Article Summary
November 30, 2020
Community Coronavirus Disease 2019 Activity Level and Nursing Home Staff Testing for Active Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 Infection in Indiana
A study assessing the potential utility of COVID-19 community SARS-CoV-2 test positivity levels or incidence to inform testing strategies of nursing home staff in Indiana did not find a meaningful threshold to predict homes with SARS-CoV-2-positive staff. Using county-level metrics of cases per 10,000 population or positivity rates to predict detection of any infected staff…
Delayed Healthcare Seeking and Prolonged Illness in Healthcare Workers during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Single-Centre Observational Study
A cross-sectional study at a London hospital found that some healthcare workers with severe symptoms of COVID-19 delayed seeking medical attention. Of 236 healthcare workers who reported symptoms consistent with COVID-19, the most common symptoms were cough (76%), fever (59%), breathlessness (36%), and loss of smell (42%). Five of nine respondents experiencing severe breathlessness and…
Dynamic Changes in Anti-SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies during SARS-CoV-2 Infection and Recovery from COVID-19
An analysis of laboratory tests from 1850 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 showed changes in SARS-CoV-2 antibody levels over time, and that levels of spike protein (S)- or receptor-binding domain (RBD)-specific IgG were important in viral clearance and recovery. Generation of S-, RBD-, and nucleoprotein (N)-specific IgG occurred one week later in patients with severe COVID-19…
Clinical Performance of the Point-of-Care Cobas Liat for Detection of SARS-CoV-2 in 20 Minutes: A Multicenter Study
A multi-site US study comparing the clinical performance of two cobas® RT-PCR tests, the Liat point of care test versus the most widely used test, the 68/8800 test, found that tests showed similar performance characteristics. The Liat test provides results in approximately 20 minutes. Overall agreement between the Liat and 68/8800 systems for SARS-CoV-2 diagnostics…
COVID-19 Growth in Rural versus Urban Counties with Major Universities at the Start of the 2020 Academic Year
[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] An assessment of COVID-19 growth in counties with universities showed that small metro and non-metro counties had a dramatic infection spike near the beginning of the semester (weeks 2-6) and infection growth remained significantly higher than their large and medium metro counterparts for the study duration (through September 27, 2020). The authors…
No Evidence for Increased Transmissibility from Recurrent Mutations in SARS-CoV-2
Phylogenetic analysis of recurrent mutations identified in a dataset of 46,723 SARS-CoV-2 viral genomes isolated from patients across the world did not detect any single mutation that was associated with significantly increased transmission ability; overall SARS-CoV-2 genomic diversity was limited. The study focused on identifying homoplasies, traits or sites that independently emerged over time. The…
Outdoor Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and Other Respiratory Viruses, a Systematic Review
A systematic review assessing the risk of transmission of respiratory viruses in outdoor versus indoor settings found that overall risk is lower outdoors, but there are gaps in the evidence. Five studies showed that few reported global SARS-CoV-2 infections have occurred outdoors (<10%) and the odds of indoor transmission was much higher (18.7 times, 95%…
Inference of Active Viral Replication in Cases with Sustained Positive RT-PCRs for SARS-CoV-2. Journal of Clinical Microbiology
A study of patients with persistent positive RT-PCR results for SARS-CoV-2 concluded that the presence of subgenomic (SG) viral RNA, which is only found in replicating viruses, might indicate that some patients had actively replicating virus. Samples from 60 individuals who had prolonged viral shedding (24-101 days) since their first RT-PCR test were evaluated. SG…
SARS-CoV-2 Transmission in an Urban Community: The Role of Children and Household Contacts
A retrospective study of infection patterns among contacts of 71 children with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection in an urban setting found that fewer than half of children who tested positive had a household sick contact (HHSC). HHSCs were defined as someone who either tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 or who had symptoms consistent with COVID-19. In all…
Quantifying Human Mobility Behaviour Changes during the COVID-19 Outbreak in the United States
A study assessing human mobility changes in the US from February to May indicated that government orders and the severity of local SARS-CoV-2 outbreaks significantly contributed to the strength of social distancing in the United States. The study used an integrated dataset of mobile device location data and constructed a Social Distancing Index to evaluate…
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