the duo pointed out

[GoodTaste]

Does "the duo" refer back to Arturo Casadevall? Because he works for both (duo) Johns Hopkins University and Liise-anne Pirofski of Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

===================
On 13 March, with the COVID-19 pandemic exploding and drugs elusive, Arturo Casadevall published what he considers “maybe the most important paper” of his long career. In The Journal of Clinical Investigation, the infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins University and Liise-anne Pirofski of Albert Einstein College of Medicine argued that one effective treatment might already be at hand: the blood plasma of people who have recovered from the disease, rich in antibodies against the virus. The strategy seems to have worked in other infections, the duo pointed out, and the infrastructure for collecting and administering plasma exists. The risks are known and comparatively low. “We recommend that institutions … begin preparations as soon as possible,” they wrote. “Time is of the essence.”


Source: Science May. 27, 2020
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020...lp-save-others

 

[GoesStation]

Read the examples of "duo" here. Do you think it refers to people or something else in your quotation?

 

[GoodTaste]

Read the examples of "duo" here. Do you think it refers to people or something else in your quotation?

Examples there are:
The comedy duo will perform tonight.
The author-illustrator duo will be signing their books tomorrow.

So you get to have two people for "the duo" and it is odd that there is only Arturo Casadevall. The passage in the OP first refers "he", yet at the closing sentence, "they" appears.
The best guess I've got is that Arturo Casadevall and the specialist (at Johns Hopkins) form the duo. The problem is that the grammar of the sentences clearly points out that the specialist is Arturo.

 

[GoesStation]

So you get to have two people for "the duo" and it is odd that there is only Arturo Casadevall.

... the infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins University and Liise-anne Pirofski of Albert Einstein College of Medicine argued that one effective treatment might already be at hand ....

Is it clear if you skip the potentially confusing parts I lightened above?

When you're reading complicated texts, try editing out inessential parts and reading what's left.

 

[GoodTaste]

Got it. Liise-anne Pirofski is the name of an expert or a doctor...

 

[GoesStation]

On 13 March, with the COVID-19 pandemic exploding and drugs elusive, Arturo Casadevall published what he considers “maybe the most important paper” of his long career. In The Journal of Clinical Investigation, the infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins University and Liise-anne Pirofski of Albert Einstein College of Medicine argued that one effective treatment might already be at hand: the blood plasma of people who have recovered from the disease, rich in antibodies against the virus. The strategy seems to have worked in other infections, the duo pointed out, and the infrastructure for collecting and administering plasma exists.

Got it. Liise-anne Pirofski is the name of an expert or a doctor...

Here's a simplified version of the above-quoted text. It leaves out a lot of facts but delivers its essential message:

Arturo Casadevall and Liise-anne Pirofski published an important paper in The Journal of Clinical Investigation. The paper says an effective treatment may exist. The treatment is to inject blood plasma donated by disease survivors. The two authors pointed out that a similar treatment seems to work for other diseases, and there's already a system for collecting and administering plasma.

You might find it helpful to write a simplified summary when you're struggling with a complicated text.

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

Got it. Liise-anne Pirofski is the name of an expert or a doctor...

Yes. Pirofski and the specialist at Johns Hopkins are two people. Two people make a duo. They think a treatment is at hand.