Respiratory Infections News

The Infectious Diseases Society of America has released diagnostic recommendations for both symptomatic and asymptomatic patients with COVID-19.

An analysis of the need for inpatient and ICU beds during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in two Chinese cities indicates that early implementation of strict disease control strategies is needed to prevent overload of local health care systems in U.S. cities.

Two randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trials at Johns Hopkins Medicine aim to determine whether blood plasma will be effective as prophylaxis against COVID-19, a strategy that would be “enormously valuable” and has been efficacious against other viral diseases.

So far this year, 88 nurses have died of COVID-19 as of May 6, according to National Nurses United, or NNU, the largest union of registered nurses in the United States.

Seasonality will likely have only a minor role in the epidemiology of COVID-19 compared with public health interventions such as school closures and social distancing, which have been shown to have a major impact, according to a prospective cohort study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Several medical societies have issued recommendations for diagnosing and treating patients with COVID-19 in response to the pandemic.

Despite a lack of trials demonstrating the efficacy of chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine for the treatment of COVID-19, promotion and use of the two treatments has led to shortages, self-treatment and fatal overdoses, according to a perspective published in The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. The perspective suggests that African countries “strongly consider” putting prescription monitoring programs in place to ensure that off-label use of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine is appropriate and beneficial for the treatment of COVID-19.

A new analysis from an international, multidisciplinary working group that was conducted in light of the “extraordinary nature” of the COVID-19 pandemic provides supports for the development of a SARS-CoV-2 controlled human infection, or CHI, trial, provided the CHI follows the proper framework.

Given the novelty of COVID-19 and a lack of scientific evidence, many clinicians treating critically ill patients with the disease, particularly those with acute respiratory distress syndrome, have been using conventional supportive care strategies and mechanical ventilation. Questions have emerged, however, about whether other treatments may also prove beneficial in this patient population.

The use of saliva tests to fill the need for diagnosing COVID-19 has its pros and cons, experts told Healio Primary Care.