2020-04-19

1State Key Laboratory of Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100085 China.;2University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049 China.;Department of Hematology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Shandong First Medical University, Jinan, 250062 China.;Shandong Medicinal Biotechnology Center, Jinan, 250062 China.;5University Creative Research Initiatives Center, Shandong First Medical University & Shandong Academy of Medical Sciences, Jinan, 250062 China.;6Center for Sickle Cell Disease and Department of Medicine, College of Medicine, Howard University, Washington, DC 20059 USA.;1State Key Laboratory of Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100085 China.;2University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049 China.

PURPOSE OF THE REVIEW: The ongoing outbreak of novel coronavirus pneumonia (COVID-19) caused by the 2019 novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) in China is lifting widespread concerns. Thus, therapeutic options are urgently needed, and will be discussed in this review. RECENT FINDINGS: Iron-containing enzymes are required for viruses most likely including coronaviruses (CoVs) to complete their replication process. Moreover, poor prognosis occurred in the conditions of iron overload for patients upon infections of viruses. Thus, limiting iron represents a promising adjuvant strategy in treating viral infection through oral uptake or venous injection of iron chelators, or through the manipulation of the key iron regulators. For example, treatment with iron chelator deferiprone has been shown to prolong the survival of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) patients. Increasing intracellular iron efflux via increasing iron exporter ferroportin expression also exhibits antiviral effect on

2020-04-19

1State Key Laboratory of Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100085 China.;2University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049 China.;Department of Hematology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Shandong First Medical University, Jinan, 250062 China.;Shandong Medicinal Biotechnology Center, Jinan, 250062 China.;5University Creative Research Initiatives Center, Shandong First Medical University & Shandong Academy of Medical Sciences, Jinan, 250062 China.;6Center for Sickle Cell Disease and Department of Medicine, College of Medicine, Howard University, Washington, DC 20059 USA.;1State Key Laboratory of Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100085 China.;2University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049 China.

PURPOSE OF THE REVIEW: The ongoing outbreak of novel coronavirus pneumonia (COVID-19) caused by the 2019 novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) in China is lifting widespread concerns. Thus, therapeutic options are urgently needed, and will be discussed in this review. RECENT FINDINGS: Iron-containing enzymes are required for viruses most likely including coronaviruses (CoVs) to complete their replication process. Moreover, poor prognosis occurred in the conditions of iron overload for patients upon infections of viruses. Thus, limiting iron represents a promising adjuvant strategy in treating viral infection through oral uptake or venous injection of iron chelators, or through the manipulation of the key iron regulators. For example, treatment with iron chelator deferiprone has been shown to prolong the survival of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) patients. Increasing intracellular iron efflux via increasing iron exporter ferroportin expression also exhibits antiviral effect on

2020-03-31

National "111" Center for Cellular Regulation and Molecular Pharmaceutics, Key Laboratory of Industrial Fermentation (Ministry of Education), Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;Institute of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hubei Key Laboratory of Industrial Microbiology, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;National "111" Center for Cellular Regulation and Molecular Pharmaceutics, Key Laboratory of Industrial Fermentation (Ministry of Education), Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;Institute of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hubei Key Laboratory of Industrial Microbiology, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;National "111" Center for Cellular Regulation and Molecular Pharmaceutics, Key Laboratory of Industrial Fermentation (Ministry of Education), Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;Institute of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hubei Key Laboratory of Industrial Microbiology, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.

MOTIVATION: Since December 2019, the newly identified coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 has caused a massive health crisis worldwide and resulted in over 70,000 COVID-19 infections so far. Clinical drugs targeting SARS-CoV-2 are urgently needed to decrease the high fatality rate of confirmed COVID-19 patients. Traditional de novo drug discovery needs more than 10 years, so drug repurposing seems the best option currently to find potential drugs for treating COVID-19. RESULTS: Compared with traditional non-covalent drugs, covalent drugs have attracted escalating attention recent years due to their advantages in potential specificity upon careful design, efficiency, and patient burden. We recently developed a computational protocol named as SCAR for discovering covalent drugs. In this work, we used the SCAR protocol to identify possible covalent drugs (approved or clinically tested) targeting the main protease (3CLpro) of SARS-CoV-2. We identified 11 potential hits, among which at least 6 hits

