Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have shown that patients with acute COVID-19 infection have increased levels of the cytokine IL-26 in their blood. Moreover, high IL-26 levels correlate with an exaggerated inflammatory response that signifies severe cases of the disease. The findings, which are presented in Frontiers in Immunology, indicate that IL-26 is a potential biomarker for severe COVID-19.
The latest WHO report updated up to 30 October 2022 has data categorized by influenza transmission zones, i.e., countries/regions with similar influenza transmission patterns.
In a recent study published in the journal npj Vaccines, researchers in China designed, produced, and evaluated the neutralization efficacy of a recombinant coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine containing four hot-spot substitution mutations based on a prefusion-stabilized severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) spike protein (S) trimer.