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Background: Detailed temporal analyses of complete (full) blood count (CBC) parameters, their evolution and relationship to patient age, gender, co-morbidities and management outcomes in survivors and non-survivors with COVID-19 disease, could identify prognostic clinical biomarkers., Methods: From 29 January 2020 until 28 March 2020, we performed a longitudinal cohort study of COVID-19 inpatients at the Italian National Institute for Infectious Diseases, Rome, Italy. 9 CBC parameters were studied as continuous variables [neutrophils, lymphocytes, monocytes, platelets, mean platelet volume, red blood cell count, haemoglobin concentration, mean red blood cell volume and red blood cell distribution width (RDW %)]. Model-based punctual estimates, as average of all patients' values, and differences between survivors and non-survivors, overall, and by co-morbidities, at specific times after symptoms, with relative 95% CI and P-values, were obtained by marginal prediction and ANOVA- style joint tests. All analyses were carried out by STATA 15 statistical package., Main Findings: 379 COVID-19 patients [273 (72% were male; mean age was 61.67 (SD 15.60)] were enrolled and 1,805 measures per parameter were analysed. Neutrophils' counts were on average significantly higher in non-survivors than in survivors (P<0.001) and lymphocytes were on average higher in survivors (P<0.001). These differences were time dependent. Average platelets' counts (P<0.001) and median platelets' volume (P<0.001) were significantly different in survivors and non-survivors. The differences were time dependent and consistent with acute inflammation followed either by recovery or by death. Anaemia with anisocytosis was observed in the later phase of COVID-19 disease in non-survivors only. Mortality was significantly higher in patients with diabetes (OR = 3.28; 95%CI 1.51-7.13; p = 0.005), obesity (OR = 3.89; 95%CI 1.51-10.04; p = 0.010), chronic renal failure (OR = 9.23; 95%CI 3.49-24.36; p = 0.001), COPD (OR = 2.47; 95% IC 1.13-5.43; p = 0.033), cardiovascular diseases (OR = 4.46; 95%CI 2.25-8.86; p = 0.001), and those >60 years (OR = 4.21; 95%CI 1.82-9.77; p = 0.001). Age (OR = 2.59; 95%CI 1.04-6.45; p = 0.042), obesity (OR = 5.13; 95%CI 1.81-14.50; p = 0.002), renal chronic failure (OR = 5.20; 95%CI 1.80-14.97; p = 0.002) and cardiovascular diseases (OR 2.79; 95%CI 1.29-6.03; p = 0.009) were independently associated with poor clinical outcome at 30 days after symptoms' onset., Interpretation: Increased neutrophil counts, reduced lymphocyte counts, increased median platelet volume and anaemia with anisocytosis, are poor prognostic indicators for COVID19, after adjusting for the confounding effect of obesity, chronic renal failure, COPD, cardiovascular diseases and age >60 years., Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Background: HIV spread among low-risk populations through heterosexual intercourse is a major public health concern. This study was aimed at describing prevalence and determinants of HIV infection among Italian low-risk subjects seeking their first lifetime HIV test., Patients and Methods: Information collected between January 1990 and December 2000 at a major counseling and testing site in Rome, Italy, was analyzed. Multiple logistic regression odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were computed., Results: Among the 14,313 study subjects, 64 (0.4%) were seropositive for HIV infection. HIV seropositivity increased with age (OR = 4.0, 95% CI: 2.1-7.6 for >/= 40 years vs 18-24), and it seemed to be more common among men (OR = 1.6, lower 95% CI:0.9). There was no evidence of temporal variations, whereas motivations for HIV testing were strongly associated with HIV prevalence. Testing for alarming symptoms (OR = 13.8) or for heterosexual intercourse (OR = 11.0) were associated with a more than 10-fold increased HIV risk., Conclusion: Our findings are consistent with data from other industrialized countries and they show a strong association between HIV seropositivity and reason for first-time testing. Moreover, they indicate a stable trend of HIV prevalence among low-risk persons in the last decade. Further studies on time trends in low-risk populations would be useful to evaluate current HIV prevention programs.