Jan 19th, 2022 - Don't count on getting a substantial SARS-CoV-2 antibody boost from additional COVID-19 vaccine doses beyond the recommended boosters in patients with autoimmune diseases. Sixteen of a group of 18 such patients showed no effective anti-spike protein antibodies a median of 84 days after completing the initial two-dose series of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, or the single dose of the ...

Jan 19th, 2022 - Note that some links may require registration or subscription. The federal government launched a beta phase of its website for free COVID-19 tests Tuesday, allowing people to order four tests shipped directly to their household. The official launch is scheduled for today. (USA Today) The Biden administration announced a plan today to distribute hundreds of millions of free N95 masks from the St...

Jan 19th, 2022 - Tests for SARS-CoV-2 immunity are needed to help assess responses to vaccination, which can be heterogeneous and may wane over time. The plaque reduction neutralization test (PRNT) is considered the gold standard for measuring serum neutralizing antibodies but requires high level biosafety, live viral cultures and days to complete. We hypothesized that competitive enzyme linked immunoassays (EL...

Jan 19th, 2022 - The emergence of the SARS-CoV-2 variant-of-concern Omicron (B.1.1.529) has destabilized global efforts to control the impact of COVID-19. Recent data have suggested that B.1.1.529 can readily infect people with naturally acquired or vaccine-induced immunity, facilitated in some cases by viral escape from antibodies that neutralize ancestral SARS-CoV-2. However, severe disease appears to be rela...

Jan 19th, 2022 - A better understanding of the risk for COVID-19 that people experiencing homelessness (PEH) face in congregate shelters versus unsheltered encampments is critical for an effective pandemic response. We analyzed factors associated with current and past SARS-CoV-2 infection among PEH in day and overnight shelters and encampments in Denver, Colorado, during June 2-July 28, 2020, and constructed mu...

Jan 19th, 2022 - The association of the ABO blood group with COVID-19 disease has been confirmed by several studies, with the blood group A patients being more susceptible and prone to a more severe clinical course of the disease. Additionally, several authors also addressed the association of ABO-types and the levels of anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in convalescents, mostly supporting a theory that the non-O bloo...

Jan 18th, 2022 - Note that some links may require registration or subscription. A fourth dose of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine boosted antibodies but to a level that appeared insufficient to prevent against Omicron infection, according to preliminary data from an Israeli trial. (CNN) The CDC said nonsurgical N95 and KN95 respirators offer better protection against Omicron than cloth masks, and urged Americans to we...

Jan 18th, 2022 - The massive and rapid transmission of SARS-CoV-2 has led to the emergence of several viral variants of concern (VOCs), with the most recent one, B.1.1.529 (Omicron), which accumulated a large number of spike mutations, raising the specter that this newly identified variant may escape from the currently available vaccines and therapeutic antibodies. Using VSV-based pseudovirus, we found that Omi...

Jan 18th, 2022 - Thrombosis with thrombocytopenia syndrome (TTS) is a potentially life-threatening condition associated with adenoviral-vectored COVID-19 vaccination. It presents similarly to spontaneous heparin-induced thrombocytopenia. Twelve cases of cerebral venous sinus thrombosis after vaccination with the Ad26.COV2.S COVID-19 vaccine (Janssen/Johnson & Johnson) have previously been described. To describe...

Jan 18th, 2022 - The aim of this study was to investigate the possible impact of smoking on the humoral response to the BNT162b2 mRNA COVID-19 vaccine (also known as the BioNTech-Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine). A longitudinal sero-epidemiological study was conducted in sample of Italian healthcare workers (HCWs). HCWs who were administered two doses of the BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine, 21 days apart, between December 2020 a...

Jan 18th, 2022 - The pandemic of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome 2 coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) is a continuing worldwide threat to human health and social economy. Historically, SARS-CoV-2 follows SARS and MERS as the third coronavirus spreading across borders and continents, but far more dangerous with long-lasting symptomatic consequences. The current situation is ...

Jan 18th, 2022 - Many studies examined the spread of SARS-CoV-2 within populations using seroprevalence. Healthcare workers are a high-risk population due to patient contact, and studies are needed to examine seroprevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies among healthcare workers. Our study investigates the seroprevalence of anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies among staff at primary healthcare institutions in Prishtina, and fa...

Jan 18th, 2022 - SARS-CoV-2 circulating variants coupled with waning immunity pose a significant threat to the long-term care (LTC) population. Our objective was to measure salivary IgG antibodies in residents and staff of a LTC facility to 1) evaluate IgG response in saliva post-natural infection and vaccination and 2) assess its feasibility to describe the seroprevalence over time. We performed salivary IgG s...

Jan 18th, 2022 - Kidney transplant recipients (KTR) have been considered as patients at higher risk of SARS-CoV-2-related disease severity, thus COVID-19 vaccination was highly recommended. However possible interferences of different immunosuppression with development of both humoral and T-cell-mediated immune response to COVID-19 vaccination has not been determined. Here we evaluated the association between mT...

Jan 18th, 2022 - Editor's note: Find the latest COVID-19 news and guidance in Medscape's Coronavirus Resource Center. A fourth shot of the COVID-19 vaccine boosts antibodies but doesn't provide enough protection to prevent infections from the Omicron variant, according to new research at an Israeli hospital. The preliminary results, released on Monday, challenge the idea of giving a second booster dose to slow ...

Jan 17th, 2022 - It is well established that thyroiditis and other thyroid disorders can be induced by COVID-19 infection, but there is limited information about the autoimmune/inflammatory syndrome induced by adjuvants (ASIA) after severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) vaccination. We report two cases of thyrotoxicosis following SARS-CoV-2 vaccine. Two young health care peoples (wife and...

Jan 17th, 2022 - Serological assays for SARS-CoV-2 have a critical role not only in diagnosis of COVID-19, but also in assessing the degree and duration of response of specific antibodies against the virus obtained through infection or vaccination. We present the results obtained with a competitive immunoenzymatic method (Chorus SARS-CoV-2 "Neutralizing" Ab) for quantitative determination of total neutralizing ...

Jan 17th, 2022 - JERUSALEM, Jan 17 (Reuters) - A fourth shot of COVID-19 vaccine boosts antibodies to even higher levels than the third jab but it is not enough to prevent Omicron infections, according to a preliminary study in Israel. Israel's Sheba Medical Center has given second booster shots in a trial among its staff and is studying the effect of the Pfizer booster in 154 people after two weeks and the ...

Jan 16th, 2022 - Variants of SARS-CoV-2 continue to emerge, posing great challenges in outbreak prevention and control. It is important to understand in advance the impact of possible variants of concern (VOCs) on infectivity and antigenicity. Here, we constructed one or more of the 15 high-frequency naturally occurring amino acid changes in the receptor-binding domain (RBD) of Alpha, Beta and Gamma variants. S...

Jan 16th, 2022 - Rapid detection of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 are critical for COVID-19 diagnostics, epidemiological research, and studies related to vaccine evaluation. It is known that the nucleocapsid (N) is the most abundant protein of SARS-CoV-2 and can serve as an excellent biomarker due to its strong immunogenicity. This paper reports a rapid and ultrasensitive 3D biosensor for quantification of COVID-19 ...