Covid19-Sources

Some infectious diseases, including COVID-19, can undergo airborne transmission. This may happen at close proximity, but as time indoors increases, infections can occur in shared room air despite distancing. We propose two indicators of infection risk for this situation, that is, relative risk parameter (Hr) and risk parameter (H). They combine the key factors that control airborne disease transmission indoors: virus- containing aerosol generation rate, breathing flow rate, masking and its quality, ventilation and aerosol-removal rates, number of occupants, and duration of exposure. COVID-19 outbreaks show a clear trend that is consistent with airborne infection and enable recommendations to minimize transmission risk. Transmission in typical prepandemic indoor spaces is highly sensitive to mitigation efforts. Previous outbreaks of measles, influenza, and tuberculosis were also assessed. Measles outbreaks occur at much lower risk parameter values than COVID-19, while tuberculosis outbreaks are observed at higher risk parameter values. Because both diseases are accepted as airborne, the fact that COVID-19 is less contagious than measles does not rule out airborne transmission. It is important that future outbreak reports include information on masking, ventilation and aerosol-removal rates, number of occupants, and duration of exposure, to investigate airborne transmission.

pathy has been increasingly reported in adults. In children, data are sparse. Our aim was to describe pediatric patients who recovered from COVID-19 and later presented with liver injury. Methods: This is a retrospective case-series study of pediatric patients with post-COVID-19 liver manifestations. We collected data on demographics, medical history, clinical presentation, laboratory results, imaging, histology, treatment, and outcome. Results: We report five pediatric patients who recovered from COVID-19 and later presented with liver injury. Two types of clinical presentation were distinguishable. Two infants aged 3 and 5 months, previously healthy, presented with acute liver failure that rapidly progressed to liver transplantation. Their liver explant showed massive necrosis with cholangiolar proliferation and lymphocytic infiltrate. Three children, two aged 8 years and one aged 13 years, presented with hepatitis with cholestasis. Two children had a liver biopsy significant for lymphocytic portal and parenchyma inflammation, along with bile duct proliferations. All three were started on steroid treatment; liver enzymes improved, and they were weaned successfully from treatment. For all five patients, extensive etiology workup for infectious and metabolic etiologies were negative. Conclusions: We report two distinct patterns of potentially long COVID-19 liver manifestations in children with common clinical, radiological, and histopathological characteristics after a thorough workup excluded other known etiologies. Copyright © 2022 by European Society for Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Nutrition and North American Society for Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Nutrition...

Exclusive: some who worked on pandemic frontline may have to sell their house after claims rejected

The Omicron, or Pango lineage B.1.1.529, variant of SARS-CoV-2 carries multiple spike mutations with high transmissibility and partial neutralizing antibody (nAb) escape. Vaccinated individuals show protection from severe disease, often attributed to primed cellular immunity. We investigated T and B cell immunity against B.1.1.529 in triple mRNA vaccinated healthcare workers (HCW) with different SARS-CoV-2 infection histories. B and T cell immunity against previous variants of concern was enhanced in triple vaccinated individuals, but magnitude of T and B cell responses against B.1.1.529 spike protein was reduced. Immune imprinting by infection with the earlier B.1.1.7 (Alpha) variant resulted in less durable binding antibody against B.1.1.529. Previously infection-naïve HCW who became infected during the B.1.1.529 wave showed enhanced immunity against earlier variants, but reduced nAb potency and T cell responses against B.1.1.529 itself. Previous Wuhan Hu-1 infection abrogated T cell recognition and any enhanced cross-reactive neutralizing immunity on infection with B.1.1.529.

AStA Wirtschafts- und Sozialstatistisches Archiv - In this short note, we apply the method of De Nicola et al. (2022) to the most recent available data, thereby providing up-to-date estimates of...

Think you know flu? Read this fascinating study from @nicd_sa et al - with detailed sampling, estimated over 40% of population got infected per season on average, and 17% had repeat infection within same season. Also evidence of asymptomatic transmission: https://t.co/pXIITwGYT8 pic.twitter.com/JOZyvzFqG7— Adam Kucharski (@adamjkucharski) May 19, 2021

In Australien wird mittlerweile über einen "plötzlichen Erwachsenentod" (SADS Sudden Adult Death Syndrome, analog zum plötzlichen Kindstod) berichtet. https://t.co/BOaQ3UTssK1/N— Martin Sauter (@Martin__Sauter) June 14, 2022

An increase of acute hepatitis of unknown aetiology has been reported among children in multiple countries worldwide. With a rapid online survey among hospitals in and outside of Europe, we describe case numbers recorded from 1 January to 18 April 2022 vs the previous 5 years. Of 24 countries that responded, we identified 5/17 European and 1/7 non-European countries with an elevation in probable cases of unexplained acute hepatitis, and severe cases were elevated in five European countries.

Some reinfection questions, answered.

