Asthma and COPD Are Not Risk Factors for ICU Stay and Death in Case of SARS-CoV2 Infection

BACKGROUND: Asthmatics and patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have more severe outcomes with viral infections than people without obstructive disease. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate if obstructive diseases are risk factors for intensive care unit (ICU) stay and death due to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID19). METHODS: We collected data from the electronic medical record from 596 adult patients hospitalized in University Hospital of Liege between March 18 and April 17, 2020, for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV2) infection. We classified patients into 3 groups according to the underlying respiratory disease, present before the COVID19 pandemic. RESULTS: Among patients requiring hospitalization for COVID19, asthma and COPD accounted for 9.6% and 7.7%, respectively. The proportions of asthmatics, patients with COPD, and patients without obstructive airway disease hospitalized in the ICU were 17.5%, 19.6%, and 14%, respectively. One-third of patients with COPD died during hospitalization, whereas only 7.0% of asthmatics and 13.6% of patients without airway obstruction died due to SARS-CoV2. The multivariate analysis showed that asthma, COPD, inhaled corticosteroid treatment, and oral corticosteroid treatment were not independent risk factors for ICU admission or death. Male gender (odds ratio [OR]: 1.9; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.1-3.2) and obesity (OR: 8.5; 95% CI: 5.1-14.1) were predictors of ICU admission, whereas male gender (OR 1.9; 95% CI: 1.1-3.2), older age (OR: 1.9; 95% CI: 1.6-2.3), cardiopathy (OR: 1.8; 95% CI: 1.1-3.1), and immunosuppressive diseases (OR: 3.6; 95% CI: 1.5-8.4) were independent predictors of death. CONCLUSION: Asthma and COPD are not risk factors for ICU admission and death related to SARS-CoV2 infection

Three essays in Macro Finance

The present thesis is a collection of three essays in Macro Finance. The first essay examines the effects of industry competition on the cross-section of credit spreads and levered equity returns. I build a quantitative model where firms make investment, financing, and default decisions subject to aggregate and firm-specific risk. Firms operate in heterogeneous industries that differ by the intensity of product market competition. Higher competition reduces profit margins and increases default risk for debtholders. Equityholders are protected against default risk due to the option value arising from limited liability. In equilibrium, competitive industries are characterized by higher credit spreads, but lower expected equity returns. I find strong empirical support for these predictions across concentration quintiles. Moreover, the calibrated model generates cross-sectional variation in leverage and valuation ratios in line with the data. The second essay provides new evidence that imperfect competition is an important channel for time varying risk premia in asset markets. To this end, we build a general equilibrium model with monopolistic competition and endogenous firm entry and exit. Endogenous variation in industry concentration generates countercyclical markups, which amplifies macroeconomic risk. The nonlinear relation between the measure of firms and markups endogenously generates countercyclical macroeconomic volatility. With recursive preferences, the volatility dynamics lead to countercyclical risk premia forecastable with measures of competition. Also, the model produces a U-shaped term structure of equity returns. The final essay explores the interactions between yield curve dynamics and nominal government debt maturity operations in a New Keynesian model with endogenous bond risk premia. Violations of debt maturity neutrality occur when the yield curve slope is nonzero in a fiscally-led policy regime. When the risk profiles of government liabilities differ, rebalancing the maturity structure changes the government cost of capital. In the fiscal theory, changes in discount rates affect inflation through the intertemporal government budget equation. When the yield curve is upward-sloping (downward-sloping), the fiscal discount rate channel implies that shortening the maturity structure has contractionary (expansionary) effects.Business, Sauder School ofFinance, Division ofGraduat

Discount rates, debt maturity, and the fiscal theory

This paper examines how the transmission of government portfolio risk arising from maturity operations depends on the stance of monetary/fiscal policy. Accounting for risk premia in the fiscal theory allows the government portfolio to affect the expected inflation, even in a frictionless economy. The effects of maturity rebalancing on expected inflation in the fiscal theory directly depend on the conditional nominal term premium, giving rise to an optimal debt maturity policy that is state dependent. In a calibrated macro-finance model, we demonstrate that maturity operations have sizable effects on expected inflation and output through our novel risk transmission mechanism

L’expérimentation animale reste indispensable (OPINION)

Trop fréquemment, l’expérimentation animale est présentée comme une pratique archaïque. Elle a bien changé. Et 100 % des patients traités le sont grâce aux concepts et techniques développés grâce à elle