Oxford’s COVID-19 Vaccine Candidate Takes a Big Leap Forward, Showing Success in Early Trials

The foot race to develop the first effective vaccine against COVID-19 involves an awfully crowded field, with 137 candidate vaccines in pre-clinical study worldwide and another 23 actually in development. But a leader seemed to emerge today with research published in the Lancet reporting promising results in a robust study by investigators at Oxford University … Read more

Report: Members of Russia’s ‘Business and Political Elite’ Have Been Receiving Experimental COVID-19 Vaccine

(Bloomberg) — Scores of Russia’s business and political elite have been given early access to an experimental vaccine against COVID-19, according to people familiar with the effort, as the country races to be among the first to develop an inoculation. Top executives at companies including aluminum giant United Co. Rusal, as well as billionaire tycoons … Read more

What the U.S. Can Learn From Other Countries About Reopening Schools in a Coronavirus Pandemic

Countries around the world are wrestling over how to reopen schools, after the coronavirus pandemic led to a closure of 60% of schools across 186 countries and territories, and forced 1.5 billion students to stay home. The question of opening schools is especially fraught in the U.S., where infection rates continue to rise and caseloads … Read more

A Cheap, Common Steroid Called Dexamethasone May Help Patients With Severe COVID-19, Study Says

A paper published Friday in the New England Journal of Medicine suggests a low-cost steroid may be a valuable treatment for severe COVID-19, building upon encouraging preliminary findings from last month. In June, U.K. researchers reported that dexamethasone—a cheap, widely available steroid that can lower inflammation in the body—appeared to reduce by a third the … Read more

COVID-19 Positivity Rates Appear to Be Spiking in Many States That Reopened Bars

Michael Neff sensed what was about to happen. It was late March, and Texas had surpassed 1,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19. He braced as governor Greg Abbott announced that many businesses—including gyms, restaurants and bars—would be prohibited from serving customers indoors. The Cottonmouth Club, his Houston cocktail bar, would have to close. “We were resigned … Read more