Ricerc@Sapienza

Background: Effective prevention and control strategies are mandatory to prevent SARS-CoV-2 infection. Main text: The Italian Pediatric Respiratory Society promotes a series of new recommendations that should be followed in pulmonary function testing laboratories during the COVID-19 pandemic. Conclusion: Pulmonary function testing should be performed in children with chronic lung disease only if it is needed to guide management and limited to the necessary tests, namely spirometry.

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome – Coronavirus – 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and its related Coronavirus Disease – 19 (COVID-19) has become a health emergency worldwide. The medical community has been concerned since the beginning of the outbreak about the potential impact of COVID-19 in children, especially in those with underlying chronic diseases. Fortunately, COVID-19 has been reported to be less severe in children than in adults. However, epidemiologic and clinical data are scarce.

Novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) became pandemic by the end of March 2020. In contrast to the 2002–2003 SARS-CoV outbreak, which had a higher pathogenicity and lead to higher mortality rates, SARSCoV-2 infection appears to be much more contagious. Moreover, many SARS-CoV-2 infected patients are reported to develop low-titer neutralizing antibody and usually suffer prolonged illness, suggesting a more effective SARS-CoV-2 immune surveillance evasion than SARS-CoV.

Background: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is currently rare in children and they seem to have a milder disease course and better prognosis than adults. However, SARS-Cov-2 pandemic has indirectly caused problems in pediatric medical assistance. In view of this we wanted to draw a picture of what happened during health emergency and analyze future prospects for restarting.

At the beginning of 2020, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) spreads worldwide. Patients with ovarian cancer should be considered at high-risk of developing severe morbidity related to COVID-19. Most of them are diagnosed in advanced stages of disease, and they are fragile. Here, we evaluated the major impact of COVID-19 on patients with ovarian cancer, discussing the effect of the outbreak on medical and surgical treatment.

We read with interest the paper by Giacobbe et al. estimating a cumulative risk of developing at least one bloodstream infection (BSI) episode (largely due to Gram‐positive pathogens) of almost 50% after 30 days at risk in severe COVID‐19 patients. (2) Similarly, Somers et al. reported an increased risk to develop bacterial superinfections, principally represented by Staphylococcus aureus ventilatory associated pneumonia (VAP), in critically ill patients infected with SARS‐CoV‐2 and treated with Tocilizumab.

Background: Mounting evidence suggests SARS-CoV-2 may impact on host microbiota and gut inflammation, infecting intestinal epithelial cells. This possible link and its implications can be investigated by observing the effects of modulation of the microbial flora in patients with COVID-19. The aim of this study was to compare the rate of mortality, the need of ICU hospitalization and the length of hospitalization in patients with severe COVID-19 pneumonia who received the best available therapy (BAT) vs. patients treated with BAT and supplemented with oral bacteriotherapy.

Teicoplanin has a potential antiviral activity expressed against SARS-CoV-2 and was suggested as a complementary option to treat COVID-19 patients. In this multicentric, retrospective, observational research the aim was to evaluate the impact of teicoplanin on the course of COVID-19 in critically ill patients.