Unter den sogenannten nicht-pharmazeutischen Maßnahmen zur Eindämmung der Corona-Pandemie waren öffentliche Informationskampagnen und Schulschließungen am effektivsten. Sie senkten die Reproduktionszahl, also die Anzahl an Menschen, die eine infizierte Person im Durchschnitt ansteckt, um 0,35 bzw. 0,24. Dies ist das Ergebnis einer Studie unter Beteiligung des IfW Kiel, die auch systematisch Daten außerhalb der USA und Chinas, unter anderem aus Deutschland, auswertete.

UTSUNOMIYA -- Following cases in east Japan's Tochigi Prefecture in which a young girl died and another suffered paralysis from

Multiple COVID-19 vaccines, representing diverse vaccine platforms, successfully protect against symptomatic COVID-19 cases and deaths. Head-to-head comparisons of T cell, B cell, and antibody responses to diverse vaccines in humans are likely to be informative for understanding protective immunity against COVID-19, with particular interest in immune memory. Here, SARS-CoV-2-spike-specific immune responses to Moderna mRNA-1273, Pfizer/BioNTech BNT162b2, Janssen Ad26.COV2.S and Novavax NVX-CoV2373 were examined longitudinally for 6 months. 100% of individuals made memory CD4+ T cells, with cTfh and CD4-CTL highly represented after mRNA or NVX-CoV2373 vaccination. mRNA vaccines and Ad26.COV2.S induced comparable CD8+ T cell frequencies, though only detectable in 60-67% of subjects at 6 months. A differentiating feature of Ad26.COV2.S immunization was a high frequency of CXCR3+ memory B cells. mRNA vaccinees had substantial declines in antibodies, while memory T and B cells were comparatively stable. These results may also be relevant for insights against other pathogens.

Indian Journal of Pediatrics - Children account for 1% to 5% of diagnosed COVID-19 infection with relatively mild presentation compared to adults. The frequency of neurological involvement in acute...

This cohort study investigates whether in utero exposure to SARS-CoV-2 is associated with risk for neurodevelopmental disorders in the first 12 months after birth.

In wenigen Fällen können Long COVID oder ein Multisystemisches Entzündungssyndrom auch nach einer COVID-19-Impfung auftreten. Fallberichte deuten zurzeit auf ein deutlich geringeres Risiko als nach einer Infektion hin. Die Datengrundlage ist jedoch...

Education secretary to issue new guidance on long Covid, as unions say teachers should get up to 12 months of full-paid leave if diagnosed with the condition

New evidence suggests anyone infected with COVID is at higher risk for heart issues—a risk that persists even in relatively healthy people long after the illness has passed.

Intensive Care Medicine -

Several studies show neutralizing antibody levels are an important correlate of immune protection from COVID-19 and have estimated the relationship between neutralizing antibodies and protection. However, a number of these studies appear to yield quite different estimates of the level of neutralizing antibodies required for protection. Here we show that after normalization of antibody titers current studies converge on a consistent relationship between antibody levels and protection from COVID-19. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Funding Statement This work is supported by an Australian government Medical Research Future Fund awards GNT2002073 (to MPD, SJK, AKW), MRF2005544 (to SJK, AKW, JAJ and MPD), MRF2005760 (to MPD), MRF2007221 (to JAT and MS), an NHMRC program grant GNT1149990 (SJK and MPD), and the Victorian Government (SJK, AKW, JAJ). JAJ, DSK and SJK are supported by NHMRC fellowships. AKW, DC and MPD are supported by NHMRC Investigator grants. The Melbourne WHO Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza is supported by the Australian Government Department of Health. The funding source had no role in the writing of the manuscript or the decision to submit it for publication, nor in data collection, analysis, or interpretation; or any aspect pertinent to the study. Authors were not precluded from accessing data in the study, and they accept responsibility to submit for publication. ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Yes The details of the IRB/oversight body that provided approval or exemption for the research described are given below: All data were publicly available and the raw data use was either extracted from publications (Feng et al. Nature Medicine 2021, Gilbert et al. Science 2021) or provided by the authors on request (Bergwerk et al. New England Journal of Medicine 2021). Analysis of this publicly available data was approved under the UNSW Sydney Human Research Ethics Committee (approval HC200242). I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Yes I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Yes I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines and uploaded the relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material as supplementary files, if applicable. Yes All data and code will be made available on GitHub upon publication.

