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March 31, 2021
Initial Report of Decreased SARS-CoV-2 Viral Load after Inoculation with the BNT162b2 Vaccine
In a real-world analysis of data from individuals in Israel who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 after receiving the first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccination (n=4,938), viral load was substantially lower (2.8 to 4.5-fold lower) for infections occurring 12-37 days after the first dose compared to individuals who had not been vaccinated. Cycle of threshold (Ct)…
Efficacy of ChAdOx1 NCoV-19 (AZD1222) Vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 Variant of Concern 202012/01 (B.1.1.7): An Exploratory Analysis of a Randomised Controlled Trial
Post-hoc analysis of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine indicated that clinical vaccine efficacy against symptomatic, PCR-positive infection was 70.4% for the B.1.1.7 variant and 81.5% for non-B.1.1.7 lineages (not including the B.1.351 variant). Neutralization activity via vaccine-induced antibodies in vitro was also lower against the B.1.1.7 variant (geometric mean ratio 8.9). Participants 18 and older in efficacy cohorts…
Pfizer-BioNTech Announce Positive Topline Results of Pivotal COVID-19 Vaccine Study in Adolescents.
[Press release, not peer-reviewed] According to a press release from Pfizer, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine showed 100% efficacy against COVID-19 among adolescents (n=2,260) aged 12 to 15 years old in the US without prior history of infection. 18 cases of COVID-19 were observed in the placebo group, and none in the vaccinated group. The vaccine also…
A Haemagglutination Test for Rapid Detection of Antibodies to SARS-CoV-2
A study of red cell agglutination tests (haemagglutination tests, or HAT) demonstrated the ability to detect antibodies to the SARS-CoV-2 receptor binding domain with a sensitivity of 90% and a specificity of 99% in blood samples taken from individuals with a PCR-confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection ≥28 days prior. The authors note that the HAT test for…
Diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 Infection with LamPORE, a High-Throughput Platform Combining Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification and Nanopore Sequencing
A novel diagnostic platform called Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification with Nanopore Sequence (LamPORE) performed similarly to RT-PCR for detection of SARS-CoV-2 in nasopharyngeal samples collected at two hospitals in the United Kingdom. The diagnostic method can process up to 92 samples simultaneously and allow for analysis of thousands of pooled samples per day. In the study,…
Increased Transmissibility of the B.1.1.7 SARS-CoV-2 Variant Evidence from Contact Tracing Data in Oslo January to February 2021
[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] Within households in Norway, the secondary attack rate of the SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1.7 lineage was 60% higher than that of other variants. The study used contact tracing data from 415 index cases and 2,718 of their close contacts from January 4 to February 28, 2021 to estimate transmissibility and found an absolute increase…
March 30, 2021
People Perceive Themselves to Adhere More Strictly to COVID-19 Guidelines than Others
Participants reported that their own adherence to COVID-19 guidelines was better than both their friends and the average citizen in an online survey from the UK, US, Germany, and Sweden (n=1,102) in April 2020. Participants reported higher self-compliance to guidelines such as handwashing, physical distancing, staying at home, and self-quarantining when sick. Though participants rated…
Verified infections with endemic common cold coronaviruses do not entail significant protection against SARS-CoV-2
A previous confirmed seasonal coronavirus infection does not appear to provide protection against subsequent infection with SARS-CoV-2, according to analysis of a large database of respiratory specimens in Sweden. The analysis is based on a database of >75,000 respiratory specimens collected from 2013-2020 and linked to 10,000 samples collected during the pandemic (February-November 2020). There…
SARS-CoV-2 Variant B.1.1.7 Caused HLA-A2+ CD8+ T Cell Epitope Mutations for Impaired Cellular Immune Response
[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] The SARS-CoV-2 B.1.1.7 variant is associated with reduced CD8+ T cell activation due to at least two specific mutations in ORF1. The authors used algorithms to predict HLA-A2 binding epitopes in both the B.1.1.7 strain and the ancestral Wuhan strain and determined whether these epitopes could activate CD8+ T cells using an…
SARS-CoV-2 Infection Risk among Unvaccinated Is Negatively Associated with Community-Level Vaccination Rates
[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] Increases in the proportion of individuals aged 16-50 years receiving the first dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine were followed by declines in the SARS-CoV-2 positivity rate among a bystander unvaccinated cohort of people under 16 years old in 223 geographically defined communities in Israel. The proportion of vaccinated individuals and SARS-CoV-2 positivity…
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