Add fuel to the fire: Inflammation and immune response in lung cancer combined with COVID-19.

The corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19) global pandemic has had an unprecedented and persistent impact on oncological practice, especially for patients with lung cancer, who are more vulnerable to the virus than the normal population. Indeed, the onset, progression, and prognosis of the two diseases may in some cases influence each other, and inflammation is an important link between them. The original chronic inflammatory environment of lung cancer patients may increase the risk of infection with COVID-19 and exacerbate secondary damage. Meanwhile, the acute inflammation caused by COVID-19 may induce tumour progression or cause immune activation. In this article, from the perspective of the immune microenvironment, the pathophysiological changes in the lungs and whole body of these special patients will be summarised and analysed to explore the possible immunological storm, immunosuppression, and immune escape phenomenon caused by chronic inflammation complicated by acute inflammation. The effects of COVID-19 on immune cells, inflammatory factors, chemokines, and related target proteins in the immune microenvironment of tumours are also discussed, as well as the potential role of the COVID-19 vaccine and immune checkpoint inhibitors in this setting. Finally, we provide recommendations for the treatment of lung cancer combined with COVID-19 in this special group.

Beneficial Flavonoid in Foods and Anti-obesity Effect

Obesity is a global health problem. In the past decades, the prevalence rate of obesity has risen sharply in epidemiology. Obesity has become an increasingly severe epidemic burden linked with different kinds of diseases, consisting of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, metabolic associated fatty liver disease, and even in COVID-19. Beneficial flavonoids in foods, as functional ingredients, combat obesity and maintain energy balance through multiple mechanisms. This review provides a brief overview of biological targets, possible mechanisms and the current therapeutic interventions including suppressing appetite, increasing energy consumption, regulating gut microbiota, inhibiting adipogenesis, anti-inflammation. In vitro and in vivo experiments as well as available clinical evidence related to the anti-obesity effects of pure flavonoid and flavonoid-rich extracts are also summarized and depicted. Furthermore, the metabolism and bioavailability of flavonoids are also concluded and discussed. Beneficial flavonoids have become promising candidates for treating and avoiding obesity, but poor bioavailability and short elimination half-life affects the absorption and efficacy. This paper reviews the different types of flavonoids and their potential effect of preventing obesity, which provide the basis for further research.

Patients with IBD have a more cautious attitude towards COVID-19 vaccination.

Background: To understand the awareness of COVID-19 vaccine, the willingness to vaccinate and the influencing factors of willingness to vaccinate in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients. Methods: The online questionnaire was distributed to conduct a survey to analyze and evaluate the willingness, awareness and trust in vaccines of IBD patients. Bivariate analyses and logistic regression models were used to analysis influencing factors. Results: We sent the questionnaire to the WeChat group for patient management and 304 patients responded, out of which 16 respondents had to be excluded and 288 respondents were included for the analysis. Among them, 209 patients vaccinated with COVID-19 vaccine. Among the non-vaccinated 79 patients, the main reasons for their concerns were afraid of vaccination aggravating IBD and fear of adverse effects. Our results showed that IBD patients with long disease duration were more willing to receive COVID-19 vaccination (P<0.05). We also observed that a high perception of benefits and cues to action to receive the vaccine were the two most important constructs affecting a definite intention for COVID-19 vaccination (P<0.05). Conclusions: Patients with IBD have a more cautious attitude towards COVID-19 vaccination, which may lead to a higher rate of vaccine hesitancy. Further efforts should be made to protect patients with IBD from COVID-19 infections and achieve adequate vaccination coverage.

Patients with IBD have a more cautious attitude towards COVID-19 vaccination

Background To understand the awareness of COVID-19 vaccine, the willingness to vaccinate and the influencing factors of willingness to vaccinate in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients. Methods The online questionnaire was distributed to conduct a survey to analyze and evaluate the willingness, awareness and trust in vaccines of IBD patients. Bivariate analyses and logistic regression models were used to analysis influencing factors. Results We sent the questionnaire to the WeChat group for patient management and 304 patients responded, out of which 16 respondents had to be excluded and 288 respondents were included for the analysis. Among them, 209 patients vaccinated with COVID-19 vaccine. Among the non-vaccinated 79 patients, the main reasons for their concerns were afraid of vaccination aggravating IBD and fear of adverse effects. Our results showed that IBD patients with long disease duration were more willing to receive COVID-19 vaccination (P<0.05). We also observed that a high perception of benefits and cues to action to receive the vaccine were the two most important constructs affecting a definite intention for COVID-19 vaccination (P<0.05). Conclusions Patients with IBD have a more cautious attitude towards COVID-19 vaccination, which may lead to a higher rate of vaccine hesitancy. Further efforts should be made to protect patients with IBD from COVID-19 infections and achieve adequate vaccination coverage.

