Editor's Note This investigation, by researchers at the University of California-Davis Medical Center, of the pattern of transmission of COVID-19 during two nosocomial outbreaks finds that close contact between patients and healthcare workers (HCWs) not airborne transmission was the cause of the outbreak. Two separate patients were admitted in February…

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Editor's Note In this study, researchers from Henry Ford Health System in Michigan found that hydroxychloroquine alone decreased the mortality hazard ratio of COVID-19 by 66%, and hydroxychloroquine with azithromycin decreased the ratio by 71%, compared to neither treatment. The vast majority of the 2,541 COVID-19 patients included in the…

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Editor's Note In this study, Yale researchers found that endotheliopathy and platelet activation might be important factors in the pathophysiology of COVID-19-associated coagulopathy. The researchers examined the blood of 68 COVID-19 patients, 48 of them in ICU and 20 receiving care in a hospital unit, along with 13 disease free…

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Editor's Note Researchers from Florida Atlantic University’s College of Engineering and Computer Science and Schmidt College of Medicine (all in Boca Raton) announced on June 24 that they have received a 1-year, $90,000 National Science Foundation RAPID project grant to design a COVID-19 knowledge base and risk assessment tool powered…

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Editor's Note: The American College of Physicians (ACP) on June 18 issued new practice points on the effectiveness of N95 respirators, surgical masks, and cloth masks for the prevention of COVID-19 in addition to standard precautions in healthcare and community settings. The ACP Practice Points, which were funded by the…

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Editor's Note Sandia National Laboratories (Albuquerque, New Mexico), one of three National Nuclear Security Administration research and development laboratories in the US, announced on June 22 that it is partnering with hospitals and device manufacturers to increase the availability of respirator masks for healthcare workers. Sandia is helping manufacturers test…

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Editor's Note In this retrospective study, researchers from the French Society of Neuroradiology found three main brain MRI patterns in patients with severe COVID-19. The analysis of 37 patients from 16 centers found: signal abnormalities in the medial temporal lobe (43%), an area of the brain related to cognitive and…

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Editor's Note In preliminary results of this study from the University of Oxford, UK, a low-cost steroid, dexamethasone, reduced deaths by up to one third in hospitalized patients with severe respiratory complications of COVID-19. A total of 2,104 patients were randomized to receive dexamethasone 6 mg once per day for…

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Editor's Note COVID-19 causes a global threat to the entire nervous system, including the brain, spinal cord, and nerves, and neurologic symptoms may appear before symptoms, such as fever, cough, or respiratory problems, finds this study from Northwestern Medicine in Chicago. This analysis found that about half of hospitalized patients…

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Editor's Note The Mayo Clinic on June 11 announced that it had launched a new SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibody test that will be available to select labs, blood banks, and biopharma clients in late June. The test measures the level of neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Neutralizing…

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