Purpose

The purpose of this study is to clinically characterise COVID-19 disease using an adaptation of a standardized protocol for rapid, coordinated, clinical investigation of severe or potentially severe acute infections by pathogens of public health interest while examining the preparedness of health workers for COVID-19 disease. This protocol will also characterise the risk of long-term consequences over time in patients following a diagnosis of COVID-19. 

Specific aims

• Describe the clinical features of COVID-19 in Uganda and monitor the progress of all hospitalized patients including what is working and what is not
• Describe, where appropriate, the response to treatment, including supportive care and novel therapeutics.
• Observe, where appropriate and feasible, pathogen replication, excretion and evolution, within the host, and identify determinants of severity and transmission using high-throughput sequencing of pathogen genomes obtained from respiratory tract, blood, urine, stool, CSF and other samples.
• Characterise, where appropriate and feasible, the host responses to infection and therapy over time, including innate and acquired immune responses, levels of immune signalling molecules in relevant body compartments and gene expression profiles in peripheral blood.
• Understand transmissibility and the probabilities of different clinical outcomes following exposure and infection.
• To describe COVID 19 related haematological and biochemical changes
• To characterise physical and psychosocial sequelae in patients post-COVID-19 hospital discharge.
• To estimate risk factors for longer term sequalae and long-term patient outcomes