Covid19-Sources

Several new studies reveal that getting multiple COVID vaccine doses provides strong protection against lingering symptoms

NIH News Release: "...findings suggest that SARS-CoV-2 infection damages the CD8+ T cell response, an effect akin to that observed in earlier studies showing long-term damage to the immune system after infection with viruses such as hepatitis C or HIV."

Die Long Covid-Expertin Kathryn Hoffmann fordert in Hinblick auf die Langzeitschäden einer Corona-Erkrankung mehr Prävention ein.

Autonome kardiovaskuläre Dysfunktion beim Post-COVID-19-Syndrom: eine große Belastung für das Gesundheitswesen Eine kardiovaskuläre autonome Dysfunktion (CVAD) ist eine Fehlfunktion des Herz-Kreislauf-Systems, die durch eine gestörte autonome Kontrolle der Kreislaufhomöostase verursacht wird.

Nature Reviews Cardiology - Cardiovascular autonomic dysfunction (CVAD) is a malfunction of the autonomic control of circulatory homeostasis and is an important component of post-COVID-19 syndrome....

Post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC), or long COVID, is characterized by persistent symptoms after acute SARS-CoV-2 infection that can vary from patient to patient. Here, we present a case s...

Seroprevalence surveys suggest that more than a third and possibly more than half of the global population has been infected with SARS-CoV-2 by early …

Zwei neue Studien: COVID-19 und Influenza können schwere Langzeitfolgen haben, COVID aber häufiger :: Long Covid ist bei geimpften Kindern seltener als bei ungeimpften.

Nature Communications - COVID-19 can be associated with neurological complications. Here the authors show that markers of brain injury, but not immune markers, are elevated in the blood of patients...

Nature Reviews Microbiology - The need for a balance between pathogen elimination and protection from cellular damage means that the central nervous system (CNS) is a partially protected niche that...

Protection from past infection against re-infection from pre-omicron variants was very high and remained high even after 40 weeks. Protection was substantially lower for the omicron BA.1 variant and declined more rapidly over time than protection against previous variants. Protection from severe disease was high for all variants. The immunity conferred by past infection should be weighed alongside protection from vaccination when assessing future disease burden from COVID-19, providing guidance on when individuals should be vaccinated, and designing policies that mandate vaccination for workers or restrict access, on the basis of immune status, to settings where the risk of transmission is high, such as travel and high-occupancy indoor settings.

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) reinfection has brought new challenges to the global prevention and control of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic; however, current studies suggest that there is still great uncertainty ...

Although the COVID-19 pandemic has persisted for over 2 years, reinfections with SARS-CoV-2 are not well understood. We use the electronic health record (EHR)-based study cohort from the National COVID Cohort Collaborative (N3C) as part of the NIH Researching ...

Counterintuitively, SARS-CoV-2 Omicron infection was associated with increased risk of Omicron reinfection in residents of long-term care and retirement homes. Less robust humoral hybrid immune responses in older adults may contribute to risk of Omicron reinfection.

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SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern (VOCs) emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic. Here, we used unbiased systems approaches to study the host-selective forc…

This randomized clinical trial evaluates a plain language recommendation format vs a standard language version for understanding COVID-19 health recommendations among youths.

Systemic corticosteroids are helpful for patients with severe COVID-19 who require hospitalization with supplemental oxygen. The role of inhaled

