5/26/20 - smart, useful, science stuff about COVID-19
SCIENCE:
1) It’s true that SARS-CoV-2 is mutating, but some coverage has represented this change as a cause for concern. A 5/26/20 story by Erin Garcia de Jesus for Science News explains what a mutation in genetic material is and why these mutations so far in the new coronavirus are normal and not meaningful to scientists. The story also describes what scientists would have to see in SARS-CoV-2 mutations to grow concerned about new viral “strains,” a term that reportedly is not well defined: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/coronavirus-covid19-mutations-strains-variants.
2) The World Health Organization (WHO) has temporarily halted its study of the anti-malaria, anti-lupus drug hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 treatment, it announced 5/25/20, per various reports. The reason given is that results of a large, worldwide study published Friday 5/22/20 in The Lancet showed a significantly higher risk of death, as well as of a type of irregular heart rhythm that can lead to sudden death, among the study’s COVID-19 participants taking hydroxychloroquine or the related drug chloroquine. The WHO will continue testing three other treatments in the other arms of the study, which has 3,500 enrolled participants in 17 countries, reports Tim Elfrink at The Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/05/26/hydroxychloroquine-who-trump-study/.
3) The late April unpublished reports about the experimental anti-viral drug remdesivir have been validated. The full study results, revealing that remdesivir shortens recovery time from COVID-19 by four days, were published Friday in the New England Journal of Medicine, as freelance science journalist Jillian Mock reports for Medscape (5/23/20). “The published results are ‘completely consistent’ with NIAID’s earlier announcement,” according to a deputy director for clinical research and special projects at NIAID (National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases) who is quoted in the story. The study of 1,063 patients at dozens of sites worldwide was randomized and double-blinded, with some participants receiving a placebo: https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/931064.
4) In a 5/21/20 Spanish-language feature story for La Nacion in Argentina, science writer Federico Kukso writes about the history of vaccines and the process of developing them, and reports on several ongoing efforts to develop a SARS-CoV-2 vaccine. “The race [for a vaccine] will not end when one of the labs claims victory,” Kukso writes and kindly translated into English for me. “Problems in production and distribution must be overcome. The doses will not be available to everyone at the same time. A ‘geopolitical pull’ is likely to begin then, amid a climate of hostilities between China and the United States, mediated by the rise of ‘vaccine nationalism’": https://www.lanacion.com.ar/sociedad/viruela-paperas-y-coronavirus-historia-como-vacunas-nid2367566.
5) A few weeks ago, I shared in the newsletter an essay by virologist Peter Piot, director of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, about his experience with being hospitalized for and recovering slowly from COVID-19. Now, a story by Donald G. McNeil Jr. in The New York Times (5/26/20) adds more detail, including quotes from an interview with Piot that he says he couldn’t have done a week ago due to being short of breath. “People think that, with COVID-19, one percent die and the rest just have flu. It’s not that simple — there’s this whole thing in the middle,” Piot is quoted as saying in McNeil’s story. The piece explains that the middle thing was a “cytokine storm,” an over-reaction of the immune system that can accompany COVID-19. Rather than re-admitting Piot to the hospital, his doctor chose to put Piot on a steroid to cut the inflammation and an anticoagulant to prevent blood clots, the story states: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/26/health/coronavirus-peter-piot.html.
6) Over the weekend (5/24/20), The New York Times published a powerful piece representing a sample of the nearly 100,000 people who have died so far in the U.S. from COVID-19. It appeared on the entire front page (A1) of the print edition and was published as an interactive timeline online: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/05/24/us/us-coronavirus-deaths-100000.html.
PRACTICAL:
7) A 5/26/20 story by JoNel Aleccia at Kaiser Health News focuses on the experience of grandparents during the pandemic and how they are coping with feelings about not seeing their grandchildren due to social distancing and the higher threat of the virus to older people: https://khn.org/news/we-miss-them-all-so-much-grandparents-ache-as-the-covid-exile-grinds-on/.
8) A reader let me know about a U.S. database of 9,000 or so scientists in all 50 U.S. states “who are eager to volunteer our time, expertise, equipment, and consumables” to help people respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Sounds like volunteers can sign up to help with testing in labs, volunteering in labs, and writing software code: https://covid19sci.org/
COMIC RELIEF:
9) Day 47 in quarantine: https://www.reddit.com/r/animalsdoingstuff/comments/gp7c0m/day_47_in_quarantine/.
10) He’s got the beat:
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Love/In friendship, Robin