustering algorithms demonstrate that all examined COVID-19 virus genomes belong to a cluster that also contains bat and pangolin coronavirus genomes.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: The COVID19, which appeared to originate in China in December 2019, has spread worldwide pandemically.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Recent research results suggest that bats or pangolins might be the original hosts for the virus based on comparative studies using its genomic sequences.
Verdict: Supports
Question: Does Vitamin D impact COVID-19 prevention and treatment?
Claim: There is a significant correlation between low vitamin D levels and death from COVID-19
Evidence: ecological investigation on 51 countries including 408,748 participants, analyses indicated no correlation between vitamin D levels and recovery rate (r= 0.041) as well as mortality rate (r=-0.073) globally.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: In Europe, there were no correlations for both recovery (r= 0.040) and mortality rate (r= -0.035).
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: A principal defence against uncontrolled inflammation, and against viral infection in general, is provided by T regulatory lymphocytes (Tregs). Treg levels have been reported to be low in many COVID-19 patients and can be increased by vitamin D supplementation. Low vitamin D levels have been associated with an increase in inflammatory cytokines and a significantly increased risk of pneumonia and viral upper respiratory tract infections. Vitamin D deficiency is associated with an increase in thrombotic episodes, which are frequently observed in COVID-19. Vitamin D deficiency has been found to occur more frequently in patients with obesity and diabetes. These conditions are reported to carry a higher mortality in COVID-19. If vitamin D does in fact reduce the severity of COVID-19 in regard to pneumonia/ARDS, inflammation, inflammatory cytokines and thrombosis, it is our opinion that supplements would offer a relatively easy option to decrease the impact of the pandemic.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: A significant negative correlation (p=0.033) has been observed between mean vitamin D levels and COVID-19 cases per one million population in European countries.
Verdict: Supports
Question: has social distancing had an impact on slowing the spread of COVID-19?
Claim: isolation during the pandemic may worsen or trigger mental health problems
Evidence: social distancing is associated with a statistically-significant reduction in the doubling rate for all but three states.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Our models predict these strict social distancing measures caused a 79% and 61% reduction in the daily cases of COVID-19 across Australia and New Zealand respectively. This provides both evidence and impetus for governments considering similar measures in response to COVID-19 and other pandemics.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: social distancing and have seen slowing the spread of COVID-19.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: the centralized social distancing is necessary to minimize the pandemic spreading.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: Does Vitamin D impact COVID-19 prevention and treatment?
Claim: study explores possible link between COVID-19 and vitamin d
Evidence: In Middle East, the recovery rate (r= 0.267) and mortality rate (r= -0.217) showed a medium correlation.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: A principal defence against uncontrolled inflammation, and against viral infection in general, is provided by T regulatory lymphocytes (Tregs). Treg levels have been reported to be low in many COVID-19 patients and can be increased by vitamin D supplementation. Low vitamin D levels have been associated with an increase in inflammatory cytokines and a significantly increased risk of pneumonia and viral upper respiratory tract infections. Vitamin D deficiency is associated with an increase in thrombotic episodes, which are frequently observed in COVID-19. Vitamin D deficiency has been found to occur more frequently in patients with obesity and diabetes. These conditions are reported to carry a higher mortality in COVID-19. If vitamin D does in fact reduce the severity of COVID-19 in regard to pneumonia/ARDS, inflammation, inflammatory cytokines and thrombosis, it is our opinion that supplements would offer a relatively easy option to decrease the impact of the pandemic.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Several studies demonstrated the role of vitamin D in reducing the risk of acute viral respiratory tract infections and pneumonia. These include direct inhibition with viral replication or with anti-inflammatory or immunomodulatory ways. In the meta-analysis, vitamin D supplementation has been shown as safe and effective against acute respiratory tract infections. Thus, people who are at higher risk of vitamin D deficiency during this global pandemic should consider taking vitamin D supplements to maintain the circulating 25(OH)D in the optimal levels (75-125nmol/L).
