COVID-19 SCIENCE UPDATES

Smell tests can screen for COVID; Cancer patients need both Pfizer doses

Here is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus.

Smell test might improve COVID-19 screening

A "smell test" might be a better way to screen for the novel coronavirus than checking for cough or fever, a new study suggests.

COVID-19 patients often lose their sense of smell without realizing it, but researchers were able to use simple scratch-and-sniff cards to correctly identify 75% of infected individuals and 95% of people without the disease.

In the study, 163 adults - who were being screened for COVID-19 with gold-standard PCR analysis of nasal swabs - were each given a card with scratch-and-sniff scents that they had to identify from a multiple-choice selection.

"Compared to other symptoms like cough, fever, fatigue, and history of COVID-19 exposure, failing the smell card was the best predictor of COVID-19 positivity," Dr. Mena Said of the University of California, San Diego told Reuters.

Quick smell tests might be a practical way to reduce COVID-19 transmission, he added, if larger studies with more diverse populations confirm these findings, which were reported on Thursday in JAMA Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery.

Good vaccine responses seen in patients with solid tumors

The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine appears to work well in patients receiving cancer treatments, according to a study from Israel.

While there was a "pronounced" lag in antibody production in the cancer patients compared with non-cancer study subjects, most patients caught up after the second dose, researchers reported in JAMA Oncology.

They studied 232 patients with solid tumors receiving various treatments - such as chemotherapy, biological agents, or immunotherapy, or some combination - and 261 healthy people of similar ages.

After the first dose of vaccine, 29% of cancer patients were producing antibodies, compared with 84% of controls.

But after the second dose, cancer patients' rate reached 86%.

Side effects were similar to those in trials of healthy individuals, and none of the cancer patients has developed a case of COVID-19, the researchers said.

They added that cancer patients' second dose should be given according to the schedule recommended by the manufacturer, even in regions where the usual policy is to delay the second dose due to vaccine shortages. -- Reuters