Covid-19, SARS-Cov-2, vaccines, Remdesivir, Chloroquine...and all that Jazz

To better understand the coronavirus’s journey from one person to another, a team of 50 scientists has for the first time created an atomic simulation of the coronavirus nestled in a tiny airborne drop of water.

Antidote COVID-19 is an addictive tower defence game, where the player helps the human immune system fight off bacteria and viruses, including the dreaded SARS-CoV-2, the culprit behind the COVID-19 pandemic. Antidote COVID-19 is not only a fun game to play but also a brilliant way to learn more about the immune system, pathogens and how to stay safe from COVID-19.

Emergex, a medical company based in Oxfordshire, has just been given the go-ahead to begin clinical trials for a skin patch vaccine against COVID-19, which uses T-Cells to kill cells infected with the virus. This second-generation solution could provide individuals with longer-lasting immunity as compared to the current options available.

Stalling COVID-19 vaccination rates threaten public health. To increase vaccination rates, governments across the globe are considering using monetary incentives. We present evidence on the effect of guaranteed payments on COVID-19 vaccination uptake. We ran a large pre-registered randomized controlled trial (N = 8,286) in Sweden and linked the data to population-wide administrative vaccination records. We found that modest monetary payments of $24 (SEK 200) increased vaccination rates by 4.2 percentage points (p = 0.005), from a baseline rate of 71.6%. In contrast, behavioral nudges increased stated intentions to vaccinate but had only small and not statistically significant impacts on vaccination rates. The results highlight the potential of modest monetary incentives to increase vaccination rates.

When there is antigenic stimulation, naive B cells can differentiate into plasmablasts with low-affinity antibodies or with the use of lymphoid structures known as germinal centers, naive B cells can gain affinity-enhancing somatic hypermutations that later differentiate into memory B cells and long-lived bone marrow plasma cells. However, whether the vaccine-induced germinal center response is the underlying cause for the increase in affinity-matured bone marrow-resident plasma cells after immunization remains under investigation.

We show that the vaccine is thermostable on the patches, with patch delivery enhancing both cellular and antibody immune responses. Elicited antibodies potently neutralize clinically relevant isolates including the Alpha and Beta variants. Last, a single dose of HD-MAP–delivered spike provided complete protection from a lethal virus challenge in an ACE2-transgenic mouse model. Collectively, these data show that HD-MAP delivery of a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine was superior to traditional needle-and-syringe vaccination and may be a significant addition to the ongoing COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic.

C'est avec un acteur de moindre envergure, Translate Bio, que le laboratoire français a fini par signer un partenariat en 2018, avant de l'acquérir à grands frais à la fin de 2020. Le groupe bâtit aujourd'hui un "centre d'excellence dédié aux vaccins à ARN messager" dans lequel il compte investir 400 millions d'euros par an. Mais Sanofi a déjà dû abandonner son projet de vaccin anti-Covid, qui serait arrivé bien trop tard par rapport à la concurrence. Il lui reste désormais un produit antigrippal, dont les essais viennent de démarrer, pour prouver qu'il peut encore prendre une place dans ce domaine.

We show that the vaccine is thermostable on the patches, with patch delivery enhancing both cellular and antibody immune responses. Elicited antibodies potently neutralize clinically relevant isolates including the Alpha and Beta variants. Last, a single dose of HD-MAP–delivered spike provided complete protection from a lethal virus challenge in an ACE2-transgenic mouse model. Collectively, these data show that HD-MAP delivery of a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine was superior to traditional needle-and-syringe vaccination and may be a significant addition to the ongoing COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic.

Where chatbots really excel is in rapidly delivering reliable content in response to the recipient’s actual needs, questions, or concerns. That allows AI tools to serve as a bridge between vaccine manufacturers, regulators, public health officials, healthcare providers on the one hand and patients on the other.

Mandates, not nudges, are needed to ensure public health at this stage of the coronavirus vaccination rollout, according to Professor Richard H. Thaler. A proponent of using nudges to promote people’s health and financial well-being, Professor Thaler says vaccine resistance is now a serious public health issue. “We’re now in the United States well into the third stage where we’re dealing with people who have very strong opinions that they should not get a vaccine,” Professor Thaler said. “I think we are past the point of nudging when it comes to the vaccine. And the reason for that is vaccinations are a simple case of an externality. If you’re unvaccinated, you can make me sick, well, probably not from Sydney, but you can make your students and colleagues sick. And you don’t have the right to make me sick.”

Les équations différentielles établies par Kermack et McKendrick en 1927 permettent de modéliser le développement d’une épidémie. Malgré leur simplicité, elles n’ont pas de solution pouvant être exprimée sous forme analytique. Quant aux multiples modèles dérivés, de plus en plus complexes sur le plan mathématique, leurs prévisions n’ont pas toujours été fiables. Or l’emploi d’Excel n’est pratiquement jamais évoqué dans les cours d’épidémiologie, alors qu’il permet de rendre la modélisation d’une épidémie compréhensible à des non-mathématiciens, de leur de montrer sa pertinence et de leur faire comprendre quelles sont les futures évolutions possibles.

