Researchers at the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA have identified rare, naturally occurring T cells that are capable of targeting a protein found in SARS-CoV-2 and a range of other coronaviruses.
Patients with the blood cancer multiple myeloma often mount a poor antibody response to COVID-19 vaccines. Mount Sinai researchers have now discovered that these patients also have a weak response from a different part of the immune system, known as T cells. Their discovery was published in a research letter in Cancer Cell in October.
Researchers are the first to introduce a novel mathematical framework to study the interplay between infectious diseases, human behavior – specifically social distancing – and economic growth. They introduced two models: a coupled disease-human behavior model to study the impact of full social distancing, and a coupled disease-human behavior model with an economic component to study the interplay between infectious diseases, human response to disease control measures, and the associated economic impact. Results show that disease elimination might be possible with various scenarios.
First global estimates of impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health in 2020 suggests additional 53 million cases of major depressive disorder and 76 million cases of anxiety disorders were due to the pandemic.
The drug, known as molnupiravir, was first shown to be efficacious against coronaviruses including the COVID-19 virus, SARS-CoV-2, by investigators in the lab of Mark Denison, MD, at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, and their colleagues at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Unvaccinated pregnant women are increasingly being hospitalized with COVID-19 during a nationwide surge of the Delta variant, according to research from UT Southwestern Medical Center.
The life-support system called ECMO can rescue COVID-19 patients from the brink of death, but not at the rates seen early in the pandemic, a new international study finds. Where once about 60% of such patients survived at least 90 days in spring 2020, by the end of the year it was just under half.
Some medical procedures can put health care workers at higher risk for contracting COVID-19 and other respiratory diseases. With these high-risk procedures, it’s important that health care providers have access to personal protective equipment (PPE), including N95 masks. However, not all procedures that may seem high risk have that designation.
Individuals with COVID-19 are most likely to spread the virus to close contacts two days before the onset of symptoms to three days after symptoms appear, and the risk of transmission is highest when patients had mild or moderate disease severity, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Georgia.
The FDA and CDC have just approved and recommended an additional dose of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines for moderately and severely immunocompromised people. Who should get it?
Researchers who have worked for nearly two decades on the previously unglamorous topic of nursing home infection prevention say the spotlight shone because of COVID-19 could accelerate efforts to reduce transmission of all types of microbes.
The study enrolled 120 transplant patients between May 25th and June 3rd. None of them had COVID previously and all of them had received two doses of the Moderna vaccine. Half of the participants received a third shot of the vaccine (at the 2-month mark after their second dose) and the other half received placebo.
The primary outcome was based on antibody level greater than 100 U/ml against the spike protein of the virus. In the placebo group - after three doses (where the third dose was placebo), the response rate was only 18% whereas in the Moderna three-dose group, the response rate was 55%.
The study enrolled 120 transplant patients between May 25th and June 3rd. None of them had COVID previously and all of them had received two doses of the Moderna vaccine. Half of the participants received a third shot of the vaccine (at the 2-month mark after their second dose) and the other half received placebo. The primary outcome was based on antibody level greater than 100 U/ml against the spike protein of the virus. In the placebo group - after three doses (where the third dose was placebo), the response rate was only 18% whereas in the Moderna three-dose group, the response rate was 55%.
Researchers at UC San Diego School of Medicine and Rady Children’s Institute for Genomic Medicine have produced a stem cell model that demonstrates a potential route of entry of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, into the human brain.
A new study from researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, published June 28 in the journal Nature, has found evidence that the immune response to Pfizer's mRNA vaccine against COVID-19 is both strong and potentially long-lasting.
The virus that causes COVID-19 normally gets inside cells by attaching to a protein called ACE2. Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found that a single mutation confers the ability to enter cells through another route, which may threaten the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics designed to block the standard route of entry.
Public health measures designed to reduce the spread of the COVID-19 virus may have fostered a substantial side benefit: A 53 percent drop in hospital admissions for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), likely due to a drop in circulating seasonal respiratory viruses such as influenza.