Covid-19 declared as a pandemic by the World Health Organisation on January 30, 2020, is a major disaster which shook the roots of almost all the economies around the globe. The outbreak began in a city of China, Wuhan majorly due to consumption of bats during December. The symptoms, the ways of spreading of infection are quite similar to that of in uenza. The areas with higher pollution levels of particulate matter have reported a higher number of deaths as compared to the number of deaths in the cases from comparatively less polluted areas. The meteorological factors have also played a major role in the extent of spread of disease and the ability of humans living in the area to ght against the disease. Social distancing and lockdown all over the nation have proved to be major weapons to ght against the further spread of disease. The lockdown, on the other hand, has given relief from the high levels of pollution resulting in good air quality and clean rivers. This study focuses on the spread of the novel coronavirus all over the world with the trend in the number of con rmed cases, deaths and the cured from the onset and also highlighting the situations in ve countries. The study further gives a prediction of the number of cases for ten days and correlates the values with the actual number of cases reported and throws light on the future aspects of the infection.
There is an increasing concern about COVID-19 worldwide. This is a new emerging infectious disease caused by a novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2), which recently broke out from the Chinese city of Wuhan and has quickly spread in China, with sporadic cases in each continent [...].
Alemtuzumab is a monoclonal anti CD-52 antibody recently approved for use in relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis(MS). Given that the targeted antigen is primarily expressed on B and T lymphocytes, the administration of this biological drug is associated with rapid but protracted peripheral lymphopenia. Areas covered: The impact on infective risk of this immune impairment is still to be fully understood. In this review, we attempt to summarize all the available literature concerning opportunistic infections occurring in patients with MS receiving alemtuzumab. Infective adverse events were observed in more than 70% of patients in phase 2/3 RCTs, mainly of mild-to-moderate severity. Nevertheless, several post-marketing reports documented cases of serious, rare, and unexpected infections. Expert Opinion: Predictive risk factors and prognostic features of opportunistic infections in this setting still need to be exactly assessed. At present, the only recommended preventive measures consist in anti-herpetic prophylaxis, Listeria-free diet, Tuberculosis prophylaxis and annual Papillomavirus screening. Given the non-negligible risk of unpredicted infective events, we advise physicians to take into account patients' history of infectious diseases and vaccine status and to consider supplementary prophylactic strategies, including screening for Toxoplasma gondii and viral hepatitis serostatus as well as pre-emptive approaches to avert CMV reactivation and Pneumocystosis.
Objective: to describe a single-center experience of Pneumocystis jirovecii pneumonia (PJP) in non-HIV patients recovering from COVID-19. Methods: We report the cases of five non-HIV patients with COVID-19 who also developed PJP at a University Hospital. Results: With the exception of one subject, who experienced an atypical and prolonged course of COVID-19, all the patients developed PJP after the clinical resolution of COVID-19 pneumonia. All but one patient had no pre-existing immunosuppressive conditions or other risk factors for PJP development at COVID-19 diagnosis. Nonetheless, following the course of COVID-19 infection, all the patients fulfilled at least one host factor for PJP; indeed, all the patients had received at least 2 weeks of high-dose steroids and three out of five had a CD4+ cell count <200/mm3. Conclusions: The use of corticosteroids for COVID-19 respiratory impairment seems to be the most common risk factor for PJP, together with viral-induced and iatrogenic lymphopenia. The worsening in respiratory function and the characteristic radiological picture during or after COVID-19 pneumonia should raise the suspicion of PJP, even in immunocompetent patients. PJP primary chemoprophylaxis can be considered in selected high-risk COVID-19 patients, but further studies are needed.
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