News • Widespread effects
Tougher childbirth in pandemic Europe
The COVID-19 pandemic has led to deficiencies and large inequalities in the care of mothers and newborns in Europe.
Coronavirus
Article • A potentially devastating impact
Covid-19 alters antibiotic use
The long-term impact of the coronavirus pandemic on antimicrobial resistance remains difficult to predict. Infectious diseases consultant Professor Alison Holmes reflects on Covid-19's effect on antibiotic use in hospitals and beyond.
News • Research
Quantum sensor to detect SARS-CoV-2 faster
Scientists at have designed a quantum sensor to detect SARS-CoV-2 faster, cheaper, and more accurate than the current gold-standard technique, PCR.
News • Tissue scarring
How a Covid-19 infection can damage the kidneys
The Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 infects the kidneys and contributes to tissue scarring, as shown by researchers from Germany and the Netherlands.
News • New study
Antibodies can neutralize omicron
An international team of scientists have identified antibodies that neutralize omicron and other SARS-CoV-2 variants.
News • Revealed via new x-ray technique
Covid-19 can cause vascular damage to the heart
Using a new x-ray imaging approach, an interdisciplinary research team has detected significant changes in the heart muscle tissue of people who died from Covid-19.
News • Coronavirus research
Why Omicron may be more evasive, but less severe
The Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 may be significantly better at evading vaccine-induced antibodies – but preliminary evidence suggests it is less likely to cause severe illness in the lungs.
News • UV-C barrier against aerosols
An 'invisible wall' to keep out SARS-CoV-2
An invisible protective wall of UV-C light developed by researchers in Munich could reliably curb the spread of viruses and other pathogens in rooms while allowing total freedom of movement.
News • Machine learning
Covid-19 diagnosis with improved accuracy, preserved privacy
Researchers in the UK and China have developed an AI model that can diagnose Covid-19 as well as a panel of professional radiologists, while preserving the privacy of patient data.
Article • Assessing infection severity
CT score predicts Covid-19 death risk
Radiologists in Paris have developed a standardised simple visual lung damage CT severity score for Covid-19 patients who do not have symptoms of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) at the time of initial treatment.
News • Life-saving treatment
First double-lung transplant after Covid-19 performed in Portugal
Doctors in Lisbon report on the case of a 61-year-old man who received a double lung transplant after his lungs were irreparably damaged by Covid-19.
Article • Pandemic management
Lessons learned from Covid-19 by a large hospital radiology department
When the coronavirus first struck in the US, hospitals in New York City were the first to feel the impact. Radiologists Professor Judy Yee, M.D., and Mark C. Liszewski, M.D., describe the lessons learned and talk about their firsthand experiences.
News • Lack of support
Frontline healthcare workers: Covid heroes – or cannon fodder?
A large-scale qualitative study looks into the difficulties frontline doctors faced across two waves of the Covid-19 pandemic in the UK and Ireland since early 2020.
News • Covid-19 protection
Needle-free coronavirus vaccine enters clinical trial
Safety trials are underway for a Cambridge-led vaccine that could be used as a booster targeting Covid-19 virus variants and relatives that threaten future coronavirus pandemics.
Sponsored • DNA extraction chemistry
Providing innovative molecular workflows to empower future diagnostics
Founded in 2018 as a DNA extraction chemistry company, Dutch company MolGen entered the market operating within the agricultural sector. At first, the company’s founders, Maarten de Groot, Wim van Haeringen and Niels Kruize, focused solely on this one industry, mainly developing and marketing advanced bulk chemistry kits for DNA/RNA extraction. These testing products and solutions successfully…
News • COVID-19
Chewing gum could reduce SARS-CoV-2 transmission
In experiments using saliva samples from COVID-19 patients, the gum, which contains the ACE2 protein, neutralized the virus.
News • COVID surveillance
Mobile robot detects social distancing breaches
A new strategy to reduce the spread of COVID-19 employs a mobile robot that detects people in crowds who are not observing social-distancing rules, navigates to them, and encourages them to move apart.
News • Patient immunity
COVID-19 variants: Rapid test identifies antibody effectiveness
Test could measure patient immunity against multiple COVID-19 variants such as Omicron and Delta at once and inform which synthetic monoclonal antibody to use for treatments.
Sponsored • Coronavirus antigen detection
An innovative test for the early diagnosis of Covid-19
Compared to previous SARS and MERS, SARS-CoV-2 became a pandemic due to the high infectivity and different mode of contagion. SARS-CoV-2 spreads more because it is contagious also before symptoms, during incubation phase. No tests to date have been able to find the virus during the pre-symptomatic stage. Stark has developed a new, rapid, non-invasive method "Stark Portable Covid-19 Antigen…
Article • Accelerating the pace of development
Fighting the pandemic with microfluidic
The Corona pandemic has a major impact on all areas of life. Nearly everyone is affected in some way – in their health, in their jobs, in their entire lives. But there are also notable bright spots. Chief among these effects is the rapid development of vaccines, test kits and, in the future, medicines that are making a significant contribution to overcoming the crisis. Microfluidic components…
News • Coronavirus imaging
Brightest ever X-ray shows lung damage from Covid-19
The damage caused by Covid-19 to the lungs’ smallest blood vessels has been intricately captured using high-energy X-rays emitted by a special type of particle accelerator. Scientists used a new imaging technology called Hierarchical Phase-Contrast Tomography (HiP-CT), to scan donated human organs, including lungs from a Covid-19 donor.
News • Gender equality in clinical trials
Women in Covid-19 research: a good start, but...
There has been a "positive shift" in inclusive gender practices in Covid-19 vaccine research, but there is still room for improvement, experts say. Women have been equally recruited and represented in randomised control trial research about Covid-19 vaccine safety, efficacy and effectiveness, according to a new study by The George Institute for Global Health and The Australian National…
News • Team sports research
Coronavirus and soccer: study investigates transmission risk
A study by the Universities of Basel and Saarland shows that there is almost no risk of transmission of the Covid-19 virus on the field. They suggest that blanket quarantine measures for opposing teams are not justified if no close contact has taken place off the playing field. Governments have introduced various measures over the past 18 months in an effort to curb transmission of the Covid-19…
News • Addressing coronavirus vaccine hesitancy
Covid-19: Could a chatbot help overcome vaccine concerns?
French researchers have found that addressing concerns related to the Covid-19 vaccination via a chatbot interface might be capable of swaying the vaccine-hesitant. Vaccine hesitancy is one of the major challenges in containing the Covid-19 pandemic. Previous studies have revealed that mass communication—through short messages relayed by television or radio—is not a very effective means of…
News • Covid-19 & influenza
Will there be a twindemic?
“Twindemic” is a term that has not yet been in the headlines but is likely to become part of our lexicon as the summer progresses.
