Surveillance surveys give clearer picture of COVID’s spread

Door-to-door surveillance surveys can provide more precise estimates of how many people are infected with COVID-19 or have immunity to COVID-19 at any given point in time than relying on self-reporting and self-testing, a Cornell-led research group has found.

Pandemic linked to 14% increase in underweight children in India

Malnutrition of Indian children rose dramatically during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new research from the Tata-Cornell Institute for Agriculture and Nutrition.

SARS-CoV-2 can infect dopamine neurons, causing senescence

Further research may shed light on the neurological symptoms associated with long COVID, such as brain fog, lethargy and depression.

Mice without immune cells show no SARS-CoV-2 symptoms

The inflammatory response from adaptive immune cells – such as B and T lymphocytes – clears the body of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, but at the same time, it also causes the characteristic symptoms of COVID-19, a new study finds.

Contagious omicron strain replicates early in infection

New research used engineered mice to compare SARS-COV-2 omicron subvariants, and found one of them, BA.5, was more virulent likely due to its ability to rapidly replicate early during infection.

Severe COVID-19 can alter long-term immune response

Severe COVID-19 infection triggers changes that affect gene expression in immune system stem cells, causing alterations in the body’s immune response, according to a new study by Weill Cornell Medicine and Jackson Laboratory investigators.

COVID boosters show value for those pregnant or trying to conceive

Pregnant women who had a previous COVID-19 infection and received full vaccination and a booster have the strongest immune protection from the disease – and pass that protection along to their unborn babies, according to a new study.

Pandemic resulted in ‘load imbalance’ among hospitals

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many U.S. hospitals had overcapacity intensive care units while other area hospitals had open ICU beds available, a phenomenon known as “load imbalance.”

Long COVID risk and symptoms vary across populations

A new study led by Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian investigators has found that the risk of long COVID and its symptoms present very differently across diverse populations and suggests that further investigation is needed to accurately define the disease and improve diagnosis and treatment.