Travel medicine and infectious disease
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Travel Med Infect Dis · Jan 2021
Meta AnalysisEfficacy and safety of tafenoquine for malaria chemoprophylaxis (1998-2020): A systematic review and meta-analysis.
In 2018, tafenoquine was approved for malaria chemoprophylaxis. We evaluated all available data on the safety and efficacy of tafenoquine chemoprophylaxis. ⋯ This systematic review and meta-analysis of trials of G6PD-normal adults show that weekly tafenoquine 200 mg is well tolerated and effective as malaria chemoprophylaxis focusing primarily on Plasmodium falciparum but also on Plasmodium vivax. Our safety analysis is limited by heterogenous methods of adverse events reporting. Further research is indicated on the use of tafenoquine in diverse traveller populations.
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Travel Med Infect Dis · Nov 2020
ReviewSaliva as a possible tool for the SARS-CoV-2 detection: A review.
Salivary tests for the new coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) diagnosis have been suggested as alternative methods for the nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal tests. ⋯ Salivary samples show great potential in SARS-CoV-2 detection and may be recommended as a simple and non-invasive alternative.
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Travel Med Infect Dis · Sep 2020
ReviewAn update on SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 with particular reference to its clinical pathology, pathogenesis, immunopathology and mitigation strategies.
Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), emerged in early December 2019 in China and became a pandemic situation worldwide by its rapid spread to more than 200 countries or territories. Bats are considered as the reservoir host, and the search of a probable intermediate host is still going on. The severe form of the infection is associated with death is mainly reported in older and immune-compromised patients with pre-existing disease history. ⋯ Rapid diagnostics have been developed, and significant efforts are being made to develop effective vaccines and therapeutics. In the absence of any virus-specific therapy, internationally, health care authorities are recommending the adoption of effective community mitigation measures to counter and contain this pandemic virus. This paper is an overview of this virus and the disease with a particular focus on SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 clinical pathology, pathogenesis, and immunopathology, along with recent research developments.
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Travel Med Infect Dis · Sep 2020
ReviewSARS-CoV-2 jumping the species barrier: Zoonotic lessons from SARS, MERS and recent advances to combat this pandemic virus.
Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by SARS-CoV-2 (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome - Coronavirus-2) of the family Coronaviridae, appeared in China in December 2019. This disease was declared as posing Public Health International Emergency by World Health Organization on January 30, 2020, attained the status of a very high-risk category on February 29, and now having a pandemic status (March 11). COVID-19 has presently spread to more than 215 countries/territories while killing nearly 0.75 million humans out of cumulative confirmed infected asymptomatic or symptomatic cases accounting to almost 20.5 million as of August 12, 2020, within a short period of just a few months. ⋯ Few of the studies have shown the potential of the animal-human interface and zoonotic links in the origin of SARS-CoV-2. Exploring the possible zoonosis and revealing the factors responsible for its initial transmission from animals to humans will pave ways to design and implement effective preventive and control strategies to counter the COVID-19. The present review presents a comprehensive overview of COVID-19 and SARS-CoV-2, with emphasis on the role of animals and their jumping the cross-species barriers, experiences learned from SARS- and MERS-CoVs, zoonotic links, and spillover events, transmission to humans and rapid spread, and highlights the new advances in diagnosis, vaccine and therapies, preventive and control measures, one health concept along with recent research developments to counter this pandemic disease.
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Travel Med Infect Dis · May 2020
ReviewTherapeutic use of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine in COVID-19 and other viral infections: A narrative review.
The rapidly spreading Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2), represents an unprecedented serious challenge to the global public health community. The extremely rapid international spread of the disease with significant morbidity and mortality made finding possible therapeutic interventions a global priority. While approved specific antiviral drugs against SARS-CoV-2 are still lacking, a large number of existing drugs are being explored as a possible treatment for COVID-19 infected patients. ⋯ Both CQ and HCQ demonstrated promising in vitro results, however, such data have not yet been translated into meaningful in vivo studies. While few clinical trials have suggested some beneficial effects of CQ and HCQ in COVID-19 patients, most of the reported data are still preliminary. Given the current uncertainty, it is worth being mindful of the potential risks and strictly rationalise the use of these drugs in COVID-19 patients until further high quality randomized clinical trials are available to clarify their role in the treatment or prevention of COVID-19.