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  • Johnson & Johnson CEO on potential coronavirus vaccine: 'I think we'll have important data by the end of the year'

    25 Mar, 2020

    Via Fox News, Talia Kaplan write: Johnson & Johnson CEO on potential coronavirus vaccine: 'I think we'll have important data by the end of the year'

    In an exclusive interview on “Sunday Morning Futures,” Alex Gorsky, the CEO of Johnson & Johnson, discussed his company’s efforts to develop a vaccine for COVID-19, saying, “I think we’ll have important data by the end of the year.”

    Gorsky discussed the goals as many hospitals have been overwhelmed am...
  • New coronavirus cases drop in Italy for second day!

    24 Mar, 2020


    Italy recorded a lower day-to-day increase of coronavirus cases for the second day in a row Monday. Italy’s Civil Protection agency documented 4,789 new cases Monday, 700 less than the 5,560 new cases reported Sunday. Also 997 less new cases were reported on Sunday, representing a big drop after their highest levels ever on Friday 20th and Saturday 21st. 

    Although it is still early to confirm any trend and more data must be collected to say it is a favorable situation, it ...
  • Zona Franca (Barcelona, Spain) will 3D-print 100 ventilators everyday

    23 Mar, 2020

    The industrializable model has been validated by experts from the Parc Taulí hospital in Sabadell (Spain).

    Consorci de la Zona Franca de Barcelona (CZFB), Leitat, Consorci Sanitari de Terrassa and the Parc Taulí hospital in Sabadell, in collaboration with several companies, have developed the first mechanical respirator by industrializable 3D printing. That is, with scalable production capacity.

    They hope to create 50-100 units a day over the next week. Respirators are, in f...
  • Can new diagnostics help in this COVID-19 pandemic?

    23 Mar, 2020
    Via Science, Robert F. Service write: The standard coronavirus test, if available, works well - but can new diagnostics help in this pandemic?


    As the United States races to ramp up testing for the pandemic coronavirus using technology based on the tried-and-true polymerase chain reaction (PCR), alternative approaches are beginning to roll out that could make it easier and quicker for people to learn whether they have been infected. Some methods modify the standard PCR test, wh...
  • WHO launches global megatrial of the four most promising coronavirus treatments

    23 Mar, 2020

    Via Science, Kai Kupferschmidt and Jon Cohen write: WHO launches global megatrial of the four most promising coronavirus treatments.

    Excerpt:

    A drug combo already used against HIV. A malaria treatment first tested during World War II. A new antiviral whose promise against Ebola fizzled last year.

    Could any of these drugs hold the key to saving COVID-19 patients from serious harm or death? On Friday, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced a large globa...
  • Hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin as a treatment of COVID-19

    23 Mar, 2020
    French Confirmed COVID-19 patients were included in a single arm protocol from early March to March 16th, to receive 600mg of hydroxychloroquine daily and their viral load in nasopharyngeal swabs was tested daily in a hospital setting. Depending on their clinical presentation, azithromycin was added to the treatment. 
    Twenty cases were treated in this study and showed a significant reduction of the viral carriage at D6-post inclusion compared to...
  • Remdesivir could be promising drug candidate to treat coronavirus

    22 Mar, 2020

    While there are no medications currently approved to treat people with the novel coronavirus, there are several therapies being investigated as potential life-saving options. Remdesivir is one of the most promising, with Donald Trump touting the drug during a press conference Thursday.

    Remdesivir, which is delivered through an intravenous infusion, was initially developed by the pharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences to treat Ebola. Although initially promising, it didn’t prov...
  • First extubated COVID-19 patients in Spain

    22 Mar, 2020

    During this coronavirus crisis, some healthcare professionals are having a breath of hope as they see how some of the severe patients are being extubated successfully, with a favorable diagnosis. “First succesfully extubated patient in a the ICU of Hospital Ramón y Cajal” claimed the Twitter user Chechu Torres.










    But this was not the only good news of these last days. Esteban Martín, general surgeon in Hospital Clinico San Carlos, also posted a mes...
  • High Temperature and High Humidity Reduce the Transmission of COVID-19

    19 Mar, 2020
    Abstract



    This paper investigates how air temperature and humidity influence the transmission of COVID-19. After estimating the serial interval of COVID-19 from 105 pairs of the virus carrier and the infected, we calculate the daily effective reproductive number, R, for each of all 100 Chinese cities with more than 40 cases. Using the daily R values from January 21 to 23, 2020 as proxies of non-intervened transmission intensity, we find, under a linear regression framework for 1...
  • On our way to the Vaccine!

    19 Mar, 2020
    35 companies are in this moment on a race to find the vaccine againts COVID-19.



    Making vaccines usually takes a decade or more between development, safety testing and manufacturing, so this race is not only against each other, is against time.
    The most positive estimates talk about 12 to 18 months to have a vaccine for this SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.
    An American team in Seattle started a Phase 1 trial to test their mRNA-1273.Find out more: https://www.nih.gov/...
  • Hand-book of COVID-19 release

    18 Mar, 2020
    Global MediXchange for Combating COVID-19 presents a presents a book that gathers the experience gained during the coronavirus outbreak in China.
     Click this link to access the book
  • What about some good news?

    18 Mar, 2020
    • China has closed down its last coronavirus hospital. Not enough new cases to support them.• Doctors in India have been successful in treating Coronavirus. Combination of drugs used: Lopinavir, Retonovir, Oseltamivir along with Chlorphenamine. They are going to suggest same medicine, globally.• Researchers of the Erasmus Medical Center claim to have found an antibody against coronavirus.• A 103-year-old Chinese grandmother has made a full recovery from COVID-19 after being treated for 6 days...