Is fake news contributing to increased Covid-19 BAME deaths?

We write this letter as doctors and proud members of the Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) community from a South Asian background. Recent Office for National Statistics (ONS) data suggest that the BAME population is disproportionately affected by Covid-19. Observations and experiences from within our family and wider community led us to explore how cultural aspects may account for these figures.

Cell cycle arrest in replicative senescence is not an immediate consequence of telomere dysfunction.

In replicative senescence, cells with critically-short telomeres activate a DNA-damage response leading to cell-cycle arrest, while those without telomere dysfunction would be expected to cycle normally. However, population growth declines more gradually than such a simple binary switch between cycling and non-cycling states would predict. We show here that late-passage cultures of human fibroblasts are not a simple mixture of cycling and non-cycling cells.