Retinal Vasculitis Following COVID-19 Vaccination: Causation or Coincidence?

BACKGROUND: With the popularity of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination, some rare ocular adverse events have gradually been reported. This report shows a rare case of retinal vasculitis following COVID-19 vaccination. DESCRIPTION: A 37-year-old male complained of unilateral severe vision loss 13 days after the first dose of an inactivated COVID-19 vaccine. The initial eye examination showed gray-white edema in the macula, and scattered patchy gray-white lesions in the peripheral retina, accompanied by peripheral retinal small vessel occlusion. After glucocorticoid treatment, the gray-white lesions gradually subsided. However, due to the initial severe damage in the fundus, macular and peripheral retinal lesions were significantly atrophied, and the vision recovery was poor. CONCLUSION: The ocular adverse event in this report may be related to the inactivated COVID-19 vaccination, however, it is difficult to rule out the accidental rare adverse events after a large number of vaccinations.

Positive Epstein-Barr virus detection in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients.

The objective of this study was to detect the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) coinfection in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). In this retrospective single-center study, we included 67 COVID-19 patients with onset time within 2 weeks in Renmin Hospital of Wuhan University from January 9 to February 29, 2020. Patients were divided into EBV/SARS-CoV-2 coinfection group and SARS-CoV-2 infection alone group according to the serological results of EBV, and the characteristics differences between the two groups were compared. The median age was 37 years, with 35 (52.2%) females. Among these COVID-19 patients, thirty-seven (55.2%) patients were seropositive for EBV viral capsid antigen (VCA) IgM antibody. EBV/SARS-CoV-2 coinfection patients had a 3.09-fold risk of having a fever symptom than SARS-CoV-2 infection alone patients (95% CI 1.11-8.56; P = 0.03). C-reactive protein (CRP) (P = 0.02) and the aspartate aminotransferase (AST) (P = 0.04) in EBV/SARS-CoV-2 coinfection patients were higher than that in SARS-CoV-2 infection alone patients. EBV/SARS-CoV-2 coinfection patients had a higher portion of corticosteroid use than the SARS-CoV-2 infection alone patients (P = 0.03). We find a high incidence of EBV coinfection in COVID-19 patients. EBV/SARS-CoV-2 coinfection was associated with fever and increased inflammation. EBV reactivation may associated with the severity of COVID-19.

Clinical characteristics of 132 healthcare worker cases with COVID-19: A retrospective study from a single center in Wuhan, China.

Many healthcare workers (HCWs) have been confirmed to be infected with SARS-CoV-2 in China. A retrospective, single-center study was conducted. The median age of the 132 HCWs with COVID-19 was 32 years, with 92 (69.7%) being females. There were 47 (35.6%) doctors, 72 (54.6%) nurses, and 13 (9.9%) other HCWs. Ten of the 132 patients (7.6%) had underlying diseases. The most common symptoms of illness onset were fever (70, 53.0%), cough (66, 50.0%), and fatigue (58, 43.9%). All patients were categorized into mild or moderate COVID-19 type on admission to hospital, and five (3.8%) progressed to the severe COVID-19 type. Sixty-six HCWs patients were included in both the early and later discharged group. In the logistic analysis, the later discharged patients had a longer time for illness onset to hospital admission (per 1 day; OR, 1.10; 95% CI, 1.03-1.18; p = .006), a higher proportion of >3 onset symptoms clustering (OR, 3.11; 95% CI, 1.27-7.62; p = .01), and a higher percentage of other HCWs (OR, 6.20; 95% CI, 1.49-25.80; p = .01). HCW patients were young female nurses with fewer comorbidities, and most were mild or moderate COVID-19 type. The later discharged patients exhibited characteristics of longer time for illness onset to hospitalization and clustering of onset symptoms.