Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome News and Research

Latest Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome News and Research

Sinopharm's candidate SARS-CoV-2 vaccine BBIBP-CorV shows promise in clinical trials

Researchers in China have conducted a phase 1/2 trial demonstrating the safety, tolerability, and immunogenicity of a candidate vaccine for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) – the agent responsible for the current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

18 Oct 2020

Future waves of COVID-19 will likely lead to further school closures

Researchers in the UK have warned that given how future waves of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) seem to be inevitable, it is likely that schools will be put under further pressure to close.

18 Oct 2020

Comparative analysis reveals common vulnerabilities across coronaviruses

Three lethal human respiratory syndromes associated with coronavirus (CoV) infections have emerged in the past two decades. They are severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2002, Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) in 2012, and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in 2019.

18 Oct 2020

WHO study finds Remdesivir and other repurposed drugs ineffective in COVID-19

A large-scale randomized trial has recently been conducted by the World Health Organization (WHO) to evaluate the efficacy of four repurposed antiviral medicines, including Remdesivir, Hydroxychloroquine, Lopinavir, and Interferon, currently used to treat hospitalized coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients.

18 Oct 2020

Return to college classes tied to a 9 percent increase in COVID-19 cases, study finds

Since a vast majority of colleges and universities in the country are bringing students back for in-person instruction amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the researchers from the University of Georgia wanted to determine the effect of this return to campus on the viral case growth in countries with a significant college student population, compared to non-college countries.

18 Oct 2020

Obesity changes ACE2 and TMPRSS2 expression in mice: Implications for COVID-19

Researchers studying young obese mice found that expression of ACE2, a receptor in host cells that binds to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), is higher in the lungs and trachea of obese mice. The finding could partly explain why obesity is a high-risk factor for COVID-19.

18 Oct 2020

Impact of COVID-19 on Australians with hypertension

Ten months into the COVID-19 pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), it is unclear how people with hypertension are coping, given their increased risk. A retrospective case-control study compared people with hypertension to matched healthy controls during COVID-19 lockdown to determine whether they have higher risk perceptions, anxiety, and prevention intentions. The study is published on the preprint server medRxiv* in October 2020.

16 Oct 2020

High-titer convalescent plasma reduced COVID-19 symptom severity in green monkeys

As scientists scramble to find effective vaccines and antivirals for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), a recent study published on the preprint server bioRxiv in October 2020 reports that the use of convalescent plasma to treat COVID-19 disease early in the course of the illness may be among the best available strategies at present.

16 Oct 2020

Should Australia re-open international borders?

Australian scientist Jessica Liebig from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), along with fellow researchers at the Queensland University of Technology and the University of New South Wales, studied the risks involved in re-opening the international borders for travelers to Australia.

15 Oct 2020

Mendelian randomization helps evaluate impact of circulating proteins in COVID-19

Researchers identify circulating proteins influencing COVID-19 susceptibility and severity by employing a large-scale two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) study.

15 Oct 2020

COVID-19 can cause sudden permanent hearing loss in rare cases

Many complications have been reported, including heart disease and prolonged respiratory issues in a group of people called “long-haulers.” Now, a new worrying finding shows that COVID-19 can cause sudden and irreversible hearing loss in patients.

15 Oct 2020

News coverage contributes to drug shortages in COVID-19

Researchers at Boston Children's Hospital in the U.S. have reported that the recent shortage of medicines used to treat coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) could be due to extensive news media coverage that results in individual hoarding or institutional stockpiling of medicines.

15 Oct 2020

Previous infections with seasonal coronaviruses might protect against SARS-CoV-2

Seasonal coronaviruses, which generally cause mild respiratory illness and symptoms of the common cold, belong to the same viral family as severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) – the agent that causes COVID-19.

15 Oct 2020

Blood purification outside the body in COVID-19 patients

Rodney Rosalia et al., in a recent medRxiv preprint research paper, study the longitudinal variation of parameters involved with systemic inflammation in critically ill COVID-19 patients upon EBP treatment.

15 Oct 2020

Study links SARS-CoV-2 seasonality to increased spread at lower temperatures

In a recent paper available on the bioRxiv preprint server, US researchers show that individual particles of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) undergo structural destabilization at relatively mild but elevated temperatures – strengthening the case for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) resurgence in the winter.

15 Oct 2020

Researchers identify potential drugs that could be repurposed as pan-coronavirus treatments

A large international consortium of almost 200 researchers from 14 leading institutions in six countries has studied three different coronaviruses - SARS-CoV-1, SARS-CoV-2, and MERS-CoV - with the aim of finding vulnerabilities shared by these three pathogens.

15 Oct 2020