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: A significant negative correlation (p=0.033) has been observed between mean vitamin D levels and COVID-19 cases per one million population in European countries.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: how does the coronavirus respond to changes in the weather
Claim: Coronavirus (COVID-19) live map tracker from Microsoft Bing
Evidence: Preliminary observations from our team and others suggest that temperature and climatological factors could influence the spread of this novel coronavirus
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Results indicated that temperatures had a negative linear relationship with the number of confirmed cases.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Correcting for that distributed delay and offering conservative estimates, we find a negative relationship between temperatures above 25 degrees Celsius and estimated reproduction number ([R]), with each degree Celsius associated with a 3.1% (95% CI, 1.5% to 4.8%) reduction in [R]. Higher levels of relative humidity strengthen the negative effect of temperature above 25 degrees.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: temperature is the most influential parameter that reduces the growth at the rate of 13-17 cases/day with a 1C rise in temperature.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: Can pets get the coronavirus disease?
Claim: Can pets get the coronavirus disease? The short answer is YES
Evidence: This virus is supposed to be spread by human to human transmission.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: The case raised the alarming possibility that pets could become part of the transmission chain for the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, which could potentially harm both them and us
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: The researchers did not study whether cats could pass the virus to people
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Therefore, there is a possibility of spreading SARS-CoV-2 through domestic pets. There are now many reports of SARS-CoV-2 positive cases in dogs, cats, tigers, lion, and minks. Experimental data showed ferrets and cats are highly susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 as infected by virus inoculation and can transmit the virus directly or indirectly by droplets or airborne route.
Verdict: Supports
Question: Does Vitamin D impact COVID-19 prevention and treatment?
Claim: vitamin D supplements can prevent coronavirus
Evidence: ecological investigation on 51 countries including 408,748 participants, analyses indicated no correlation between vitamin D levels and recovery rate (r= 0.041) as well as mortality rate (r=-0.073) globally.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: A principal defence against uncontrolled inflammation, and against viral infection in general, is provided by T regulatory lymphocytes (Tregs). Treg levels have been reported to be low in many COVID-19 patients and can be increased by vitamin D supplementation. Low vitamin D levels have been associated with an increase in inflammatory cytokines and a significantly increased risk of pneumonia and viral upper respiratory tract infections. Vitamin D deficiency is associated with an increase in thrombotic episodes, which are frequently observed in COVID-19. Vitamin D deficiency has been found to occur more frequently in patients with obesity and diabetes. These conditions are reported to carry a higher mortality in COVID-19. If vitamin D does in fact reduce the severity of COVID-19 in regard to pneumonia/ARDS, inflammation, inflammatory cytokines and thrombosis, it is our opinion that supplements would offer a relatively easy option to decrease the impact of the pandemic.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: testing positive for COVID-19 was associated with increasing age(RR(age<50)=1.05,p<0.021;RR(age[]50)=1.02,p<0.064)), non-white race(RR=2.54,p<0.01) and being likely vitamin D deficient (deficient/treatment-not-increased:RR=1.77,p<0.02) as compared to likely vitamin D sufficient(not-deficient/treatment-not-decreased), with predicted COVID-19 rates in the vitamin D deficient group of 21.6%(95%CI[14.0%-29.2%] ) versus 12.2%(95%CI[8.9%-15.4%]) in the vitamin D sufficient group.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: there is not enough evidence on the association between vitamin D levels and COVID-19 severity and mortality. Therefore, randomized control trials and cohort studies are necessary to test this hypothesis.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: Can people recover from COVID-19?
