Two off-the-beaten-path research papers on the coronavirus, with interesting results

There have been a flood of research papers released in the last few days related to coronavirus as the world’s researchers try to understand where this virus came from and what it does.  Much of the work is either clinical to understand how to properly diagnose and treat patients, or epidemiological to understand (and hopefully control) how it spreads.  But there are many other research teams exploring other aspects of the coronavirus; here are two such examples, with interesting results. One looks at whether there is reason to believe that at least some COVID patients lose their sense of smell; …

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New coronavirus research sheds light on outcomes for patients, effectiveness of efforts to slow spread

Over the weekend, a research group led by a team at Imperial College in the UK published a paper looking at the effectiveness of various efforts taken by governments to stem the spread of the COVID-19 outbreak. It has been credited with convincing UK and US government officials to get serious about moving quickly and decisively — but it also points to the rough road ahead of us.

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What we know now about the coronavirus, and the response

A lot has happened in the six weeks since I first posted on the Wuhan coronavirus, now called COVID-19. In mid-January there were a handful of cases, not a lot of data, and almost no cases outside of one province in China.  All three of those situations have changed somewhat, and with several confirmed cases and (as of this writing) six deaths in Washington state, it’s worth pausing for a moment and taking a hard look at what we know now.

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