Stanford Medicine says it “strongly supports the use of face masks to control the spread of COVID-19.” Yet viral stories falsely claim a “Stanford study” showed that face masks are unsafe and ineffective against COVID-19. The paper is a hypothesis, not a study, from someone with no current affiliation with Stanford. Update: The paper was retracted.
We look at what is known about the rare clotting conditions associated with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, their frequency and the risks of COVID-19.
Tests that detect current infections with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, are known as viral tests. There are two types: a Nucleic Acid Amplification Test, or NAAT, and an antigen test.
Many of the NAATs use a molecular biology technique known as the polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, to detect even a very tiny amount of the virus in a specimen.
The PCR test takes advantage of some natural features of biology to essentially scan through all of the RNA present in a sample — such as a nasal swab — and search for the presence of coronavirus RNA.
The COVID-19 mRNA vaccines authorized for use were found to be safe and effective in clinical trials and real-world conditions. A professor in Ireland baselessly claims in a video circulating on social media that they are not, and that those who get the vaccines will die as a result within several years.
A viral video features a doctor making dubious claims about COVID-19 vaccines and treatments at a forum hosted by Idaho’s lieutenant governor. Dr. Ryan Cole claims mRNA vaccines cause cancer and autoimmune diseases, but the lead author of the paper on which Cole based that claim told us there is no evidence mRNA vaccines cause those ailments.
All of the authorized COVID-19 vaccines are effective at preventing symptomatic disease. Yet Fox News host Tucker Carlson baselessly casts doubt on the effectiveness of the vaccines, because federal officials urge fully vaccinated people to wear masks in public settings.
SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is spread from person to person through respiratory droplets or particles when infected people cough, sneeze, talk or breathe.
Most often, transmission occurs when such droplets or particles are breathed in or land in or on a person’s eyes, nose or mouth. As a result, risk is thought to be highest when people are in close contact with one another, typically within 6 feet or so of an infected person,
The exact origin of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the disease COVID-19, remains unknown. Many scientists think that the virus likely originated in bats and then jumped to humans either directly or indirectly, through contact with an animal. Such zoonotic transfers have happened before with the coronaviruses responsible for SARS and MERS.
A paper published in Science in July 2022 analyzed the available evidence and implicated the wildlife trade and the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan,
There are no cures for COVID-19, but an increasing number of evidence-based treatments have been identified. Some of these have emergency use authorization, rather than full approval, from the Food and Drug Administration.
At the end of December 2021, the FDA authorized for emergency use the first oral antivirals for COVID-19, Pfizer’s Paxlovid and Merck’s molnupiravir. Both drugs are authorized for patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 who are at high risk of severe disease.
Nearly 200 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in the U.S., including 7.2 million doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The CDC and FDA recommended “a pause in the use” of the J&J vaccine “out of an abundance of caution” because of six cases of a rare type of blood clot.