As health care systems around the world attempt to cope with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) “tsunami,” concerns about ongoing spread of disease from individuals who are infected without symptoms have been raised.

The swiftly moving novel coronavirus continues its relentless spread around the world, upending life as we know it and creating a breeding ground for misinformation. Some rumors are harmless, while others can be dangerous, stoking fear and threatening health. Here, we separate true from false, based on the best science and expertise available.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is issuing warning letters to firms for selling fraudulent products with claims to prevent, treat, mitigate, diagnose or cure coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). We are actively monitoring for any firms marketing products with fraudulent COVID-19 prevention and treatment claims. The FDA is exercising its authority to prot...

The emergence of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has required an unprecedented response to control the spread of the infection and protect the most vulnerable within society. Whilst the pandemic has focused society on the threat of emerging infections and hand hygiene, certain infection control and antimicrobial stewardship policies may have to be relaxed. It is...

May 8th, 2020 - COVID-19 Testing: The Threat of False-Negative Results.|2020|West CP,Montori VM,Sampathkumar P,|epidemiology,isolation & purification,classification,methods,classification,diagnosis,epidemiology,prevention & control,methods,organization & administration,diagnosis,epidemiology,methods,epidemiology,

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV-2) [1]. It has led to a pandemic worldwide due to its extremely infectious nature. At present, the route of transmission of SARS-CoV-2 is still controversial, but the major route of the COVID-19 to rapidly spread through indoor environments, is ca...

Since the outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Wuhan in December 2019, by March 10, 2020, a total of 80,932 confirmed cases have been reported in China. Two consecutively negative RTPCR test results in respiratory tract specimens is required for the evaluation of discharge from hospital, and oropharyngeal swabs were the most common sample. However, fals...

Apr 20th, 2020 - Infectious disease specialist Gonzalo Ballon-Landa, MD, of Scripps Health in San Diego, was a bit bewildered. One of his patients who had all the signs and symptoms of COVID-19 had tested negative with the nasopharyngeal swab RT-PCR assay. But when his hospital system's lab re-ran the sample, this time his patient was positive, just as he suspected. And while Ballon-Landa i...

In the high-stakes world of coronavirus testing, one mistake has taken center stage: the dreaded false negative, wherein a test mistakenly deems an infected person to be virus-free. These troublesome results, experts have said, can deprive a person of treatment and embolden them to mingle with others, hastening the spread of disease.

Mar 31st, 2020 - In a physician WhatsApp group, a doctor posted he had a fever of 101 degrees Fahrenheit and muscle ache, gently confessing that it felt like his typical "man flu" which heals with rest and scotch. He worried that he had coronavirus. When the reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for the virus on his nasal swab came back negative, he jubilantly announced his relief. Lik...

Apr 27th, 2021 - Introduction: A novel Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was reported via nucleic acid identification in December, 2019. Accuracy of SARS-CoV-2 diagnostic assays has emerged as a major barrier to COVID-19 diagnosis, particularly in cases requiring urgent or emergent treatment.Areas covered: In this review, we explore the major reasons for false...

Oct 27th, 2020 - Medscape asked top experts to weigh in on the most pressing scientific questions about COVID-19. Check back frequently for more COVID-19 Data Dives, and visit Medscape's Coronavirus Resource Center for complete coverage. Ashish K. Jha, MD, MPH President Trump and his advisor, Scott Atlas, MD, argue that there is a lot of false coding of COVID deaths. Th...

Oct 27th, 2020 - Medscape asked top experts to weigh in on the most pressing scientific questions about COVID-19. Check back frequently for more COVID-19 Data Dives, and visit Medscape's Coronavirus Resource Center for complete coverage. President Trump and his advisor, Scott Atlas, MD, argue that there is a lot of false coding of COVID deaths. This is junk news which, ...

Information and frequently asked questions about requirement for proof of negative COVID-19 test or recovery from COVID-19 for all air passengers arriving in the United States

Feb 15th, 2022 - COVID-19 is a multi-system infection with emerging evidence-based antiviral and anti-inflammatory therapies to improve disease prognosis. However, a subset of patients with COVID-19 signs and symptoms have repeatedly negative RT-PCR tests, leading to treatment hesitancy. We used comparative serology early in the COVID-19 pandemic when background ...

Sep 1st, 2021 - Across the country, state medical licensing boards and state and national medical associations are struggling with how to respond to physicians who make scientifically baseless public statements about COVID-19, often in a viral video. They fear such statements are increasing public confusion and are heightening political conflict, particularly regarding vaccines and the wearing of...

Jan 11th, 2021 - COVID-19 is diagnosed via detection of SARS-CoV-2 RNA using real time reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (rtRT-PCR). Performance of many SARS-CoV-2 rtRT-PCR assays is not entirely known due to the lack of a gold standard. We sought to evaluate the false negative rate (FNR) and sensitivity of our laboratory-developed SARS-CoV-2 rtRT-PCR targeting the enve...

Apr 14th, 2022 - Covid-19 Boosters - Where from Here?|2022|Offit PA,|

Apr 1st, 2020 - In a physician WhatsApp group, a doctor posted he had fever of 101 °F and muscle ache, gently confessing that it felt like his typical “man flu” which heals with rest and scotch. Nevertheless, he worried that he had coronavirus.

Mar 30th, 2020 - Editor's note: Find the latest COVID-19 news and guidance in Medscape's Coronavirus Resource Center. In a physician WhatsApp group, a doctor posted he had fever of 101° F and muscle ache, gently confessing that it felt like his typical "man flu" which heals with rest and scotch. Nevertheless, he worried that he had coronavirus. When the reverse transcription polymerase chain react...