Claim: no-one can ever recover from COVID-19
Evidence: Of the 74 confirmed patients with COVID-19, 26 (35%) recovered during the study period and voluntarily stopped using the system.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Our study provides the first evidence of inflammatory immune signature in early recovery stage, suggesting that the COVID-19 patients are still vulnerable after hospital discharge.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Most patients with coronavirus disease (COVID-19) who show mild symptoms are sent home by physicians to recover.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Epidemiological, clinical and immunological studies from COVID-19 recovered patients are particularly important to understand the disease and to prepare better for potential outbreaks in the future.
Verdict: Refutes
Question: are there any drugs that work for SARS-CoV or SARS-CoV-2 in animals?
Claim: A combination of two existing drugs is highly effective against SARS-CoV-2 in cell cultures.
Evidence: There is no therapeutic FDA-approved drug against SARS-CoV-2 infection, although a combination of anti-viral drugs is directly being practiced in some countries. 
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Thus, our goal is to test the most active antivirals identified in adequate animal models infected with SARS-CoV-2, to add more information about possible in vivo efficacy. In turn, successful antivirals could be tested in clinical trials as treatments for infected patients, but also as pre-exposure prophylaxis to avoid novel infections until an effective and safe vaccine is developed.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Several efforts are currently made to find a treatment for COVID-19 patients. So far, several anti-viral and immunosuppressive or immunomodulating drugs have demonstrated some efficacy on COVID-19 both in vitro and in animal models as well as in cases series. 
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: When used for prophylaxis or treatment neither the standard human malaria dose (6.5 mg/kg) nor a high dose (50 mg/kg) of HCQ had any beneficial effect on clinical disease or SARS-CoV-2 kinetics (replication/shedding) in the Syrian hamster disease model. Similarly, HCQ prophylaxis/treatment (6.5 mg/kg) did not significantly benefit clinical outcome nor reduce SARS-CoV-2 replication/shedding in the upper and lower respiratory tract in the rhesus macaque disease model. In conclusion, our preclinical animal studies do not support the use of HCQ in prophylaxis/treatment of COVID-19.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: how do people die from the coronavirus?
Claim: Alzheimer's led to the deaths of around 80.6 people in England per 100,000 in August, compared with 7.2 for Covid-19.
Evidence: Lack of personal protective equipment was cited as a common cause of death.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Respiratory failure has been cited as the major cause of death
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: The cause of most deaths has been acute pneumonia.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Compared to the recovered group, more patients in the death group exhibited characteristics of advanced age, pre-existing comorbidities, dyspnea, oxygen saturation decrease, increased WBC count, decreased lymphocytes, and elevated CRP levels.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: Which are the first symptoms of the coronavirus disease?
Claim: A rarely mentioned early symptom is gastrointestinal distress.
Evidence: This paper reports the diagnosis and treatment of one COVIN-19 patient with conjunctivitis as the first symptom and one COVIN-19 patient with conjunctivitis.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: The pathogen was proved to be a novel betacoronavirus called 2019 novel coronavirus (officially named by the World Health Organization as COVID-19). The typical clinical manifestations were fever, cough, dyspnea, and myalgia or fatigue. Less common symptoms included headache, diarrhea, nausea and vomiting.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: A number of COVIN-19 cases with conjunctivitis or conjunctivitis as the first symptom have been observed in our clinical work.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID19) affects principally the respiratory tract but recent studies described that COVID19 could present a broader clinical spectrum from the absence of any symptoms to heart (1), digestive (2) or EarNoseThroat (including anosmia and ageusia) (3) manifestations. Here we report two cases of peculiar skin manifestation.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: has social distancing had an impact on slowing the spread of COVID-19?
Claim: social distancing means keeping people far enough apart that they can't spread coronavirus
Evidence: The government of different countries has adopted various policies to contain this epidemic and the most common were social distancing and lockdown. Our analysis revealed that the measures can slow down the outbreak. We can reduce the epidemic size and prolong the time to arrive at the epidemic peak by seriously following the measures suggested by the authorities.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: The decentralized strategy is insufficient when used alone, but offers the best results when combined with the centralized one. Indeed, the (C+D) is the most efficient isolation strategy at mitigating the network superspreaders and reducing the highest node degrees to less than 10% of their initial values.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: stronger social distancing, e.g., cutting 75% of social ties, can reduce the outbreak by 75% for the C isolation, by 33% for the D isolation, and by 87% for the (C+D) isolation strategy.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: counties where the policies have been imposed have effectively increased social distancing and have seen slowing the spread of COVID-19.
