Saliva: the future of mass screening
Could saliva be the future of mass screening? In his comment on the paper by Isao Yokota et al. we presented on September 29, Lorenzo Azzi highlights the potential merits of saliva: it can...
Author: The Editors
Host vs. Virus
Only a small proportion of patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection have respiratory compromise, a respiratory distress syndrome, and multiorgan failure. Who is to blame, the virus or the host? To help answer this question, Andre...
Superspreading event in Ho Chi Minh City
St. Patrick’s Day, March 14. Bar X. Ho Chi Minh City. The bar had 2 indoor areas for clients, a 300-m2 area downstairs and an 50-m2 area upstairs, with no mechanical ventilation. During open...
Born to SARS-CoV-2+ Mothers
Don’t separate SARS-CoV-2 positive mothers from their newborns and let them breastfeed their kids. This recommendation, already published by Italian pediatricians in June, has now been confirmed by a study of 101 neonates. Two...
SARS CoV-2 transmission in music clubs
Article of the day – and bad news for music clubs: asymptomatically infected persons can transmit the virus as soon as 2 days after infection. Substantial exposure can even occur within a few hours....
Cytokine storm
Daniel Leisman and colleagues question the role of a cytokine storm in COVID-19-induced organ dysfunction after a systematic review and meta-analysis of 25 COVID-19 studies (n=1245 patients) and four trials each in sepsis (n=5320),...
Solidarity Trial: Hydroxychloroquine, Remdesivir etc.
Will remdesivir soon join the hydroxychloroquine and lopinavir graveyard? Interim results from the Solidarity Therapeutics Trial, coordinated by the World Health Organization, indicate that remdesivir, hydroxychloroquine, lopinavir and interferon regimens appear to have little...
Top 10 Special: Transmission
The 5th COVID Reference Edition will be published this month. These are 12 papers we will include in the Transmission chapter. Find more about ‘spit happens’, aerosolized fomites, leisure transmission venues and choir super-spreading....
Cracking molecular processes
A Science paper by 200 researchers. The authors from six countries uncovered molecular processes used by coronaviruses MERS, SARS-CoV1 and SARS-CoV2 to manipulate host cells. They found 73 human proteins with which components of...
Paris under Curfew
As we disclosed yesterday, the French President Emmanuel Macron has announced this evening a 9 p.m. – 6 a.m. curfew of at least four weeks (see the comment on the paper by Andronico et...
Curfews against COVID
Could curfews be a less costly alternative, both economically and socially, to complete lockdowns? In French Guiana, an overseas départment, a combination of curfews and targeted lockdowns in June and July 2020 was sufficient...
Top 10 Special: Epidemiology
Later this month, we will publish the 5th COVID Reference Edition. Find 10 papers we will include in the Epidemiology chapter. The topics: “variolation”; introduction of SARS-CoV-2 in Europe, North America and Brazil; seroprevalence...
Virulence factor Nsp1
A major virulence factor of SARS-CoV is the non-structural protein 1 (Nsp1) which suppresses host gene expression by ribosome association (see our July 18 CR Top 10: Thoms M, Buschauer R, Ameismeier M, et...
Crowds and COVID
The dynamic of the current SARS epidemics in the Greater Paris and Madrid are reason for concern. In this article, Moritz Kraemer, Benjamin Rader and colleagues predict that crowded cities worldwide could experience more...
Common cold and COVID
The four endemic coronaviruses (eCoV: HCoV-OC43, -HKU1, -NL63, and -229E), the most common etiologic agents for the seasonal “common cold”, share sequence homology with SARS-CoV-2. Here, Joseph Mizgerd, Manish Sagar and colleagues show that...