Contagion Live News Network: Coronavirus Updates for April 2, 2020

Welcome to the Contagion Live News Network, I’m Michaela Fleming and this is the coronavirus update for Thursday April 2^nd.

Over the past 27 days, more than 900,000 cases of the virus have been identified. Across the globe over 200,000 people have recovered from their illness and more than 50,000 have died.

Cases are at their highest in the United States where more than 200,000 cases have been confirmed. The hardest hit areas in New York with more than 85,000 cases and New Jersey with more than 22,000 cases. These 2 states account for nearly half of the total cases in the United States.

In Europe, Italy and Spain are the hardest hit by the virus. Both countries have each recorded more than 100,000 cases of COVID-19.

Today on Contagion®, we posted several new articles on COVID-19. In the Acute Infections section of our April issue we featured an interview with Dr. Christina Tan, state epidemiologist and assistant commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Health. Dr. Tan highlights the epidemiology of the novel virus and also discusses contagiousness, disease surveillance, and warning signs and symptoms.

New articles on Contagion® also cover the latest information from the CDC’s Coronavirus Response Team featuring preliminary data on the risk of severe COVID-19 disease in patients with underlying health conditions including chronic lung disease and cardiovascular disease.

Be sure to check out our coverage of a paper published today in EBioMedicine which concluded that the investigational COVID-19 vaccine, PittCoVacc produced antibodies that may offer sufficient protection against SARS-CoV-2 in mouse models. The study investigators are now working with the US Food and Drug Administration and hope to launch a phase 1 human clinician trial in the coming months.

For other stories relevant to COVID-19 and the latest infectious disease news, visit ContagionLive.com. To track the spread of the pandemic in the United States and abroad, be sure to use the Contagion® Outbreak Monitor.

For the Contagion Live News Network, I’m Michaela Fleming, thanks for tuning in.