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The Best of the Coronavirus Blog This Week
Welcome to the fall surge
The latest vaccine news. This week, Johnson & Johnson and Novavax’s Covid-19 vaccine candidates advanced to the final stages of clinical trials, which brings the number of vaccines in phase 3 trials to 11. Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine may have an advantage over its competitors because it could need only one shot instead of two and doesn’t have to be kept frozen. Read more news from the vaccine race below.
What underlies a severe Covid-19 infection? In two new studies published in the journal Science, research identifies potential immune system weaknesses that may affect how a person’s Covid-19 infection plays out. A notable portion of people who develop severe symptoms have “misguided” antibodies that attack a person’s immune system instead of the virus. Among the people studied, this abnormal immune response occurred much more often in men (which might offer some explanation as to why more men die from Covid-19 than women). There are other important findings too, and you can read about them below.