Design of 3D-Printed Electronic Fiber Optic Sensor to Detect Rhodamine B Reagent: An Initiation to Potential Virus Detection.

A fluorescence device based on ultraviolet light is proposed in this paper, which currently stands at the design stage with the eventual aim to potentially detect virus/antibody fluorescence reactions. The designed device is proposed to have the characteristics of high reflectivity, low power consumption, wide spectrum of light source, and proper silver coating. For fabrication and raising product quality, 3D printing technology and a sputtering test will be used. In this connection, this paper firstly introduces the design sources; then, the ideas of inventing fluorescence detection devices based on ultraviolet light, followed by the data analysis as well as discussing the results of computer simulations. The design process, materials, methods, and experiments are demonstrated following the reality work procedure. Instead of directly using a virus or antibodies for the experiment, at the current design stage, we focus on using this device to detect the rhodamine B reagent. Experiment shows that this reagent can be successfully detected. With this achievement, we logically believe that such type of an ultraviolet optical sensor, with further development and testing, may have the possible value to detect a single virus such as COVID-19, as well as other viruses or small molecules. Though there is long way to go to achieve such a goal, future works experimenting with the detection device on real virus or antibodies can take place more efficiently with a good foundation.

Metabolomic analyses reveal new stage-specific features of COVID-19.

The current pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has affected >160 million individuals to date, and has caused millions of deaths worldwide, at least in part due to the unclarified pathophysiology of this disease. Identifying the underlying molecular mechanisms of COVID-19 is critical to overcome this pandemic. Metabolites mirror the disease progression of an individual and can provide extensive insights into their pathophysiological significance at each stage of disease. We provide a comprehensive view of metabolic characterisation of sera from COVID-19 patients at all stages using untargeted and targeted metabolomic analysis. As compared with the healthy controls, we observed different alteration patterns of circulating metabolites from the mild, severe and recovery stages, in both the discovery cohort and the validation cohort, which suggests that metabolic reprogramming of glucose metabolism and the urea cycle are potential pathological mechanisms for COVID-19 progression. Our findings suggest that targeting glucose metabolism and the urea cycle may be a viable approach to fight COVID-19 at various stages along the disease course.

Duration of SARS-CoV-2 positive in quarantine room environments: A perspective analysis.

OBJECTIVE: To determine the duration of SARS-CoV-2 persistence in quarantine hotel environments. METHODS: 39 Patients confirmed by RT-PCR were included. We collected clinical features, laboratory test results, smear sample information, and quarantine room information. Genome sequencing and phylogenetic analysis were conducted. We analyzed the factors associated with environmental contamination. RESULT: Among 39 COVID-19 cases, 10 were asymptomatic and 37 were imported from aboard. We collected 271 swab samples from environmental surfaces related to observational patients. Eighteen swab samples from seven patients were positive. The highest contamination rates occurred on cups (100%), followed by hand sink (12.82%), toilet seat and flush (7.89%), telephone (5.56%), bedside table (5.56%), and floor drain (5.41%). The results showed that environmental surface contamination was associated with the clinical cycle threshold values for patients (P = 0.01) and the sampling interval time after the cases left their rooms (P = 0.03). The duration of environmental surface contamination was associated with the wet status of the sampling site (P = 0.01). CONCLUSION: Our findings showed that environmental contamination might be attributed to the viral load in the respiratory tracts of patients and the sampling interval time after the cases left their rooms. Moist surfaces were more vulnerable to remaining SARS-CoV-2 RNA-positive. Our study highlights the importance of implementing strict chemical disinfection strategies in quarantine rooms.

Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy (VRET) for Anxiety Due to Fear of COVID-19 Infection: A Case Series.