available. Here we show that, beyond the acute phase of illness, 30-day survivors of COVID-19 exhibited higher risks of AKI, eGFR decline, ESKD, major adverse kidney events (MAKE), and steeper longitudinal decline in eGFR. The risks of kidney outcomes increased according to the severity of the acute infection (categorized by care setting into non-hospitalized, hospitalized, and admitted to intensive care). The findings provide insight into the long-term consequences of COVID-19 on kidney outcomes and suggest that post-acute COVID-19 care should include attention to kidney function and disease. Background COVID-19 is associated with increased risk of post-acute sequelae involving pulmonary and extrapulmonary organ systems—referred to as long COVID. However, a detailed assessment of kidney outcomes in long COVID is not yet available. Methods We built a cohort of 1,726,683 US Veterans identified from March 1, 2020 to March 15, 2021, including 89,216 patients who were 30-day survivors of COVID-19 and 1,637,467 non-infected controls. We examined risks of AKI, eGFR decline, ESKD, and major adverse kidney events (MAKE). MAKE was defined as eGFR decline ≥50%, ESKD, or all-cause mortality. We used inverse probability–weighted survival regression, adjusting for predefined demographic and health characteristics, and algorithmically selected high-dimensional covariates, including diagnoses, medications, and laboratory tests. Linear mixed models characterized intra-individual eGFR trajectory. Results Beyond the acute illness, 30-day survivors of COVID-19 exhibited a higher risk of AKI (aHR, 1.94; 95% CI, 1.86 to 2.04), eGFR decline ≥30% (aHR, 1.25; 95% CI, 1.14 to 1.37), eGFR decline ≥40% (aHR, 1.44; 95% CI, 1.37 to 1.51), eGFR decline ≥50% (aHR, 1.62; 95% CI, 1.51 to 1.74), ESKD (aHR, 2.96; 95% CI, 2.49 to 3.51), and MAKE (aHR, 1.66; 95% CI, 1.58 to 1.74). Increase in risks of post-acute kidney outcomes was graded according to the severity of the acute infection (whether patients were non-hospitalized, hospitalized, or admitted to intensive care). Compared with non-infected controls, 30-day survivors of COVID-19 exhibited excess eGFR decline (95% CI) of −3.26 (−3.58 to −2.94), −5.20 (−6.24 to −4.16), and −7.69 (−8.27 to −7.12) ml/min per 1.73 m2 per year, respectively, in non-hospitalized, hospitalized, and those admitted to intensive care during the acute phase of COVID-19 infection. Conclusions Patients who survived COVID-19 exhibited increased risk of kidney outcomes in the post-acute phase of the disease. Post-acute COVID-19 care should include attention to kidney disease....

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed a number of key challenges that need to be urgently addressed. In particular, rapid identification and validation of prognostic markers is required. Mass spectrometric studies of blood plasma proteomics provide a deep understanding of the relationship between the severe course of infection and activation of specific pathophysiological pathways. Analysis of plasma proteins in whole blood may also be relevant for the pandemic as it requires minimal sample preparation. Here, for the first time, frozen whole blood samples were used to analyze 189 plasma proteins using multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mass spectrometry and stable isotope-labeled peptide standards (SIS). A total of 128 samples (FRCC, Russia) from patients with mild (n=40), moderate (n=36) and severe (n=19) COVID-19 infection and healthy controls (n=33) were analyzed. Levels of 114 proteins were quantified and compared. Significant differences between all of the groups were revealed for 61 proteins. Changes in the levels of 30 reproducible COVID-19 markers (SERPING1, CRP, C9, ORM1, APOA1, SAA1/SAA2, LBP, AFM, IGFALS, etc.) were consistent with studies performed with serum/plasma samples. Levels of 70 proteins correlated between whole blood and plasma samples. The best-performing classifier built with 13 significantly different proteins achieved the best combination of ROC-AUC (0.93-0.95) and accuracy (0.87-0.93) metrics and distinguished patients from controls, as well as patients by severity and risk of mortality. Overall, the results support the use of frozen whole blood for MRM analysis of plasma proteins and assessment of the status of patients with COVID-19. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Funding Statement In part of targeted proteomic analysis E.N.N., A.S.K., P.A.S and A.G.B. acknowledge the support by a MegaGrant of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation [Agreement with Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, #075-10-2022-090 (075-10-2019-083)]. In part of sample preparation and data analysis I.N.K., A.E.B, N.V.Z., M.I.I. gratefully appreciate funding from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation (# 44.1, 44.2 and 44.4). ### 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: The study was approved by the ethical committee of the Federal Research Clinical Center (FRCC) under Federal Medical and Biological Agency (Russia) (clinical protocol No. 5, 11 May 2021). 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, such as any relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material, if applicable. Yes All experimental results were uploaded to the PeptideAtlas SRM Experiment Library (PASSEL) and are available via link: (accessed on 4 September 2023).

