Topic description and stories

Cambridge researchers have played a vital role in the fight back against COVID-19, from the use of genomics to track its spread and mathematic modelling to understand infection rates through to innovative screening programmes to keep its students and staff safe.

Intensive care unit at Addenbrooke's Hospital

Underactive immune response may explain obesity link to COVID-19 severity

20 March 2023

Individuals who are obese may be more susceptible to severe COVID-19 because of a poorer inflammatory immune response, say Cambridge scientists.

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Schoolchildren in Rwanda

Students in Rwanda confound pandemic predictions and head back to school

07 Oct 2022

New data from Rwanda, and some of the first published on how COVID-19 has impacted school attendance in the Global South, suggest that a widely-...

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Model of coronavirus and hypodermic needle

Referrals to long COVID clinic fell by 79% following roll-out of the vaccine

06 Oct 2022

Referrals to Cambridge’s long COVID clinic fell dramatically in the period August 2021 to June 2022, which researchers say is likely due to the...

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Female scientist in laboratory

Set up reserve lab capacity now for faster response to next pandemic, say researchers

28 Sep 2022

Researchers say a ‘human bottleneck’, due to historical cuts in public health funding, delayed the UK’s scale-up of COVID-19 testing in the early...

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New Heart and Lung Research Institute opens

11 Jul 2022

A major new institute opens today, bringing together the largest concentration of scientists and clinicians in heart and lung medicine in Europe.

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Portrait of young woman farmer holding fresh eggs in hands

Intensive farming may actually reduce risk of pandemics, experts argue

24 Jun 2022

Scientists evaluate the evidence that intensive livestock farming is causing pandemics, and find that intensive farming could actually reduce the...

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Woman wearing a mask on public transport

No ‘safest spot’ to minimise risk of COVID-19 transmission on trains

22 Jun 2022

Researchers have demonstrated how airborne diseases such as COVID-19 spread along the length of a train carriage and found that there is no ‘safest...

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Surgeons performing heart surgery

Heart surgery delays will cost lives, warns research

17 Jun 2022

Pandemic has delayed lifesaving treatment for thousands of people with severe aortic stenosis.

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3d digital image corona virus on planet Earth in Africa

Scientists publish first real-world data from Africa looking at immune response to AZ/Oxford COVID-19 vaccine

11 May 2022

Scientists have released the first real-world data from Africa on the effectiveness of two doses of AstraZeneca/ChaAd0x-1 COVID-19 vaccination...

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Protected areas saw dramatic spikes in fires during COVID lockdowns, study finds

05 May 2022

Scientists suggest that some staffing of protected areas should be considered “essential services” in future crises.

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Senior woman wearing face mask lying on hospital bed

Cognitive impairment from severe COVID-19 equivalent to 20 years of ageing, study finds

03 May 2022

Cognitive impairment as a result of severe COVID-19 is similar to that sustained between 50 and 70 years of age and is the equivalent to losing 10 IQ...

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Woman and newborn baby

Women in England had predominantly negative experiences of childbirth during pandemic in 2020, survey finds

12 Apr 2022

47% of parents in a national survey reported negative experiences of giving birth during the pandemic in 2020, with uncertainties about rapidly...

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Memory and concentration problems are common in long COVID

17 Mar 2022

Seven in ten long COVID patients experience concentration and memory problems several months after the initial onset of their disease, with many...

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