Antibodies in the blood of COVID-19 survivors know how to beat coronavirus – and researchers are already testing new treatments that harness them.

A person who has recovered from COVID-19 donates plasma in Shandong, China.
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Ann Sheehy, College of the Holy Cross

Amid the chaos of an epidemic, those who survive a disease like COVID-19 carry within their bodies the secrets of an effective immune response. Virologists like me look to survivors for molecular clues that can provide a blueprint for the design of future treatments or even a vaccine.

A dispatch from the front lines: ‘We don’t talk in terms of supply numbers, we talk in terms of days’

W. Graham Carlos, Indiana University School of Medicine

Brown paper bags line the windowsill of the COVID-19 intensive care unit at Eskenazi Hospital in downtown Indianapolis. The bags are filled with the N95 masks we’re reusing, labeled with the handwritten names of my staff: Patrick, Angela, Brittany. They are mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters.

Protecting nursing home residents will require spending money and improving infection control

Kathryn Hyer, University of South Florida; David Dosa, Brown University, and Lindsay J. Peterson, University of South Florida

At least 11 people have died from COVID-19 in New Orleans nursing homes in the past week, just after the deaths at a Seattle nursing home weeks ago showed the extreme danger of the virus in nursing home settings.

The COVID-19 pandemic has spread to almost every country on Earth. And yet, several American officials refer to it as the “Wuhan virus” or even the “Chinese virus.”

U.S.-Chinese antagonism in this vein is not new. But, while this deliberate move to associate Wuhan, and more generally China, with the COVID pandemic serves a political purpose for the Trump administration, it also has significant implications for civil society and public health.