The moon, as viewed from Queens Borough Hall, the seat of the borough’s president
Good afternoon. This is Jonathan Spira, director of research at the Center for Long Covid Research, reporting. Here now the news of the pandemic from across the globe on its 1,484th day
In news we cover today, a new study found that SARS-CoV-2 causes an increased risk of allergic diseases, Moderna lost a key ruling in patent case relating to mRNA technology, and Covid-induced ARDS can result in heart damage.
TODAY IN COVID HISTORY
On April 3, 2020, the Federal Emergency Management Agency committed $1.1 billion in federal support to New York state. “Total medical supplies and equipment provided to New York include 1,096,922 N95 respirators, 1,836,891 surgical masks, 365,295 face shields, 219,811 surgical gowns, 8,059 coveralls, 1,435,129 gloves, and 4,400 ventilators,” the agency said in a statement.
In Maine, Governor Janet Mills issued an executive order today mandating that travelers coming into Maine, regardless of their state of residency, self-quarantine for 14 days and the United States Tennis Association that it might not be the time for people to be playing tennis, “It is in the best interest of society to take a collective pause from playing the sport we love,” the group said.
Then President Donald Trump was criticized in the media for having said that anti-malaria drugs that were being tested as potential treatments were “having some good results,” even though public health officials said that the results of such tests were several months away.
Trump also announced updated mask guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that people use “non-medical cloth-based face coverings,” but, when asked if he would mask, Trump, who would later in the year come very close to dying from Covid, replied, “I don’t think I’m going to be doing it.”
Finally, as of this date, there were at least 273,880 SARS-CoV-2 cases in the United States and 7,077 people had died from the virus. The increase of 1,094 deaths that day was the most coronavirus deaths in a single day since the start of the pandemic.
LONG COVID
A new study published in Nature Communications examined the association of SARS-CoV-2 with immunologic phenomena that may cause allergic conditions of various kinds. Such conditions are, in some cases, known to be symptoms of Long Covid.
The multi-national study included some 150,000 participants from South Korea, 77,000 from the United Kingdom, and 542,000 from Japan who had been infected with SARS-CoV-2. After adjusting for all known variables that could affect the study’s outcome, the researcher team, led by three scientists from the Medical Science Research Institute at the Kyung Hee University College of Medicine, discovered that individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 showed a 20% higher occurrence of allergic diseases compared to those not infected.
UNITED STATES
In a courtroom in Philadelphia, U.S. District Judge Mitchell Goldberg of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania issued an order that strengthened Arbutus’ arguments in a patent infringement lawsuit related to Moderna’s mRNA coronavirus vaccines.
Goldberg ruled in favor of Arbutus on 3 of 4 patent claims, although that does not settle the case. A trial is currently set to begin in April 2025.
Arbutus said it had developed the lipid nanoparticles that enclose the vaccine’s mRNA payload. The related patents were licensed to Genevant Sciences, a joint venture between Arbutus and Roivant Sciences.
To function in vivo, mRNA requires safe, effective and stable delivery systems that protect the nucleic acid from degradation and that allow cellular uptake and mRNA release and that is where the lipid nanoparticles come in as they are used to deliver RNA to target cells.
While it is known that SARS-CoV-2 can trigger acute respiratory distress syndrome, a condition in which fluid leaks into the lungs and prevents oxygen from passing into the body, it was not known if this would then contribute to heart damage.
A team of researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital examined heart tissue specimens from 21 people who died with SARS-CoV-2-associated ARDS as well as specimens from 33 people who died from non-COVID-19 causes prior to the pandemic. They found that the patients with Covid had more macrophages than tissue from the control group and their findings suggest that SARS-CoV-2 increases the inflammatory share of macrophages in the heart, leading to heart damage. It also suggests that dialing back the body’s immune response might be an effective treatment as might the targeting pro-inflammatory heart macrophages.
GLOBAL STATISTICS
Now here are the daily statistics for Wednesday, April 3.