1WHO/IVB/13.01 The ability to assess the protective efficacy of a vaccine by measuring the proportion of vaccinees who generate a particular immune response, without having to measure clinical outcomes, has significant advantages. The availability and quality of such substitute endpoints1 are important for vaccine development, licensure and effectiveness monitoring. A better understanding of the interrelationships between vaccination, the immune response, protection, and clinical outcomes is thus of interest not only to regulatory authorities but also to microbiologists, immunologists, epidemiologists and statisticians. This is a complex and controversial topic, and many aspects need clarification. Although regulatory bodies have drawn up definitions for “correlates” and “surrogates” of protection for the purpose of licensure, these terms are not used consistently among regulators, nor in the broader literature. Different study designs, each with their strengths and weaknesses, have been used to evaluate immunological substitute endpoints of vaccine-induced protection. Various statistical tools have been developed to evaluate these endpoints, but few epidemiologists are familiar with the details of these methods. Immunological substitute endpoints can be relative or absolute quantities, and further information is needed on how they are affected by factors such as the challenge dose, the mechanism of action of the vaccine, the environment, or host characteristics. This document presents an overview of definitions and methods relating to studies of substitute endpoints. It aims to facilitate communication and to encourage the development of a broad research agenda on the issue. Although the greatest interest in this topic currently relates to vaccines, immunological correlates of protection have far-reaching implications for passive protection (maternal immunity and immunoglobulin prophylaxis), risk screening (e.g. tuberculin or rubella antibody testing in pregnant women) as well as for a basic understanding of pathogenesis and immunity.

Although the immune correlate of protection by vaccines is often antibody to prevent acquisition and cellular functions to clear infection, the situation may be

This paper attempts to summarize current knowledge about immune responses to vaccines that correlate with protection. Although the immune system is redundant, almost all current vaccines work through antibodies in serum or on mucosa that block infection or bacteremia/viremia and thus provide a correlate of protection. The functional characteristics of antibodies, as well as quantity, are important. Antibody may be highly correlated with protection or synergistic with other functions. Immune memory is a critical correlate: effector memory for short-incubation diseases and central memory for long-incubation diseases. Cellular immunity acts to kill or suppress intracellular pathogens and may also synergize with antibody. For some vaccines, we have no true correlates, but only useful surrogates, for an unknown protective response.

A marker of immune function that statistically correlates with protection after vaccination may be either a mechanistic correlate of protection or a nonmechanis

Neutralizing antibodies can block infection, clear pathogens, and are essential to provide long-term immu- nity. Since the onset of the pandemic, SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies have been comprehensively investigated and critical information on their development, function, and potential use to prevent and treat COVID-19 have been revealed. With the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 immune escape variants, humoral immu- nity is being challenged, and a detailed understanding of neutralizing antibodies is essential to guide vaccine design strategies as well as antibody-mediated therapies. In this review, we summarize some of the key find- ings on SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies, with a focus on their clinical application.

European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging - Several weeks after COVID-19 infection, some children report the persistence or recurrence of functional complaints. This clinical...

The pandemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has become a global crisis with a growing number of mortalities and morbidities worldwide. Despite performing numerous researches, there are still considerable unrevealed details regarding the long-term complications and post-infection immunity of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Based on pathophysiological features, SARS-CoV-2 may act similarly as an oncovirus in the lung. This letter summarized three possible oncogenic mechanisms of SARS-CoV-2 that may be associated with lung cancer development.

The pandemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has become a global crisis with a growing number of mortalities and morbidities worldwide. Despite performing numerous researches, there are still considerable unrevealed details ...

This cohort study investigates the risk of multisystem inflammatory syndrome after SARS-CoV-2 infection in vaccinated and unvaccinated children before and during the Omicron wave in Denmark.

How immune dysregulation affects recovery from COVID-19 infection in patients with cancer remains unclear. We analyzed cellular and humoral immune responses in 103 patients with prior COVID-19 infection, more than 20% of whom had delayed viral clearance. Delayed clearance was associated with loss of antibodies to nucleocapsid and spike proteins with a compensatory increase in functional T cell responses. High-dimensional analysis of peripheral blood samples demonstrated increased CD8+ effector T cell differentiation and a broad but poorly converged COVID-specific T cell receptor (TCR) repertoire in patients with prolonged disease. Conversely, patients with a CD4+ dominant immunophenotype had a lower incidence of prolonged disease and exhibited a deep and highly select COVID-associated TCR repertoire, consistent with effective viral clearance and development of T cell memory. These results highlight the importance of B cells and CD4+ T cells in promoting durable SARS-CoV-2 clearance and the significance of coordinated cellular and humoral immunity for long-term disease control.

Infection with SARS-CoV-2 virus is associated with a wide range of symptoms. The REal- time Assessment of Community Transmission -1 (REACT-1) study has been monitoring the spread and clinical manifestation of SARS-CoV-2 among random samples of the population in England from 1 May 2020 to 31 March 2022. We show changing symptom profiles associated with the different variants over that period, with lower reporting of loss of sense of smell and taste for Omicron compared to previous variants, and higher reporting of cold-like and influenza-like symptoms, controlling for vaccination status. Contrary to the perception that recent variants have become successively milder, Omicron BA.2 was associated with reporting more symptoms, with greater disruption to daily activities, than BA.1. With restrictions lifted and routine testing limited in many countries, monitoring the changing symptom profiles associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection and induced changes in daily activities will become increasingly important.