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 New heart problems seen in recovered COVID-19 patients
More than three-quarters of recently recovered COVID-19 patients had
heart muscle problems show up during magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)
tests, German doctors reported on Monday in JAMA Cardiology. In some
patients, the heart may be "in serious trouble as a part of COVID-19
disease," Dr. Valentina Puntmann of University Hospital Frankfurt
told Reuters. Among 100 patients ages 45 to 53, "a considerable
majority" - 78 - had inflammation in the heart muscle and lining.
Sixty-seven had recovered at home while 33 had required
hospitalization. Half of the former patients were more than two
months out since their diagnosis at the time of the MRI.
Thirty-six patients reported ongoing shortness of breath and general
exhaustion, and 71 had blood markers of heart muscle damage.
Compared with similar people who had not had COVID-19, the recently
recovered patients' hearts pumped more weakly and displayed other
risk factors for heart failure.
Puntmann suspects the abnormalities are signs of permanent problems.
"While we do not have direct evidence for late consequences yet,
such as the development of heart failure ... it is quite possible
that in a few years, this burden will be enormous based on what we
have learned from other viral conditions that similarly affect the
heart," she said. (https://bit.ly/304omz1; https://bit.ly/3g5PDGH)
Mutation may have made virus more vulnerable to vaccines
A genetic mutation that made the new coronavirus more infectious may
also make it more vulnerable to vaccines, researchers believe. The
mutation, designated D614G, increases the number of "spikes" on the
surface of the virus and makes them more stable, allowing the virus
to more efficiently break into and infect cells. The mutation will
not pose problems for vaccines now in clinical trials, however,
because the extra spikes retain the targets for the "neutralizing
antibodies" the vaccines are designed to induce.
Those targets, called receptor-binding domains, or RBDs, are the
places where the spike attaches itself to the cells it infects. With
more spikes, there are more RBDs for the antibodies to bind to in
order to neutralize the virus. "The gain in infectivity provided by
D614G came at the cost of making the virus more vulnerable to
neutralizing antibodies," the researchers wrote in a paper posted on
medRxiv on Friday ahead of peer review. (https://bit.ly/39vmRNr)
Do-it-yourself masks should have several layers
Do-it-yourself face masks are far more effective at blocking
virus-containing droplets if they are made with two or three layers
of fabric, researchers advised on Friday in the journal Thorax.
Using high-speed video and special lighting, they saw that when
masks have multiple layers, fewer droplets generated by speaking,
coughing and sneezing escape, and droplets that do escape do not
spread as far.
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There is a tradeoff between protection and breathability as the number of layers
increases, but "three layers is quite comfortable," study coauthor Raina
MacIntyre of UNSW Sydney, in Australia, told Reuters. For their experiments, her
team compared masks made from a single or double layer of T-shirt fabric, which
had a thread count of 170/inch.
They also tested a surgical mask. Freeze frames from the video showed that while
the surgical mask was most effective, the two-ply cloth mask did a fairly good
job at limiting the distance droplets traveled. Even the one-ply mask was
helpful. "The effectiveness of a mask depends on several factors other than
filtration, which is what we tested," MacIntyre added. "For example, the outer
layer should be made of a water-resistant fabric such as polyester," she said.
"It is also best to use fabrics with high thread count and fine weave."
(https://bit.ly/3hzumFE)
Pandemic may increase children's risks for eating disorder
Pediatricians in Australia report a dramatic increase in severe cases of the
eating disorder anorexia nervosa during the pandemic and are concerned that the
same thing might be happening among vulnerable young people worldwide.
People with anorexia have a pathological fear of becoming fat, and as a result
they can become severely malnourished and suffer life-threatening heart damage.
At Perth Children's Hospital, the number of children with anorexia nervosa
requiring hospitalization for nutritional rehabilitation since the start of the
pandemic has more than doubled compared with the three previous years,
researchers said in a paper published on Friday in Archives of Disease in
Childhood. Lockdowns may have "disconnected patients from protective factors"
like school routine and peer relationships, they speculate.
Also, they warn, many patients have additional mental health issues like
depression, anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder, which may be worsened by
the increased focus on hand hygiene and fear of contracting COVID-19. "We all
urgently need to better understand the reasons why young people with eating
disorders have been hospitalized at very high rates during COVID-19, to know how
to best help and ensure their physical health safety," study leader Dr. Yasheer
Venay Haripersad told Reuters. (https://bit.ly/301mEyj)
Open https://graphics.reuters.com/
HEALTHCORONAVIRUS/
yxmvjqywprz/index.html in
an external browser for a Reuters graphic on vaccines and treatments in
development.
(Reporting by Nancy Lapid and Linda Carroll; Editing by Bill Berkrot)
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