Laboratory experiments have shown mouthwash can quickly kill coronaviruses, but there’s no evidence mouthwash can prevent the virus from infecting people. The Adams School of Dentistry is investigating how well mouthwash works to reduce the amount of SARS-CoV-2. Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Adams School of Dentistry have launched a clinical trial to test
The Pfizer BioNTech coronavirus vaccine produces as good results in the “real world” as have been previously documented in randomised trials. A case control study, which has been peer reviewed and published in the New England Journal of Medicine, compared 596 618 people who were newly vaccinated in Israel and matched them to unvaccinated controls. Two doses
Infection by the new corona virus strain SARS-CoV-2 and its related syndrome COVID-19 has been associated with more than two million deaths worldwide. Patients of higher age and with preexisting chronic health conditions are at an increased risk of fatal disease outcome. However, detailed information on causes of death and the contribution of pre-existing health
People who have had evidence of a prior infection with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, appear to be well protected against being reinfected with the virus, at least for a few months, according to a newly published study from the National Cancer Institute (NCI). This finding may explain why reinfection appears to be relatively rare,
The Food and Drug Administration’s staff released a briefing document on Wednesday endorsing Johnson & Johnson’s one-shot coronavirus vaccine as safe and effective. An FDA advisory panel will meet Friday to review the briefing document and vote on whether to recommend an emergency use authorization (EUA). The FDA could then issue the (EUA) as soon as this
The 501Y.V2 variants of SARS-CoV-2 containing multiple mutations in Spike are now dominant in South Africa and are rapidly spreading to other countries. In this paper, experiments with 18 pseudotyped viruses showed that the 501Y.V2 variants do not confer increased infectivity in multiple cell types except for murine ACE2-overexpressing cells, where a substantial increase in
The race to produce vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 began when the first sequence was published, and this forms the basis for vaccines currently deployed globally. Independent lineages of SARS-CoV-2 have recently been reported: UK–B.1.1.7, South Africa–B.1.351 and Brazil–P.1. These variants have multiple changes in the immunodominant spike protein which facilitates viral cell entry via the Angiotensin
Human monoclonal antibodies are safe, preventive and therapeutic tools, that can be rapidly developed to help restore the massive health and economic disruption caused by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. In this just published paper on Cell researchers of Fondazione Toscana Life Sciences, National Institute for Infectious Diseases Lazzaro Spallanzani, Imperial College London and
The study is the first to describe across an entire country the effect of the Pfizer and Oxford-AstraZeneca jabs in the community on preventing severe illness resulting in hospitalisation. Previous results about vaccine efficacy have come from clinical trials. Hospitalisation drop By the fourth week after receiving the initial dose, the Pfizer and Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines
For the millions of Americans now eligible to receive the Pfizer or Moderna COVID-19 vaccines, it’s recommended that everyone get two shots. The first dose of these mRNA vaccines trains the immune system to recognize and attack the spike protein on the surface of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The second dose, administered a few weeks later, boosts