DMZ – WISSENSCHAFT¦ Anton Aeberhard ¦ Seit dem Ausbruch der SARS-CoV-2-Pandemie haben Epidemiologen Schätzungen zufolge in der WHO-Region Europa allein in den letzten drei Jahren etwa 36 Millionen Menschen identifiziert, die unter den Symptomen von Long Covid leiden. Neben den bekannten physischen Beschwerden treten bei Long Covid-Patienten häufig auch kognitive Beeinträchtigungen auf, die oft als "Brain Fog" bezeichnet werden. Britische Wissenschaftler haben kürzlich in einer bahnbrechenden Studie herausgefunden, dass es eine bedeutsame Verbindung zwischen Long Covid, verstärkter Thromboseanfälligkeit und diesen kognitiven Problemen gibt. Die Forschungsarbeit, angeführt von Maxime Taquet von der Abteilung für Psychiatrie an der Universität Oxford, hat wichtige Erkenntnisse über die Ursache von kognitiven Beeinträchtigungen nach einer akuten SARS-CoV-2-Infektion geliefert. Die Ergebnisse der Studie sind alarmierend: Einer von acht Covid-19-Patienten erhält innerhalb von sechs Monaten nach der akuten Infektion eine Diagnose von neurologischen oder psychiatrischen Problemen. Besonders besorgniserregend ist dabei das häufig auftretende Symptom des "Brain Fog", das die Patienten lange begleiten kann. Die Forscher entdeckten während ihrer Analyse und den Nachuntersuchungen bemerkenswerte Zusammenhänge. Während der akuten Phase einer Covid-19-Erkrankung führten erhöhte Werte des Blutgerinnungsfaktors I, auch bekannt als Fibrinogen, im Vergleich zum Entzündungsmarker CRP (c-reaktives Protein) häufiger zu objektiv messbaren kognitiven Störungen. Fibrinogen wird in der Leber produziert, und erhöhte Werte im Blut weisen auf Entzündungsvorgänge hin, die auch die Blutgerinnung aktivieren können. Darüber hinaus zeigten die Studienteilnehmer mit erhöhten Fibrinogenwerten signifikant schlechtere Ergebnisse in Tests zur subjektiven Wahrnehmung kognitiver Probleme. Dies legt nahe, dass die Bildung von Mikrothromben im Gehirn mit diesen Beeinträchtigungen in Verbindung stehen könnte. Zusätzlich besteht die Möglichkeit, dass Fibrinogen direkt Nervenzellen im Gehirn schädigt. Ein weiterer bedeutender Marker in der Studie war D-Dimer, ein bekannter Indikator für Thrombosen. Die britischen Wissenschaftler fanden auch hier einen klaren Zusammenhang zwischen erhöhten D-Dimer-Werten und kognitiven Störungen. Diese Erkenntnisse wurden durch die Analyse von über 90 Millionen britischen elektronischen Krankenakten bestätigt. Die mögliche Erklärung für diese Zusammenhänge liegt in der Vermutung, dass erhöhte D-Dimer-Konzentrationen im Blut auf die Bildung von Thromben in den kleinen Blutgefäßen der Lunge hinweisen könnten. Dies könnte wiederum zu einer langfristigen Verringerung der Sauerstoffaufnahme führen und somit Erschöpfungszustände verursachen. Die Forschungsergebnisse legen nahe, dass in schweren Covid-19-Verläufen die Verwendung von Medikamenten zur Hemmung der Blutgerinnung erwogen werden sollte. Dies könnte möglicherweise dazu beitragen, Long Covid-Probleme zu verhindern oder zumindest erheblich zu lindern. Die Studie hat nicht nur das Verständnis von Long Covid vertieft, sondern könnte auch neue Wege zur Behandlung und Prävention dieser Langzeitfolgen der Krankheit eröffnen.