Virtual reality exposure therapy (VRET) is becoming popular for treating phobia and anxiety disorder. The recent pandemic of COVID-19 not only causes infection per se but also has an impact on mental health. This case series aimed to explore the role of VRET in the intervention of psychiatric illnesses with chief complaints of fear of COVID-19 infection. In vivo exposure therapy for fear of COVID-19 infection is not possible due to the risk of virus infection; in this scenario, the VRET provides an immersive experience and can act as adjunctive therapy for treating phobias and anxiety disorders arising due to novel coronavirus pandemic. Clinical presentation and findings as well as management and procedures of VRET are discussed. Medical record of three patients (two male and one female) at the Shenzhen Mental Health Center (Shenzhen Kangning Hospital), China, was included in the present case series. Patients were assessed with the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale and Fear of COVID-19 Scale to measure anxiety and fear, respectively. Throughout VRET sessions, we gradually and systematically exposed the patient to virtual COVID-19 scenarios (for example, touching stained door handle which may have viruses, watching pandemic news, watching frontline health care workers, etc.). In our study, VRET intervention significantly reduced the related symptoms caused by fear of COVID-19 infection. Furthermore, virtual reality can provide relevant theoretical and practical support for exploring the remote psychological counseling of patients in isolation wards.

Current Prevention of COVID-19: Natural Products and Herbal Medicine.

Starting from December 2019, novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has caused tremendous economic loss and unprecedented health crisis across the globe. While the development of cure is at full speed, less attention and fewer effort have been spent on the prevention of this rapidly spreading respiratory infectious disease. Although so far, several vaccine candidates have advanced into clinical trials, limited data have been released regarding the vaccine efficacy and safety in human, not mention the long-term effectiveness of those vaccines remain as open question yet. Natural products and herbal medicines have been historically used for acute respiratory infection and generally show acceptable toxicity. The favorable stability for oral formulation and ease of scaling up manufacture make it ideal candidate for prophylactic. Hereby, we summarized the most recent advance in SARS-CoV-2 prevention including vaccine development as well as experimental prophylactics. Mainly, we reviewed the natural products showing inhibitory effect on human coronavirus, and discussed the herbal medicines lately used for COVID-19, especially focused on the herbal products already approved by regulatory agency with identifiable patent number. We demonstrated that to fill in the response gap between appropriate treatment and commercially available vaccine, repurposing natural products and herbal medicines as prophylactic will be a vigorous approach to stop or at least slow down SARS-CoV-2 transmission. In the interest of public health, this will lend health officials better control on the current pandemic.

Air and surface contamination in non-health care settings among 641 environmental specimens of 39 COVID-19 cases.

Little is known about the SARS-CoV-2 contamination of environmental surfaces and air in non-health care settings among COVID-19 cases. We explored the SARS-CoV-2 contamination of environmental surfaces and air by collecting air and swabbing environmental surfaces among 39 COVID-19 cases in Guangzhou, China. The specimens were tested on RT-PCR. The information collected for COVID-19 cases included basic demographic, clinical severity, symptoms at onset, radiological testing, laboratory testing and hospital admission. A total of 641 environmental surfaces and air specimens were collected among 39 COVID-19 cases before disinfection. Among them, 20 specimens (20/641, 3.1%) were tested positive from 9 COVID-19 cases (9/39, 23.1%), with 5 (5/101, 5.0%) positive specimens from 3 asymptomatic cases, 5 (5/220, 2.3%) from 3 mild cases, and 10 (10/374, 2.7%) from 3 moderate cases. All positive specimens were collected within 3 days after diagnosis, and 10 (10/42, 23.8%) were found in toilet (5 on toilet bowl, 4 on sink/faucet/shower, 1 on floor drain), 4 (4/21, 19.0%) in anteroom (2 on water dispenser/cup/bottle, 1 on chair/table, 1 on TV remote), 1 (1/8, 12.5%) in kitchen (1 on dining-table), 1 (1/18, 5.6%) in bedroom (1 on bed/sheet pillow/bedside table), 1 (1/5, 20.0%) in car (1 on steering wheel/seat/handlebar) and 3 (3/20, 21.4%) on door knobs. Air specimens in room (0/10, 0.0%) and car (0/1, 0.0%) were all negative. SARS-CoV-2 was found on environmental surfaces especially in toilet, and may survive for several days. We provided evidence of potential for SARS-CoV-2 transmission through contamination of environmental surfaces.