Verdict: Supports
Question: are there any drugs that work for SARS-CoV or SARS-CoV-2 in animals?
Claim: proton pump inhibitors, such as omeprazole and vonoprazan, reduce the infection of cells by SARS-CoV-2
Evidence: There is no therapeutic FDA-approved drug against SARS-CoV-2 infection, although a combination of anti-viral drugs is directly being practiced in some countries. 
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Thus, our goal is to test the most active antivirals identified in adequate animal models infected with SARS-CoV-2, to add more information about possible in vivo efficacy. In turn, successful antivirals could be tested in clinical trials as treatments for infected patients, but also as pre-exposure prophylaxis to avoid novel infections until an effective and safe vaccine is developed.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: When used for prophylaxis or treatment neither the standard human malaria dose (6.5 mg/kg) nor a high dose (50 mg/kg) of HCQ had any beneficial effect on clinical disease or SARS-CoV-2 kinetics (replication/shedding) in the Syrian hamster disease model. Similarly, HCQ prophylaxis/treatment (6.5 mg/kg) did not significantly benefit clinical outcome nor reduce SARS-CoV-2 replication/shedding in the upper and lower respiratory tract in the rhesus macaque disease model. In conclusion, our preclinical animal studies do not support the use of HCQ in prophylaxis/treatment of COVID-19.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: The results suggest the effectiveness of Ribavirin, Remdesivir, Sofosbuvir, Galidesivir, and Tenofovir as potent drugs against SARS-CoV-2 since they tightly bind to its RdRp. In addition, the results suggest guanosine derivative (IDX-184), Setrobuvir, and YAK as top seeds for antiviral treatments with high potential to fight the SARS-CoV-2 strain specifically. 
Verdict: Neutral
Question: will SARS-CoV2 infected people develop immunity?
Claim: obesity is the most common risk factor for severe illness from COVID-19 with over 30% of the population affected. Obesity causes several health issues that predispose people to complications.
Evidence: The CD4 + memory exploiting could help immune system to recall immunity of already know antigens against coronaviruses, avoiding or limiting "lung crash" until virus specific immunity develops and making it faster and prolonged. Finally, this administration could be helpful not only in already infected patients, but also before infection. In fact, people could have an immune system more ready when the contact with the Covid-19 will occur.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Thus both qualitative and quantitative features of B and T cell immunity to spike constitute informative biomarkers of the protective potential of novel SARS-CoV-2 vaccines.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: In this study, we collected blood from COVID-19 patients who have recently become virus-free and therefore were discharged, and analyzed their SARS-CoV-2-specific antibody and T cell responses. We observed SARS-CoV-2-specific humoral and cellular immunity in the patients. Both were detected in newly discharged patients, suggesting both participate in immune-mediated protection to viral infection.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Knowledge of the molecular mechanisms of viral cycles and immunity is an important prerequisite for the development of vaccination strategies and development of effective drugs.
Verdict: Neutral
Question: can bcg vaccine cure covid-19
Claim: We don't know yet whether BCG will reduce the severity of COVID-19
Evidence: Two recent studies have suggested a link between the BCG vaccination policy and the morbidity and mortality due to COVID-19.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Of late, Bacillus CalmetteGurin (BCG) has been speculated as a possible protection from COVID-19.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: BCG might provide the protection against COVID-19, with consequent less COVID-19 infection and deaths and more rapid recovery.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Universal immunization of BCG can provide great protection against the COVID-19 infection because the BCG vaccine gives broad protection against respiratory infections.
