(2020-03-27). Misinformation and the Coronavirus: On the Dangers of Depoliticization and Social Media. counterpunch.org 
Bill Gates created the coronavirus. China secretly developed it in a lab as a biological weapon. A cure exists and the government controls it, but won't release it to the public. The virus is no more dangerous than the seasonal flu. Coronavirus is a "fake news" hoax manufactured by the news. You can use hand
(2020-03-27). 'Open your STUPIDLY abandoned plant': Trump lashes out at GM & Ford over ventilator delay. rt.com 
President Donald Trump has lost his patience with automakers who promised to produce ventilators to treat Covid-19 patients, threatening to invoke his emergency powers to force General Motors and Ford to live up to their pledge. | "They said they were going to give us 40,000 much needed Ventilators, 'very quickly,'" Trump tweeted on Friday. "Now they are saying it will only be 6000, in late April, and they want top dollar." | He added that it's "always a mess" with GM CEO Mary Barra, and that he will invoke the Defense Production Act, a piece of wartime legislation giving the president the power to order manuf…
(2020-03-27). #PrayForBoris trends after PM Johnson contracts Covid-19, sparking fierce debate on Twitter. rt.com 
In the aftermath of British PM Boris Johnson revealing that he has coronavirus, #PrayForBoris started to trend online, infuriating many who claim less high-profile figures such as NHS workers deserve just as much attention. | Johnson News that the deadly virus had hit at…
(2020-03-27). UK health secretary Hancock follows PM Johnson in testing POSITIVE for Covid-19. rt.com 
The UK's health secretary Matt Hancock has tested positive for coronavirus just hours after Prime Minister Boris Johnson revealed that he is carrying the disease. | In a video posted on Twitter, a nasally Hancock said that he had been working from home in recent days because he was displaying "mild symptoms" of the Covid-19 infection. He said that doctors told him to get tested and the test came back positive so he will be self-isolating until next Thursday. | Following medical advice, I was advised to test for I…
(2020-03-27). How austerity and anti-immigrant politics left Italy exposed to viral blitzkrieg. peoplesworld.org 
As the viral blitzkrieg rolls across one European border after another, it seems to have a particular enmity for Italy. The country's death toll has far surpassed China's, and scenes from its hospitals look like something out of Dante's imagination. Why? Italy has the fourth-largest economy in the European Union, and in terms of health …
(2020-03-27). The Dangers of Depoliticization and Social Media. zcomm.org Misinformation and the Coronavirus…
(2020-03-27). Australian teachers use social media to speak out on coronavirus danger, unions collaboration with government. wsws.org One teacher wrote: "The world is screaming at us to see what happens when governments are too slow to act. Strike now!"
(2020-03-27). Gordon Brown's Call for Global Government to Tackle Coronavirus Pandemic Triggers Twitterarti. sputniknews.com The former UK prime minister urged nations to form the new supergovernment, stating that such a group could coordinate better to tackle the pandemic as well as deal with its economic aftermath.
(2020-03-27). Watch Travis Barker Joins Machine Gun Kelly in #LockDownSessions to Cover Paramore's Misery Business. sputniknews.com As the COVID-19 continues to spread worldwide, with the US becoming the leader in number of cases, American celebrities are isolating themselves to survive the pandemic, and some of them are getting creative.
(2020-03-27). What's Corona-Crazier: Nude Girl Straddling Wall Street Bull or Cleanroom Suit-Dressed Man in NYC? sputniknews.com Everyone goes crazy in their own way. With around 39,000 confirmed cases of novel coronavirus in the state of New York and a state of emergency declared some residents (or visitors?) have found several eye-catching ways to entertain themselves.
