Culture
DURHAM, N.C. -- A team of scientists studying the origin of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that has caused the COVID-19 pandemic, found that it was especially well-suited to jump from animals to humans by shapeshifting as it gained the ability to infect human cells.
RIVERSIDE, Calif. -- How might the novel coronavirus be prevented from entering a host cell in an effort to thwart infection? A team of biomedical scientists has made a discovery that points to a solution.
In complex surgery, is there a correlation between the volume of services provided per hospital and the quality of treatment results? This is the question addressed in eight commissions on minimum volumes that the Federal Joint Committee (G-BA) awarded to the Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG). The IQWiG report is now available for the sixth intervention to be tested, complex oesophageal surgery.
Due to the devastating worldwide impact of COVID-19, the illness caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus, there has been unprecedented efforts by clinicians and researchers from around the world to quickly develop safe and effective treatments and vaccines. Given that COVID-19 is a complex new disease with no existing vaccine or specific treatment, much effort is being made to investigate the repurposing of approved and available drugs, as well as those under development.
Wearing face masks at home might help ward off COVID-19 spread among family members
79% effective at curbing transmission--but only before symptoms emerge
Wearing face masks at home might help ward off the spread of COVID-19 infection among family members living in the same household, but only before symptoms develop, suggests a study of Chinese families in Beijing, accepted for publication in BMJ Global Health.
The first study of COVID-19 to specifically analyse the effect of the disease in hospitalised patients with diabetes has found that one in ten patients dies within 7 days of hospital admission, and one in five is intubated and mechanically ventilated by this point. The research is published in Diabetologia (the journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes [EASD]), by Professor Bertrand Cariou and Professor Samy Hadjadj, diabetologists at l'institut du thorax, University Hospital Nantes, INSERM, CNRS, and University of Nantes, France, and colleagues.
The combination of carfilzomib, lenalidomide, and dexamethasone (KRd) did not show superior efficacy in patients with newly diagnosed myeloma absent a high-risk disease prognosis, compared with the standard of care--bortezomib, lenalidomide, and dexamethasone (VRd). Data from a planned interim analysis for efficacy and toxicity for the ENDURANCE (E1A11) randomized phase three trial will be presented in the plenary session of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting to occur virtually from May 29-31 (Abstract LBA3).
If physical distancing measures in Ontario are relaxed too much or too quickly, the province could see hospitals overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients as well as exponential growth in deaths, concludes new research involving a University of Guelph infectious disease modeller.
The findings, contained in a research letter published in Annals of Internal Medicine, suggest that if Ontarians increase their contacts to normal levels in the coming weeks, the virus will quickly spread and result in cases exceeding hospital ICU (intensive care unit) capacity.
Leesburg, VA, May 28, 2020--An investigation published open-access in the American Journal of Roentgenology (AJR) revealed a high frequency of negative chest CT findings among pediatric patients with laboratory-confirmed coronavirus disease (COVID-19), while also suggesting that bilateral, lower lobe-predominant ground-glass opacities (GGOs) are common in the subset of patients with positive CT findings.
For most people who die of cancer, the spread of the initial tumor is to blame. "Metastasis is what kills most cancer patients," says Serge Fuchs, a professor in Penn's School of Veterinary Medicine. "Yet there are not many, if any, drugs that specifically target metastatic processes."
PITTSBURGH-- Faced with a common peril, people delay making decisions that might save lives, fail to alert each other to danger and spread misinformation. Those may sound like behaviors associated with the current pandemic, but they actually surfaced in experiments on how social networks function in emergencies.
May 27, 2020, NEW YORK, NY - As chromosomes go, X and Y make an unlikely pair. The X is large and contains thousands of genes critical for life. The Y, by contrast, is little more than a nub. Its main purpose is to provide the instructions for initiating male development and making sperm. Yet these two very different chromosomes must work together if they are to meet and pair up properly during meiosis -- the special form of cell division that creates sperm and egg.
As the novel coronavirus spread across the globe in early 2020, hospitals worldwide scaled back medical procedures, including life-saving heart surgery, to deal with the emerging threat of COVID-19. Now, as the SARS-CoV-2 virus becomes a chronic fact of life, hospitals must find ways to resume cardiac surgeries while protecting patients and health care workers as much as possible from SARS-CoV-2.
DURHAM, N.C. – Small-scale gold mining in the Peruvian Amazon poses a health hazard not only to miners but also to nearby communities. Contrary to common assumption that communities closest to mining bear the brunt of exposure, new evidence shows that the highest non-occupational mercury exposures occur in native communities hundreds of kilometers away from mining.
ITHACA, N.Y. - Bacteria have a cunning ability to survive in unfriendly environments.
For example, through a complicated series of interactions, they can identify - and then build resistance to - toxic chemicals and metals, such as silver and copper. Bacteria rely on a similar mechanism for defending against antibiotics.