Correlation between laboratory findings and clinical severity among the COVID-19 patients in the tertiary care centre

Background: Coronavirus is a highly infectious novel virus we are in urge to know more about their clinical characteristics and laboratory findings for the characterization and selection of treatment protocol. Methods: Prospective, single centre study. Two months data was collected, clinical characteristics data from patient case sheet and the laboratoryvalues from the Hospital Information System (HIS) for the month of July and August 2020. Results: Of 462 patients, 55 (11.9%) are falls under asymptomatic category, 194 (42%) are in mild category, 167 (36.1%) are in moderate category and 46 (10%) in severe category. Fever 230 (49.8%) and cough 211 (45.7%) was most common clinical symptom with p value < 0.01. Non-severe vs severe, 340 (73.6%) and 201 (43.5%) showed decreased in eosinophil count and absolute eosinophil count, 125 (27.1%) and 80 (17.3%) patient showed decrease in lymphocyte count and absolute lymphocyte count, 200 (43.3%) showed increase in neutrophil count with a significance of p value >0.05.186 (40.3%) patients had one or more co-morbidities. Laboratory findings between Asymptomatic VS symptomatic, showed significance changes in neutrophil, lymphocyte, Aspartate aminotransferase, Alkaline phosphatase, globulin values (p value <0.05). Conclusion: Clinical severity categorization at the time of admission was very helpful for the treating doctors in proper understanding of disease progression and appropriate treatment of the patient. Presence of co-morbidity, abnormal laboratory values, old age group patients, higher Computed Tomography score, higher mortality rate are seen more in patients who were in clinical severity grade severe category than in non-severe category patients.

The impacts of COVID-19 lockdown on wildlife in Deccan Plateau, India.

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic brought unprecedented changes in human activity via extensive lockdowns worldwide. Large-scale shifts in human activities bestowed both positive and negative impacts on wildlife. Unforeseen reduction in the activities of people allowed wildlife to venture outside of forested areas to exploit newfound habitats and increase their diurnal activities. While on a negative note, a reduction in forest-related law enforcement led to substantial increase in illegal activities such as poaching. We conducted mammal surveys in forested and nearby farmland of a fragmented landscape under two distinct scenarios: pre-lockdown and lockdown. An increase in poaching activities observed during the lockdown period in our study area provided us an opportunity to investigate the impact of the lockdown on wildlife. Camera trapping data of four highly poached mammalian species, namely black-naped hare Lepus nigricollis, wild pig Sus scrofa, four-horned antelope Tetracerus quadricornis and leopard Panthera pardus were considered to investigate activity patterns and habitat use, to understand the effect of lockdown. The pre-lockdown period was used as a baseline to compare any changes in trends of activity patterns, habitat use and detection probabilities of targeted species. Species-specific changes in activity patterns of study species were observed, with an increment in daytime activity during lockdown. The results showed species-specific increase in the habitat use of study species during lockdown. Reduction in the detection probability of all study species was witnessed. This is the first study to highlight the effect of the COVID-19 lockdown on the responses of wildlife by considering the changes in their temporal and spatial use before and during lockdown. The knowledge gained on wildlife during reduced human mobility because of the pandemic aid in understanding the effect of human disturbances and developing future conservation strategies in the shared space, to manage both wildlife and humans.

Can mandated BCG vaccine promote herd immunity against novel coro-navirus? A potential solution at hand to tackle covid-19 pandemic

The 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) infection is an emerging pandemic that poses a severe threat to global public health. This pandemic started from the Wuhan City of Hubei Province in China, and is speculated to have originated from bats and spread among humans with an unknown intermediate transmitter. The virus binds to angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2), which is abundantly expressed on various human cells, including lung epithelial and intestinal cells, thereby entering into these cells and causing infection. It is transmitted to other humans through airborne droplets from infected patients. Presently there are no specific treatments or vaccines that are available to curtail the spread of this disease. There are few indirect reports that explain the potential importance of the mandated BCG vaccine as a protective factor against COVID-19. There is a speculation that a live attenuated vaccine (BCG vaccine) can be beneficial against COVID-19 to develop the initial immune response, and can also spread in the community, thereby boosting herd immunity to fight against COVID-19. This review summarizes the conclu-sions of various reports on the BCG vaccine, and is an attempt to establish BCG-vaccination mediated herd immunity as an effective instant intermediate approach in curbing COVID-19 spread in highly populous countries. © 2020 Bentham Science Publishers.