Category Archives: Medical research

US scientists develop cheap smartphone-based test kit for Covid

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Doing a test with new technique could cost a 10th of a PCR and has been as reliable in small-scale trial

Scientists have developed a highly sensitive Covid test that relies only on low-tech kit and a smartphone, which could be used as a quicker, cheaper alternative to PCR testing.

The team behind the 25-minute saliva test say it provides a highly reliable platform for testing in the workplace or at home. It requires a basic lab kit that includes a cardboard box, a small hot plate and LED light that can be produced for less than £75. The cost of running a test, including the reagents, is about a 10th of a PCR test and is also cheaper than a lateral flow test. The team’s findings are published in the journal JAMA Network Open.

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Coronavirus vaccines may reduce risk of long Covid, ONS study finds

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Observational study finds double-jabbed people 41% less likely to report Covid symptoms 12 weeks after a positive test

Vaccination could reduce the risk of long Covid, research by the Office for National Statistics suggests.

The study, of more than 6,000 adults, found those who were double-vaccinated had a 41% lower likelihood of self-reporting Covid symptoms 12 weeks after first testing positive.

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Long Covid: doctors find ‘antibody signature’ for patients most at risk

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Low levels of certain antibodies found to be more common in those who go on to develop long Covid

Doctors have discovered an “antibody signature” that can help identify patients most at risk of developing long Covid, a condition where debilitating symptoms of the disease can persist for many months.

Researchers at University hospital Zurich analysed blood from Covid patients and found that low levels of certain antibodies were more common in those who developed long Covid than in patients who swiftly recovered.

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‘Paradigm shift’ needed in way WHO is funded, says director general

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Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says Covid pandemic has proven that health is ‘an international issue’

The head of the World Health Organization has warned member countries that the UN’s global health body is being “set up to fail” without a “paradigm shift” in the way that it is funded and supported.

In stark language delivered to the WHO’s executive board, the organisation’s director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said that the coronavirus pandemic, which has claimed more than 5.5 million lives, had underlined the need to strengthen health systems as well as pandemic preparedness plans.

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Long Covid: nearly 2m days lost in NHS staff absences in England

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MPs urge support for workers after data shows extent of ongoing illness in first 18 months of pandemic

NHS trusts in England lost nearly 2m days in staff absences due to long Covid in the first 18 months of the pandemic, according to figures that reveal the hidden burden of ongoing illness in the health service.

MPs on the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on coronavirus estimate that more than 1.82m days were lost to healthcare workers with long Covid from March 2020 to September 2021 across England’s 219 NHS trusts.

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Bionic eye implant enables blind UK woman to detect visual signals

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Breakthrough offers hope of restoration of sight to people suffering vision loss because of dry AMD

An 88-year-old woman has told of her joy at becoming the first patient in the UK to benefit from a groundbreaking bionic eye implant that enabled her to detect signals for the first time since going blind.

The woman from Dagenham suffers from geographic atrophy. The condition is the most common form of dry age-related macular degeneration (AMD), which affects millions of people worldwide and can cause loss of sight.

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Moderna aims to launch single Covid and flu booster jab within two years

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Combined vaccine should be ready in time for winter infectious season in 2023, says drug firm’s chief executive

Moderna is aiming to launch a single booster vaccination that will protect against both Covid-19 and flu within two years, its chief executive has said.

Stéphane Bancel said that the combined vaccine – which will protect against Covid-19, influenza and RSV, a common respiratory virus – could be available before the winter infectious season in 2023.

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Life after lockdown: how do we best recover from the pandemic?

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Two years of Covid have wreaked havoc with the nation’s mental health. What can be learned from the survivors of other traumas and is there a way of thinking ourselves to a happier, healthier place?

It was October 2020 when I realised I was going to have to ask for help. I’ve always been anxious, but thanks to the pandemic, I developed debilitating health anxiety. A dire winter was coming and any respite we’d had over the summer felt like it was slipping away. I couldn’t get to sleep and when I finally did, I had nightmares. My stomach churned and my hands shook so badly I had to give up caffeine. I developed a chronic reflux cough and, on more than one occasion, got into such an irrational spiral about it being Covid that I had to book a PCR test just to be able to function.

