By Nancy Lapid
(Reuters) – The following is a summary of some of the latest scientific studies on the new coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus.
Long-term COVID-19 effects seen in children
‘Long COVID’ – a term that refers to the effects of the virus that lingers for weeks or months – can also be a problem for children, a small study indicates. Doctors at a large Italian hospital found 129 children and teens with COVID-19 who were otherwise generally healthy. About 42% recovered completely on average about five months after their diagnosis. About one in three young people still had one or two symptoms, and more than one in five had three or more, according to a report published on medRxiv on Tuesday. The most common persistent problems were insomnia (reported by 18.6%), respiratory symptoms, including chest pain and tightness (14.7%), nasal congestion (12.4%), fatigue (10.8%), muscle pain (10.1%), joint pain (6.9%) and concentration problems (10.1%). Although these problems were more common in children who were obviously ill, they initially also developed in infected young people with little or no symptoms. There is increasing evidence that restrictive measures to curb the pandemic are significantly affecting the mental health of children, the researchers acknowledge. According to their findings, the potential long-term effects that COVID-19 may have on children should be considered when developing measures to reduce the impact of the pandemic on their overall health. (https://bit.ly/3j8eITL)
Patients’ antibodies target virus from many angles
Most antibody treatments and vaccines targeting the coronavirus focus on stimulating an immune response against the peak protein it uses to break into cells. Targeting the virus to other sites may be a better approach. Their study of COVID-19 survivors whose immune systems elicited strong responses to the virus showed that more than half of the antibodies were targeted to components of the virus other than the protein. The most common targets of the antibodies that are not against the tip were the closed capsule in which the virus stores its genetic instructions and specific parts of the instructions, such as pieces of the RNA code. This suggests that non-spike-related antibodies may play an important role in clearing the virus, the research team said in an article published on bioRxiv before peer review on Thursday. As for the natural immunity, it also indicates that the immune system, when it comes to new varieties of protein stimuli, will have other places on the virus that it can still remember and attack. A spokesman for the researchers said their company, Immunome Inc., was developing a cocktail of antibodies that targeted various viruses. (https://bit.ly/3j73nDn)
COVID-19 may affect kidney filtration
COVID-19 impairs the kidneys’ ability to filter waste and toxins in some patients, according to a new report. Kidney filters usually do not allow much protein into the urine. Researchers who studied 103 COVID-19 patients found that about 24% of them had protein albumin in their urine, and 21% high protein cystatin c in their urine. About 25% of the patients had a non-infectious piece of coronavirus in their urine, but none of the samples contained infectious viruses. This suggests that the virus particles that researchers saw were “a direct result of a filtration disorder instead of a viral infection in the kidney”, according to a report posted on medRxiv on Sunday before the peer-review rating. None of the patients had signs of renal function except the filtration problems. “At this stage, we do not know if these disorders are a sign of long-term consequences,” said co-author Choukri Ben Mamoun of the Yale School of Medicine. “For this reason, we report these findings and emphasize the need for long-term investigation into the effects of this infection.” (https://bit.ly/3oDhHF4)
Open https://tmsnrt.rs/3c7R3Bl in an external browser for a Reuters image on vaccines being developed.
Graph: Vaccine race tracking: http://graphics.reuters.com/HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS/VACCINE-TRACKER/xegpbqnlovq/
(Reporting by Nancy Lapid; Edited by Bill Berkrot)
Originally published