The Potential Role of Extracellular Vesicles in COVID-19 Treatment: Opportunity and Challenge.

SARS-CoV-2 infection has become an urgent public health concern worldwide, severely affecting our society and economy due to the long incubation time and high prevalence. People spare no effort on the rapid development of vaccine and treatment all over the world. Amongst the numerous ways of tackling this pandemic, some approaches using extracellular vesicles (EVs) are emerging. In this review, we summarize current prevalence and pathogenesis of COVID-19, involving the combination of SARS-CoV-2 and virus receptor ACE2, endothelial dysfunction and micro thrombosis, together with cytokine storm. We also discuss the ongoing EVs-based strategies for the treatment of COVID-19, including mesenchymal stem cell (MSC)-EVs, drug-EVs, vaccine-EVs, platelet-EVs, and others. This manuscript provides the foundation for the development of targeted drugs and vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 infections.

Knowledge, attitude, and practice toward COVID-19 vaccination in Kazakhstan: a cross-sectional study.

Background: There are several COVID-19 vaccines available and many are under different stages of development. However, vaccine hesitancy, including vaccination delays and refusals, represents a major hurdle for achieving herd immunity. The current study aims to evaluate COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and the associated factors.Method: This is a cross-sectional survey-based study that was conducted between Aug and Nov 2020.Results: There were 417 respondents with nearly 61% females, more than 65% fall between the ages of 18 and 29 years, three-quarters holding a university degree, with more than 63% identified as single, and those who have no children represented more than 67% of the respondents. More than 36% of the respondents considered themselves COVID-19 vaccine hesitant. COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy appeared to be high among female respondents (p = .02), aged 30 years old and above (p < .001), widowed or divorced (p < .001) and those who have a child (p < .001). One of the most vaccine hesitancy influencing factors is the vaccines' country of origin.Conclusion: There appears to be a high COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among the participants with several associated factors. The current finding provides a knowledge base for policymakers for communication improvement and confidence-building in relation to COVID-19 vaccines and vaccination.

Clinical evidences on the antiviral properties of macrolide antibiotics in the COVID-19 era and beyond.

Macrolides are a large group of antibiotics characterised by the presence of a macro-lactone ring of variable size. The prototype of macrolide antibiotics, erythromycin was first produced by Streptomyces and associated species more than half a century ago; other related drugs were developed. These drugs have been shown to have several pharmacological properties: in addition to their antibiotic activity, they possess some anti-inflammatory properties and have been also considered against non-bacterial infections. In this review, we analysed the available clinical evidences regarding the potential anti-viral activity of macrolides, by focusing on erythromycin, clarithromycin and azithromycin. Overall, there is no significant evidences so far that macrolides might have a direct benefit on most of viral infections considered in this review (RSV, Influenza, coronaviruses, Ebola and Zika viruses). However, their clinical benefit cannot be ruled out without further and focused clinical studies. Macrolides may improve the clinical course of viral respiratory infections somehow, at least through indirect mechanisms relying on some and variable anti-inflammatory and/or immunomodulatory effects, in addition to their well-known antibacterial activity.