Analysis: "More flashes of light in the corona darkness"

There is a huge amount of research on the new corona virus right now. The more that emerges, the clearer it becomes which ones at the population level are the largest risk groups. It is positive, because the more we know about the disease and who is exposed, the more we can do to protect those who are above all at risk.

Children and adolescents appear to have mild infections and are not represented among the serious cases.

In Italy, the average age of deaths is 79.5 years and the majority are men. Only 30 percent of those who have died are women. Nearly half had three or more underlying diseases before being affected by the coronavirus. The 17 people under 50 who died had all serious illnesses before, such as cardiovascular disease, lung disease and diabetes.

However, young people can also get serious illness, although it is less common. In the United States, one fifth of those who have become so ill that they have had to be hospitalized for 44 years. There are also occasional cases where young, healthy people have died without understanding why.

- At the individual level, this virus can also affect young people, but at a population level it is now increasingly clear which risk groups are. It is therefore important that everyone takes this disease very seriously and do what they can to reduce the risk of spreading the disease, says Karin Tegmark-Wisell at the Public Health Authority.

It is still unclear if anyone who has recovered from covid-19 is also immune to the disease and if so how long. A lot of them indicate that you are at least immune for a short time. Therefore, tests that can show whether you have had the virus are very important, not least for health care professionals and those working in the elderly care, who can then go back to work without risk. In several countries, this type of testing is now underway. In Sweden, it is only a matter of weeks before they are available, according to state epidemiologist Anders Tegnell.

The same type of tests, which look for antibodies to the virus in the blood, can also help answer the question of how many people have had covid-19 without understanding it. In Italy, a study of the residents of the small town of Vò shows that several people have carried the virus without symptoms.

If many such cases are detected through the new tests, it is important for understanding how the infection spreads, and the estimated mortality in the disease is likely to decline. Children's role in the pandemic can also become clearer, as there are suspicions that many children have carried on the infection without showing symptoms.

Never before have so many researchers at the same time begun the pursuit of medicine for a disease, as now with covid-19. Around 400 drug trials have already begun. In the US, subjects were allowed to start testing a new vaccine this week, which can be ready in no more than one year. Research on antibodies, which can provide temporary protection against the virus, is also advancing. Dutch researchers may be the first in the world to have found an antibody that blocks the new coronavirus, which is an important breakthrough if the preliminary results prove to be correct.

But effective medicines will be delayed. Promising preparations must first be tested very carefully to see that they really have an effect on the disease and do not produce serious side effects, which takes time. However, Matti Sällberg, one of the researchers who is trying to produce a working vaccine, is convinced that someone will eventually succeed.

- There are so many who work on this. I'm sure there will be a vaccine, the question is just when.