2020-03-31

National "111" Center for Cellular Regulation and Molecular Pharmaceutics, Key Laboratory of Industrial Fermentation (Ministry of Education), Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;Institute of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hubei Key Laboratory of Industrial Microbiology, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;National "111" Center for Cellular Regulation and Molecular Pharmaceutics, Key Laboratory of Industrial Fermentation (Ministry of Education), Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;Institute of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hubei Key Laboratory of Industrial Microbiology, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;National "111" Center for Cellular Regulation and Molecular Pharmaceutics, Key Laboratory of Industrial Fermentation (Ministry of Education), Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.;Institute of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hubei Key Laboratory of Industrial Microbiology, Hubei University of Technology, Wuhan, China.

MOTIVATION: Since December 2019, the newly identified coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 has caused a massive health crisis worldwide and resulted in over 70,000 COVID-19 infections so far. Clinical drugs targeting SARS-CoV-2 are urgently needed to decrease the high fatality rate of confirmed COVID-19 patients. Traditional de novo drug discovery needs more than 10 years, so drug repurposing seems the best option currently to find potential drugs for treating COVID-19. RESULTS: Compared with traditional non-covalent drugs, covalent drugs have attracted escalating attention recent years due to their advantages in potential specificity upon careful design, efficiency, and patient burden. We recently developed a computational protocol named as SCAR for discovering covalent drugs. In this work, we used the SCAR protocol to identify possible covalent drugs (approved or clinically tested) targeting the main protease (3CLpro) of SARS-CoV-2. We identified 11 potential hits, among which at least 6 hits

2020-04-08

Department of Thoracic Surgery, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, 100020, China.;Department of Thoracic Surgery, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, 100020, China.;Department of Thoracic Surgery, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, 100020, China.;Department of Gastroenterology, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430022, Hubei, China.;Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing Institute of Respiratory Medicine, Beijing Engineering Research Center for Diagnosis and Treatment of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital), Beijing Key Laboratory of Respiratory and Pulmonary Circulation disorders, Beijing, 100020, China.

BACKGROUND: Since 3 months ago, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) broke out in Wuhan, China, and spread rapidly around the world. Severe novel coronavirus pneumonia (NCP) patients have abnormal blood coagulation function, but their venous thromboembolism(VTE) prevalence is still rarely mentioned. OBJECTIVES: To determine the incidence of VTE in patients with severe NCP. METHODS: In this study, 81 severe NCP patients in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of Union Hospital (Wuhan, China) were enrolled. The results of conventional coagulation parameters and lower limb vein ultrasonography of these patients were retrospectively collected and analyzed. RESULTS: The incidence of VTE in these patients was 25%(20/81), of which 8 patients with VTE events died. VTE group was different from non-VTE group in age, lymphocytes counts, activated partial thromboplastin time (APTT), D-dimer, etc. If 1.5 µg/mL was used as the D-dimer cut-off value to predicting VTE, the

2020-04-08

Department of Thoracic Surgery, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, 100020, China.;Department of Thoracic Surgery, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, 100020, China.;Department of Thoracic Surgery, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing, 100020, China.;Department of Gastroenterology, Union Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430022, Hubei, China.;Department of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital, Capital Medical University, Beijing Institute of Respiratory Medicine, Beijing Engineering Research Center for Diagnosis and Treatment of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Beijing Chao-Yang Hospital), Beijing Key Laboratory of Respiratory and Pulmonary Circulation disorders, Beijing, 100020, China.

BACKGROUND: Since 3 months ago, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) broke out in Wuhan, China, and spread rapidly around the world. Severe novel coronavirus pneumonia (NCP) patients have abnormal blood coagulation function, but their venous thromboembolism(VTE) prevalence is still rarely mentioned. OBJECTIVES: To determine the incidence of VTE in patients with severe NCP. METHODS: In this study, 81 severe NCP patients in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of Union Hospital (Wuhan, China) were enrolled. The results of conventional coagulation parameters and lower limb vein ultrasonography of these patients were retrospectively collected and analyzed. RESULTS: The incidence of VTE in these patients was 25%(20/81), of which 8 patients with VTE events died. VTE group was different from non-VTE group in age, lymphocytes counts, activated partial thromboplastin time (APTT), D-dimer, etc. If 1.5 µg/mL was used as the D-dimer cut-off value to predicting VTE, the

2020-03-31

Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Emergency Management Office, Tianjin Health Commission, Tianjin, China.

