A Critical Analysis of Some Recent Medical Research in Science on COVID-19

The highly infectious and rapidly mutating SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes the COVID-19 disease is confronting the international community with few palatable options. The research output on COVID-19 has been revolutionary, especially in the medical and biomedical sciences, where the search for a vaccine is essential for the world to have a semblance of normality in a COVID-19 normal world. Much of the advanced research has been distributed in the leading medical journals, where the latest medical research is distributed on a daily basis. The Science journals also have a new section on "Coronavirus: Research, Commentary, and News" that strives "to provide the best and most timely research, analysis, and news coverage of COVID-19 and the coronavirus that causes it. All content is free to access." The purpose of this paper is to provide a critique of 124 interesting and highly topical research papers that have been published on general medicine, translational medicine, immunology, and robotics in Science. The diverse topics include the effectiveness of vaccines against mutations, establishing trust is hard work, distrust is easy, transmission of COVID-19 between mink and humans, the war against COVID-19 deniers, SARS-CoV-2 is already endemic, COVID-19 efficacy, safety is essential for any vaccine for SARS-CoV-2, aerosol transmission of SARS-CoV-2, pre-existing immunity to COVID-19 de novo mutations, and frequency and duration of COVID-19 reinfection, SARS-CoV-2 transmission between mink and humans, further known unknowns about T cell immunity to COVID-19, modeling confusion to clarity in a COVID-19 world, determining serological correlates of COVID-19 severity, what came first, effective COVID-19 vaccines or trial ethics?, safety et al. requirements for COVID-19 vaccines, controlling transmission heterogeneities and controllability of SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, transmission dynamics for a seemingly never ending COVID-19 pandemic, susceptibility to and long hauler effects from severe COVID-19, attack rates of COVID-19 in the Brazilian Amazon, humoral immunity to severe COVID-19, phylogenetic analysis of COVID-19 superspreading events, seasonal flu versus seasonal COVID-19, controlling the spread of COVID-19, antibody responses to severe COVID-19, direct and indirect COVID-19 effects on the heart, government interventions against COVID-19, COVID-19 vaccines should be celebrated with, by and for all, countering the division on COVID-19 and mutated strains, encompassing tests for COVID-19, positive messages give hope, even in a COVID-19 world, how safe, effective, durable, and affordable are warp speed COVID-19 vaccines?, correlations of severe COVID-19 viral responses, known and unknown long haul effects from COVID-19, how should approved COVID-19 vaccines be distributed globally?, anaphylactic reactions to Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine, open access is excellent, but who should pay, especially during COVID-19?, fast spreading COVID-19 mutations, the reality of COVID-19 in Africa, how does COVID-19 affect cancer and its treatment in Africa?, duration of immune memory to COVID-19, COVID-19 mutations and vaccinations, COVID-19 lineage dynamics, mutations, and vaccines, COVID-19, immunity, and endemicity, and T cells, immune systems, aging hosts in a COVID-19 world, social robots assisting humans in the COVID-19 era, herd Immunity against COVID-19 through infection or vaccination, cross-reactive immunity to zoonotic diseases like COVID-19, and multivalent nanobodies, neutralization, suppression of COVID-19 escape mutants, public debate about science is essential in a COVID-19 world, scientific reporting on COVID-19 in China, circadian rhythms and social jet lag in COVID-19, COVID-19 social control measures should have been implemented years ago, tackling student mental healthcare, especially during COVID-19, modelling prioritized COVID-19 vaccine strategies, optimal vaccination strategies for COVID-19, COVID-19 spillovers between species, comovements in science and policy during COVID-19, mathematical and statistical models to guide informed COVID-19 responses, preclinical efficacy and targeting of SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, engineering potent antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, viral mutants escaping antibodies for treating COVID-19, can China help to alleviate bilateral debt payments during COVID-19?, pricing allowances to mitigate carbon dioxide emissions during COVID-19, sequencing SARS-CoV-2 RNA genomes to mitigate COVID-19, unanswered questions about antiviral immunity to COVID-19, neutralization of antibodies against escaped mutants, adapting vaccines to escaped mutants, public health and social measures during COVID-19 vaccinations, interpreting the outcomes of COVID-19 tests, disinfection against COVID-19 and antimicrobial resistance, augmenting antiviral immune responses of vaccines for COVID-19, age demographics propelling higher waves of COVID-19, escaping antibodies, recurrent deletions, evading immunity from SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, escaped mutants and herd immunity, new vaccines for mild to severe symptoms from COVID-19, escaped mutants of SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, are vaccines safe, effective, and durable against escaped mutants?, ethnic diversity in clinical trials for better COVID-19 vaccines, contact tracing for COVID-19 helps everyone, Science metric initiatives, viral sequencing in detecting COVID-19 strains and variants, single-domain antibodies that neutralize replication of SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19, tracing SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 in the UK, COVID-19 penalty for academic mothers, a balanced life during COVID-19, lipopeptides, intranasal prophylaxis, SARS-CoV-2 transmission, and impaired exhaustion and severe COVID-19, would a universal COVID-19 vaccine be safe, effective, and durable?, main protease of SARS-CoV-2 antivirals inhibit replication, temporal duration from COVID-19 to pre-COVID-19 normal, mentoring and supervision are more important than the research topic, especially during COVID-19, can mutations in genes confer antibiotic resistance?, connecting violent entertainment and aggression, vaccines are essential for herd immunity from COVID-19, COVID-19 vaccines should be available to everyone, especially healthcare workers, which COVID-19 vaccines are safe, effective, and durable?, building confidence to face a PhD committee, especially during COVID-19, academic openness and national security during COVID-19, antiviral activity against SARS-CoV-2, ignoring the status of retracted COVID-19 papers is academic fake news, vaccinating children and adolescents against COVID-19, inhibiting SARS-CoV-2 by enhancing host cell infection, testing COVID-19 megatrial therapies and treatments, new scientific frontiers in the time of COVID-19, questionable data throw school openings during COVID-19 under a spotlight, supply chains and COVID-19 vaccines: The need for speed, research lessons from COVID-19, transmissibility and impact of the UK COVID-19 lineage, neutralizing the impact of the UK COVID-19 lineage, within-host diversity and transmission of COVID-19, partial immunity from COVID-19 vaccine dosing regimes, great challenges need great ideas, especially for COVID-19, hoarding COVID-19 vaccines is unethical, COVID-19 vaccination passports for international travel, naming COVID-19 strains, variants, and lineages, zoom meetings for mothers during COVID-19, research is supposed to be enjoyable, COVID-19 or no COVID-19, asymptomatic and presymptomatic COVID-19 cases, impaired immunity through evolving SARS-CoV-2 variants, how many mentors is optimal, especially during COVID-19?, why is trust in COVID-19 vaccines volatile?, the science behind the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, and practical carbon capture in a COVID-19 world. As numerous mutations of the original wild-type SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus are still being detected, eternal vigilance is essential as the increasingly higher waves show no evidence of slowing down.