“One of the most diabolical things about this pandemic is the on and on-ness of it all,” says Amanda Ripley, author of The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes – and Why. “Humans can withstand a lot of turmoil and instability if they can recover.” Prior to Covid, Ripley studied people who survived tornadoes and terror attacks, emergencies for which the mental health consequences are much better understood than the long, slow-burn, seemingly endless one we find ourselves living through.

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Covid loses 90% of ability to infect within minutes in air – study

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Exclusive: findings highlight importance of short-range Covid transmission

Coronavirus loses 90% of its ability to infect us within 20 minutes of becoming airborne – with most of the loss occurring within the first five minutes, the world’s first simulations of how the virus survives in exhaled air suggest.

The findings re-emphasise the importance of short-range Covid transmission, with physical distancing and mask-wearing likely to be the most effective means of preventing infection. Ventilation, though still worthwhile, is likely to have a lesser impact.

This article was amended on 11 January 2022. In an earlier version, we said Covid loses 90% of ability to infect within five minutes. It is actually within the first 20 minutes – with most of the loss occurring within the first 5 minutes. This has been corrected for clarity.

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Why pig-to-human heart transplant is for now only a last resort

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Analysis: As doctors monitor world’s first human recipient of pig heart, safety and ethical concerns remain

The world’s first transplant of a genetically altered pig heart into an ailing human is a landmark for medical science, but the operation, and the approach more broadly, raise substantial safety and ethical concerns.

Surgeons at the University of Maryland Medical Center spent eight hours on Friday evening transplanting the heart from the pig into 57-year-old David Bennett, who had been in hospital for more than a month with terminal heart failure.

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Will Covid-19 become less dangerous as it evolves?

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Analysis: experts warn that viral evolution is not a one-way street and a continuing fall in virulence cannot be taken for granted

The pandemic has been awash with slogans, but in recent weeks, two have been repeated with increasing frequency: “Variants will evolve to be milder” and “Covid will become endemic”. Yet experts warn that neither of these things can be taken for granted.

Those stating that viruses become less deadly over time often cite influenza. Both of the flu viruses responsible for the 1918 Spanish flu and 2009 swine flu pandemics eventually evolved to become less dangerous. However, the 1918 virus is thought to have become more deadly before it became milder. And other viruses, such as Ebola, have become more dangerous over time.

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Maryland doctors transplant pig’s heart into human patient in medical first

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Patient is doing well three days after the highly experimental surgery, doctors say, though it’s too soon to know if it is a success

In a medical first, doctors in Maryland have transplanted a modified pig’s heart into a human patient in a last-ditch effort to save his life.

Doctors at the University of Maryland medical center said Monday that the patient was doing well three days after the highly experimental surgery, though it is too soon to know if the operation has been a success.

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Are we witnessing the dawn of post-theory science?

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Does the advent of machine learning mean the classic methodology of hypothesise, predict and test has had its day?

Isaac Newton apocryphally discovered his second law – the one about gravity – after an apple fell on his head. Much experimentation and data analysis later, he realised there was a fundamental relationship between force, mass and acceleration. He formulated a theory to describe that relationship – one that could be expressed as an equation, F=ma – and used it to predict the behaviour of objects other than apples. His predictions turned out to be right (if not always precise enough for those who came later).

Contrast how science is increasingly done today. Facebook’s machine learning tools predict your preferences better than any psychologist. AlphaFold, a program built by DeepMind, has produced the most accurate predictions yet of protein structures based on the amino acids they contain. Both are completely silent on why they work: why you prefer this or that information; why this sequence generates that structure.

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Global spread of autoimmune disease blamed on western diet

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New DNA research by London-based scientists hopes to find cure for rapidly spreading conditions

More and more people around the world are suffering because their immune systems can no longer tell the difference between healthy cells and invading micro-organisms. Disease defences that once protected them are instead attacking their tissue and organs.

Major international research efforts are being made to fight this trend – including an initiative at London’s Francis Crick Institute, where two world experts, James Lee and Carola Vinuesa, have set up separate research groups to help pinpoint the precise causes of autoimmune disease, as these conditions are known.