L’épidémie actuelle de coronavirus remet l’épidémiologie au premier plan. Une partie de cette discipline consiste à modéliser l’évolution de l’épidémie grâce à des outils mathématiques. Ces outils peuvent consister en un système d’équations aux dérivées partielles, de la théorie des graphes, des probabilités ou encore la science des données. Nous vous proposons quelques références en ligne pour avoir un aperçu de ces outils.

We found that cotton masks, surgical masks, and N95 masks all have a protective effect with respect to the transmission of infective droplets/aerosols of SARS-CoV-2 and that the protective efficiency was higher when masks were worn by a virus spreader. Importantly, medical masks (surgical masks and even N95 masks) were not able to completely block the transmission of virus droplets/aerosols even when completely sealed. Our data will help medical workers understand the proper use and performance of masks and determine whether they need additional equipment to protect themselves from infected patients.

The available vaccines against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) are quite effective in preventing Coronavirus disease (COVID-19). However, the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant is of significant concern because it is highly contagious and can infect vaccinated individuals. A new study published on the preprint server bioRxiv* explores the mechanism of the Delta variant's high infectivity and suggests a plausible pathway by which the Delta variant could escape from vaccine-induced immunity.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) vaccines have proven effective at preventing COVID-19-related mortality and illness. Since no vaccine is 100% effective, breakthrough infections are likely to occur. New research by a group of scientists at Erasmus Medical Center and Radboud University in the Netherlands looked at vaccine-breakthrough infections in a large group of vaccinated healthcare workers (HCWs).

Since November 2020, there has been a rapid emergence and spread of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants of concern (VoCs). These VoCs are often associated with enhanced transmissibility and virulence as compared to the ancestral strain of SARS-CoV-2.

Les ARN (pour Acides RiboNucléique) sont des molécules dont la structure est proche de celle des molécules d’ADN (Acide DésoxyriboNucléique). Beaucoup moins stables que ces dernières, ce qui signifie qu’elles sont plus facilement détruites, les molécules d’ARN jouent toutefois de nombreux rôles dans les cellules. Ceux-ci varient selon la classe d’ARN considérée : ARN de transfert ou ARN ribosomique qui interviennent dans l’assemblage des protéines, ARN guides qui aident à positionner certaines enzymes au bon endroit… Aujourd’hui encore, de nouvelles classes d’ARN possédant diverses fonctions biologiques sont découvertes.

As the highly transmissible Delta variant continues to spread across at least 17 provinces, China is facing a new dilemma: is its once-successful “zero tolerance” approach to containing the spread of the virus over, and what comes next? Unlike Britain and Singapore, where officials have explicitly encouraged people to “learn to live with the virus”, China has yet to officially shift its messaging.

Due to the harmfulness of cigarettes, a high frequency of smokers is suspected among people suffering from COVID-19. However, some studies report that the number of current smokers hospitalized for SARS-CoV-2 infection is lower than expected, considering the prevalence of smoking in individual countries. Nicotine could restore the impaired function of the nicotine cholinergic system and possibly mitigate the cytokine storm.

Although it is well established that cigarette smoking is associated with morbidity and mortality in several respiratory infections, data from recent studies suggest that active smokers are underrepresented among patients with COVID-19. This has led to claims that a ‘smoker’s paradox’ may exist in COVID-19, wherein smokers are protected from infection and severe complications of COVID-19. We aimed to review and summarise existing literature in this context.

Overall, the detection of all mutations in SARS-CoV-2 and their relations with pathological changes is nearly impossible, mostly due to asymptomatic subjects. In this review paper, the reported mutations of the SARS-CoV-2 and related variations in virus structure and pathogenicity in different geographic areas and genotypes are widely investigated. Many studies need to be repeated in other regions/locations for other people to confirm the findings. Such studies could benefit patient-specific therapy, according to genotyping patterns of SARS-CoV-2 distribution.

7 coronaviruses are known to affect humans; all have ancestry in mammalian hosts. COVID-19 is the 3rd zoonotic epidemic & the 1st pandemic caused by a coronavirus. SARS-CoV-2 intermediate hosts & all susceptible animal species still remain unknown. The One Health approach is essential for understanding SARS-CoV-2 transmissibility

These findings highlight the potential risks for COVID-19 infections in the event that intact infectious viral particles are deposited on these contact surfaces. Therefore, this study shows that shared toilet facilities in densely populated areas could lead to an increase in risks of COVID-19 infections. This calls for the implementation of risk reduction measures, such as regular washing of hands with soap, strict adherence to wearing face masks, and effective and regular cleaning of shared facilities.