(2020-03-27). Cuba slams US for indicting Venezuelan president. yenisafak.com Cuba slammed the U.S. for indicting Venezuela's elected President Nicolas Maduro on alleged narco-terrorism charges on Thursday. "I condemn the #US immoral drug-trafficking accusation against president @NicolasMaduro and #Venezuela, which is based on brazen lies," Cuba's Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said on Twitter, shortly after the indictment.He also criticized the timing of the alleged charges, which came in the middle of a global fight against the coronavirus pandemic."Even in times of #COVID19, the US government proves to be the main threat to peace and tranquility in #OurAmerica," he added.The U.S. offe…
(2020-03-27). British PM Boris Johnson tests positive for coronavirus. yenisafak.com British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced Friday he tested positive for the new coronavirus."Over the last 24 hours I have developed mild symptoms and tested positive for coronavirus," Johnson wrote on Twitter."I am now self-isolating, but I will continue to lead the government's response via video conference as we fight this virus. Together we will beat this," he vowed.On March 23, the prime minister's spokesman said that Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab would be the "designated survivor" if the prime minister fell ill with coronavirus or was otherwise incapacitated.The spokesperson also said: "The prime mini…
(2020-03-27). The Tories' latest coronavirus response is peak hypocrisy. thecanary.co 
The UK government has Coronavirus: more UK government action: | Sky News tweeted on Friday 27 March: | The Government has written to all local authorities in England asking them to house all people sleeping rough,those in hostels and night shelters by the w…
(2020-03-26). Walmart, Amazon, eBay, Facebook, and Craigslist cited for pandemic price gouging. peoplesworld.org 
HARRISBURG, Pa.—Why are we not surprised by this? Thirty-three state Attorneys General from both parties, led by Pennsylvania's Josh Shapiro and including Minnesotan Keith Ellison, Kwame Raoul of Illinois and Maryland's Brian Frosh, are going after five big businesses who let outside sellers use those firms' online platforms for price-gouging consumers harmed or scared by …
(2020-03-26). Bolivia: TSE Gives Possible Date for Presidential Elections. telesurenglish.net Bolivia's Supreme Electoral Tribunal announced a possible date for the next presidential elections. The elections were supposed to be held on May 3, but were postponed due to the threat of Covid-19. | RELATED: | On its official Twitter profile, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal published a statement announcing the date of the elections between Sunday, June 7 and Sunday, September 6, 2020. | According to t…
(2020-03-26). Cuba: FM Denounces US Defamation of Cuban Medical Collaboration. telesurenglish.net Cuba's Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla denounced the claims by the U.S. government about Cuban medical collaboration in the countries affected by Covid-19. | RELATED: | In an official statement, the Cuban government representative stated that Washington's hostility towards his country cannot affect Cuban solidarity with nations in need. | On his official Twitter account, Parrilla denounced the U.S. alle…
(2020-03-25). Our leaders are terrified. Not of the virus, of us! dissidentvoice.org 
You can almost smell the fear-laden sweat oozing from the pores of television broadcasts and social media posts as it finally dawns on our political and media establishments what the coronavirus actually means. And I am not talking about the threat posed to our health. A worldview that has crowded out all other thinking for …
(2020-03-25). 'I'm so happy I can barely speak': Trump responds to Romney's negative coronavirus, gets bashed for 'sarcasm'. rt.com 
President Donald Trump says Senator Mitt Romney not having coronavirus is "really great news," but he followed that up by slamming him as a "RINO" and "terrible presidential candidate." | Romney announced this week he has tested negative for Covid-19 following a move into self-isolation in Utah after he discovered Senator Rand Paul — with whom he'd had recent contact — had tested positive for the disease. | Trump took his usual swipes at his political adversary, though this time in a rather sarcastic fashion. | "This is really great news! I am so happy I can barely speak," the president tweeted in…
(2020-03-25). Is there a doctor in the house? Nevada state medical team that banned malaria drug for coronavirus lacks qualification. rt.com 
Nevada's top health officials lack the qualifications one might expect in leaders making public health recommendations for the US, but that hasn't stopped them from attacking a potential Covid-19 treatment. | Trump's detractors in the Nevada state health department have moved heaven and earth to stop doctors in the state from prescribing two drugs the president deemed promising for treatment of coronavirus, insisting he's not qualified enough for his opinion to outweigh a lack of medical consensus. However, a few Twitter detectives discovered on Wednesday that these "professionals" don't seem to have all the n…
(2020-03-24). Economist Jeffrey Sachs: Trump "Understands Nothing, Listens to Nothing" as Pandemic Surges in U.S. democracynow.org 
As #NotDying4WallStreet trends on Twitter, President Trump defies his top scientists and soaring infection rate, saying he will ease restrictions soon to jumpstart the economy. We speak with economist Jeffrey Sachs about the stimulus package that failed to pass again Monday, as Democrats called the measure a slush fund for corporations. Sachs also led the WHO's Commission on Macroeconomics and Health from 2000 to 2001 and played a key role in conceiving and establishing the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which helped distribute new medicines to fight infectious diseases.
