Massachusetts General Hospital

Researchers are reporting some progress in their search for drugs that tamp down the overwhelming immune reaction that can kill a patient with COVID-19.

In the U.S. South — home to nine of the nation's 12 heaviest states — obesity is playing a role not only in COVID-19 outcomes but in the calculus of the vaccination rollout.

Doctors are researching why some patients remain unconscious for days or weeks, even after sedating drugs are withdrawn. They also worry that these patients aren't being given time to recover.