Verdict: Refutes
Question: Can smoking help in preventing COVID-19?
Claim: Does Smoking Make COVID-19 Better? No it does not
Evidence: Cannabis smoking is linked with poor respiratory health, immunosuppression and multiple contaminants. Potential synergism between the two epidemics would represent a major public health convergence. Cigarettes were implicated with disease severity in Wuhan, China.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: Higher genetically proxied BMI and lifetime smoking score were associated with increased risk of sepsis in both UK Biobank (BMI: odds ratio 1.38 per standard deviation increase, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.27 to 1.51
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: Our findings support a causal effect of elevated BMI and smoking on risk of sepsis and severe covid-19.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: Active smoking was associated with decreased odds of Covid-19.
Verdict: Refutes
Question: Can face masks protect me from the coronavirus disease?
Claim: The N95 Respirator Mask Protect You Against coronavirus
Evidence: We also demonstrated that three brands of medical masks blocked over 99% viruses in aerosols. The avian coronavirus was completely inactivated after being steamed for 5 minutes.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: In this study, we demonstrated, using avian coronavirus of infectious bronchitis virus to mimic SARSCoV2, that medical masks and N95 masks remained their blocking efficacy after being steamed on boiling water even for 2 hours.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Together, this study suggested that medical masks are adequate for use on most social occasions, and both medical masks and N95 masks can be reused for a few days with steam decontamination between use.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Our results indicate that surgical face masks could prevent transmission of human coronaviruses and influenza viruses from symptomatic individuals.
Verdict: Refutes
Question: Can pets get the coronavirus disease?
Claim: here is currently no evidence that animals, including pets, can be infected with the coronavirus, and no evidence that animals can spread the virus
Evidence: The researchers did not study whether cats could pass the virus to people
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)--the virus that causes coronavirus disease (COVID-19)--has been detected in domestic dogs and cats, raising concerns of transmission from, to, or between these animals.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Our results support the view that the pet owners and other persons with COVID-19 in close contact with animals should be cautious of the way they interact with them.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: Scientists now report that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, doesnt do a good job of copying itself in dogs, pigs, chickens, and ducks But cats are susceptible to the virus and can give it to one another via airborne transmission
Verdict: Refutes
Question: Can animals spread COVID-19?
Claim: while dogs don't seem to spread the disease, coronavirus-infected cats do
Evidence: Coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) is now a pandemic threat. This virus is supposed to be spread by human to human transmission.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Cellular angiotensin converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) is the receptor of SARS-CoV-2 which is identical or similar in different species of animals such as pigs, ferrets, cats, orangutans, monkeys, and humans. Moreover, a recent study predicted that dog might be secondary host during the evolution of SARS-CoV-2 from bat to human. Therefore, there is a possibility of spreading SARS-CoV-2 through domestic pets.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Experimental data showed ferrets and cats are highly susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 as infected by virus inoculation and can transmit the virus directly or indirectly by droplets or airborne route.
Verdict: Refutes
Evidence: Although there is currently no evidence that animals play a substantial role in spreading COVID-19,
Verdict: Refutes
Question: has social distancing had an impact on slowing the spread of COVID-19?
Claim: hand-washing, mask-wearing and social distancing - are slowing the spread of the flu
Evidence: social distancing is associated with a statistically-significant reduction in the doubling rate for all but three states.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: We use a simple log-linear model with intercept and trend break to evaluate whether the measures are effective preventing/slowing down the spread of the disease in Turkey.
Verdict: Neutral
Evidence: The decentralized strategy is insufficient when used alone, but offers the best results when combined with the centralized one. Indeed, the (C+D) is the most efficient isolation strategy at mitigating the network superspreaders and reducing the highest node degrees to less than 10% of their initial values.
Verdict: Supports
Evidence: To analyze the effectiveness of social distancing in the United States (U.S.).
Verdict: Neutral