Thrombosis has turned out to be one of the major subplots of the COVID-19 clinical story. In this conversation, two experts in hemostasis and thrombosis explain how academic physicians and scientists have been studying the coagulation defects seen in patients with COVID-19 in order to more effectively monitor patients and prevent complications.

The SARS-CoV-2 virus was first identified and sequenced using a technique known as “unbiased sequencing.” During this conversation, Robert Schlaberg, MD, Dr Med, MPH, takes us inside this technology, helps us understand how it works, and describes how it can significantly improve infectious disease diagnosis. He also explores how scaling up this technology will catalyze a quicker diagnostic response to future pandemics.

Dr. Marc Couturier has experienced a number of pandemics during his career as a microbiologist, from West Nile virus to Zika virus to SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19). And he knows what it’s like to work in both a commercial clinical lab and a public health lab. In this conversation, he describes how lab professionals from both these settings have been working in recent years to improve pandemic preparedness and response.

How do clinical laboratories report data to public health agencies, and what do those agencies do with the data? In this conversation Sam Marsden describes his experiences working in both the public health and clinical diagnostic arenas. He also dives into the critical role of public health agencies in gathering, analyzing, and applying data to improve the health of communities.

To manage and ultimately conquer COVID-19, the public is placing its hopes on rapid scientific discovery. What does it take to make this happen? Dr. Tracy George, executive director of clinical trials and PharmaDx at ARUP Laboratories, describes how her group is coordinating efforts across multiple outside research groups to facilitate faster and larger trials to answer important questions about COVID-19 therapy.