As of Wednesday, at press time, the world has recorded 704.62 million Covid-19 cases, an increase of 0.01 million in the last 24 hours, and 7.01 million deaths, according to Worldometer, a service that tracks such information. In addition, 675.45 million people worldwide have recovered from the virus, an increase of 0.02 million in the same period.
The reader should note that infrequent reporting from some sources may appear as spikes in new case figures or death tolls as well as the occasional downward or upward adjustment as corrections to case figures warrant.
Worldwide, the number of active coronavirus cases as of Wednesday at press time is 22,160,640, an increase of 3,000 in the past 24 hours. Out of that figure, 99.8%, or 22,125,704, are considered mild, and 0.2%, or 34,936, are listed as critical. The percentage of cases considered critical has not changed over the past 19 months.
Since the start of the pandemic, the United States has, as of Wednesday, recorded 111.78 million cases, a higher figure than any other country, and a death toll of 1.22 million. India has the world’s second highest number of officially recorded cases, 45.03 million, and the world’s fourth highest death toll, 533,547.
The newest data from Russia’s Rosstat state statistics service showed that, at the end of July 2022, the number of Covid or Covid-related deaths since the start of the pandemic there in April 2020 is now 823,623, giving the country the world’s second highest pandemic-related death toll, behind the United States. Rosstat last reported that 3,284 people died from the coronavirus or related causes in July 2022, down from 5,023 in June, 7,008 in May and 11,583 in April.
Meanwhile, France is the country with the third highest number of cases, with 40.14 million, and Germany is in the number four slot, with 38.83 million total cases.
Brazil, which has recorded the third highest number of deaths as a result of the virus, 711,249, has recorded 38.73 million cases, placing it in the number five slot.
The other five countries with total case figures over the 20 million mark are South Korea, with 34.57 million cases, as number six; Japan, with 33.8 million cases placing it in the number seven slot; and Italy, with 26.72 million, as number eight, as well as the United Kingdom, with 24.91 million, and Russia, with 24.1 million, as nine and ten respectively.
CURRENT U.S. COVID STATISTICS AT A GLANCE
In the United States, in the week ending March 16, 2024, the test positivity rate was, based on data released on March 22 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was 4.0%, and the trend in test positivity is -0.6% in the most recent week. Meanwhile, the percentage of emergency department visits that were diagnosed as SARS-CoV-2 was 0.6%, and the trend in emergency department visits is -21.1%.
The number of people admitted to hospital in the United States due to SARS-CoV-2 in the same 7-day period was 9,345, a figure that is down 13.9% over the past 7-day period. Meanwhile, the percentage of deaths due to SARS-CoV-2 was 1.5%, a figure that is down 16.7% in the same period.
VACCINATION SPOTLIGHT
Some 70.6% of the world population has received at least one dose of coronavirus vaccine by Wednesday, according to Our World in Data, an online scientific publication that tracks such information. So far, 13.57 billion doses of the vaccine have been administered on a global basis and 10,587 doses are now administered each day.
Meanwhile, only 32.7% of people in low-income countries have received one dose, while in countries such as Canada, China, Denmark, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, at least 75% of the population has received at least one dose of vaccine.
Only a handful of the world’s poorest countries – Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia and Nepal – have reached the 70% mark in vaccinations. Many countries, however, are under 20% and, in countries such as Haiti, Senegal, and Tanzania, for example, vaccination rates remain at or below 10%.
In addition, with the beginning of vaccinations in North Korea in late September, 2023, Eritrea remains the only country in the world that has not administered vaccines in any significant number.
Finally, as of March 31, 2024 , only the following countries and territories have not reported any cases of SARS-CoV-2 infections whatsoever:
Antarctica
British Antarctic Territory
Peter Island
Overseas
Bouvet Island
Heard Island and McDonald Islands
Prince Edward Islands
South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands
Anna Breuer contributed reporting to this story.
The Coronavirus Daily News Brief is a publication of the Center for Long Covid Research. www.longcov.org
If you have Long Covid and need to talk to someone, call the Long Covid Patient Peer Counseling Phone Line, or HOPELINE. The HOPELINE is our free, confidential support and information service.
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