COVID Reference Daily Top 10 Papers

+++ Transmission +++

3 December Manna A. Be Aware of Droplets and Bubbles. Ann Intern Med 2020, published 1 December. Web page: https://doi.org/10.7326/G20-0114 No comment.   28 November Cunningham L, Nicholson PJ, O’Cnnor J, McFadden JP. Cold...

+++ Treatment +++

Blog 3 December WHO Solidarity Trial Consortium. Repurposed Antiviral Drugs for Covid-19 — Interim WHO Solidarity Trial Results. N Engl J Med 2020, published 2 December. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMoa2023184 Harrington DP, Baden LR, Hogan JW...

+++ Vaccines +++

Blog 3 December WHO Ad Hoc Expert Group on the Next Steps for Covid-19 Vaccine Evaluation.  Placebo-Controlled Trials of Covid-19 Vaccines — Why We Still Need Them. N Engl J Med 2020, published 2...

+++ Diagnosis +++

Blog 3 December Dugdale CM, Anahtar MN, Chiosi JJ, et al. Clinical, laboratory, and radiologic characteristics of patients with initial false-negative SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid amplification test results. Open Forum Infect Dis 2020, published 24...

+++ Virology +++

Blog 1 Dezember Popa A, Genger JW, Nicholson MD. Genomic epidemiology of superspreading events in Austria reveals mutational dynamics and transmission properties of SARS-CoV-2. Science Translational Medicine 23 November 2020: eabe2555. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1126/scitranslmed.abe2555 Alexandra...

+++ Immunology +++

Blog 2 Dezember Agarwal V, Venkatakrishnan AJ, Puranik A et al. Long-term SARS-CoV-2 RNA shedding and its temporal association to IgG seropositivity. Cell Death Discov. 6, 138 December 2, 2020. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41420-020-00375-y A retrospective...

+++ Clinical Manifestation +++

Blog 2 Dezember Cao A, Rohaut B, Guennec LL, et al. Severe COVID-19-related encephalitis can respond to immunotherapy. Brain December 2, 2020. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1093/brain/awaa337 See title (“can” respond). The authors report a case series...

+ + + Collateral Effects + + +

Blog 2 Dezember Perez S, Innes GK, Walters MS, et al. Increase in Hospital-Acquired Carbapenem-Resistant Acinetobacter baumannii Infection and Colonization in an Acute Care Hospital During a Surge in COVID-19 Admissions — New Jersey,...

7 Days

The daily Top 10 – every day the best papers published in the best medical and scientific journals. By Christian Hoffmann & Bernd S. Kamps. Copy-editor: Rob Camp.   30 November Epidemiology Vos ERA,...

+++ Epidemiology +++ x

29 November Trieu MC, Bansal A, Madsen A, et al. SARS-CoV-2-specific neutralizing antibody responses in Norwegian healthcare workers after the first wave of COVID-19 pandemic: a prospective cohort study. J Infect Dis. 2020 Nov...

+++ Severe COVID-19 +++

Blog 29 November Knoouhuizen SA, Aday A, Lee WM. Ketamine‐Induced Sclerosing Cholangitis (KISC) in a Critically Ill Patient with COVID‐19. Hepatology 23 November 2020. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1002/hep.31650 Prior reports of recreational ketamine abuse have been...

+++ Pediatrics +++

Blog 2 Dezember Lee EH, Kepler KL, Geevarughese A, et al. Race/Ethnicity Among Children With COVID-19–Associated Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome. JAMA Netw Open November 30, 2020;3(11):e2030280. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.30280 Distribution of race/ethnicity among 223 MIS-C cases...

+++ Prevention +++

29 November Vogel G, Couzin-Frankel J. Grade: incomplete. Science 27 November 2020: Vol. 370, Issue 6520, pp. 1023-1027. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.370.6520.1023 Schools around the world are again the site of a large, and largely uncontrolled,...

+++ Comorbidities +++

Blog 24 November Yu B, Li C, Sun Y, et al. Insulin treatment is associated with increased mortality in patients with COVID-19. Cell Metabolism November 23, 2020. Full-text: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmet.2020.11.014 Oops! In this retrospective study...

+++ Education +++

+++ Education +++

13 November Rubin EJ, Baden LR, Morrissey S. An Update from Operation Warp Speed. Audio interview (28:20). N Engl J Med 2020; 383: e127. Access: https://doi.org/%2010.1056/NEJMe2033111 The editors discuss the pace of discovery in...

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5th International Edition | 7 November | Finally, after five months, we have published the next edition of COVID Reference – The COVID Textbook (462 pages; we apologize for the delay). We will keep...

Versatile and multivalent nanobodies

| 6 November | An early inhalation of nanobodies – the future treatment? VHH antibodies or nanobodies (Nbs) are minimal, monomeric antigen-binding domains derived from camelid single-chain antibodies. Unlike IgG antibodies, Nbs are small,...

Touching surfaces

Touching surfaces

| 5 November 2020 | The estimated risk of infection from touching a contaminated surface was less than 5 in 10,000 in a study by Amy Pickering, Abigail Harvey and colleagues. From April to...

COVID-19 and myocardial injury

| 2 November 2020 | In this multicenter cohort study (7 hospitals in New York City and Milan) the authors analyzed hospitalized COVID-19 patients who had undergone transthoracic echocardiographic (TTE) and electrocardiographic evaluation during...

Household transmission

| 31 October | Important study (because prospective). After enrollment, 101 index patients and 191 household members were trained remotely by study staff members to complete symptom diaries and obtain self-collected specimens, nasal swabs...

++ Español ++

Purgatorio | 31 de octubre | Si lees español, lee Los médicos en las UCI: “Aún no es el infierno, pero sí el purgatorio”. El País 2020, published 31 October | Una cuarta parte...

++ The Textbook ++

| Treatment | 31 October 2020 | Let’s face reality: at the beginning of the second pandemic wave, we have some steroids which have been shown to reduce mortality in patients with severe COVID-19;...

SARS-CoV-2 viremia and mortality

SARS-CoV-2 viremia and mortality

SARS-CoV-2 viral loads, especially plasma viremia, are associated with increased risk of mortality. This is the result of a study by Jonathan Li, Jesse Fajnzylber and colleagues who report SARS-CoV-2 respiratory tract, plasma, and...

++ Pandemic Autumn ++

France lockdown | 28 October | The dramatic second COVID-19 wave in France has lead Emmanuel Macron to announce a new lockdown in the country. The November lockdown which is due to last at...

Case Fatality Rate (CFR)

The country-specific crude case fatality rates (CFR), the percentage of COVID-19-associated deaths among confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infections, have been the subject of much speculation. There are still striking differences between countries. According to worldometer.com accessed...

Tocilizumab: No benefit

Tocilizumab was not effective for preventing intubation or death in moderately ill hospitalized patients with Covid-19. This is the result of a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial involving SARS-CoV-2 patients with hyperinflammatory states and at...

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...