To Write in Unwellness: Documenting A/P/A Voices

In this collectively written essay, we write as volunteers with A/P/A Voices: A COVID-19 Public Memory Project to share and hold space for this archive's stories, images, sounds, and silences. A/P/A Voices first emerged in Spring 2020 when a group of public-facing scholars, activists, and cultural workers converging at the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at NYU recognized the critical need to document the myriad experiences of Asian Americans, Asian immigrants, and Pacific Islanders during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the past year and a half, A/P/A Voices volunteers have conducted over seventy-five oral histories with community organizers, mutual aid workers, healthcare workers, and cultural workers across the country, and over seventy-five artifacts (artwork, videos, other ephemera) have been donated by participants. Through a collective form of writing we describe as dwelling in unwellness, we consider how the A/P/A Voices project and its improvised form of curation—informed by interruption, relational co-laboring, listening, and slowness—is necessitated by prolonged crisis. We ourselves are not outside of the pandemic;rather, as scholars, cultural workers, activists, and caregivers who navigate different levels of precarity, we are entangled within and beyond its folds. Thus, our writing with, rather than about, this project begins with the following questions: How do we connect our experiences of crisis to A/P/A Voices and to one another? How is our work enacted in solidarity with other communities of color devastated by racism and carceral violence, as well as disproportionate economic violence and the uneven effects of an ongoing public health crisis? What does it mean to engage a memory project from a place of unwellness?

Vitamin D in defense against the terrorism of coronavirus disease 2019: A meta-analysis

Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic was also spread during winter time in December from Wuhan the city of China to worldwide. Various studies conducted throughout the world have indicated the possible relationship between Vitamin D and COVID-19 infection. Aim: This narrative review is designed to support Vitamin D role and its efficacy in managing COVID-19 menace. Materials and Methods: Latest 50 articles for Vitamin D, and COVID-19 relationship and management were scrutinized to summarize this article from data bases of PubMed and Google scholar in English language. Diagrams were created by biorender.com to summarize pictorial relations. Conclusions: Higher mortality is associated with countries of high-level Vitamin D deficiencies. Many studies have found a significant relation between Vitamin D deficiency and COVID-19 complications and related comorbidities. It is highly supported by many literature to recommend daily dose of Vitamin D3 10,000 IU/day for a few weeks to rapidly increase 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels above 40–60 ng/mL, in population at higher risk.

Immunomodulator Vitamin C: An Adjuvant Therapy in Second Wave of Coronavirus Disease 2019

Since its sudden outbreak in December 2019 in Wuhan, A pandemic of SARS-CoV-2 has been announced. Vitamin C is a water-soluble vitamin with anti-oxidant and immunity-boosting properties. Vitamin C acts as a nutritional supplement profoundly impacting the immune response to the second or third wave of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Vitamin C efficacy as an adjuvant treatment for inflammation and symptoms associated with COVID-19 infection should be investigated further. This report sheds light on the available information on the current clinical trials and pharmacotherapy related to COVID-19. Information available on Pubmed, EMBASE, Scopus, Web of Science databases and EU clinical trials regarding the use of therapeutic agents in patients with COVID-19 was used to perform analysis. Data was taken from 18 clinical trials available in the U.S. National Library of Medicine. All trials that are active, completed, or in the process of recruiting are included in data. Because of majority of clinical trials are still ongoing, specific results and high-quality clinical evidence are lacking. Before being standardised for use, the protocol must undergo large randomised clinical studies using a variety of existing medications and potential therapies. The pivotal role played by vitamins C in maintaining our immune system, is quite apparent. This review is an attempt to summarize the available information regarding the use of vitamin C as an adjuvant therapy in COVID-19 patients.

Prevalence of oral manifestations in COVID-19: A systematic review.

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a novel disease caused by a newly identified virus Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causing diverse systemic manifestations. The oral cavity too is not spared and the symptoms appear either independently, concurrently, or sequentially. In view of the rising documented cases of oral lesions of COVID-19, this systematic review aims to assess the prevalence of oral manifestations in COVID-19 confirmed individuals. An extensive literature search was conducted in databases like Scopus, Pubmed/Medline, Livivo, Lilacs and Google Scholar and varied oral signs and symptoms were reported as per the PRISMA guidelines. Studies published in English language literature only were included and were subjected to the risk of bias using the Joana Briggs Institute Appraisal tools for prevalence studies, case series and case reports. In a two-phase selection, 34 studies were included: 21 observational, 3 case-series and 10 case reports. These observational studies included approximately 14,003 patients from 10 countries. In this review, we explored the most commonly encountered oral and dental manifestations in COVID-19 and identified that loss of taste acuity, xerostomia and anosmia were frequently reported. Elevated incidence of opportunistic infections like mucormycosis and aspergillosis were reported during the treatment due to prolonged intake of steroids. Immunosuppression and poor oral hygiene led to secondary manifestations like enanthematous lesions. However, it is not clear that oral signs and symptoms are due to COVID-19 infection itself or are the result of extensive treatment regimen followed [PROSPERO CRD42021258264].

Merchandise and Service Trade Deviations During COVID-19: A Performance Comparison Between India and China

The current study compares trade performance between India and China during COVID period (January?December 2020). The merchandise trade and commercial service exports and imports from both countries were obtained from the official World Trade Organization website to compare the output (deviation of actual from projected during COVID-19) of India and China?s foreign trade with the rest of the world. The present study employs models of autoregressive integrated moving average using a three-step model creation process. As per the results obtained, we can conclude that India is behind China in achieving the amount of merchandise exports and imports in relation to the output of its previous years, while China?s variance between expected and real is relatively lower. When comparing service exports and imports, it can be found that the gap between service exports is not much, but in the case of service imports, China?s deviation from India is much greater.

Engineering human ACE2 to optimize binding to the spike protein of SARS coronavirus 2.

The spike (S) protein of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) binds angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) on host cells to initiate entry, and soluble ACE2 is a therapeutic candidate that neutralizes infection by acting as a decoy. By using deep mutagenesis, mutations in ACE2 that increase S binding are found across the interaction surface, in the asparagine 90-glycosylation motif and at buried sites. The mutational landscape provides a blueprint for understanding the specificity of the interaction between ACE2 and S and for engineering high-affinity decoy receptors. Combining mutations gives ACE2 variants with affinities that rival those of monoclonal antibodies. A stable dimeric variant shows potent SARS-CoV-2 and -1 neutralization in vitro. The engineered receptor is catalytically active, and its close similarity with the native receptor may limit the potential for viral escape.

Management Strategies for Cancer Patients in the Time of COVID-19 Pandemic.

Coronavirus disease 2019 commonly designated as COVID-19 has been declared by World health Organisation (WHO) as a pandemic on 11 March 2020. 'Lock down' is found to be the only effective method to control this outbreak and due to the contagious nature of this disease most of the hospitals have stopped elective interventions. Cancer is a second leading cause of death globally and the bystander victims in this scenario are the patients with suspected and proven cancer. Head and neck cancer has a survival rate of 40% to 50% after definitive therapy and the delay in treatment for even 1-2 months may lead to inoperability and poorer outcomes. On contacting the colleagues in different countries, it was found that different strategies have been adapted to prioritize cancer patients. Hence, such type of measures appropriately amended can be implemented as soon as possible to avoid harm to cancer patients.