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Pat Benatar's 1980 hit song "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" could have a very different meaning today. People around the world anxiously anticipate a new kind of "best shot" -- a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine. There are currently 166 novel coronavirus vaccine candidates in development, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Twenty-four of those candidates are being evaluated in clinical trials in humans. Most of those are in early-stage clinical studies. However, five COVID-19 vaccine candidates are either currently in late-stage clinical testing or are scheduled to begin a phase 3 study in the next few days. Sinopharm Group is developing two of the five late-stage candidates, one with Wuhan Institute ofBiological Products and another with Beijing Institute of Biological Pro...

So-called serology research looks for antibodies in the blood that fight the illness, and how many of us have them. Other research looks at how long these antibodies last. The latest results from these studies are said to show us two kinds of bad news -- that immunity after exposure to the illness is not such a sure thing, and that the number of us who have been exposed and fought off COVID-19 are fewer than hoped. This pushes our goal of herd immunity farther into the distance, potentially even calling it into question altogether. But in measuring antibodies for COVID-19, might we have overlooked other blood markers that help fight off the sickness? Is it possible we are under-estimating both how long immunity lasts, and how close t...

Maine CDC reports 24 new cases of coronavirus, no new deaths Updated: 10:18 AM EDT Jul 26, 2020 The Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported 24 new cases of coronavirus and no new deaths on Sunday.The total number of deaths in Maine remains at 119.The 24 new cases puts the total number of cases in the state to 3,814.A total of 3,284 Mainers have recovered from the virus, which is an increase of 3 over the past 24 hours.Taking away recoveries and deaths, active cases in Maine have risen slightly to 411.The Maine CDC reported Saturday, they've opened an outbreak investigation associated with Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, based o...

By Denise Royal and Rosa Flores, CNN Miami — A 9-year-old girl with no known underlying health conditions is the youngest person to die from coronavirus complications in Florida, officials said. Kimora "Kimmie" Lynum died on July 18 in Putnam County, according to Florida Department of Health records. It confirmed her identity and said she's the state's youngest coronavirus fatality. She had no pre-existing health issues and her mother took her to the hospital due to a high fever, said family spokesman Dejeon Cain. The hospital sent her home and she collapsed a short time later, Cain said. "She was always happy and made everybody happy. She was phenomenal," said Cain, who's also her cousin. The family...

But it was too late for the Roberts family. Paul Roberts, a former musician and carpenter turned computer programmer for NASA, now works at a software company. He and his wife, a retired Methodist Hospital nurse who calls herself a “glass half full person,” ran an online fanzine and attended Comic Con events years ago. For years, they gathered weekly with their two daughters, son-in-law and now-7-year-old grandson for jigsaw puzzles and fierce games of Uno. “They are amazing nerds,” Ms. Roman, 38, said of her parents. Sheryl Roberts, 65, understood the perils of the pandemic — she had diabetes, asthma and heart disease, which could put her at higher risk. Her husband had chronic lung disease and a stent to open a blocked coronary artery. “We have been so careful, so very careful, and stay...