(2020-03-22). Pakistan PM once again asks Trump to lift Iran sanctions. iranian.com Prime Minister of Pakistan who believes that US sanctions against Iran are cruel and unfair has once again called upon Donald Trump to lift economic sanctions from the Islamic Republic. Imran Khan in a tweet on Sunday said the people of Iran are facing untold suffering as sanctions are crippling Iran's efforts to fight COVID19. …
(2020-03-16). [Correspondence] COVID-19: consider cytokine storm syndromes and immunosuppression. thelancet.com As of March 12, 2020, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has been confirmed in 125 048 people worldwide, carrying a mortality of approximately 3 ∑7%,1 compared with a mortality rate of less than 1% from influenza. There is an urgent need for effective treatment. Current focus has been on the development of novel therapeutics, including antivirals and vaccines. Accumulating evidence suggests that a subgroup of patients with severe COVID-19 might have a cytokine storm syndrome. We recommend identification and treatment of hyperinflammation using existing, approved therapies with proven safety profiles to addre…
(2020-02-27). [Comment] COVID-19: combining antiviral and anti-inflammatory treatments. thelancet.com Both coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) are characterised by an overexuberant inflammatory response and, for SARS, viral load is not correlated with the worsening of symptoms.1,2 In our previous Correspondence to The Lancet,3 we described how BenevolentAI's proprietary artificial intelligence (AI)-derived knowledge graph,4 queried by a suite of algorithms, enabled identification of a target and a potential therapeutic against SARS coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; the causative organism in COVID-19).
(2020-02-24). [Correspondence] Viral load of SARS-CoV-2 in clinical samples. thelancet.com An outbreak caused by a novel human coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was first detected in Wuhan in December 2019,1 and has since spread within China and to other countries. Real-time RT-PCR assays are recommended for diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection.2 However, viral dynamics in infected patients are still yet to be fully determined. Here, we report our findings from different types of clinical specimens collected from 82 infected individuals.
(2020-02-24). [Comment] COVID-19 pneumonia: what has CT taught us? thelancet.com In late December, 2019, a cluster of cases of viral pneumonia was linked to a seafood market in Wuhan (Hubei, China), and was later determined to be caused by a novel coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; previously known as 2019-nCoV).1 The genome sequence of SARS-CoV-2 is similar to, but distinct from, those of two other coronaviruses responsible for large-scale outbreaks in the past: severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV; about 79% sequence identity) and Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV; about 50%).
(2020-02-20). [Comment] The burden of viral respiratory infections in young children in low-resource settings. thelancet.com Acute lower respiratory infections (ALRI), encompassing bacterial and viral pneumonias, acute viral bronchiolitis, and bacterial and viral bronchitis, remain the leading cause of global child mortality.1 The thrust of global prevention and treatment efforts has been directed against bacterial causes of ALRI, and deaths from bacterial pneumonia have decreased substantially since 1990 because of improved access to health care and life-saving antibiotics, as well as increased use of vaccines targeted at bacterial respiratory pathogens.
(2020-02-06). [Spotlight] Coronavirus epidemic: preparing for extracorporeal organ support in intensive care. thelancet.com Zoonotic viral infections are more frequently crossing species to infect human populations. In 2003, the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) virus was transmitted to humans from exotic animals in wet markets in China, and in 2015, the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) virus was transmitted from camels in Saudi Arabia. In both cases, and with the 2019 coronavirus outbreak in China, the original host of the virus is likely to be bats.
(2020-02-05). [Correspondence] Nicotine patches with e-cigarettes for smoking cessation: Twitter discussion from a respirology journal club. thelancet.com On Dec 12, 2019, our Twitter-based University of Toronto Respirology and Sleep Journal Club1 discussed Walker and colleagues' pragmatic, randomised, parallel-arm trial designed to look at the effectiveness of combining nicotine patches with an e-cigarette (with and without nicotine) on 6-month smoking abstinence.2 Our discussions highlighted the challenges of studying populations of smokers in general, given the habitual nature of the exposure, challenges related to follow-up, and a need for reliable and valid objective measures of smoking abstinence (appendix).