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Could microclots help explain the mystery of long Covid? | Resia Pretorius

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My lab has found significant microclot formation in long Covid patients. Unfortunately, these are missed in routine blood tests

One of the biggest failures during the Covid-19 pandemic is our slow response in diagnosing and treating long Covid. As many as 100 million people worldwide already suffer from long Covid. That staggering number will eventually be much higher, if we take into account that diagnoses are still inadequate, and that we still do not know what the impact of Omicron and future variants will be.

Patients with long Covid complain of numerous symptoms, the main ones being recurring fatigue and brain fog, muscle weakness, being out of breath and having low oxygen levels, sleep difficulties and anxiety or depression. Some patients are so sick that they cannot work or even walk a few steps. There is possibly also an elevated risk of stroke and heart attacks. One of the biggest sources of concern is that even mild and sometimes asymptomatic initial Covid-19 infection may lead to debilitating, long-term disability.

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Britain got it wrong on Covid: long lockdown did more harm than good, says scientist

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A new book outlines the mistakes and missteps that made UK pandemic worse

There was a distinctive moment, at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, that neatly encapsulated the mistakes and confusion of Britain’s early efforts to tackle the disease, says Mark Woolhouse. At a No 10 briefing in March 2020, cabinet minister Michael Gove warned the virus did not discriminate. “Everyone is at risk,” he announced.

And nothing could be further from the truth, argues Professor Woolhouse, an expert on infectious diseases at Edinburgh University. “I am afraid Gove’s statement was simply not true,” he says. “In fact, this is a very discriminatory virus. Some people are much more at risk from it than others. People over 75 are an astonishing 10,000 times more at risk than those who are under 15.”

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New studies reinforce belief that Omicron is less likely to damage lungs

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Six research groups’ findings all suggest variant multiplies more in throats and causes less serious disease

A growing body of evidence indicates that the Omicron Covid variant is more likely to infect the throat than the lungs, which scientists believe may explain why it appears to be more infectious but less deadly than other versions of the virus. Six studies – four published since Christmas Eve – have found that Omicron does not damage people’s lungs as much as the Delta and other previous variants of Covid. The studies have yet to be peer-reviewed by other scientists.

“The result of all the mutations that make Omicron different from previous variants is that it may have altered its ability to infect different sorts of cells,” said Deenan Pillay, professor of virology at University College London.

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I’m a UK Covid scientist. Here’s a sample of the abuse in my inbox

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Messages may contain unhinged expletives, threatening tropes … or one of my interviews set to music

“You scaremongering ignorant fucking cunt, you and your retarded team made predictions that could have fucked this country for billions of pounds, fucked Christmas for a second time and cost thousands thier [sic] jobs only to have your most pessimistic ballshit [sic] now found to be just that. How fucks like you can sleep at night is beyond me and I hope you are fucking held to account for what you have done and could have done if there weren’t some people in the government with a brain.”

How would you like to get this in your inbox? As a senior scientist advising the government on Covid, I get this sort of email on a fairly regular basis. Indeed, (someone calling himself) Mr Roberts (who sent this) is a regular offender. What particularly upset me about this email was that it wasn’t sent to me, but to a junior member of my team. Awful, isn’t it?

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Covid: how long are people infectious and how do isolation rules vary?

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The US has cut the self-isolation period to five days, while in England it is seven with negative tests

The US has announced it is cutting the recommended self-isolation time with Covid to five days. How long are people with Covid infectious for, and why do the rules vary between countries?

What are the rules for self-isolation in the UK?

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Guidance v rules: which Covid measures work better?

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Analysis: the Tories are arguing against further restrictions – but what do scientists think works best to prevent the spread of Covid?

They are questions that have cast a shadow over the festive season: will new Covid measures be needed, and if so, when and what form will they take?

The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) has said peak admissions could be comparable with or even greater than previous highs without significant behaviour change or further interventions, but many Tory backbenchers have argued against legal restrictions, saying that the public should be trusted to make their own decisions on the risks they wish to take.

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