Severe acute respiratory distress syndrome-coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) provokes symptoms ranging from mild viral illness to a systemic inflammatory syndrome with multi-organ failure and has been associated with cases of arthritis. We report a clinical case of SARS-CoV-2 associated arthritis in which …

We systematically reviewed and appraised the epidemiological evidence on allergic diseases as risk factors for Long-COVID. Meta-analysis revealed that pre-existing asthma measured in hospital-based p...

Correspondence from The New England Journal of Medicine — Receipt of mRNA Covid-19 Vaccines and Risk of Spontaneous Abortion

While the BA.2.86 variant demonstrated significant antigenic drift and enhanced ACE2 binding affinity, its ability to evade humoral immunity was relatively moderate compared to dominant strains like EG.5 and HK.3. However, the emergence of a new subvariant, JN.1 (BA.2.86.1.1), which possesses an additional spike mutation, L455S, compared to BA.2.86, showed a markedly increased prevalence in Europe and North America, especially in France. Here, we found that L455S of JN.1 significantly enhances immune evasion capabilities at the expense of reduced ACE2 binding affinity. This mutation enables JN.1 to effectively evade Class 1 neutralizing antibodies, offsetting BA.2.86’s susceptibility and thus allowing it to outcompete both its precursor BA.2.86 and the prevailing variants HV.1 (XBB.1.5+L452R+F456L) and JD.1.1 (XBB.1.5+L455F+F456L+A475V) in terms of humoral immune evasion. The rapid evolution from BA.2.86 to JN.1, similar to the earlier transition from BA.2.75 to CH.1.1, highlights the importance of closely monitoring strains with high ACE2 binding affinity and distinct antigenicity, despite their temporarily unremarkable immune evasion capabilities. Such strains could survive and transmit at low levels, since their large antigenic distance to dominant strains allow them to target distinct populations and accumulate immune-evasive mutations rapidly, often at the cost of receptor binding affinity. ### Competing Interest Statement Y.C. is the inventor of the provisional patent applications for BD series antibodies, which includes BD55-5514 (SA55). Y.C. is the founder of Singlomics Biopharmaceuticals. Other authors declare no competing interests.

We still have much to learn about many aspects of COVID-19 — including its lingering health effects and the mechanics of its mutations — but we do know we can’t let our guard down, write Dawn Bowdish and Andrew Costa.

Journal of Medical Virology is a clinical virology journal focused on the diagnosis, epidemiology, immunology and pathogenesis of human viral infections & diseases.

There's still so much we don't know about COVID-19.

Persistent symptoms following the acute phase of COVID-19 present a major burden to both the affected and the wider community. We conducted a cohort study including over 856,840 first COVID-19 cases, 72,422 re-infections and more than 3.1 million first negative-test controls from primary care electronic health records from Spain and the UK (Sept 2020 to Jan 2022 (UK)/March 2022 (Spain)). We characterised post-acute COVID-19 symptoms and identified key symptoms associated with persistent disease. We estimated incidence rates of persisting symptoms in the general population and among COVID-19 patients over time. Subsequently, we investigated which WHO-listed symptoms were particularly differential by comparing their frequency in COVID-19 cases vs. matched test-negative controls. Lastly, we compared persistent symptoms after first infections vs. reinfections.Our study shows that the proportion of COVID-19 cases affected by persistent post-acute COVID-19 symptoms declined over the study period. Risk for altered smell/taste was consistently higher in patients with COVID-19 vs test-negative controls. Persistent symp- toms were more common after reinfection than following a first infection. More research is needed into the definition of long COVID, and the effect of interventions to minimise the risk and impact of persistent symptoms.