OBJECTIVE: This study describes the epidemiologic features of an outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Tianjin caused by a novel coronavirus and provides the scientific basis for prevention and control measures. METHODS: Data from COVID-19 cases were collected from daily notifications given to the National Health Commission of the People's Republic of China and Tianjin Health Committee. All of the data were analyzed with SPSS, version 24.0 software (IBM Corp, Armonk, NY). RESULTS: As of February 24, 2020, there have been 135 confirmed cases, 3 deaths, and 87 recoveries in Tianjin, China. The incidence of COVID-19 was 8.65/1 000 000 with a 2.22% case fatality rate. Regarding geographic distribution, the incidence was 8.82 per 1 000 000 in urban areas and 8.00 per 1 000 000 in suburbs. During the early stage of the epidemic, most cases came from urban areas and in patients with a history of sojourning in Hubei Province. The majority of patients were 31-70 years old (75.97%).

2020-03-31

Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Institute of Disaster Medicine, Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.;Emergency Management Office, Tianjin Health Commission, Tianjin, China.

OBJECTIVE: This study describes the epidemiologic features of an outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Tianjin caused by a novel coronavirus and provides the scientific basis for prevention and control measures. METHODS: Data from COVID-19 cases were collected from daily notifications given to the National Health Commission of the People's Republic of China and Tianjin Health Committee. All of the data were analyzed with SPSS, version 24.0 software (IBM Corp, Armonk, NY). RESULTS: As of February 24, 2020, there have been 135 confirmed cases, 3 deaths, and 87 recoveries in Tianjin, China. The incidence of COVID-19 was 8.65/1 000 000 with a 2.22% case fatality rate. Regarding geographic distribution, the incidence was 8.82 per 1 000 000 in urban areas and 8.00 per 1 000 000 in suburbs. During the early stage of the epidemic, most cases came from urban areas and in patients with a history of sojourning in Hubei Province. The majority of patients were 31-70 years old (75.97%).

2020-04-12

Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China. rongzhihui53@163.com.

The aim of this study was to investigate the clinical characteristics of neonates born to SARS-CoV-2 infected mothers and increase the current knowledge on the perinatal consequences of COVID-19. Nineteen neonates were admitted to Tongji Hospital from January 31 to February 29, 2020. Their mothers were clinically diagnosed or laboratory-confirmed with COVID-19. We prospectively collected and analyzed data of mothers and infants. There are 19 neonates included in the research. Among them, 10 mothers were confirmed COVID-19 by positive SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR in throat swab, and 9 mothers were clinically diagnosed with COVID-19. Delivery occurred in an isolation room and neonates were immediately separated from the mothers and isolated for at least 14 days. No fetal distress was found. Gestational age of the neonates was 38.6 ± 1.5 weeks, and average birth weight was 3293 ± 425 g. SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR in throat swab, urine, and feces of all neonates were negative. SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR in breast

2020-04-12

Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China.;Department of Pediatrics, Tongji Hospital, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430030, China. rongzhihui53@163.com.

The aim of this study was to investigate the clinical characteristics of neonates born to SARS-CoV-2 infected mothers and increase the current knowledge on the perinatal consequences of COVID-19. Nineteen neonates were admitted to Tongji Hospital from January 31 to February 29, 2020. Their mothers were clinically diagnosed or laboratory-confirmed with COVID-19. We prospectively collected and analyzed data of mothers and infants. There are 19 neonates included in the research. Among them, 10 mothers were confirmed COVID-19 by positive SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR in throat swab, and 9 mothers were clinically diagnosed with COVID-19. Delivery occurred in an isolation room and neonates were immediately separated from the mothers and isolated for at least 14 days. No fetal distress was found. Gestational age of the neonates was 38.6 ± 1.5 weeks, and average birth weight was 3293 ± 425 g. SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR in throat swab, urine, and feces of all neonates were negative. SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR in breast