key: cord-0862348-hpdchxbv
authors: Liu, Antonio
title: Two Weeks of “COVID-19” Search on PubMed.gov
date: 2020-11-27
journal: Acta Biomed
DOI: 10.23750/abm.v91i4.11016
sha: 78b2dafb533188ec850caae0ad7352cff34348af
doc_id: 862348
cord_uid: hpdchxbv

BACKGROUND AND AIM Letter to Editor, report the amount of literature generated over two weeks on PubMed.gov related to COVID-19 Methods: reporting the daily number of "hits" from "COVID-19" search on PubMed.gov Results: There were 66988 entries on PubMed.gov on the search word "COVID-19" on October 24, 2020. The average daily increase in number of entries was 335. CONCLUSIONS point out the fact that the literature volume is increasing in an exponential manner (www.actabiomedica.it).

To the Editor, I am reading Chan's article with great interest (1) . Since World Health Organization declared COVID-19 as a pandemic on March 11, 2020, the scientific world has seen a rapidly increasing amount of literature like no other pandemic before. A search for "COVID-19" in early April yielded roughly 3500 hits. The same search on August 22 nd already yielded 42,693 entries (2) . The daily average at that moment was roughly 181 articles per day. The same search on October 24 th showed 66,988 entries. By November 7 th , there were 71,682 entries. (Figure 1 ) The daily average increase in number of articles is 335, an amount that will probably exceed the ability of the fastest and most enthusiastic reader. For comparison purpose, the daily average of article produced for "HIV" was only 54. There are articles that analyzed the publishing pattern already, with some casting doubt on the scientific merits of some articles (1, 3) . Data that is difficult to track would be the actual number of submission (which must be even higher) and peer review duration (which is getting longer). Back in April, our paper on isolated meningoencephalitis (4) was accepted within 48 hours of submission and "rejection" was unheard of till late May. Lately, some submission has taken well over 4 weeks before revision is suggested. The type of literature has also changed. The first round was mostly case report and observational series. Nowadays, papers on pathophysiology, treatment and large-scale review paper begin to appear. This is the first pandemic in the Figure 1 . Number of COVID-19 "hits" on PubMed from Oct 24 -Nov 7, 2020. so call "information age", it will be interesting to follow the development in the literature world and learn how does its "lead" our fight against COVID-19 pandemic.

Each author declares that he or she has no commercial associations (e.g. consultancies, stock ownership, equity interest, patent/licensing arrangement etc.) that might pose a conflict of interest in connection with the submitted article Table 1 . Daily publication average for COVID-19 and others from Oct 24 to Nov 7, 2020.

COVID-19 or MERS or SARS HIV

COVID-19 and literature evidence: should we publish anything and everything? Acta Biomed

Letter to the Editor: Exponential increase in COV-ID-19 related publications compared to other pandemic diseases. Rambam Maimonides Med J

Characteristics of academic publications, preprints, and registered clinical trials on the COVID-19 pandemic

Meningoencephalitis without respiratory failure in a young female patient with COV-ID-19 infection in Downtown Los Angeles

Adventist Health White Memorial

The author would like to thank Prissilla Xu for preparation of this manuscript.