A small study from China suggests transfusions of blood from those who have beaten the disease could help buy time for new victims


Transfusions of blood serum from people who’ve recovered from covid-19 could help severe cases recover, according to a new study from China.

Plasma donation: The concept of using blood from survivors—or “convalescent plasma”—isn’t new, but it’s now being tried against covid-19 because there aren’t any drugs known to work. A survivor’s blood is ch...

Abstract
To determine distribution of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 in hospital wards in Wuhan, China, we tested air and surface samples. Contamination was greater in intensive care units than general wards. Virus was widely distributed on floors, computer mice, trash cans, and sickbed handrails and was detected in air ≈4 m from patients.






As of March 30, 2020, approximately 750,000 cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) had been reported global...

A new coronavirus (CoV) identified as COVID-19 virus is the etiological agent responsible for the 2019-2020 viral pneumonia outbreak that commenced in Wuhan1–4. Currently there are no targeted therapeutics and effective treatment options remain very limited. In order to rapidly discover lead compounds for clinical use, we initiated a program of combined structure-assisted drug design, virtual drug screening and high-throughput screening to identify new drug leads that target the COVID-19 viru...

EFPIA, the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations, and Vaccines Europe are delighted to announce the organisation of the event “Europe COVID-19 battle: The pharmaceutical industry response”, the first of a series of virtual events.

This event will provide an opportunity to hear about and ask questions on the search for vaccines, diagnostics and treatments for use in the fight against COVID-19 and how we continue to ensure the supply of medicines to the pa...

Air pollution, it turns out, is extremely bad for you -- deadly, actually -- all the time. But it's especially dangerous in the middle of a global pandemic that attacks the lungs.


A recent study, which is still awaiting peer review, from researchers at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health, estimates a 15% increased death rate from Covid-19 with a small increase — 1 microgram per cubic meter of air -- in a type of air pollution called fine particulate matter, or PM2.5, which ...

How does COVID-19 kill? Uncertainty over whether it is the virus itself — or the response by a person’s immune system — that ultimately overwhelms a patient’s organs, is making it difficult for doctors to determine the best way to treat patients who are critically ill with the coronavirus.
Clinical data suggest that the immune system plays a part in the decline and death of people infected with the new coronavirus, and this has spurred a push for treatments such as steroids that rein in th...

Under WHO’s coordination, a group of experts with diverse backgrounds is working towards the development of vaccines against COVID-19.

The group makes a call to everyone to follow recommendations to prevent the transmission of the COVID-19 virus and protect the health of individuals. The group also thanks everyone for putting their trust in the scientific community.



Declaration
We are scientists, physicians, funders and manufacturers who have come together as part...

Michael J. Loeffelholza and Yi-Wei Tangb published in Emerging Microbes & Infections a state of the art of the current laboratory methods available for testing coronaviruses. For the study, the authors focused on the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak going on in Wuhan. 
Viral pneumonias typically do not result in the production of purulent sputum. Thus, a nasopharyngeal swab is usually the collection method used to obtain a specimen for testing. Nasopharyngeal specim...

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The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency use authorization for a blood purification system to treat patients 18 years of age or older with confirmed Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) with confirmed or imminent respiratory failure.




The authorized product works by reducing the amount of cytokines and other inflammatory mediators, i.e., small active proteins in the bloodstream that control a cell’s immune respons...

AbstractAs the pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) spreads, new data emerge and understanding of the disease improves. Reports associated with children are growing but still scarce. The epicenter of the epidemic has displaced to Europe. The first case in Spain was declared on January 31, 2020, and the first case in the Madrid region was declared on February 27, 2020.
MethodsWith the aim of obtaining an overview of the proportion of confirmed cases among those tested and the sev...

The Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases  and the Department of Epidemiology of Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health write this article projecting the transmission dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 through the post-pandemic period.
Abstract

There is an urgent need to project how transmission of the novel betacoronavirus SARS-CoV-2 will unfold in coming years. These dynamics will depend on seasonality, the duration of immunity, and the strength of cross-immunity to/from the oth...